Sometimes, even Al Davis gets it right.
We had Pike scrimmage-practice today. Much like practice, but instead of practicing, we just scrimmage in various games to predetermined amounts while split up in teams. Stop worrying about strategy, and dial in on winning. Just a taste of real competition. More battling, for sure, will come as the season progresses.
Today's session was good. There was a ton of fire and desire which had faded from our playing style of late. There was spiking and jawing. My kind of environment. The D team on the first game, 7-3. Then we lost the next 4 games to 3. We closed with a win in a game to 5, I'm pretty sure. Practice Record is slipping, either way. That'll have to be remedied.
Some notions to (re)focus on:
I had some nice throws/pulls. A couple of looks were unnecessarily difficult, which resulted in either tough completions or Ds, and one throw (to Jamie) was completely ludicrous and should not have been contemplated, let alone thrown. Sometimes brothers conspire for maximum stupidity on the field as well as off.
I love long hot summer practices.
Practice Record:
12-8 (Passable at best)
--
Workout Total:
4 hours ultimate
Saturday, June 30
Just Win
Friday, June 29
Ten Thousand
What a Mad World.
This morning at 10:03:36 am, someone from Northeastern University viewing Firefox at a resolution of 1280 x 1024 and pushed the hit count of this waste of space to 10000 while visiting 3 pages for ~14 seconds.
Is this world mad because I have all of this info at my fingertips or because over 10,000 separate visits to this website have occurred?
Thursday, June 28
Wash It All Away
After the workout, the rains came.
As I walked back to the office to pick up my bag, all I could think about was the water washing everything off of me. The sweat, the fatigue, the negativity that had lurked inside me since Boston. I started feeling clean from it all. The burdens had been lifted.
But as the walk continued, I contemplated the source to which I attributed my newfound feeling of lightness. Was it actually the rain that had washed everything from my mind? I thought and thought and slowly realized that it wasn't the rain that gave me a clear mind, it was the workout. The rain was just drawing my attention to the feeling.
After the workout, I've covered so many bases in my life. I've put in work for Pike, I've kept myself healthy, I've done something fun and whatever else. More importantly, it removes doubt of my prowess on the field from my mind. I know that I'm putting in the work. I don't need to wonder. When I line up on the field, I can look across to my opponent and know that he has not outworked me. Soon enough, he'll know. I can't worry about getting beat or missing a play from time to time because I know I'm working to make that play next time.
I invest so much of my time to this sport and my team that putting in the work as the season pushes ahead is the least I can do for myself. If I'm going to play this much ultimate, why not be good at it? If my teammates are going to put in this much time, what gives me the right to expect less from myself?
--
Workout Total:
30 min explosive lower body
12 min whole body circuit
10 min stretching (Should have been longer)
Wednesday, June 27
Keep'em Guessin'
That's the strategy to use against every opponent.
In this instance, it is my body vs my mind.
My mind knows that I should be staying unpredictable in terms of which days I train and which I don't. The problem is that since my mind knows it, my body can use that knowledge to anticipate what I'll put it through on a given day.
Tonight's summer league cancellation gave me a great chance to get the jump on myself. Instead of the game coupled with a quick workout afterward, I did nothing. I had planned to do nothing on either Thursday or Friday, but now life conspired to keep me guessing and I wasn't going to pass up the opportunity. I stretched and read. I lazed about and a thought struck me as I considered something a notion that I try to keep close to my heart, but is difficult at times. The notion is that you need to have fun when you play. Even when you train.
When I play, I'm enjoying myself to no end. No matter my outward demeanor, I love the challenge. I love the competition. There is no other place I'd rather be. Similarly, when I'm training for ultimate, I love it. I enjoy the workouts I do because I focus on winning them. Most of the things I do are short and intense enough that the challenge presented is enough to make the exercise fun. Jumping and sprinting and all of that madness is fun, when you think about it.
The difference is that if you compare this to the hours of endurance training that some teammates (and tons of random people I see out there) put themselves through seems so joyless. Next time you see someone running a long distance, just look at his or her face. Do you read a single note of enjoyment? Nope. When you see me training, you will see joy. I bust my ass during each section and then I catch my breath and goof around with my workout buddies. Or I drift a little and smile at the workout I'm doing before the watch snaps me back into action. I drink in the environment and the experience because I include brief rests in every phase of the workout. Time for the muscles to regroup and time for the mind to make sense of it all.
Go all out to earn your rest and enjoy the experience.
--
Workout Total:
20 min stretching
Tuesday, June 26
Breaking News from the Track: This Shit is Hard
Did a track workout in the sweltering heat of NYC this evening.
I felt that it was a matter of manhood to go out and do the workout because I knew well enough that the heat at this level was just a challenge, and not, in fact, a serious health hazard. As I ran over to the track, I felt awful. When I arrived, I saw Zac and Jeff as they were doing 200s or whatever Puppet Regime is up to this week, but did not go over to check it out as I was searching for some objects to jump onto and off of for my plyo workout.
