#eighth man

[decembersoul]

the suprerhero who derived his power from...smoking!

[we-breathe-quadball]

People can't handle real journalism in quidditch yet I see. 

[quidditchelitist]

EIghth Man World Cup Discussion

Tonight at 9 EDT I will be doing a live streamed discussion with The Eighth Man staff where we'll break down the World Cup, pot-by-pot. Don't miss it. Check back here or on facebook at 9 for the link.

[divinewolfwood]

How do you non-biasedly write the tournament recap of a tournament your team won?

[quidditchelitist]

Dan Daugherty -- Sportsman of the Year

Earlier today, the 8th man named Daniel Daugherty the Sportsman of the Year for 2012. Article: http://www.eighthman.com/2013/01/18/daniel-daugherty-2012-sportsman-of-the-year/

You should all check out the article before reading on here, this is going to serve as a supplement to it.

Dan is a good friend of mine, as well as a rival captain within Ohio, and I could not have more respect for him. His dedication to the game is astounding. Bu the article covered all that. I want to share with you my experience playing with Dan at Quidcon.  It's been a while since it happened, so I can't remember every play as clearly as I could 6 months ago, but two very specific plays come to mind. The first, we had just scored, I was playing chaser. Dan was the on-point defender, I was guarding on the left side. As I was watching the ball out of my peripheral, I saw the ball come loose, rolling towards Dan. Without hesitation, I took off down the left side of the field, knowing I could trust Dan to find me, and knowing Dan would trust me to finish the play, even though we had never played chaser together before. He did, and hit me with a perfect pass, led perfectly, which left me one step away from the short hoop. An easy goal, and a perfect summary of Dan as a player: completely trusting, a deadly defender, and a perfect distributor.

 The next was the only time I ever saw Dan come close to showing off. (sorry Dan, I have to tell this one) We were up by a fair margin, and Dan was left with a wide open breakaway, no beaters, no keepers, no chasers, nothing between him and the hoops. It was as sure a goal as goals can ever get. We've all seen players take these and dunk them hard through a shorter hoop. Not Dan. Dan decided to go for a layup on the middle hoop, and was promptly denied by the t-joint connecting the pole to the hoop. One of the funniest things I've ever seen.  But, in all seriousness, Dan was a huge part of that Quidcon team. He's a natural leader on and off the pitch, and we wouldn't have made the finals without him. Congrats on Sportsman of the Year, you deserve it. 

[fromthekeeperzone]

Article on film study in quidditch by me, Tyler Rafferty.

[divinewolfwood]

Congratulations, Becca.  It's well earned :)

[divinewolfwood]

My full responses for our 8th man roundtable

Ethan had to cut a bunch out of everyone's so he gave everyone permission to post their full responses.  Here are mine:

1. What do you believe to be the ideal roster composition?

Assuming your team plays one female beater/one female chaser as most top teams tend to do, take your 21 best players, with some constraints on position and gender.  You should take at least 4 but no more than 6 beaters, with at least two of each gender (but don't do 2 of one gender and 4 of another).  No more than 2 dedicated seekers.  Fill out the rest of your roster with keeper/chasers (assuming you have flexibility that enough of your chasers can play keeper), with at least 25% of them being female.  You can violate these rules if you have a completely elite player at one position (for instance, if you have a super elite female chaser but she doesn't have much backup behind her, you may be able to go below 25%), but you'd better know what you're doing.

2. Give us a dark horse to win the World Cup that isn’t getting nearly enough attention.

LSU. I was going to put Baylor here, but it feels like even they're getting more attention.  All you hear out of the Southwest these days is Texas and Texas A&M, and for good reason, but LSU is definitely not a team anyone should be sleeping on.  People seem to have the impression that this team is still just Brad and some beaters, which was never the case, but it's even further from true now.  Though their team will probably hate me for pointing out their other chasers are solid too, because they want opposing teams to just focus on Brad.

3. What area of quidditch strategy remains the most underdeveloped? What’s holding it back?

Timing-based interactions between beaters and chasers.  Theoretically, it should be extremely powerful to time these interactions precisely, but it just hasn't really fully developed out.  It's not being held back by anything but time and experience, though.  It just happens that since it's the case of the complex interaction of positions, it's significantly harder to practice, especially outside of game conditions.

4. Should team strategy over the course of a two-day tournament differ from a single-game weekend? Why or why not?

Yes, definitely.  In a single-game, you have one game, and there's nothing to save for.  In a two-day tournament, making sure your team stays rested is vital.  I've lost games with my team that we had no business losing because our top players had played too much and had no legs for the second day of a tournament.  In a single game, all bets are off, and you may as well be going full-out.

5. What are some of the best one or two person drills you can do over break to keep yourself in top quidditch form?

For chasers: one person as a passer, one person near a hoop, practice catching it two handed and scoring super-quickly.  Do sweet dunks.  Also, one person with the ball, other person on defense and has to stop them and recover the quaffle.  

For beaters: one bludger, have the second person attempt to retrieve the ball, and the first person attempts to beat the person retrieving the ball before they can recover it.

For seekers: either have one snitch/one seeker or each person has a snitch sock, and the person who catches the other person's snitch sock wins.

For one person, I guess just target shooting with the appropriate ball.  But honestly, people should probably just work out if they're completely by themselves.

6. Should gamesmanship (ignoring uncalled beats, exaggerating injuries, milking the ref) be a part of quidditch?

Some degree of gamesmanship is always going to be there, but it's a matter of degrees.  I'd be really upset with my team members if I found out they were ignoring uncalled beats or intentionally exaggerating injuries, because those are explicitly illegal under the rulebook.  But I'll fully admit that I definitely will "milk" the refs, though usually that's because my team's getting hit by illegal tactics that are seemingly never called (defenseless receiver, for one).