Category Archives: Calgary Roughnecks

Week 2 picks

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The first week of the season had some of the expected and a bit of the unexpected. The expected: Rochester and Minnesota both got great goaltending but the Knighthawks offense was just that much better than the Swarm’s. The unexpected: Colorado had goaltending problems until rookie Dillon Ward showed up, John Grant didn’t record a point until almost the end of the third quarter, and Mark Matthews didn’t score. Also unexpected: Philadelphia impressed, Buffalo did not. Well, given the fact that Buffalo ended up last in the league last year and wasn’t much better the year before, perhaps that shouldn’t have been unexpected. But I really thought the changes the Bandits made would make for a better performance than what we saw.

Record: 1-2 (.333)

Game
Comments
Pick
CAL @ TOR No team in the league scares me as much as Calgary when they come to town. Their offense is just too stacked and the team is just strong top to bottom. That said, the Rock ain’t bad either so I’m going with the home floor advantage. Rock
VAN @ COL The Stealth are right behind the Roughnecks in terms of a strong top-to-bottom team. Tyler Richards is probably the best goalie in the league not named Matt, and they must have some serious confidence in the likes of Tyler Digby and Cody Bremner to keep them in lieu of Dean Hill and the Nooch. Stealth

2014 NLL Predictions

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As I do every year, here are my predictions for the final regular season standings for the upcoming season, and also the major end-of-season awards.

Final Standings

East

  1. Rochester
  2. Toronto
  3. Buffalo
  4. Minnesota
  5. Philadelphia

West

  1. Calgary
  2. Vancouver
  3. Edmonton
  4. Colorado

 

Individual Awards

MVP

Winner:  Garrett Billings. He’s been right up there in MVP voting for a couple of years, and I think this is his year.
Short list: Cody Jamieson, Mark Matthews

Goaltender of the Year

Winner: Matt Vinc. I may just pick Vinc every year until he retires or The Next Matt Vinc arrives.
Short list: Tyler Richards, Aaron Bold

Defensive Player of the Year

Winner: Kyle Rubisch. Like Vinc, I’ll likely just keeping guessing Rubisch until someone else rips the award away from him.
Short list: Mike Grimes, Rory Smith

Transition Player of the Year

Winner: Geoff Snider. This is who I think should win. If I were to pick who I think will win, it’d be Jordan MacIntosh. But MacIntosh isn’t strictly a transition player, and for some reason this really annoys me. This is similar to Jeff Shattler a couple of years ago – was he the MVP: yes. Was he the transition player of the year: in my opinion, no.
Short list: Jesse Gamble, Brad Self

Rookie of the Year

Winner: Robert Church. This award is almost always a tough one. It’s a crapshoot which rookies will quickly adapt to the NLL and which will not.
Short list: Logan Schuss, Jason Noble, Cody Bremner, Karsen Leung

Les Bartley (Coach of the Year)

Winner: Chris Hall
Short list: Troy Cordingley, Derek Keenan

GM of the Year

Winner: Steve Dietrich
Short list: Doug Locker

2014 preview: Calgary Roughnecks

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RoughnecksThe success the Calgary Roughnecks has seen over the life of the franchise is surprising, in a couple of ways. In their twelve seasons, they have only missed the playoffs once, and that was in their first year. They’ve only had two seasons under .500. They’ve finished with more goals scored than allowed every season but their first. They’ve finished first in their division five times (2013, 2012, 2011, 2009, 2005). And yet with all that regular season success, they’ve only made it to the Championship game twice, winning both of them.

2013 season summary

Record 9-7 (Tied for 1st in West, seeded 1st)
Home 3-5
Away 6-2
Goals for 222
Goals against 211
Top scorer Shawn Evans (112 points)
Playoffs Division semi-finals: Beat Colorado 15-10
Division Finals: Lost to Washington 14-13

Roster changes

Only the Knighthawks made fewer off-season moves than the Roughnecks. In fact, if it weren’t for injuries, there might only have been one – and that one wasn’t even made by the team: defender Nolan Heavenor announced his retirement. Heavenor was one of those fly-under-the-radar kind of defensemen – no glory (not that defenders ever get much glory) but lots of respect from teammates and opponents alike.

Notable names missing from the announced roster include Travis Cornwall, Scott Ranger, and Pete McFetridge, all of whom are on the PUP list, and Scott Carnegie, assigned to the practice squad. Also missing from last year are Joe Resetarits who was traded to Buffalo, and Aaron Pascas who was released. Additions to the roster include Tor Reinholdt and Karsen Leung, both Mann Cup finalists with the Langley Thunder, and a third goaltender – Peter Dubenski, who will play behind Mike Poulin and Frankie Scigliano.

