Overview:
Evan Schemenauer is a Saskatoon based NLL writer. Random thoughts is a weekly column which outlines a wide variety of thoughts that Evan has on the NLL and lacrosse world!
Note: The opinions in this column are Evan's personal thoughts. They do not reflect the opinions of other members of the LC Daily Staff.
First, welcome to my first Random Thoughts on Lacrosse Culture Daily. This is an exciting time. When Lacrosse Flash went on hiatus, I wanted to take some time and make sure that Random Thoughts was moving to the right place, and when Lacrosse Culture got a hold of me to join the group, I knew right away this would be the right fit.
Little did I know at the time that other members of the Lacrosse Flash family had made the same decision. So while we have a new family, we still have the old family, and the Lax Flash family is still very much a family. With that, let’s get going!
Can Someone Explain What’s Going On?
This NLL season has become the least predictable season I can ever recall. People might use the word parity, but that’s not exactly correct. There are teams at 6-1 and 6-2 alongside one team at 2-6. But this season is simply unpredictable. I’ve had people tell me they’re flipping a coin or turning on auto picks in Who Ya Gott (my picks contest) because of this unpredictability.
I’ve discussed at length that nobody could possibly have predicted that Albany would start the season 6-0. For six straight weeks they were the underdog. Then they finally become the favourites and then lose two straight. This past week, they played Vegas, without Doug Jamieson in the lineup due to injury.
Even so, they still have Justin Geddie. And they’re playing Vegas, at home, in what is likely the worst road trip Vegas has to make all season, who was just coming off an embarrassing defeat at home. The thought of many was that Geddie would be just fine, and indeed he was. Geddie allowed just 9 goals on 54 shots (0.833 save %). On any given weekend, that should be enough to get you the win.
The Firewolves started the game up 3-0 in the opening quarter. And then the scoring went bone dry. They went 29 minutes without a goal, but even then, that goal with five minutes left in the third tied the game at four. I watched this game in utter bewilderment that this young, exciting offence continued to go cold in a 9-6 final. Is this a loss that will come back to haunt Albany when the regular season comes to an end?
Vegas is perhaps the biggest example of unpredictability. At 3-4, Vegas has surprised Panther City at home in overtime after tying the game on a buzzer beater, beaten San Diego at home and now beat Albany on the road, while racking up lopsided losses to Saskatchewan (17-5), Calgary (17-11) and Panther City (21-12). Vegas currently holds the final playoff spot despite these crazy results.
Last week I broke down stats for Vancouver and Colorado when they win and lose. Here’s the same numbers for Vegas.
When they win, they average 10.00 goals for, 8.00 goals against and have a 0.843 save %.
When they lose, they have a near identical offensive output, 9.50 GF, but 16.75 GA and a save % of 0.667.
That’s a whopping 8.25 GA and 0.175 SV% difference when they lose. If the defense and goaltending can get some consistency, they’ll be fine, but without it, they’ll be in trouble. Despite these blowout losses, Vegas still holds the final playoff spot as of now.
Then there’s Panther City who just came off a record-breaking win, come into Saskatchewan who hasn’t won a home game in 10 months and sits in last place, and the offense comes to a grinding halt in a 10-9 loss. Seeing this game in person, I could come up with a number of ways that Panther City lost this game, but that wouldn’t be fair in a one goal loss.
Panther City has on its resume a disappointing comeback loss against Vegas and a tough loss in Saskatchewan, where just the slightest improvement in each game has them at 5-2 instead of 3-4. Once again, these tough losses may come back to haunt them come April.
Then there is Buffalo where there are some worrying signs. They sit in 4th place at 5-3, but they’re averaging 12.38 GA per game. This isn’t the normal Matt Vinc and it’s not the normal Buffalo defence. In their last four games, they’ve allowed 13, 15, 14 and 14 goals. They’re a bit fortunate they’ve won three of those four games. It’s a pattern they need to fix quickly.
Then there’s the Riptide who we all questioned after they started the year 0-3 and the offence had gone dead cold, to turn it around and now sit at 4-4. Much like the Bandits, they’ve won a few of those games in shootouts. Their win this weekend against Calgary was a far better defensive effort however.
Speaking of Calgary, their 2-5 record has to be a shock to everyone. Yes, there is no Curt Malawsky, but a drop off this steep after a season where they broke their team record for wins in a season is terribly disappointing. They haven’t played much at home going into this past weekend, but back to back losses at home to New York and Toronto isn’t going to help matters.