Workout looked like this:
Plyo Workout:
Richochet Jump 3x50
Side-Side Box Jump 4x10
Onto Box Jump 3x8
Low Squat Jump into Jump Lunge 3x5 per leg
1-2-3 Jump 3x5 jumps per leg
30 yard accelerations x4
Consecutive Broad Jumps 3x8
60 seconds rest between sets and exercises
Upper Body Circuit/Interval
4 clap pushups
5 divebombers
6 regular pushups for speed
15 sec rest
4x through
The first section was hard, but not killer. That is, it was just what a plyo workout should be. I knew that my muscles were getting worked over, but I wasn't completely dead for movement, but the muscles/tendons I use to be springy were fatigued. The second part of the workout was a killer. Just try it, trust me. I think in the future, I'll try to do something more like 8x through a 2-3-4 progression with 10 seconds rest. This would approximate a Tabata Interval set while mixing up the exercises for the full duration. On the other hand, I might also collapse and die.
Speaking of the Tabatas, these will become more and more prevalant in my workouts as the Fall Series approaches. Tabata sprints are really hard. Tabata suicides are worse. Tabata-set marking drills are murder. I also like to say Tabata. Just a phenomenal way to train for explosive endurance. Train your body to exert maximum force multiple times!
We got together and threw for a bit after this. I feel like I'm picking up disparate movement patterns from effective throwers and incorporating them into my style as a thrower. It is an odd thing to you notice certain effective little movements or adjustments that great throwers make and then consciously decide that you should be able to do that. My version never quite duplicates the observed version, but I know exactly from whence/whom most of my throws/fakes originated and how they've changed over time to be my version of them. That is, they change slightly to be more effective for my slightly peculiar style of throwing/faking while retaining their basic form.
--
Workout Total:
30 min Explosive Strength
3 min upper body interval
Monday, June 25
NYU MVP Matchup
We took on Indigo tonight.
I anticipated a solid matchup between two teams at about the same place in the standings. Indigo is the home of Scott Arnold, Drew Jones, June Bae, Katrina Krasnansky and more. Among the "more" is Jeff Ho, the most gifted NYU ultimate alum, fellow first round draft pick and altogether nasty player.
The first half definitely didn't live up to the hype as we rolled to an early 6-2 lead on some all-around sweet play from our team led by greedy downfield cutting for goals. I think we faltered here for a bit before taking half at either 8-7 or 8-6. My throws were on, but my defense was a little soft. Gotta work that a little more in the second half. It can really be a fun challenge to cover a really good player in summer league because they'll generally be handling and will have a ton of space to work in. Go in and work on every aspect of your defense because the other team will continue throwing to their stud.
Now, this is not the same as making crazy bids and trying to get glory Ds in summer league. That's bush-league. Work on your fundamentals. Try to seal the mark. Work on playing "deny" defense. Try to focus just on your man and see if you can take away his first option every time he gets the disc. If you get an obvious chance to make a clean layout bid, go for it, but don't take the risks that you might in a club game. That's a quick way to get labeled as "no fun."
As the second half got underway, it was clear that they had decided to stay in this game and fight to the bitter end. I got off some nice throws in this part of the game, including a huck that made Rick Kahn look 20 years younger. The game ended in our favor, 15-13. Both teams were missing a ton of people. Next up? Zagoria!
--
90 minutes ultimate
15 min stretching
Sunday, June 24
Boston, Day Two
Why am I tired this morning?
Where am I this morning? It is dark, I clearly hear cars passing by. IT sounds sleepy yet a little active. Seems altogether too welcoming to be a hotel... We're in Boston this weekend, right? I think I'm at Elizabeth's place. A quick survey of the room confirms it. Right on.
Though I'm hardly awake, I'm being offered coffee. What service! Am I supposed to leave a tip? We slowly get ourselves together for the day ahead. For some reason, despite our huge roster yesterday, I'm a little tired. As I contemplate the specific way in which I'm tired, it becomes clear that it was more of the "I stood in the sun for a thousand hours yesterday" sort than the "I killed myself on the ultimate field all day yesterday." Fair enough, I know just the remedy. Get a little stretching done, down some coffee and visualize perfection for the day ahead.
We drop by another Dunkin' Donuts (They're everywhere!) on the way to the fields and, of course, saw other ultimate players there. Dan Yi and other miscreants this time around. Traveling toward the field, all I could think of was getting more dialed in today and staying there, no matter what other distractions entered into the equation. Whenever some option other than staying focused came through my mind, I would chose to stay focused.
Warmups were pretty good for me. I got a good sweat going, woke my muscles up and completed all of my passes. Got my feet moving on the mark and tried to think about my acceleration out of every direction change, small or large. Didn't get quite enough deeper throws in, but I felt confident nonetheless.
