my first cleats

my first cleats...

well not exactly. i played soccer for 10 years as a child, and other than one inexplicable year where my parents didn't feel i needed them (which was weird, since i was playing on the supposedly elite 'kangaroo team'... elite because we had jerseys, and a mascot in a kangaroo suit who would come to the games and never talk. i still don't know who was in that suit. i do remember that our goalie was j.c., who was m.c. (the coaches) son... he was bad...but i remember my first ultimate cleats.

i had sprained my ankle in the yellowstone employee touch football challenge game, lodgepole lodge (the lodgepole longpoles) vs. everyone else... it was actually a break, but i wouldn't find that out for several years when i finally, for another sprain, had an xray...anyway, moving to eugene, i moved in w/ oregon players gb and cf, and heard about this game ultimate. i had never seen it. i had certainly never played it. i was vaguely aware that this one fraternity at my first college played it a lot.it sounded cool.

so, while still limping around, i bought cleats. i waited exactly 6 weeks from the 'sprain', per the docs instructions... ankle more or less stable, i strapped on my champion high tops, only one size too big, and went to my first practice. and there in the summer of 1990, at the fields by the oregon track, i began playing ultimate...

i was terrible, of course. my first memory is being taught a 3 fingered flick by some leaguer. my next memory is playing at sectionals, w/ some swilly team (but did have some old heavy guy who had played w/ the flying circus)... it turned out it was sectionals, which would cost me my elligibillity some years later. i'm not happy about the loss of that year of elligibillity, but i think it only fair that the UPA should send me the newsletters i never got.by the end of my 6 months in eugene, i thought i was far better than i was. at my last practice, i caught huck after huck from mike wing w/ c.f. diving behind me.i thought i was the sh!^.

today i finished up as the tournament director for the oregon hs tournament. and it made me reflect on my early days...

it's not a bad career, 6 nationals (3 w/ Chain, 3 w/ sockeye), 2 college nationals, 3 worlds... but... no championships.

bummer.

but its had its moments...

lowlight: played w/ a team of legends of boston at the boulder in 1994, and lost a game, then jumped ship to play w/ a bunch of NYNY stars and lost the rest of the games. i was, you guessed it, the only person to lose every game at that tournament...

highlight? probably worlds '02. playing w/ sockeye, in my 2nd year w/ them... played a near flawless tournament (albeit, w/ some restrictions on playing time), until i had like 4 goals and 4 assists against furious... i suspect that the game for bronze meant less for furious than for me... but i caught the game winner w/ a move i'd like to patent... i jabbed for the cone... and a young, but already obviously very talented oscar grabbed my jersey... i pulled up, said calmly... 'hey, don't...' and bolted for the cone, and caught the game winner and looked down to see my foot land just inside the line... yeah team.

along the way, couple poultry days wins, a fist full of seattle and bend league championships, a couple of upa newsletters appearances and some nice photos... most in the 'pre digital era'. shit. now, everytime there's a tournament, there's 800 pictures...

favorite tourney, is still, ironically, my unbelievably worst ever finish, some awful result in st. andrews... but what a tournament that was...

more to follow...

unlike literary genius kd, i promise no great prose this summer. but i do promise more. and i look forward to reading some classic blog entries... and writing some long pointless ones myself...