A limited number of copies of our book "Ultimate Techniques and Tactics" will be available for $20 CDN at the Gaia tent at the World Ultimate and Guts Championship in Vancouver beginning August 2. If possible, we (my co-author Eric Zaslow (Zaz) and I) will set up one or two autograph sessions at the tent for anyone who is interested. You can also track us down playing with USA Masters, as long as we're not in the middle of a game.
See you there.
Wednesday, July 23, 2008
Thursday, July 17, 2008
training request
Someone on my team wanted to make a request. Suppose a player had a major tournament, we'll call it Worlds, in 3 weeks and wasn't in as good shape as he wanted to be. His remaining training time is limited and often comes a few minutes at a time. What would you recommend for him? What kind of exercises?
Tuesday, July 01, 2008
Nothing to see here, move along
I’d like to apologize to the Masters Division for destroying whatever credibility we may have had. We won the “Easterns Div II” at the Boston Invite this weekend, which means we were 17th of 32. We came in seeded 11th or 12th and expected to finish about there, with a little luck in the top 8, with some bad luck something like 13th. But then again, when your average age is 40, you don’t practice, and you don’t do much training, it doesn’t really matter how good you used to be.
Well, that’s not really true. If we didn’t used to be really good, we would have finished more like 27th than 17th.
It all started out innocently enough. We were in the second tier of 8, seeded 2nd in our pool of 4, with top two crossing over against the bottom two from the top tier. We won our first game against Tombstone 14-12. We were up 2-3 the whole game. I got off a lefty backhand for the gamewinner (lifetime lefty backhand: something like 6/6, 3 GT). In some ways, this was a preview for Worlds, as they will be representing Canada, but they didn’t have a complete squad (one guy filming, one guy sitting, another guy playing with another team most of the time except for a few illegal points which we certainly would have called them on had it made a difference in our advancement), and I don’t know if they were showing us everything. (We withheld our new O and D formations, the bi-angled stack and the ho-stack clam.)
Then, disaster. 2 hour bye, plus we noticed our next opponents lost to Bodhi, 15-5. No problem, that locked up a top two finish for us, no need to get ready for the next game. And at one time (199x), that was true, we would have gone up 2-0 and traded out for a 15-13 victory. We came out flat, and got flatter, and flattened. There was a timeout late in the first half, followed by another break to lose half 8-5, and further degradation in the second half put us at 15-8. While this did lead to some enjoyment at figuring out all the possible tiebreaking scenarios (Bodhi has to lose by less than 14 to guarantee top two, we have to win by 7 unless Tombstone wins in which case we just have to win but if we lose then we want Tombstone to lose, etc.), it wasn’t enough to make up for the poor performance.
Next game started well with a break, but then more blah, going down 8-2. Near the end of the half, a short hospital pass went up to me, I jumped, my defender got his fingers on it a split-second before I did. I started to rip it out, but then let go while everyone anticipated the strip call and stopped. I waved "no call", and he threw the disc to a teammate for a goal while most players looked on. I stuck with my non-call but then asked for a check, mistakenly thinking that I had made a call before retracting it, thus meriting a check, but I gave that up too without realizing that this was what the rules said, too. Most thought it was a strip, one guy told me he thought it wasn't. The second half was a moral victory as we managed to get 9. This sent us down into a crossover game against some Brown alumni plus Chain guys, drastically underseeded at 23rd coming in (they finished 9th, ahead of two 2007 Nationals qualifiers, giving up no more than 10 in any game). We were tired and old, and we lost a few guys in having to relocate fields, and we got beaten deep repeatedly. The closest we came to being in a position to win was having a pass dropped in the upwind end zone that would have made it 9-6.
A scrawny scrub who hardly played wanted me to blog about how bad it was that they were seeded so low. It was a good question. Clearly, going in they were one of the top 16 teams. Zip, AJ, Joel Wootten were the biggest names, plus several other players who played at Nationals last year. But they were a pickup team without any history, and all of the other teams who were in the top half were real club teams (albeit two of us were Masters teams). Should one of them have been bumped to make way for a group of guys who were better but had no way to prove it beforehand? (They proved it afterward, but they were limited to no better than 9th.) A few years ago, another pickup team (Thermonuke) won this tournament, but they had a little more history and a wider cast of characters. On the other hand, these other teams may have worked hard and earned a spot.
btw, I’m a strong proponent of stratification in tournaments. The Women and Mixed divisions at Boston Invite both had an 8 team round robin with no crossover (but also disappointingly no final game). For Open, there wasn’t as clear of a line, certainly not at the #8 spot, and except for Great Britain and Machine, none of the Elite teams had plane flights. With a full set of Nationals teams, a completely split-off Elite div is probably the best, but with less of a field, this way makes sense.
So we lost and got rewarded with an 8:30 game on Sunday. Not surprisingly, at 8:20 we didn’t have a full squad, and I’m sure our opponents were wondering if they were going to get a forfeit. Got a break early, gave it back, traded until we broke to take half 8-6. Gave it back and proceeded to trade to 11-11, scored, then broke three more times to win.
This set up the semis against Colt .45. Our previous matchup against them at White Mountain Open in 2007 helped to launch a blogging career, but there was to be no repeat of that loss. There was again not a lot of ebb and flow to the game; perhaps we got a three goal run once, but otherwise, just single breaks here and there. (Runs always add to the dramatic tension in a game. The only exception is if there is a long streak of no breaks at all, especially if there are some points with multiple turnovers, and you start to wonder who is going to blink first. As an O player, I always felt more pressure in this situation, as your hopes get up when your D gets a turn, only to have them sink away again on the cluster of an offense they run. Repeat.) One of their guys called travel twice on Arnold on non-egregious violations, probably in line with what others were doing, then after the second one, tapped the disc in a little too enthusiastically and knocked it out of his hands. At some point, Arnold told him he didn’t know how to play the game, so for the rest of the game, whenever this kid did something good, he would repeat the line. And I would repeat the line to my team whenever one of his pulls sailed out of bounds halfway up the field. Eh, no hard feelings, it’s just amusing to me now.
After the game, we tried to find an open field to move up our “final” (there was a bye scheduled) but couldn’t, and our opponents (Tombstone again) weren’t all that interested in waiting around to play us again. Their captain came looking for us and said, “We have 12 guys playing still and 3 of them are going to get hurt if they have to play another game.” So I raised my arms in triumph, and he didn’t argue with my proclamation of our victory, so we are claiming that as a forfeit win. We’ll see them again in a few weeks at Worlds.
I stayed around (my wife was still playing) and watched the end of the Open semis (both one-pointers) and most of the Open finals. GOAT-Pony was a multiple-turnover final point. The final turnover came on a long pass than hit the ground before a diving BVH could catch it, and he lay there after for a few seconds, clutching the disc. His opponent came up and tried to rip it out of his hands, but BVH wouldn’t let go, and the opponent started yelling at him, unaware (I hope) that BVH was mildly injured. But even after understanding this, he was still somewhat belligerent, so I screamed at him, “Why don’t you just piss on him?” as that would seem in character.
The finals were exciting. GOAT is my new role model for Huck n Hope. Boston was also unafraid to put it up occasionally on a whim, but not nearly as often. Kids today.
Well, that’s not really true. If we didn’t used to be really good, we would have finished more like 27th than 17th.
It all started out innocently enough. We were in the second tier of 8, seeded 2nd in our pool of 4, with top two crossing over against the bottom two from the top tier. We won our first game against Tombstone 14-12. We were up 2-3 the whole game. I got off a lefty backhand for the gamewinner (lifetime lefty backhand: something like 6/6, 3 GT). In some ways, this was a preview for Worlds, as they will be representing Canada, but they didn’t have a complete squad (one guy filming, one guy sitting, another guy playing with another team most of the time except for a few illegal points which we certainly would have called them on had it made a difference in our advancement), and I don’t know if they were showing us everything. (We withheld our new O and D formations, the bi-angled stack and the ho-stack clam.)
Then, disaster. 2 hour bye, plus we noticed our next opponents lost to Bodhi, 15-5. No problem, that locked up a top two finish for us, no need to get ready for the next game. And at one time (199x), that was true, we would have gone up 2-0 and traded out for a 15-13 victory. We came out flat, and got flatter, and flattened. There was a timeout late in the first half, followed by another break to lose half 8-5, and further degradation in the second half put us at 15-8. While this did lead to some enjoyment at figuring out all the possible tiebreaking scenarios (Bodhi has to lose by less than 14 to guarantee top two, we have to win by 7 unless Tombstone wins in which case we just have to win but if we lose then we want Tombstone to lose, etc.), it wasn’t enough to make up for the poor performance.
Next game started well with a break, but then more blah, going down 8-2. Near the end of the half, a short hospital pass went up to me, I jumped, my defender got his fingers on it a split-second before I did. I started to rip it out, but then let go while everyone anticipated the strip call and stopped. I waved "no call", and he threw the disc to a teammate for a goal while most players looked on. I stuck with my non-call but then asked for a check, mistakenly thinking that I had made a call before retracting it, thus meriting a check, but I gave that up too without realizing that this was what the rules said, too. Most thought it was a strip, one guy told me he thought it wasn't. The second half was a moral victory as we managed to get 9. This sent us down into a crossover game against some Brown alumni plus Chain guys, drastically underseeded at 23rd coming in (they finished 9th, ahead of two 2007 Nationals qualifiers, giving up no more than 10 in any game). We were tired and old, and we lost a few guys in having to relocate fields, and we got beaten deep repeatedly. The closest we came to being in a position to win was having a pass dropped in the upwind end zone that would have made it 9-6.
A scrawny scrub who hardly played wanted me to blog about how bad it was that they were seeded so low. It was a good question. Clearly, going in they were one of the top 16 teams. Zip, AJ, Joel Wootten were the biggest names, plus several other players who played at Nationals last year. But they were a pickup team without any history, and all of the other teams who were in the top half were real club teams (albeit two of us were Masters teams). Should one of them have been bumped to make way for a group of guys who were better but had no way to prove it beforehand? (They proved it afterward, but they were limited to no better than 9th.) A few years ago, another pickup team (Thermonuke) won this tournament, but they had a little more history and a wider cast of characters. On the other hand, these other teams may have worked hard and earned a spot.
btw, I’m a strong proponent of stratification in tournaments. The Women and Mixed divisions at Boston Invite both had an 8 team round robin with no crossover (but also disappointingly no final game). For Open, there wasn’t as clear of a line, certainly not at the #8 spot, and except for Great Britain and Machine, none of the Elite teams had plane flights. With a full set of Nationals teams, a completely split-off Elite div is probably the best, but with less of a field, this way makes sense.
So we lost and got rewarded with an 8:30 game on Sunday. Not surprisingly, at 8:20 we didn’t have a full squad, and I’m sure our opponents were wondering if they were going to get a forfeit. Got a break early, gave it back, traded until we broke to take half 8-6. Gave it back and proceeded to trade to 11-11, scored, then broke three more times to win.
This set up the semis against Colt .45. Our previous matchup against them at White Mountain Open in 2007 helped to launch a blogging career, but there was to be no repeat of that loss. There was again not a lot of ebb and flow to the game; perhaps we got a three goal run once, but otherwise, just single breaks here and there. (Runs always add to the dramatic tension in a game. The only exception is if there is a long streak of no breaks at all, especially if there are some points with multiple turnovers, and you start to wonder who is going to blink first. As an O player, I always felt more pressure in this situation, as your hopes get up when your D gets a turn, only to have them sink away again on the cluster of an offense they run. Repeat.) One of their guys called travel twice on Arnold on non-egregious violations, probably in line with what others were doing, then after the second one, tapped the disc in a little too enthusiastically and knocked it out of his hands. At some point, Arnold told him he didn’t know how to play the game, so for the rest of the game, whenever this kid did something good, he would repeat the line. And I would repeat the line to my team whenever one of his pulls sailed out of bounds halfway up the field. Eh, no hard feelings, it’s just amusing to me now.
After the game, we tried to find an open field to move up our “final” (there was a bye scheduled) but couldn’t, and our opponents (Tombstone again) weren’t all that interested in waiting around to play us again. Their captain came looking for us and said, “We have 12 guys playing still and 3 of them are going to get hurt if they have to play another game.” So I raised my arms in triumph, and he didn’t argue with my proclamation of our victory, so we are claiming that as a forfeit win. We’ll see them again in a few weeks at Worlds.
I stayed around (my wife was still playing) and watched the end of the Open semis (both one-pointers) and most of the Open finals. GOAT-Pony was a multiple-turnover final point. The final turnover came on a long pass than hit the ground before a diving BVH could catch it, and he lay there after for a few seconds, clutching the disc. His opponent came up and tried to rip it out of his hands, but BVH wouldn’t let go, and the opponent started yelling at him, unaware (I hope) that BVH was mildly injured. But even after understanding this, he was still somewhat belligerent, so I screamed at him, “Why don’t you just piss on him?” as that would seem in character.
The finals were exciting. GOAT is my new role model for Huck n Hope. Boston was also unafraid to put it up occasionally on a whim, but not nearly as often. Kids today.
Monday, June 23, 2008
Ultimate Showcase Series
The Ultimate Showcase just completed its third year in the Boston area. It's a series of games featuring the club players in the Boston area against each other, competing in Open and Mixed.
There were three preliminary games at area schools (Concord, Bedford, BB&N in Cambridge, Charlestown) prior to the finals at a nice new soccer stadium in Somerville.
My team (Cambridge) won the Open final (hurray!) but gave up the final four points to lose the Mixed final by 1 (doh!). Even though I didn't care too much, I still hated losing that final in that way. I thought we had clinched the game after I caught a long pass in the crowd (flat-footed; I lead the league in flat-footed contested catches) and dished off a lefty backhand for the goal to put us up 14-11 with about 6 minutes left in a running clock (we had the field only until 3 pm). But boom, boom, and it's 14-13, pull with less than a minute. With about 20 seconds left, we decide to throw it deep, turn, and then they launch their own deep pass with about 8 seconds left for the goal. (It wasn't really clear, though, what the cap rule was, whether the game would have ended right there or if the point would have been finished.) The soccer guys who had the field next and were watching were nice and allowed us to play another point. But long throw, non-catch, and they moved it upwind 70 yards for the game.
Our Open team barely made it to the finals. We lost our first game 15-11, and because of point differential needed to win our next game by at least 4. We took half 8-6, then stretched it out to 14-9, but once again, we faltered. Gave up one again, then another, then another turn, got it back, another turn, got it back, and then punched it in to make it on the margin (our opponent had already clinched their spot by scoring at least 9).
It was good playing with the Boston Ultimate guys, but I wish more of them had participated. I don't think that any of the ones who played in the finals were teammates of mine ever (other than Alex) (ok, there were two, on further review). Hmm, interesting also, I just looked at their 2007 roster and only counted 11 guys who I had played with just the year before.
Kudos and thanks to the crew who ran these events, Erik Sebesta primarily. It would be good to get more fans for these events. We seemed to be plagued by bad weather this year. The finals had looked like storms, but instead just brought high winds, at least until about 30 minutes after the game, when lightning and heavy rains did hit.
There were three preliminary games at area schools (Concord, Bedford, BB&N in Cambridge, Charlestown) prior to the finals at a nice new soccer stadium in Somerville.
My team (Cambridge) won the Open final (hurray!) but gave up the final four points to lose the Mixed final by 1 (doh!). Even though I didn't care too much, I still hated losing that final in that way. I thought we had clinched the game after I caught a long pass in the crowd (flat-footed; I lead the league in flat-footed contested catches) and dished off a lefty backhand for the goal to put us up 14-11 with about 6 minutes left in a running clock (we had the field only until 3 pm). But boom, boom, and it's 14-13, pull with less than a minute. With about 20 seconds left, we decide to throw it deep, turn, and then they launch their own deep pass with about 8 seconds left for the goal. (It wasn't really clear, though, what the cap rule was, whether the game would have ended right there or if the point would have been finished.) The soccer guys who had the field next and were watching were nice and allowed us to play another point. But long throw, non-catch, and they moved it upwind 70 yards for the game.
Our Open team barely made it to the finals. We lost our first game 15-11, and because of point differential needed to win our next game by at least 4. We took half 8-6, then stretched it out to 14-9, but once again, we faltered. Gave up one again, then another, then another turn, got it back, another turn, got it back, and then punched it in to make it on the margin (our opponent had already clinched their spot by scoring at least 9).
It was good playing with the Boston Ultimate guys, but I wish more of them had participated. I don't think that any of the ones who played in the finals were teammates of mine ever (other than Alex) (ok, there were two, on further review). Hmm, interesting also, I just looked at their 2007 roster and only counted 11 guys who I had played with just the year before.
