Should We Change the Size of Nats and Mixed Nats?

Following Mixed Nats 2010 (continuing a string of highly appreciated events over the last several years), AFDA has hit the ground running in inviting State and National administrative types their views on some of the key issues surrounding Nationals and Mixed Nationals.

We here in the stately Brisbane Ultimate Blog mansion of course (as you readers have no doubt come to expect) have some views, so we'll try to discuss over the next few weeks, starting with the size of Nats and Mixed Nats.

One of the things that regularly comes up is the size of Nationals and Mixed Nats. Since about 2005, the Open and Women's divisions at Nationals have been generally capped at 16 teams, and Mixed Nats at 24 teams. (There have been a few variations - Nationals 2006 allowed two WUCC-bound Masters Clubs expand the Open division to 18, and Mixed Nats this year grew to 28 because of the number of NSW teams wanting to go and the availability of field space. The Women's division also periodically doesn't fill its division.)

The reasoning for capping is generally two-fold. One is it builds the quality of play. As Ultimate grows, keeping the numbers at Nationals the same should see the quality of play continually improve because its frankly harder for chumpy players to get there (see Open Nats in 2003 and 2004). Without a cap, the event becomes a bit of a free-for-all, with a very wide range of talent involved, including near-beginner people who didn't know the rules etc etc (shocking eh?)

The second reason is to smooth out and support volunteers hosting the event. A routine size helps establish basic standards (eg you must have at least 9 fields to host Nats) and knowledge (eg you need to order this many discs). Volunteers (both hosts and AFDA) are always desperate for feedback (ie acknowledgement of their work) and Nationals players generally provide their feedback in terms of comparisons to other years, and negative feedback can be devastating, so there's a driver to try to do at least "the same as last year".

Keeping the cap steady is also powerful for establishing continuity from year to year (9th out of 16 is a definite improvement on 10th out of 16 the previous year, as opposed to being 9th out 12 one year and 10th out of 27 the following.) Having a clear and entrenched structure also helps people plan from year to year - they get to know the qualification system, the draw structure and so forth. This saves a lot of angst - people have appreciated the certainty in size we've had over the last six years. Good policy is by definition something you don't change often, after all.

Still, the other perspective is that its unfortunate that people who really want to go miss out on going to Nationals/Mixed Nats. If the sport is growing, why aren't our major events, after all? Ultimate is about including everyone we can and so forth.

And capping also discourages elite players from going 'long term' and getting involved in weaker teams and risking missing out, meaning that our major events don't contribute to growing the sport outside the event (not that they have to, but it seems most people want us to do everything we can to grow the sport in the ongoing search for greater legitimacy).

Consistent apping also means that there is very little turnover in the players attending Nationals from year to year. If someone wants to crunch the numbers, that would be very interesting, but annecdotally you'd have to assume that somewhere upwards of 75% (quite possibly in the 85-90% range) of the people who attended Nationals 2010 would've attended Nationals 2009 and probably Nationals 2008 as well. We all know that going to Nationals is a great way to grow a journeyman player (and group of players) to the next level, and that this delivers on all fronts when that person gets back home. But equally, these group of people have a vested interest in the present system which shouldn't be ignored when thinking about this.

So the view for change here in the stately mansion is twofold.

A simple approach would be that AFDA could continue with the current caps as minimums, BUT if a host can provide a suitable venue and AFDA is confident they can do it, then AFDA should be willing to enlarge divisions. This needs to be done at the bidding stage. In weighing up bids, if there are differences between them as to the number of teams hosts can welcome, then this should be a factor in deciding. And when the successful host is announced, people need to be told then the number of teams that will be invited (ie several months out and well before players start preparing).

But here's something more daring. In future, AFDA could *require bidders* to describe how they would *concurrently* run Bashionals with Nationals.

Same host (or two hosts in partnership), same weekend (maybe only 2 or 3 days rather than 4), same admin including promotion, same social events (huge muthaflarking parties!), but using a separate venue within the same city - because deep down, its field availability that determines size, but players want to feel like they are part of something BUG. Bashionals becomes clearly Nationals Division 2. If it was keen enough, AFDA could even make Bashionals 'real' by shrinking Division 1 from 16 down to 12 teams (or 24 down to 16) for a few years to establish its numbers as well as making a clearly quality statement about both Div 1 and 2. And the winners of Div 2 could even an automatic Wildcard to Div 1 the following year or something.

Your thoughts welcome in the comments section below, but you can also email AFDA and State/Territory admin types with your constructive views - they love to hear about it.