Actually, when it comes to watchability, refs and SotG are about the same. What determines watchability is the execution. We can all remember ultimate games that were awful and painful to watch and we can all remember basketball/football/soccer games that were awful and painful to watch. There are certain things that make a game more watchable and more exciting and things that detract from that, but reffing and SotG don't really have anything to do with those.
First off, no one likes to watch a blow out. The other day I went to watch the (evil) Cardinal play the Lady Ducks and it sucked. Other than Nia Jackson's valiant drives it was a depressing display. There's only so many uncontested offensive rebounds followed by uncontested lay-ups you can watch. There's only so much interest in wondering if the Ducks can hold the lead under 20...30...40... But refs and SotG don't have anything to do with that. Blow outs happen.
No one like to watch a game with a ton of stoppages. I mildly follow high school basketball here in western Oregon and twice recently, teams have used the hold-the-ball technique to eat the clock. There isn't a shot clock, so if you are undefended, you can hold it indefinitely. In the recent Mapleton-Triangle Lake game, Mapleton held the ball (literally held it) for 2 minutes of the 4th quarter while clinging to a four-point lead. A handful of years ago, Siuslaw held the ball the entire first quarter, before putting up a three at the buzzer. First quarter score? 0-0. There are always nooks and crannies in the rules for teams to exploit - if they are willing.
While there is no difference here between a reffed and SotG in theory, although there are some much needed changes that need to be made to the observing system to effect the necessary speeding up of the game. A couple of years ago at Solstice, I implemented an observing system designed to speed the game up and make it more watchable. I went through a ton of uncut game footage and timed and categorized all the stoppages. Here were the biggest issues: time between points, bricks, arguments, calls. Most frequent call resulting in stoppages? Foul on the mark. Traveling was not a major issue. (Footage was from club nationals.) Here are the important changes to remedy these issues.
1. Less time between points. The NFL runs 40 seconds. Surely we can get to 60. It will be an adjustment, but not nearly the adjustment going to 90 seconds was. In the 90s, Schwa (masters of eating the clock) once were timed at 5 minutes between points!
2. Brick at midfield. A brick almost doubles the time between points as Joe Handler swaggers off to get the disc, survey the field, check it in....yawn. Defenders hated this rule, but the number of bricks dropped precipitously when we tried this at Solstice.
3. Quick observer rulings. The current policy of time for players discussion of calls achieves two bad things, while failing to achieve its stated goal of allowing for player determination of a call. First of all, letting the players discuss means any call that needs discussion takes 2 or 3 or more minutes to resolve before play can get going again. Also, it creates an opportunity for drama. When observers step in quickly, the opportunity for players to argue and carry on is snuffed out. The supposed goal of observers waiting is for the players to have time to resolve the call, but that only happens maybe 5% of the time and the remaining 95% of calls result in argument, drama and an observer ruling. At Solstice, we used a simple "walk-to" rule. When a call was made, we (the observers) started walking to the play. When we got there, we asked the players, "do you have a call?" If they said yes, they made it. If they were still arguing, we made the call.
4. TMFs for bad calls. The object of this policy is to prevent teams from controlling the game by making lots and lots of calls. Once it is clear that a team is going to make lots and lots of calls, they should be held to a high standard of accuracy and punished if they don't reach it. Also, players should get TMFs for cheating even if it isn't called. At the club level, only about 10% of marking fouls are called because it is such a disadvantage to stop play. These uncalled fouls should generate TMFs even if the thrower isn't calling them.
Wednesday, February 16, 2011
Wednesday, February 9, 2011
Get in the Back of the Line, Sucker!...or Why Refs are a Bad Idea
Right now, ultimate is in the front of the line. A line of one, but we're in the front. As soon as we add referees at any division of the sport, we move to the back of the line. Behind soccer, rugby, lacrosse, rowing, tennis, wrestling...you name it. In case you haven't noticed, resources are incredibly scarce out there right now. Even sports on the big time are struggling. As we consider these issues, we should consider where we are, where we are going and how we can best get there.
Right now, under SotG, our sport is growing at a breakneck pace. We are outgrowing soccer, lacrosse, rugby...you name it. This is absolutely fantastic. There is nothing that will help our sport more right now than growth. A big part of that growth it SotG and self-officiation. Most of our growth is coming in the youth division and parents love SotG and the culture it brings to our sport. The moral lessons inherent in ultimate and SotG are ones that every parent wants to teach their kid: respect, restraint and honesty. Not only that, the culture of ultimate is a welcome respite from the nastiness of high-stakes soccer or basketball. At the core of that culture is SotG. Every game you play, SotG helps build that respect and culture. To be able to say to a parent, "Ultimate is self-officiated at all levels," is incredibly powerful.
