Thirteen players were named today as franchise players, one day before the start of the National Lacrosse League free agent signing period.

The baker's dozen, who would have been unrestricted free agents, will now remain with their current teams for the 2007 season, but are guaranteed a salary 20 percent higher than otherwise available to them.

Each team was able to protect two of its eligible unrestricted free agents, players 32 years of age or older with six seasons of professional experience.

Two clubs protected a pair: Edmonton pulled back newly-acquired forwards Dan Stroup and Chris Gill, while Toronto tagged forward Jim Veltman and goaltender Bob Watson.

Also designated today as franchise players were Rob Blasdell (Arizona), John Tavares (Buffalo), Jason Wulder (Calgary), Rich Catton (Colorado), Curtis Palidwor (New York), Jake Bergey (Philadelphia), Dallas Eliuk (Portland), Pat O'Toole (Rochester) and Derek Malawsky (San Jose).

Chicago and Minnesota did not tag any players, with only the Shamrox having a decision to make -- the Swarm had no one eligible.

That left 22 players as unrestricted free agents (listed below), in addition to over 40 restricted free agents.

Players have three paths to restricted free agency:

1. The player does not agree to terms with the club owning the right to his services and sits out for one full year;
2. The club owning the right to the player's services offers compensation lower than what the player earned this past season;
3. The player is not offered compensation at or above the league-wide per-game average salary.

In any of those cases, the player must have played in at least 23 games, spanning at least three seasons.

No compensation is awarded to teams that lose free agents, although teams have the right to match any offer made to a restricted free agent.

The following players are eligible for free agency (restricted free agency unless noted):

ARIZONA STING
 Mark Cochrane (UFA)
 Curt Malawsky (UFA)
 Peter Veltman
BUFFALO BANDITS
 Kyle Couling (UFA)
 Rich Kilgour (UFA)
 Pat McCready (UFA)
 Ken Montour
 Kim Squire
CALGARY ROUGHNECKS
 Kevin Dostie 
 Ted Dowling (UFA)
 Andrew Leyshon
 Andy Ogilvie (UFA)
 Aaron Smith
 Devan Wray
CHICAGO SHAMROX
 Jason Clark (UFA)
 Jon Harasym
 Bryan Kazarian
 Carter Livingstone
 Tom Montour
 Ryan O'Connor
COLORADO MAMMOTH
 Pat Coyle (UFA)
 Mike Law
 Chris Levis
EDMONTON RUSH
 Cam Bergman
 Pat Campbell
 Randy Daly
 Dwight Maetche (UFA)
 AJ Shannon
 Rob Williams (UFA)
MINNESOTA SWARM
 Brock Boyle
 Kelly Hall
 Mark Miyashita
 Sean Pollock
 D'Arcy Sweet
NEW YORK NO-NAMES
 (None)
PHILADELPHIA WINGS
 Bryan Barrett
 John Gagliardi
 Peter Jacobs (UFA)
 Erik Miller (UFA)
 Brock Robertson
 Brad Self
PORTLAND LUMBERJAX
 Bruce Alexander (UFA)
 Adam Bysouth
 Damien Davis
 Ray Guze
 Del Halladay (UFA)
 Mike Hominuck
 Casey Powell
ROCHESTER KNIGHTHAWKS
 Marshall Abrams
 Pat Cougevan (UFA)
 Bill Greer
 Mike Hasen (UFA)
 Stephen Hoar
 Blake Miller (UFA)
 Ken Millin
 Steve Penny
 Regy Thorpe (UFA)
SAN JOSE STEALTH
 Curtis Hodgson
 Andrew Martin
TORONTO ROCK
 Chris Driscoll (UFA)
 Steve Evans
 Dan Ladouceur (UFA)
 Matt Shearer (UFA)
 Phil Wetherup