the upa takes on wall street

as a grade a procrastinator, there's nothing like frisbee on the internet to keep me off task. a new blog (or old) blog entry, an ultivillage highlight, or an innane rambling to the club email list will usually do the trick. but as i started to do the reading for a midterm paper at 9 last night, conger called and alerted me to a real gem.



turns out i probably would have stumbled accross what he was calling about at some point sooner or later. as most everyone probably knows right now, cultimate abruptly enveiled Conference 1 to the public. you can read more about it on the website, but the basic plan is to take their conception of the top 25 teams in the country, sort them into five divisions based on geography, and have them play a five-tournament, 34-game regular season. the top 14, plus two teams not initially given the nod to compete in the Conference, would then play at Cultimate nationals. the sticking point in all of this is that these teams would not compete in the UPA series.

i had to really make an effort to only check up on things once in a while through the night, but since the initial news hit rec, there have been over ten seperate threads with hundreds of posts. the huddle dropped three different articles (including an interview with the homeboy brodie), and everyone from players here at uva to toad seems to have an opinion.

well, here's mine:

• first, i think a lot of people saw this or something like it coming sooner or later. Cultimate really has been doing big things, and with the growing success of their tournaments, they at least have the audience to entertain the notion. i think the fact they're in a position to have people lamenting the death of the UPA at the drop of a new website speaks volumes about both where the college scene is now and just how big a deal this could potentially be.

• that said, the key word here is potentially. according to The Huddle, only Florida and Texas have officially signed on, and even then, if no one else participates i'm sure they'll bail. while i can see a lot of teams wanting to do this (the whole free jersey and no tournament fee deal is, well, a sweet deal, and if all of the teams invited were to participate, the level of competetion would certainly be pretty hard to beat), there are some things that have me skeptical. rostering issues, the short notice, and the potential controversy of two different college champions are some of the things that make me wonder if those who see this as a simple ultimatum to the upa are right. still, Cultimate seems to be on board the whole "gowing professionalism in frisbee" thing, so i suspect they have some kind of reason to confidently break this kind of news.

• as for whether Conference 1 would be a good or bad thing if it actually happened is really dependent on who you ask. for people who really want to see the sport get more exposure and gain "legitimacy" (whatever that means), it's probably a step in a favorable direction. for those who never even have a shot at getting into double digits during sectionals, i doubt it matters much at all. maybe i'm being selfish, but i feel like those who would really affected by the current proposal are those playing for teams who seem themselves as on the cusp-- the type of team that made sunday in arguably the nation's toughest regionfor the first time in a while, lost somewhat respectably to one of these Conference 1 teams, and is returning pretty much everyone. i think everyone's first reaction is to think that things are a little unfair. obviously, the possibility of not really being given a shot to show we belong belong is stomach churning. still, though, i'm witholding my judgement. there are so many maybes surrounding this whole thing that it's senseless to draw any conclusions. besides, Cultimate ain't got shit to do with shit when it comes to Wolfpack and CCC.

• this whole broughaha does drive home a reality that i've been thinking about a lot lately: more and more, we're seeing the emergence of a college ultimate elite. a decent, but still small enough to make it exclusive, number of teams are getting more and more selective with the tournaments they go to and the teams they play. while i certainly don't think that right now this means they have the best athletes and players accross the board, i do think this trend could lead to a drop-off in the mobility among teams that aren't quite top tier. when you play a better team, you learn from it: how they act, what sets they run, how good of shape they're in, etc. really, it's the whole reasoning behind an up and coming team wanting to go to centex or stanford in hopes of being better prepared at regionals. if high levels aren't accessible, this phenomena could really decline. moreover, one thing that i really love about ultimate is the lack of stratification. the idea that making nationals and being guarded by a callahan winner isn't that far out of reach is pretty cool, and i'd hate to see that possibility go. i think, though, that i'm getting ahead of myself. besides, who's to say that if the current "elite" teams block themselves off they won't end up recycling stale match-ups and suffer a fall off themselves?

• from the few times i've talked to Skip, he seems like a genuinely nice guy who has ultimate's best interest at heart. i'll reserve comment about Cyle.

like i said, i'm not ready to jump to any conclusions about this thing. if anything, it's nice to see so much concern and engagement with regard to our sport's governing body (keep in mind that you have another two weeks or so to vote in upa elections).

really, though, i'm just waiting for dar's commentary.