What motivates professional athletes? Mike Trout’s 12-year, $430 million contract or Cristiano Ronaldo’s 82 million Twitter followers show fame and fortune are large driving forces. Players in Major League Lacrosse, however, are not as fortunate. The league’s average attendance in 2018 was 3,619 people per game, and players held other jobs to make ends meet. In 2019, many high-profile MLL players left to start their own league, the Premier Lacrosse League, believing they could better raise the profile of the sport and their salaries. But what made other players and coaches stay in MLL? Why did several spectators remain superfans?Major League Life goes behind-the-scenes of all six MLL teams and explores why the league is so important to its players, coaches, and superfans. Whether it is the Massachusetts kids that went from fans in the stands to players on the field or the goalie from Japan that attended open tryouts for three years before landing a spot on the Denver roster, read why the league means so much to them when so many others don’t even know it exists.