Category Archives: Edmonton Rush

Top 10 surprises from the 2012 NLL season so far (pt. 2)

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In part 1, we covered Steve Toll, Athan Iannucci, Paul Rabil, Tyler Carlson, Evan Kirk, Matt Roik, and Nick Rose, as well as some rule changes. In this article, we’ll cover the top 5 surprises in 2012.

5. John Grant

John Grant being an impact player should not surprise anyone. He’s been an impact player his entire career in the NLL, MLL, MSL, or any other L he’s played in. But I don’t think anyone expected him to be as dominant as he has been this season. Not only is he 37, but he’s only three years removed from missing an entire season because of a serious injury that became life-threatening. He recovered well enough to go out and score 83 points in his last year in Rochester and another 83 in his first year in Colorado. Fine numbers, to be sure, but not Grant-like. In fact, 83 points was Grant’s lowest total (playing a full season) since his rookie year in 2000.

John Grant

Grant is a fierce competitor, so it is no surprise that he’d want to get back to his previous numbers – not because the personal stats are important to him, but because he wants to lead his team to as many wins as possible, and his contribution to that objective is putting up tons of points. Starting the season with 11 points was nice, but following it up with 9 and 10 points was amazing. Nobody thought he could keep up a 10-points-per-game pace, and he hasn’t. But he’s still averaging 8.3 points per game. He has yet to pick up less than 3 goals or 3 assists in a game and his season low for a single game is 7 points. He missed two games with an upper body injury, and then returned with another 7 point performance. Before the injury, he was on pace for 136 points in a season, blowing the old single-season record away by 21 points. In fact, even after missing two games (1/8 of the season), he is still on pace to break the record. Unbelievable.

4. Buffalo’s 6 game losing streak

The Bandits are mostly the same team as last year. They traded Chris Corbeil but got Billy Dee Smith back from injury, and also gained Luke Wiles and Mat Giles. They went 10-6 last year and given the team changes, you wouldn’t expect a huge drop-off this season. Sure enough, they started the season 2-0 with wins against the Rock at home and the Knighthawks on the road. And then it all fell apart. The Bandits lost their next six in a row, something they have never done before in a single season. (They did finish the 1999 season with five losses and missed the playoffs, then started 2000 off with a loss. Similarly, they finished 2009 with two losses and started 2010 with four, but there was a playoff win and loss in between.)

Some of the games were ugly. They managed to shut out Philadelphia for half the second quarter and all of the third, and still lost the game. They lost 19-11 to the Swarm in a game that included a 7-0 third quarter. They lost to the Knighthawks in a game that included a 7-0 second quarter. But there were two one-goal losses in there as well, including an overtime game against the Stealth. Of course, the Stealth were 0-3 at the time and then lost their next three.

Bandits coach and GM Darris Kilgour has a reputation for being fiery and passionate, and I’m sure that during this streak more than a few f-bombs were dropped. But after losing six in a row, the Bandits started their next game against the Rock down 5-1 and losing 11-8 at the half. Did Darris lose his mind and scream and yell like a stereotypical drill sergeant? Not at all. In his IL Indoor interview with Tracey Kelusky, Ty Pilson used the unlikely word “gentle” to describe Kilgour’s reaction. Kelusky said “he just said you guys are sticking with it, you guys aren’t panicking, and that’s something we were doing during that six-game skid… He said we’re playing confident, keep doing that and we’ll have success.” How did that go over with the Bandits? They outscored the Rock 13-3 in the second half and won 21-14. That is solid coaching.

3. This year’s crop of rookies

Every year, one rookie is singled out and given the NLL Rookie of the Year award. And every year, there are arguments that someone else deserved it as well. Last year, Curtis Dickson won it over Cody Jamieson, and in 2010, Stephan Leblanc beat out teammate Garrett Billings. This year, the number of deserving rookies who will not win ROY is crazy. It seems that every team has a rookie who’s having an outstanding season, and some have more than one. In the case of the Minnesota Swarm, you could almost nominate half the team.

There are high-scoring forwards like Crowley, Powless, Jones, Lincoln, and Keogh. There are defenders and transition guys like Gamble, Thompson, MacIntosh, and Cornwall. And there are goaltenders like Kirk, Carlson, and Scigliano. At this point in the season, the race is likely between Crowley and Jones, but all of these guys have played well so far and with a few strong games to finish the season, any one of them could find themselves in the ROY race. I don’t remember another season with such a strong group of rookies – not just in terms of how good they are, but in terms of how many good ones there are.

2. Colorado starting 6-0 and 8-1

Maybe others saw this coming, but I certainly didn’t. This is related to #5 above, the amazing play of John Grant, but even if you thought he’d have a good season, did you foresee Adam Jones being so good? And the defense playing well even without Mac Allen? And Gavin Prout playing so well? And Chris Levis? And Sean Pollock and Jamie Lincoln and Jordan McBride and Derek Hopcroft and Ian Hawksbee and Rory Smith and Creighton Reid and Ilija Gajic and…? Honestly, none of those things individually is an absolute shock but the fact that they all happened at the same time has resulted in the Mammoth being the best team in the league, which is a distinction they haven’t been anywhere near for years. The Mammoth only won 5 games in 2011, and managed to match that total in 2012 after… 5 games. They have a very good chance of doubling their win total from last year.

