UPAs Day 3 and Other Things

So I've thought about what writing my UPA Day 3 recap for a while but I didn't really want to bother. It probably had something to do with the fact that day 3 was not one for the history books. We got crushed by Chain Lightning in the quarters, beat Ring of Fire in a consolation play-in game and lost to Revolver in a game that neither team really took seriously for 5-6. In the end we finished the tournament in sixth position which all things considered is awesome but it still felt like a big letdown.

On the plus side I think that we were better than all of the teams that finished behind us. You could argue that Sockeye was better than us but I'm going to go with they were not. Their arrogance drops them behind us despite the fact they beat us (barely and only with cheating). That still doesn't make me feel better. I know we lost to Jam and Ironside, both of whom would eventually contest the finals but I don't think that we were really close to those teams. The score against Ironside was close but I don't think that we could have done better and they definitely could have.

There are a few reasons why I felt like our finish was a letdown and I'll mention the two biggest ones (in my humble opinion).

1) As a team we were in really bad shape. I felt pretty fit and had the stamina to play a lot but I think I was lacking a bit of leg strength to be able to play as well as I would have wanted to. But there were some guys who had nothing to offer. At this level that just isn't good enough. The tournament format is gruelling and if you don't have a fit roster, you won't go far. In every single game that we played we started off strong and finished slow, a very good indicator that we weren't fit enough. This is an easy issue to deal with... get in shape before you show up at UPAs.

2) We had average line-calling/roster management. Guys who were tired or having bad games were getting called on the line ahead of other guys who were fresh or were having good games. I'm not talking about myself, I'm talking about guys who should have been on the field but spent a lot of time on the sidelines talking to me. UPAs isn't a place to play favourites, to try to keep the PT complainers happy or to play as many points as possible. If you want to play every single point stay home and play Goosebowl. At UPAs, the needs and goals of the team come first and I don't think we did that. There were guys who didn't deserve to be on the field playing on "Universe-point" lines and there were guys who should have been on the field picking their noses on the sidelines. I'm not sure what the problem was but I wasn't about to question it while it was happening; if there is one thing that I have learned it's that you don't help anything when you complain. Do I think that I could have managed the roster a bit better? Yes I do. I've been calling lines for Mephisto for a long time now and I've think I've been pretty ruthless in how I've gone about doing it... being ruthless is the only way to do it fairly and as long as you are fair and can explain that then no one can be upset.

So UPAs were awesome. I'm really glad that I got to go and play in the open division, it is so much better than masters. That's all I really care to say about UPAs.

After a really, really, really busy summer of ultimate it was time to shut it down for a while. I've been going to gym to keep in shape but haven't really been thinking much about disc. I've been pretty busy with life but it's been a happy shift. I didn't go to a single winter tournament and I couldn't be happier about that. Tryouts for Mephisto start in one month and the biggest question on my mind is do I go for another year or is it time to retire while I'm still at the top. Okay, maybe not literally at the top but being on the 2nd best Canadian Men's team, the 2nd best Master's team in the World and the 6th best North American Men's team qualifies as at the top of my game in my books. Maybe that will be my next post in a few months... to retire or not to retire, that is the question!

DF