Farewell to the Blazers

The streak continues.

As I wrote on the NLL Blog back in December of 2010, the last time the National Lacrosse League began a season with the same teams in the same cities as the previous season was 1993. Despite Brad Banister's constant whining about Calgary's financial situation last winter and the rumours about Rochester having financial troubles during the spring and then similar rumours about Boston just last month (quickly denied by the Blazers), it began to look like the streak might finally end in 2012. No such luck.

The Boston Blazers announced yesterday that the rumours of their death weren't so greatly exaggerated after all. They have "temporarily suspended operations for the 2012 National Lacrosse League (NLL) season", with a view to relocate the team and re-join the league in 2013. Of course, those of us who have followed this league for a while and have seen our share of dispersal drafts know that "temporarily suspending operations" in the NLL is the same as "vanishing forever". No team that has actually played has ever ceased operations and then returned, though a number have intended to. The closest would be these same Blazers – the team was introduced back in 2007 but shortly before their first season (2008) began, the NLL ran into labour troubles. Both the Blazers and the Arizona Sting took that as an opportunity to suspend operations until 2009 to get their financial houses in order. The labour problems were soon settled, the Blazers and Sting players were dispersed, and the season went on. In 2009, the Blazers did indeed begin play as they said they would, though the Sting did not.

Yesterday's press release stated that the team was shutting down to "begin the initial steps to relocate the team to a new home facility for the 2013 season". This is reminding me a little of the Sting situation – a very good team with lots of potential for the future that had to be shut down because of money issues. Of course, no NLL team has ever folded for anything other than money issues – nobody's going to fold simply because the team sucks. The two may be related – having a sucky team isn't likely good for attendance – but if the attendance is there, the team will survive regardless of how well they play. Just look at the Philadelphia Wings over the last decade.

But the Blazers, like the Sting, were a very good team. They made the playoffs in each of the three seasons they played. In 2010 the Blazers grabbed Casey Powell in the Orlando Titans dispersal draft and traded for Josh Sanderson, adding two superstars to a team that already featured Dan Dawson. Three of the biggest names in indoor lacrosse - two former MVPs and a perennial All-Pro - playing on one line. Add in a former Goaltender of the Year in Anthony Cosmo and a rookie of the year candidate defender with tremendous potential in Kyle Rubisch, and you have the core of a very solid team. The fans recognized this as well - Boston's attendance increased in each of the three seasons they played, to over 8700 per game in 2011. These are not Colorado numbers, but they're better than Washington's; in fact, they're more than double Washington's 2011 average of just over 4100.

So who's to blame here?

Some have pointed the finger directly at the NLL itself for allowing this to happen. I don't buy that because the NLL doesn't (and shouldn't) control the financial operations of its franchises. Could the NLL have stepped in and attempted to negotiate a better deal with the TD Garden? Well, who's to say they didn't? At the end of the day, the lease on the Garden was just too expensive for the Blazers to handle, and it would have been beyond irresponsible for the league to force them to continue playing anyway. It was easy to blame the fans in Albany or  San Jose for the Attack/Stealth leaving because they did have Washington numbers. But the Blazers were doing OK attendance-wise and as I said, those numbers were on the rise. We just don't know enough about the details to be able to really decide on who's to blame. Perhaps the Blazers negotiated a bad deal that ended up handcuffing them. Perhaps the TD Garden people were overly greedy. Perhaps some combination of both.

Here are three things we do know:

1. 24 players plus a number of trainers, coaches, and support staff that worked in the NLL last season will not be in the NLL next season.
2. "Stability" continues to be a word that is not associated with the NLL.
3. This is a sad time for indoor lacrosse fans across North America, whether they're Blazers fans or not.