My Laxmas Wish List? The ultimate unified pro lacrosse league. I want the NPLL.

What did you ask Santa for this year? Maybe one of the cool new smart balls from GET REPS. Maybe some swag from your favorite PLL or NLL team. A new stick set up from ECD. Maybe get yourself a custom strung head from Sidewall Jedi, Tucker Strings, or YoungWiz himself Chris Kavanagh. Me? I am aiming slightly higher. Given that it’s the season of miracles, that’s exactly what I’m asking for. The biggest lacrosse Christmas miracle of all. 

What I want for Laxmas is the total and complete merger of the NLL and PLL into a single entity. The NPLL (name is work in progress).

That’s right. One mega league. The scope of which wouldn’t even be comparable to ABA/NBA or AFL/NFL mergers of old, because this would form a league with year round competition in multiple disciplines of the sport. Current cities that have two teams would be merged down into one, while markets that have just one team would keep their one team. That would leave us with an 18 team league. For the record, the EPL has 20 clubs.

Boston Cannons

Buffalo Bandits (they don’t merge, don’t mess with what they have going on)

Calgary Roughnecks

Carolina Chaos

Colorado/Denver OutMoth

Georgia Swarm

Halifax Thunderbirds

Las Vegas Desert Dogs

Maryland Whipsnakes

Oshawa FireWolves

Ottawa Black Bears

Philadelphia WaterWings

Rochester Knightlas

San Diego RedSeals

Saskatchewan Rush

Toronto Rock

Utah Archers

Vancouver Warriors

No, the midwest STILL doesn’t have a team. One miracle at a time.

Split this into Eastern and Western conferences.  East has Boston, Buffalo, Carolina, Halifax, Maryland, Philly, Oshawa, Rochester and Toronto.  West has Calgary, Colorado, Georgia, Ottawa, Vegas, San Diego, Saskatchewan, Utah, and Vancouver. Sorry Georgia and Ottawa, I have to make the numbers work and I used a dice roll to land on you. Maybe one of you can move to Edmonton or something. 

Consider. Philadelphia has a single lacrosse team. There is one Philadelphia roster. From that roster, gameday lineups are set for outdoor games in the summer and indoor games in the winter. Some players appear in both, some just outdoors, some just indoors. If you’re on the active roster, you’re eligible to suit up indoors and outdoors. Each team has full autonomy to set gameday rosters with whoever they choose from their full complement of talent. Rosters are expanded enough to allow for spots to be used on single discipline specialists.

The culmination of the full outdoor and indoor schedule would result in a champion with a points system, similar to the top soccer leagues in Europe. Being dominant in just outdoor or just indoor wouldn’t be enough. Roster construction can’t just focus on indoor alone or outdoor alone. But you’d want to have those special players who excel at a particular discipline. Graeme Hossack would be the top defender around, Brennan O’Neill and CJ Kirst would be highly sought after weapons, but teams still need players like Jack Rowlett to erase top weapons in field, even if he doesn’t play box. Field first close defenders are key. Goalies who are particularly good indoors would have incredible value, while a player like Brett Dobson who excels at both would be a huge asset. Graham Bundy Jr may not play indoors, but that two point power is key for outdoors. Mitch Jones might not ever play outdoors, but a passer like that indoors is a must for a contender. It’s a whole new kind of thought process around roster construction, free agency, and drafting.

Speaking of, that’s all getting unified too. One draft. Teams picking players to bolster their outdoor roster, indoor roster, or try and be at the top of the draft for those extremely versatile guys who can be a star at both. Get ready to open up the checkbook when players like Connor Fields hit the open market in free agency. Blaze Riorden’s true market value as the best goalie outdoors and an excellent lefty scorer indoors may never be truly understood.

And to further enhance the fun, we have to disperse the players who currently play in both leagues. After all, Zach Currier plays for Philadelphia outdoors and San Diego indoors. So who gets one of the best midfielders and transition players in lacrosse? The most electric draft you’ve ever seen.  Players who are currently rostered indoors and outdoors enter a pool and are redrafted to a new club, order determined at random via lottery. Players who would hit this pool include Currier, Trevor Baptiste, CJ Kirst, Brennan O’Neill, Connor Fields, Brett Dobson, Danny Logan, Justin Inacio, Joe Nardella, TD Ierlan, Tom Schreiber, Owen Grant, Ryan Terefenko, it would be seismic and incredible.

There are positives to this! Oh you’re a big fan of the Waterdogs but never go to Wings games? What if you just got to keep watching your same favorite players from outdoors play indoors? Love the Knighthawks, but lukewarm on the Atlas? Hey, you can go see all those Knighthawks play outdoors now! Are you from Buffalo and just need ANYTHING to do in the summer? The Bandits play field now! If you want a mega league title, you need to be there supporting your guys outside or inside too. Could this system also improve player compensation? Demand for players who can help win you a title with indoor AND outdoor play means better leverage in salary negotiations. Combined teams in a single market means it could be more feasible for players to live in the market of their home team, since they’ll be able to play year round. Your team has a particularly rough rivalry game outdoors, wait until they can go inside and actually fight!

More and more players are choosing to play both box and field these days. Skillsets from both are necessary to be successful at Sixes, the discipline that the sport will play in the Olympics. I’m asking Lacrosse Santa to help us lean into that with a mega merger that affords players the chance to play both box and field. 

There isn’t enough Christmas spirit in all the world to get this to actually happen. It’s pure fantasy. That contract idea would never work. Venue logistics would be a mess. All those redrafted guys would be pissed. Record books would become a massive mess, or at least overloaded with asterisks. But it is the season of miracles. Maybe Santa is a lacrosse guy.