To DQ or not to DQ

That is the question.
Whether 'tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles,
And by opposing end them?

I dunno. It's easy to predict the UPA's decision.

It definitely sucks for the two players who won't be playing. Originally I felt worse for the captain who got dragged down, but it was probably more her fault than the omitted player, who really would never have any reason to suspect that her name wasn't on the roster.

On the other hand, the other 59 teams at Nationals presumably got it right. I spent countless hours checking and double-checking, herding the cats to see who was actually in or not and nagging them to sign up and send in their waiver and enter their birthdate and everything else. Not that I would have done anything with that time, but I'd like to have it back.

I definitely see that the UPA can't let this go with just a shrug. When they first started getting serious about requiring everyone to be a member before playing in the series, membership (and membership dues) increased by more than 10% that year after several years of close to zero growth. They have probably already spent many hours they don't have right now to deal with this when they should be preparing a tournament for the 1500 other players.

But then why does it have to be disqualification? Again, I see the UPA's view, and I can't imagine that any other sports organization would even be having this discussion. If you're not on the roster, you don't play, period. Use someone who is not on the roster, you're DQ'ed and face possible extra sanctions. Simple, right?

But still, it seems harsh, especially because this may be those two's only visit to Nationals. (Then again, players sometimes get hurt the week before or the first game of Nationals and don't play.) They could still be severely punished so that no one would want to be in that situation but still be allowed to play. For instance, have to do 40 hours of community service before being allowed to play in another UPA event. Pay "court costs", a fine to cover the UPA's time on this. Pick up trash every day. Massage Will Deaver's feet at the end of each day after fetching him a couple beers (well, maybe they would prefer to remain DQ'ed to this).

Then again, the UPA doesn't want to nor should have to listen to every sob story (and there would be a lot more if they backtracked), and soon it might become impossible to DQ those who really deserve it. "No tolerance" might be the greater good, all things considered.

So, not much new here. Not a plea to the UPA to reconsider, at least not today. I wrote a couple things to rsd this week that might be construed I think that the whole team deserves to be kicked out; I don't, I just didn't expect anything different from the UPA. This is not your father's UPA, for better and for worse.

Good luck to everyone.

formats

I was just checking out the other regions that had pools of 5 to see their schedules. Three of the Divs at South Regionals had 10 teams (5 per pool), and each had a different schedule. The one in the format manual is the one we used at Sectionals. Here it is:
4 v 5 2 v 3
1 v 3 2 v 4
1 v 5 3 v 4
1 v 4 2 v 5
1 v 2 3 v 5

Kinda sucks to be 3 in this format, opening with 2 and then 1. What is especially interesting is that finishing 2nd in the pool instead of 3rd can be quite beneficial, more than the difference between 1st and 2nd or 3rd and 4th. In a 5 team Masters Regionals, 1 and 2 play off for the 1st spot to Nationals while 3 plays 4, then there is a second game to go. Thus, if 1-3 are equal, the teams that finish top two have a 75% chance of advancing, while 3rd has a 50% chance. So, what might be the most pivotal game of the pool is played in the first round, then the next most pivotal games are in the 2nd round (not only 1v3 but also conceivably 2v4 if 4 is underseeded).

Speaking of opening with 2 and 1, I'm still a little ticked about the seeding and format at 1990 Nationals. We (Earth Atomizer, the little engine that could) had made Nats in 1989 ahead of Graffiti, had split with them during the year (and neither had won anything since NYNY and Boston #1 (let's see, they must have been First Time Gary that year, but let's just call them Titanic) were winning everything in the area), but they won the final game, and somehow they finagled the 3rd seed (or maybe it was because our seeding representative, Bruce Jacobson, was too nice). We were bummed because we wanted a shot at Titanic in the semis instead of NYNY, who always handled us. (As an aside, we played Titanic closer than Graffiti did, while they played NYNY closer than we did.) Anyhoo, it all went to seed until we dismantled Graffiti 19-9 in the game to go, but it was too late to play the 2/3 game, so we played it the following week and won, 21-17, to earn the #2 seed from the mighty NE. Titanic had lost by 1 in the semis at Nats in 1989, and were in year 4 of a 17 year streak of making semis. So, out of 12 teams, they seeded us....

9th. Just ahead of Titanic at 10th.

And our schedule had us playing the top seed LA in the first round, then 2nd seed (3rd overall) Windy City in the second (and final) round of the first day. Didn't seem fair. We got smoked by LA, 19-7 (this was the first year pool play games were to only 19 instead of 21), then lost a two-pointer to Windy City to end our tournament. We won our last three games after that so we could play the what-if game. We definitely would have benefitted from a different first day, but then again, maybe the next games wouldn't have gone the same way had we played them early. The Condors game in particular probably would have had a different tone. We got them on the last day after they had fallen apart. They went in seeded 3rd in the pool but played and acted badly, and actually kicked off one of their players (a captain, maybe? I hardly knew who anyone was back then, being only slightly older (25) than most of you reading this blog, and rsd did not exist yet).

