NLL Insider

Canadians are weird.

When I was a rookie in the NLL (the first time in 1998) I played for the New York Saints. I guess to say “played” is overstating my service; I belonged to the New York Saints. I spent a year on the practice squad and another on the roster, driving from Long Island to Brooklyn every weekend at 8 a.m. to hopefully one day get a crack at the lineup.

I cracked three times; I scored a goal, got beat up by Andy Ogilvie in front of mom and dad, and obviously, as any Saints fan in the late 90s knows, lost three games.

During my abridged stint with the St. Bernards, two things were evident: we sucked, and we didn’t have many Canucks. Now, 10 years later, I have discovered that these truths were not only correlational but also conditional. Meaning, we sucked because we didn’t have any Tragically Hip loving, Roots wearing, Pamela Anderson claiming, Alan Thicke yearning…you get the picture.

Sure, I played with Gee String Nash and Jay Wulder back on Strong Island, but they were the exceptions and not the rule. The franchise believed that fans from LI wanted to see LI talent play. This was a miscalculation; fans want to see wins, they could care less if their paperboy is out there getting worked over.

It pains me to say it, but Americans need time to learn this game. With so few spots up for grabs each season, the learning curve often resembles a sympathetic phone call from a head coach, informing you that the team is just too deep this year, but you have a lot of potential. Or in my case with the Saints, a pink slip in the mail.

In my experience as an American field / indoor NLL player, it takes about three years to figure out what the hell is going on. Learning the two-man game, attempting to score while a man in a fat suit stands in front of a little square net, and trying to decipher a bastardized version of the English language that your Canadian teammates are mumbling are not skills that are picked up in four weekend cram sessions called training camp. American college players who do aspire to play in front of 18,000 fans in the NLL would probably be best served trying to play Junior in Canada during the summer.

This recommendation will surely be met with the following:

“I am so burned out, I need my summers off.”
“Go to Canada? It’s so cold.”
“There is more to life than lacrosse.”

Yes, there is indeed more to life than lacrosse. There are boring jobs to work, dirty diapers to change, and mounting bills to pay; BETTER GET LIVING.

Playing professional lacrosse may not pay all the bills, and your body may feel like that of Private Pile after a soap-in-sock beatdown by the rest of the platoon, but these are small prices to pay for getting to compete into adulthood.

Learn the game America, it is worth it!

Brian is in his seventh NLL season, his sixth with Colorado. The Hofstra grad comes off a career 67-point season and is starting a camp business called Unified Lacrosse. Contact him at brian.langtry@nllinsider.com.

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