Rx for Your Ailing Wand

Just like members of congress, I haven't read the Obamacare bill, but word on the street is that it covers trips to your stick doctor. Score! Nothing like a freshly strung twig to make me feel like I can shoot like Rabil, without all the weight lifting, practice, and such.

As a frequent troller of the stick doctor's lounge on the the Lacrosse Forums, I found a guy who's like the Wilt Chamberlain of stringing. He's done about 300 chicks sticks in his career. That's right 300. Ladies and gentlemen, Spencer Madden of Eugene, Oregon. Better known on the internetz as LAXFreak04. You think 300 is a big number, how about this kid is a 6'8" laxer? Reminds me of the kid on Georgetown's EMO who just steps on to the field to unleash rockets.

Hoya's answer to Spencer Madden

Spencer matriculated at South Eugene high school and now attends the University of Portland. It all started with his first AV8. Not satisfied with the factory tennis racquet, he figured out how to tweak it to his liking and the rest, as they say, is history. Ironically, I just strung an AV8 for a teammate who played for Towson and I don't think he has any idea that it's a beginners stick, but I digress. Portland's stick doctor definitely doesn't have that problem. Spencer has tried almost every head out there and tries to stay on the bleeding edge of lax technology. It's probably not too hard to do when you're stringing a stick at a clip of about 15 per month.

Triangle top string in all it's purple glory

When you got a pretty looking pocket, dudes come calling. Wait, check that. Bros come calling. Sounds a little bit better, I guess. If you play lax you know there's always that dude who can string a nice stick just like there's always that one dude who left his checkbook in the hotel room when you're collecting for the tourney, at the field. Spencer's a pretty generous teammate though. He typically hooks his team up for free and only charges randoms about $20 bucks with shipping included. Not bad when you consider dudes are forwarding requests like, "high pocket with no whip and very very high hold, that has a snappy, smooth release and can help me shoot faster." What? Get the f*%$ outta here.

This guy can do it all though. From a simple 20 minute mesh job to a traditional to the pita, you name it. You name it, cause I can't. Had to look up what pita was. While most guys can't wrap their head around stringing a stick, there are those that treat it like an art form. I suppose there's a sense of pride when you see people playing well with a stick you've strung for them. Like any craft, it takes a little practice. It takes reverse engineering. It takes patience. Now that I think about it, someone really needs to make a Maverik/Rabil style commercial of a guy who's serious about stringing.

Nice flow!

The haters are wondering by now if the dude can play though. I say to them, does it matter when your wand is on-time? But yes, dude can bring it. Despite playing only 4 years of HS lax, Spencer is a weapon when he's on the field. In HS, he earned all-league honors 3 times and made the Rhino all-state select team as a senior. Perhaps even more impressive was that he was his team's offensive MVP all 4 years. Now-a-days, that 6'8" frame translates into a roughly 90 MPH shot. Just realized after a quick calculation that, at 5'8", if I were a foot taller, I'd be shooting roughly 134 MPH. Sigh. Anyway, he transitioned from an attackman in HS to a middie at the University of Portland. With his size, he's adept at alley dodging and then just shooting over whoever gets in his way. We'll have to check back with him later to see how the season went.

Hold-7, Whip-4, Flow-10

What's a real live stick doctor use himself? This guys uses 15mm Marc Mesh on a STX Surgeon 10 mounted on a Nike Pursuit shaft. That means nothing to the guys running on my masters team rocking the excals from '88, but to the kids out there I'm guessing that sounds like a pretty good set up.

Feel free to hit him up if you want to add 3 goals/game to your stat sheet. Fix yo stick.