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Ted Reeve, two sport hall-of-famer (lacrosse and football) and popular columnist for the Toronto Telegram, took a look at the “modern” game and didn’t exactly like what he saw. The following was from his Telegram column in September 1937.

“So we think it would be as good a time as any (when we can’t do any harm with our remarks) to say that this sport that goes by the name of lacrosse these days is often exciting, is invariably skill-ful and generally entertaining enough for players and spectators. Nevertheless, it is not lacrosse. It is not field lacrosse, nor it ain’t box lacrosse.

Now don’t get me wrong. Many of the players are really great exponents of this pastime and men such as Connell, Fitzgerald, McLean, Anthony, Squires, Gair, Harrison, Don Smith of Brantford, and the like, would have done all right in the best days of real lacrosse.

“Then what is the trouble?” says you. Well, says we, as an old defence man, simply this – the legislators have made a joke out of the real old game of lacrosse (indoors, outdoors, or in an arcade) by handicapping the defense men (or any other checkers) in such an extent that the ball carrier has all the best of it and goals are registered with ridiculous ease until the scoring becomes boring.

The sticks are too small to start with. Then a home man backs into his check with the ball held away and high. The rearguard reaches around his man to hook the stick and is put off for wrestling or the man with the ball is given a free throw inside his check. Sample Two – a rusher comes dodging in and the defense man meets him with a “square-check,” a good, clean way of stopping a rush, and he is put off for cross-checking. Sample Three – if the defense man swings at his opponent’s arms, he is given the jug for slashing. About all he can do is stand there and try for intercepts.

We don’t mean that the defense men should be rough and resort to dirty play. Great defense men of the recent past, such as Gordie Thoms, Stew Beatty, Ty Silk, and Mike Harris, were seldom penalized. Nor was the heavy swinging Bill Coulter, who hit hard but kept his checks down on the pads. And to go further back to the Golden Days of lacrosse, rearguards such as Harshaw, Finlayson and Kavanaugh were effective and strong without committing mayhem. Even those giants of the days gone by, however, would have their troubles playing defense under the present rules.

So when the other old lacrosse players or fans approach us and say: “Why don’t you write more about lacrosse, you used to be nuts about the game,” we have to give them the answer.

So that is one reason we do not go to lacrosse games very often. The other is that a lot of people are enjoying the contests, it seems, so why should we go mooching around to them, throwing cold water on the situation. But the main idea is that every time we watch whatever it is they are playing now under the name of lacrosse we break down completely over the fate of the defense man.

So let us turn to football, a game where you can still knock a man down without being deported.”