Club and college ultimate should serve as banner divisions to promote the growth of our sport. As such they should do so within the framework of SotG. It kind of goes back to If it Ain't Broke... We are growing at a torrid pace with SotG at all levels. Why would we change it? As a brief aside, both the college division and the club division need some changes to function better. The Open College division needs to make some changes in the way games are observed to prevent the kind of debacle we saw in the finals last year. Less time for discussion, TMFs for every bad call and censuring of coaches. The Club division needs to get out of Sarasota and out of October. Please! Who watches those games? Put the finals in Boston or Seattle where you will have 10,000 fans and youth players watching.
Now that I've distracted you from my main point, let me conclude in a high quality, middle school conclusion kinda way. The most important element for the development of our sport right now is growth. We are currently growing at the fastest rate of any sport in the country and we are doing it with SotG functioning at all levels. Not only should we keep SotG at all levels, we should strengthen the presentation of it at the Club and College levels so they can serve as flagships for the sport.
Right now, under SotG, our sport is growing at a breakneck pace. We are outgrowing soccer, lacrosse, rugby...you name it. This is absolutely fantastic. There is nothing that will help our sport more right now than growth. A big part of that growth it SotG and self-officiation. Most of our growth is coming in the youth division and parents love SotG and the culture it brings to our sport. The moral lessons inherent in ultimate and SotG are ones that every parent wants to teach their kid: respect, restraint and honesty. Not only that, the culture of ultimate is a welcome respite from the nastiness of high-stakes soccer or basketball. At the core of that culture is SotG. Every game you play, SotG helps build that respect and culture. To be able to say to a parent, "Ultimate is self-officiated at all levels," is incredibly powerful.
Club and college ultimate should serve as banner divisions to promote the growth of our sport. As such they should do so within the framework of SotG. It kind of goes back to If it Ain't Broke... We are growing at a torrid pace with SotG at all levels. Why would we change it? As a brief aside, both the college division and the club division need some changes to function better. The Open College division needs to make some changes in the way games are observed to prevent the kind of debacle we saw in the finals last year. Less time for discussion, TMFs for every bad call and censuring of coaches. The Club division needs to get out of Sarasota and out of October. Please! Who watches those games? Put the finals in Boston or Seattle where you will have 10,000 fans and youth players watching.
Now that I've distracted you from my main point, let me conclude in a high quality, middle school conclusion kinda way. The most important element for the development of our sport right now is growth. We are currently growing at the fastest rate of any sport in the country and we are doing it with SotG functioning at all levels. Not only should we keep SotG at all levels, we should strengthen the presentation of it at the Club and College levels so they can serve as flagships for the sport.
Thursday, February 3, 2011
If You Had One More Eye...or Why Refs are a Bad Idea
...you'd be a cyclops. Refs make mistakes. Always. All the time, every game, no matter how good they are. When you ask one person to completely police a game, they are going to mess up. Our current system of self-officiation plus observers is incredibly accurate. Even the worst games are called more accurately than the best reffed games.
Let me define 'accurate.' In this situation, what I mean is whether or not the outcome of an individual call is correct. Is the 'travel' a travel? Is a 'foul' a foul? In ultimate, the answer is yes and yes and yes. In reffed sports, the answer is sometimes yes and sometimes no.
Accuracy hides a much bigger issue: fairness. Each individual call may be correct, but if one team is systematically calling a lot of stuff that the other team isn't, you end up with an unbalanced and unfair game. This happens all the time in reffed games. The difference in ultimate is that it is the competitors themselves manufacturing the advantage. This issue of fairness and the ability of one team to create an advantage for themselves is the strongest argument for refs.
A few thoughts on this. First, adding refs won't increase accuracy - it will decrease it. It won't increase fairness, either. It will actually create more games that are decided unfairly. All it will do is remove the control of that unfairness from the players. Finally, don't be confused into thinking that adding refs will keep people from working the rules to their advantage. On the contrary, adding refs will greatly increase the amount of cheating and gamesmanship as players and coaches learn to really take advantage of the rules, enforcement and the officials.
Let me define 'accurate.' In this situation, what I mean is whether or not the outcome of an individual call is correct. Is the 'travel' a travel? Is a 'foul' a foul? In ultimate, the answer is yes and yes and yes. In reffed sports, the answer is sometimes yes and sometimes no.
