Hitting a Plateau (and getting over it)

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So as of late, I feel that I've hit a plateau as far as improvement. This is obviously frustrating, and my initial reaction was to just blame it on the lack of ultimate (and players to aspire to play like). But this is nought but a rationalization: As always, the answer lies in no other than myself. Moreover, I feel that I played the worst ultimate in recent history last Sunday.


So what do I do? I could sit around and mope about it, then be frustrated when I suck on the field, but that's not fun and does no one any good. What I have to do is pick a focus. Lately, I've just been so happy to be on the field, that I've let myself slip into a nonchalant way of playing. It's mostly more like organized pick up (and mixed, not to knock on mixed but) and I've found it really hard to focus on my game. I let myself get sort of swept into this lull, because the people around me aren't as focused on improvement (so much as just playing). I never want to play ultimate just because "that's what I do". Don't get me wrong, its not just situations like these that you can get into this mode; You can totally be in a rigorous program, say elite college or club, and still let this happen. My point is that humans are creatures of habit, and its easy to get sucked into a habit. Just don't let yourself think that you are trying to improve, when improving yourself just become a part of your routine. Or to sound more articulate, don't let improving become the status quo.
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Niji: Number of Touches

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I was talking to a Japanese women's player, and she mentioned that American teams in general don't touch the disc as often in practice compared to Japanese teams. Basically, American drills are focused on certain situations and the application of set plays than getting a high number of touches. I thought about this and I would have to agree.

(Kind of like Soccer.)

Drills run at WM are a good example; there are very few drills that focus on getting a high number of touches and throws. Even the ones that do are hampered by the fact that you have a lot of wait time. My friend even related this to the difference in the way Japanese players develop their throws versus American players. While this is a little iffy, the point that catching and throwing 5 times more would make you better at catching and throwing seems to be fair.
More Touches! (actually those are iPhones but we can pretend)

So, what can be done? The answer is elegantly simple: Just more run drills that involve more throwing and catching per minute. One such drill is where you are in groups of three, and basically do the box drill, just with 3 people. (this is also a great warm up drill) 10 flicks to the open side, 10 io flicks, 10 open side backhands, 10 io backhands, 10 hammers, and adjust cuts to make sense.
Basically, this is part of the puzzle of how to develop players faster that I've been overlooking.

So, what I would recommend, is getting drills that focus on touching the disc often and quickly (with actual catches and realistic throws). I think that it would especially help if captains would take a moment to explain what is being accomplished in each drill, and what skills one is supposed to glean from each. This will help players focus on what they are doing, as well as actually help improve players, rather than drills just being a glorified and prolonged warm up.
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Niji: Getting Rid of Drops

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Drops. Drops. Drops.


Something needs to be done differently in practice, or else this drop syndrome is *going to kill you guys.* Honestly, WM has the worst case of the drops I've ever seen in ANY college team. Even shitty teams don't drop as much as us. So what can you guys do?

1. Running drills seriously (every throw, every catch) and making sure people are focused and putting pressure on themselves.

2. Play elimino: Run a drill (like the 4 corners box drill) with lots of quick movement and throwing, and a player is eliminated when they either mess up a throw or drop a disc. Keep playing until either you hit 100 consecutive throws or too many people are eliminated.

3. Run a catching drill. Have 4 people with a bunch of discs in a zigzag, and just make cut after cut towards each thrower full speed, catch and run the disc to the thrower, and continue to the next person.

4. During scrimmages, make drops a joint liability. What I mean by this is at the end of each point, run a sprint (or a half field suicide) for every drop your side committed.

5. Focus on catching when throwing around. If you're dropping the disc when you're casually throwing around, that mentality *WILL* bite your butt at some point.

6. Think of other stuff on your own, too.
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Niji: Zone Offense and Strategically Subbing Players

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So last week, we played a team called Peach, which extensively used zone. In fact, they never went man if they could help it, and frustrated our o-face. Obviously, this would have been avoided, had we practice more together, and knew who would do what against a zone. But alas, this was not the case.

So what should have we done?

