Process of Illumination

My freshman college season was in 1999.  The prior off-season the Hodags had decided to undergo some giant changes.  For the first time ever, there would be tryouts to make the team in the fall.  The now-classic logo made its debut on the front of our three all-cotton jerseys, colored baby blue, white, and black.

The captains elected to implement this new paradigm were Opie and Simon McNair, a mathematics grad student from Canada far older than anyone else on the team.  He was set to play his fifth year of college disc that season until, shortly after the fall began, he learned that a change in the UPA's eligibility guidelines rendered him, sadly, ineligible.  The rules before had established eligibility starting the moment you became a UPA member and for five years afterwards.  The subtle change that year was that your clock started ticking when you joined the UPA or any other worldwide governing body of Ultimate.  As a Canadian, he'd been a part of CUPA before joining the UPA, and that got 'im.

After a short bit of soul-searching he decided to stay on board with the team and act as our coach through the season.  Being the most experienced and oldest, he guided that young team through the transitional phase from ragtag runners throwing the fris', to the disciplined national power the Hodags are today.  He stuck around the following year as well, and he and Opie put the pieces in place one practice at a time.

It has come full circle for me now.  Last week I spoke to the captains of this year's Hodags and they extended the offer to have me coach the team this year, in a role far more involved and critical than the advisory roles Muffin and I shared last year.  I, of course, accepted.

My main duties will be planning and running practices and implementing team-wide concepts and strategies as directed by the team leadership.  I expect that as the season progresses we will delineate our roles on the team more specifically, but I am mindful of their leadership and plan on limiting my role where I feel the captains and officers need to take charge.  To put it another way, I think my main contributions will be in getting the team ready to play at a tournament, and then providing strategic adjustments in games, and their job will be to make sure the team is actually performing when it's go time.  I am the study guide, they are the test-takers.

I'm incredibly excited at the opportunity.  The styles of practice and leadership that I've been providing as captain of Madison Club have been well-received, and I feel like we're on track to do great things.  I'm anxious to throw lumps of freshmen on my potter's wheel and build them up into a new generation of KM dominators, as mindful of sportsmanship as they are of fundamentals and hard work.

Hodag Love!

The Dow tanked. UFSE continues strong!

Buy:

• Streetgang - Recent merger between competitors should mean a stronger product for consumers in '09.
  
• Chase Sparling-Beckley - Best mixed division player. Ever.
  
• Next Level HS Ultimate camp - Inaugural year goes off without a hitch. Team synergy in service-based market was strong and immediate. A bargain right now.
  
• Alex Simmons - Virtual unknown about to be known. Buy now, but don't tell who gave you the insider info.
  
• Carleton College - With coming influx of young national talent, should continue to hold its top spot for the foreseeable future.
• Madison Club - Head-hunters hire away regional rivals' studs and grow in the process.
• Doublewide - Current portfolio has them positioned to make big moves upward.
• Russell Wynne - Currently trading for pennies, but developing innovative technology that will blow away the competition.
• UPA Communications Director - New executive director signals possibility that next CD may actually stick around a bit.
• Old People - Maiden GrandMasters championship buys this company a little more shelf-life and relevancy before being being sent to the knackers.
• Riot - Despite an epic meltdown of their Finals Nuclear Reactor, they seemed to have cleared out the radiation nicely. Acquisition of Gwen Ambler steadies the ship.
  

Hold:

• Revolver - speculators have driven up price enough to keep profit margins small, but should meet expectations.
  
• Ironside - strong 2nd quarter puts them in line to grab more market share, but showdown with Revolver looms over patenting of moniker "Club Champions"
  
• Machine - purchased assets from truck company pennies on the dollar, but mismanagement continues to keep them hovering in place.
  
• Furious George - This stock's up-and-down performance makes it a shaky investment in their crowded market, but the payoff for current stockholders could be large.
  
• Fury - Latest tournament loss should not inspire a selling panic. Still one of the most solidly performing stocks.
• Gabe Saunkeah - current inactivity is no sign that this company won't continue to impress when its machines start humming again.
• Mixed Division - like MySpace or PerezHilton, it's not going anywhere.
  

Sell:

• Jam - Much of the upper brass retired with golden parachutes. Stock will rebound eventually, but still trading high enough that a sell at this time can allow a larger buy-in later.
  
• Sub Zero - Employee diaspora leaves gaping holes in assembly line.
  
• RSD - Old media is dead. New informational feeds and spam clog are rendering it irrelevant.
  
• Unempowered Observers - All indications signal that their product will be useless in the future.
  
• Plain Jerseys - Sublimation is quietly inching away market share, and consumers are liking what they see.
  
• Sectionals Nudity - Product Recall forces company into bankruptcy.