Then again, it worked out ok for Titanic (better, actually). They opened with NYNY (and lost), but then got #2 seed Tsunami, who IIRC didn't have everyone there the first day because they knew they were just going to have two games they would win. Titanic won that won and made it to the finals.

Anyway, go DoG.

ulticritic is an idiot

That is all.

Call me Luke

It’s been awhile, thought I’d let you all catch up on my sports life.

I’ve been playing in an Over-40 pickup basketball game in town. There is only one guy who I would call a good player, about half the guys have some skills, and the rest are what you would expect from an old man pickup game in an affluent suburb. This has been a great environment for developing my game, much like summer league was back when I first started making a conscious effort to develop more throwing skills. I’m finally making some basketball moves for the first time since that one year in college where I played at lunchtime most days. I even try hard on defense, harder than on O. There are two guys who play unspiritedly. One guy is old and a bit fat and is a bad player, but he’ll take down anyone who beats him and is set for an uncontested layup attempt. He’s quite dangerous, to be honest. He’ll also yell occasionally when a player is shooting. “Very classy,” I said once, but I don’t think he heard. I can excuse his behavior a little bit, because if he didn’t cheat, his team would be at a great disadvantage because he’s so bad. The other guy is more irksome, and actually caused me to lose my cool a few weeks ago. He’s one of the guys with some skills. When he plays hard, he can get open and sometimes he’ll go on a hot streak. But most of the time he’ll just play some clutching and pushing game, usually subtle enough that you wouldn’t notice it but it is what makes it easy to get open or to get in the proper place for a rebound. I got tired of it one day and grabbed his arm as he was about to push off, then did it again the next time to make sure he knew it wasn’t an accident, then gave him a gentle shove just to make it absolutely sure. I’m come very close to making a deliberate bad makeup call, but have limited myself to making snide comments.

Softball season started last night, a thrilling 4-2 win for the Cougars. I saw five pitches in three at-bats, taking one for a strike, taking one for a ball, and putting the other three into play. All of the strikes seemed like pitches I could drive rather than strikes nibbling at the corner. First at-bat was a weak grounder to shortstop that I normally would have beaten out but my legs weren’t loose despite an adequate warmup. Second at-bat was a medium-hard liner into short right-center, an easy single from the moment it left the bat. Third at-bat came in the bottom of the sixth, two outs, runner on first, tie game. It was a hard grounder that the shortstop was able to get a glove on with a good play, but it was a hit no matter how good of a play he could have made. I had hoped/expected to hit a line drive over the left-center fielder’s head. Runners on the corner. I possibly could have made second had I been thinking of it out of the box, but I had expected it to be a clean single with no possibility of making second. The next batter hit a groundball to shortstop. The shortstop fielded it cleanly and looked to toss it to second for the inning-ending forceout, but I got a good jump and got there first. The SS’s throw to first was late and then bounced off the 1B’s glove and squirted down the line. I continued round third and headed home. The throw got there first, but I slide to the outside and swiped the plate with my hand, completely evading the tag. (Merely beating the tag isn’t enough in this league, since the umps generally call any close, cleanly- executed play an out.) This insurance run took the pressure off us in the last inning and we were able to close them out. This game was a big contrast to our previous game last year, a season-ending loss in the first round of the playoffs. That final score was 21-20, featured a ton of errors and walks and home runs, while this one was cleanly-played (we didn’t allow anyone to reach on error, although there were two errors that allowed them to take the extra base). (I really ought to move away from the paradigm of “lack of errors = good fielding”. More important than avoiding errors is making the marginal plays. Our game-winning hit was one of those plays not made. My first grounder to shortstop would have been a play not made had I run a little faster. Those type of plays are at least as frequent as the errors (and many errors happen on those marginal plays where the fielder has to zing the throw).)

I’ve only been out to the golf course once this year, but had a good time, playing 27 holes in about 4 hours. 42-39-44 on the always difficult Stow Acres North. I had a 10 hole stretch where I was only one over par. Many of my recent rounds have featured a stretch of 6-10 holes where I was almost even, so I’m optimistic about my chances of extending that stretch one day soon to a full 18 holes. I got a new 3 wood this winter, replacing a club which I hardly ever used because of a lack of confidence in it, and I am quite pleased. I hit seven fairways in a row with it, and also nailed two strong shots from the fairway over a pond onto the green, shots I knew were stupid but decided to go for anyway. Shot-by-shot available upon request. Unofficial Handicap Index stands at 9.7.

The Frisbee schedule is surprisingly full. I wouldn’t be surprised if I actually played more ultimate this year than in previous years, both in the number of tournaments and points played per tournament. Played Fools already, scheduled for WMO, Masters Easterns, and Boston Invite this spring, probably summer league tournament and Hingham, maybe another summer or fall tournament, then Sectionals (if Masters teams are still allowed to play Open), Regionals and Nationals. That’d be 10, and I’ve played 9, 12, 9, 5, and 10 the last five years.

