Jamie Batley says Shawn Evans has been coddled for years

May 26th, 2008 by Paul Tutka

It’s been several weeks now that the rumours surfaced that Peterborough Lakers’ product, Shawn Evans, was interested in being dealt to the Six Nations Chiefs of the MSL, in what would be his first full year playing Sr. A lacrosse, after years of dominating the junior game.

And as NLL Insider reported last week, the deal some were calling as good as done in mid-May, is still not all that close to being finalized. Actually, “finalized” would imply a trade between Peterborough and Six Nations is on the horizon, but as the Peterborough Examiner reported earlier today, this thing’s so far from being on the horizon that the paper work for the trade is buried well behind a landscape of snow capped mountains.

Plus, it’s getting kinda ugly.

Peterborough Lakers’ GM and Head Coach, Jamie Batley, told the Examiner, “Our organization feels that (an Evans trade to Six Nations) would be a major mistake to trade someone of his calibre.”

“We feel we’ve coddled him since he was 16. The last three or four years he’s come up and helped us, and we appreciate that, but we’ve also opened the door for him to play. In doing so, we’ve neglected to develop some other players because we knew he’d be playing.”

Batley also says that little is being offered in return for Evans, who first played for the Sr. Lakers as a sixteen-year-old in 2003, winning two Mann Cups with the team in 2004 and 2006.

The Lakers split an opening double header with the St. Regis Indians this past weekend, where they were without not only Evans, but also John Grant, Tracey Kelusky, Dan Carey, Chris White, Kyle Laverty, Pat O’Toole, Scott Self, Brad Self and Brian Croswell. This on top of losing Scott Evans to an apparent rib injury sustained in the first game against the Indians. In the Lakers’ win over St. Regis, the team was led by Peterborough Jr. A stud, Josh Gillam., who finished up with a hat-trick.