Ranger is a big part of the Roughnecks offense whose absence will be very much noticed, so I find it odd that they didn’t go with another forward on the roster instead of a third goaltender. Their forwards include the likes of Dobbie, Dickson, Shattler, Veltman, and Shawn Evans, so perhaps they’ve decided that they’re fine on offense, but the only other forward on their roster is Matthew Dinsdale, who only got 7 points in 13 games last year. They can’t be sending out 5 of these 6 guys on every offensive shift, so presumably some of the transition guys (Leung, Reinholdt, and Geoff Snider) will be pulled forward for some shifts until Ranger returns.

Burning question

Which Mike Poulin will the Roughnecks see – the 2012 version (Goaltender of the Year, 10.27 GAA, 78.9 Save%), or the 2013 version (12.82 GAA, 74.2 Save%)?

Look out for

Curtis Dickson. Widely regarded as one of the best offensive players anyway, I can see this 50-60 point guy climbing into the 80-90 range. And not just because there are two more games.

Prediction

First in the west.

Haiku

Roughnecks score a lot
Evans was the MVP
But there’s no Ranger

NLL 2014 rosters: Who’s in, who’s out

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Here is a complete list of the changes in rosters for each team compared to last season. The “In” lists contain players that are on the 20-man roster that were not on the final roster from last season, and may include players that were on the practice roster or IR last year. The “Out” lists contain players that were on the final roster last year but are not on the 20-man roster now, and does not include players that are now on one of the other lists (eg. PUP, IR). Players on the Holdout, Physically Unable to Perform (PUP), or Injured Reserve (IR) lists may be moved to the active roster before the season begins.

Names for each list are in alphabetical order.

Buffalo Bandits

In: Ryan Benesch, Kevin Brownell, Troy Cordingley (head coach), Dave Pym (assistant coach), Joe Resetarits, Rory Smith, Andrew Watt
Out: Carter Bender, Nick Cotter, Jon Harasym, Mike Hominuck, Derek Hopcroft, Tracey Kelusky, Darris Kilgour (head coach), Mike McNamara, Luke Wiles
IR: Eric Penney
PUP:
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Colin Boucher, Jordan Critch, Hayden Smith, Mitch Wilde

 

Minnesota Swarm

In: East Division, Cameron Flint, Mike Hobbins, Jordan Houtby, Scott Jones, Jason Noble, Logan Schuss
Out: Dan Ball, Mitch Belisle, Ryan Benesch, Nic Bilic, Jay Card, Evan Kirk, Pat Smith, Corbyn Tao, Andrew Watt, West Division
IR:
PUP: Matt Gibson
Holdout:
Practice Squad:

 

Philadelphia Wings

In: Don Alton, Kyle Buchanan, Blane Harrison (head coach), Tracey Kelusky, Evan Kirk, Brian Megill, Michael Poppleton, John Ranagan, Pat Saunders, Garrett Thul, Ryan Ward
Out: Kevin Buchanan, Ned Crotty, Angus Dinley, Ethan Farrell, Jim Forsythe, Brandon Francis, Kyle Hartzell, Pat Heim, Steve Holmes, John McFadyen, Mike McLellan, Brandon Miller, Johnny Mouradian (head coach), Paul Rabil, Jeff Reynolds, Brian Teuber, Drew Westervelt
IR:
PUP: Rob Campbell, Brendan Mundorf, Max Siebald, Kyle Wailes
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Michael Diehl, Eric Hoffman, Bill McGlone

 

Rochester Knighthawks

In: Mac Allen, Mike Thompson
Out: Mike Accursi, Rory Glaves, Matt Hummel, Kyle Laverty, Jimmy Purves, Jon Sullivan
IR: Jamie Batson
PUP: Angus Goodleaf, Zac Reid
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Wenster Green, Mark White

 

Toronto Rock

In: Craig England, Dan Ladouceur (assistant coach), John Lovell (head coach), Blaine Manning (assistant coach), Ethan O’Connor
Out: Troy Cordingley (head coach), Scott Evans, Mike Hobbins, Blaine Manning, Brendan Thenhaus, Roger Vyse, Cam Woods
IR:
PUP:
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Dustin Dunn, Eric Law, Jeff Swift, Mike Lum-Walker

 

Calgary Roughnecks

In: Peter Dubenski, Cody Hawkins, Karsen Leung, Garrett McIntosh, Tor Reinholdt
Out: Jackson Decker, Nolan Heavenor, Aaron Pascas, Joe Resetarits
IR:
PUP: Travis Cornwall, Pete McFetridge, Scott Ranger
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Brett Baron, Scott Carnegie, Jake Hayes, Barclay Hickey

 