First Game vs Truck Stop, 11-15
This was an odd game. Our D had the disc twice on the first point and failed to convert. As the game went on, our D would alternate between getting scored on in 1 throw and grinding through a long point of solid D only to get scored on. When we got turns, we did not capitalize. I imagine TS could say the same, based on how bad I felt this game was all around. The Boston group heckling our final was clearly horrified by the number of turnovers in this game. I think it is fair to say that TS and Pike were as well. It was disappointing to lose to them, but not entirely unexpected considering the number of times we'll likely face off over the course of the season. Some things were better than yesterday, some were about the same. Some great stuff on which to improve came out of this game.
Bye
Watched some Wicked/Ambush, had a little chat with Danny and Ryan about what was wrong with Pike's offense, finally stopped by the scoreboard and checked out how everything had gone thus far.
Second Game vs Zebra Muscles, 15-9
While they strung together some nice pairs of points, we were ahead pretty much the whole way. I was continually covering a squirrelly handler-type who would do the strangest thing from the dump position in the middle of the stall count: Go Deep. I mean, yeah, there's a ton of space in front of you, but you run by all of the defense who can presumably use the power of sight to provide help D. There was a little shoving match in this one that I helped break up pretty quickly. Stupid ultimate players. I'm pretty sure that this was the game where Schmucker laid out over some guy's shoulder on an in-cut to get a D and then immediately caught the upwind huck for a bookend. That may be the most ridiculous thing I've seen on the field in 07.
Third Game vs The Van Buren Boys, 13-11
They only have 9 guys. I hope this won't be like Goat at Chicago a couple of years back. Or Boston X/Y at the Pike Invite, for that matter. Small teams often rally so well together that they give everyone tough games. Team chemistry counts for a ton in ultimate. This team also plays to their strengths very well by putting up deep shots to classically American corn-fed athletes early and often. Their active zone was a little challenging as it was aggressive and a bit sneaky. We did manage to push through in this one for the tourney ending W, which was nice.
Julie, Jamie and I got going pretty quickly after our game ended as Jamie had to travel after he got rid of us in Jersey City. On the trip back, we stopped at a roadside restaurant of some kind and had a discussion about the omnipresence of corn products in the American diet and a number of other completely unrelated things.
The rest of the drive was uneventful and we arrive back in Jersey a bit after 10pm.
The whole car ride was full of thoughts about ultimate and so many things I wanted to write down and tell my teammates or captains. Definitely a disappointing trip in terms of direct result, but I feel that we often learn best from failure. Now we have a better sense of what we need to improve upon in order to reach our goals. Time to use the lessons of the past to plan the course of our future. Now the real season begins.
--
Workout Total:
3 games of ultimate
Saturday, June 23
Boston Invitational, Day One
"I've got to say, that didn't go as well as I had hoped."
That's what I thought to myself as we arrived to the field on Saturday morning. The trip up there, as I fully expected, was fraught with difficulty, as they say. The plan involved my brother leaving work at 5pm, going to Philly to pick up Wickner and then driving to Jersey City to pick up Julie and I, eat and head up to Boston.
Of course, this scheme makes no sense at all and all of the driving involved is through high-traffic areas at that particular time of the day. Even in ideal traffic conditions, this is a difficult maneuver to pull off. Executed perfectly, it could probably be done in a little under 3 hours. For those of you scoring at home, this means the vehicle's EPAT (Earliest Possible Arrival Time) at Jersey City was a little before 8pm. The LPAT (If you are unable to figure this one out, hire a tutor) was somewhere in the neighborhood of Midnight (Tangent).
This mean that there was a decision point during that time frame in terms of "Should we forge ahead tonight or grab rest while we can and then push on in the dawn?" I had been mulling this decision point over in my head for a couple of days earlier in the week and could only decide that it was a decision that would need to be made in the moment. Why? Because only at that moment would I know my feelings about either option.
As Jamie and Wicknah approached, I was asleep in anticipation of whichever option we ended up with. I was due up to drive the next leg of the trip. If we were going at night, I would need to recover from the 2pm margaritas at work not in terms of being drunk, but that drinking is more tiring than not. If we were going in the morning, I would like to start amassing some sleep now and try to hit a minimum of 5 hours. They arrived and the group was polled. As the moment came to decide, I realized that I had no particular benefit from either decision, stated that I was more than happy to drive no, and more than happy to drive in the morning. At least that's what I thought at the time. I may have groggily grumbled: "Either is fine. I have no opinion."
