The good and bad of inside out throws

One of the challenges of coaching is having young players as well as older players understand the difference in the window of opportunity of i/o throws and o/i throws. Especially break throws.

No matter what level of team here in the northeast, at least once a game, there is always the dreaded i/o break turnover to someone making a cone cut from the back of the stack. Their trajectory is never really narrow enough to shield the defender, and it never had a chance of being completed, but people will always, always try it.

The above is my poor attempt to draw an accurate representation of the temporal and spacial windows of a cutter and of a thrower's two main break options, the around and the inside break. I say poor because I think I have only depicted the spacial windows, and some can debate about those as well.

The setup is your typical endzone cut. A person is cutting from the back. Ideally, they would be starting their cut at the very end of the endzone , but this is showing the typical poor use of endzone real estate. The cut begins in the middle of the field and about 5 yards from the back of the endzone. This is a typical endzone offense.

Because he is cutting at the cone, he is cutting at a 45 degree angle (20 yards from sideline, 20 yards back from cone). This is a much more horizontal cut than people normally cut when they are cutting on the field, and, because of this, the window for the i/o is smaller and shorter than it normally is.

The above diagram is not perfect. I am using it merely as a visual aide to get my point across.

The point:
1.) The I/O Break window normally in the endzone is EARLY in the cut.

2.) Most turnovers on I/O breaks happen because people throw them too late in the cutters cut. Most turnovers happen because people typically aren't throwing the disc to get to the receiver in the of the red. They typically are throwing the disc by the time the receiver has ran into the i/o throwing lane. By this time, it is too late.

3.) I think the around break is more successful because the temporal window to throw happens later in the cut, so a thrower can decide to throw the break later in the cutters cut. It also gives more leeway to people with slower releases.

I think, in college, the turns happen because they decide to throw the throw too late and then either wind up throwing behind the receiver, or trying to make up for lost time by throwing it fast and hard which makes the throw unpredictable and uncatchable.

Aside: I wanted to put a third layer on top of the two layers that demarcated the temporal windows of when to throw the throw, but that confused even me and I thought of the idea. It would be sweet if I could do a 3D one with that though!

-josh

p.s. I am going to draw a couple diagrams containing situations where i/o breaks are sweet later this weekend.

Brown Tourney Thoughts...

MIT went to Brown today for a tourney. We were missing some key players because of fraternity obligations, and we were missing a very good, promising young handler because "sleep caught up to him". But all in all, I thought Saturday was a pretty good.

Aside: I could write an entire post on MIT and Lehigh's fraternities and how the are the bane of my coaching existence, but that is another time, another post. I could also write a whole post on how, in the age of cell phones, can people not wake teammates up to come to tourneys. If you know you are going to have trouble waking up, sleep on a friends couch, use the buddy system, etc.

Okay, enough of that, onto the tourney.

We went down to the tourney with 4 seniors, 1 new grad student, 2 3 year members, 4 2nd year members, and 5 rookies. We had a pretty good mix of new vs. experienced, but we were definitely missing some offensive power, especially on the D side of things, and it showed.

Game 1: Wesleyan.
This was probably our worst game of the day. We were playing fine defensively the first half, and Wesleyan was helping us out too with some pressured drops. Our O was scoring, but not playing very well. Our handler motion was poor all day. This is something we will have to work on at practice.

We got up 2 breaks, everyone was playing well and feeling well, and then we lost energy and focus during halftime. We didn't get another break after that, and we forced very little turns. It was capped at 10-9 us, and then we get to 11-10 us I think before we get broken twice on nervous play and then poaching off to help other players out on D. That was it. Lost on double game point receiving. We have to learn how to want to win.

The good part of this game was that the rookies played good defense, and they got to play a lot.

Game 2: Brown Y or X.
We go up early, and stay up. The newer players got a lot of experience, and the rookies were cutting very well after a turn. They were aggressive and hungry when cutting. The only downside of this game is that the points take a long time because of the bad handler motion and people do not want to swing the disc. Just painfully grind it up the openside.

We use half to talk about dump swinging some, and we come out and it's better. Game ends 11-3.

Game 3: WPI.

I got to play with two WPI players during Boston tryouts this summer and they were athletic, had good throws, and had a good mind for the game. MIT played them in a night scrimmage in the fall and lost to them pretty handedly and they were looking for some revenge.