Christian Del Biano hasn’t been as lights out as he was a year ago. The transition game isn’t what it used to be. The number of turnovers against New York led coach Josh Sanderson to call out his team in a post-game press conference. But here’s a crazy stat. Calgary has 80 GF and 77 GA this season. Yes, a 2-5 team has a positive goal ratio. Their two wins have been by an average of 6.50 goals. Their five losses have been by an average of 2.00 goals.
And finally, there is Saskatchewan who finally broke the home losing streak with Derek Keenan on the bench. Keenan didn’t seem to say much on the bench, but he was likely the calming factor the team needed that freed Jimmy Quinlan to focus on the offense. Saskatchewan has numbers just like Calgary, 72 GF and 69 GA, with these stats being skewed by a 12-goal win in Vegas.
Once again, there are the what ifs. What if they pulled off the overtime win against Albany. What if they didn’t blow the 4th quarter lead against Vancouver. I still believe they need to win two of their next three games during a stretch of games against teams they’re in a playoff battle with to make the playoffs.
Video Review
The video review system in the NLL isn’t perfect, but I’m not expecting perfection when the league has budget limitations. Teddy Jenner stated in his Burning Takes that the NLL needs to adopt a VAR system, but then clarified he’s looking more to a central command system that the NHL employs than a full VAR system that FIFA and most top football leagues around the world use.
Once again, we need to keep budget limitations in mind. The Scottish Premier League pays $1.6 million USD per year to have their VAR system. Tennis tournaments use a Hawkeye system to judge line calls, and it’s been an amazing innovation in tennis to eliminate human error on line calls. But the system costs a tournament around $100,000 per location to rent for the week. These are figures the NLL can’t afford, and whether a chip can be inserted into a lacrosse ball and maintain its elasticity I do not know.
The central command concept I do like though. In the NHL, they have a central office in Toronto that can buzz down to the penalty box if something needs to be reviewed. This is perhaps more critical in lacrosse given that you have additional dimensions to whether a goal was legally scored, including the shot clock and crease violations. Rather than having the challenge system on goals, and where you’re reliant on having the correct replay on the scoreboard, or on a no goal call, whether you get a replay at all, you have a system where command central can make the call to the floor.
On a goal that they may have to overturn, they can halt play before the next face off takes place. On a no goal call, play can continue while command central reviews the play. If it is a good goal, they buzz the shot clock operator to stop play, or if there is something close that still requires reviewed, they can halt play at the next whistle.
The best replay system still requires having the proper camera angles to produce the necessary results. In Philadelphia, the overhead cam doesn’t show the entire crease. In Rochester, there isn’t an overhead cam. And this week we saw two weaknesses in Georgia’s system. The first is that the overhead is zoomed out so far that it makes close crease violations hard to spot. But the bigger flaw showed up in overtime.
Andew Kew scored the game winner 81 seconds into overtime, but the controversy was regarding the shot clock and whether it expired before the ball crossed the line. There are two issues at hand here. First, the shot clock rule in the NLL is that the ball must cross the goal line, hit the goaltender, or hit the post prior to the shot clock hitting zero.
This is a difference from the PLL and the NBA, where the ball has to be released prior to the expiration of the shot clock. I far prefer the release rule because it’s easier to determine when the ball left the player’s stick/hand before the shot clock expires instead of when the ball enters the goal/basket.
After Kew scores, a very lengthy review takes place, and then Mark Gardonio makes the only call he can. There is no camera angle available to him where the ball is when the shot clock hits zero, and he has to stick with the call on the floor of a good goal. Looking at this closer, frame by frame, the shot clock on the score line on the television screen hits zero with the ball still in Kew’s stick, but that is an unofficial clock.
Trying to see what I can see of the shot clock in an unclear picture, I would say the most likely outcome was that the shot clock hits zero while the ball is in flight. But can I say what I saw was undisputable, I can’t. I would have probably come to the same conclusion as Gardonio.
This loss took Vancouver to 2-6. If there are enough cameras to give the right angle, it doesn’t guarantee that Vancouver wins, but it still gives them a shot. An overtime win puts Vancouver at 3-5 and within a half game of the playoffs. At 2-6, it’s going to be exceedingly difficult for them to make the playoffs, and that’s why its so critical to have the cameras in the right places.
A team’s destiny shouldn’t be decided by a lack of evidence on something there should be evidence for, to state the decision one way or another. Curt Malawsky was doing everything he could to not say anything bad about the officiating in his post-game interview with Ty Merrow. But he had to be frustrated by this outcome.
Gimmicks
This past week there was a lengthy rant on the NLL Discussion Page on Facebook regarding the, as the fan put it, “gimmicks” that teams are using to try to draw crowds and when the NLL can stop doing this and let the game sell itself.