The team is quite different from last year – Mac Allen is out with an injury, Steve Toll retired (temporarily – see #10 on this list) as did Brian Langtry, Joel Dalgarno is out for the year because of work commitments, Ned Crotty and Dan Carey were traded, and Connor Martin was released. Instead, we have Adam Jones, Jordan McBride, Jamie Lincoln, Jon Sullivan, Rory Smith, Sean Pollock, Mat MacLeod, Creighton Reid, and Derek Hopcroft. Is the fact that a team with this many changes has gelled as well as they have a testament to good coaching by Bob Hamley, or Gavin Prout becoming captain, or some combination of both? I’m sure Mammoth fans don’t care, but they’re certainly enjoying the ride.

1. Washington starting 1-6

It was surprising that a bad team would retool and instantly become a great team, but it’s even more surprising that a great team would make very few changes over the off-season and become a lousy team. And that’s what the Stealth looked like for the first seven games of the 2012 season. They won an overtime squeaker against the also-struggling Buffalo Bandits, but lost to the Roughnecks twice, the Wings, the Knighthawks, and the Swarm, and they got smoked by the Edmonton Rush 16-5 in their own arena.

Rhys Duch

Sure, they lost Jeff Zywicki to injury early in the year, but he only played three games last year anyway. They traded Matt Roik but Tyler Richards played more than twice as many minutes as Roik did in 2011. Richards and Rhys Duch got injured as well, but not until the Stealth were 1-5. They did lose Luke Wiles, who’s tearing up the turf in Buffalo, and didn’t really replace him, so that’s something. But Duch and Ratcliff couldn’t find the back of the net, and Richards had a worse GAA than every starting goalie in the league and several backups.

The Stealth have been struggling with low attendance despite two consecutive Champion’s Cup appearances; the highest Washington crowd this year, 4687, is 600 less than the lowest crowd anywhere else (5267 in Rochester). Maybe you could use that fact to argue that winning and losing has no bearing on attendance in Washington so it doesn’t matter if they win or lose. But I doubt it. And I doubt the players are OK with losing if it doesn’t affect the crowds.

Part, maybe even most, of the problem was the absence of head coach Chris Hall. CH was the heart and soul of the Stealth, but our old nemesis cancer raised its ugly head once again, this time in the form of throat cancer, and Hall had to stay away from the arena to concentrate on his treatment and recovery. Thankfully, it seems that Hall has won this battle, and after missing the first six games of the season he returned cancer-free to the bench. The Stealth lost their first game after his return, but have won two of three since then.

Week 12 picks

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The Bandits are back! After I said last week that I wouldn’t be picking the Bandits until they proved they “are worthy of a pick”, they proved just that. Obviously my statement was the straw that broke the camel’s back, the thing that finally kept them going during the games and got them to play as well as we thought they would at the beginning of the year. Similarly, right after I said I wouldn’t pick the Stealth until they started winning, they started winning. Post hoc ergo propter hoc.

So I ended up 0-2 on Bandits games. At least I got the Philly / Edmonton game right, though not by much. Six games this weekend, so let’s get to them.

Record: 17-27 (.386)

Game

Comments

Pick
PHI @ COL Now that the Mammoth don’t suck anymore, the Pepsi Center is a tough place for visitors to win again. John Grant will not be back this weekend, though my prediction of the Mammoth offense not being as good without him didn’t really come true. They really stepped up last weekend in his absence, and I see no reason why they couldn’t do it again, though the Philly defense has been really solid lately. Mammoth
BUF @ CAL Before last weekend, this would be a no-brainer, but with Buffalo playing so well last weekend, it’s a tougher now. Buffalo may be confident enough now that they can just keep rolling, but this one comes down to goaltending. I think Thompson at his best is better than Poulin at his best, but average Poulin beats average Thompson. If Cosmo plays as he can, he may be the best in the league but he still seems to be shaking off rust. Roughnecks
WAS @ EDM The Stealth have been looking more like the Stealth we expected over the last few weeks. They split with the Mammoth two weeks ago but even in the loss they looked pretty good against a team that was 7-1 at the time. If Paul Rabil announces he will actually suit up for the Rush I may change my pick, but I don’t see that happening. Stealth
TOR @ ROC The Rock are 3-17 lifetime in Rochester, but of course one of those thee was the Championship game in 2003. The other two wins came last season, so I think it’s safe to say the home-and-home curse between these two teams is over. The Rock will be breaking in new starting goalie Nick Rose and hoping to end their three-game losing streak, while the Knighthawks are looking to continue both their two-game winning streak and their three-game home winning streak. The Rock are my team and I hate betting against them, but they just haven’t impressed me at all over the last three games. Knighthawks
COL @ PHI This was my toughie of the week. Colorado certainly has the talent to sweep the Wings, but Philly has been getting better and better as the season has progressed. Philly’s first in the east though they’re not having the dominant season the Mammoth are having. The fact that John Grant is missing will help the Wings, but as I said above the Mammoth offense managed just fine without him two weeks ago. If one team sweeps this series, they will undoubtedly be the #1 team in the league, but I foresee a split. Wings
MIN @ WAS The Swarm are impressing me more and more, and they’ll be fresh while the Stealth will have played the night before and travelled from Edmonton. Certainly not a guarantee (both Colorado and Calgary have won the second game of back-to-back games this year), but I’ll go with the Swarm’s young legs on this one. Swarm

Previous weeks:

Week 1 – 0-1
Week 2 – 2-2
Week 3 – 2-2
Week 4 – 2-4
Week 5 – 2-2
Week 6 – 1-3
Week 7 – 2-2
Week 8 – 1-3
Week 9 – 2-2
Week 10 – 2-4
Week 11 – 1-2

Top 10 surprises from the 2012 NLL season so far (pt. 1)

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2012 has been a season full of surprises in the NLL, and it’s only half over. In true “top ten list” fashion, we’ll start at #10 and move up towards #1.

