i'm just plain tuckered out. Sectionals was not so bad, except for playing 70 - 80 points of ultimate in a day. Probably should have rested up or gone reaaaaallllllly easy for a few days, but didn't so ended up wrenching my left hammy a little (just hurts, doesn't seem to slow me down from doing the kind of running i'll be doing for a while)...
School is 'full on.' It's at least a couple hours of extra work a day, plus coaching, plus, as is the case yesterday, 7 hours on the bus to take the JV2 runners over to Hood River for a race. The Highlight for me, the 2 mile round trip run into town when we stopped for food so that i could eat 'Taco Del Mar' instead of mcFood... Although I do like a little McBreakfast now and again.
I digress. As usual. Some highlights of the week. Tuesday night, I was here late preparing for wednesday's absence. Biking home around 9:00, I saw a sweet shooting star directly above/in front of me... really spectacular, bright long trail, dramatic... and then i hit this ditch filled with gravel... i did not eat it, because i was not turning, but it struck me as a cosmic three stooges moment... diversion, and the trap...
Wednesday a student reported seeing coyotes (6) on the bus ride near school... i do know the said student boards the bus near my address, so he would have seen these animals within a couple miles of school...
Now, in response to Jim's comment that my blog is purely personal, I present ultimate corner. Deep in the cozy book and paper strewn world that is lukes brain, over in the corner, under those old bills i need to look over, (no the other pile), there, there is ultimate corner.
Revisiting flipping.
First half breaks are more valuable. Assuming a mirrored half, If you receive to start the game (team A), and swap goals you win 15-14. We all know that. But if 'team B' breaks in the 1st half, and A DOESN'T GET IT BACK IN THE FIRST HALF, Team B takes the first half 8-7. In the 2nd half, A needs 2 breaks to win. So a 1st half break is more valuable. Jim, Alex, quantify.
What's the point? I guess you should really decide if your 'o' guys are slow starters. And maybe you should inform your team of the value of a fast start.
There.
Frisbee talk.
6 comments:
Looks like the first person here was another one of those spammers. I'm telling you, spam finds a way into anything.
So, talking about the flip, I'm sure Jim will run through the numbers, but surprisingly enough, I will take it from the softer side of science. In the heyday, DoG inevitably wanted to receive the disc, based on Jim's assertion (correct), that if no one gets broken, the first team receiving will win. Granted, that never happened, but he was playing statistics. Also, as DoG was all about the O, the philosophy was to get the O going as quickly as possible (I feel like I have already posted on this, I'll have to check). Nowadays, with DoG's offense more vulnerable, I have changed my mind and prefer to start the game on defense (uh-oh, strategy tip). In Santa Cruz, Sunday morning I had chosen to pull against Doublewide. As it ends up, that choice ended up costing us at the end of the game, as it was VERY close. So, in the Condors semi, I went against recent form and chose to receive. Well, we easily moved it upwind against them, and then Forch floated a short backhand for a goal that Hollywood skied. They quickly scored, we were immediately deflated, the D watching from the sidelines was also deflated, and the runaway was on. I guarantee you if we score that first goal, the game is COMPLETELY different. We probably still lose, but NOTHING like 15-4, maybe 15-12 or so. Can't even predict. So, these days I'm playing the psychological game on the pull as opposed to the statistics. Eat that Jim.
Wasn't part of Jim's theory that you should do whatever makes it more likely that you score first? So, in some games that would be the wind, in some that would be O?
Mathematically, it seems reasonable that first-half breaks are more valuable. That said, second half breaks seem to have a big momentum value, which is hard to quantify.
i commented yesterday, but then lost the post due to browser error. i only mention it because it started out recapping boston's former policy of "always O".. so now i would have looked like a genius.
smiles and softie came out west [at separate times] and both were die hard "we should play O first.. because we score and then... we... we..." (see alex's post).
like most players they didn't see why it worked, only that it worked. and had no intention of figuring out what worked for jam.
like most have alluded to, it comes down to your team.. what gets them up in the morning.. what drives them.. what their strengths and weekenesses are.
i think it comes down to the first point.. if you are certain your O can come in cold and score on point 1 and put pressure on the other team's O to score, you should do it.
if your O is just shaky enough, where the other team could strike first, play d.
your O's approach can come into play too. jam '00 had a high offensive scoring percentage per possission w/o turnovers (~75-80%), in '01 and since it is much lower. if there is a decent just you're just going to give the other team the disc on a missed huck (see recent fad of "Big O and Big D"), might as well start on D, since possesion isn't as important to you and you get that 2nd half lift.
if there were a universal obvious choice... i would think that would be reflected some what in [american] football games... which to my knowledge, it is not.
[marshall... i think we're talking weather not a factor here]
Mathematical advantage is not just if you don't have any breaks, but if you have an equal number of breaks. Once the hold serve percentage drops below, oh, 70%, the advantage becomes pretty minimal. And if there is no win by 1 cap, like in the old days when everybody always chose to pull to start, there is no advantage at all.
1st half breaks are more important only if it's the difference between you being ahead or behind, because winning the half is essentially worth half a break (exception: if it's an upwind/downwind game and you score upwind to take half, that's only .49 of a break, I think; in the 1998 Women's finals, this happened to Verge, and they lost by 1 to Godiva). A break that makes it 8-7 instead of 8-6 is no more important than any other break, but the one that makes it 8-7 in your favor is the big one. Of course, you don't know at the time whether an early break is the one that makes the difference in the half (or the game (see 5-4, Furious/DoG 2002 semis)).
For every philosophical argument about team psych, there is an equal and opposite philosophical argument. Say you choose to pull, and neither team gets a break for a few points. This puts extra pressure on your O, since a single break puts you down 2, instead of putting you down 1 and giving your O a chance to tie it up.
Or look at it this way: in a typical upper level game, there are about 2-3 breaks per team per half. So, you're really playing a half to 2 or to 3 with a time limit (i.e., you only have 8 chances to get breaks). It's just too much of a disadvantage to start on D. (Note that without the time limit, it's an advantage to pull first, since you have the first opportunity to break. But as I said, you have only so many chances.)
The flip in football is not relevant, since there is a time limit, and the half is long enough that you can't predict whether there will be an even or an odd number of possessions, and the second half is symmetrical. So while it may be that one team does get more possessions, you probably aren't any more likely to get more if you start with the ball in the first half (perhaps if you are expert at clock management, you can). There is an analogy with overtime, when every single team elects to receive (possibly not if the wind is exceptionally strong). Now, if only they did some test of skill for the overtime flip. Or perhaps they gave one team the decision on where to kick from and the other team the decision on whether to kick or receive.....
And why wouldn't your O be equally as shaky on its (note to Alex: not "it's") first point regardless of whether it's (note to Alex: not "its") the first point of the game or the second point? Maybe it would even be more shaky on the second point if it meant possibly going down 2-0.
"Smiles", that's super. Makes me laugh every time I see it.
Finally, a personal note for the Seigses of the world: that semifinal was the first full game of ultimate that my 84 year old aunt and my 55 year old cousin had ever seen. The first partial game they had seen was the end of the first-ever loss to Doublewide (thanks, Al). And they got to see me get point-blocked with the force not 10 yards from where they were sitting. That was sweet.
thanks to guest poster Jim Parinella for his erudite ramblings on a variety of subjects... tune in to his home blog for more on all these subjects. Except Seigs, forever consigned to the dustbin-blog of history.
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