any lacrosse player will tell you that their pocket stretches in the rain and the field was soaked this day. also, you are calling out all pictures where kids are carrying and cradling the ball. any action shot of someone carrying the ball is going to make it appear to have an illegal pocket. might be hard for you to understand but the gravitational force created by cradling a lacrosse stick makes the pocket temporarily deeper and forces the ball to the deepest spot in the pocket. that is the whole point of cradling, so if you look at an action shot of a kid cradling, of course his pocket is going to look much deeper than it is when being checked. as far as cross checking goes, it has always been a part of college lacrosse. youth refs may require that your hands be together, but that is just part of the college game and it might slowly become completely legal like it is in the MLL.