 

10. Steve Toll’s return

Steve TollHe hasn’t played yet, but Rush GM Derek Keenan has already announced his signing. I guess Toll’s retirement was never official, so he’s just a free agent. What I don’t know is whether his “iron man” streak will continue. He played all 16 games with the Mammoth last year, and wasn’t on a roster for the first part of this season, so does that count as breaking the streak? If not, he’ll only be one game behind the new leader Shawn Williams. Williams and Toll are good friends off the floor, so it stands to reason that Willy was involved in this transaction somehow, but I don’t know whether he convinced Steve to come back, or Steve asked him to put in a good word with the boss.

In case you are wondering, the other Toll on the Rush, Jarrett, is not related to Steve. At least he doesn’t think so.

9. Iannucci and Rabil

The biggest trade of last summer was unquestionably Brodie Merrill for Athan Iannucci. At the time, I thought Philly got robbed blind – not because Iannucci is so much better than Merrill, but because they gave the Rush three first round draft picks among everything else. Well, someone got robbed blind, but it wasn’t Philadelphia. Merrill is playing very well for the Wings, but Iannucci never reported to the Rush. Apparently he didn’t have problems with the team or the city, but the contract negotiations got heated and apparently things started to get personal, and Iannucci refused to play. Five games into the season, Nooch was finally traded to the Stealth, where he’s been OK, though nowhere near his level of play back in 2008. In return, the Rush got transition star Paul Rabil – who then refused to report to the Rush, and the whole thing started over again. This time it wasn’t about money; Rabil had been trying to get traded back east for years, but Washington couldn’t do it. I guess travelling to Edmonton would have been worse than to Washington since there are likely no direct flights from the Baltimore area (where Rabil lives) to Edmonton, so he’d likely end up having to fly to Seattle anyway and then to Edmonton so his travel schedule just got way worse. I guess you can’t blame him for that, but when you hear that someone like John Grant can up and move his entire family, including a young child, to Denver, you feel less sympathy for Rabil.

My impression of Rabil has always been that the MLL and field lacrosse in general is his thing, and the NLL is an interesting pastime and way to make a few bucks and keep up his skills during the winter. That’s not to say he doesn’t try hard; I’m sure he gives 110% when he’s on the floor, but if he had to give up the NLL or the MLL, the NLL would lose in a heartbeat. This is not a judgement or criticism of him, he just likes field lacrosse better. He’s happy to play in the NLL, but if it means lots of travel and major inconvenience, then he’s fine giving it up.

The trading deadline has just passed and Rabil was not dealt, so the deal now looks like Merrill, Mike McLellan, Dean Hill, a 5th round pick in 2011, and a 4th round pick in 2013 to the Wings for Alex Turner, Brodie McDonald, and first round picks in 2012, 2013, and 2014. Given the first rounders, it’s still not that terrible a deal for the Rush long term, but certainly isn’t helping them this year.

There are rumours that Derek Keenan will ask Rabil to report for the rest of the year, but that seems unlikely. I can’t imagine the reception he’d get from the Edmonton fans when his name was announced.

8. The rule change making the most difference

A number of rule changes were announced for 2012. A lot of people, myself included, thought the change from ten seconds to eight would be the most significant, or possibly the “two feet in the box” substitution rule. But when I’m watching the game, the two that make the most difference for me (and I’m putting them together because they’re related) are the delay of game on possession change, and the fast start rule. When the ref blows the whistle to signal a possession change (eg. a moving pick) or the shot clock expires, the attacking player must immediately put the ball down on the floor and give the other team some room. None of this rolling it away from the other team or running around for an extra second or two to give your team a chance to change. It’s been pushed to the limit a few times, where a player will put it down but not completely stop it, and it rolls a couple of feet and the player is given a penalty. That seems excessive, but assuming those kinds of calls disappear as the refs and players get more used to the rule, it really keeps the game moving.

The other one is related – say a player on team A shoots at the net and misses, and then the shot clock expires. If the ball bounces off the boards and all the way out to centre and a team B player picks it up there, the ref blows the whistle and play just continues. In previous years, play would be stopped, the ball would be brought back to the goal area, and team B would start again. Again, the new rule keeps the game going. It makes transition plays more likely and forces teams to either change faster (but the “two feet in the box” rule makes sure that they’re not too fast) or have the O guys play more D, which we’re seeing a lot this year.

7. The goalie situation in Minnesota

At the beginning of the season, it looked like Minnesota’s goalies might be Nick Patterson and Anthony Cosmo, which should have been an excellent tandem. In reality, Cosmo was unlikely to play, as he told the Swarm before they picked him in the Boston dispersal draft. So the Swarm decided to go with rookies Tyler Carlson and Evan Kirk backing up Patterson. After Patterson let in 20 goals in the Swarm’s first game, they gave Carlson a try. Carlson went 2-2 with a GAA around 11 in his first four games, and Evan Kirk and went 2-0 and an amazing 6.50 GAA in his first two games. Patterson was released, Cosmo was finally traded, and Minnesota has just as great a goalie tandem as expected, but not with the players that we expected. After ten games, the Swarm are 5-4 and third in the west, Carlson is 3-2 with a GAA of 11.14, and Kirk is 2-1 with a league-leading GAA of 8.33 and by far the best save percentage with 83.2%. Only one other goalie is over 80%, and that’s Calgary’s Frankie Scigliano (another rookie), who’s only played 51 minutes.

6. The goalie situation in Toronto

Bob Watson decided to retire following the 2010 season but after the Rock lost the Championship Game, owner Jamie Dawick (among others) managed to convince him to come back for one more year. It ended up as a storybook ending that couldn’t have been scripted any better, with a Championship for the Rock and well-earned Championship Game MVP honours for Watson. But as happy as Rock management and fans were with 2011, the question loomed: how do you replace Bob Watson?