Kudos and thanks to the crew who ran these events, Erik Sebesta primarily. It would be good to get more fans for these events. We seemed to be plagued by bad weather this year. The finals had looked like storms, but instead just brought high winds, at least until about 30 minutes after the game, when lightning and heavy rains did hit.
Wednesday, June 18, 2008
Blogging the Huddle- #4
It's a great time to be a young player. There is so much information available on strategies, teams travel much more than they used to, the knowledge about training is miles ahead of what it was.
The most recent addition to this list is The Huddle. This is unique in that it has many different opinions on a common topic.
This bi-week's issue is "The 'Up!' Call" on what to do when you're beat deep and it's thrown.
Responses on what to do immediately were split between "find the disc" and "sprint all-out and react to the receiver finding the disc". (Of course, there was a lot of "It depends..." in there.)
But the purpose of this blog entry is to provide a forum for comments. The editors decided not to allow comments for good reason, but I figure the quality of commentary here is often quite high (better than the posts in some instances!), so have at it. What did you think?
PS. They have 100 000 hits already! It took me a year and a half and 150 posts to get that. Congrats, and well done!
The most recent addition to this list is The Huddle. This is unique in that it has many different opinions on a common topic.
This bi-week's issue is "The 'Up!' Call" on what to do when you're beat deep and it's thrown.
Responses on what to do immediately were split between "find the disc" and "sprint all-out and react to the receiver finding the disc". (Of course, there was a lot of "It depends..." in there.)
But the purpose of this blog entry is to provide a forum for comments. The editors decided not to allow comments for good reason, but I figure the quality of commentary here is often quite high (better than the posts in some instances!), so have at it. What did you think?
PS. They have 100 000 hits already! It took me a year and a half and 150 posts to get that. Congrats, and well done!
Monday, June 09, 2008
Masters Easterns
For a day, it looked like this tournament was destined to join an elite group that included Turkey Swamp 1997, Tuneup 1998, ECC 2001, and Nationals 2004 as contenders for Worst DoG Tournament Ever. Nothing went well, and there wasn't even a glimmer of hope that things were going to go well. Since it was the first time that some had played since Nationals, and none of us had a whole lot of PT since then, it wasn't quite desperate, but neither was it looking like just a little blip on the road to success.
But then we did well on Sunday, so we can return to our slumber.
To save you all from having to read Alex's recap, I'll mention our scores: 15-6, 9-15, 15-12, 8-15; 15-8, 15-8. We had about 14 on Saturday, about 11 on Sunday. The turnaround was largely due to improved play on our part but also worse play by our opponents, who seemed to have some fundamental problems with catching on Sunday.
My own play mirrored that of the team's (or perhaps the team's mirrored mine; my ego is large enough to believe that the complete difference between Saturday and Sunday was me). I was on travel for work and so ate too much and slept not enough and was feeling a little worse for wear by Saturday. I never was able to feel like I could get to top speed. I couldn't chase down a huck from John Bar in the Philly game, a point that started our downfall (it had been 4-4 without a turnover prior to that). I got winded a little too easily, even accounting for the 90+ degree temperature, and I was just jogging a little too much on D.
But Sunday was a lot better. Again, there are still areas for improvement, but everything seemed to go easier and provide fewer reasons for anguish.
The low numbers for our team was disappointing. It's a local tournament for us, we have a roster of somewhere between 25 and 35 (depending on how you count all the guys who have standing invites but didn't play at Nationals and the out-of-towners), and we have a smaller team than a squad from Nova Scotia. Worlds is coming up in less than 2 months, and although people are married with families, etc., it's still not good that we have so few. Philly is hosting a six-team Masters tournament in July that would be a perfect tuneup for us, but if we have such bad turnouts so close to home, I can't imagine we'd have more than four show up in another Region. But I'm sure everyone will be there for Worlds.
Not a whole lot else to report. I called two fouls and a strip, don't think I had anything called on me. The strip was worth retelling. It was the 2nd half of Saturday's game against Philly, we just got a turnover, and Alex threw me a short pass, which I pancaked. Paul Bonfatti came diving by and swatted it away at about the same time that I grasped it. I'm quite certain that no one else but us two had a good enough perspective to know for sure. The flight of the disc afterwards was probably more typical of a clean block, but I'm also reasonably confident that I had both hands firmly against the disc before he touched it. I called it, Paul protested, I thought about it a little, remembered back to 1994 in the semis of Easterns against Philly when I called a similar strip, and decided that there was probably about 1.0-1.2 total strips between the two plays and so therefore the fair thing to do would be to take back the call. They put it into play right away and scored while some of us were still standing around wondering what happened, so I insisted that there be a check, and then some of them were upset that we were making up rules (as Alex mentioned, the game was a bit chippy, as was our game against them in the quarters of Nationals last year), so I briefly considered and threatened to stick with the original call, which I still felt would have been defensible, but we all settled on a check, their disc. And they scored in two passes.
Both fouls were on the same stall count. Oddly, the fact that they completely prevented me from releasing a throw made them less bad in my mind, since that indicates those were probably legitimate attempts to block a throw rather than deliberate or semi-deliberate muggings to prevent a break. That is, the contacts were hand-to-hand (or nearly so) rather than involving the arm, shoulders, or body.
While I'm here, the recent Huddle article asked about how to stop a handler who suddenly is going deep. My immediate thought was that someone would suggest "mug him" (or the other guys who are throwing to him), but I was surprised that none of the guys and only one of the women came up with that idea (and she attributed the idea to other teams, not hers). I guess none of us have ever played WITH someone like that, only AGAINST. It's like Lake Wobegon, we're all cleaner and more honest than average. I guess I plead guilty to that, too.
But then we did well on Sunday, so we can return to our slumber.
To save you all from having to read Alex's recap, I'll mention our scores: 15-6, 9-15, 15-12, 8-15; 15-8, 15-8. We had about 14 on Saturday, about 11 on Sunday. The turnaround was largely due to improved play on our part but also worse play by our opponents, who seemed to have some fundamental problems with catching on Sunday.
My own play mirrored that of the team's (or perhaps the team's mirrored mine; my ego is large enough to believe that the complete difference between Saturday and Sunday was me). I was on travel for work and so ate too much and slept not enough and was feeling a little worse for wear by Saturday. I never was able to feel like I could get to top speed. I couldn't chase down a huck from John Bar in the Philly game, a point that started our downfall (it had been 4-4 without a turnover prior to that). I got winded a little too easily, even accounting for the 90+ degree temperature, and I was just jogging a little too much on D.
But Sunday was a lot better. Again, there are still areas for improvement, but everything seemed to go easier and provide fewer reasons for anguish.
The low numbers for our team was disappointing. It's a local tournament for us, we have a roster of somewhere between 25 and 35 (depending on how you count all the guys who have standing invites but didn't play at Nationals and the out-of-towners), and we have a smaller team than a squad from Nova Scotia. Worlds is coming up in less than 2 months, and although people are married with families, etc., it's still not good that we have so few. Philly is hosting a six-team Masters tournament in July that would be a perfect tuneup for us, but if we have such bad turnouts so close to home, I can't imagine we'd have more than four show up in another Region. But I'm sure everyone will be there for Worlds.
Not a whole lot else to report. I called two fouls and a strip, don't think I had anything called on me. The strip was worth retelling. It was the 2nd half of Saturday's game against Philly, we just got a turnover, and Alex threw me a short pass, which I pancaked. Paul Bonfatti came diving by and swatted it away at about the same time that I grasped it. I'm quite certain that no one else but us two had a good enough perspective to know for sure. The flight of the disc afterwards was probably more typical of a clean block, but I'm also reasonably confident that I had both hands firmly against the disc before he touched it. I called it, Paul protested, I thought about it a little, remembered back to 1994 in the semis of Easterns against Philly when I called a similar strip, and decided that there was probably about 1.0-1.2 total strips between the two plays and so therefore the fair thing to do would be to take back the call. They put it into play right away and scored while some of us were still standing around wondering what happened, so I insisted that there be a check, and then some of them were upset that we were making up rules (as Alex mentioned, the game was a bit chippy, as was our game against them in the quarters of Nationals last year), so I briefly considered and threatened to stick with the original call, which I still felt would have been defensible, but we all settled on a check, their disc. And they scored in two passes.
Both fouls were on the same stall count. Oddly, the fact that they completely prevented me from releasing a throw made them less bad in my mind, since that indicates those were probably legitimate attempts to block a throw rather than deliberate or semi-deliberate muggings to prevent a break. That is, the contacts were hand-to-hand (or nearly so) rather than involving the arm, shoulders, or body.
While I'm here, the recent Huddle article asked about how to stop a handler who suddenly is going deep. My immediate thought was that someone would suggest "mug him" (or the other guys who are throwing to him), but I was surprised that none of the guys and only one of the women came up with that idea (and she attributed the idea to other teams, not hers). I guess none of us have ever played WITH someone like that, only AGAINST. It's like Lake Wobegon, we're all cleaner and more honest than average. I guess I plead guilty to that, too.
Sunday, May 25, 2008
WMO 2008
Short story: see last year. Replace "Colt .45" with "Dartmouth Alum" (or Die Nasty, I think they were called), throw in a couple more 1-pointers, and you'll be all set.
The most remarkable thing of the weekend was that there was one point in the first or second game where all seven players were wearing the same shirt. I can't ever recall that at a spring tournament, and there were probably whole years where it didn't happen except at Nationals.
Saturday, we had 13 players (one bailed last minute with a "tweaked back"). Not too hot, sometimes cloudy, occasional wind (in one of the games, there was a string of 4-5 points in a row where the wind picked up when we were receiving and died down when we were pulling). We debuted the horizontal stack, and ended up using it fairly often over the weekend. It worked best for us when the downfield cutters got off quick passes in succession. The only long pass the handler stack completed to a cutter was a quail forehand I threw that bounced off the chest of the defender. But it was kinda fun running back and forth a few yards at a time until something opened up.
We had the desired first round bye, which let most people drive up Saturday morning. I was shocked when I got there 10 minutes before game time that we actually had more than enough to play.
We lost our second game to Phoenix, 14-13 or 15-14. We had so many opportunities to score in that game but turned too many of them. We received at double game point, Alex hucked to me, it hung a little and my defender made a good but not great play to knock it over (I should have boxed him out better). They hucked it back, caught it, and then we didn't get enough people back to play defense and they scored it. Overall we did poorly that game on huck defense. Phoenix went on to win all their games until losing in the semis to Bodhi, a new Amherst/Boston team that started off in the B bracket.
Next game was to avoid the 9 am pre-quarter round. We sat around in between games and skipped the hot box warmup, so I asked prior to the opening pull whether we would go down 3, 4, or 5 before waking up. Strangely, though, it was us that started off well, leading 2-0 (at which point I quipped, "time to trade out until the cap"). But then they woke up and went up two breaks and received to start the second half. I vaguely remember some zone or junk D as we made our own run to start the second half with several breaks, and we traded out to win 13-10. This guaranteed us at least 2nd place and thus a first-round bye, provided we could beat Colt 45. They came in seeded 2nd in the pool (us first), but were missing Match and some others and had gone winless. It was a pretty low-key game, and though it appeared losable somewhere along the line, we held on for a 13-10 win.
For Sunday's play, we were down to 10, as three had other things to do (including, get this, a "Soberfest"). Two who were supposed to come for Sunday only bailed. Then two were late, and one stupid idiot pulled up lame because he drank too much beer (not that there's anything wrong with that) and not enough water. We went up a break and had chances for another, but pissed it away and once more went down two breaks, pulling, at half. This time our run didn't start until 12-10, but we tied it up just in time for the hard cap, double game point. We got a block just outside our end zone, and immediately called time out, which we had agreed among ourselves that we had. No, no, no, says the other team. "I'm a captain, and I agreed with one of your guys that there were no time outs this point." "Well, I'm a captain and I did not agree to any such thing, so you can't use that argument." They tried to invoke the Captain's Clause, but again I insisted that none of our captains had agreed to that, so barring any such agreement, we should play by the UPA rules (which I was beginning to doubt that I knew correctly; I sure hope I am correct, or else I truly made an ass out of myself after the game, instead of just sorta). Eventually, they generously let us keep the disc with a stall count of 3. After a few seconds, I cut for the dump, but kinda cut away since there was a lot of space there, and the thrower threw it straight back, and my defender laid out for the game-ending Callahan. I was still mad enough about the time out that I got my rulebook out, then walked over to the frisbee central to make sure there weren't any tournament-specific rules about timeouts in the cap, then came back and handed the rulebook to the other captain and said, "Here, read this."
We then had a consolation game against Red Tide. This one yet again went to double-game point, us receiving. We turned it twice, but so did they, and we finally scored on a DGP possession (our first goal in five chances). I did a little fist-pump after throwing the game-winner, just as a little reminder that we could still win a close game (I guess we did okay on this score at Nationals last year, but against Open teams, we have had a lot of one-pointers with mostly bad results).
Although there were lulls for sure, I felt pretty good, easily my best "first tournament of the year" in at least five years. My D on handlers was pretty good, not so good on zone D, okay on receivers. No real terrible decisions on throws (not to say perfect execution, but some good long throws), always something that can be troubling after a layoff.
We were discussing how strange it was that we were able to do well with our advanced age. Only 4 of 13 were under 40. I figured even with only 10 people there Sunday, we still had the most years of life of any team there. And we were even missing 20 of our teammates.
The most remarkable thing of the weekend was that there was one point in the first or second game where all seven players were wearing the same shirt. I can't ever recall that at a spring tournament, and there were probably whole years where it didn't happen except at Nationals.
Saturday, we had 13 players (one bailed last minute with a "tweaked back"). Not too hot, sometimes cloudy, occasional wind (in one of the games, there was a string of 4-5 points in a row where the wind picked up when we were receiving and died down when we were pulling). We debuted the horizontal stack, and ended up using it fairly often over the weekend. It worked best for us when the downfield cutters got off quick passes in succession. The only long pass the handler stack completed to a cutter was a quail forehand I threw that bounced off the chest of the defender. But it was kinda fun running back and forth a few yards at a time until something opened up.
We had the desired first round bye, which let most people drive up Saturday morning. I was shocked when I got there 10 minutes before game time that we actually had more than enough to play.
We lost our second game to Phoenix, 14-13 or 15-14. We had so many opportunities to score in that game but turned too many of them. We received at double game point, Alex hucked to me, it hung a little and my defender made a good but not great play to knock it over (I should have boxed him out better). They hucked it back, caught it, and then we didn't get enough people back to play defense and they scored it. Overall we did poorly that game on huck defense. Phoenix went on to win all their games until losing in the semis to Bodhi, a new Amherst/Boston team that started off in the B bracket.
Next game was to avoid the 9 am pre-quarter round. We sat around in between games and skipped the hot box warmup, so I asked prior to the opening pull whether we would go down 3, 4, or 5 before waking up. Strangely, though, it was us that started off well, leading 2-0 (at which point I quipped, "time to trade out until the cap"). But then they woke up and went up two breaks and received to start the second half. I vaguely remember some zone or junk D as we made our own run to start the second half with several breaks, and we traded out to win 13-10. This guaranteed us at least 2nd place and thus a first-round bye, provided we could beat Colt 45. They came in seeded 2nd in the pool (us first), but were missing Match and some others and had gone winless. It was a pretty low-key game, and though it appeared losable somewhere along the line, we held on for a 13-10 win.
For Sunday's play, we were down to 10, as three had other things to do (including, get this, a "Soberfest"). Two who were supposed to come for Sunday only bailed. Then two were late, and one stupid idiot pulled up lame because he drank too much beer (not that there's anything wrong with that) and not enough water. We went up a break and had chances for another, but pissed it away and once more went down two breaks, pulling, at half. This time our run didn't start until 12-10, but we tied it up just in time for the hard cap, double game point. We got a block just outside our end zone, and immediately called time out, which we had agreed among ourselves that we had. No, no, no, says the other team. "I'm a captain, and I agreed with one of your guys that there were no time outs this point." "Well, I'm a captain and I did not agree to any such thing, so you can't use that argument." They tried to invoke the Captain's Clause, but again I insisted that none of our captains had agreed to that, so barring any such agreement, we should play by the UPA rules (which I was beginning to doubt that I knew correctly; I sure hope I am correct, or else I truly made an ass out of myself after the game, instead of just sorta). Eventually, they generously let us keep the disc with a stall count of 3. After a few seconds, I cut for the dump, but kinda cut away since there was a lot of space there, and the thrower threw it straight back, and my defender laid out for the game-ending Callahan. I was still mad enough about the time out that I got my rulebook out, then walked over to the frisbee central to make sure there weren't any tournament-specific rules about timeouts in the cap, then came back and handed the rulebook to the other captain and said, "Here, read this."