Colorado Mammoth

In: Cameron Mann, Bob Snider, Dillon Ward, Drew Westervelt
Out: Mac Allen, Joel Delgarno, Ilija Gajic, Jaeden Gastaldo, Ian Hawksbee, Ryan Hotaling, Dan Lewis, Richard Morgan, Jarrett Park, Gavin Prout, Rory Smith
IR:
PUP:
Holdout: Casey Powell
Practice Squad:

 

Edmonton Rush

In: Nic Bilic, Robert Church, Riley Loewen, Jimmy Quinlan (defensive coach), Adrian Sorichetti, Dane Stevens
Out: Mike Burke, Mike Cudmore, Jimmy Quinlan (player), Ryan Ward, Devan Wray (defensive coach)
IR:
PUP: Corey Small
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Mitch Bannister, Jarrett Toll, Alex Turner

 

Vancouver Stealth

In: Cody Bremner, Tyler Digby, Alex Gajic, Ilija Gajic, Brett Hickey, Sean Lundstrom
Out: Kyle Buchanan, Tim Henderson, Dean Hill, Athan Iannucci, Mitch Jones, Justin Pychel, Bob Snider
IR: Brett Bucktooth, Mitch McMichael
PUP:
Holdout:
Practice Squad: Josh Hawkins, Neil Tyacke, Chris Wardle, Nick Weiss

Gavin Prout – the Knighthawk?

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Gavin Prout spent two seasons in New York and then six in Colorado, the last five as captain of the Mammoth, averaging 84 points per season. So it was a bit of a shock in Colorado, and throughout the NLL world, when he was traded in 2009 to the Edmonton Rush. He played with the Rush for the 2010 season and about half of 2011 before being traded back to the Mammoth. But something that many people, myself included until recently, don’t remember about Prout being traded from the Mammoth to the Rush was that it never happened.

What could have beenProut, along with Andrew Potter, was traded from the Mammoth to the Rochester Knighthawks in 2009 for Ilija Gajic (some draft picks were involved as well). Potter had been sent to the Mammoth from the Knighthawks the previous year in the deal that brought Gary Gait out of retirement. Interesting that a guy that played all of five games in his NLL career was involved in two such significant trades. Anyway, two weeks later, the Knighthawks sent Prout and Dean Hill to the Rush for a first round draft pick. But the fact that Prout was a Knighthawk for a couple of off-season weeks is usually forgotten.

A number of other players also spend time on teams for which they never played. Here are just a few:

After the Boston Blazers folded, Anthony Cosmo and Josh Sanderson were both selected in the dispersal draft by the Minnesota Swarm. Before the first round of the draft had even ended, Sanderson had been traded to the Rock, while Cosmo sat out half of the next season before being traded to the Bandits.

Shawn Williams is another player who, like Sanderson, can measure the amount of time he spent on the Minnesota roster with a stopwatch. In July 2012, Williams was traded from the Rush to the Swarm for two second-round draft picks. The same day, he was sent off with Brendan Doran as well as the #5 overall pick in the 2012 draft and two other 2012 draft picks to Buffalo for the #3 overall pick. That seems to me like an expensive way to move up two positions – and in fact, it really only moved the Swarm up one position since they went from having picks #2, 4, and 5 to having picks #2, 3, and 4.

Paul Rabil might be the only player to have joined two separate organizations consecutively and never play for either of them. But this story begins six months before Rabil got involved. In the summer of 2011, the Wings traded Athan Iannucci, Alex Turner, Brodie MacDonald, and three first round draft picks to the Rush for Brodie Merrill, Dean Hill, Mike McLellan, and a couple of later draft picks. Nooch never signed with the Rush, and a month into the 2012 season, he was traded to the Stealth for Paul Rabil. Rabil also refused to sign with the Rush and sat out the rest of the 2012 season.

Almost a year after the original Iannucci trade, the Rush sent Rabil to the Knighthawks for Jarrett Davis, but Rabil never reported to Rochester either. Only a couple of weeks before the 2013 season began, he was sent to Philadelphia along with Jordan Hall, Joel White, and Robbie Campbell in exchange for Dan Dawson, Paul Dawson, and a first round draft pick. Rabil is now happy in Philadelphia, and I’m pretty sure the Knighthawks were OK with what they got out of the deal.

But not every player was traded to a team they never played for. Here are some players who were drafted by teams they never played for:

  • Ilija Gajic, Rochester, 2009
  • Joel Dalgarno, Toronto, 2009
  • Craig Point, Boston, 2007
  • Ryan Benesch, San Jose, 2006
  • Blaine Manning, Calgary, 2001
  • Geoff Snider, Vancouver, 2001 (he opted to return to university and was drafted again by the Wings in 2006)
  • Tom Marechek, Buffalo, 1992
  • John Tavares, Detroit, 1991 (and not until the third round!)