Matt RoikThey answered that question in July, when they traded Kyle Ross to Washington for Matt Roik. Over and over, Rock management sung his praises. When Boston announced in September that they would “temporarily suspend operations” (NLL-speak for “vanish forever”), the rumours of Anthony Cosmo’s return to Toronto started almost immediately. The Minnesota Swarm traded three players to the Mammoth to get their first round pick, and they chose Cosmo. When I heard that Toronto and Minnesota had made a trade during the dispersal draft, I assumed it would be for Cosmo. Instead, it was Josh Sanderson coming to the Rock, and once again the Rock said that Matt Roik was their man and that they had no interest in Cosmo.

Five games into the season, it certainly looked like they’d made the right choice. The Rock were 3-2, and Roik had been solid in the two losses and great in the three wins. He was even named Defensive Player of the Week for week 5. Smooth sailing, right? Wrong. Four games later, the Rock are 4-5 and last in the East. So do they stick with the guy they’ve been talking about as “their man” since July? Nope. They release him outright and trade for Calgary backup Nick Rose. Then they talk about how it wasn’t Roik’s fault that they’ve played badly in the last few games, but Roik paid the price anyway with his job, possibly his season, and maybe even his career.

This whole situation is eerily similar to the 2004 Rock season. Legendary coach and GM Les Bartley had announced over the off-season that he was fighting cancer and would not be able to be behind the bench during the 2004 season. The Rock named Derek Keenan and Ed Comeau the interim GM and coach respectively in Les’ absence. But after only 6 games, both were fired and the Rock hired Terry Sanderson (who was an assistant coach with the Bandits at the time – the Rock would give up a draft pick the next year as punishment for “tampering”) as the new GM and coach. Considering that both Keenan and Comeau have gone on to great success in the NLL, both winning the GM and Coach of the Year awards, I have to wonder what might have been if they had been given a little more leeway and time. But Rock fans certainly can’t complain about how things worked out, considering the team went 8-2 over the rest of that season and then won the Championship the next year. (Les Bartley would lose his battle with cancer at the tragically young age of 51 the day after that 2005 Championship game.)

Rock fans may always wonder what might have been had Roik been given more time. But if Rose works out in Toronto as well as Sanderson did, the question may just never come up.

 

Coming soon: the top 5.

Week 11 picks

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I have still yet to break the elusive .500 mark this season, and not just on the season as a whole; I haven’t broken .500 in any single week either. I went 2-4 last week, but was this close to going 4-2. I called the split of Colorado and Washington, but for some reason I decided that the Stealth would win in Colorado and the Mammoth would win in Washington. They did split, but each team won at home.

This is the first season that I’ve really made an effort at individual game predictions during the regular season. I have come to the following stunning conclusion: it’s hard. When the experts over at IL Indoor (and yes, I write there too but I’m just a fairly knowledgeable fan, those guys live and breathe lacrosse) are all under .500, what chance does an amateur like me have? You can go with “gut feelings”, but we all know how reliable they are. Or, you can attempt to use logic, but you end up with contradictions. Take the Philly-Toronto game from a couple of weeks ago:

  • The game is in Toronto, so I can clearly not choose Philadelphia
  • Philadelphia has a winning away record while the Rock have a losing home record, so I can clearly not choose Toronto
  • Toronto is the reigning NLL Champion, so I can clearly not choose Philadelphia
  • Philadelphia beat Toronto in their last meeting, so I can clearly not choose Toronto
  • Toronto beat Philadelphia in the game before that, and by a greater goal differential, so I can clearly not choose Philadelphia
  • Philly has Kevin Crowley, a potential rookie of the year, as well as former MVP Dan Dawson, so I can clearly not choose Toronto
  • Toronto has perennial top scorer Josh Sanderson and former MVP Colin Doyle, so I can clearly not choose Philadelphia
  • Philly has beaten the Bandits twice this year while the Bandits beat Toronto in their only meeting, so I can clearly not choose Toronto

I decided to go with Toronto, and Philly won. After using my dizzying intellect to do all that analysis, I picked the game wrong. The real choice should have been obvious: don’t make picks.

Record: 16-25 (.390)

Game

Comments

Pick
BUF @ TOR I believe I’ve chosen the Rock to win every game they’ve played this year, so perhaps I am a homer when it comes to that. But in my defense, it’s not like the Rock is a terrible team and my picks make no sense. Could the Bandits beat the Rock in Toronto? Sure. The Rock are under .500 at home this year, Cosmo’s shaken off a lot of rust, and John Tavares has stolen a game or two in his career. But I seem to go with trends for my picks – until Buffalo proves to me that they are worthy of a pick (and losing 6 in a row is not the way to do that), I won’t be picking the Bandits. Rock5
MIN @ BUF Gotta go with Minnesota on this one, mainly for the same reason as above, though Minnesota has been playing really well lately, so I might have picked them even if Buffalo wasn’t last in the league. Swarm
EDM @ PHI Toughie of the week. I picked Philly to beat Edmonton a couple of weeks ago because the Wings were in first in the East and Edmonton was second-last in the west. The Rush won. Now Philly’s in first in the east and Edmonton is last in the west. I gotta go with the odds and pick Philly again. Wings

Previous weeks:

Week 1 – 0-1
Week 2 – 2-2
Week 3 – 2-2
Week 4 – 2-4
Week 5 – 2-2
Week 6 – 1-3
Week 7 – 2-2
Week 8 – 1-3
Week 9 – 2-2
Week 10 – 2-4