We then had a consolation game against Red Tide. This one yet again went to double-game point, us receiving. We turned it twice, but so did they, and we finally scored on a DGP possession (our first goal in five chances). I did a little fist-pump after throwing the game-winner, just as a little reminder that we could still win a close game (I guess we did okay on this score at Nationals last year, but against Open teams, we have had a lot of one-pointers with mostly bad results).
Although there were lulls for sure, I felt pretty good, easily my best "first tournament of the year" in at least five years. My D on handlers was pretty good, not so good on zone D, okay on receivers. No real terrible decisions on throws (not to say perfect execution, but some good long throws), always something that can be troubling after a layoff.
We were discussing how strange it was that we were able to do well with our advanced age. Only 4 of 13 were under 40. I figured even with only 10 people there Sunday, we still had the most years of life of any team there. And we were even missing 20 of our teammates.
Wednesday, February 27, 2008
Japan Friendship Tour 1994, part 1
My wife was out of town at a Frisbee tournament last weekend, so I took the boy to go sledding with the de Frondevilles over at a hill in Arlington. This was his first real sledding hill, although we had gone a few times in the backyard. He can actually get some speed going in the backyard if the snow is right, and there is a tree a bit off to the side to make it interesting, but it’s small. At the Arlington hill, I rode with him a few times at first, but then decided to let him go by himself (after glancing around to make sure the missus hadn’t flown in suddenly to say it was a bad idea). He made it just fine, although with the crowded hill there were a few close calls. I think he may have even been knocked over one time at the bottom, but it was barely hard enough to merit a foul.
The memory of careering down a hill, however, brought back memories of 1994. Twelve of us were flown to Japan (all expenses paid) to be instructors for a week at a frisbee camp. This was about the fifth time that Masa Honda and Hiro had worked with Mike O’Dowd (a teammate of Masa’s on Windy City in the ‘80s) to bring some Americans over to help them develop the game. Considering how good they’ve become, maybe this wasn’t a good idea (I told Masa at Nationals last fall (he played with O’Dowd’s Troubled Past) that maybe they will have to come over here now to give us clinics). Here is an article from an American ex-pat who was in Japan and played in their Nationals that year, a few months after this clinic.
The crew:
This was the first time that women were flown over. There were a few women’s teams attending, possibly for the first time, but mostly it was the men’s teams. Teams attended for a day or two, had some instruction, and also got to play one game against the Americans.
To cut to the story, one night, we had a few Sapporo beers and decided to explore the grounds. (I should stop now and say we were pretty inconsiderate, disrespectful, and stupid about the whole adventure.) We were at the Dai Shin En in Takahagi, about three hours north by train from Tokyo, where we had stayed the first night. This place was a cross between a hotel, a camp, and a dorm. There were plenty of sports training facilities, including a disc golf course and a golf pitching course. But we were more concerned that night with the alpine slide and the artificial ski hill.
It was raining steadily that night, so sliding down a hill seemed like a good idea. We first tried the alpine slide, using trays taken from the cafeteria, but that didn’t work too well, so we headed across the facility to the ski slope. The slope was a hard plastic fake grass, with small densely-packed needles which got pretty slick when it rained. I think we may have been using the trays to slide down and were having fun, when someone (probably the same guy (cough Switzer cough)) found two big park benches. Thus, the Jamaican bobsled team decided to come out.
We were a bit drunk, of course, and hit the hill hard. I was on the first bobsled, and it became evident very quickly that this thing was fast. We did everything we could to slow ourselves but still sped down the hill. We managed to stop ourselves, though, and immediately started running up the hill to tell the other bobsled not to go. We yelled, waved our arms, and jumped up and down, but maybe it was the rain, or maybe it was the beer, or maybe it was the obliviousness of the girls and Switzer, and they took off at full speed, giggling all the way. Near the bottom of the hill, Switzer bailed out and suffered some brushburns, but the girls continued on, past the bottom, up the ramp, through a pavilion (narrowly missing a cement pole), caught some air, and got themselves stuck under a plasticky chain-link fence. We all immediately decided that this was the last run of the night.
Other non-frisbee memories:
Two water-closet stories: At the Dai Shin En, there was a row of stalls in the bathroom. The first one didn’t have a toilet, just a hole in the floor, as did the second one, so I stopped looking, figuring they’d all be that way, and I used this one all week, squatting to do my business. At the end of the week, I decided to venture all the way to the end, and saw an “American-style toilet”.
In the restroom at the Tokyo airport, there was an American-style toilet along with the normal ones. Apparently, they had had some trouble with natives not understanding how to use it, so there was a sign indicating that you are supposed to sit on the seat and not squat on top of it.
Waking up at 5 am a few times because of the jet lag and walking around town and playing the golf course. (It wasn’t really a course. The holes were each about 20 yard doglegs, about 6 feet wide, and you have to keep the ball within the ropes before chipping it into a bowl suspended above the ground.
Doing lots of guns.
Hanging out at the beach one evening and doing a group photo gun (that was a favorite photo of mine for some time; I wonder whether I still have it). The wall at the edge of the beach was really far from the water, I want to say 50-100 yards, and we were sitting there chatting when all of a sudden a wave ran all the way up to the wall. We then found out that there had been some recent drownings (strong swimmers, too; it seems that sometimes strong swimmers are more at danger because they think they can handle greater challenges when it really doesn’t matter how good of a swimmer you are. Snorkelers who dive very deep (more than 30 feet) can black out when they hit the surface, but that wouldn’t ever happen to an average swimmer who would go no more than 10 feet deep) where people got washed out to sea by a rogue wave.
Hanging out in the sento at the inn. Buzzy and Aaron were jawing good-naturedly. Aaron made a crude comment. Buzzy told him if he said it again he’d pop him. Aaron said if he popped him he’d give him a forearm shiver back. Buzzy repeated his threat. Aaron said it, and the rest occurred as promised, and we continued with our evening.
Mystery meat in the cafeteria. And the corn chowder.
Ro-cham-squirrel. We had a party one night, and Biscuit and I did a series of roshams to see who had to drink the warm beers lying around (loser drank). You weren’t allowed to look in the cup first to see how much, you had to guess. Luckily, there were no smokers, so there was never a risk of having to down a cigarette.
Next: the frisbee
The memory of careering down a hill, however, brought back memories of 1994. Twelve of us were flown to Japan (all expenses paid) to be instructors for a week at a frisbee camp. This was about the fifth time that Masa Honda and Hiro had worked with Mike O’Dowd (a teammate of Masa’s on Windy City in the ‘80s) to bring some Americans over to help them develop the game. Considering how good they’ve become, maybe this wasn’t a good idea (I told Masa at Nationals last fall (he played with O’Dowd’s Troubled Past) that maybe they will have to come over here now to give us clinics). Here is an article from an American ex-pat who was in Japan and played in their Nationals that year, a few months after this clinic.
The crew:
- from San Francisco: Mike O’Dowd, Brian “Biscuit” Morris, Scott Lipscomb, Caryn Lucido, Molly Goodwin
- Portland: Kathy Porter, Jon King, Aaron Switzer
- Colorado: Buzzy Ellsworth
- Boston: me, Christine “Teens” Dunlap
- St. Louis: Mark Houska
This was the first time that women were flown over. There were a few women’s teams attending, possibly for the first time, but mostly it was the men’s teams. Teams attended for a day or two, had some instruction, and also got to play one game against the Americans.
To cut to the story, one night, we had a few Sapporo beers and decided to explore the grounds. (I should stop now and say we were pretty inconsiderate, disrespectful, and stupid about the whole adventure.) We were at the Dai Shin En in Takahagi, about three hours north by train from Tokyo, where we had stayed the first night. This place was a cross between a hotel, a camp, and a dorm. There were plenty of sports training facilities, including a disc golf course and a golf pitching course. But we were more concerned that night with the alpine slide and the artificial ski hill.
It was raining steadily that night, so sliding down a hill seemed like a good idea. We first tried the alpine slide, using trays taken from the cafeteria, but that didn’t work too well, so we headed across the facility to the ski slope. The slope was a hard plastic fake grass, with small densely-packed needles which got pretty slick when it rained. I think we may have been using the trays to slide down and were having fun, when someone (probably the same guy (cough Switzer cough)) found two big park benches. Thus, the Jamaican bobsled team decided to come out.
We were a bit drunk, of course, and hit the hill hard. I was on the first bobsled, and it became evident very quickly that this thing was fast. We did everything we could to slow ourselves but still sped down the hill. We managed to stop ourselves, though, and immediately started running up the hill to tell the other bobsled not to go. We yelled, waved our arms, and jumped up and down, but maybe it was the rain, or maybe it was the beer, or maybe it was the obliviousness of the girls and Switzer, and they took off at full speed, giggling all the way. Near the bottom of the hill, Switzer bailed out and suffered some brushburns, but the girls continued on, past the bottom, up the ramp, through a pavilion (narrowly missing a cement pole), caught some air, and got themselves stuck under a plasticky chain-link fence. We all immediately decided that this was the last run of the night.
Other non-frisbee memories:
Two water-closet stories: At the Dai Shin En, there was a row of stalls in the bathroom. The first one didn’t have a toilet, just a hole in the floor, as did the second one, so I stopped looking, figuring they’d all be that way, and I used this one all week, squatting to do my business. At the end of the week, I decided to venture all the way to the end, and saw an “American-style toilet”.
In the restroom at the Tokyo airport, there was an American-style toilet along with the normal ones. Apparently, they had had some trouble with natives not understanding how to use it, so there was a sign indicating that you are supposed to sit on the seat and not squat on top of it.
Waking up at 5 am a few times because of the jet lag and walking around town and playing the golf course. (It wasn’t really a course. The holes were each about 20 yard doglegs, about 6 feet wide, and you have to keep the ball within the ropes before chipping it into a bowl suspended above the ground.
Doing lots of guns.
Hanging out at the beach one evening and doing a group photo gun (that was a favorite photo of mine for some time; I wonder whether I still have it). The wall at the edge of the beach was really far from the water, I want to say 50-100 yards, and we were sitting there chatting when all of a sudden a wave ran all the way up to the wall. We then found out that there had been some recent drownings (strong swimmers, too; it seems that sometimes strong swimmers are more at danger because they think they can handle greater challenges when it really doesn’t matter how good of a swimmer you are. Snorkelers who dive very deep (more than 30 feet) can black out when they hit the surface, but that wouldn’t ever happen to an average swimmer who would go no more than 10 feet deep) where people got washed out to sea by a rogue wave.
Hanging out in the sento at the inn. Buzzy and Aaron were jawing good-naturedly. Aaron made a crude comment. Buzzy told him if he said it again he’d pop him. Aaron said if he popped him he’d give him a forearm shiver back. Buzzy repeated his threat. Aaron said it, and the rest occurred as promised, and we continued with our evening.
Mystery meat in the cafeteria. And the corn chowder.
Ro-cham-squirrel. We had a party one night, and Biscuit and I did a series of roshams to see who had to drink the warm beers lying around (loser drank). You weren’t allowed to look in the cup first to see how much, you had to guess. Luckily, there were no smokers, so there was never a risk of having to down a cigarette.
Next: the frisbee
Saturday, February 09, 2008
rules
From Section I Etiquette in the Rules.
The Spirit of the Game
[This sport] is played, for the most part, without the supervision of a referee or umpire. The game relies on the integrity of the indivudal to show consideration for other players and to abide by the Rules. All players should conduct themselves in a disciplined manner, demonstrating courtesy and sportsmanship at all times, irrespective of how competitive they may be. This is the spirit of the game of [this sport].
[This sport], of course, is golf. I just got my copy of the updated Rules of Golf today and noted that they made some (what I would call) common-sense improvements. For instance, simply carrying a non-conforming club will not get you DQ'ed, only penalized, and standing on your line of putt is now legal if done to avoid standing on someone else's line.
The other proximate cause for this post is the recent rsd discussion on the intentional self-mac or airbrush. My understanding is that the rule was put in because ultimate players also used to do other disc sports such as freestyling and controlled macking and finger-delaying was a part of their arsenal of disc skills. So, the intent is that since the disc is advanced by passing, it would be an unfair advantage to advance by delaying. But the rest of the rule, I'm not sure what was intended. Was it really intended that you should be allowed to mac it to someone else? If it's so easy to mack it to yourself, it can't be that much more difficult to mack it to a teammate. And in a related rule, is it really intended that you can mack your own pass but you can't catch it or greatest it?
I know that writing specifications can be difficult. I remember once on the Board that we put in some specific language one year to cover some contingency, and the next year the statement was reinterpreted to mean something else. And this was for something that we had thought about. There are many examples where you don't actually consider a case and then the case comes up and the users are left to interpret what is written.
A problem can arise when there is mindless devotion to what is written as the be all, end all. In golf, maybe this is ok, since the individuals have pretty much no input into what the rules should be. Perhaps the rules committee does respond to public complaints, as this year's changes seem to indicate, but traditionally it doesn't seem that way. Ultimate players, however, have a more direct relationship with the rules committee, and can even take part in rules experiments through local tournaments or leagues.
So we can change stupid rules or ambiguous ones. I think one of the main purposes of the 11th Edition was to tackle this, to remove exceptions ("the rules don't prohibit it, so it's allowed") and to clarify.
Anyway, as always, I remain ambivalent to rules interpretations. I know them pretty well, follow them pretty well, but am very lax at calling them, most of the time. (An exception is when I feel that the following conditions are met: the player gains an advantage, does it on purpose, knows the rule, and does it repeatedly. I called something like this at goaltimate last week and pissed off the violator. I'm perfectly willing to let laziness or ignorance or an occasional minor semi-deliberate offense slide, though.) I too often let myself get involved in rules arguments started by other people, and I usually take the petty pro-rules side.
And just for completeness, I'm anti-ref, pro-observer, don't mind certain calls being actively done by observers.
The Spirit of the Game
[This sport] is played, for the most part, without the supervision of a referee or umpire. The game relies on the integrity of the indivudal to show consideration for other players and to abide by the Rules. All players should conduct themselves in a disciplined manner, demonstrating courtesy and sportsmanship at all times, irrespective of how competitive they may be. This is the spirit of the game of [this sport].
[This sport], of course, is golf. I just got my copy of the updated Rules of Golf today and noted that they made some (what I would call) common-sense improvements. For instance, simply carrying a non-conforming club will not get you DQ'ed, only penalized, and standing on your line of putt is now legal if done to avoid standing on someone else's line.
The other proximate cause for this post is the recent rsd discussion on the intentional self-mac or airbrush. My understanding is that the rule was put in because ultimate players also used to do other disc sports such as freestyling and controlled macking and finger-delaying was a part of their arsenal of disc skills. So, the intent is that since the disc is advanced by passing, it would be an unfair advantage to advance by delaying. But the rest of the rule, I'm not sure what was intended. Was it really intended that you should be allowed to mac it to someone else? If it's so easy to mack it to yourself, it can't be that much more difficult to mack it to a teammate. And in a related rule, is it really intended that you can mack your own pass but you can't catch it or greatest it?
I know that writing specifications can be difficult. I remember once on the Board that we put in some specific language one year to cover some contingency, and the next year the statement was reinterpreted to mean something else. And this was for something that we had thought about. There are many examples where you don't actually consider a case and then the case comes up and the users are left to interpret what is written.
A problem can arise when there is mindless devotion to what is written as the be all, end all. In golf, maybe this is ok, since the individuals have pretty much no input into what the rules should be. Perhaps the rules committee does respond to public complaints, as this year's changes seem to indicate, but traditionally it doesn't seem that way. Ultimate players, however, have a more direct relationship with the rules committee, and can even take part in rules experiments through local tournaments or leagues.
So we can change stupid rules or ambiguous ones. I think one of the main purposes of the 11th Edition was to tackle this, to remove exceptions ("the rules don't prohibit it, so it's allowed") and to clarify.
Anyway, as always, I remain ambivalent to rules interpretations. I know them pretty well, follow them pretty well, but am very lax at calling them, most of the time. (An exception is when I feel that the following conditions are met: the player gains an advantage, does it on purpose, knows the rule, and does it repeatedly. I called something like this at goaltimate last week and pissed off the violator. I'm perfectly willing to let laziness or ignorance or an occasional minor semi-deliberate offense slide, though.) I too often let myself get involved in rules arguments started by other people, and I usually take the petty pro-rules side.
And just for completeness, I'm anti-ref, pro-observer, don't mind certain calls being actively done by observers.
Thursday, January 17, 2008
Testosterone man speaks (well, grunts)
So, as you guys have figured out, that was an old rant of mine. I wanted to shock people a little, at least those who didn't recognize it right away. In 1993, Boston developed an attitude and tried to be like NYNY. We had a strong team, and had beaten NY by 7 at Regionals to take the top seed at Nationals. But then we met them in the semis and lost. That game had a "bench-clearing brawl" and a headbutt, and lots of jawing and posturing and all that. I remember the feeling very well still, although the specifics of the game are almost completely gone now.