We decided to go in the morning. Departure time: 3:30 am for a drive that I usually do in 3.5-4 hours given moderate to good traffic. That should be fine for an 8:30 game, 7:30 arrival time. I wanted to get there by a little after 7 for some extra warmup after the car ride and a little extra throwing time to learn the wind, but if I didn't, it would not be a huge loss as I warm up well and generally adapt my throws to the environment pretty easily. A lot of that came from throwing in lotsa wind whenever possible over the last 4 years or so. On the beach, in stormy (non-lightning) weather, at East River Park, windy tournaments, whatever. When the wind picked up, I found someone with whom to throw, or took my bag of discs out and threw at a bunch of different angles to a targets in different directions. Each time working on the angle of the disc compared to the wind. As I did this, I realized that the release point was only indirectly responsible for the angle at which the disc traveled. The wrist snap is the key at every release point. If you can translate the force generated from your ankles, up through your legs, hips, torso, shoulders, and arms into the correctly angled and attenuated directional snap of the wrist, any release point (given the ability to generate the necessary snapping power in the required direction from that release point) is a possibility.
Assured that we would arrive on time, I slept easily.
At 3:07am, the first alarm when off. Oh, I think I mistimed my sleep cycles... That's why we have multiple alarms. I went back to sleep knowing that in 3 minutes another alarm would go off. At 3:10 I got up very easily. We gathered our stuff, and got into the car. Bob Marley makes for good late summer night drive music. An on-time departure! Perfecto! "Everything's comin' up Milhouse!"
The drive is a lovely early morning jaunt to Beantown. I honestly don't recall that much of it. Well, that is until I follow the directions that say turn onto I-90E from I-90E. I follow that, as crazy as it sounds, and about 20 miles later (due to the combination my nearly encyclopedic knowledge of driving follies on the way to Devens and my utter inability to get there right the first time) I realize that we've made an error. We pull over and look at a map, realizing that the directions I was handed were supposed to say "turn onto I-290 from I-90." Ah hell, now we'll just go on back to I-495N and head back on route 2. Sadly, this is something I've done before. But the original time was due to not actually having directions or a map, just a general sense of where Devens was. That was kinda fun. This was the opposite of that. The good side was that we had made good enough time and left early enough to get to the fields on time with breakfast.
We do arrive in time, and get to our fields. We were about ready to warm up when I realized that I had left some things in the car (notably, my first cup of coffee this morning) so I went back as the team started the jog. I caught up with them by midway through our active warmups (which after initial resistance have been near unanimously adopted) and worked myself through a slightly abbreviated version that I like to use for workouts and summer league. It really focuses on the hips, core and larger muscles. A quick set of stretches with engaged muscles through a couple key ranges of motion takes care of the smaller groups. Into our skipping warmups and the like. Then drill time. A little live play and some extra time for pulling and deep looks.
I looked around at some point and realized that we had no fewer than 30 guys. It turns out that we had 31 guys. The list broke down like this: Heckman, Trey, Brandon, TC, Jeff, Dono, Ian, Tim Johnson, Ben Kleveland, Dusty, Ringo, Fink, Schmucker, Tous, Heng-Scheng, Malcolm, Dan Yi, Jamie, Foss, Art Shull, Ed Resnik, Raphael, Ricky, Eddie Peters, Mutton, Spanish, Justin Illuzi, Perry Gorgin, Pribicko, Mio and Herschel. Subbing is going to be a bitch. Team focus is going to be difficult to maintain.
First game vs Medmen, 15-6.
I was surprised, I expected more from this team. It seemed like nothing was working for them all day long against any team that they played. Perhaps it is a hot and cold thing with them. Perhaps it all lies in the completion percentage on their unorthodox deep looks. If they connect? This team is no fun to play because they're making headway with passes approximately 100% of defenses encourage. When they're not completing them, it is clearly in the interest of the other team to play high-percentage ultimate.
Second Game vs PoNY, 10-15.
Ouch. The additions to their roster are paying dividends. The combination of a growing level of individual talent, team-level familiarity and the addition of Bailey and BVH (Despite Bailey's apparent inability to catch things thrown to him by BVH) bodes well for this squad in 07. A lot of ex-Pike on that roster and it is always terrible to lose to guys you know. Unfortunately for them, Goat is again looking strong and while Boston doesn't' seem invincible, they haven't completely gelled yet either.
Bye round.
Watched a little of Amp v Mischief, Puppet v Tandem and Godiva v someone.
Third Game vs Boston, 8-15.
This was not fun either. Focus is definitely suffering for everyone at this point. Players have been out for too long. The offense is bogging down and the D is not converting when we are given/create our own opportunities. Kurt Gibson made his appearance for Boston in this one. That could be another great addition to that team, provided he fits in with whatever philosophy the new team has. Teddy seemed to be getting a lot of blocks on us. Losing this one meant that we had to play a crossover to determine if we were in the upper or lower bracket on Sunday. These games are never fun. The lower team is fired up and usually pretty tired while the upper team is pissed off and negative after not faring so well. This game was no different.