Week 10 picks

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And my streak continues. Other than week 1 which only consisted of a single game, I am 2-2 in every odd numbered week, and .500 or lower in every even numbered week. The last five weeks have alternated between 2-2 and 1-3, and that will end this week since there are six games.
John Grant will not be playing in Colorado’s two games this weekend, which may or may not make the picks in the Colorado games easier. After all, Rochester lost five players (including their top scorer) for one week and won, then lost when those players returned. I have said at least twice this season that Colorado’s offense was based mainly around Grant and if he were to get injured or started slumping, they wouldn’t be able to recover as well as other teams with more balanced offense. Now we’ll see how prescient those statements were.
Record: 14-21 (.400)

Game
Comments
Pick
CAL @ EDM Edmonton is a better team than their record indicates. If their offense can start clicking, their defense is good enough to make them contenders. But that has to start happening pretty soon, or it might be too late.  They’ve only had two home games, but they beat Philly last weekend at home, and they’ll be motivated to put on a good show for their Twitter jersey game. Rush
PHI @ TOR The Rock’s last four games were: two blowouts against Philly (one in each direction), then a convincing win against a good team (Rochester), and a humiliating loss against a bad team (Washington). Depending on which Rock team shows up this weekend, it could be good or it could be very bad for them. Philly’s on a two-game losing streak, but first place and the season series is on the line, so expect a hard-fought game. Rock
EDM @ CAL Yeah, the post-All-Star-game Rush will be better than the pre-All-Star-game Rush, but sweeping the Roughnecks? Not there yet. Roughnecks
WAS @ COL OMG look at me picking Washington. A couple of weeks ago this would have been a no-brainer: Colorado sweeps the Stealth, with the over-under on the weekend goal differential around 15. But since then the Mammoth have proved that they are beatable, and the Stealth have proved that there is indeed a good lacrosse team buried under there somewhere. The Stealth’s fortunes will continue – for one game, anyway. I actually made this pick before it was announced that Grant would be out, but I’m a little more confident in it now. Stealth
BUF @ ROC Buffalo can’t lose six in a row, can they? Well, I also thought they couldn’t lose three in a row, or four, or five. I expect Cosmo to have a better game as he shakes off more rust, but the Knighthawks are getting great production out of Cody Jamieson and great leadership and production out of Mike Accursi, and Matt Vinc had a great game against Philly. Hawks in a close one. Knighthawks
COL @ WAS Yeah, the post-All-Star-game Stealth will be better than the pre-All-Star-game Stealth, but sweeping the Mammoth? Not there yet. Mammoth

Previous weeks:
Week 1 – 0-1
Week 2 – 2-2
Week 3 – 2-2
Week 4 – 2-4
Week 5 – 2-2
Week 6 – 1-3
Week 7 – 2-2
Week 8 – 1-3
Week 9 – 2-2

NLL Mid-season report: West division

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Following my recent mid-season report on the East, let’s take a look at the NLL West. We have two awesome teams, one in the middle (but on the high side), and one not scoring but doing very well defensively. And the Stealth.

 

Roughnecks Calgary Roughnecks

Offense: A+

Best in the league, at 13.6 goals per game. They only have one player in the top ten in scoring, but five in the top 25. Hell, even their goalie is averaging more than a point per game. They haven’t scored fewer than 12 goals in any game, and scored 21 last week against a previously-undefeated team. They’ve only lost twice, both in overtime. With a couple of lucky bounces, the Roughnecks could easily be 7-0.

Defense: A

Only one team has allowed fewer goals than the Roughnecks, and that’s the Rush who also have a great defense, but have played one fewer game. Note that the Bandits have also played one fewer game than Calgary, but Buffalo has allowed one more goal. In terms of average, the Roughies are second-best in the league, with 10.7 goals against per game. In their five wins, they’ve only allowed as many as 11 goals once. Mike Poulin is one of the best goalies in the league, Nick Rose is better than average as a backup, and Frankie Scigliano made his NLL debut a couple of weeks ago and allowed 5 goals in 35 minutes for a sparkling 8.56 GAA. Add in defenders and transition guys like Geoff Snider, Curtis Manning, Andrew McBride, and Mike Carnegie, and the Roughnecks don’t even need a great offense to be successful.

Overall: A+

But they do have a great offense. They don’t have the best record in the league right now, but I’d call them the best team in the league.

 

Mammoth Colorado Mammoth

Offense: A

Only Calgary has averaged more goals per game than the Mammoth’s 13.3. Of course, the fact that John Grant is playing out of his mind right now is a large part of that. Grant is not averaging 10 points per game anymore, he’s down to a measly 8.4. Grant has 59 points in 7 games – only 22 players had more than that last season. If his production for the rest of the season drops by 50%, he will still end up with more points than anyone had last year. Oh yeah, and they also have Gavin Prout, early Rookie of the Year candidate Adam Jones, and Sean Pollock who are all in the top 20 in scoring.

After that though, it drops off significantly. Jamie Lincoln has 15 points, but nobody else has more than 6. That’s the problem with having such a dominant superstar (if you can call having a player of Grant’s calibre a “problem”) – if he gets injured or hits a multi-week slump, the Mammoth are in less of a position to recover than, say, the Roughnecks.

Defense: B+

The Mammoth are fifth with 12 goals against per game. If you take out the Calgary loss, they’d be second at 10.5. They gave up 14 goals in their first game, then the numbers dropped steadily until they were down to 7 in back-to-back weeks. Then Calgary came in and blew them away. Still, that’s only one game, so we’ll give them the benefit of the doubt for now. Chris Levis is having his second straight great season. Imagine how good this team would be if Mac Allen wasn’t hurt.