I wrote it after reading complaints from a bunch of people who weren't there and who had no idea what it was like to be in our shoes. It drew quite a response. I can still quote some of the replies. "Mr. Parinella's horrible posting pisses me off." "@%&$ you and the horse you rode in on." "There is no place in the game for people like Jim Parinella." But there were also replies from people who knew me that defended, somewhat, me or my point of view.
So, this was my response.
Wow. I guess this means I'm not invited to play with Rec.Sport.Disc at Fools
next year.
I'd like to explain a little about why I wrote. I fully expected to get flamed
terribly. Tross (law...@brandeis.something) posted an opposing viewpoint that
was very mild, and got nailed for it, so I knew it was coming. I can take it,
I'm pretty thick-skinned. I'm enjoying this whole discussion, even though
anyone that dares to say anything along my lines provokes outcries of "Savage"
and "Kill that aggressive guy". I would like to thank the people that wrote in
with support. They really made my day.
I'd like to clarify some things that people may have gotten out of my post:
1. I am not an asshole. The sig was a reference to a previous post equating
wanting to win with being a "testosterone filled asshole". How many of you
know me? I think that I have (at least until this week) a pretty good reputation
(as a person) among this crowd. I think most people consider me a quiet, mild-
mannered guy who plays hard but fair. I'm sure many of those people are now
saying, "I never knew he was suck a jerk", but I was also hoping other people
would read the post and think, "Hmm, Jim's always been pretty reasonable. Maybe
he's got a point." I put my name at incredible risk because I read statements
that I considered to be just plain wrong, and I could not sit and let it go by
any longer. I've been on teams that didn't make it out of Sectionals, I still
captain a summer league team, I still play in pickup tournaments. I like the
game. But it's a sport, and sports have winners and losers.
2. I do not think that fights in the game are a good thing. But nor do I think
they're the end of the world. If there were an ejection rule, that would help.
3. Man is an aggressive animal. Screaming for joy is an act of aggression.
Wanting to win is a form of aggression. "(W)hen the disc is crisp, when the flow
is kind, I get this pulsating ball of energy brewing at the base of my skull."
Do you get this same feeling when you're on defense and the flow is kind? Isn't
this the same as saying, "I enjoy it when I humilate my defender"? It's not the
same as hitting someone, but isn't that aggression all the same?
4. It really is a different game at the top. This was really the main point of
my post, and it's the point that people seemed most unwilling to accept. Do
any of your teammates puke regularly after track workouts? Do you study game
films of your opponents to know their tendencies better? Do you have half a
dozen different defenses to throw at an opponent? Does everyone on your team
break the mark? I was on Earth Atomizer when we made it to the semifinals at
Worlds in 1991, but I think that this team is really at another level. I've
learned so much more in the last two years with BB than I did in my first nine
of playing.
5. Along those lines, individuals play for different reasons. If you're
playing because you like sports but don't like all the yelling, that's fine.
I don't want you to stop playing. Just accept that not everyone feels the
same way.
I will admit that I focused too much on aggression in my first post, hence the
overwhelming response. For what it's worth, I was calm when I wrote it, and
even revised it to remove the personal attacks (unlike others--you know who
you are). It just irritated me that seemingly most posts had no basis in fact
and relied purely on emotions and feelings (but isn't that always the case).
Flame away.
Jim Parinella
Big Brother
"If you can't open your mind, are you sure you still have one?'
I wrote it after reading complaints from a bunch of people who weren't there and who had no idea what it was like to be in our shoes. It drew quite a response. I can still quote some of the replies. "Mr. Parinella's horrible posting pisses me off." "@%&$ you and the horse you rode in on." "There is no place in the game for people like Jim Parinella." But there were also replies from people who knew me that defended, somewhat, me or my point of view.
So, this was my response.
Wow. I guess this means I'm not invited to play with Rec.Sport.Disc at Fools
next year.
I'd like to explain a little about why I wrote. I fully expected to get flamed
terribly. Tross (law...@brandeis.something) posted an opposing viewpoint that
was very mild, and got nailed for it, so I knew it was coming. I can take it,
I'm pretty thick-skinned. I'm enjoying this whole discussion, even though
anyone that dares to say anything along my lines provokes outcries of "Savage"
and "Kill that aggressive guy". I would like to thank the people that wrote in
with support. They really made my day.
I'd like to clarify some things that people may have gotten out of my post:
1. I am not an asshole. The sig was a reference to a previous post equating
wanting to win with being a "testosterone filled asshole". How many of you
know me? I think that I have (at least until this week) a pretty good reputation
(as a person) among this crowd. I think most people consider me a quiet, mild-
mannered guy who plays hard but fair. I'm sure many of those people are now
saying, "I never knew he was suck a jerk", but I was also hoping other people
would read the post and think, "Hmm, Jim's always been pretty reasonable. Maybe
he's got a point." I put my name at incredible risk because I read statements
that I considered to be just plain wrong, and I could not sit and let it go by
any longer. I've been on teams that didn't make it out of Sectionals, I still
captain a summer league team, I still play in pickup tournaments. I like the
game. But it's a sport, and sports have winners and losers.
2. I do not think that fights in the game are a good thing. But nor do I think
they're the end of the world. If there were an ejection rule, that would help.
3. Man is an aggressive animal. Screaming for joy is an act of aggression.
Wanting to win is a form of aggression. "(W)hen the disc is crisp, when the flow
is kind, I get this pulsating ball of energy brewing at the base of my skull."
Do you get this same feeling when you're on defense and the flow is kind? Isn't
this the same as saying, "I enjoy it when I humilate my defender"? It's not the
same as hitting someone, but isn't that aggression all the same?
4. It really is a different game at the top. This was really the main point of
my post, and it's the point that people seemed most unwilling to accept. Do
any of your teammates puke regularly after track workouts? Do you study game
films of your opponents to know their tendencies better? Do you have half a
dozen different defenses to throw at an opponent? Does everyone on your team
break the mark? I was on Earth Atomizer when we made it to the semifinals at
Worlds in 1991, but I think that this team is really at another level. I've
learned so much more in the last two years with BB than I did in my first nine
of playing.
5. Along those lines, individuals play for different reasons. If you're
playing because you like sports but don't like all the yelling, that's fine.
I don't want you to stop playing. Just accept that not everyone feels the
same way.
I will admit that I focused too much on aggression in my first post, hence the
overwhelming response. For what it's worth, I was calm when I wrote it, and
even revised it to remove the personal attacks (unlike others--you know who
you are). It just irritated me that seemingly most posts had no basis in fact
and relied purely on emotions and feelings (but isn't that always the case).
Flame away.
Jim Parinella
Big Brother
"If you can't open your mind, are you sure you still have one?'
Monday, January 14, 2008
Testosterone Man
Ban whole teams for a year? Put a man in the penalty box for spiking? What a
bunch of thin-skinned self-righteous whiners!
I play for Big Brother, and it irritates me to know that I am now considered
evil. Where the hell do you people get off saying this? I thought Tross'
"Six levels of Ultimate" posting was an excellent behind-the-scenes look from
an "elite" team's perspective, and I had hoped people would realize and accept
that it's a different game at that level. Unfortunately, a lot of people
refuse to accept that socialism will never work.
I don't play the game because of SOTG. I don't bust my ass doing wind sprints
in the cold and rain because I want to be accepted in a friendly community.
I don't spend several thousand dollars a year and all my vacation time so that
some computer geek has a high opinion of me. Ultimate, beyond everything
else, is a sport, and sports are about competition. That's why I'm out there.
I want the game to become more competitive. I want Cuervo to sponsor us. I
want the game to be accepted in mainsteam America. I want it to evolve into
something more watchable.
You want to spike the disc? Spike it!! (Incidentally, George "Win one for
the Gipper" Gipp is often credited with the first "spike" in football). Most
spikes I've seen aren't personal--they're either celebratory ("Yes, we scored,
we're still in this game") or mildly retaliatory ("You fouled me all over the
field and I still scored! Ha ha!"). In fact, we even spike it during
practice. It's about intensity, emotion, competition, winning, and losing.
In the NFL, you know that if you get scored on, a spike is coming, and you
better accept it. I've never seen a football player return the spike, by the
way, like many good-spirited ultimate players do. Retaliation equates with
being a poor loser. It also takes your concentration away.
Retaliation led to the near-"fights" in the NY-Big Brother semifinal.
Unfortunate, but as Tross stated, it's surprising it hasn't happened sooner.
If you consider the typical ultimate player, though, it isn't surprising.
Most historically have never played another sport at a level higher than gym
class, and have no idea what it's like to do so. He thinks we should respect
each other because we are all equal, all of us just creatures of this world,
and he can't stand to see other people get ahead if they don't play by his
rules. Your typical non-ultimate athlete, on the other hand, believes that
the best man wins. The best way to stop someone from spiking at you is to
work harder and play better so he never has the opportunity. You say that we
have no respect for other players. I say we have a higher level of respect,
the respect of warriors, the respect that says you give everything you have on
the field of honor, and it's all decided on the field. Afterwards, it's over.
That's what sports is about.
I don't think most levels of the game have to be this intense. If you're just
playing for fun in a friendly, less-competitive atmosphere, then aggressive
behavior isn't good. Many NY/Big Brother players coach high school teams,
captain summer league teams, and play in pickup games and tournaments (many
"good-spirited" players mentioned in a recent posting about the Fairfield,
Ct., Turkey Bowl are NY/BB guys), and wouldn't dream of spiking it on some
rookie or screaming after a goal. But it's a different game at the top, as
different as your pickup touch football game is from the Super Bowl.
Learn to deal with it. If you can't, I suggest you take some mildly
hallucinogenic drugs and stick to summer league.
Jim Parinella
Big Brother
"Testoterone-filled asshole and proud of it"
bunch of thin-skinned self-righteous whiners!
I play for Big Brother, and it irritates me to know that I am now considered
evil. Where the hell do you people get off saying this? I thought Tross'
"Six levels of Ultimate" posting was an excellent behind-the-scenes look from
an "elite" team's perspective, and I had hoped people would realize and accept
that it's a different game at that level. Unfortunately, a lot of people
refuse to accept that socialism will never work.
I don't play the game because of SOTG. I don't bust my ass doing wind sprints
in the cold and rain because I want to be accepted in a friendly community.
I don't spend several thousand dollars a year and all my vacation time so that
some computer geek has a high opinion of me. Ultimate, beyond everything
else, is a sport, and sports are about competition. That's why I'm out there.
I want the game to become more competitive. I want Cuervo to sponsor us. I
want the game to be accepted in mainsteam America. I want it to evolve into
something more watchable.
You want to spike the disc? Spike it!! (Incidentally, George "Win one for
the Gipper" Gipp is often credited with the first "spike" in football). Most
spikes I've seen aren't personal--they're either celebratory ("Yes, we scored,
we're still in this game") or mildly retaliatory ("You fouled me all over the
field and I still scored! Ha ha!"). In fact, we even spike it during
practice. It's about intensity, emotion, competition, winning, and losing.
In the NFL, you know that if you get scored on, a spike is coming, and you
better accept it. I've never seen a football player return the spike, by the
way, like many good-spirited ultimate players do. Retaliation equates with
being a poor loser. It also takes your concentration away.
Retaliation led to the near-"fights" in the NY-Big Brother semifinal.
Unfortunate, but as Tross stated, it's surprising it hasn't happened sooner.
If you consider the typical ultimate player, though, it isn't surprising.
Most historically have never played another sport at a level higher than gym
class, and have no idea what it's like to do so. He thinks we should respect
each other because we are all equal, all of us just creatures of this world,
and he can't stand to see other people get ahead if they don't play by his
rules. Your typical non-ultimate athlete, on the other hand, believes that
the best man wins. The best way to stop someone from spiking at you is to
work harder and play better so he never has the opportunity. You say that we
have no respect for other players. I say we have a higher level of respect,
the respect of warriors, the respect that says you give everything you have on
the field of honor, and it's all decided on the field. Afterwards, it's over.
That's what sports is about.
I don't think most levels of the game have to be this intense. If you're just
playing for fun in a friendly, less-competitive atmosphere, then aggressive
behavior isn't good. Many NY/Big Brother players coach high school teams,
captain summer league teams, and play in pickup games and tournaments (many
"good-spirited" players mentioned in a recent posting about the Fairfield,
Ct., Turkey Bowl are NY/BB guys), and wouldn't dream of spiking it on some
rookie or screaming after a goal. But it's a different game at the top, as
different as your pickup touch football game is from the Super Bowl.
Learn to deal with it. If you can't, I suggest you take some mildly
hallucinogenic drugs and stick to summer league.
Jim Parinella
Big Brother
"Testoterone-filled asshole and proud of it"
Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Live commentary on Masters final
There is a 20 minute highlight up on ultitv.com. I thought I would provide commentary while watching. For the most part, I typed as I watched, but paused it three or four times.
Here we go:
Preview. First game all tournament we’re wearing the white shirts. I tried to get cute during the flip negotiations and I ended up losing. Can’t remember if we won the disc flip or not, but we ended up choosing to pull a bunch. Interesting camera shot, far away. Wind is coming toward the camera and from the right maybe 30 degrees.
0-0, receiving. Swing, swing. Nice catch by me, funny high release, followed by another high release by Mooney, foul on the catch. Good effort by Coop just to get fouled. Could easily have been blocked cleanly. Hammer for the goal, Alex to Alec.
1-0, somehow that point got skipped, only one of the game. Amazing how in a 20 minute highlight, virtually every pass is shown.
1-1 We’re on O again, Alex sails the i/o over Alec’s head. Maybe I have a chance to get it but I’m not ready for it, turnover. Ahh, block by Alec, slow walkup. I cut off Mooney for the first pass, quick high release. Another foul somewhere. High release, another foul on Coop’s guy. Lots of short stuff. Alex looking hammer, swing, oh, throw that Mooney. Jeez, look that off, and throw THAT? Well, it’s a goal, ok.
2-1, us, pulling upwind They moved it up the line, huck it, too far (out the back). Ah, a long throw from us. Jeez, the airbounce under the defender’s arm for the goal. Must talk to thrower later.
3-1, downwind. Junk? No, just man, no wait, maybe junk. Ok, junk, as no one is covering the thrower. Trapped on the line, pivot dude. Ooh, nice catch on the crossfield hammer. Nice catch for the goal.
3-2, receiving upwind. Hey, we’re on the line. No offsides today. Paul, fake swing, back the other way. Greff again to me. Standing, standing, ooh, yuk, nice catch by Coop. Jim to Coop for the goal, my only (plus) fantasy point of the game.
4-2, pulling. Two passes, in the middle. Nothing to comment on, diving block or maybe a drop. Ooh, good long cut, but not thrown, then why throw that next one? Ok, it’s caught, that’s good. I was standing behind this one saying “NOOOO”..
5-2, pull. I can’t see them, they’re so small. Zone, thrown into the ground. Quick pickup and score. That’s gotta hurt.
6-2, pull. Another junk or zone. Probably zone, as the marker is chasing the Frisbee. Ok, transition, anvert up the field, another, (is that really your choice?). And another for the goal. Don’t really like that pass.
6-3, receiving. Look at us hold that line. Greff, swing to Moon, throw me the damn disc, I’m open. Swing back, hammer to Marshall. He looks like Lyn. I had a tough time figuring out who that was at first. A huck, ah, a change in camera view, finally, so you can actually recognize people. Ooh, toasted on the other end, fine catch for the break.
6-4, receiving. I break across the stack, must have been a pick in there. Durn. Interesting play to watch, I was focusing on Coop on the in-and-out cut, and Boardman poaches from 10-15 yards away. I spot him, follow his path back to where he was and then see Bickford all the way across the field and try to hit him. As he catches the disc OB, there is no one within 15 yards of him. I hadn’t even considered that I might throw it out there. The throw was carried a little by the wind. Smart play on the transition (how did he get over there after being the poacher? Where was everyone else?) ooh, should have been a veteran travel call on the huck, his foot was at least an inch from the line.
6-5, receiving. Mostly same line in still. Alex wants to huck but can’t. Simon swing to Mooney to Marshall. I have almost no trouble recognizing anyone even with the small screen. Mannerisms are pretty distinct. Another foul. Another jam it in the corner for the goal.
7-5, important one for them. Another camera switch. Huck up the line. Goal.
7-6, important now for us. After being in control, we need to take it to half. Good pull, play up the line. Cut of death, which was open all weekend. Crossfield swill hammer, nice catch by Mooney. Nice throw for the goal, Alex to Alec. That’s halftime.
8-6, pulling. Zone. Transition. Drop? No, point block by Stewart. Medium length huck from Seeger, Cameros runs it down for the goal.
9-6, pulling. Another transition point, I think. Fast break for them. Probably is a goal, yup, lots of open space.