Accuracy hides a much bigger issue: fairness. Each individual call may be correct, but if one team is systematically calling a lot of stuff that the other team isn't, you end up with an unbalanced and unfair game. This happens all the time in reffed games. The difference in ultimate is that it is the competitors themselves manufacturing the advantage. This issue of fairness and the ability of one team to create an advantage for themselves is the strongest argument for refs.
A few thoughts on this. First, adding refs won't increase accuracy - it will decrease it. It won't increase fairness, either. It will actually create more games that are decided unfairly. All it will do is remove the control of that unfairness from the players. Finally, don't be confused into thinking that adding refs will keep people from working the rules to their advantage. On the contrary, adding refs will greatly increase the amount of cheating and gamesmanship as players and coaches learn to really take advantage of the rules, enforcement and the officials.
Wednesday, February 2, 2011
Bellingham Invite
We went up to Bellingham to play in the Invite this weekend. This is the third year of its existence and the third year we've won it...sort of. It has slowly become a really nice tradition for the team and myself. Mizu, the girls and I usually stay in Seattle and visit with friends. I miss that on Saturday, but the tourney is only one day so I get Saturday night and Sunday to hang out.
This year, bad weather, bad offenses, short rounds and yappy coaches (guilty!) made for a number of capped games. My suspicion that us (U of O), Washington and UBC are all top-10 teams was confirmed as we three-way tied, all beating each other. Here's a review of those three games:
Round 1: UW v UBC. UW came out screaming and handed it to UBC early and went up huge. I wasn't keeping score, but I'm going to guess that they were up 6 at half. UBC was playing okay, but they dropped so many passes - at least 8 in the first half and 3 goals over the course of the game. They couldn't stop UW's offense or match their intensity on defense. In the second half, though, UBC switched to zone and UW started to falter. (It was very clear that no one had worked on zone offense yet - everyone's sucked.) UBC ran out of time and lost 11-9 at the hard cap. The nicest thing for me in that game was to see Stefi Chow back on the sideline after a year off.
Round 2: U of O v UBC. What a weird, lackluster, ugly game. Bailey was out with a hamstring and Julia went down with a bruised heel on the second point. We weren't quite sure how to proceed without those two in there. Neither team could move it on the other's zone and there was turnover after turnover. Still, we managed to earn a two point lead with about 8 minutes to play...and gave up three to lose 9-10. Blech.
Round 4: U of O v UW. After beating PLU 13-0, we were going to face UW. Our captains got us riled up and ready to go and we came out with the intensity we'd needed in the morning. Our defense gave UW fits and they never could get a rhythm. At 8-6 us and 5 minutes to play, we all realized that UW would need to score two to force overtime. Instead, we scored 2 and won, 10-6.
Our Western and PLU games were blow outs (13-1 and 13-0) respectively, so it's hard for me to say a lot about those teams. I know Western played UW to 7-9 and one of their best players was sidelined for our game, so...
Tomorrow I'll get out a Why Refs are a Bad Idea... post. This one will be about accuracy.
This year, bad weather, bad offenses, short rounds and yappy coaches (guilty!) made for a number of capped games. My suspicion that us (U of O), Washington and UBC are all top-10 teams was confirmed as we three-way tied, all beating each other. Here's a review of those three games:
Round 1: UW v UBC. UW came out screaming and handed it to UBC early and went up huge. I wasn't keeping score, but I'm going to guess that they were up 6 at half. UBC was playing okay, but they dropped so many passes - at least 8 in the first half and 3 goals over the course of the game. They couldn't stop UW's offense or match their intensity on defense. In the second half, though, UBC switched to zone and UW started to falter. (It was very clear that no one had worked on zone offense yet - everyone's sucked.) UBC ran out of time and lost 11-9 at the hard cap. The nicest thing for me in that game was to see Stefi Chow back on the sideline after a year off.
Round 2: U of O v UBC. What a weird, lackluster, ugly game. Bailey was out with a hamstring and Julia went down with a bruised heel on the second point. We weren't quite sure how to proceed without those two in there. Neither team could move it on the other's zone and there was turnover after turnover. Still, we managed to earn a two point lead with about 8 minutes to play...and gave up three to lose 9-10. Blech.
Round 4: U of O v UW. After beating PLU 13-0, we were going to face UW. Our captains got us riled up and ready to go and we came out with the intensity we'd needed in the morning. Our defense gave UW fits and they never could get a rhythm. At 8-6 us and 5 minutes to play, we all realized that UW would need to score two to force overtime. Instead, we scored 2 and won, 10-6.
Our Western and PLU games were blow outs (13-1 and 13-0) respectively, so it's hard for me to say a lot about those teams. I know Western played UW to 7-9 and one of their best players was sidelined for our game, so...