Overall: A

It may seem weird to rank the Roughnecks higher than the Mammoth considering the Mammoth have a better record. It’s not like the Mammoth are overachieving and have beaten a bunch of weak teams – they are definitely a strong team, and if Grant stays hot and Levis continues to play well, they could have an amazing year. But I really believe the Roughnecks are better overall.

 

Rush Edmonton Rush

Offense: F

The top two scorers on the Rush are tied for 27th in the league. They have scored 10.7 goals per game, the second-worst in the league. They have less than 10 goals in 3 of their 6 games thus far, though they did score 16 against the Stealth. Shawn Williams is on pace for 64 points, his lowest total since 2000 when he only played 10 games.

Defense: A+

Wow. Just, wow. The Rush have given up an average of 10.2 goals per game, the best in the league by half a goal. Strangely, they’re even better away from Rexall Place, giving up a stingy 9.5 goals per game compared with the 11.5 at home. They’ve lost Chris Corbeil to injury, but still have Kyle Rubisch, Brett Mydske, top Money Baller Derek Suddons, Ryan Dilks, Jarrett Toll, and captain Jimmy Quinlan. There was word that the Rush were going to trade Paul Rabil to the Bandits for Jeremy Thompson or to the Knighthawks for Jordan Hall but they don’t need transition or defense. They need scoring.

Overall: C+

The Rush are the new Mammoth. Last year’s Colorado Mammoth also had a very good defense (though not this good) and a really bad offense. Of course, the Mammoth are kicking butt this year, so maybe the Rush have that to look forward to next year. Giving up Brodie Merrill for Iannucci Rabil nothing hasn’t hurt the defense at all, (how good would the defense be with Brodie?) but the offense needs help.

 

Swarm Minnesota Swarm

Offense: B+

Callum Crawford, Ryan Benesch, and Kevin Ross are leading the Swarm offense, no surprise there. But four of the next five are surprising: rookies Jordan MacIntosh, Corbyn Tao, and Jay Card along with 2nd year transition guy and captain Andrew Suitor, who has already eclipsed his 10 points from last year. The Swarm are fourth in the league in scoring, with 12.6 goals per game.

Defense: B

After the Blazers expansion draft, we thought the Swarm goalies this year might be Anthony Cosmo and Nick Patterson, a more than acceptable combo. Turns out to be neither one, and the Swarm went with rookie Tyler Carlson who has been very good and rookie Evan Kirk who has been outstanding. The Swarm are seventh with 11.6 goals against, but are improving – they’ve only given up more than 9 goals in one of their last four games. Their home goals against average is 9.5, almost two full goals better than anyone else. The defense has tended to be great in the wins (opposing scores are 11, 9, 6, and 7), but not very good at all in two of the three losses (scores of 20, 16, and 12).

Overall: B

With all the young kids, you might think this is a team that will be good in a few years, and I’m sure they will. But they’re also good right now.  The Minnesota Swarm have never won a playoff game, but they definitely have as good a shot this year as they’ve ever had.

 

Stealth Washington Stealth

Offense: F

The loss of Luke Wiles was pretty big, but not this big. The Stealth are dead last in the league, only scoring 9.3 goals per game. They’re the only team under ten, and 1.4 goals behind Edmonton. As Stephen Stamp and Ty Pilson discussed on last week’s Boxla Beat, the problem is simple: Ratcliff and Duch are just not scoring. Ratcliff has 15 goals on a league-leading 97 shots on goal – compare that to Curtis Dickson, who has 15 on only 60 shots, or John Grant, with 27 goals on 86 shots. Now Duch is injured and Jeff Zywicki is back, but that’s a wash at best. The addition of Athan Iannucci hasn’t helped much so far, but once he shakes off the rust he could make a big difference.

Defense: F

The Stealth are also dead last in this category, giving up 13 goals per game – 14 at home. They’ve given up 15 or more goals three times. Chris Seidel has played 93 minutes and leads the team with a brutal 12.26 GAA. Tyler Richards has a 77.5% save percentage, which is not bad (5th in the league). But his GAA of 12.58 is only good for twelfth among goalies – and this is a nine-team league, so three backups (including his own) are ahead of him in that category. Richards is also injured now, so unless Seidel and newcomer Matt King can stop the bleeding, things may get worse before they get better.

Overall: F

Sorry Stealth fans, but there are no two ways around it. The Stealth have sucked so far this year. Chris Hall returned to the bench for the last game, which didn’t have the impact on the team that I was expecting, but I don’t know how many of the practices and such before that game he was able to attend. Maybe once he’s running the whole show, the team will start playing like the team that went to the last two Championship games but right now, that’s certainly not how the Stealth look.

The Stealth have the same problem as the 1992 Orlando Magic, whose GM Pat Williams said “We can’t win at home. We can’t win on the road. As general manager, I just can’t figure out where else to play.“

Week 8 picks

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Like fellow Rock fan and blogger Jon Turner, I had another 2-2 week. I’ve now gone 2-2 in four of the seven weeks so far this season, which means I’m better than .500 this year at having .500 weeks! In terms of my picks, I had a pretty average week, but outside of that, it wasn’t an average week at all. Not only did my sister have a baby on Sunday (totally not lacrosse-related, but pretty freakin’ awesome), but I will be posting my first-ever interview here on NLL Chatter tomorrow. If those weren’t awesome enough, there’s more. I posted an article about Geoff Snider, which he read and liked. But wait! There’s still more! Again like Jon Turner, I also won a trivia contest on Twitter today run by the Toronto Rock. The third  question of the day was “Who was the other goalie alongside Whipper on the 1988 Founders Cup Champion KW Braves?” and I was the first to answer Steve Dietrich (full disclosure: a somewhat educated guess on my part, in that I was pretty sure Chugger was from K-W), so I won an autographed All-Star Card and lacrosse ball.

