Comment Of The Day: Spirit Needs To Be Officiated

October 18, 2012 by Charlie Eisenhood in News with 8 Comments

Ryan Mallen took a look at the new USA Ultimate strategic plan and had this to say:

I’m glad that USA Ultimate includes Spirit of the Game in its plan, but they don’t discuss any details about how to resolve the issues with self-officiation that have arisen with increased levels of competition over the past few years (especially in the US and Canada). In my opinion, ultimate in its current state is not viable as a spectator sport because of the chaotic nature of self-officiation. If USAU wants to market and display (and eventually charge admission for?) competitive ultimate, it needs to improve the quality of play in a number of ways.

They could start with some adjustments to the rulebook.

To me, competitive ultimate has become increasingly difficult to watch. Too many questionable calls are being made (and subsequently argued for way too long) at the most exciting moments, and it creates an awkward pacing to the game. As a player, I stay engaged because I’m interested in the call (read: shameless ultimate nerd), but I can imagine that non-ultimate playing spectators (read: expanded viewership, see goal #1) would be confused and/or turned off by this.

A quick fix for the pacing issue would be to implement a time cap on foul call discussions (10 seconds?), after which the ruling is automatically turned to the observer. Also, to cut back on the number of calls in general, I think travel calls should be taken out of the hands of the players and made actively by observers only.

As for the un-Spirited play… it really bothers me when teams use techniques like calling bogus travels and intentional fouls to slow offensive movement; its a clear violation of Spirit, but observers rarely intervene (unless the fouls become excessive to the point of physical harm/danger). I believe that observers need to take a much more authoritative role in penalizing teams that persist in violating Spirit. Whether its a more liberal assessment of TMFs/PMFs or a new system entirely, I believe some adjustments are necessary to deter teams from playing in an un-Spirited fashion.

I don’t think ultimate needs referees. I think self-officiation (with the aid of observers) is a valid (and sometimes more efficient) model for organizing competitive play. But there are some refinements and clarifications that need to be made before USAU starts pursuing a wider audience. I personally would like to see (from USAU) a clarification on the role of Spirit, which seems at times like a redheaded stepchild in discussions for furthering the sport. I believe its up to the USAU to (re)commit itself to SOTG and set forth a plan to establish the important role of Spirit in playing ultimate at all levels of competition. Self-officiation under the code of SOTG is part of what makes ultimate so great; it’s a unique and intriguing element to the sport the just needs some fine tuning to become sustainable. I hope that SOTG can endure the growing pains of our sport to bring the Spirited ultimate we know and love to a wider viewership.

USAU says it plans to “lead a community-wide effort to clarify and communicate how Spirit of the Game applies to behaviors on and off the field”. I look forward to finding out what that means exactly.

Tagged 2013 Strategic Plan, observers, referees, SOTG, USA Ultimate

Stefan Barnes

YES!!! SOTG is what sets Ultimate apart from other teams sports, yet, over the last decade as the desire for Ultimate to become more mainstream has set in, SOTG has started to be ignored by players, by strategists and most of all by tournament organizers who (I will say) don’t want to deal with teams/players who use unspirited tactics as a way of playing. I once called a team out at my first Nationals when one of their players kept yelling “foul him” every time that our team caught the disc. He really didn’t think they were doing anything wrong.
Evan

Totally agree. There needs to be a consequence for “strategic” fouls, and it needs to be fair, swift, and severe enough to be a real deterrent. Two warnings and then you’re out of the game, maybe?

Personally I don’t see the need to discuss fouls at all. Make the call, contest or no contest, move on. Ten seconds is much longer than it should take,
Tom

THANK YOU EVAN! That’s exactly how foul calls should be handled every single time. Arguing about a call is a waste and rarely ever change the outcome (whether the person will contest it or not).
Dalton Russell

I think for ultimate ever to be taken seriously and to be more than just the sport that people chuckle at when you tell them you play there needs to be referees on all levels. People will never consider it anything more than a half serious pick up game until there are legitimate referees. Spirit of the game was awesome when ultimate was a small scale sport and it is still awesome when playing casual pick up. Now however, ultimate is one of the fastest growing sports in the country. It has been proven time and time again that spirit of the game alone can no longer govern the sport. It has also been proven that outsiders wont take it as a serious sport until it starts looking like a serious sport.

Also there is a big push for youth ultimate frisbee programs all the way down to the pewee level. How can we expect young kids interested in the sport to have to call their own fowls. Kids at that level would be unable to ref the games for themselves because they couldn’t possibly understand the game well enough. I mean imagine a self umpired 1st grade tee-ball game it would be a disaster and the same goes for kids ultimate. The best way to grow the sport is to get kids involved young and that cant happen unless the games are refereed.
Chris

I can’t remember if it is actually in the observer manual, but new observers are taught to intervene if discussion lasts longer than 15 seconds.

I think the widespread notion that to be a sport we need referees is way off base. The observer system is a good one, though it needs some tweaks (misconducts should be more strict). Young kids can do just fine self-officiating, even if they need the assistance of an observer (or at the youngest level maybe coaches?) to make the right calls. With correct coaching – after all, USAU does want to increase both number of observers AND number of coaches – kids CAN make those calls properly, it’s simply good conflict resolution skills. And what parent doesn’t want their kids to learn those?
Brummie

There seems to be a general feeling that SOTG is already broken, and that seems to come from the players in this (and other) discussions.

@Tom “Arguing about a call is a waste and rarely ever change the outcom” I could not disagree more. Do we want 2 min discussions? No, of course not. But in games that have only a handful of turnovers and are won by a small margin, it is better to ensure the correct resolution than a swift one. If people are taught to be fair minded in their approach to SOTG, rather than unreasonably biased, then it is perfectly reasonable that calls are resolved.

Realistically, sending the disc back is a *failure* of SOTG; if there is a contested strip in the endzone, I want it to either be a goal, or a turnover. Not “oh well, never mind, try again”. That is the worst outcome for all parties. That’s the reason that a few seconds of reasoned discussion can bring the game forward, and is much better for the game than “just send it back”.

As far as the original comment is concerned, my question would be simply; How does USAU intend to integrate with WFDF? WFDF prohibits the use of observers, let alone referees.
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Tom

I don’t think SOTG is broken, and it is what attracted me to playing this game in the first place. As the sport grows and evolves, it may need to be adjusted a little bit but I believe that it needs to stay a large part of the game in order for the sport to continue its growth and success.

I think “just send it back” happens a lot of the time (at least from my experience) becuase a lot of the people I have played with have never fully read the rulebook. I have only played with obeservers a handful of times, so I think that it is crucial that players read these rules and understand and explain what is/isn’t a foul.

Some players have called fouls and then do a horrible job explaining why its a foul, resulting in a contest.

I can see where you are coming from @Brummie, and at the elite level when a defense may only get 2-3 turns an entire game; every possession becomes invaluable.

Comment Of The Day: Spirit Needs To Be Officiated

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