I’m sure there are plenty of others. Leave a comment if I missed any!

The top 10 one-team NLL players

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Last week, Down Goes Brown did a post (actually on Grantland.com) called The 10 Greatest One-Team NHL Players. Since DGB is unlikely to cover lacrosse anytime soon, I decided to do it myself. Given that there are fewer teams in the NLL, the history is much shorter, and there has been far more team movement than the NHL, there really aren’t all that many such players. If we restrict ourselves to players with more than 50 games in their NLL careers, all with a single team, we find that there are only 54 of them. But there are still some pretty good names on this list.

Incidentally, DGB is one of the funniest sports blogs anywhere. If you’re a hockey fan, I strongly recommend it.

So without further ado, here are the top 10 players who spent their entire NLL careers with one team. The number of games listed includes playoff games. I’m restricting the number of games played to 100 or more, since it’s not quite fair to put people like Cody Jamieson (54 games) or Garrett Billings (72 games) on this list so early in their careers.

10. Jeremy Hollenbeck, Rochester Knighthawks (127 games)

Jeremy Hollenbeck

Hollenbeck played ten seasons with the Knighthawks, winning a Championship in 1997. In 2011, he was inducted into the Rochester Knighthawks Hall of Fame.

9. Dan Ladouceur, Toronto Rock (150 games)

Dan Ladouceur

In the early 2000’s, Laddy was one of the anchors of the best defense in the NLL, along with guys like Jim Veltman, Glenn Clark, Terry Bullen, and Pat Coyle. He even scored a goal or two here and there (I distinctly remember a breakaway where he ran up the floor frantically looking around for someone to pass to, then buried it himself), including one in the 2002 Championship game. At about 6’6″ he was an imposing figure and a good fighter too (see above, having a chat with Shawn Evans), though I did once see him dropped with one punch. In a 2002 fight in Toronto, Matt Green hit him with a shot to the jaw that knocked him unconscious.

I have heard rumours that the Rock were not allowed to trade Ladouceur because of his job as a Durham Regional police officer (I believe he’s on the SWAT team), but I confirmed with Laddy himself that it’s not true. He said they could have traded him at any time but they were a classy organization and worked with him.

8. Peter Jacobs, Philadelphia Wings (158 games)

Peter Jacobs

As good a face-off guy as Geoff Snider is, he’s only matched Peter Jacobs’ high of 318 face-off wins in a season once. (The all-time record is 319 by Bob Snider in 2012.) Jacobs is also the only person not named Snider to ever have a face-off percentage above 70% for a season. Jacobs played 12 seasons for the Wings, winning just shy of 60% of almost 3,000 face-offs. He didn’t finish a single one of those seasons with a percentage below 50%.

7. Jake Bergey, Philadelphia Wings (142 games)

Jake Bergey

Bergey played ten seasons in Philly and won two Championships. He scored 50+ points six times, including 86 in 14 games in 2001. He’s currently second all-time in Wings goals, assists, and points.

In the 2007 expansion draft, he was chosen by the Boston Blazers, but was traded back to Philly before the season started. Then the Blazers sat out the 2008 season so there was another expansion draft. Bergey was chosen by Boston again, and again was traded back to the Wings. He has to be one of the few players who played for a single team his entire career and yet was traded twice.

6. Andrew McBride, Calgary Roughnecks (185 games)

Andrew McBride

McBride has played 11 seasons in Calgary, and has been the captain since Tracey Kelusky was traded after the 2010 season. He’s a defender, transition player, a fighter, an outstanding team leader, and you’ll never hear a more well-spoken guy during an interview. And when is Movember time of year, he is look like Borat.

5. Rich Kilgour, Buffalo Bandits (225 games)

Rich Kilgour

Darris’ big brother was captain of the Bandits for 12 years, won four championships, had his number retired by the Bandits and is in the NLL Hall of Fame. Only one player personifies the Bandits better than Richie Kilgour and, well, we’ll get to him later.

4. Regy Thorpe, Rochester Knighthawks (217 games)

Regy Thorpe

Regy Thorpe was a big tough defender who played an amazing fifteen seasons with the Knighthawks, beginning in 1995, the team’s first season in the league. He won two Championships and was captain of the 2007 Championship team. But most interestingly, he was the first player-GM in NLL history when he took the reins of the team and played in the 2009 season. His tenure as a GM only lasted one season before owner Curt Styres took over, but much to the chagrin of NLL scorers, Thorpe played one more season before retiring in 2010.