Fourth Game vs New Noise, 15-14.
This game was kinda odd. I felt like we were in control for most of the game, and at some point I looked at the scoreboard and was a bit alarmed. It seemed that a double game point was likely. to their credit, they were completing a ton of deep looks to some guy wearing what looked like scrubs. They were entirely unafraid to hang it up there and bet on their guy. And their guys were winning a lot while we were failing to adjust. I can't remember how this ended, as by this point I was doing a terrible job of staying focused. After being up at 3:10 and pushing through until this game that started at 5pm, I was just plain fading. I kept fighting, but it was hard when I wasn't in the game. While playing, I found it easy to play at a passable level, but not at my best. Kinda frustrating.
In any case, we retain the right to play in quarters and it turns out that we play Truck Stop at 8:30am. Nice. I like playing against this team as both teams hate to lose to each other. Not that I like or dislike them personally, but that I value their presence as opponents. These games are always battles.
Julie, Jame and I tossed in the beautiful weather until the sun was nearly down. That was a nice, relaxing way to round out the day and unwind a bit. Try to quiet the mind and think about the paths of the disc on the backdrop of a nice sunset.
We went to stay in Somerville with a friend of ours, Elizabeth, and had BBQ. It was good, although I was asleep by the time it came and had to be woken up to partake. Not a shocker for anyone considering the length of that particular day. Set the alarm for some early hour and fell asleep right away...
--
Workout Total:
8 hour ultimate tournament
Boston (Tangent)
This is a complete tangent, but "Midnight in a Perfect World" from DJ Shadow's Endtroducing is the shit.
The Wikipedia page linked to above is one of the reasons the internet if awesome. The sample sources shown there used to be hosted on a website with a constantly changing web address. The only way that you would know how to find the updated site was to subscribe to the associated email list. Now, with the ability of many users to update the page, there isn't really a way to stop the information from being shown, save for some sort of hard core government shutdown. Even then it might not be possible. As the information base gets connected, people who know the original artists (David Axelrod, for example was dope as hell) will fill in more info and then info about the songs and the like. That is a very interesting spiral of interrelation. The dark side of it is that the more esoteric the information, the fewer people are knowledgeable enough to edit it. This isn't usually a huge deal, but in the case of wikipedia, it is not everyone's hobby. Perhaps it will be at some point, or even find its way to a more omnipresent catch-all for information. If Wikipedia had an unlimited storage capacity, would they loosen restrictions for pages about people? Could it then become the base internet portal through which we view the world?
Imagine it, a web page is created when you're born. Your parents give that website to everyone you meet as a child so that everyone you've ever met can add to your page. When you get old enough, you can edit your page to link to things you're involved in and interested in. To keep it even, half of the page could be property of the individual, and the other half could be property of the community at large. As you link to pages about things that interest you and people you know, you can edit their pages. This way, you're involved with the pages of things which interest you.
Wait a second, doesn't this all sound a lot like life? You live, you have an internal consciousness, there are external consciousnesses around you, you are able to change/remain yourself while others change/keep their opinions of you and during your life you can be involved in those things that interest you.
I know it's a crazy fantastic scenario, but if you consider the things that you do online and align them with the physical activities replaced by the tappy-tapping of fingers on a keyboard, and then think of the shock of the telephone before that, you might agree that it is not an impossible path to eventually travel. Not that it is likely, but that it could follow from the events unfolding now.
In any case, when my eyes glaze over on a car ride or on a bye round, these are the things that flood through my head. When people ask me what I'm thinking about or what's on my mind, this is an example of why I often say "nothing." This was difficult enough to get down in typed form, extemporaneously, my train of thought will all but assuredly be derailed.
Friday, June 22
The Redshirts Are Coming!
Pike and our fetching red jerseys will be headed to the Boston Invitational tomorrow.
Somehow, there's another cockamamie travel scheme afoot involving people from Philly, Allentown and Jersey City taking the same car to Boston to stay in a friend's place not close to the fields. I'm sure we'll do a number of dumb things because we'll be a car full of dumb ultimate players. Our arrival will be late and I will likely be asleep in the car for long stretches. Some things never change.
Pike's bringing a more than full roster this weekend (As we are wont to do). This tournament always requires a strange balance for our team as we try to work it as a both a tryout and competitive tournament. That is, we have tryouts, but we're subbing to win. I happily have nothing at all to do with subs. If I were charged with reconciling those two notions, my brain might pop.
As for the competition, we'll be facing Boston, PoNY and Medmen in pool play. That's a good pool in terms of different styles of play and interest in the teams. Boston is the new conglomerate on the block and this may give some indicator of what they'll be like as a team. PoNY got some new pickups and seem more confident coming into this season than they have been of late. Medmen are always a dangerous team and seem to be growing/progressing as a team as they play together. After Pike's disappointing 06, what will we bring to the table in 07?
