Turn the Music Off
I’ve covered a lot of professional lacrosse games in my career. I’ve seen the best and worst New York Riptide crowds, Saskatchewan Rush versus Georgia Swarm games (those never do well attendance-wise for the Swarm), an electric crowd at Rogers Arena when the Warriors were Warrioring — with a media meal so good that I still think weekly about it —, The Nest in Halifax, exhibitions in the ILA, Rochester, a personal favorite in Mohegan Sun. Outside of the insane atmospheres that are Banditland, the Saddledome, and the Loud House (bucket list items, the lot), I’ve experienced a wealth of crowd atmospheres and sizes.
Friday was the first time I’ve ever seen a summer box game in winter.
No PA, no music, no replays, no halftime entertainment, no distractions during media timeouts, the ability to hear everything that was happening and the communication from teams and benches, a shot clock operator that wasn’t a referee, a remote broadcast crew despite me being on-site and very willing to not swear for two hours (all love, Dave and Mitch, can’t wait to hear your call when I score the game this weekend). If there were 50 fans there, I’d be impressed (and hopefully they weren’t driving back on ice in the darkness).
I loved it.
The fans that were there knew it was their responsibility to create energy, waving their arms in front of them as they sang the simplistic chorus of “Chelsea Dagger” every time the Swarm scored, screaming “Take” breath “a” breath “seat” for every Black Bears’ penalty. They stuck around on a night that might behoove them to leave earlier.
To those 50-ish fans, honestly, thank you for contributing to the most fun atmosphere I can recall at an NLL game, an experience I simulatenously hope never happens again and dearly wish would.
I rarely talk about attendance in my articles for a few reasons:
I worked for the Swarm organization and understand how hard it is to get fans to Gas South Arena, reasons internal and external (but never the fault of the players and coaches, who always put on a show and go above and beyond with fans). There are still people in that organization I’m friends with and talk to regularly, and I’ll never cast aspersions their way.
The NLL can crow “The Next Major League” until they’re purple in the face, but it’s really obvious that crowd sizes across the 14 markets are lopsided. I don’t feel a need to point that out every week. It’s tiring.
The default reaction from way too many of you whenever attendance and the Swarm come up is “Move the team back to Minnesota/Never should’ve left Minnesota,” which is just such a tired and irrelevant point to make. I completely understand the sentiment, but directing that resentment at me like it’s my fault Arlotta packed up and left is annoying.
So, it’s weird that on a night when Georgia — the state of — did what it always does when weather gets wintry — clear certain main roads and beg everyone to stay home until it’s warmer — that I feel a need to talk about attendance. But last night was weird, so it’s par for the course.
The Swarm made the correct move keeping the game on the schedule and carrying on business-as-usual when it was anything but. It would have been incredibly expensive to cancel and move it to later in the season, not to mention an absolute headache trying to figure out when that game could be made up. Everyone flew in before the weather was bad, they’re laughing at us and the “winter storm” that they experience often during the winter, get it over with. There was a good humor over the whole affair, an attitude of “what can you do but play lacrosse” that was familiar from my time working with the Swarm whenever anything screwy happened (I remember no hot water at the ILA and players warming up in the fan zone of Nassau Coliseum because a forklift fell into the ice post-Capitals vs. Rangers). Coaches and players have the same job whether there are 13,000 fans or 50 like last night.
I understand I am not the target audience for the NLL. I am a box lacrosse degenerate; I will go watch box lacrosse whenever I get the opportunity. Hell, on a night when I was probably better served staying home and not braving the icy roads that my local government can’t be bothered to de-ice, I made the trek and went through way too much hotel nonsense just to be the only person in the catwalk of Gas South Arena bothering to cover the game in person — which has been the case for years now.
But I could do without the amalgam of disjointed music and crowd-pleasing activations during media timeouts, and last night reinforced that. You pick up on so much being able to hear Brett Dobson and Mike Manley communicate during a defensive shift. Dan Ladouceur and his bench taught me new swear words and insults with their chirping during the game. The adjustments coached to players during media timeouts were eye-opening, hearing in real time how Georgia and Ottawa tried to adapt to one another.
There’s a game within the game that’s being covered up by distractions, designed to keep kids and their parents entertained despite the NLL product being the best it’s ever been and worth the price of admission on its own.
That matryoshka game made Swarm mistakes the more obvious in their silence before Riptide goals, the stick taps punctuated by specific callouts from the bench, defensive awareness on strong left/right, the complaining to refs — ludicrous and fair all at the same time — much more enticing to watch than any live game I’ve seen before.
The NLL should have more games without music. Keep it quiet. Let the play and players/coaches do the talking. Keep the media timeout and halftime shows — I love when the Swarm have local high and middle school teams play exhibition games during halftime, always entertaining. But no one cares that a barn didn’t play Guns & Roses “Welcome to the Jungle” during a game. Players swear; parent your kids better and enjoy the action in front of you.
Friday was a weird freak occurrence in a state not set up to handle inclement weather. It revealed a ton about the NLL product and its strengths. I really hope the NLL leans into that more.