For context, the fan is from Saskatchewan and was mostly upset at the festivities on Saturday night, with the Rush having a Febtoberfest, with $2 hot dogs, $5 beers, and Jay Onrait and Joey Chestnut for halftime entertainment. The fan also wasn’t happy with all the jersey auctions that were taking place and the lack of a panel on TSN and ESPN during the half.
I have to say that I agree very little with this fan’s standpoint. The only small portion that I agree with is that some teams have overkilled the jersey auction. There was one season in Saskatchewan where jersey auctions happened four times, although the fourth wasn’t planned and occurred in the wake of the Humboldt Broncos bus crash.
I think jersey auctions are a good thing if they are done in moderation. There is a large group of fans that want game worn memorabilia. And when you look at events such as Tucker Out Lymphoma nights in Buffalo and Vegas or Lacrosse Out Cancer night in Colorado, these are big events that draw larger than normal crowds, engage the audience and raise money for a good cause. Under no circumstances should these events be stopped.
The fan misses the mark on what he refers to as gimmicks and what I’ll refer to as part of the sports entertainment package. If I take Major League Baseball for instance and compare it at the age the NLL is today, they were using these theme nights or other spectacles for ages to draw crowds. I can recall the stories of a team allowing its fans to make all the managerial decisions one game in the 1950’s. In another, a 4-foot-tall player was brought into a game once to draw a walk.
Even in 1979, the White Sox held an infamous Disco Demolition Night. To this day, many teams in the big 4 leagues use theme nights to try to draw a crowd.
If you look at the most successful NHL team in recent memory, the Vegas Golden Knights, the spectacle that is put on for the crowd’s entertainment is second to none, and I can’t stress enough that every fan should attend a VGK game if presented the chance.
They still have the Showgirls, the drum line, the fortress on one end of the arena, the spectacular pre-game show on the ice, and celebrities coming in to sound the horn at the beginning of each period. Selling sports in any league is as much about entertaining the fans while play isn’t going on as it is while the play is going on.
If we didn’t have the entertainment at NLL games, including the music, the theme nights, the goal horns, the goal songs and dances, what are we left with? We’re left with what is the game itself, and that’s what the WLA and MSL offer. The crowds outside of Peterborough and Victoria are tiny and are mostly restricted to hardcore lacrosse enthusiasts and family and friends. That won’t pay the bills in the NLL.
When the Rush first arrived in Saskatoon, of the 15,000 people in the stands, less than 1,000 had ever played lacrosse. It’s the high adrenaline party atmosphere that drew a lot of people, which was assisted by a great team on the floor. Early in the first season, the Seattle Seahawks cheerleaders were brought in and that alone brought several thousand new fans into the building.
Bringing in someone like Joey Chestnut is done because in many cases, these events work to bring people to the arena. Give the Preistners credit, despite a team that hasn’t been playing well, they’re doing what they can off the floor to try to draw a crowd.
Sometimes these events work and sometimes they don’t. Joey Chestnut wasn’t the draw the Rush were hoping for as they had their worst in-arena crowd of the season, around 4,000 to 5,000 people in the building.
One of the most infamous examples was the Swarm bringing in Ludacris to perform at halftime of the 2017 finals. It was a huge draw because it was cheap at $20/ticket to see Luda for a 15-minute set, even if you could care less about lacrosse. It drew a huge crowd that night, but it wasn’t as sustained as the Swarm were hoping for. But once again, they tried.
As for the broadcasts, a halftime panel simply isn’t in the cards for several reasons. One of them being the cost of flying in a panel to a central location each week. Another being the staggered start of game times. Staggered start times are a necessity because the NLL still relies on gate revenue for most of its revenue base and each market needs to adjust to what works best for their market to maximize intake.
We would love to have all these bells and whistles, with the best producers in the world each game, but there are budget limitations.
Old Time Lacrosse
On Monday night we were pleasantly surprised when the NLL released a 2.5-minute skit featuring Pat Gregoire and Connor Kearnan reenacting the opening scene in the 1977 classic move Slapshot. While Pat Gregoire did a good job of re-enacting Jim Carr, it was Connor Kearnan that stole the show, putting on a near perfect re-enactment of Denis Lemieux.
For those that haven’t seen the original scene, or the NLL’s release, I’m including the links below.
Slap Shot opening scene:
And the NLL re-enactment:
This was one of the biggest fan engagements on social media for the NLL in some time, and even led Steve Carlson, who plays the infamous Steve Hanson in the movie Slapshot, to give a shoutout to lacrosse.
Let’s hope that videos like this crossover to Slapshot fans that don’t know lacrosse yet, and maybe will experience it for the first time.
Until next time…