So I’m now 5 games below .500 overall, which means that even if I go 4-0 this week, I’ll still be under .500. But this is the week, I just know it. This is the week where…. ah, who am I kidding? Let’s just get to my random guesses predictions for week 8:

Record: 11-16 (.407)

Game
Comments
Pick
CAL @ COL If anyone can beat the Mammoth, it’s the Roughnecks, and I wouldn’t be shocked if they did. But as I said last week, I’m just going to keep picking Colorado until they lose. Mammoth
PHI @ EDM Philly’s first in the east, Edmonton is second-last in the west. Easy pick, right? If you think so, you’re new to this game. There are no easy picks. Could the Rush pull off the upset and beat the Wings? Sure they could, and I almost picked them to beat the Wings. But then I remembered last week’s game against the Rock. The Wings offense is starting to click, and their defense was outstanding. Wings
ROC @ TOR This will be a tough one for the Rock. They got spanked by the Wings last week so they’ll be angry. But Rochester pulled out a gutsy win last week without their top scorer and a bunch of other starters, and those guys are all back this week. I think Matt Roik will rebound from last week and the Rock will head into the All-Star game above .500 – unlike myself. Rock
MIN @ WAS Another tough one but coaching comes into play in this game, almost more than the players. Minnesota has been playing well of late but inexplicably fired coach Mike Lines yesterday. This game will be Joe Sullivan’s first as head coach, and also marks the return of Chris Hall to the Stealth bench. I think Hall’s return after fighting cancer will be a huge lift to the team, and might just turn their season around. Stealth
West @ East I’ll make a couple of predictions on the All-Star game: (1) My younger son will be playing on his iPod at some point during the game, causing me to question buying him a ticket. (2) Getting out of the parking lot after the game will be a nightmare. (3) Over/under on goals scored: 35, and I’m taking the over. ?

Previous weeks:

Week 1 – 0-1

Week 2 – 2-2

Week 3 – 2-2

Week 4 – 2-4

Week 5 – 2-2

Week 6 – 1-3

Week 7 – 2-2

Week 7 picks

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Statistics are funny. If I were to flip a coin to make my picks each week, odds are that I’d end the season around .500. What does it mean when the coin-flip method would give you a better record than me, five of the seven IL Indoor writers posting their picks, and three of the five In Lax We Trust writers? We all follow the league closely and we know the teams and players and what they can do. We’re not going to get everything right, of course, and there are going to be teams and players that play better or worse than you think they will. But shouldn’t we be able to do better than random chance at our game predictions? You might think so, but obviously, you’d be wrong.

So there was a big trade this week, which will affect two of the games below. Paul Rabil has struggled a little this year, like the rest of his former Stealth teammates, so will his change of scenery give him a boost? And will Athan Iannucci, in his first game of the year, give the Stealth’s offense the spark they so desperately need?

Record: 9-14 (.391)

Game

Comments

Pick
EDM @ CAL Edmonton just got better by adding Paul Rabil (assuming he plays, and there are rumours that he won’t), but how long will it take him to learn the Rush system and be able to really contribute? Might take a couple of games, might take 5 or 10 minutes. Either way, Calgary is a formidable opponent, so I’m going to have to go with the Roughies here. Roughnecks
COL @ MIN I don’t follow the NFL at all but I won an NFL pool a few years ago, when the Patriots were at their peak. One of my “strategies” was “always take the Patriots”, and it almost always paid off. The Mammoth are like that now. I like the direction the Swarm are going and after their two-win weekend, I’m sure they have a lot of confidence. I don’t think the Mammoth will go 16-0 this year, but I just can’t bring myself to bet against them yet. Mammoth
WAS @ ROC Recent circumstances (and I’m not talking about the Iannucci trade) make this a easier pick. Rochester will be without their leading scorer Cody Jamieson, as well as Jordan Hall, Travis Hill, Sid Smith, and Tyler Burton. Of course this doesn’t mean that they will lose, but it certainly doesn’t help. Iannucci will be pumped to play well enough to make people forget about the whole holdout thing. Stealth
PHI @ TOR Toronto dominated Philadelphia prison-style (continuing with the Iannucci theme) in their last meeting, and they’ve had a week off, and Colin Doyle will likely be returning to action. Philly has since beaten the Bandits so I can’t see this being the cakewalk that the last game seemed to be, but I still think the Rock will take this one. Rock

 

Previous weeks:

Week 1 – 0-1
Week 2 – 2-2
Week 3 – 2-2
Week 4 – 2-4
Week 5 – 2-2
Week 6 – 1-3

Iannucci for Rabil: Who won the trade

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The Athan Iannucci era ended in Edmonton the other day. The stats: zeroes across the board. But the Washington Stealth don’t care about that, they’re just concerned with the more important number associated with Iannucci: 71, the record-setting number of goals he scored in 2008 when he was league MVP. This number was so intriguing to the Stealth that they were willing to give up a player who has been called “the best lacrosse player in the world”, Paul Rabil. That quote was referring to field lacrosse, not box, but Rabil is no slouch in the indoor game either. But who really wins this trade?