We start out on D and get a turn and keep rolling. Everyone is playing well, WPI isn't hitting their hucks, and they obviously are missing some players. I would like to think that we got a little better as well. I thought our D was good, and our O started to click. I think we win 13-4 or something.

Game 4: Bye.

It had been rainy and slightly windy all day, and during our bye everything let loose. I was watching UMass and WPI slug it out with hellish zone points. It was a really strong crosswind with a steady rain. After sitting in cars for a little and getting warm, the MIT kids came out and we used this bye time to work on throws in the wind, and then we discussed zone.

It is uncertain if the bye won or not.

Game 5: UMass.

UMass looked like a combination of their A and B squad, or maybe it was some veterans with some rookies mixed in like we had. Regardless, they weren't the veteran heavy squad that UMass is known to have year after year after year.

We somehow decide to start on defense going upwind. I thought I taught the kids to choose downwind when it is windy. Crap.

We start out, UMass hucks it, they score. They come down in zone. We turn it two feet from our endzone doing nothing we talked about in the bye about zone.

I think we turn it again giving up the upwind and downwind. We then score on their zone by going over the top downwind.

I am now left in a situation that a coach has to be in. If we win this game, we are in the winner's bracket tomorrow, and if we lose, we are in the loser's bracket. It would be nice to play against the toughest competition we could tomorrow, but, at the same time, it would also be nice to be able to continue to play the rookies and sophomores as much as I have been throughout the day.

I decide to stick thrower heavy lines in (i.e. the veteran lines). This doesn't pay out until we get a break right before half to make it 7-5. We start out on O and score.

We then go out and get 3 breaks in a row because we have worked on becoming more active on the mark and helping some on D. It seems to be paying off, and some rookies are being put on the veteran lines. I think it is 9-8, and then they score to make it 9s at softcap.

MIT then starts dancing instead of cutting on the dump cuts, and we are making too deep out cuts and stranding the thrower. We turn it, they score. We then have to score an upwinder. We work it up halffield and then turn it over throwing to a covered man incutting on a high stall. They score on a huck that we thankfully covered very well (we have been working on protecting the deep after a turn).

Henry from UMass really took this game over the last couple of points; he played great D and you could see him impose his will onto the game. I hope more of our players learn how to do that this year. We already have a handful that can do it, but it is awesome when a whole team wants to.

We have a lot to work on, but there is a lot of promise. The D was better now than it was at regionals last year and we were missing some good defenders today. Our offense had some hiccups. The biggest ones came once the softcaps went on. I think once we work out our handler movement a little better the hiccups should happen less and less.

I wish I could be there tomorrow,

-josh

Good Defense Happens BEFORE the Disc Moves

My first year on a club team, we had some smart older players on my team. One of them was somewhat of a D specialist, and he would say: "90% of defense happens before your man gets out into the lane."

This took me a long time to learn or even understand what he meant because I was young and fast, and could just run past my man for blocks (note: we didn't play too many good teams). Especially in college, I would just stand on the breakside of my man, follow him in to the disc, bait the throw, and get the block. This works extremely well when you play on a mid-tier college team. However, if you ever want to play after you graduate from college, you need to learn how to actually and properly play defense with proper positioning.


One of this season's goals for MIT is to learn how play defense with the same fundamentals as a club team would. I have talked to some people about it, and they think that this endeavour is crazy, that the dictation concept will be lost and it will simply become, stand 7 yards behind your man and give him the free in pass. But, they don't coach you guys, and they don't understand how hard you work at this sport.

The following is are excerpts from emails that the coaches on my club team have sent to us about how to play good, fundamental defense. They actually can write in real sentences and have mastered basic punctuation, so, if anything seems a little off, or words have been left out, it is probably me adding stuff in.

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1.) Good D Happens Before the Disc Moves - Dictate

• Be Aggressive. The nature of the sport of ultimate is pretty unbalanced, the offense has a huge advantage. Don't give it an even bigger advantage by playing passive defense - chasing your man around - dictate where you want him to go, take control of that, and tip the scale over towards the defense.
  
  
• Re-adjust Your Defensive Position Constantly. In a perfect world, all you would have to do is dictate slow, fat handlers out, and tall, fast, goal scoring idiots with no throws to speak of under, and we would win.
  
  That would be a nice world to live in, but it isn't real, instead, how you dictate your man is usually more about what your team is doing, what you are trying to take away, where the disc is.
  