Red Sox are doing well, Yankees less so. I don’t really get into the “Yankees Suck!” cheer (even though they do), since cheers that focus on the other team are for losers, plus the Red Sox have been the Evil Empire Lite with their big budget and gamesmanship and nearly-unmatched string of championships this century (only five other teams, none of them from NY, has as many titles as the Sox so far). I haven’t seen or even listened to more than a token amount this year, though.

No ski days this winter so far. No long cross-country runs, except for that one nice day this winter where I jogged for about 20 minutes and had to stop once for twice for sore feet.

what's in a name?

DoG, by any other name, would swill just as sweet.

So, who owns the name Death or Glory? A few years ago, a bunch of us got an email from some kid at a high school in Georgia, I think it was, who wanted to call themselves Death or Glory in our honor. Most of us, I think, didn’t want it to happen, as it might somehow sully the name, or perhaps would imply a relationship between the teams, and as we didn’t know them at all, couldn’t say they’d be good followers. It didn’t even occur to me at the time that there are tons of little Red Sox or Patriots teams out there without any hint of a link with the professional team, but then again, a Little League team would not be eligible for the World Series, while the junior DoG would technically have a shot at meeting big DoG in the finals of Nationals. Anyway, I don’t know if a few people responded or if every single one of us ignored the request, but we never heard from him again nor did we ever run across another DoG (not to say that there haven’t been copycat names like RoQ or BoG or anything else with the meme X or Y).


What got me thinking about this was that another old-timer suggested to me that now would be a good time to retire the name DoG, as Alex and I are almost certainly (usual disclaimer here) not coming back for another season in Open. Do we (and the other departed DoG from the early days) have any rights to the name? What if the team split into two factions and both wanted to keep the name? What if we wanted to call our Masters team DoG? What if the team started to play the HnH and the alumni decided that it wasn't appropriate for DoG? Could we ask the current players to think about a new name, and should they listen?

Who owns the name? There is no team owner. The members of the team have the right to come up with their own name, subject to decency requirements at big events, but what about when names are already taken? There have been a couple cases in ultimate history where teams have appropriated their names or logos from copyrighted entities (Arm and Hammer, Twisted Metal) and got into some trouble. How about Furious George even?

I knew I should have trademarked the name back in 1994.



PS. Did anything happen at the UPA Board meeting? Haven’t seen anything yet.

WFDF congress

WFDF held their Congress at Worlds this month, apparently. Here’s the link to the minutes. Some comments:

1. It seems that every single request for player eligibility was approved, even the one where there was a comment “at some point we’re actually going to have to enforce these eligibility rules.” WFDF still seems to have the old UPA mindset of “yeah, ok, I guess.” Which is good in many ways, and more in line with how ultimate used to be, just not what the UPA is doing now.
   
   
2. There were many comments on the World Games and what to change, but nowhere did it mention even considering changing from Mixed to either Open or Women’s play.
   
3. WFDF is considering alternating 4 men/3 women and 3 men/4 women for Mixed rather than offense chooses. The recommendation was to switch them “every other point”, but I’m not sure if they mean “two points with 4 men, then two points with 4 women” or “one of each”. The former is better, since the latter would have one team always going upwind with 4 women (or 4 men, take your pick) and the other going that way with 3.
   
4. There was some discussion of bid allocation for the next World Clubs, and a new, semi-formal system put in place. These allotments always depend on the showing at the previous WUCC and WUGC. 25% (about 7-10 for Open) go for strength and 10% for attendance. It could mean that Japan gets more bids to the next one than does the US. Although everyone in the world who cared to attend this world championship did attend, in 2010 it will likely be in Europe and may be limited to “80-90 teams” for all divisions.
   
5. They are looking to update the rules, and the rules sub-committee includes some of the usual suspects, but it's odd that they made no mention of the fact that the UPA is also in the process of updating their rules. Golf recently made a great effort to get the USGA and the R&A to iron out differences in the two sets, but now ultimate might be splitting further. Of course, there is an unreconciliable difference regarding Observers, but there are other things being changed in the 11th edition of the UPA rules that will probably not be in the WFDF's new set. I suppose I could look, but nah. But here are some things I did see:
   
   • 2.7. Teams are guardians of the Spirit of the Game, and must:
     2.7.1. take responsibility for teaching their players the rules and good spirit,
     2.7.2. discipline players who display poor spirit; and
     2.7.3. provide positive feedback to other teams about how to improve their adherence to the Spirit of the Game.
     
   • No exposed metal on cleats or wristwatches, even one with a strap and no metal. Not sure how that could be dangerous, other than someone getting into a fight because of an argument about timing.
     
   • Pick distance is 5 meters.
     
   • Ok, it says that men and women alternate 4/3 after every two points.
     
   • Time limit is 75 seconds, not 90 as it is here.
     
   
   
6. Let’s give Corey an asterisk, just because.