1. Thought of the huck and D as an option sooner. We had height, by a lot.
2. Taken a time out and chilled out. We shot ourselves in the foot because constantly turned it over *down field*. We would break through the zone (after we figured out how to do so), only to turn it over.
3. Most importantly, figured out an offensive set against the zone.

This third point is what I want to focus on most:
We kept subbing people in somewhat haphazardly, and we never got a working rhythm against the zone. I think this may have been our biggest downfall.
At some point, to me it seemed that a handler set of Ishii-san, Osho-san, and I was able to open up the zone, but we didn't really stick to this. The handlers I was working with kept changing, as did a lot of the other personnel, which makes it hard.
blah blah, you get the idea.
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Niji: Defense - Heads Up or Lock On?

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Re-post (excerpt):


Nick Hargreaves: Just some preemptive advice: watch your man's eyes and hips. I don't know if you've ever noticed but when I'm playing D I hardly ever look at the disk. I always stay right on my man's hip and look him right in the eye. I also love to keep a hand on his back/hip, it helps you know where your man is at all times, even if you're looking at the disk.



Interesting point about watching hips and eyes Nick! I definitely agree that this is a great way to play shut down defense, and is a very necessary component in the overall scheme of defense.


In response to that though, I would recommend that you try to be more aware of where the disc is as well as who has the disc. This way, you will be able to:

a. anticipate the next throw which lets you

b. anticipate the next cut as well as

c. play help defense.


This way, you can play smarter and not fall for cuts that wont lead to anything, e.g. if the thrower is looking dump, there's no need to stick to your man like glue on a deep cut. In fact, in this case, if you do, then a smart cutter will short-change that deep cut and cut in dark side, which will be a perfectly timed continuation off of the dump-swing, leaving you miles behind.


My favorite example is a vertical stack in front of the endzone:

The disc is on the trap-side (let's say force flick), and is being dumped and swung all the way across the front of the end zone. A smart defender will see this happening, and *switch positions* to shade in the *dark (break) side* to stop the easy IO or around backhand throw for the score. Obviously, the further the disc gets to the dark side, the more you should shade in towards the dark side. In fact, is the disc is all the way on the backhand corner, and the stack is in the middle, then I as a defender, would 100% be standing on the break side on my man, i.e. as if the force were backhand. The point is that at this juncture, the IO flick or the around backhand is pretty easy to put (especially since there is a high probability that this person is a handler), so you want to force a much harder throw (like a blade-y flick to the opposite corner) rather than give up the much easier IO flick score.

Again, you must quickly anticipate and switch positions before the disc is swung back to the force side, because if you are caught in this position, then the obvious result is your man taking you force side for an easy score.


That being said, there is a time for both methods of defense. In my opinion, no player is complete without both, and the best way to utilize these strategies is in tandem. Mixing it up and doing both (many times within the length of a point) will definitely make you guys monster defenders.

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Niji: Scrimmage vs. Bombers, DiscMania, Nomadic Tribe

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Overall individual performance: B

I actually didn't have too many turns for the most part. I had one stupid turn when I tried to float one over a guy, another where my finger slipped and bulleted a flick too IO, and one where I misread the wind and put a flick huck deep that had an IO touch that got swept by the crosswind. The last one was a rushed throw: my guy went straight up on me so I faked a hard backhand, and even though I lost my mark, I hurried into it. Obviously I need more practice with that.

I always got the disc when I wanted to, and so I never felt like anyone was able to deny what I wanted to do. Same goes for throws, for the most part.

Defense was a bit more dubious. I got beat deep twice in 2ish 3ish games, one of which was because I looked for a poach D too long, and got burned by my guy. I haven't been beat deep like that since sophomore year or something, damn.

Otherwise I played okay shutdown D, and concentrated on stopping the next throw if my guy got the disc. I had more than one chance to layout D swing passes to my guy, and I am kicking myself for not pulling the trigger. But, now I have a good mental image of what I need to do, so when the opportunity arises, I will be sure to capitalize.

Oh, one time when I was playing wing though, in the end zone, I should have just manned up on one of the guys, and I didn't, which was stupid and it led to an easy score. Bad Niji.