  Good defenders re-adjust their position over and over throughout the point. Kevin and I, try to make it a point at practice, to keep saying in our heads where we are forcing our men. Try to do this at practice and in games until it becomes natural.
  

2.) Use Your Body!

• Physically place yourself in the path between the person you are covering and where they want to go.
  
  • Example 1.) To stop the upline dump, you must place your body between the dump, and the area upfield where he wants to go (normally a diagonal path).
    
  • Example 2.) When guarding a deep threat, you want to stand blocking him from turning and sprinting deep towards the endzone.
  • Example 3.) When guarding the last people in the stack near their scoring endzone, you want to stand in their path between them and the cone they are trying to score at.
    

• Take Micro-Charges. For dictation to be effective, you have to keep your cushion small.
  
  Reach out and touch someone small, but you can't just stand and expect them to run into you and stop. Your body weight should be towards where you want to send them. The more micro-charges you can take, the better.
  
  Micro-charges are just what you think they would be - You are "standing", someone turns to run into you, you absorb it, and then move your body once again in the path that they want to go, and they run into you again. By standing I mean bouncing on your toes, weight towards the direction you want them to go.
  

3.) Triangulate Whenever Possible.

• See the disc and your man. This is much harder to do when you are fronting your man or "faceguarding" i.e. playing people who play close to the disc.
  

4.) Keep On the Outside Shoulder of Your Man.

• Don't give up the easy out cut if you are forcing in. And vice versa for if you are forcing out. Dictation does no good if you simply let your man run by you.
  
  Watch people make out cuts. 9/10 of them will involve someone running in hard, and then pivoting toward the openside and sprinting deep. If you were dictating your man under, and sprinting with him on his outside shoulder, when he turns to plant and sprint deep, you are in his way, blocking his path.
  
  If you decided to stay on his inside shoulder since that is easier to get layout blocks on shitty throws, if he plants to go out, you are left just sprinting in.
  

5.) When the Disc is Up, Beat the Man to the Spot.

• Win the Race. Dan Cogan, the old MIT coach used to tell his kids that offense is a race that the offense decides when it starts, and where it ends.
  
  The concept of dictation on D is to make this race a bit more fare. Instead of letting the Offense decide where the race will occur, place your body in a way that limits the offensive player to one direction. Now you know where the race will end. Stay close on your man, and when the disc is thrown, win the last part.

************************************************************************************

This is a lot of stuff to digest. When it comes down to it, it all is pretty simple, and we are going to spend a lot of time honing our dictation skills. I think we are capable of being the best, most physical defense by the end of the season, but it starts at practice. Commit yourself to working hard, and commit yourself to learning these fundamentals.

If you have any questions, just write it in the comment section and I will get back to you.

-josh

Nationals: A Quick Rundown

Wednesday: Fly into Sarasota with MIT alum Dave H. Dave and I go to the store, I buy food for my room, we check in, and then we find some food to eat. After that, we do a macc line on the beach. I am pretty terrible at anything that involves co-ordination, it isn't like I fail to comprehend which direction or which hand should brush the disc, it just gets to me and BAM! into the ground.

Oh well. I also threw on the beach some. The wind was really strong, so that is always good to get some touches in. At night, we ate lasagna that mccarthy and funboy (the harvard and tufts coach for you guys) made. It was awesome.

By the way, simple life lesson for the day. If you buy your ticket 4 or so months in advance like Emily did, the airline can change it's flight times and layover cities on you. You should check into that so you aren't in chicago for 3 hours flying to florida from boston.

Thursday: Wake up, go to the fields. As usual, dewy, flat, and level. We get start active warmups 1 hour before game time.

We play the Condors 1st. The have some athletes, and 2 good handlers. I covered some guy named Steve Dugan for a little this game. Apparently he has a big backhand (besides just being a really good handler), which people informed me of after the point in which I flashed over to the open-side on a no huck call, and then he bombed a beautiful backhand bomb upwind to a cutter in stride. After that, I tried to stay at home on his backhand, and when we forced backhand, I marked pretty flat and straight up.

I forced him out some, our zone was getting blocks, and our O line was in stride. We won pretty comfortably by 15-12. I think our O line got broken maybe 2 times in the last couple possessions to have the Condors make the game close.

Second game was against Bodhi. It is tough playing against some of your friends and old teammates, but I really thought it was best for everyone if we came out and played them as hard as we possibly could. I think we did. We won 15-8. They made some drops and throw aways, and our zone lines worked pretty well against them, except against Bill Stewart who cranked out a huge thumber over our cup. Somewhere Cy Prothro was smiling.

