twodoebs

On Saturday night, Kati and I attended an event that was billed as historic. It was the first game for the New York Titans professional lacrosse team at Madison Square Garden.

The New York Titans play in the National Lacrosse League ("NLL"). The NLL is an indoor lacrosse league that replaced the old Major Indoor Lacrosse League ("MILL"). Back in the day, Pittsburgh had a team that was a part of the MILL called the Pittsburgh Bulls (get it?--the Pitt Bulls).

I played some lacrosse in high school. I also went most of the Pittsburgh Bulls games and thought seeing New York's new team play their first game would be fun.

Before I explain why the game wasn't any fun, let me explain why I thought the game WOULD be fun. First of all, when I used to go to the Pittsburgh Bulls games, I used to have a good time 'cause the sport was so scrappy--while they certainly weren't skill based, they were high scoring and entertaining. And unlike hockey, which is always trying to get fighting out of the games, the MILL didn't seem to care if there were ten fights per game.

Second, we had a great experience with the Brooklyn Cyclones minor league baseball team this summer. In opposition to a Yankees game--where we spend over $100 for tickets (and STILL have seats way up in the nosebleeds) then at LEAST another $100 for concessions--when we went to the Cyclones game, tickets rights behind home plate were twenty bucks a pop and for another $20, we ate all we wanted to all night long.

I thought we were gonna have the best of both worlds, with the MILL excitement in the games and the cheap night out. Trouble is, it wasn't EITHER. While the tickets WERE pretty cheap, we still had to pay MSG concession prices. And unlike the old MILL games, this was sanitized and boring. Where the Pittsburgh Bulls fans used to regularly throw stuff on the field, we were warned that if anything was thrown on the MSG field, the Titans would be charged with a two minute penalty. Where the Pittsbugh fan used to chant "Bull shit, bull shit" (get it?--they were the Pittsburgh BULLS!) when they didn't like a call, there were so many twelve year old boys at this game last night that nobody said ANYTHING exciting last night.

AND--to top it all off--they had this PA announcer last night who had OBVIOUSLY never been to any sporting event. Ever. He would try to get the fans to do the old de-FENSE, de-FENSE cheer, but somehow he managed to get the rhythm wrong, so that nobody knew how to follow along with him. And--speaking of defense--he didn't even seem to know the DIFFERENCE between defense and offense. Not to mention that he didn't know any of the player's names, so he would say things like "great save by . . . the GOALIE!"

Bottom line: New York Titans and MLL=not fun.