By Jim Parker - The Windsor Star - 1/30/1989
A conk on the coconut.
Whaaack!
A face-first free fall into the boards.
Splaaat!
A two-handed tomahawk.
Cruuunch!
Holy headaches, Batman. Break out the Bayer. Welcome to the Major Indoor Lacrosse League, where life imitates guerrilla warfare. One piece of sage advice: If you ever decide on a tour of downtown Beirut, take a Detroit Turbo. A startling discovery was made Sunday afternoon at Joe Louis Arena.
A real man’s game. Pro lacrosse, MILL style, is a breeding ground for furore, fuming and — for anybody with a vivid imagination — a wide range of potential fractures. Also a certain fanaticism among its participants, as in, “I never saw an opponent’s head I didn’t want to wrap my stick around.”
OK. Seriously. How physical does it get? They never ask if there’s a mere doctor in the house; these guys need orthopedic surgeons. IT WAS THE New England Blazers who came calling on the Turbos. The real news isn’t that Detroit won, but that both teams survived.
One of the home team’s players, backup goalie Gavin Stevenson of Windsor, is a part-time undertaker. Fitting. Fortunately nobody had to be carried off in a body bag.
Organizers call this game a hybrid form of lacrosse because it melds various aspects of the field and indoor box versions.
From the looks of it, they threw away a pair of rule books and wrote a new one. Then they threw that one away too.
Suggesting the MILL referees turn a blind eye to a lot of things only slightly understates the case. Like saying Miss Silver Bullet, the buxom escort employed by the beer company that is one of the league’s primary sponsors, is known for more than just her bottlecaps.
“As long as it’s not a deliberate attempt to injure, almost anything goes,” says Turbos’ forward Chris Rivait of Windsor.
THE RULES say blows to the head are no-nos, right? Uh, right. Ever meet a guerrilla who played by the rules? “They usually let that head stuff go,” Rivait explains. “A lot of guys get it anyway because they dip and duck.” At five-foot-seven, Rivait’s problem is he doesn’t have to dip and duck to get decked.
“You get your bell rung, you hear the rattle. But it’s when you get caught on the blind side that you feel it the most.” Ah yes, the infamous blind-sider. You’re streaking up the middle of the floor. Your goaltender lofts a long, lazy pass. You look back over your shoulder to catch it.
They have a name for a pass like that here in Windsor. The Hotel Dieu pass. But hey. What harm is there in a little physical contact? This is no sport for sissies. A real man’s game, remember?
“They all stand up for their rights out there,” says Turbos’ coach Medo Martinello, not widely known in lacrosse circles as a whimpering pacifist. “You take your hits, you give them.”
He says a player’s reaction after having his chimes sounded is an indication of his true inner strength. “The great thing to me is to see a super hit and watch the guy roll over, get right back up and get back into it.
“I feel the whole game really boils down to a breaking of wills. You break the other guy’s will first or he beats you. You beat the other guy by showing him you’re not going to be broken.”
Forget broken wills. What about broken bones? “It’s tough out there, but it’s not as brutal as it appears,” says Rivait, who was able to count his welts and abrasions on the fingers of one hand. “If you’re prepared, you can take the hits.”
The big concern most players have? Figuring out the easiest way to climb out of bed the next morning. “Depending on when and how you get hit, you’re stiff and sore,” Rivait notes. “The day after, you feel heavy. When we play a Saturday game, I usually spend the Sunday on the couch. “BUT IT GOES away.”
Right. And before you know it, you’re suited up again and it all comes right back. The next-to-bottom line? The players embrace this game with an uncommon zeal. For many, lacrosse in any fashion seems not so much their sport as their religion. The bottom line? The fans eat it up too. Besides, nobody ever needed a cast to mend a broken will.
“The big thing to remember, as Canadians, is this league doesn’t allow the wooden sticks that don’t give,” says Turbos’ general manager Wayne Martinello, Medo’s son. “These Fiberglas sticks we use break.
Our first game, we went through 50 shafts.” Let’s see. That’s 50 crosschecks, bare minimum. Bruises on top of bruises. Who knows how many tubes of Heet? Definitely a real man’s game, this pro lacrosse.
Afterwards, not a single real man sinks into a soothing whirlpool he doesn’t enjoy.