Tomorrow I'll get out a Why Refs are a Bad Idea... post. This one will be about accuracy.
Monday, January 24, 2011
If It Aint Broke or Why Refs are a Bad Idea
This year at College and Club Nationals there were ~330 games played across six divisions. Of those games 4 or 5 were marred by bad spirit. Four in college open and one in masters. None in women's. None in mixed. None in club open. That's a mere 1.5% of all games played at the National level.
There is an undercurrent in discussion about referees and spirit of the game that somehow spirit of the game doesn't actually work. That somehow we are all sputtering along in a broken system. Look around! Game after game after game is played under SotG successfully.
As watchers and followers of the game, we are naturally drawn to the big and the exciting and the interesting. A consequence of this is that we overemphasize big events and undervalue all the accumulated small events. When a game breaks down and spirit breaks down, that game and those teams become the talk of the tournament. When that game happens at Nationals or in the finals of Nationals, it becomes all that anyone can see.
I don't think we should ignore the importance of these games. They have a huge impact on the quality of people's experience playing ultimate and sometimes a huge impact on the competitive outcome of a tournament. There are some wise adjustments that can be made to the process of spirit of the game and observing that will make a big difference in reducing the occurrence of these games.
Looking at the numbers more deeply, the story gets quite interesting. Five of the divisions (women's, college women's, mixed, club open and masters) had a 100% or 98% (1 of 39) success rate. College open is where teams are struggling. If four of those games were failures, that makes for an almost 7% failure rate. Why? How do you fix it? We know SotG works (if it works in club open, it'll work anywhere) so how do we get this one division back on track?
There is an undercurrent in discussion about referees and spirit of the game that somehow spirit of the game doesn't actually work. That somehow we are all sputtering along in a broken system. Look around! Game after game after game is played under SotG successfully.
As watchers and followers of the game, we are naturally drawn to the big and the exciting and the interesting. A consequence of this is that we overemphasize big events and undervalue all the accumulated small events. When a game breaks down and spirit breaks down, that game and those teams become the talk of the tournament. When that game happens at Nationals or in the finals of Nationals, it becomes all that anyone can see.
I don't think we should ignore the importance of these games. They have a huge impact on the quality of people's experience playing ultimate and sometimes a huge impact on the competitive outcome of a tournament. There are some wise adjustments that can be made to the process of spirit of the game and observing that will make a big difference in reducing the occurrence of these games.
Looking at the numbers more deeply, the story gets quite interesting. Five of the divisions (women's, college women's, mixed, club open and masters) had a 100% or 98% (1 of 39) success rate. College open is where teams are struggling. If four of those games were failures, that makes for an almost 7% failure rate. Why? How do you fix it? We know SotG works (if it works in club open, it'll work anywhere) so how do we get this one division back on track?
Sunday, January 16, 2011
Don't Move to Beacon Hill or Why Refs are a Bad Idea
Way back in 2002, when my wife and I were freshly and madly in love, we decided to move. Our apartment on Capitol Hill had no outdoor space and we were desperate for a porch and a garden. So we started looking, found a place in Beacon Hill with two huge decks and yard and moved in. It sucked.
We had been so focused on what we were missing, that we didn't give any thought to what we might have to give up to get it. The corner apartment with windows facing south and west? Goodbye. The most interesting street in Seattle four blocks away? Goodbye. Walk to downtown? Goodbye. 3 minute bike ride to Pike Place Market? Goodbye. as
It is all too easy to get caught up with what is wrong with ultimate. It's all to easy to say "Refs will fix it." We need to be smarter and more far-sighted than that. The issues around Spirit of the Game and refs and self-officiation are incredibly complicated. How we choose to address them will have profound impacts on the game as we play it today and how it will be played in the future. In this series, I am going to look at these issues and see if it isn't possible to tease them apart and in the process, engender a real conversation.
We had been so focused on what we were missing, that we didn't give any thought to what we might have to give up to get it. The corner apartment with windows facing south and west? Goodbye. The most interesting street in Seattle four blocks away? Goodbye. Walk to downtown? Goodbye. 3 minute bike ride to Pike Place Market? Goodbye. as
It is all too easy to get caught up with what is wrong with ultimate. It's all to easy to say "Refs will fix it." We need to be smarter and more far-sighted than that. The issues around Spirit of the Game and refs and self-officiation are incredibly complicated. How we choose to address them will have profound impacts on the game as we play it today and how it will be played in the future. In this series, I am going to look at these issues and see if it isn't possible to tease them apart and in the process, engender a real conversation.