3. Blaine Manning, Toronto Rock (199 games)

Blaine Manning

Blaine Manning had a pretty successful start to his NLL career, winning championships in 3 of his first 4 seasons (2002, 2003, 2005) with the Toronto Rock. It kind of went downhill after that for a couple of years, but after The Rock GM Who Must Not Be Named was fired and Terry Sanderson was brought back, Manning was a big part of the rebuilding process that resulted in the 2011 NLL Championship. Long before Dan Dawson arrived in Boston, Manning was one of the original Big Three along with Colin Doyle and Josh Sanderson in Toronto. They peaked in 2005 when Doyle finished first overall in scoring, Manning tied with John Grant for second, and Sanderson tied with John Tavares for third – and all five of them finished with over 100 points.

I went on and on about Manning in an article right after he retired, so I won’t rehash all his stats here. Suffice it to say that Manning should be a lock for the NLL Hall of Fame once he is eligible.

2. Tom Marechek, Philadelphia Wings (161 games)

Tom Marechek

Tom “Hollywood” Marechek won four championships in 12 NLL seasons and was inducted into the NLL Hall of Fame in 2007. Marechek is the all-time Wings leader in both goals and assists, and is 8th all-time in the league in goals. But of the top goal-scorers in league history, only one player in the top 10 (and two in the top 25) have played fewer games than Marechek. The only players who averaged more goals per game than Marechek are Gary Gait, Paul Gait, John Grant, and John Tavares. Not bad company.

Hard to believe he’s only the third-best lacrosse player from Victoria, BC.

1. John Tavares, Buffalo Bandits (313 games)

John Tavares

No-brainer. Tavares is one of the best players ever to play in the NLL (many argue he is the best), and after 22 seasons with the Buffalo Bandits, there’s no argument who’s at the top of this list. Or most lists, for that matter.

Tavares owns pretty much every offensive NLL record, most of them by a mile. As of the end of the 2013 season, he has 778 career goals, ahead of second-place Gary Gait by 130 and ahead of third-place (and the closest still active player) John Grant by over 200. He has 887 assists, 108 more than Colin Doyle. He has 1665 points; if he retired today, second place Doyle couldn’t catch him even with four more 100 point seasons. He’s scored an amazing 5.95 points per game over his career, second only to John Grant’s 6.37. (Technically he’s also behind a guy named Gary Edmands with a career average of 6 – he scored 6 points in his only NLL game with the Bandits in 1996.)

Since Tavares is still active, the amazing numbers will just continue to climb.

Honourable mentions

  • Billy Dee Smith, Buffalo Bandits, 149 games
  • Pat McCabe, New York Saints, 119 games
  • Mike Carnegie, Calgary Roughnecks, 105 games
  • Kyle Sorensen, San Jose / Washington Stealth, 105 games (I know, two different teams but they’re the same franchise so it counts.)

Just under the radar

These guys didn’t quite make the 100 game limit, but I wanted to acknowledge them anyway.

  • Devan Wray, Calgary Roughnecks, 99 games
  • Jeff Zywicki, San Jose / Washington Stealth, 99 games
  • Sal LoCascio, New York Saints, 95 games

The NLL Hall of Fame: Why is "not yet" an option?

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Pat O’Toole, the former goaltender for the Rochester Knighthawks, Buffalo Bandits and New York Saints (!!) was elected last month to the NLL Hall of Fame. He was unquestionably deserving – 16 seasons in the league, second overall in total saves, two Championships, one Goaltender of the Year award, and he leads the Knighthawks in every goaltending category there is. He’s the third straight person to be elected into the Hall by himself, and also the third straight goaltender, after Bob Watson and Steve Dietrich.

What was even more interesting about the announcement was who was not going in. Four other players were nominated: Pat McCready and Kaleb Toth both received 48% of the vote, well short of the 75% required, and Chris Driscoll and Regy Thorpe both received 21%. The 1993 Buffalo Bandits were nominated as a team and received 42%. The omission of Toth, in particular, had some heads shaking throughout the IL Indoor forums and Twitter. Many were saying he should have been a shoo-in, while others said that he was good but not quite worthy of the Hall of Fame.

This begs the question: what would make a player worthy? Obviously there’s no criteria that guarantees you entry into the Hall, though being good enough for long enough to pick up 1000 career points (only 6 players have ever done it) would probably be the equivalent to 300 wins for a pitcher in baseball. But there will be lots of players that don’t get 1000 points that deserve to be in the Hall – Paul Gait, Tom Marechek, Darris Kilgour, and Dan Stroup are already in the Hall with fewer. And that number’s only useful for scorers – what about transition guys, defenders, and goalies? Finally, there’s more to Hall of Fame worthiness than just numbers.