9-7, receiving. Oh, c’mon, throw that. One of you guys huck it to me, even if I’m not that open. Great, up the line, the old “39” offense (as in “don’t bother using the other 39 yards of the field”).
10-7, pulling. Huck, little guy on defense, Turtle doesn’t see Fassina coming up behind. A “man on” call from his teammates would have helped. That’s about the only thing I want to hear from the sideline (or “nobody”, just as important). That’s worth a point a tournament. Jeez, Damon, we yelled at/questioned him all weekend on that backhand flip to the forehand side, he maintained it’s the right throw. Hmm, questionable choice on the goal throw, but a foul, and then a nice catch for the bookend by Fassina. Starting to pull away.
11-7, pulling. Man. Yup, could see that huck coming, no one near, goal.
11-8, receive. Can’t see, too small. Pass, camera switch. Funny, I can recognize myself just from the stomach catch. Another great “39” offense. Five straight passes up the line, cut of death for another goal by Alex, tying a career high.
12-8, looks junky. Downfield quick, goal.
12-9. receive. Just keep it going, guys. Alex fakes the huck. Swing, swing. Huck from Mooney, Simon wide open for the goal. He’s 10 yards in, but the defender has him check his feet, it looks like.
13-9, zone. Seeger and John Bar on the point. Oh, Lenny with the block. He was our best middle middle way back. Gary, pivot or do something that lets us know you’re not afraid. Ok, goal, stupid looking spike. Why now?
14-9, another huck to Turtle, blocked again by Fassina. Turn it over, D, the O wants to win this game. Sigh. Ok, not great movement, but everything is being caught. Ok, good movement there, about 15 passes later, goal!!!!!! Hugs,. Replay, the old chainsaw, even if none of the guys involved know what that call means.
Ooh, nice touch, putting the elimination chart on the screen.
Looks like we had only 3 turnovers in the game, unless there were some at 1-0 that the camera missed. Like I said, virtually every pass was shown, too. That would mean the O was 8/11 (two breaks), and the D 7/7. Their O would then have been 7/14, and their D 2/3. Vaguely reminiscent of the 1995 final, I guess, with the O playing well but not historically so, the D getting no more than an average number of turnovers, but the D not turning it over once they got it. I mentioned this somewhere, probably talking to the UPA reporter, that when we did well, it was because the D scored when they had it. It was always mentally difficult watching the D get it 2, 3 times in a point and give it back each time, not to mention that you actually get the break when they do score.
Q&A
In case anyone is still reading, let's do a Q&A. Phone lines are open. Questions with 1-2 paragraph length answers preferred.
Friday, November 16, 2007
Mixed vs Masters
Someone suggested jokingly that we should have played off against the Mixed champs to see who the real B Division champ was.
I'm fairly certain we would beat a mixed team. But we can ask what the strategies would be for such a game for both teams. And it doesn't even have to be mixed versus men, it just has to have three distinct classes of players. 4 studs on team A, 7 good but far worse players on team B, and 3 decent but far worse than good players on Team A. (This level of disparity can also happen in more recreational play, but one possible solution there would be to completely ignore the worst group of players.) This is what the case would be if you took an all-star team of players from Open and Women's Nationals and played off against an all-star team from Masters Nationals. To generalize, let's just say that the top Mixed and Masters players could play in Open and Women's but wouldn't be anywhere close to as dominant, and the benchwarmers at O/W Nats would be starters in mixed. I think that's a fair assessment of the talent level, although I'm not sure it's completely relevant.
Strategically, it seems fairly obvious. The "mixed" team would want to iso the big 4 as much as possible, just as any team wants to iso its best players, but has the added burden that there will be deep help. They'd probably need to run some kind of spread offense but would need to split its men. For defense against this, perhaps a version of the Clam, or maybe the old Tea Cup we used back in summer league 15 years ago. In that, we'd cover the other team's top 5 players and let the other two roam, nominally playing the equivalent of middle middle and deep deep. For this, maybe you'd cover just 4 and have one of the other three play something like 3 in the Clam or covering whichever of the women was closest to the disc.
When the "masters" team has the disc, I'd be tempted to run a homey with whoever is being covered by the women. Defensively, if this tactic wasn't being used, perhaps a clam with one woman as 4 (weakside downfield) and the others up front (or maybe move one of them to 5). Or maybe a zone. You would probably want to encourage the other team to huck it because you'd win most 50/50 shots. But the old team should be smart and really take a look at where all the defense is before hucking it.
All would mark extra aggressively against the less skilled players and sag off a little on the better ones.
I don't know whether you'd have any additional strategies for upwind/downwind or if you have large variations within each group. (Maybe you'd put your fastest woman up front in the clam.) Or whether you'd prefer to have women handlers or deeps, other things being equal.
Lastly, this will never happen because neither team could stand the embarrassment of losing to the other. Perhaps if someone were to make this the semi-pro league, they'd do it.
I'm fairly certain we would beat a mixed team. But we can ask what the strategies would be for such a game for both teams. And it doesn't even have to be mixed versus men, it just has to have three distinct classes of players. 4 studs on team A, 7 good but far worse players on team B, and 3 decent but far worse than good players on Team A. (This level of disparity can also happen in more recreational play, but one possible solution there would be to completely ignore the worst group of players.) This is what the case would be if you took an all-star team of players from Open and Women's Nationals and played off against an all-star team from Masters Nationals. To generalize, let's just say that the top Mixed and Masters players could play in Open and Women's but wouldn't be anywhere close to as dominant, and the benchwarmers at O/W Nats would be starters in mixed. I think that's a fair assessment of the talent level, although I'm not sure it's completely relevant.
Strategically, it seems fairly obvious. The "mixed" team would want to iso the big 4 as much as possible, just as any team wants to iso its best players, but has the added burden that there will be deep help. They'd probably need to run some kind of spread offense but would need to split its men. For defense against this, perhaps a version of the Clam, or maybe the old Tea Cup we used back in summer league 15 years ago. In that, we'd cover the other team's top 5 players and let the other two roam, nominally playing the equivalent of middle middle and deep deep. For this, maybe you'd cover just 4 and have one of the other three play something like 3 in the Clam or covering whichever of the women was closest to the disc.
When the "masters" team has the disc, I'd be tempted to run a homey with whoever is being covered by the women. Defensively, if this tactic wasn't being used, perhaps a clam with one woman as 4 (weakside downfield) and the others up front (or maybe move one of them to 5). Or maybe a zone. You would probably want to encourage the other team to huck it because you'd win most 50/50 shots. But the old team should be smart and really take a look at where all the defense is before hucking it.
All would mark extra aggressively against the less skilled players and sag off a little on the better ones.
I don't know whether you'd have any additional strategies for upwind/downwind or if you have large variations within each group. (Maybe you'd put your fastest woman up front in the clam.) Or whether you'd prefer to have women handlers or deeps, other things being equal.
Lastly, this will never happen because neither team could stand the embarrassment of losing to the other. Perhaps if someone were to make this the semi-pro league, they'd do it.
Tuesday, November 13, 2007
where da blogs
Where is everyone? I was hoping to see recaps from AJ, Idris, Hh, and have had to make do instead with summaries from the lesser divisions (Timmy, the 15/16 game). C'mon, men, sack up and let us know what happened. Are there other blogs out there from people who were at Nationals, even as spectators? Feel free to post links in the comments.
And where is that Masters video on ultitv? The other divisions had the misfortune of having their finals on a windier day and so didn't appear as aesthetically pleasing as they could have. Even allowing for that, though, the games didn't seem that crisp on video (I had a morning flight and so didn't go to the fields on Sunday). Lots of athletic plays from the men.
Teams today seem to rely more on the athleticism of the receiver as a catcher, while we used to rely on their athleticism as cutters. Sure, use it as a cushion, but it shouldn't be the deciding factor.
For spending all that time at the fields at Nationals, there seems precious little time to see folks. There are always several people I see only in passing one day and never again, even people in my division. Thank heavens for the beer tent or I might not see anyone.
The immediate post-season is always difficult, even in a year like this one where we won and we didn't have the all-consuming schedule. It takes several days for my body to get back to normal, and there are still some lingering sore spots.
I would really have liked to have played one more game with our team against one of the Open teams at Nationals, just to see. Maybe we'll be able to get a full squad out next spring in preparation for Worlds. We had pretty spotty attendance this year other than at Regionals and Nationals.
That's about it.
And where is that Masters video on ultitv? The other divisions had the misfortune of having their finals on a windier day and so didn't appear as aesthetically pleasing as they could have. Even allowing for that, though, the games didn't seem that crisp on video (I had a morning flight and so didn't go to the fields on Sunday). Lots of athletic plays from the men.
Teams today seem to rely more on the athleticism of the receiver as a catcher, while we used to rely on their athleticism as cutters. Sure, use it as a cushion, but it shouldn't be the deciding factor.
For spending all that time at the fields at Nationals, there seems precious little time to see folks. There are always several people I see only in passing one day and never again, even people in my division. Thank heavens for the beer tent or I might not see anyone.
The immediate post-season is always difficult, even in a year like this one where we won and we didn't have the all-consuming schedule. It takes several days for my body to get back to normal, and there are still some lingering sore spots.
I would really have liked to have played one more game with our team against one of the Open teams at Nationals, just to see. Maybe we'll be able to get a full squad out next spring in preparation for Worlds. We had pretty spotty attendance this year other than at Regionals and Nationals.
That's about it.
Wednesday, October 31, 2007
1 of N, N >= 3
Vancouver, baby! Worlds, here we come.
I have to admit, this turned out to be really fun and exciting and even emotional. Back last year when I knew I would be “getting the band back together”, I really didn’t even care about the results too much beyond simply wanting to make sure we didn’t embarrass ourselves. I regretted a bit that it was so many years after our peak and that we had probably missed our chance to win the division owing to our advanced age (average 40, only 6 of 31 under 37). But somewhere along the way, the magic returned, people remembered how to play, and it was just like old times.
My first venture into Masters still felt like Nationals, although with four of six teams making quarters, pool play didn’t have the same urgency to it. The most notable difference had nothing to do with the division, but was the weather. Only for a brief time on Friday was it hot and sunny, and for the first time since 1996 in Plano, we got rain. I guess the relative coolness prevented us from losing people to cramps and injuries, as we managed to finish the tournament with all of our players available (although with 31, playing time was tight for some). Equally impressive is that almost all of the vintage DoGs (average age 42) who were not presently hurt (at least five of them who may have been there if not) played.
I don’t think I changed my view of the division that much. Although 8 games in 3 days is a lot, more than the others play, I think the final is just fine happening on Saturday so the “real” divisions can have their finals on Sunday. I wouldn’t have minded moving up the final 30 or 60 minutes even though that would have meant there’d be less of a showcase due to the overlap with the Open semis (oh, and the other divs, too). The field wasn’t populated with 250 pound old men, nor was it just a contest between 33 year olds. The play wasn’t perfect, but then again, neither was it so in the other divs. Pool play was much more civil, for sure. There was almost no ho stack, and not an excess of hucking (or hoping). And once the games got going, and got close, it was just like it always was.
I was very happy with how I played. In contrast to every other tournament, I felt good from the get-go (partly due to taking a Wednesday jog with a Fartlek component to get my legs loose), and except for the start of our last two pool play games, never felt anything but. I did tire by the final, but that was the eighth game of playing virtually every O point in the tournament, 80% of those as The Man. I even got my most D time at Nationals since 2002 (1/6th of a point). I felt like I was as fast as last year, maybe even faster, although it would be hard to come up with a valid reason that would be so, what with my relaxed training and practice schedule. (I will provide one, though: I played in just as many tournaments this year, and about 50% more points. This was my old style of training, playing a lot of ultimate and demanding a lot from myself at those tournaments. Nothing trains you for ultimate quite like tournaments.) I caught about half a dozen hucks, most of them from Alex on opportunity cuts off of flow. These are my favorite, because it’s all about timing and recognition and I feel smarter than everyone else. Sometimes these will come when my defender flashes off ever so briefly to poach on an in-cut, but usually I will just be playing, with my defender fronting me from the middle of the stack, and the play will just develop such that I find myself with no help defender behind me and my man still fronting me, unaware of the change. I take a step in, then go as hard as I can deep for half a dozen steps before glancing up to see if the disc is up. Another reason I like this cut better than bolting deep in the four person play is that I am more confident that the disc will be thrown because I have already assessed the mark. In the finals, I found myself making what I thought was good long cuts several times off the called play only to find the marker preventing the toss.
As in each of the previous 17 Nationals we attended, Alex was convinced that we had the much tougher pool. This time, he turned out to be correct, as all four of the teams from Pool A won their quarterfinals games. These four teams had been awfully close in pool play, with only a meaningless last round game between us and Surly being decided by more than two points. In the other pool, Old and In The Way cruised through Day 1 outscoring their opponents 45-22 (including 2nd seed and 2006 runner-up BIGS), setting themselves up as the early favorite in the tournament.
We started off with Ironwood from Arizona, a nice break-in for us. We had “only” 27 at that point, which was still our largest roster of the year, and it gave us a chance to get everyone acclimated to the tournament. About a third to half of the team had, shall we say, significantly less experience at Nationals than Mooney, who made his record-extending 23rd appearance at the Show. Two had last played in the UPA Series in about 1996, and one fellow had played at College Nationals twice in the ‘80s. And at least half didn’t play in the series at all last year (and only four made it to Nationals, three in Open). So it was good to get our legs going, try out some D’s, and made some mistakes without it costing us. DoG, 15-6. The 3 and 4 seeds, meanwhile, had a 17-16 battle right next to us.
Next up was Mileage from Texas. We knew they had a couple tall receivers who could threaten us but otherwise we felt pretty confident, if for no other reason than we didn’t recognize most of them. I guess five of the teams had cores that were players we recognized from Open (us, Double Happiness, Rage, Boulder, and Sub Zero) plus Above and Beyond, which had a smattering of post-NYNY New Yorkers abetted by more than a few “young” guys. I had told Jeff Brown, our fretful defensive stopper, that if one of them was killing us I wanted a shot if I was feeling well. He said to remind him if it came up. I did end up covering one of them after a turnover and despite being outpositioned, felt confident that I was going to sky him on a floater. I didn’t. As for the game, I already have forgotten the ebb and flow, but I think that we established a pattern of taking a 3 goal lead then letting them back into it before pulling it out at the end.
Next up, our old friends from the Bay Area, Troubled Past. A lot of people thought of this as a finals preview. It was great to see a lot of old friends. I was in Japan with four of them (O’Dowd, Masa, Switzer, and Lippy) back in 1994 as part of a series of clinics that the Japanese federation sponsored to improve the game there. I told Masa that with their successes at Worlds last year, perhaps they will be coming over here now to give clinics. (I should probably write about that trip sometime.) The team also featured Billy and the Worm, two fellow Short Fat Guys who we tried to recruit for our team before they lied to us and blew us off, and a handful of other vets. Following the pattern of the previous game, we got up 3 before giving it back. Ten yards away from the win, I had a Forch moment at 14-13, dropping a short swing pass when I got stuck between pancaking and rim-catching. Instead of ending it and getting an extra half-hour for heckling and the beer garden, we had to play another five points. Double game point featured an exciting play, with receiving stud Alec Ewald misplaying a huck in the end zone, then burying his head in his hands (I had to laugh at that one even with what it meant), before Bickford got the block and we converted for the win. The game was remarkably low-key and friendly despite the history and the significance (I suppose that is a difference from Open Nationals).
This pretty much clinched the pool for us, requiring only that we win one of the games on Friday, and also provided a good setting for the World Series game that night. We had 11 rooms at one of the condos on the Bayside, right next to the Palm Bay Club, where we ventured over for some hot-tubbing. We got a little bit lucky finding that place as we didn’t make the reservation until the Thursday after Regionals, but the rate was good and we had all of us together, plus we didn’t have to worry about drunken yahoos on the beach.
Friday’s first game was against Boneyard from Raleigh, who would have to beat us and 2-1 Mileage to make quarters. Finally during this game the sun came out, and I applied sunblock for the only time of the weekend. We wanted to open up the rotation again after two consecutive tight games. Alex wanted to get his calf massaged by the Boston Ultimate trainer (a friend of ours who has played summer league with us) and figured he could only do it during a game, so he ran over there partway through the first half and delegated the offensive subbing to me. For the next 20 minutes, I had lines ready, switching players in and out depending on whether they were in on the D point, but the D kept scoring. I finally managed to call a line moments before Alex got back, and we scored. With nothing left to prove, I returned the reins, and we cruised to victory and locked up first place.
This set up a trap game for us against Surly, who was also locked into their position.(there could have been a three-way tie for 3rd, but Surly would have taken the second spot on head-to-head). Even though it shouldn’t matter, a loss in that game can have a carryover effect to the next round. So we started off this one treating it normally, and only after they pulled their top players and we opened up a good lead did we relax a bit. The 15-8 final score was meaningless for prediction (but good for the RRI!).
