Here's my thoughts on refereed ultimate as played at the Rylands this past weekend. Take it or leave it. :-)
Firstly, a massive thank you to everyone involved, particularly the referees who had a difficult (maybe impossible) job, took a lot of flak, an dealt with it all in a very professional manner. It is obvious they had been trained, they had practiced and the tournament had a very professional feel to it; whistle blowers, timekeepers and scorekeepers were all there, so it was more like a world championships than a pickup tournament. It was a *lot* of fun. Everyone who was there played it in a very friendly manner; there was plenty of deliberate fouling between friends and even people who didn't know each other, yet there was nothing aggro going on at all. Most teams were having a good laugh at the opportunity to play ultimate in an entirely new way, and it was very good natured. In normal ultimate every player is a referee, so it was nice to be able to do two things differently this weekend; 1) not have to think about the rules for once (if you did something wrong then the ref would blow, right?), and 2) try to gain whatever advantages you can against a ref that you can't against another person (i.e. cheat). If the idea of cheating sounds abhorrent then please bear with me while I explain... I don't think, nor have ever thought, that fully refereed ultimate can replace ultimate in the same manner it is played now. My objective for the weekend was to see exactly how easy it was to cheat and get away with it, and to find the level of contact that was acceptable to the refs. It soon became obvious that when the disc moved quickly it was far easier to foul on the mark without being seen; this resulted in fouls on throws that resulted in turnovers which wouldn't have occurred in a normal game of ultimate: advantage defence. When the disc moved slowly (such as swings, dumps etc with few players behind the disc) the refs had a better view of the action and even small infractions (disc space seemed a common one) were harshly punished compared to normal ultimate (mlu: 2 "disc space" calls = sending off; ultimate: 2 "disc space" calls = foul, reset stall): advantage offence. Having said that, it was far easier to get away with fouls on the mark at the start of the count before the refs got into position; one quick foul then step away while the player on the disc appeals to the ref. There was a lot of appealing for decisions, a lot more than I expected, and the refs didn't really know how to deal with it - they were very tentative sometimes which made it difficult to play to the whistle, as sometimes the whistle stopped play and sometimes it didn't. Sometimes fouls, strips, etc were given when they weren't and vice versa, but that kind of thing will probably even out over the course of a game. The refs stalled far too slowly and let lots of rather blatant travels (particularly changing direction on catches) go: advantage offence. They were also far too harsh on incidental contact, particularly on contested under cuts: again, advantage offence. If fouling on the mark wasn't seen then breaking the mark became quite a dangerous option; teams seemed very cagey about breaking marks aggressively because small contact that might not be seen by the ref, and a lot of throws resulted in turns that would have been called back in ultimate. As for how the games played vs ultimate, it was quite different. The rules for OB pulls and offsides are absolutely brilliant and should be used in ultimate; virtually no teams were offside compared to in a normal game of ultimate when almost every pull has someone offside on O or D. New discs were provided whenever the disc went out of bounds, and the O had only 7 seconds to get the disc in play following a turn, which resulted in a lot less downtime during points, which was great and kept the games fast. Because breaking the mark was a lot more risky, offence was a lot more cagey and generally involved swinging the disc a lot until a good deep threat became available. Any dodgy throws deep usually resulted in turnovers because it was too difficult to pull the disc down in a crowd when you're being fouled, and too hard for the refs to see it. Its also a lot harder to get open when someone is holding your arm :-) I'd like to see this become an annual event: All-Star Refereed Ultimate. I don't think it will ever replace ultimate so you can stop panicking, but it was a lot of fun. I would like to see the rules become streamlined (I don't think there is a need for two types of fouls, and a whistle should always stop play) and think they should mimic the rules of ultimate more closely (things like holding someone's arm while they're cutting or in the stack should be dealt with more harshly, while minor infractions such as disc space and double teaming needs to be made less harsh). The refs could make their own lives easier by being harsh on anyone who argues with them, rather than being bullied (as happened a little during the first North v Midlands game when we spent half the time with both teams shouting at the refs). There should also be a points cap, and the time that the first half runs over should be taken from the second half (if there are ten seconds on the clock when the point starts and the point lasts 3 minutes of game time, then the second half should be 3 mins shorter); some of the games were really long. I did enjoy the long gap between games though, having one game off meant having a 2 1/2 hr break, which was the kind of thing you usually only get at big international tournaments. I think that having referees can stop people cheating in the same way that they can in self-refereed ultimate, but it just opens up new ways for those people to cheat when the ref's back is turned (3-4 refs on one pitch can't see everything), and of course they will miss things that happen that are blatant to both players (such as contact on the mark or strips). Conclusion: referees should not be used in ultimate; but refereed ultimate makes for a very enjoyable weekend. :-) Thanks again to those who made it happen. Brummie __________________________________________________ BritDisc mailing list [email protected] http://www.fysh.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/britdisc Staying informed - http://www.ukultimate.com/staying-informed
