The Swarm began their off season plans last week when they traded Tyler Carlson and the 2014 #1 pick to Edmonton for Brodie MacDonald and the 2014 #3 pick. With any luck, that will be it. The Swarm have two things they need to do this summer: draft well and nothing else.
The Swarm approach the draft in September with five total picks; two of those are in the first round (three and five). They also hold the 10th, 29th and 38th picks. Barring any trades, they will be sitting out the third and sixth rounds. This draft class isn’t terribly deep outside of the Thompsons and Jeremy Novle.
The other thing they need to do is nothing. In the 2013 offseason, the Swarm blew up the team, sending Ryan Benesch, Andrew Watt, Evan Kirk and Nik Bilic to other teams. A young team got even younger, with the oldest players being 30, and the majority of players having 1-2 years of NLL experience. The offseason trades in 2013 brought in picks; the Swarm owned the 2013 draft, but they didn’t have the success they’d had in previous seasons.
They had made playoff appearances since 2010 and recorded a 4-14 record in 2014. 8 players of 20 were new. It wasn’t that any of the players weren’t good; it was just that the offseason trades jarred team chemistry, and it took awhile to get it back. You could see the progress throughout the year. It didn’t necessarily translate into wins, but you could see the team become more comfortable with each other and better able to anticipate each other.
I’m not saying the Swarm shouldn’t add players; I’m saying they shouldn’t do it en masse. There’s a draft pick or two I’d like to see in blue and yellow. I just feel that they need to give the current team a little more time to gel and see how that goes before making anymore changes. You can always make changes; it’s pretty hard to undo them when they don’t go as anticipated.
