Sept. 24, 2007

by Matt DaSilva, Lacrosse Magazine Online Staff

There's a lot of news coming out of the National Lacrosse League these days, the latest of which you'll find here on Lacrosse Magazine Online: the NLL has imposed an Oct. 15 deadline to reach a collective bargaining agreement with the Professional Lacrosse Players Association, or it will cancel the 2008 season.

Working on this story was interesting. I'm always interested in matters of the NLL, as it is as professional a structure as any in lacrosse.

The league draws over a million fans a year, makes good on most of its promises, represents a sustainable income for players and, in the cases of some teams, actually makes money. The NLL's following dips well outside the traditional lacrosse confines, and its New York-based league office is responsive to the needs of the players, owners and, as I have found in this latest inquiry, the media.

But sometimes it is stretched too thin. Perhaps unfairly, the NLL must be held to the standard it has created in its 21st-century growth.

For instance, although a high percentage of the league's players also play for other entities such as Major League Lacrosse in the U.S. and the Ontario Lacrosse Association and Western Lacrosse Association in Canada, the PLPA deals (and gripes) solely with the NLL.

PLPA president Peter Shmitz said NLL franchises have recently sold for as much as $3.5 million, compared to the $1.5 million Philadelphia Barrage general manager Keith Mecca is seeking for his three-time MLL championship team.

And yet, the MLL managed to secure a 10-year TV deal with ESPN2, while the NLL fiddled on Versus for a year and cannot lock a major network into a long-term deal. While that can be attributed to the time of year during which the respective leagues play, it does not help when a triennial face-off between the NLL and PLPA imperils the league's otherwise promising future.

For the most part, the league is on course for what it set out to do when Jim Jennings took over as commissioner in 2000. Jennings wants 24 teams and a 20-game schedule by 2011. If the NLL and PLPA do, in fact, agree to a new CBA by Oct. 15, it must be for at least five years to make that viable.

New proposals have popped up, like an NLL2 feeder league and an NLL outdoor league. Likewise, neither is viable without a long-term CBA.

There's an overriding perception among players that the NLL is more affluent than it is letting on - the PLPA even audited every franchise after finding the league's disclosed figures unsatisfactory. The players want an open-book policy regarding parent corporations, including NHL teams, in certain cases.

Truth is, at this point, the players need the league more than the league needs the players. It's like the NLL pays them just enough to rely on playing lacrosse as a source of income.

Schmitz, a former player with the Boston Blazers from 1992-96 who 15 years ago helped found the PLPA, is aware of this.

"To a large degree we are a reactive organization," he said. "We can't control our parents. At best, we can direct and encourage them to go in certain directions, hopefully to put ourselves in a position to maintain equity and the equitable interest of the players."

NLL deputy commissioner George Daniel, who after the 2007 stepped down as team president of the New York Titans to resume his post with the league office, has said the league is serious in its deadline. He cited the 12-day player strike in December 2003 as debilitating to the league's efforts to market teams that relocated to Arizona and San Jose for the 2004 season. The Arizona Sting played the first game ever at new Jobing.com Arena just 18 days after the strike was settled Dec. 18.

"I appreciate now more than ever how hard it is to sell tickets," Daniel said of his experience with the Titans. "Last year, I came on in late August and had about four months to get ready for opening day. That was hard enough to market New York and the rent for the [Madison Square] Garden. It's a huge undertaking. With the Titans, the Boston team, and in Chicago, owners are making huge financial commitments.

"This league needs labor unrest like a hole in the head. It's better business to just shut it down and not venture into that land of uncertainty. It gets to be a bigger black hole."

The NLL needs to make sure that its players are taken care of and that the PLPA is better informed of its financial plight, and the players need to agree to at least a five-year deal. If it means they're underpaid for a year or two if the league explodes unexpectedly, so be it. The only way it can get to that stage is if the NLL can commit its time and resources to what matters: the product.

More from the NLL

In other NLL news:

• Despite the potential imperilment of CBA negotiations the NLL announced the 2008 regular season schedule last week. Opening night is Saturday, Dec. 27, as the New York Titans host the Chicago Shamrox at Madison Square Garden at 8 p.m. The expansion Boston franchise opens Jan. 12 at Edmonton.Click here for the full slate.

• The Titans, who split home games between Nassau Coliseum and Madison Square Garden for their inaugural season in 2007, will play all eight of their home games at MSG in 2008. Tim Kelly, the general manager of the MLL's Long Island Lizards, has taken over as the Titans' chief operating officer.

• The San Jose Stealth is under new ownership. The team has been sold to an investment group led by Silicon Valley businesspeople Steve Luczo and Bill and Denise Watkins. The ownership group, LW Lacrosse LLC, includes current team president and general manager Johnny Mouradian.

• Among a bevy of player transactions, the Calgary Roughnecks have signed Shinya Maruyama after two years trying. Maruyama, 32, is believed to be the NLL's first Japanese player. He has long held esteem as Japan's best field lacrosse player, moonlighting with U.S. club teams and trying out for a few MLL teams in between stints with Japan's national team. "We know there will be some adjustment to the indoor game but he's the type of person that can adjust and adapt his game quickly," Roughnecks general manager Kurt Silcott said. Check out the NLL news archive for this and other transactions.

• The 2008 season will be Jim "Scoop" Veltman's last as a player in the NLL, but the Toronto Rock has assured the 41-year-old will remain with the team. The club signed Veltman to a five-year contract to remain with the franchise as a member of Glenn Clark's coaching staff upon his retirement as a player. Veltman had been courted by the Colorado Mammoth to replace Gary Gait, now the women's lacrosse coach at Syracuse, behind the bench there.