The third game was against Jam. They run a really pretty offense where everyone is a cutter, handler, and deep threat. Some people do it more than others, but it just seems like the flow positions more than other teams do. I guarded Gabe for most of the game, and I thought we had a pretty good battle. He is really fun to cover because he does everything, and he does everything well, so you have to always be on your toes ready for a deep strike after he was the dump, or a give-n-go, or some crazy off hand throws. We again win 15-12, but it felt close except for the fact that I don't think our O line was broken once (I might be wrong about this though... I don't really pay too much attention to our O line).

Friday:

With Thursday's performance, Ironside and Jam move up to the winners bracket. Bodhi and the Condors, who Bodhi "upset" dropped down to the losers bracket.

First game Friday, we play Goat. Ah Goat, how many times can we play them in the season? They are off playing their normal Goat game (which they do very well), which is small pass, small pass, pass to Hassell, bomb. This works 90% of the time. I believe we go down early in this game, and then our D line catches on fire. Think of Hassell as a cross between andrew and cody. baller.

At some point in the game one of our D cutters gets stagnant on the line and I realize I am making a double cut with Funboy and start to curl away when he throws it which my defender makes a fantastic layout for and hits the disc, unfortunately for him, I clap it at about the same time and then he hits my elbow with his still laying out body which not only knocks me forward, but I lose possession. I call foul, they flip out. I go to the observer, and he couldn't see it. Redo. I felt bad, but the play wasn't over after he hit it, he still hit my body.

I think I score a couple goals this game, including the game winner. I have been scoring goals all weekend which is weird since I handle and "should" be throwing them, but people seem generally disinterested in guarding the ole' upline cut.

The next game is against Sockeye. It starts out well, I think we go down a break maybe on the second O point (an O cutter gets hit with the disc on the pull!!!! Watch the disc! It can happen to you), but then the D line I am on gets the turn and I score. I am feeling good this game and finally throw a goal instead of scoring it, and feel very in control on Defense. They take half I think, and we are at 15-14 sockeye pulling and we turn it over. They score to make it 16-14 sockeye.

We find out that there was a lot of craziness that happened in the other pools, and that Bravo is playing the prequarters for the right to play Sockeye in the morning and we will play Ring of Fire in the morning. I am not sure what the weather will be like, but for some reason I think Ring would be more vulnerable to our zone than Bravo, so I like that draw.

I watch Brutesquad play the prequarters game. It was AWESOME not playing in the prequarters. You get unbelievably tired in that game.

They looked pretty good when I was watching, but Emily finally had succumbed to the "i broke my foot and could only aqua jog for 8 solid weeks before nationals" heat sickness and tiredness. Apparently she played great in the two games before that, so she was pretty content laying in the shade and trying to not spend the night in the hospital while watching her teammates clean up.

Saturday: Get up, get ready to play ring. I like playing ring. I played against their captain, jared inselmann all throughout college, and was his teammate on Rage. He is a great player and an even better teammate. I covered him for a lot of the game, but since our zones were working, we played a lot of zone. Everyone likes zone, except for the cup. I am the cup. The game was pretty contentious since we didn't have observers and there was a lot riding on this game.

Ring played a pretty physical game where they forced middle / clogged middle. Their strategy seemed to be to bump early in the count, and then back off. Unfortunately for them, when they backed off, they stopped being active on the mark, and their flat marks were very easy to break.

Both sides got a little chippy, and by the time observers came from god-knows-where, they were a welcome sign no matter how bad at observing they might be.

We won this game 15-11, and then got to sit around for a long time. I ate food, sat in the shade, and walked around if I got nervous. I also got my hamstrings and calves worked on by our PT guy. It was painfully awesome. He breathed some life into my legs.

The Semi's were next, and it was against Chain. We are 1 and 1 with them this year, and last year, they beat us in a very sketchy way on a botched observer ruling (play needed to stop, and they let it play on). We played a lot of zone on them. Even if we didn't score or get the turn, we made the point happen slowly. This was especially important because sometimes their D line would force a turn and then almost score, or we would score but they would be drapped all over us, and then the D line would go out there and throw zone and make them throw 100 passes, and by the time their D line was back out there, our O line was no longer feeling the pressure from the last point, and their D line had forgotten their intensity from the point before.