After being sent to Edmonton in the biggest trade of the last off-season, Athan Iannucci never reported to the Rush because he never signed a contract. The details of the negotiations were never released, but there were rumours that Nooch was asking for top dollar on a multi-year contract. Iannucci himself said that this wasn’t the case and that there would be players in the league making double what he was asking for. Rush owner Bruce Urban said that what Iannucci was asking for, specifically in the second year, was not allowed by the CBA. Regardless, the Rush started the season without Nooch and it quickly became clear that he was unlikely to suit up for them.

I remember watching Iannucci in a playoff game in Buffalo during his 2008 MVP season. He just had a presence when he was on the floor. You knew that every defender was watching him and yet it seemed that he could score at will anyway. The only other player I’ve seen with that level of dominance is John Grant. But Grant has kept up that dominance for a decade, and this season it seems stronger than ever. Iannucci, on the other hand, had injury problems and only played 10 games in the 2009 season and missed 2010 entirely. He returned last year, apparently back to full health, but wasn’t nearly as dominant, only racking up 29 goals and 61 points in 13 games. Neil Stevens from Lacrosse Magazine points out that he only played in one playoff game, a loss, in his “five years with Philadelphia” (which was really four because of the year he didn’t play) but that’s hardly Iannucci’s fault – the Wings had sucked for years before Nooch got there, and he did score four goals in that one playoff game.

Dominance aside, Iannucci’s numbers make him look like the prototypical “ball hog” during his MVP season – he only had 29 assists to go with his 71 goals. John Grant, on the other hand, has had more assists than goals in 9 of his 11 NLL seasons. Now Iannucci didn’t have Shawn Williams, Scott and Shawn Evans, Cory Bomberry, and Craig Point to pass to in Philadelphia, so perhaps that’s an unfair comparison. But Bob Chavez at IL Indoor recently ranked Iannucci as the 16th best player in the league saying that, in short, he’s back. In 15 playoff games with the Langley Thunder this past summer, Nooch picked up 45 points, helping the Thunder to their first Mann Cup appearance. It would not surprise me if Stealth GM Doug Locker was at one or more of those games, and liked what he saw.

Paul Rabil has been one of the best transition players in the NLL for three years. He is, as I said, widely known as one of the best field lacrosse players in the world – he’s been named MLL MVP twice, MLL Offensive Player of the Year twice, and MVP of the World Lacrosse Championship in 2010. His shot has been clocked at a blistering 111 mph. He was a big part of Washington’s 2010 and 2011 NLL Championship appearances, and seemed to be one of the faces of the Stealth franchise along with Rhys Duch and Lewis Ratcliff. Given his offensive success in the MLL, he can obviously be a scoring threat, but he’s listed as a transition player and that’s how he’s primarily been used.

But Washington’s problem this year is not transition, it’s offense. Even including Rabil, they have three players with more than 10 points after five games – and one of those three only has 11. Tyler Richards, the starting goalie, is tied for 7th on the team in points. Unless they convert Rabil to be a full-time forward, he can only have so much of an impact. Iannucci, on the other hand, is pure offense. I honestly don’t know how good of a defensive player he is, and with the new rules promoting transition, it’s more likely than in previous years that he’ll be caught on the floor and have to play some defense – this is true for all offensive players, not just Nooch.

On the assumption that Iannucci is average defensively (i.e. not a superstar but not a pylon either), it would seem that the Stealth are willing to give up some transition and defense for a ton of offense, which is what they need. The Rush gain a great transition player while giving up nobody from their starting roster. There are still rumours that Rabil is not finished being moved, and that he may come even further east, in which case he’s trade bait, and the Rush will still get something significant for him. It’s hard to say that they got Rabil for free though, even if Iannucci never played for them, considering they did give up Brodie Merrill to get Iannucci. The Rush also receive a first-round draft pick for next year from the Stealth, while Washington gets the Rush’s second round pick. Note that this brings the total count of first round draft picks Edmonton has received for Brodie up to four (over the next three years).

I think the Stealth did improve in an area that they absolutely had to improve in, and so this was a pretty good move for them. I’d have to call Edmonton the winner though, considering they got one of the most exciting and dynamic players in the game, gave up nothing from the roster that played their first four games, and upgraded a second round pick to a first. As with all trades though, we’ll have to revisit this after the season ends, or even a year or two down the road, and see how it really played out.

Week 6 picks

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Another 2-2 week in week 5. I was right about Colorado being on a roll, and the Rock starting to look like the Rock again, but I thought the Bandits would return to playing like the 2-0 Bandits rather than the Bandits from last weekend, and I thought the Minnesota-Rochester game was just too close to call. The Rock and Mammoth are off this week, while Minnesota plays twice and interestingly, both are home games.

Record: 8-11 (.421)

Game

Comments

Pick
EDM @ MIN Will this be the “Battle of the Basement”? Washington is currently in last overall but nobody thinks they’ll stay there. Minnesota has looked pretty good so far, but I’m going to go with my prediction at the beginning of the year that Edmonton will be a stronger team than the Swarm. Rush
CAL @ WAS Washington finally has a win, and they’ll be hungry to make up those games that they lost. But even if the Stealth were playing at their full potential, I think Calgary is a better team. Another battle of the Sniders – we know that one of them won’t be winning 60+% of the face-offs. Roughnecks
ROC @ MIN Rochester’s starting to play really well but this is similar to both of the previous picks in that nobody would look at you funny for picking either one. I’m going with Cody Jamieson to continue his hot streak and Matt Vinc to shut the door at the other end. Knighthawks
BUF @ PHI Can Buffalo lose four games in a row? No chance, right? Well, I wouldn’t have thought they could lose three in a row, but it happened. Obviously every team hates to lose, but if I had to pick a team that hates to lose more than the rest, it would be the Bandits. I think they will be back with a vengeance this weekend. Bandits