Guest poster week continues, this time around featuring a GIANT of Australian Ultimate Frisbee blogging, Mr Simon Talbot. Simon is the local 'big man'* of the Ballarat scene, recent member of the AFDA Board, and new national Universities Coordinator. So here's Simon ...
Ultimate - A Spectator Friendly Sport?
It's the dream of many an Ultimate player - for their sport to be played live on TV on a Friday night on FOX Sports 3. Or to have crowds of thousands cheering every layout score and heckling Wetnose. But obviously we've got quite a way to go before some generous sponsor/network executive takes a punt. I've heard many people discuss whether ultimate is a spectator-friendly sport, most arguing that it isn't and some drastic changes would be required. Me? I think changes are needed, but only subtle ones...
Problem: Foul arguments creating lengthy breaks in play.
Solution: I dunno...maybe have the players learn the rules?
Seriously...listen to the next foul argument you come across. I bet you that in 95% of them there's at least one player who doesn't know what the correct ruling should be. If we ever get a chance to showcase a full game of ultimate on the telly, one of the most vital considerations would be that the players involved know the rules of the sport inside out. The laws of ultimate place the onus on the players for knowing and upholding the rules - how about they actually do it?
Problem: The crowd doesn't know what the call is.
Solution: Create some simple hand signals for the players to use.
It happens in every Final - play has stopped, there's a bit of discussion, and the murmurs among the audience begin - "what was the call?" If our current audience (ie: players) aren't able to spot why a stoppage has occurred, how can we expect non-players to understand? In all other sports, refs/umpires use hand signals to communicate decisions to all players and spectators - why not use something similar in ultimate? There's too many different calls to have different signals for all of them, so how about some simple ones to notify the other players and the crowd, and then the players involved in the foul can sort out the details.
* Foul - one raised hand.
* No contest - both arms raised, forming an X.
* Contest - both arms raised straight.
The armchair spectator won't then need to know the intricacies of the rule - just that "player X called a foul, player Y contested, so the disc goes back." This would be similar to many other sports - you don't need to know the rules in detail, just enough to work out what's going on. I watch and enjoy rugby union only knowing two rules - passes must go backwards, and you have to release the ball when tackled. The ref's hand signals explain the rest as we go along.
Problem: Current tournament formats don't attract spectators.
Solution: Learn from other sports.
Ultimate all too often gets compared to field team sports, eg: soccer, AFL, hockey. Why not compare it to other types of sports. For example, I feel ultimate is very much like surfing and skateboarding - very participant driven, requires unique skills, and each sport has a "culture" associated with it.
So let's look at tournaments, such as NUFL - all day affairs, many games going on at once. Now look at tennis and golf - all day affairs, many people competing at once. And they get thousands of spectators to their tournaments. We should tell them to bring deckchairs and a picnic lunch - make a day of it.
Problem: Most ultimate games don't "look" very organised.
Solution: Aesthetics.
Lines, uniforms, a scoreboard. No brainer, really.
Feel free to comment with any other problems. I'll then shoot them down with my brilliance.
Thank you for reading, and for more of my crazy man ramblings, go to http://ballaratultimate.blogspot.com It will kill at least eight minutes!
Cheers
Simon
*Sociologists studying the Victorian Ultimate community have compared it to the Papua New Guinean traditional tribal system, where local 'big men' or 'big women' run the show and are allowed to huck at will, regardless of team strategy.
5 comments:
You're right about the rules issue on calls.
Every player above a beginners' league level should have a full copy of the rules and have read them. It would mean shorter stoppages, better calls and better spirit.
the other problem is lack of money flying around for the sport. this leads to lack of decent facilities. If we had a 5000 person stadium with a permanent field in sydney then we would be set for things like NUFL. Also the lack of organisation for things like NUFL lead to poor turn outs. Next NUFL i hope that everything is organise slightly more in advance. I was able to get the website working as a space to ditribute info to the masses but it is little use if the TD doesnt have the info. If NUFL was paid even half the atention that Nationals is paid it would be a vastly more successful tournament.
As for the Hand signals i think this a good idea we already have brick calls... well we should. Why not have a hand signal however can i suggest that the contest be a NO DEAL above your head as some lazy people cant lift their arms past 45 degrees.
I'm going to try out those hand signals on Thursday. See what funny looks we can get.
The main thing that pisses me off no end is that the rules are really very very very simple. Here is an example:
A foul is called...
Contested or uncontested...
Outcome = position of disc.
THE END
Not rocket science, really it comes down to everyones freaking ego, get over it and only argue the rules off the pitch.
This leads to the next point about the future of Ultimate. If it turns pro, it will turn to shit unless some sort of referee is introduced (which I'm completely against). When there is money on the line, people will call technical fouls. Perhaps the ref could not be directly calling fouls but there to kick people out of the game if they call to many fake ones? Who knows.
Good blog by the way.
The problem are on different types of fouls pete, for example push out fouls.
Or that people don't know what to do about rules like marker violations. 1 uncontested violation means -2 to the stall count, if it's contested play stops. 2 uncontested marker violations means stall count is reset to 1 and play resumes with a check.
Good point Gref, people do seem to struggle with the variations of foul outcomes.
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