After an extra half hour break, we played our quarterfinal against Philly’s OLDSAG. No matter how big your roster is, if another team’s is bigger, you can make fun of them, and Philly’s 37 man outfit provided us some chuckles as well as 1000 post-game handshakes. There were intermittent sprinkles in the first half to go with a steady quartering wind (I wonder if they can rotate the fields 45 degrees next year so the games will be a straight cross-wind instead). The game was chippier than any of our pool play games, probably because something was finally at stake. Several calls that had opponents groaning, although I’m hard-pressed to remember any of them now except for some point blocks. We broke early to take the lead, but we were broken at 5-5 to give it back, despite an actual layout block by me. They scored upwind against our O to take half 8-6. (Technical note: if it’s an upwind/downwind game more than an offense/defense game, then the upwind break to take half only counts as half a break since there is no ensuing downwinder. Normally, if you lose the half, you have to outbreak the other team in order to win. This game, at the time, was fairly close to the crossover point between O/D and upwind/downwind, so I knew that if the D could score upwind just once, we’d be in good position, though not completely “on serve” at that point. We’d still need a downwind D break, either immediately after the upwinder or after an upwind O score.) The rain continued in the second half, and lightning soon flashed in the distance. I waited for the horn suspending play, but it did not come for several minutes, during which we managed to get our upwinder and downwinder to take the outright lead. I was happy to avoid the horn, since I figured our chances of breaking were greater in bad weather.
So, the first lightning delay at Club Nationals since I have been around. 30 minutes, plus another 17 minutes to warm up, 16 minutes more to soft cap, then an unfortunate 24 minutes to hard cap if necessary. We began trading after play resumed, and it began to look like we might trade out to the cap (we hoped, rather than gakking at double game point). But at 14-13, fate smiled on us. We got a block about 20 yards out, with two defenders bashing into each other hard enough to require injury subs. “Mooney, Greff, you’re in!” shouted Jeff Brown. But then we learned there was a foul called on the throw. “Mooney, Greff, you’re out!” Two defensive-minded replacements went in. Play continued but was sloppy, and we struggled to keep the disc moving. After a turnover near our goal line, one of our guys pulled up lame with an aching hamstring. I found myself called in, only to hear, “Jim, we need a D handler.” So I turned around, a little confused, and starting walking off, only to learn that I was supposed to fill that bill. “Eh, how hard can it be?” I reasoned. “Sure, I’ll stay near the disc.” I was surprised to see that our opponents turned down the opportunity to put in a fresh defender when the point had already lasted 5-10 minutes. I happily dodged and weaved the disc up the field. At one point, I had the disc about 20 yards out from the goal and saw a poach in the end zone but knew it would take a hell of a throw to get it there. By the time I figured out how I had to throw it, my senses had come back and I looked instead for another 10 yard pass, and a few passes later, we had the goal and the win. The game and that point in particular are as fun a one as I can remember being part of in some time, probably since the 2002 semi.
This set up a rematch against Troubled Past at 10:30 on Saturday. If we hadn’t known them before, we knew them from the 33 point outing two days prior. We had a little advantage since we had picked up Mooney, Seeger, and Lenny. The flow of the game was almost identical to the first, but the tone was quite different. Two of them in particular seemed intent on changing the game through their voices when the disc was not in play (one through incessant celebration, the other through complaining). As I said afterwards, it made it a lot less fun to play the game, but a lot more fun to win it (I said this to one of the perps and several of his teammates as I apologized for getting a little obnoxious myself, responding in kind (though to a lesser extent) whenever one of these guys got involved; they replied that they hadn’t noticed; I also chatted about it with celebration guy later over a beer at Mr. Big’s without any animosity). So, we took half by three, and it started to look like we might even pull away, but they solved us for a while and got three breaks in a row to take the lead. We got back on serve and again got into a position where it looked like we might trade out downwinders to the cap. Then DoG blinked. At 15-15, I was having a point reminiscent of the game-winner against Philly, catching every second or third pass and immediately getting off the continuation. I caught another swing, turned and threw it right to Worm. In retrospect, I think I actually intended to throw it to him, since it was the cut I was expecting, and I also saw a flash of Patagonia red moving in that direction. Luckily for me, we got it back, maybe after another set of turnovers, and punched it in. A miscommunication throwaway gave us the disc on their half of the field, and the D guys ran it in for the emotional win and a spot in the finals, back where we belong.
We had almost three hours before the final. We called Jordan, who couldn’t make it down, so our heart and soul could take part in our excitement. We celebrated a little, reminisced a little, and then began getting ready for the big game. Although DoG hadn’t been in the finals since our last win in 1999, I do think that experience helped us prepare. I wouldn’t say that I was hyperfocused and running on adrenaline, but I really paid no attention to the outside agencies at all. I heard Doug heckling Paul one point, and I vaguely remember some other Bostonians calling to me, but otherwise have absolutely no memories of the crowd or the announcers or of doing anything other than playing ultimate. The game itself was easily our most complete game. Traditionally, our best games occurred when the D was able to score most of the time they got the disc. Looking back to the famous 1995 final where we had three turnovers and won 21-10, our D actually had just an average game defensively (9 goals allowed in 20 possessions), and our O had a good but not noteworthy game itself (10 of 13), but the difference was in converting after a turn (11 of 11). And so it was in this game, although not to the same extent (don’t have the stats yet). Our O had some kinks in it at the beginning, but we were able to avoid getting broken thanks to some nice plays by Coop. Through the game, lots of people were making plays and not many were making mistakes. From the writeup, it looks like we might have only had 5 or 6 turnovers the whole game.
The O scores to make it 14, then it strikes me that I might be deprived yet again of a championship-winning goal. At game point in our first win in 1994, I tried a difficult catch on a fouled throw and biffed it. The disc returned to the thrower, swung quickly to the other side of the field, and we (not me) scored. Since then, over 9 titles, I never caught or threw the final goal. So when I realized this, seeing how we were up by 5, I was kinda hoping to get another chance. But then we got a damn D and worked it the length of the field for the title. Well, at least it was one of my teammates who scored it, I suppose.
Surly was nice enough to share beer with us after the game. We got the trophy, donated this year by Throwback, and quickly scanned it to see the record for most consecutive titles (2, by Keg Workers 2000-2001). Pictures, drinking from the cup, hanging out, etc. By the time I was ready to go to the beer tent, it was closed. Alex and I headed to Mr. Big's for some Guinness and a car bomb and to see some friends, then off to the team dinner. I remarked that for coming into this not really caring that much, it felt awfully good and I was proud of how the team came together. Everyone was in pretty good spirits. Kudos to Jeff Brown and Alex for running subs, a difficult task with that many players who hadn't played together all that much.
Now, who to pick up for Worlds next year....
I have to admit, this turned out to be really fun and exciting and even emotional. Back last year when I knew I would be “getting the band back together”, I really didn’t even care about the results too much beyond simply wanting to make sure we didn’t embarrass ourselves. I regretted a bit that it was so many years after our peak and that we had probably missed our chance to win the division owing to our advanced age (average 40, only 6 of 31 under 37). But somewhere along the way, the magic returned, people remembered how to play, and it was just like old times.
My first venture into Masters still felt like Nationals, although with four of six teams making quarters, pool play didn’t have the same urgency to it. The most notable difference had nothing to do with the division, but was the weather. Only for a brief time on Friday was it hot and sunny, and for the first time since 1996 in Plano, we got rain. I guess the relative coolness prevented us from losing people to cramps and injuries, as we managed to finish the tournament with all of our players available (although with 31, playing time was tight for some). Equally impressive is that almost all of the vintage DoGs (average age 42) who were not presently hurt (at least five of them who may have been there if not) played.
I don’t think I changed my view of the division that much. Although 8 games in 3 days is a lot, more than the others play, I think the final is just fine happening on Saturday so the “real” divisions can have their finals on Sunday. I wouldn’t have minded moving up the final 30 or 60 minutes even though that would have meant there’d be less of a showcase due to the overlap with the Open semis (oh, and the other divs, too). The field wasn’t populated with 250 pound old men, nor was it just a contest between 33 year olds. The play wasn’t perfect, but then again, neither was it so in the other divs. Pool play was much more civil, for sure. There was almost no ho stack, and not an excess of hucking (or hoping). And once the games got going, and got close, it was just like it always was.
I was very happy with how I played. In contrast to every other tournament, I felt good from the get-go (partly due to taking a Wednesday jog with a Fartlek component to get my legs loose), and except for the start of our last two pool play games, never felt anything but. I did tire by the final, but that was the eighth game of playing virtually every O point in the tournament, 80% of those as The Man. I even got my most D time at Nationals since 2002 (1/6th of a point). I felt like I was as fast as last year, maybe even faster, although it would be hard to come up with a valid reason that would be so, what with my relaxed training and practice schedule. (I will provide one, though: I played in just as many tournaments this year, and about 50% more points. This was my old style of training, playing a lot of ultimate and demanding a lot from myself at those tournaments. Nothing trains you for ultimate quite like tournaments.) I caught about half a dozen hucks, most of them from Alex on opportunity cuts off of flow. These are my favorite, because it’s all about timing and recognition and I feel smarter than everyone else. Sometimes these will come when my defender flashes off ever so briefly to poach on an in-cut, but usually I will just be playing, with my defender fronting me from the middle of the stack, and the play will just develop such that I find myself with no help defender behind me and my man still fronting me, unaware of the change. I take a step in, then go as hard as I can deep for half a dozen steps before glancing up to see if the disc is up. Another reason I like this cut better than bolting deep in the four person play is that I am more confident that the disc will be thrown because I have already assessed the mark. In the finals, I found myself making what I thought was good long cuts several times off the called play only to find the marker preventing the toss.
As in each of the previous 17 Nationals we attended, Alex was convinced that we had the much tougher pool. This time, he turned out to be correct, as all four of the teams from Pool A won their quarterfinals games. These four teams had been awfully close in pool play, with only a meaningless last round game between us and Surly being decided by more than two points. In the other pool, Old and In The Way cruised through Day 1 outscoring their opponents 45-22 (including 2nd seed and 2006 runner-up BIGS), setting themselves up as the early favorite in the tournament.
We started off with Ironwood from Arizona, a nice break-in for us. We had “only” 27 at that point, which was still our largest roster of the year, and it gave us a chance to get everyone acclimated to the tournament. About a third to half of the team had, shall we say, significantly less experience at Nationals than Mooney, who made his record-extending 23rd appearance at the Show. Two had last played in the UPA Series in about 1996, and one fellow had played at College Nationals twice in the ‘80s. And at least half didn’t play in the series at all last year (and only four made it to Nationals, three in Open). So it was good to get our legs going, try out some D’s, and made some mistakes without it costing us. DoG, 15-6. The 3 and 4 seeds, meanwhile, had a 17-16 battle right next to us.
Next up was Mileage from Texas. We knew they had a couple tall receivers who could threaten us but otherwise we felt pretty confident, if for no other reason than we didn’t recognize most of them. I guess five of the teams had cores that were players we recognized from Open (us, Double Happiness, Rage, Boulder, and Sub Zero) plus Above and Beyond, which had a smattering of post-NYNY New Yorkers abetted by more than a few “young” guys. I had told Jeff Brown, our fretful defensive stopper, that if one of them was killing us I wanted a shot if I was feeling well. He said to remind him if it came up. I did end up covering one of them after a turnover and despite being outpositioned, felt confident that I was going to sky him on a floater. I didn’t. As for the game, I already have forgotten the ebb and flow, but I think that we established a pattern of taking a 3 goal lead then letting them back into it before pulling it out at the end.
Next up, our old friends from the Bay Area, Troubled Past. A lot of people thought of this as a finals preview. It was great to see a lot of old friends. I was in Japan with four of them (O’Dowd, Masa, Switzer, and Lippy) back in 1994 as part of a series of clinics that the Japanese federation sponsored to improve the game there. I told Masa that with their successes at Worlds last year, perhaps they will be coming over here now to give clinics. (I should probably write about that trip sometime.) The team also featured Billy and the Worm, two fellow Short Fat Guys who we tried to recruit for our team before they lied to us and blew us off, and a handful of other vets. Following the pattern of the previous game, we got up 3 before giving it back. Ten yards away from the win, I had a Forch moment at 14-13, dropping a short swing pass when I got stuck between pancaking and rim-catching. Instead of ending it and getting an extra half-hour for heckling and the beer garden, we had to play another five points. Double game point featured an exciting play, with receiving stud Alec Ewald misplaying a huck in the end zone, then burying his head in his hands (I had to laugh at that one even with what it meant), before Bickford got the block and we converted for the win. The game was remarkably low-key and friendly despite the history and the significance (I suppose that is a difference from Open Nationals).
This pretty much clinched the pool for us, requiring only that we win one of the games on Friday, and also provided a good setting for the World Series game that night. We had 11 rooms at one of the condos on the Bayside, right next to the Palm Bay Club, where we ventured over for some hot-tubbing. We got a little bit lucky finding that place as we didn’t make the reservation until the Thursday after Regionals, but the rate was good and we had all of us together, plus we didn’t have to worry about drunken yahoos on the beach.
Friday’s first game was against Boneyard from Raleigh, who would have to beat us and 2-1 Mileage to make quarters. Finally during this game the sun came out, and I applied sunblock for the only time of the weekend. We wanted to open up the rotation again after two consecutive tight games. Alex wanted to get his calf massaged by the Boston Ultimate trainer (a friend of ours who has played summer league with us) and figured he could only do it during a game, so he ran over there partway through the first half and delegated the offensive subbing to me. For the next 20 minutes, I had lines ready, switching players in and out depending on whether they were in on the D point, but the D kept scoring. I finally managed to call a line moments before Alex got back, and we scored. With nothing left to prove, I returned the reins, and we cruised to victory and locked up first place.
This set up a trap game for us against Surly, who was also locked into their position.(there could have been a three-way tie for 3rd, but Surly would have taken the second spot on head-to-head). Even though it shouldn’t matter, a loss in that game can have a carryover effect to the next round. So we started off this one treating it normally, and only after they pulled their top players and we opened up a good lead did we relax a bit. The 15-8 final score was meaningless for prediction (but good for the RRI!).
After an extra half hour break, we played our quarterfinal against Philly’s OLDSAG. No matter how big your roster is, if another team’s is bigger, you can make fun of them, and Philly’s 37 man outfit provided us some chuckles as well as 1000 post-game handshakes. There were intermittent sprinkles in the first half to go with a steady quartering wind (I wonder if they can rotate the fields 45 degrees next year so the games will be a straight cross-wind instead). The game was chippier than any of our pool play games, probably because something was finally at stake. Several calls that had opponents groaning, although I’m hard-pressed to remember any of them now except for some point blocks. We broke early to take the lead, but we were broken at 5-5 to give it back, despite an actual layout block by me. They scored upwind against our O to take half 8-6. (Technical note: if it’s an upwind/downwind game more than an offense/defense game, then the upwind break to take half only counts as half a break since there is no ensuing downwinder. Normally, if you lose the half, you have to outbreak the other team in order to win. This game, at the time, was fairly close to the crossover point between O/D and upwind/downwind, so I knew that if the D could score upwind just once, we’d be in good position, though not completely “on serve” at that point. We’d still need a downwind D break, either immediately after the upwinder or after an upwind O score.) The rain continued in the second half, and lightning soon flashed in the distance. I waited for the horn suspending play, but it did not come for several minutes, during which we managed to get our upwinder and downwinder to take the outright lead. I was happy to avoid the horn, since I figured our chances of breaking were greater in bad weather.
So, the first lightning delay at Club Nationals since I have been around. 30 minutes, plus another 17 minutes to warm up, 16 minutes more to soft cap, then an unfortunate 24 minutes to hard cap if necessary. We began trading after play resumed, and it began to look like we might trade out to the cap (we hoped, rather than gakking at double game point). But at 14-13, fate smiled on us. We got a block about 20 yards out, with two defenders bashing into each other hard enough to require injury subs. “Mooney, Greff, you’re in!” shouted Jeff Brown. But then we learned there was a foul called on the throw. “Mooney, Greff, you’re out!” Two defensive-minded replacements went in. Play continued but was sloppy, and we struggled to keep the disc moving. After a turnover near our goal line, one of our guys pulled up lame with an aching hamstring. I found myself called in, only to hear, “Jim, we need a D handler.” So I turned around, a little confused, and starting walking off, only to learn that I was supposed to fill that bill. “Eh, how hard can it be?” I reasoned. “Sure, I’ll stay near the disc.” I was surprised to see that our opponents turned down the opportunity to put in a fresh defender when the point had already lasted 5-10 minutes. I happily dodged and weaved the disc up the field. At one point, I had the disc about 20 yards out from the goal and saw a poach in the end zone but knew it would take a hell of a throw to get it there. By the time I figured out how I had to throw it, my senses had come back and I looked instead for another 10 yard pass, and a few passes later, we had the goal and the win. The game and that point in particular are as fun a one as I can remember being part of in some time, probably since the 2002 semi.