Kaleb TothBut I’m going to start with the numbers because, you know, that’s what I do. Kaleb Toth finished his 13-year career with 713 points (14th all-time) in 186 games (24th), for a career average of 3.83 (46th). He had 9 seasons (in ten years) with 50+ points (14th), and 6 seasons with 60+ points (13th). Only Andrew McBride has played more games as a Roughneck. He’s the team leader in goals, assists, and points; the next closest current Roughneck is Scott Ranger, 241 points back.

So he’s 14th all-time in points. You might think well, he didn’t make the top 10. But consider this: 1243 players have played at least one game in the NLL. Only 13 have more points than Toth, putting him in the top 1.2%. Was he as dominant as guys like Grant or Tavares? No. Was he the best player on his team his entire career? No, he played with guys like Tracey Kelusky, Lewis Ratcliff, and Josh Sanderson. But it’s safe to say that he was one of the top 2 or 3 guys on the Roughnecks for eight straight years from 2002 until 2009.

You also have to consider the non-stats factors. He was the face of the Roughnecks for much of his career, being a hometown Calgary boy, and Calgary is now one of the cornerstone franchises in the league. Toth spent a lot of time in the community and attempting to grow lacrosse in Alberta and from what I understand, this has been very successful. And you can’t forget his two years in Toronto, scoring one of the most famous goals in Toronto Rock history, if not league history.

So I think I’ve made my case for why Kaleb Toth deserves to be in the NLL Hall of Fame. Personally, I think Pat McCready should be in there as well. It would be harder to make a similar argument for McCready, but only because he was a defender and so comparing numbers is much harder. And I’d be OK with the ’93 Bandits going in as a team. But that’s not what this article was supposed to be about. It was supposed to be looking at the question of how we decide whether or not a player deserves Hall of Fame inclusion. But other than maybe the 1000 point plateau, there’s no definite criteria for Hall of Fame candidates, so each has to be examined individually.

Because the NLL Hall hasn’t been around all that long (there are only 21 people in it, 8 of which were not players), it’s a little more difficult than other sports to say “so-and-so is in the Hall, and this guy’s career was similar (or better), so he should be in as well”. But if we want to go down that road, we can. Dan Stroup is in the Hall of Fame. Toth played 4 more games than Stroup but had 184 more points. They were both forwards so logic says that if Stroup’s in, Toth should be in.

What’s probably happening here is the same idiocy that happens in other Halls of Fame: the concept of a “first-ballot Hall of Famer”. The idea is that there are those players who were so good, they deserve to be inducted into the Hall of Fame as soon as they are eligible (on their first ballot). Meanwhile there are other players who are good enough to be in the Hall, but not as good as the “first-ballot” players, so they should not be inducted as soon as they’re eligible, they should be made to wait a year or two (or nine, right Andre Dawson?). This makes no sense to me, and I wrote about it (in the baseball world) four years ago. From that article (and this part applies to the NLL Hall of Fame as well):

The Hall of Fame is not an ordered list of players. If someone deserves to be there, vote for him. If he gets 100% of the vote, well good for him, but it doesn’t mean that he’s better than Ruth or Cobb [or Gait or Veltman].

If you think Toth is worthy of the Hall of Fame, vote for him. If you don’t think he’s good enough, that’s fine. But don’t give me this “not yet” crap.

I’m not sure which I hope for more: (1) that the NLL Hall of Fame voters do not think this way (good) and they just believe that Toth isn’t good enough (bad). Or (2) that the voters do think this way (bad) and that Toth will get in next year (good). We’ll have to wait for the results of next year’s voting to see which it is.

2013 NLL season wrap-up

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Well, that’s it for one of the most exciting and entertaining NLL seasons ever, thanks in part to the parity in the league. Almost every game was unpredictable, and there wasn’t a single game all year where anyone would have been honestly shocked if the losing team had won. Incidentally, that’s my excuse for finishing below .500 in my predictions.

A lot of interesting things happened in the 2013 season, some of which were expected, some of which were not. Let’s take a look at a few of each.

Five things we expected

  1. Parity. As I mentioned above, the parity in the league is unprecedented. The Bandits only won 6 games, but four of them came against the Champions, the Championship runners-up, and the Rock, who had the best record. The team with the best record was ahead of the team with the worst record by only 4 wins (10-6 vs. 6-10), the smallest that number has been since Detroit finished 6-2 and four teams were 3-5 back in 1992.
  2. The Stealth didn’t suck. Nobody expected their 2012 season to be as bad as it was, but I’m pretty sure that nobody realistically expected it to happen again.
  3. Garrett Billings cemented himself as one of the top offensive players in the NLL with his second-straight 100-point season.
  4. After one of the best offensive seasons ever, John Grant returned to earth with a pedestrian (for him) 91 points. Matt Vinc
  5. Matt Vinc won his third Goaltender of the Year award. Another few years of this type of performance, and the “best of all time” argument between Watson and Eliuk will become a three-way conversation. In fact, it’s almost there now.