It should be exciting!
--
Workout Total:
30-45 min stretching (planned)
Thursday, June 21
Rules Again
Quick Thoughts on "Ideal Rules" as inspired by a conversation on rsd.
Note that these are not fully thought out, just the concepts that I feel could alter the game slightly for the better, barring some glaring oversight.
Line Calls: Active 3rd Party
Up/Down: Active 3rd Party
Travels: Active 3rd Party
Stalls: Active 3rd Party, consider 8 second stall-count
Fouls/Violations: Players still make calls. If the call is not contested? Follow the current rules. If a foul is contested? Go immediately to the observer who makes a ruling in X seconds. I don't know what an appropriate time is, but 20 seconds seems completely reasonable. The observer should be able to quickly get the opinion of the other observer(s) and ask quick, direct questions of the players and take their answers into consideration, if necessary.
Double Teams: Don't exist. Why would they in the first place, really?
Contact on the Mark: Fouls on the mark are treated much like 11th ed. "disc space" rules. Fouls called on the marker = drop two counts. If the foul occurred before the throw, play on and drop 2. If the foul was in progress at the time of the foul, and the throw is complete, play on. If the foul was in progress at the time of the foul and the throw is incomplete, the disc reverts to the thrower. If the foul occurred after the throw, the thrower is wasting his breath. The Thrower may call "Violation" for any contact to stop play. Perhaps a new word for this type of foul to avoid confusion. I know it sounds dumb, but "Touch" seems obvious and brief. The you can reserve "Foul" to indicate the stoppage of play instead of necessitating the use of the word "Violation."
Disc Space: Nonexistent, but contact rules on the mark still apply.
Maybe we'll make a wholly watchable sport of this yet.
--
20 min explosive strength
15 min stretching
Wednesday, June 20
Cohesion?
Team Navy wins again!
As the game went on (we were playing White, a team with two the 4 WSL captains for whom I've played, Sonny and Michele. The other two are Julie.), I started to feel that the team was moving together as a unit instead of as a bunch of individuals. There were glimpses of this earlier, but there were some extended moments as this game went on. We're starting to learn each other's games and preferences. And our women just keep on running for everything. That never hurts.
I had possibly my best overall game thus far as I threw ~5 or 6 goals and caught 5 or 6 (including a HUGE bomb from Sardo early in the game) to go with some Ds. That was nice. I also felt more confident and comfortable actively taking in more visual cues ("Whole Field") in hopes of making more informed decisions on the field. Admittedly, this level is a bit easier to read than the level at which Pike plays, but this slight improvement is but a step on the path.
I love getting opportunities to pull in summer league. I get the chance to try more aggressive pulls, work on the height that gets me the most distance, work on the height that gets me the most hangtime with a little less distance, dial in my preferred landing spots given variables like type of D, wind, who you expect to be catching the pull, etc. There are so many skills to improve in ultimate. I love the possibilities. I love getting into the tiny alterations and decisions teams and individuals can make. The almost-imperceptible skills that come into play once or twice a tournament but finish with game-altering plays.
I'm a sports junkie.
--
Workout Total
90 min summer league
10 min stretching
Tuesday, June 19
End of Ball
Our basketball team didn't show up for the game today.
I mean, we were there, we just didn't *show up,* y'know? We lost by an embarrassingly large margin to a team that we had manhandled earlier in the season. I was only useful playing defense as I hadn't touched (possibly even looked at) a basketball since our last game about 2 weeks back. I was having a tough time dribbling and shooting. It wasn't hard to pivot, pass, or play D as that's what ultimate is about, but the rest of it seemed like a foreign concept.
This happens at about this time every year. My focus really begins to narrow on ultimate. I mean, I think it is pretty obvious that I think about ultimate regularly, but at about June, my interest in other things drops off the table, so to speak. I blame this on a number of things, but the most consistent variable at this time of year is the finish of the NBA playoffs. There are no longer any sports I want to watch on TV (aside from the occasional soccer match broadcast en Espanol). Basketball is over, football has a couple of months before it gets going, and I haven't been into baseball's regular season since the strike in the early 90s. Postseason is a different things as the story arcs are shortened into a smaller number of directly related games instead of a mammoth 162 game season of tangentially related games. At least that's my perspective.
Also did an abbreviated version of the plyo work I've been doing over the last 2 weeks when I got up this morning.
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Workout Total:
44 min Basketball
20 min explosive strength
20min stretching (x2)
Monday, June 18
Back up to .500
Tonight's game was pretty easy.
It seemed like the team we were playing against (Dark Green) was tired from the weekend (Sounds like a fair number of people went to the Ommegang Tourney) and never really got up to speed. It didn't help them that under league rules they had to play 4/2 to our 4/3 (M/W) for most of the first half. Just another night of focusing on some particular throws in flow and trying to see the whole field. Another small though vital thing to work on when you have the chance is to minimize the time it takes you to go from catching to throwing. The shorter this time is (and the more completely ready you can be in that time) the more dangerous you will be.