This set up a rematch against Troubled Past at 10:30 on Saturday. If we hadn’t known them before, we knew them from the 33 point outing two days prior. We had a little advantage since we had picked up Mooney, Seeger, and Lenny. The flow of the game was almost identical to the first, but the tone was quite different. Two of them in particular seemed intent on changing the game through their voices when the disc was not in play (one through incessant celebration, the other through complaining). As I said afterwards, it made it a lot less fun to play the game, but a lot more fun to win it (I said this to one of the perps and several of his teammates as I apologized for getting a little obnoxious myself, responding in kind (though to a lesser extent) whenever one of these guys got involved; they replied that they hadn’t noticed; I also chatted about it with celebration guy later over a beer at Mr. Big’s without any animosity). So, we took half by three, and it started to look like we might even pull away, but they solved us for a while and got three breaks in a row to take the lead. We got back on serve and again got into a position where it looked like we might trade out downwinders to the cap. Then DoG blinked. At 15-15, I was having a point reminiscent of the game-winner against Philly, catching every second or third pass and immediately getting off the continuation. I caught another swing, turned and threw it right to Worm. In retrospect, I think I actually intended to throw it to him, since it was the cut I was expecting, and I also saw a flash of Patagonia red moving in that direction. Luckily for me, we got it back, maybe after another set of turnovers, and punched it in. A miscommunication throwaway gave us the disc on their half of the field, and the D guys ran it in for the emotional win and a spot in the finals, back where we belong.
We had almost three hours before the final. We called Jordan, who couldn’t make it down, so our heart and soul could take part in our excitement. We celebrated a little, reminisced a little, and then began getting ready for the big game. Although DoG hadn’t been in the finals since our last win in 1999, I do think that experience helped us prepare. I wouldn’t say that I was hyperfocused and running on adrenaline, but I really paid no attention to the outside agencies at all. I heard Doug heckling Paul one point, and I vaguely remember some other Bostonians calling to me, but otherwise have absolutely no memories of the crowd or the announcers or of doing anything other than playing ultimate. The game itself was easily our most complete game. Traditionally, our best games occurred when the D was able to score most of the time they got the disc. Looking back to the famous 1995 final where we had three turnovers and won 21-10, our D actually had just an average game defensively (9 goals allowed in 20 possessions), and our O had a good but not noteworthy game itself (10 of 13), but the difference was in converting after a turn (11 of 11). And so it was in this game, although not to the same extent (don’t have the stats yet). Our O had some kinks in it at the beginning, but we were able to avoid getting broken thanks to some nice plays by Coop. Through the game, lots of people were making plays and not many were making mistakes. From the writeup, it looks like we might have only had 5 or 6 turnovers the whole game.
The O scores to make it 14, then it strikes me that I might be deprived yet again of a championship-winning goal. At game point in our first win in 1994, I tried a difficult catch on a fouled throw and biffed it. The disc returned to the thrower, swung quickly to the other side of the field, and we (not me) scored. Since then, over 9 titles, I never caught or threw the final goal. So when I realized this, seeing how we were up by 5, I was kinda hoping to get another chance. But then we got a damn D and worked it the length of the field for the title. Well, at least it was one of my teammates who scored it, I suppose.
Surly was nice enough to share beer with us after the game. We got the trophy, donated this year by Throwback, and quickly scanned it to see the record for most consecutive titles (2, by Keg Workers 2000-2001). Pictures, drinking from the cup, hanging out, etc. By the time I was ready to go to the beer tent, it was closed. Alex and I headed to Mr. Big's for some Guinness and a car bomb and to see some friends, then off to the team dinner. I remarked that for coming into this not really caring that much, it felt awfully good and I was proud of how the team came together. Everyone was in pretty good spirits. Kudos to Jeff Brown and Alex for running subs, a difficult task with that many players who hadn't played together all that much.
Now, who to pick up for Worlds next year....
Tuesday, October 23, 2007
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.
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.
Wednesday, October 17, 2007
Masters preview
Since no one else is doing it, and there is a vast demand for it, here you go.
I got no clue, either. O'Dowd did a preview for the Newsletter. In his original version, he mentioned me and Alex, but what it got past the editor, they took us out and put in Mooney, who had been on loan to Above and Beyond the last couple years. O'Dowd will get his.
Masters was really hard to seed, since there was almost no Masters play this year outside of the series, and there was a lot of turnover from last year. Four of the Regionals winners did not play at Nationals last year (hmm, two Open winners did not, either, which has to be the most in some time). In figuring out what I would send in, I looked at how teams did in Open play this year, but that task was made more difficult by the Score Reporter not reporting what these teams RRI was in Open play. I ended up trying to find equivalents for those teams, opponents against whom they may have had close games, and tried to guess from there, but that too was error-prone. Masters teams are even less likely than Open to have full or near-full rosters at any event, sometimes even Regionals.
We played four Open tournaments this year. Clambake didn't make it to the Score Reporter. For the other three, we were listed as Big Ego Ultimate. At Sectionals, we lost by 1 point to the team that finished 4th at Open Regionals and split with the two teams that finished 5/6 (but won the pool by point differential). The most we had was 20 or so at Sectionals. We had about 15 at Clambake, about 12-13 at Boston Invite, and 8-11 at White Mountain Open. That's another thing about Masters; players tend to be available for only part of the weekend. We had at least four guys who showed up only for Saturday. Another guy showed up for our first game, disappeared for a few hours to go to his daughter's soccer game, then reappeared for part of our game before a bye (this same fellow showed up on Saturday of Clambake moments before the last point of our last game of the day). I think we have 31 at Nationals, three of whom are missing the first day (plus another 3-4 will presumably get hurt on the first day and miss the rest).
Even looking at the rosters won't necessarily help determine how strong a team is (several of you wienies are already jumping up and down saying that should have nothing to do with seeding). "Oh, this guy is great. Well, he was great. 10 years ago, when he played. Hmm, I wonder if he can still walk." At the other extreme, some teams might have a bunch of 33 year olds who either never happened to live in an ultimate mecca or perhaps were never that much as Open players but have hardly aged compared to their peers (and elders). The Senior Golf tour has had several of their top players come from the lower echelons of the regular tour or even from outside the ranks of the pro tour (Allen Doyle didn't even turn pro until 46, played on the mini-tours for a few years before turning 50, and has won more than $11M since).
So, in the end, seeds are based on previous Nationals. Our #3 seed, for instance, probably has a lot of basis in the 1994-1999 Nationals. OLDSAG didn't play last year, choosing to go to Worlds instead, and is seeded 4th. Troubled Past just formed and is #1, based mostly on winning the NW but also probably a little on Double Happiness' success in the 1990s (which is why I argued for the #1 seed based on head-to-head).
Of the 31 on our team attending Nationals, we have 15 guys who played on the championship teams of the '90s, anywhere from 10 to 13 in a given year. 6 of the 8 who played for all six champs will be there, as will 4 of the 6 who played for five of them. Last year, I told a bunch of people, "We're getting the band back together," and I wasn't sure exactly how much of a competitive team it would be, and how much of a reunion tour it would be. I held off on inviting some good players because I wanted to see whether it would be a total reunion tour (maybe not the best move).
But then partway through the year, it wasn't looking at all like a reunion tour. I think only three of old DoG attended White Mountain Open, and maybe only five for Boston Invite. We had good participation at Masters Easterns, but still not overwhelming. I built up the team with other recruits, though, and even without the vintage players, it was looking like we would be at least nominally competitive. It wasn't until the (nearly) full army showed up at Regionals that things really started to come together. Even with our random sampling of 12-20 at previous tournaments, we were holding our own against those young guns, even the ones who ran.
So, I like our chances. And they just got better, because Dick Brown is already frothing and sending out inspirational emails to the team.
Yeah, baby, it starts in a week!
I got no clue, either. O'Dowd did a preview for the Newsletter. In his original version, he mentioned me and Alex, but what it got past the editor, they took us out and put in Mooney, who had been on loan to Above and Beyond the last couple years. O'Dowd will get his.
Masters was really hard to seed, since there was almost no Masters play this year outside of the series, and there was a lot of turnover from last year. Four of the Regionals winners did not play at Nationals last year (hmm, two Open winners did not, either, which has to be the most in some time). In figuring out what I would send in, I looked at how teams did in Open play this year, but that task was made more difficult by the Score Reporter not reporting what these teams RRI was in Open play. I ended up trying to find equivalents for those teams, opponents against whom they may have had close games, and tried to guess from there, but that too was error-prone. Masters teams are even less likely than Open to have full or near-full rosters at any event, sometimes even Regionals.
We played four Open tournaments this year. Clambake didn't make it to the Score Reporter. For the other three, we were listed as Big Ego Ultimate. At Sectionals, we lost by 1 point to the team that finished 4th at Open Regionals and split with the two teams that finished 5/6 (but won the pool by point differential). The most we had was 20 or so at Sectionals. We had about 15 at Clambake, about 12-13 at Boston Invite, and 8-11 at White Mountain Open. That's another thing about Masters; players tend to be available for only part of the weekend. We had at least four guys who showed up only for Saturday. Another guy showed up for our first game, disappeared for a few hours to go to his daughter's soccer game, then reappeared for part of our game before a bye (this same fellow showed up on Saturday of Clambake moments before the last point of our last game of the day). I think we have 31 at Nationals, three of whom are missing the first day (plus another 3-4 will presumably get hurt on the first day and miss the rest).
Even looking at the rosters won't necessarily help determine how strong a team is (several of you wienies are already jumping up and down saying that should have nothing to do with seeding). "Oh, this guy is great. Well, he was great. 10 years ago, when he played. Hmm, I wonder if he can still walk." At the other extreme, some teams might have a bunch of 33 year olds who either never happened to live in an ultimate mecca or perhaps were never that much as Open players but have hardly aged compared to their peers (and elders). The Senior Golf tour has had several of their top players come from the lower echelons of the regular tour or even from outside the ranks of the pro tour (Allen Doyle didn't even turn pro until 46, played on the mini-tours for a few years before turning 50, and has won more than $11M since).
So, in the end, seeds are based on previous Nationals. Our #3 seed, for instance, probably has a lot of basis in the 1994-1999 Nationals. OLDSAG didn't play last year, choosing to go to Worlds instead, and is seeded 4th. Troubled Past just formed and is #1, based mostly on winning the NW but also probably a little on Double Happiness' success in the 1990s (which is why I argued for the #1 seed based on head-to-head).
Of the 31 on our team attending Nationals, we have 15 guys who played on the championship teams of the '90s, anywhere from 10 to 13 in a given year. 6 of the 8 who played for all six champs will be there, as will 4 of the 6 who played for five of them. Last year, I told a bunch of people, "We're getting the band back together," and I wasn't sure exactly how much of a competitive team it would be, and how much of a reunion tour it would be. I held off on inviting some good players because I wanted to see whether it would be a total reunion tour (maybe not the best move).
But then partway through the year, it wasn't looking at all like a reunion tour. I think only three of old DoG attended White Mountain Open, and maybe only five for Boston Invite. We had good participation at Masters Easterns, but still not overwhelming. I built up the team with other recruits, though, and even without the vintage players, it was looking like we would be at least nominally competitive. It wasn't until the (nearly) full army showed up at Regionals that things really started to come together. Even with our random sampling of 12-20 at previous tournaments, we were holding our own against those young guns, even the ones who ran.
So, I like our chances. And they just got better, because Dick Brown is already frothing and sending out inspirational emails to the team.
Yeah, baby, it starts in a week!
Tuesday, October 09, 2007
Regionals
Well, I guess we need to buy shirts, shorts, and numbers.
First, the streaks. 12 Regional titles in a row (and 15 of 16), covering about 50 games (can't be bothered to look it up right now). 16 Nationals appearances in a row (and 18 of 19). 14th in a row with a team called "DoG". 24th straight Regionals appearance, 25th straight UPA series appearance.
The tournament went better than expected. As I mentioned on rsd, no one had bought his ticket to Sarasota prior to the tournament. There were three teams of roughly equal caliber (plus two teams that weren't as competitive) and two spots to Nationals. the format was full round robin on Saturday and modified clipped elimination on Sunday (1 plays 2 for 1st, 3 plays 4 to be eliminated, loser and winner play for 2nd spot to Nationals). It's version 5.1.2.A.chi, I think, in the handbook.
First round is at 8:30. We have 38 names on our mailing list, about 35 on the roster, and somewhere between 25 and 30 who are actually playing. We hadn't had anything close to a full team in our prior five tournaments, and as is typical of a Masters team, introductions were done at the beginning of Regionals. People are still strolling in at 8:30, or 9 for that matter (one player was at the Sox game the night before which didn't end until 1), but we still have plenty. We roll over Mt. Crushmore 15-4.
Next up is Tombstone, the #2 seed. They could easily have been the #1 seed, or the #3 seed. They are purported to be a merger of Tombstone, which won Canadian Nationals a couple months ago, and GLUM, which finished 2nd at CanNats and won the NE Region last year, finishing 5th at Nationals, but word is that they are bringing a small squad because of Canadian Thanksgiving. I develop an immediate dislike on the first point for one of their players who mauls me a couple times (not violently, just hackingly) while playing poor defense, then tapping the disc back in quickly and silently. The game is close through the first half, but we pull away. Mooney convinces Alex to withdraw a foul call, thus leading to a discussion after the game of the many, many, many times that Steve has handed the disc to the other team. (Most notable was in pool play at 1996 Worlds, where a pick call on double game point just prior to a huck was somehow overruled by Moons, and we lost right then and there. I know one player who is still livid about that. But this led directly to another story of a double game point call. At pool play at Nationals in 1998, a Condor caught a scoober very close to the line in the end zone. (Two videotapes from cameras right next to each other provided conclusive but contradictory evidence on whether he was in.) Discussion ensued, I saw Mooney saunter over to hand the game away, and I say to him, "Steve, don't say another word." He backs away, the disc eventually goes back, same pass is thrown and is OB, we move it upwind for the win. With the wind as strong as it was and the disc where it was after it was sent back, I'd have to guess that the Condors would still expect to win in excess of 95% of the time.) We stretch it out to a 5 goal win, which gives us a lot of breathing room in the event of a 3 way tie.
Next up is Above and Beyond, the other team that could have been seeded anywhere from 1-3 (their biggest claim is that they made semis at Nats last year and are the only of the three teams who played in the series last year as the same team). It's our second tough game in a row, but at least one of the three had to play back-to-back (given that none of the tough games were in the first round), and even though we were the top seed and thus in line for the favorable schedule, it wasn't really an earned first seed so we sucked it up. Similar pattern to the first game, close for the first half, then we pulled away, this time winning 15-11. A&B may have realized that point differential wasn't going to come into play if they lost, and even if they won, they would still need to win or keep it close against Tombstone in order to finish top two, so perhaps they conceded at some point. I noticed that Arnold and I were rarely on the field at the same time, which was a surprise since he so often covers me. I've come to really enjoy playing against him because it's always a battle, and though it was easier with others on me, I was disappointed.
We then had a bye, followed by a final game against Not Dead Yet, a team which plays in the local club league. I played one point only and was on the field for only about 15 seconds, which was enough for me to make the Man cut and huck the goal.
I had only two turnovers on the day, a drop on a stupid hammer and a breakmark flick to the middle of the field. (The hammer should have been the fourth straight O point goal for us that came off a hammer or blade to me, only two of them from Alex.) I went up well twice. I was embarrassingly bad at jump balls last year and possibly the year before. In my defense, it always seemed that I had to wait an excruciatingly long time for those and thus had to jump flat-footed against a young defender coming in at full speed. I once again found myself playing almost exclusively O points after playing both ways all year. But it seems like we have a fairly deep (though less star-laden, even if the names are the same) roster this year, and the tournaments are long, so I can deal. I think I will play some D points as needed at Nationals, but generally will stick to O.
So, we were set up for two shots at making Nationals. Finals are at 10:45, though we tell everyone 10:30 (but still people saunter in; having a local tournament is great and was definitely an advantage, but players try to maintain a semblance of normal life and so are more likely to skip out on parts of the weekend). And what a difference for the weather. Saturday was hot, probably in the 80s and with a lot of sun, but it's in the 50s with some wetness and more wind than the day before. We pull to start the game and are up 4-2 with several chances to add another. There is an injury after one of their turnovers, and I am called in for O. I expect to be the first cutter, but someone else goes first, unsuccessfully. I fill but the pass is behind me and it goes through my hands. A few passes later, the mark is broken and my guy catches the continuation for the goal. Well, that was an excellent 30 seconds of ultimate. Next point, I throw an open side pass several yards behind the receiver, and we are broken for the tie. I take myself out. At 7-5, receiving for the half, we become embroiled in a hell point. I have one turnover that point, a pass similar to the potential game-ender that Goat would later have in the Open finals, and another pass that was not caught (I think it was mostly a drop, but it wasn't a perfect throw), but I continue to work hard, cutting deep at least twice, and am about to cut to the end zone a third timebut see Mooney streaking that way, so I do a highly effective stand still and act like I'm about to cut, and the thrower hits Steve for the goal.
