Paul Rabil, shown here in 2018, has retired from lacrosse as a player. But he is not retiring from ... [+]
Paul Rabil won’t be on the field competing when the Premier Lacrosse League holds its championship game Sunday at noon at Audi Field in Washington. Rabil, a midfielder considered one of the greatest players in the history of the sport, announced his retirement Tuesday on that same field.
But he can take plenty of pride when the Whipsnakes Lacrosse Club faces off with the Chaos Lacrosse Club for the title on NBC at noon Eastern time. The PLL itself was co-founded by Rabil and his brother, Mike, and the fact that the game is on national TV on a broadcast network is a testament to Rabil’s dedication to growing the sport at every level and getting it as much exposure as possible.
And Rabil is not stopping, continuing to apply the same attitude and intensity to his endeavors off the field as he did to becoming an iconic player on it.
“I wanted to be as great as anyone who’s ever played the game and I let people know that, for better and for worse,” Rabil said in his retirement speech.
Thus, even as Rabil announced his retirement as an active player with the Cannons Lacrosse Club of the PLL, he almost immediately announced at the same news conference that he’s establishing an initiative called Goals for Greatness, which is aiming to resource lacrosse goals in all 50 states by working with municipalities and community groups to identify public areas that can utilize them.
Of the idea, Rabil said in a one-on-one phone interview, “It’s a personal one that I’ve been thinking about during the back half of my career.”
He noted that when he was growing up in Gaithersburg, Md., “It was never a challenge to find a basketball court or a baseball diamond. They're built into the local parks and recs. And something that I've always dreamed about is—half the battle of (playing) lacrosse is—what if lacrosse goals were everywhere on fields across the country? It would help players, both current and those potentially looking to try it, even competitive or just for fun, to have access to it.”
This also would have a marketing effect, Rabil believes.
“And what happens to the psychology of the casual sports fan,” he noted, “is they see baseball diamonds and soccer goals and basketball hoops, they begin to recognize the game and they begin to accept it. It's almost like a validation of the sport in the culture of America. I think part of this initiative is to improve accessibility to the game, and part of it is to introduce the game to as many people as possible.”
“For a sport to become as popular,” he continued, “as the Big 4 (football, baseball, basketball, hockey) in the mainstream media, they need the professional league to grow. That’s what we’re seeing most recently with UFC, Major League Soccer and Formula 1. And the reality is that people have to do it, the people that are investing and improving upon the operations and providing a red-carpet experience for people to see the best players in the world do what they do best.”
Rabil noted, “I believe there was a feeling in lacrosse for a long time that the game was so great that it would just grow organically and then we plateaued. That to me was a signal that more needed to be done and that next step to grow the game was at the pro level.”
Paul Rabil and Mike Rabil co-founded the Premier Lacrosse League in 2018, in part because Rabil believed “the game wasn’t getting the recognition,” he said, “that I think a lot of us who love the game thought it deserved.”
At that time, he had played in the Major Lacrosse League (MLL) for 11 seasons, but decided to start a new league in the hope of raising not only the game’s profile, but players’ salaries and the amount of money invested in the sport at the professional level.
They had tried to buy out MLL in 2017, but Mike Rabil told sportspromedia.com that the Rabils and their investors “were never really taken seriously” by the MLL.
Thus, they began their own four-team league, and were able to gain the backing of such heavy hitters as NBCUniversal, Creative Artists Agency (CAA), The Kraft Group (Robert Kraft, New England Patriots owner), Joe Tsai Sports (Joe Tsai, Brooklyn Nets owner) and numerous others.
Then, in December 2020, the PLL merged with the MLL to form an eight-team league under the PLL banner.
Mike Rabil, the PLL’s CEO, recently tweeted that the championship game will be the highest-attended game in PLL history. There are tickets still available at 20,000-seat Audi Field.
Paul Rabil, who was named among Ones To Watch in addition to the The Bloomberg 50 in 2018 (which honors movers and shakers in business and other fields), noted that they are using social media, the internet and new technology “to expedite the growth of the PLL. Hopefully, we’ll get there as a result of what we’ve done the past three years and onward.”
“The more I did (social media), the more I learned about the origination of modern pro sports through television and other mediums,” he added. “There are two parts to it. There's a value to awareness and the old adage, if you build it, they will come.”
But then there also is the “relentless, year-round work of acquiring and retaining your customers. We think that these venues sell themselves, but the reality is whether you’re in the NFL or NBA, these teams have 40-person sales teams that are constantly banging the phones and selling tickets to the next home game. They have 40-person sponsorship teams. The work behind the scenes is no different than a Fortune 500 company looking to continue to grow and improve its product.”
Mike Rabil said in a statement, “I am champing at the bit to roll up our sleeves and build his off the field legacy with him for years to come.”
Paul Rabil also is helping in the push for lacrosse to become an Olympic sport in time for 2028 Summer Games, which will be held in Los Angeles. That goal received a boost in July when the International Olympic Committee officially recognized World Lacrosse, the international governing body for both men’s and women’s lacrosse. That is believed to be the first step toward it becoming an Olympic event, and Rabil believes that would help it gain even more popularity at the grassroots level.
“We’re officially on the path to 2028,” he said. “The future has never been brighter for lacrosse.”
Even without one of its greatest players. But with one of its most innovative entrepreneurs and most enthusiastic and influential proponents still behind it.