This is specifically applicable to endzone offense, but it is useful all over the field. In the endzone, the spatial windows for throws are tighter. As such, it would behoove a good offensive player to increase the temporal windows for his throws by being able to throw as early in the stall count as possible. That isn't to go so far as to say that you must throw it as quickly as possible, but decreasing the amount of time during the stall count during which you are unable to throw will increase the number of options you can consider as a thrower by increasing the amount of useful time you have during each possession.
SL: 2-2
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90 min ultimate
10 min core
15 min stretching
Sunday, June 17
Continuation, Goddamnit!
So a foul situation occurred back in Austin that I forgot to mention.
I caught an upline pass from the dump near the center of the field with my defender behind me. I stopped to set a pivot and throw. He ran into me. I called foul and immediately threw it to a wide open guy on the breakside for 10 yards or so. Now, by the letter of the rule, this throw comes back, which is what the guy who was guarding me argued. And he was right, by the letter of the rule.
On the other hand, considering that I called the foul and threw in very rapid succession, the player to whom I was throwing was completely open and the defender who ran into me ran into my left hip just before I started throwing my backhand (meaning he had no shot to stop this throw regardless of the occurrence of this foul), should that pass really come back because when I was fouled I said "foul?" I would argue no, by the spirit of the rule. If we are truly attempting to simulate what would occur if I had not been fouled, the disc would be in my receiver's hands.
I do not like the relevant mental calculus of "Should I call this foul and give up my right to throw a pass? How long can I wait to make this call? Should I just call disc-space? If I am being marked by a guy who likes to leg-hump and I continually (and accurately) call disc space, do I continually get free throws? If so, why? If not, why not?"
This is a pretty simple situation that is made unnecessarily complex by following the rules to the letter instead of accepting that the wording may be a little off in a given situation. This is a fantastic place for, say, a third party to step in...
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Workout Total
30 min stretching
Saturday, June 16
How will I get to practice this week?
I mean, I've got to go all the way to Philly this weekend.
That's about 2 hours by car, but again, I don't have a car. I'll try to catch a train and then ride down with Dono. Leave the apartment at ~7am and arrive at practice at ~9:30am. So far. The dumb things I do for this sport...
Practice gets going with a quick game to 3 after our warmups. The D team gets and early chance and I throw a goal-line turnover on a throw that I've had since 1999. Damn. I need to make sure I've got that throw at the beginning of the game... what went wrong there? Which part of the equation wasn't quite right? I come to the conclusion that it was my hips. I generally warm them up well, but this time around I seem to have forgotten something and instead of getting low and throwing, I leaned over and threw. Bad Dusty! I had another turnover on another throw that I would throw 100 times out of 100. It was a continuation to Schmucker and it just went a little long. Bad again! That one was just a matter of letting the disc hang at a different altitude instead of just off the ground. With a couple of inches more height on it (to say nothing of the couple feet higher it could have been without any trouble), it would have been a perfect breakside continuation. It wasn't. We lost this game 0-3. Ouch. I did, however, get to D Jamie's huck in this one. That's always fun.
We worked on O/D near the disc and some basic plays during the practice and included 2 more games. In the next game to 3, the D team came out with a bunch more energy and focus to win 3-1. In the final game of the day, the rubber match, we played to 7 with double scores for every odd point. I'm not sure how it happened, but we ended up losing this one as well. I got another D, but did not do enough facilitation on offense to make my team win. First practice with a losing record. Damn.
Later in the evening, we went to Ian's place for a BBQ. Good number of people out. Heckman and I ran the table for a bunch of rounds of cups or whatever that game with the plastic cups on top of the tent poles is called. I lost another round of Blokus Trigon. To be fair, I always play against TC and he's far more experienced as a player. In fact, he's somewhat dominating. That being said, I'd rather have him in the game than out of it because that way when I win, it'll be against someone who knows what he's doing.
Blokus Trigon Record: 0-2
Practice Record: 10-4
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Workout Total:
4 hours practice
Friday, June 15
Too Much Ohio
"He chose poorly."
I was presented with a choice. Either go to College Nationals as a spectator or return to Poultry Days as a player. Why a choice? Going to Ohio twice in one year is quite enough, thanks. I eventually decided that "roadtripping with my [three] favorite allies" to College Nationals to see the inaugural appearance of NYU at Nationals was the better choice for 07. This was flying directly against the strong reasons in favor of P-Days. Such the chance to beat Julie (who played with Chicken Pax) by accepting Bailey's lobbying to play with the Smerfs.