Somewhere in the first half, I have one of my trademark triple-bobble catches. The field had a lot of bare spots in the middle, and as I cut for a simple dump, I trip. I get a hand on it to keep it alive, maybe the defender hits it once or twice, but by the third or fourth contact I have in under control even though I am still on the ground, and snag it.
At halftime, especially with us receiving, they apparently decide to open up the bench in order to prep for the backdoor game. They score only twice more and we can begin our (dry, unfortunately) celebration.
It was terrific and even a little bit emotional to win with this crew. We have about a dozen of the old DoG plus several others who have been around the block, but also several players for whom this will be their first trip to Nationals, and I'm happy for them, more than I was happy for my 23 year old teammates in previous years (nothing against them personally, just that 23 year olds generally haven't been around the game long enough to truly appreciate it). And though we didn't win by less than 4, I never had the feeling that playing the games was just a formality, as was so often the case in recent years, where our typical chances of making Nationals were well over 99%.
So, one $450 plane ticket later, I am on my way to Sarasota. At some point, Alex and I realized we have to contact Joe Seidler so he can update his Hall of Records. Yeah, addendum!
First, the streaks. 12 Regional titles in a row (and 15 of 16), covering about 50 games (can't be bothered to look it up right now). 16 Nationals appearances in a row (and 18 of 19). 14th in a row with a team called "DoG". 24th straight Regionals appearance, 25th straight UPA series appearance.
The tournament went better than expected. As I mentioned on rsd, no one had bought his ticket to Sarasota prior to the tournament. There were three teams of roughly equal caliber (plus two teams that weren't as competitive) and two spots to Nationals. the format was full round robin on Saturday and modified clipped elimination on Sunday (1 plays 2 for 1st, 3 plays 4 to be eliminated, loser and winner play for 2nd spot to Nationals). It's version 5.1.2.A.chi, I think, in the handbook.
First round is at 8:30. We have 38 names on our mailing list, about 35 on the roster, and somewhere between 25 and 30 who are actually playing. We hadn't had anything close to a full team in our prior five tournaments, and as is typical of a Masters team, introductions were done at the beginning of Regionals. People are still strolling in at 8:30, or 9 for that matter (one player was at the Sox game the night before which didn't end until 1), but we still have plenty. We roll over Mt. Crushmore 15-4.
Next up is Tombstone, the #2 seed. They could easily have been the #1 seed, or the #3 seed. They are purported to be a merger of Tombstone, which won Canadian Nationals a couple months ago, and GLUM, which finished 2nd at CanNats and won the NE Region last year, finishing 5th at Nationals, but word is that they are bringing a small squad because of Canadian Thanksgiving. I develop an immediate dislike on the first point for one of their players who mauls me a couple times (not violently, just hackingly) while playing poor defense, then tapping the disc back in quickly and silently. The game is close through the first half, but we pull away. Mooney convinces Alex to withdraw a foul call, thus leading to a discussion after the game of the many, many, many times that Steve has handed the disc to the other team. (Most notable was in pool play at 1996 Worlds, where a pick call on double game point just prior to a huck was somehow overruled by Moons, and we lost right then and there. I know one player who is still livid about that. But this led directly to another story of a double game point call. At pool play at Nationals in 1998, a Condor caught a scoober very close to the line in the end zone. (Two videotapes from cameras right next to each other provided conclusive but contradictory evidence on whether he was in.) Discussion ensued, I saw Mooney saunter over to hand the game away, and I say to him, "Steve, don't say another word." He backs away, the disc eventually goes back, same pass is thrown and is OB, we move it upwind for the win. With the wind as strong as it was and the disc where it was after it was sent back, I'd have to guess that the Condors would still expect to win in excess of 95% of the time.) We stretch it out to a 5 goal win, which gives us a lot of breathing room in the event of a 3 way tie.
Next up is Above and Beyond, the other team that could have been seeded anywhere from 1-3 (their biggest claim is that they made semis at Nats last year and are the only of the three teams who played in the series last year as the same team). It's our second tough game in a row, but at least one of the three had to play back-to-back (given that none of the tough games were in the first round), and even though we were the top seed and thus in line for the favorable schedule, it wasn't really an earned first seed so we sucked it up. Similar pattern to the first game, close for the first half, then we pulled away, this time winning 15-11. A&B may have realized that point differential wasn't going to come into play if they lost, and even if they won, they would still need to win or keep it close against Tombstone in order to finish top two, so perhaps they conceded at some point. I noticed that Arnold and I were rarely on the field at the same time, which was a surprise since he so often covers me. I've come to really enjoy playing against him because it's always a battle, and though it was easier with others on me, I was disappointed.
We then had a bye, followed by a final game against Not Dead Yet, a team which plays in the local club league. I played one point only and was on the field for only about 15 seconds, which was enough for me to make the Man cut and huck the goal.
I had only two turnovers on the day, a drop on a stupid hammer and a breakmark flick to the middle of the field. (The hammer should have been the fourth straight O point goal for us that came off a hammer or blade to me, only two of them from Alex.) I went up well twice. I was embarrassingly bad at jump balls last year and possibly the year before. In my defense, it always seemed that I had to wait an excruciatingly long time for those and thus had to jump flat-footed against a young defender coming in at full speed. I once again found myself playing almost exclusively O points after playing both ways all year. But it seems like we have a fairly deep (though less star-laden, even if the names are the same) roster this year, and the tournaments are long, so I can deal. I think I will play some D points as needed at Nationals, but generally will stick to O.
So, we were set up for two shots at making Nationals. Finals are at 10:45, though we tell everyone 10:30 (but still people saunter in; having a local tournament is great and was definitely an advantage, but players try to maintain a semblance of normal life and so are more likely to skip out on parts of the weekend). And what a difference for the weather. Saturday was hot, probably in the 80s and with a lot of sun, but it's in the 50s with some wetness and more wind than the day before. We pull to start the game and are up 4-2 with several chances to add another. There is an injury after one of their turnovers, and I am called in for O. I expect to be the first cutter, but someone else goes first, unsuccessfully. I fill but the pass is behind me and it goes through my hands. A few passes later, the mark is broken and my guy catches the continuation for the goal. Well, that was an excellent 30 seconds of ultimate. Next point, I throw an open side pass several yards behind the receiver, and we are broken for the tie. I take myself out. At 7-5, receiving for the half, we become embroiled in a hell point. I have one turnover that point, a pass similar to the potential game-ender that Goat would later have in the Open finals, and another pass that was not caught (I think it was mostly a drop, but it wasn't a perfect throw), but I continue to work hard, cutting deep at least twice, and am about to cut to the end zone a third timebut see Mooney streaking that way, so I do a highly effective stand still and act like I'm about to cut, and the thrower hits Steve for the goal.
Somewhere in the first half, I have one of my trademark triple-bobble catches. The field had a lot of bare spots in the middle, and as I cut for a simple dump, I trip. I get a hand on it to keep it alive, maybe the defender hits it once or twice, but by the third or fourth contact I have in under control even though I am still on the ground, and snag it.
At halftime, especially with us receiving, they apparently decide to open up the bench in order to prep for the backdoor game. They score only twice more and we can begin our (dry, unfortunately) celebration.
It was terrific and even a little bit emotional to win with this crew. We have about a dozen of the old DoG plus several others who have been around the block, but also several players for whom this will be their first trip to Nationals, and I'm happy for them, more than I was happy for my 23 year old teammates in previous years (nothing against them personally, just that 23 year olds generally haven't been around the game long enough to truly appreciate it). And though we didn't win by less than 4, I never had the feeling that playing the games was just a formality, as was so often the case in recent years, where our typical chances of making Nationals were well over 99%.
So, one $450 plane ticket later, I am on my way to Sarasota. At some point, Alex and I realized we have to contact Joe Seidler so he can update his Hall of Records. Yeah, addendum!
Open seedings
Well, you gotta rank Boston ahead of Sockeye since Boston is 1-0 head-to-head.
Of course, I don't mean that. A team will play 30-50 games over the course of a year (more when you count the split squad teams they send to some spring tournaments), but some just want to take the results of 3, 2, or even 1 of all those games as the primary determinant of which of two teams deserves a higher seed. It's particularly silly in this example because it was a one-point pool play defeat in a tournament that Sockeye won (while Boston lost in quarters), a tournament that had 9 of the Nationals qualifiers plus Revolver and the Buzz Bullets.
Anyway, as promised, here are my seedings. I wrote a post last year about the method. The only change this year was to give bonus points also for making the semis at a top tournament like ECC or Boston Invite.
The method is to take a team's tournament RRI as shows up in the Score Reporter, give bonus points for finishing high, take a weighted average (with bigger tournaments counting as more), add bonus points for last year, and regress them to a low-Nationals-team level if they don't have enough tournaments this year.
One big problem I can't figure out is how much credit to give Jam for last year. Qualitatively, a team gets credit for both how they did and for how their Regional equivalent did, so Jam would get some credit since they won the Regional and the top finisher from the NW won Nationals, plus they're from the NW, which always seems to be worth extra points. They have the second highest rating prior to the bonus points, but three teams would jump ahead of them if they got no points.
So, without further ado, here are the results:
Team w/2006 No 2006 RRI
Sockeye 1 1 1
Bravo 2 4 4
Furious 3 11 7
SubZero 4 3 3
Jam 5 2 2
Ring 6 5 5
Boston 7 7 9
Condors 8 6 6
Chain 9 10 10
GOAT 10 9 8
Rhino 11 12 12
DWide 12 8 11
TStop 13 13 13
Machine 14 14 14
VBB 15 15 15
Pike 16 16 16
Comments:
1. Furious is an interesting case. RRI by itself has them 7th, but they drop to 11th because they didn't do well in elimination games (other than Can Nats; they lost in Sectionals and came in 3rd in region). But then the bonus for last year lets them leapfrog all those teams.
2. Otherwise, there is a disappointing lack of difference from straight RRI, whose main flaw in seeding is that it overvalues close losses. It's a predictive algorithm, so it is more accurate looking forward, but doesn't properly give credit for wins and losses. I may have discussed this already, but compare Boston and GOAT at CUT and Boston Invite. GOAT has a higher RRI at CUT than Boston, even though Boston beat GOAT twice and won the tournament. Similarly, GOAT won Boston Invite and beat Boston but had only a small advantage in RRI. In both cases, the tournament winner happened to have some close games along the way while the other team had bigger victories in the other games. I think this is probably where the algorithm is most off from how I would seed teams (and it was designed to mimic that method). Two of the Regional runnerups (Chain and Condors) had higher RRIs than the champ.
3. Most teams were pretty consistent, even comparing tournaments like Sectionals and ECC. "Inconsistent" Boston actually had the 4th lowest variance, but perhaps their inconsistency is manifested within a tournament rather than from tournament to tournament. The VBB had the second highest variance, but that is due to one significantly higher performance. That touranemnt? Nope, it was Sectionals, which was more than 200 points (equivalent to a 15-11 win) higher than any other tournament.
4. Sub Zero was surprisingly high. They were helped out a lot by their dominance at Regionals, which was the highest RRI for any team at any tournament this year (2954 including the 40 point bonus for winning).
I guess what I might want to do instead is to somehow figure out a strength of field for a tournament, allocate points based on final placement, then adjust for wins and losses during the tournament (so someone who wins while going undefeated would do better than one who wins while losing twice in pool play). Sounds doable.
The remaining issue I haven't addressed yet is how to handle inconsistencies. Sockeye emerges as #1 but lost their Region. They are so far ahead of Bravo that my solution is to bring Jam in front of them for the overall #1 and leave the others in the same order. DW and Chain are also inconsistent, but in this case, their average score is right in the middle of some other teams, so the final seedings by this algorithm are:
Jam
Sockeye
Johnny Bravo
Furious George
Sub Zero
Ring of Fire
Boston Ultimate
Condors
Doublewide
Chain Lightning
GOAT
Rhino
Truck Stop
Machine
The Van Buren Boys
Pike
Well, even I don't believe it, but once the method was set, there is no subjectivism. GOAT and Rhino seem low, but what higher team deserves the 11 and 12 seed?
Of course, I don't mean that. A team will play 30-50 games over the course of a year (more when you count the split squad teams they send to some spring tournaments), but some just want to take the results of 3, 2, or even 1 of all those games as the primary determinant of which of two teams deserves a higher seed. It's particularly silly in this example because it was a one-point pool play defeat in a tournament that Sockeye won (while Boston lost in quarters), a tournament that had 9 of the Nationals qualifiers plus Revolver and the Buzz Bullets.
Anyway, as promised, here are my seedings. I wrote a post last year about the method. The only change this year was to give bonus points also for making the semis at a top tournament like ECC or Boston Invite.
The method is to take a team's tournament RRI as shows up in the Score Reporter, give bonus points for finishing high, take a weighted average (with bigger tournaments counting as more), add bonus points for last year, and regress them to a low-Nationals-team level if they don't have enough tournaments this year.
One big problem I can't figure out is how much credit to give Jam for last year. Qualitatively, a team gets credit for both how they did and for how their Regional equivalent did, so Jam would get some credit since they won the Regional and the top finisher from the NW won Nationals, plus they're from the NW, which always seems to be worth extra points. They have the second highest rating prior to the bonus points, but three teams would jump ahead of them if they got no points.
So, without further ado, here are the results:
Team w/2006 No 2006 RRI
Sockeye 1 1 1
Bravo 2 4 4
Furious 3 11 7
SubZero 4 3 3
Jam 5 2 2
Ring 6 5 5
Boston 7 7 9
Condors 8 6 6
Chain 9 10 10
GOAT 10 9 8
Rhino 11 12 12
DWide 12 8 11
TStop 13 13 13
Machine 14 14 14
VBB 15 15 15
Pike 16 16 16
Comments:
1. Furious is an interesting case. RRI by itself has them 7th, but they drop to 11th because they didn't do well in elimination games (other than Can Nats; they lost in Sectionals and came in 3rd in region). But then the bonus for last year lets them leapfrog all those teams.
2. Otherwise, there is a disappointing lack of difference from straight RRI, whose main flaw in seeding is that it overvalues close losses. It's a predictive algorithm, so it is more accurate looking forward, but doesn't properly give credit for wins and losses. I may have discussed this already, but compare Boston and GOAT at CUT and Boston Invite. GOAT has a higher RRI at CUT than Boston, even though Boston beat GOAT twice and won the tournament. Similarly, GOAT won Boston Invite and beat Boston but had only a small advantage in RRI. In both cases, the tournament winner happened to have some close games along the way while the other team had bigger victories in the other games. I think this is probably where the algorithm is most off from how I would seed teams (and it was designed to mimic that method). Two of the Regional runnerups (Chain and Condors) had higher RRIs than the champ.
3. Most teams were pretty consistent, even comparing tournaments like Sectionals and ECC. "Inconsistent" Boston actually had the 4th lowest variance, but perhaps their inconsistency is manifested within a tournament rather than from tournament to tournament. The VBB had the second highest variance, but that is due to one significantly higher performance. That touranemnt? Nope, it was Sectionals, which was more than 200 points (equivalent to a 15-11 win) higher than any other tournament.
4. Sub Zero was surprisingly high. They were helped out a lot by their dominance at Regionals, which was the highest RRI for any team at any tournament this year (2954 including the 40 point bonus for winning).
I guess what I might want to do instead is to somehow figure out a strength of field for a tournament, allocate points based on final placement, then adjust for wins and losses during the tournament (so someone who wins while going undefeated would do better than one who wins while losing twice in pool play). Sounds doable.
The remaining issue I haven't addressed yet is how to handle inconsistencies. Sockeye emerges as #1 but lost their Region. They are so far ahead of Bravo that my solution is to bring Jam in front of them for the overall #1 and leave the others in the same order. DW and Chain are also inconsistent, but in this case, their average score is right in the middle of some other teams, so the final seedings by this algorithm are:
Jam
Sockeye
Johnny Bravo
Furious George
Sub Zero
Ring of Fire
Boston Ultimate
Condors
Doublewide
Chain Lightning
GOAT
Rhino
Truck Stop
Machine
The Van Buren Boys
Pike
Well, even I don't believe it, but once the method was set, there is no subjectivism. GOAT and Rhino seem low, but what higher team deserves the 11 and 12 seed?
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