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12/02/01
Greg
Traynor of the Philadelphia Wings is in the Spotlight. Greg sat down with PLPA
correspondent Saul Davidson.
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Greg, nothing short of a hard fought battle tonight. The start of a five game opening road trip for Philadelphia. The Wings and the Attack have quickly become a rivalry in the eyes of the fans and even the players. Your feelings on that to start us off?
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I think just to go a little deeper into the question, anytime you get the first game of the year, especially on the road it's a little bit more difficult. This is our first and Albany's already had 2 games. They are a great team and they're a little bit more of a Canadian style team and we're more of an American field oriented team. But we do have some of the best shooters in the box game. We thought our styles coming in would contrast nicely and that we could match them athletically. But we also have six guys that have never played a game before. And that's the difference in this league. I'm sure if you took a look at their (Albany's) roster you'll find that these guys have played one two or three years of box. It was a great game, a three goal game, and we had some chances to take it in the end but our power play was a little cold and we had some defensive lapses.
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Philadelphia certainly had a lot of opportunities on the power play and you mentioned that you have a lot of new rookies on this roster. It was felt that these new guys coming in already fresh with the new rules in their minds would play a stronger more disciplined defense. You yourself had a great breakaway goal tonight and it was one of the 3 instances where the Wings battled back to tie the game up. Take us through the play when you have the ball all on your own.
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Well on that particular play and coming into the play I wanted to make sure that I had the room to shoot. I had one or two guys behind me. You've really gotta try to make the goalie freeze. I faked high and he came up a bit and I went to the five hole and I was lucky that it went in.
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A couple of these teams already have a jump on Philadelphia one or two games into the season. You have a chance to see a lot of the highlights around the league as well. Including the high scores. You find yourself on the breakaway goal and you have yourself three more inches of width on the goal. How do you feel about that change this season?
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Oh it definitely helps. Especially for the American born players. Last year some of the goalies were so big and had so much padding that you literally couldn't see any net. But now when your stick is out extended, that's when the angle is going to come in. It really helps the players who have played field lacrosse all of their life because now you finally have some net to shoot at. This is something that hasn't been there before so I think the goalies are having a little bit more of a hard time adjusting to it plus the scores of all the games that I have seen have been 32-15 tonight was 19-16. It's definitely increased the scoring in the league but I think it's really positive.
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Some of your summer teammates from the Boston Cannons Major League Lacrosse team like Mike Busza and Dan Radebaugh and others like Jamie Hanford have gone onto other things, some traded, some questionably left unprotected by Wings management. Who should we be looking for out of the rookies for new potential Wings threats?
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Well, there's a bunch. We have about ten new faces. Overall we had a lot of new starters tonight. Ryan Traynor played tonight. He's not a rookie. He's actually played for two years but never had a chance to play. This was his first time tonight and he's 28 years old. He's not in essence a rookie but this is his first game. Jeff Spano is in the starting line up and he's been playing real well. There's a bunch of other really good quality guys that will do pretty well.
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Vancouver upsets Toronto today.
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They did!?!
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Winning by a goal! Philadelphia has five games on the road, the next against Vancouver. How do you think this five game road trip is going to affect the start of the Wings' season?
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My personal feelings. I think it's a positive for us. There are so many distractions when you play at home. We all work hard. When we get home you have people calling you for tickets all the time. And you're just trying to do more things with your daily life. I just got married and my wife and I are trying to do things. When you get on the road you're just not really that distracted. You can focus more on the game and on the task at hand. Besides the travel for some of the younger guys I think it's a bonus and nights like tonight we really get to bond with a lot of the players on our team and that's important.
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You had a great summer on the field playing with the Cannons. Overall your thoughts on where you feel more comfortable in this sport. In or out of the box?
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Well I've had much more success in the outdoor game. The last few years on this team I haven't really been given the chance to prove myself. I played in 98 and I've played in every single game I think except the championship. After that my playing time just decreased. We had different systems such as more offence more defense. I'm more of a two-way player. This is now my sixth year in the league so hopefully I make the transition. I have to be able to contribute a little bit more.
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The Wings have a long road ahead of them and the Wings faithful are always the most positive bunch in the league. On a colorful note Lou Anthony and myself calling the game live on Arena Media noticed that you and Ryan were missing something on the back of your jerseys. What's up with that?
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Well that was a joke actually. We came in and got here and they had misspelled the back of our jerseys. They also didn't have any numbers on them. They had to tape the numbers on. Ryan Traynor had number one and I had number two with tape. And then we got our jerseys. And I'm not even number 61! I don't know what happened there. They said that they'd be sure to fix it. T-R-A-I-N-E-R it wasn't that bad. But it happens.
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Good luck to you in the rest of the season...thanks for talking with us!
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Thanks!
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