Five things we didn’t expect

  1. Sophomore slump? Never heard of it. If you look at the top rookies of 2012 – Kevin Crowley, Adam Jones, Jordan MacIntosh, Tyler Carlson, Evan Kirk, Johnny Powless – only Kirk dropped off significantly from his rookie performance. Powless dropped from 50 points to 40, but he had to start sharing the ball with the likes of Dan Dawson and Casey Powell. The rest all stayed about the same or got better.
  2. Getting rid of Casey Powell won’t hurt your offense. The Knighthawks averaged 11.1 goals per game before the trade, 11.3 after. Cody Jamieson and Dan Dawson both saw their points/game averages go up to make up for the loss of Powell, Dawson from 4.2 to 5.1, and Jamieson from 5 to 6.3.
  3. Mike Poulin had a distinctly un-Poulin-esque season. His 12.70 GAA was the highest of his career, almost 2.5 points higher than 2012. The only starters who finished with higher GAAs were Evan Kirk and Anthony Cosmo. But his performance in the Roughnecks’ 12-11 OT victory over Edmonton at the end of the season was outstanding, and he played well against both the Mammoth and the Stealth in the playoffs. Shawn Evans
  4. Shawn Evans has been a very good player for years, and taking his game to the next level wasn’t wholly unexpected. But this year, Evans jumped the next level and went to the one after that. He bested his career high in points by 33 and won the scoring title by 12. His 112 points is tied for the 5th best season ever, putting Evans among the Gaits, Grants, and Tavares’.
  5. The Knighthawks started the year 0-3, were never above .500 at any point, and only two teams scored fewer goals. But they are the Champions. Actually, we should have expected it, since it’s almost what they did last year.

So there’ll be no more NLL games until at least December when training camps open. Don’t worry folks, it’s only… um… seven months. (sigh) Until then, we still have the MLL for outdoorsy types, and the MSL and WLA for people who like sweating in arenas in July. There may or may not be other American indoor leagues as well, such as NALL, PLL, MILA, and possibly others; so many of them started up so fast I kind of lost track of which ones still exist.

So enjoy your summer and fall, whether it’s filled with lacrosse or not! NLL Chatter will be more or less quiet over the summer, but we’ll publish the odd story as things unfold: the new CBA, trades, the entry draft, rule changes, the 2014 schedule, things like that. And we’ll be back next season with the usual mix of relevance and irreverence. See you then!

Division final picks

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I went 2-2 in last week’s first-round games, just as I did in the first round last year. I continue to get the Stealth completely backwards – they lose when I pick them to win and vicy versy. I knew the Swarm were going to be a tough opponent for the Rock, but not that tough. The predictions only get tougher from here. Hopefully I do better than my Swarm @ Rock finals prediction from 2012.

Regular season record: 33-39 (.458)
Playoff record: 2-2 (.500)

Game

Comments

Pick
MIN @ ROC After watching the Swam dismantle the Rock last weekend, it’s hard to bet against them. Knowing that Cody Jamieson will be at best playing hurt (and more likely not playing at all) and they may also be without Cory Vitarelli doesn’t help the Knighthawks’ cause. But I agree with Teddy Jenner: if the Swarm don’t start Tyler Carlson after his recent performances, they’re nuts. Carlson vs. Vinc – this will be a great goalie battle. Swarm
WAS @ CAL Was this one ever tough to call. Both teams have it all. Great goaltending? Check. Lots of firepower up front? Check. Transition? Defense? Great faceoff guy named Snider? Check, check, check. The biggest difference here is coaching. Chris Hall was my second choice for the Les Bartley award and has taken the Stealth to the Championship in 2 of the last 3 years, while Curt Malawsky is a rookie. Gary Gait won the championship as a rookie coach so there’s precedent there, but I still think I’m gonna have to give this one to the Stealth. Stealth

2013 NLL Award winners

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Every year the IL Indoor writing staff submit their picks for the annual NLL awards, and here are mine. Note that these are not picks for who I think will win, they’re picks for who I think should win.

Offensive player of the year – Shawn Evans

Runners-up: Garrett Billings, Rhys Duch, Callum Crawford

Billings had almost as great a season in 2013 as he did in 2012, and Duch set personal records in both goals (leading the league) and assists. Crawford only had 4 games (out of 14) with less than 6 points – none of them after March 3 – and had six straight games of 8+ points. But Evans had them all beat before he even began his final game. Evans had five games with 10+ points, more than John Grant had during his record-setting 2012 season, while only Crawford and Dan Dawson even had two.