I think we take half on a huck to Colin Mahoney. The second half, we play a lot of man, and when we get the turn, the upline is open a lot. I don't know if this is a new trend in club teams, but they seem to leave the upline cut open a lot, especially when forcing backhand.

This might be an O's D thing since they can't fathom not having people that can't complete flick dumps out to space, but, with a strong crosswind, the upline throw was really easy compared to the dump out to space.

At one point I score on an upline cut, and in a moment of passion and idiocracy, I spike the disc next to my laid out defender (getting a TMF). It was a very assclown move, and about 2 minutes after it happened I felt like a complete assclown.

I rightfully got sat for a couple points after that to get my head back to get my head back in the game and to remind me that our goals for the season were to be the best team in the country and the best team to play against in the country. Not only did I let them down a little, but I also represent you guys as well as lehigh, and I don't want to be known as "that" douche.

We finished the game on D, with a huck from George Stubbs to Colin. I was running to give george a dump when I realized that he wasn't at all looking dump and just kept on running down field to see if I could catch some swill.

Sunday: My normal Saturday night routine at nationals is normally a blur, and I wake up with two sprained ankles. This saturday night, I went to eat with my condo mates, we talked about Sunday, we bought food for the morning, and we cleaned the condo to be ready to check out.

Oh, and we took ice baths. Well, at least Colin and I did. Kevin and Brent were too pansy. Refreshing isn't the word for it. My left calf was cramping all night before the bath, and it helped some.

Sunday we got to the fields and were the first people there. Then Jam showed up. We all throw around, do active warmups, breakmark drill, hucking drill, O vs. D endzone drills, and then we get our game faces on.

I was pretty pumped for this game. I thought I played Gabe pretty well on Thursday and was looking forward to the rematch, but he apparently hurt his hamstring something fierce and could not play today. That was unfortunate.

The game started out pretty well, and then Jam got a break. The first D point, we got a turn, worked it down about 60 yards, and then seigs threw a swing pass a little too far for me to get. I sprinted as hard as I could, and layed out pretty strong, but it dinked off my finger tips and I slammed my face into the ground hard enough for my ears to ring. Jam promptly scores.

In the first half, we get another turn on a Damien Scott dropped pass in the zone. We move the disc up to about midfield, and I am actually cutting downfield because we were fast breaking. I then find myself poached off of, and curl back towards the disc. I set up as the dump to get the swing, and the disc hooks on funboy's finger and knifes into the ground for another missed opportunity on D. crap. What is promising though is the fact that the D line seems to be getting turns fairly readily, and when we have the disc moving, Jam's O line seems to not want to run with us.

Unfortunately our O line is not playing as clean as we have been all tourney. Jeff is hurt from the Chain game when he was tackled at least twice on fairly late hits, and Jam is putting good pressure on our handlers to have to work to reset the disc.

I think they take half 8-6. At some point, we get a break on a huck to kevin to pull within 1 or 2. We have multiple chances to score on D now, but we are being hesitant and not fast breaking at all. We instead are cautiously walking to the disc, and we seem to be stranding the throwers.

At 12-11 Jam, we get a turn off of a George Stubbs layout. I have been covering Damien Scott this point, and I am the front of the stack (the dump). Seigs wants to get it off line, and decides to throw it quickly to me just as I am getting ready to cut for an I/O from him. It picks up a in the wind, and unfortunately for me Damien is about 6 inches taller than me and I see his hands reach over my head as I am jumping and reaching up for it, and he just comes to the disc smacking it out of the way before it is even in my catching wheelhouse. I then get bowled over by him only to get up and see them scoring on a fast break. In hindsight, I should have called a foul to stop the fast break (he cleanly d'ed it, and I had no chance of catching it after before he hit me), but him knocking me down prevented me from helping out seigs who was caught in a 2 on 1 situation.

Damn. 13-11. I think we must turn it 2 times on O to lose the game then. It all went by so fast, but I am glad that it was a very clean and very fast paced game with not many calls at all. I think this game will actually be watchable.

The game seemed sort of surreal. I didn't feel nervous at all playing it, and I thought we were playing well, but we just weren't clicking as team; that is for both the O and the D lines.

After the game and the awards ceremony, I went over with emily and we looked at the UPA trophy. It only motivated me more to get ready for next year. Pretty soon I am going to write down my list of goals so that next year, it will be ironside that wins.

So that ends my club season, so I guess that means I have to start coaching you guys. Let's make it a good year.

-josh