Now, as it turns out, the Smerfs broke with tradition and won this year. That would have been a fun team to play with. Why? Because I could have made a critical, yet fantastically risky throw to a marginally open cutter for increased crowd excitement, goal or not. That's what I like to bring to the table at these sorts of affairs. I'll put your playmakers in position to make plays.
While I don't regret the decision to have the epic road-trip, a chance to win a tournament like Poultry Days is rough to miss. Perhaps I should have sacrificed another weekend at practice with Pike? "Time alone, oh time will tell..." I'm guessing time will tell me at around the beginning of October if I made the right choice...
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30 min lower-body plyo (same as earlier this week)
12 min core workout
20 min stretching
Thursday, June 14
So Tarr Wants a Graffiti War?
It was a strange sight in the PATH.
There I was, admiring some wonderful poster whose creator was thoughtful enough to depict a product that I might want to purchase. It was a digital something or other that would surely make my wholly unsatisfying and unorganized life more closely resemble the opposite of both the former and latter. I bet I would feel hip if I purchased this product. Maybe even tech-savvy.
As I perused the list of contacts shown on the poster depicting a screenshot of this computerized whatever, I noted that there was a "T" in black ink scrawled over some hapless and ill-respected "B." As I looked closer, I saw that the first name of the imaginary person whose imaginary name was defaced was Adam. His last name was originally Barr, but now it read "Tarr, Adam."
Very sly of you, sir. To send some young misguided ultimate miscreant to the lovely Garden State for the sole purpose of spreading your crazy format gospel. Devious tactic, indeed.
To be sure, this brought a ton of thoughts to my mind at the time. First, could there possibly be some other Adam Tarr? Yeah, sure. More interesting to me is to act as if it were somehow related to the frisbee world's Tarr. Would he have done that? Would it be stranger for someone else to have done it or for him to have done it? Then I got on the notion of name recognition in ultimate and how odd it is that anyone is recognized for doing anything in this silly sport. What an odd enclave we've carved out for ourselves here. Be wary if you see Christopher Guest lurking in the shadows.
Anyway, that's all. Today was a rest day. Just stretching.
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Workout Total:
30 Min Stretching
Wednesday, June 13
NYU Matchup!
Tonight's summer league game was a must-win for Navy.
That's in large part because of the number of NYU alums that play for both teams. On my team, we've got Julie, Jimmy, JP and myself. Red has Zac Roy and Matt Leventhal. For added incentive, Red also had Iana, the infamous Canadian passenger from a couple of weeks ago and the other Pike player in WSL, Heng-Scheng.
It was a fun game, for sure. I opened the game throwing a handful of flicks for deep goals. We then had some turnovers throwing into poaches. Some were definitely my errors. I'm so used to not really looking too hard for poachers with Pike because the cutters are encouraged to cut in such a manner that any poaching is completely obvious. Also, the person being poached is encouraged to get open immediately and let the thrower know. this doesn't always happen at Summer League. By not checking for the poach because I assume that no one could be in such a bad offensive position, I end up throwing into the poacher without seeing him. The time to release the huck is often *now* so I react based on what I see. This is a prime example of being able to take in more of the field in one look and see that poacher, no matter the team or the level of play.
As the second half progressed, we found ourselves down, so I started playing exclusively to force turnovers. I succeeded in the way of 3 layout Ds on the dump and a couple of other turnovers forced from a breakside poach or marking well. We brought the game tighter again (and our team is getting better by the game) only to lose 12-15 on some dumb turnovers by me (another deep poacher) and some other players.
I'm still confident about this season and excited about the possibilities for this team. Stepping back and not scrutinizing every decision or play is tough for me, even in summer league. I feel bad as I'm spewing off about this that and the other strategic option or whatever knowing full well that if I were listening to me, I might not, well, listen to me.
Summer League Record: 1-2
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Workout Total:
90 minutes of ultimate
Tuesday, June 12
ERP Track Club Rained Out!
So I took a rest day instead.
I watched the open finals from 06 Nationals again. You can start to see and understand the offensive progressions for each team if you do a little slow-mo action and watch the players and their eyes/movement carefully. This is part of working to take in more visual cues. If I see these things develop slowly and constantly focus on predicting what will happen next, I can put myself in the head of my potential opponent for a moment and determine what a defense could do to counter his next move. I love the minutiae of it all.
I find it very exciting that the game of ultimate is so young, strategically. Go, for example, is a fantastic game whose strategy has evolved over thousands of years. Chess? Hundreds. Same for various sports over time. As ultimate evolves, we gain progressively more video evidence of the evolution of the game in terms of strategy and the like. You can see styles of play emerge and vie for dominance over time and work to an in-depth understanding of the styles of each offense. As you watch more and more ultimate closely, more and more detail emerges out of the simple game. It doesn't quite rival "The Beautiful Game" of soccer at this point, but there are moments... There are moments...
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Workout Total:
30 min stretching