Nomadic:
This is the first time in a while that I felt that I really felt pressure when I was on O. Still not a lot of pressure, but more than usual, so that was fun. Etc
got tired of this post so Imma just post it even though its really only half done.
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Niji: Tuesday Night Pick-Up 09/07/10

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Today I showed up with 45 minutes of pick-up to play. This, in turn, made me play a lot harder than usual, and was probably good for me. I played the best D I've played in a while:

I had poach D after poach D, as well as many D's on my man on in-cuts.

The down-side to my playing was that I would go and play help defense when the disc is near the endzone and there was a wide open open-side cut, which was good because it prevented the easy score; Obviously, that left my man wide open, which was utilized more than once. Aw shucks.

So what should I do in this case?
I'm not sure. I'd be much more frustrated if the other team scored on an easy open side cut, but it sucks to help out in that situation, and then get pwnd for it. In a perfect world, this wide open force side cut would never be open, and in an almost perfect world, who ever I am picking up for will pick up my man. But sadly, we don't live in either. :/

Another mistake I made was a huck from Yoshio to me. I burned my man deep, but Jei poached in on the throw. I could have jumped early and gotten the disc, but since I wouldn't have ended up in the endzone, I decided to divert my run to box Jei out and milk the disc into the endzone. This resulted in me slightly misjudging my run, and I set myself up for a very difficult catch, and missed the catch. Embarrassing.

Bulleted a couple of my IOs. Definitely a sign that I need to be throwing more.

Playing O was eh. Alright, but nothing stellar. I get frustrated when I'm open but people don't hit me. But its just pick up.
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How to Take a Dump

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Force backhand, disc tapped in on the right sideline. What the hell are you supposed to do?

Creativity comes into play here I think. Oh, and a competent team who know what is going on.

The dump can either setup in the regular place (inline with the handler) OR (OR!!!!) IN THE FRONT OF THE STACK!!
How cool would that be? I mean, yeah, the handler would be "stranded" if the dump chilled there for awhile. But that's not the point so shut the hell up. Start the cut from the front of the stack. As dump, try to position your man to be inline with the mark's back, negating the use for the man-on (and the mark to a lesser extent). From there either cut strike (if the handler can handle a force side fake to a break throw) or fake into the "break side" or right sideline then cut for a dump, most likely for yardage. Going strike or dump would always get some yardage out of a commonly difficult situation.

Here are some diagrams: 2 comments

O-line and D-line

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If your o-line scores every offensive point, you will never lose.

But, unless your d-line can break your opponent, you can never win.

The best o-line is not simply about having no turns. While this has happened, its near impossible to actualize. So then what? It's tough on a smaller team like WM, where we have to draw from a smaller talent pool, but this problem remains: An o-line player has to be able to play defense when the disc is turned over. In fact, no player who does not play good defense should ever be allowed to play offense. Because doing so makes it clear to everyone on your team that that is okay. And it most certainly is not.

Your thoughts?
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Picking New Recruits

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With our coming decisions on who should make the team and who should not, I have to wonder what should be the correct process for picking people for the A-team. Do you want to go for a kid who has played his entire life and therefore really impresses based on the fact that he is straight up more experienced than his peers? Or is athleticism/enthusiasm more important? There are obviously a few kids that are pretty much shoe-ins to make the team as they have a little bit of both, but Ultimate remains a college sport and the ability for a person to pick it up freshman year in college and soon become a valuable contributor to the team remains, so the peripheral kids I kinda feel like it would be really hard to truly pick who should play A-team and who should be "cut".

Anyway, my real question is, to what extent should personality play a role in who is accepted onto the team and who is not? If a kid shows that he has a fair amount of experience coming in and is also pretty athletic, but is a total creep do you really want to take them? To a certain extent exclusivity is bullshit, but still i dont like weirdos. Hmmm, this probably has less to do with ultimate than just picking friends ahaha, but it is still a club sport, we are here to have fun in the end and we don't have an obligation to take them. On another note, if you see a kid who is a little bit better than another kid, but your not sure he will stay with the team (join frats and whatnot) who should you take? Basically at what level should you value your perception of a kid's devotion? 3 comments