PLL and NLL Merger Coming Today
After an extremely long, heated, and fiery inferno of a battle that raged for a marathon of nearly four years, the NLL and PLL will announce they are merging today. It paves the way for a total reimagining of lacrosse at the professional level.
As a result of the merger, the single league will contain 23 teams, some of which tour and some don’t. “It’s a really easy to understand and totally defensible model. We’ll have a dozen home markets where we play games every week, but we also are going to have 11 of the teams tour and go between each of those home markets. Plus the home market teams will each play neutral site away games 5 times a year. So we’re managing to combine having home market model and the touring model in a way that is completely devoid of the benefits of each model,” said a spokesperson for the NPLL (National Premier Lacrosse League).
There will be other highly visible changes to the pro lacrosse product as a result of the merger. Games will be played indoors, with boards, but on a PLL size and lined field and with field lacrosse goals. Goalies, however, will wear NLL equipment. The 15 yard two point line remains, but the number of players on the field will match the NLL rules, meaning the game will be played five on five on a massive outdoor field in an indoor arena. The faceoff has been banned. The international lacrosse community was thrilled at the creation of another entirely new discipline and ruleset for lacrosse.
As for what makes now the best time for a merger? “Frankly, we just got tired of ‘what abouts’ from a bunch of Canadians in our comment sections,” said a PLL spokesperson who sounded exhausted. “There’s not a single other reason we pursued this.”
The only piece of history that won’t be part of the merger is the NLL record book. As of today, the entirety of the record book is being erased and no longer recognized in any way as part of pro lacrosse. “We think this should go a long way to clearing up the ‘pro lacrosse’ record questions we’ve been seeing, and once again congratulations to Paul Rabil on being the all-time points leader in pro lacrosse history,” said a PLL spokesperson.
A call to the NLL office went unanswered, kind of. It seemed as if someone accidentally knocked the phone off the hook as it was ringing, and in the background, someone could be heard saying, “Chicago Red Stars — total lock for the title this year.”
As part of the overlap, several pro players will have to play for multiple teams at the same time. In events where team rosters overlap too severely, for example the Bandits and Chaos, when the teams play each other, teams will be picked in a fantasy draft fashion, with coaches, for example Andy Towers and John Tavares, serving as team captains. The players picked last will not receive full game checks.
Games will continue to be broadcast on ESPN family of networks, further growing exposure for the sport. It will be available in the US and every other country in the world via internet stream, except for Canada.
Players seemed aware of and able to understand that the news. “It’s a thing that is happening in real life,” said a two time PLL All Star. “Lacrosse is fun and we’ll be playing something like it,” said a former NLL MVP. The excitement was the opposite of palpable.
No one in the new league will be allowed to play for the Mann Cup.
The new league will begin operation in 2023 playing all games on Sundays, plus a prime time game on Monday and Thursday nights, and overlap entirely, to the day, with the NFL season.