Wednesday, January 12, 2011
Regional Review
Fugue is now in Region 1 or what been named the Northwest. The NW includes Oregon, Washington, British Columbia and a whole bunch of open space were there isn't much college ultimate going on. Structurally, there are some weirdnesses about our new region. From a competition standpoint, it is pretty straight forward.
It's with great sadness (and a small bit of relief) that we say goodbye to Northern California. Stanford has been the standard we all use to measure our programs by and it'll be weird to have them gone. Still, it makes Regionals a little easier to lose them and Cal. The true NW (OR, WA, BC) always felt a bit separated from the California teams and I think our new region will be good. Tighter and more family.
Our region is very large geographically (it's bigger than western Europe), but there aren't very many teams to scatter across it. The ten to twelve teams in existence are mostly strung down the coast valleys in Oregon (the Willamette), Washington (the Puget Sound) and BC (the Fraser.) For the existing teams, it means a more manageable-size region and one where we can drive to everything. It increasing (greatly) the likelihood of a Regionals held on Canadian soil, since UBC has the facilities and logistical know-how to run a good tourney. For developing or new teams in the Big Sky (Idaho, Montana, Alberta and Utah) the geography makes an insurmountable barrier. If you think I'm exaggerating, you should read this about crossing the western passes.
The Conference to Regionals shift will be weird as well. If the DIII schools opt out of DI Regionals (which I expect them to - see why below) our Conference is our Region. Not only that, we might not even get eight teams who want to go to Regionals?! From a competition standpoint, it will be very weird to play the Conference tournament (just for Regional seeding!) and then turn around and play all the same teams again at Regionals.
There are three schools in the Northwest who will challenge for spots at Nationals and then, once there, will challenge for the title. Those three are Oregon, Washington and UBC. I'm going to write more about these teams when I do national analysis, because they are all contenders. The next two teams, Western and PLU are a step down from those teams. Alyssa is done and with her, the hopes of Chaos. They still have some good players, but depth has always been an issue for them and without someone to carry the gigantic load Alyssa's did, they are unlikely to contend. PLU is the defending DIII champions and I expect that they will make defending their crown a priority. Reed looked good in the fall, so PLU will have a challenge at the Regional level.
What the redraw does for us is to shift our focus from April and May to February and March. In the past, it was Regionals that mattered. You worked and worked and worked for that one tournament. For many regions, it'll still be that way. But for us, where we have a big divide between the haves and have-nots, the question will be whether the big three teams can play well enough early in the season to earn three bids to Nationals.
It's with great sadness (and a small bit of relief) that we say goodbye to Northern California. Stanford has been the standard we all use to measure our programs by and it'll be weird to have them gone. Still, it makes Regionals a little easier to lose them and Cal. The true NW (OR, WA, BC) always felt a bit separated from the California teams and I think our new region will be good. Tighter and more family.
Our region is very large geographically (it's bigger than western Europe), but there aren't very many teams to scatter across it. The ten to twelve teams in existence are mostly strung down the coast valleys in Oregon (the Willamette), Washington (the Puget Sound) and BC (the Fraser.) For the existing teams, it means a more manageable-size region and one where we can drive to everything. It increasing (greatly) the likelihood of a Regionals held on Canadian soil, since UBC has the facilities and logistical know-how to run a good tourney. For developing or new teams in the Big Sky (Idaho, Montana, Alberta and Utah) the geography makes an insurmountable barrier. If you think I'm exaggerating, you should read this about crossing the western passes.
The Conference to Regionals shift will be weird as well. If the DIII schools opt out of DI Regionals (which I expect them to - see why below) our Conference is our Region. Not only that, we might not even get eight teams who want to go to Regionals?! From a competition standpoint, it will be very weird to play the Conference tournament (just for Regional seeding!) and then turn around and play all the same teams again at Regionals.
There are three schools in the Northwest who will challenge for spots at Nationals and then, once there, will challenge for the title. Those three are Oregon, Washington and UBC. I'm going to write more about these teams when I do national analysis, because they are all contenders. The next two teams, Western and PLU are a step down from those teams. Alyssa is done and with her, the hopes of Chaos. They still have some good players, but depth has always been an issue for them and without someone to carry the gigantic load Alyssa's did, they are unlikely to contend. PLU is the defending DIII champions and I expect that they will make defending their crown a priority. Reed looked good in the fall, so PLU will have a challenge at the Regional level.
What the redraw does for us is to shift our focus from April and May to February and March. In the past, it was Regionals that mattered. You worked and worked and worked for that one tournament. For many regions, it'll still be that way. But for us, where we have a big divide between the haves and have-nots, the question will be whether the big three teams can play well enough early in the season to earn three bids to Nationals.
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