NLL Insider

Welcome to the season’s final installment of the Fantasy Fix column.

Seems like the year just flew by, didn’t it? Now all we have to look forward to is the Ted Jenner victory party (see picture). And just so it’s clear, that little guy there is Paul Tutka. After all, it’s only reasonable to believe that they’re going to party together.

Anyway, to end our little ride, I wanted to switch it up from what I’ve been doing the past 16 weeks. Rather than me telling you which guy that I think will tear it up out on the carpet this week, which one won’t, and me ultimately being wrong on both, I wanted to talk about one of the biggest intangibles in sports, and truly one of the hardest things to quantify - Motivation.

The NLL is unlike most of the other professional sports leagues in that money is not a really a motivation factor. In the NFL of MLB, you often hear about someone playing in a “Contract Year”, or guys signing incentive-laden deals. And kind of on that same note, it’s rare to hear about a guy dogging it out on the floor because he wants to be traded.

These are things that happen in the high dollar industry that is pro athletics, but not something that can be included in a conversation about the oldest professional lacrosse league.

To me, that’s refreshing. But that aside, the reason I’m discussing it in regards to fantasy lacrosse is because it also points to the fact that there are many other elements that are motivating these guys to go out there each week, beat their bodies up to an unimaginable degree, and put their talents on display.

It’s another intangible, but I think one of the biggest motivators for these is Pride. Every time someone suits up for their team in the NLL, I think there is a significant amount of pride on the line, and the only way to gauge “the winner” in a battle of pride is to actually determine a winner and a loser, thus the outcome of a game actually resolving this factor.

Plus, a lot of these guys grew up playing one another, and after the season is over, will head North to continue these individual battles, only with new rosters. For some players, showing they can match wits, or beat their opponents, is all the motivation one needs.

Next, as it always is, Playing Time is another stimulus for these weekend titans. The last thing you want to do is travel however many miles each week only to strap it up as a practice squad guy, or as a healthy scratch. Because when the arena is filling in, you’ve laced up your jersey, and you can smell the stink of the locker room, you want to be out there cracking skulls and scoring goals, just like everyone else. P.T. is a great motivator, and one that will certainly apply this weekend as guys try to show their worth before the next wave of newbies enters the league, trying to take their spots.

Finally, I’ll call the last factor that I will discuss, Impact. If you can go out, play a game, and despite the result, have almost no tangible impact, there isn’t much motivation there. It would be like if you spent 10 years working on your life’s work, and you accomplished quite a bit, but no one noticed. You might justifiably be a little peeved at the conclusion of your masterpiece.

So for NLL players this week, think about what they can accomplish with a win versus a loss. If the answer is unchanged based on the result, you have to question the motivation driving them toward a particular goal.

For example, that’s why if I were playing in my fantasy final (Arggh, I’m not!), I would sit anyone from Edmonton, Chicago or Toronto. All of you that aren’t buying this are saying, “This guy’s crazy, no way I sit so and so…” But when you blow the bragging rights from the championship because you didn’t listen, I have no problem being right there in the back of your head saying, “I told you so.”

Now the $1 million question - How does any of this apply to Fantasy Lacrosse? Well, smart guy, I’m about to tell you.

Base your lineups for the championship (if you’re in it of course) on what the motivations of your players are. If a player on your roster has nothing to lose, but nothing to gain, you’ve gotta’ bench ‘em. If they have important playoff seeding to determine, or are fighting for their playoff lives, you go ahead and start them.

Certainly some of things that I brought up, like Pride and P.T. will always have a bearing, but realize there are degrees of motivation too, and it is up to you to figure out which factors trump each other. That’s why you are the decision-maker, and I am merely the hermit living in a cave that you come to for advice.

For instance, if you’re deciding between a star on the LumberJax and another top player on the Knighthawks, going by the theory I’ve presented to you today, you’ve got to go with the guy playing for Rochester. He has a higher motivating factor - win or go home - versus the Portland player’s mentality of “Beat Buffalo“, and get a higher seed, but remain on the road for Round One of the playoffs.

Of course, these things won’t work 100 percent across the board, but like I’ve been telling you all season long, you have to play it like a game of Blackjack. By that, I mean that you have to play the odds almost entirely, and then pick and choose maybe one risk that isn’t quite in your favor every once and again, just to keep it interesting, and because it can make you look like a genius.

So use these motivators not as a Be all, End all, but rather, as a guide to winning your championship.

Closing Notes:

A great bit of thanks goes out to all those who sent in questions this season and to everyone for reading - whether you bad mouthed me on the Wingzone blogs, or just in your head. It’s been my absolute pleasure steering you every which way on managing your rosters and doing my best to provide you good fantasy counsel.

Best of luck to you all as we close out the fantasy season, and as we all look forward to the NLL playoffs. It’s gonna’ be great!

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