LAX Sports !

By Sean Connolly

Is it time? I think so. The Olympics includes pedestrian sports such as table tennis and badminton, so why not involve a real sport that actually takes physical skill? All I’m saying is that if you can win a gold medal in ping-pong, you should be able to do the same with lacrosse.

Whenever this argument arose, the main point people would bring up is that lacrosse isn’t played as much as it is in America and Canada. To that pathetic point I say how many countries play judo, water polo, and trampoline. Trampoline?!? That’s a sport in the Olympics folks, and that always becomes my most stellar argument.

So, what does lacrosse need to become an Olympic sport? It needs fans. Lacrosse needs people behind the sport that want to see lacrosse in the Olympics as much as the athletes do. It’s growing popularity with the development of Major League Lacrosse along with a huge youth movement in which a lot of young kids are picking up the sport earlier and earlier forcing their high schools to also pick up lacrosse programs.

It seems to me that most of the team sports played in the Olympics aren’t taken seriously. They aren’t because those players don’t get paid by their clubs to play for their country. So most players either voluntarily choose to sit out or are forced to not play. So in team sports like baseball, and soccer you never get to see the world’s best, which is what the Olympics are supposed to represent. If the Olympics give the opportunity to these lacrosse guys they will not disappoint. I’m positive that John Grant and Brian Langtry would have been on the first flight to Beijing if they had the chance, but sadly they didn’t but hopefully by either the 2012 Olympics(which is pretty doubtful to get a sport instated in 4 years) or the 2016 Olympics which could fittingly end up in America in Chicago, we will see Lacrosse as an Olympic sport.