Transition player of the year – Jesse Gamble

Runners-up: Geoff Snider, Jeremy Thompson, Brad Self

Is this a bit of a homer pick? Possibly, but I really thought Gamble had a hell of a year. He played strong defense, ran like the wind, scored a bunch of goals (including two on the power-play), and led the team in loose balls.

I thought about picking Jordan MacIntosh, who will probably win the award, but decided against it for the same reason I didn’t think Jeff Shattler should have won this award two years ago – he’s not really a transition player. He’s an excellent player, no question, and as good as he was, he even stepped up his game when Andrew Suitor went down with a season-ending injury. But he played a lot more shifts on offense than he did defense. In the division semi-final game, MacIntosh played as much offense as Benesch or Crawford did. Gamble is a true transition player.

Defensive player of the year  – Kyle Rubisch

Runners-up: Chris Corbeil, Scott Self

It sounds like Kyle Rubisch might be the winner of this award every year for the foreseeable future. The word I hear most often to describe his play is “beast”.

Goaltender of the year – Matt Vinc

Runners-up: Brandon Miller, Tyler Richards, Nick Rose

If not for Matt Vinc, the Knighthawks might have been hitting the links early, not the Bandits. To have a goalie with the best GAA and the best save percentage in the league and still finish at .500 tells you how bad their offense was. Similarly, as one Wings fan put it, the Wings would be 1-15 without Brandon Miller. I’m not sure it would have been that bad but the Wings had a similar problem to the Knighthawks – outstanding goaltending, but almost no offense to speak of.

Rookie of the year – Mark Matthews

Runners-up: Kiel Matisz, Shayne Jackson, Dhane Smith, Curtis Knight

From a stats point of view, it was closer than you might have thought. Matthews had 4.31 points per game, while Jackson and Matisz had 4.00 and 3.94 respectively. But Matthews turned the Rush’s mediocre offense from last year into the third highest-scoring in the league, and that’s after losing Aaron Wilson, Scott Evans, and Shawn Williams. Obviously Matthews himself didn’t make up the difference entirely, but he forced opposing defenses to focus on him. This opened things up for Ryan Ward, Corey Small, and Zack Greer, all of whom increased their point totals over 2012.

Unsung player of the year – Cory Vitarelli

Runners-up: Kasey Beirnes, Jay Thorimbert, Brodie MacDonald

When you think of the offensive stars on the Knighthawks, you think Jamieson, Dawson, Powless, Accursi, Point, even Keogh, but Vitarelli doesn’t always spring to mind. But he was third in team scoring, put up at least a point in every game he played this year, and scored some of the prettiest goals we saw all season. Beirnes has gotten more recognition in the last year or two for his hard work playing behind big-name guys like Doyle, Billings, and Sanderson, but he’s been doing that for years. Jay Thorimbert had almost identical face-off numbers to Bob Snider, which is impressive in itself. Thorimbert split face-off duties in 2012 with Brandon Francis and Jeremy Thompson, but became the Bandits’ only face-off man this year – and increased their team face-off win percentage from 48.3% to 59.7%. Brodie MacDonald only played in three games this year, but put in at least 20 minutes in each, and finished with a GAA of around 8 and a save percentage of 80%. Having that kind of backup goalie behind you has to be a great confidence boost for both Aaron Bold and Derek Keenan.

Coach of the year – Troy Cordingley

Runners-up: Chris Hall, Derek Keenan

The Rock were the most consistent team this year, in a league where many teams looked unstoppable one week and terrible the next. Chris Hall showed how important he is to the Stealth, bringing them back from their brutal 2012 season, much of which was played without him, to second place in the West.

GM of the year – Derek Keenan

Runners-up: John Arlotta, Curt Styres

Drafting Mark Matthews wasn’t the master stroke – every GM would have done that. But in the off-season, Keenan retooled the offense, turning them from the worst in the league to the third-highest scoring – and managed to do this despite losing Shawn Williams, Aaron Wilson, and Scott Evans. Keenan also turned Paul Rabil, a player who never played for him and wasn’t going to, into Jarrett Davis.

MVP – Shawn Evans

Shawn EvansRunners-up: Garrett Billings, Callum Crawford, Matt Vinc

Evans had an outstanding year. He led the league in both assists and points, almost setting records in both, and beat his next closest teammate by almost fifty points. He had almost exactly the season Garrett Billings had a year ago, and Billings was my choice for MVP then. How close were their seasons?

G A Pts PPG LB Shots SOG
Billings 2012 32 82 114 10 74 195 131
Evans 2013 32 80 112 12 69 186 139

Evans had the same number of goals as he did last season but picked up 33 more assists. Just to cap it all off, Evans scored the overtime winner in the last game of the season to clinch the Western division for the Roughnecks.