Marking Thought: Stay Balanced
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Loading ...I alluded to the importance of not reaching (by which I mean “over-extending.” Certainly you will use your hands and arms while marking) when I wrote about being mobile. The opposite of reaching is balance.
Balance originates from your core.
Balance means not overextending yourself (don’t get caught reaching!).
Balance means being poised to respond to anything the thrower will, well, throw at you. Don’t get lulled into a false sense of security–stay poised to deny the thrower’s options. (An awareness of where the threats are behind you–dump? streaking cutter deep?–help significantly to this end).
It’s a challenge to develop the mobility, and particularly the discipline to avoid reaching on the mark and to strive for balance. But really, how many point blocks have you seen come from a guy leaning over and reaching? How many pictures have you seen of a thrower breaking a mark who is practically falling over, she’s reaching so hard?
Of course, rules are made to be broken, and you’ll find that the big reach (the layout on the mark, the foot-block attempt) will occasionally work at causing a turn, if for no reason other than the sheer surprise of the thing. Sometimes David Ortiz can steal second because the catcher isn’t expecting the 230(+)-pound DH to be fleet enough to try in the first place. Doesn’t mean it should be your standard. Discipline yourself. Learn by the conventional wisdom so you can cast it aside in the instants where it is most effective.
More on mobility and balance on Thursday.
Marking Thought: Spacing
(No Ratings Yet. Click to Rate!) Loading ...There’s a time and a place for near and far spacing.
Incidentally, the spacing and location of your mark can and should be changing over time. Jackson makes some good points about the utility of spacing between yourself and your mark, so start there:
Are you looking to prevent the break throw? If so, back up. You’re right that you can easily get your arm past a close mark, and by being farther away you’ll have more time to react to pivots, fakes and throws.
However, if you’re looking to put pressure on hucks, then get close. Yes, you might get broken sometimes, but if your defensive strategy is to pressure hucks, while still keeping substantial pressure on break throws, then I think close is the way to go.
Most throwers today will be able to break marks regardless of how you mark. I think that (in general) marking to prevent break-throws is a losing battle. The better approach is to realize that break throws will go off, but by pressuring them, you can increase the chance of a non-perfect throw going off, which gives the downfield defender a chance at a block. Similarly, if you are pressuring hucks, then defenders (who will inevitably be a step or two behind) will have a greater chance at blocking a non-perfect throw. A far mark puts very little pressure on hucks, which makes it very difficult for downfield defense against any team with good throwers
In short:
I’m of the opinion that the best marks apply both techniques throughout the duration of a single mark. As I’ve already said, be active. Even if you’re bouncing around, if you’re not fundamentally altering your approach to marking dynamically, the thrower is sizing up how to beat what you’re showing him–you’re playing his game. Showing the thrower different looks through a point and through a stall count can force them to play your game, assuming you leverage your margin intelligently. I’m also of the opinion that while trying to prevent ALL break throws can be a losing battle, intelligent use of the mark to take away the biggest threat dynamically as the count shifts can be extremely effective. Similar to how you might look to poach off of a cutter who is sitting pat in the stack without threatening to move, if the mark’s position allows breaks that the thrower isn’t currently looking for, you’ll be able to more effectively pressure the throws she is. A very simple example of this is shifting the mark around to take away the dump at a high stall count. When it’s clear that the thrower only wants to hit the backfield for the dump, a mark can find success in conceding easier throws upfield in order to apply more pressure to the backfield option. If you extend that approach to include not only dumps but hucks, inside vs. outside breaks (hint: it’s nearly impossible to throw an IO break past a mark that is a step off), even high vs. low throws, you can present a very dynamic and effective mark. If your entire defense (including your sidelines) is cued in to this as a defensive strategy, the potential applicability skyrockets as downfield can adjust to what the mark is dynamically taking away–if the mark shifts to protect the dump, the defender at the front of the stack can shade to take away the IO option, if pressuring hucks, defenders can front their men more confidently, etc. This extends to more than simply how close or how far you are from your man (how you angle your mark and how aggressive you are are also key), but one of the easier ways to leverage the mark is by simply looking to take an extra step in or out on the mark as the count shifts–perhaps you stay tight on the first couple counts to pressure a huck in flow, and then back off a half-step to contain more conventional break/dump looks and avoid drawing a foul at a high count (I guarantee you your high-level club teams teach this very adjustment as a fact of life–or at least did before the advent of the disc space rule [XIV.B.3] as an additional deterrent). Maybe you start off with a loose mark trap on the sideline of a zone to prevent a quick swing back across the field, and inch in closer to pressure the over-the-top throw attempts after a few seconds. Incidentally, Stephen Hubbard adds some great points about fouling in a comment on the last post, and also brings up the important question (among others): aren’t we just talking about fouling routinely on the close mark? When I say “close mark” I absolutely DO NOT mean foul the thrower. If you’re capable of being mobile, you shouldn’t need to foul. If you have any kind of intelligent defense behind you, you shouldn’t need to foul. If you’re getting hosed by the other team making hucks in flow with no mark and feel the need to foul to stop it…try playing smarter defense and taking away those opportunities in the first place (or make adjustments downfield if you can’t). There’s a wealth of strategic options you can employ on the mark and in concert with the mark, and fouling is really never appropriate. Incidentially, I also find a mark that plays THAT close to be far less effective at stopping any throws (but I also didn’t practice it terribly much–there was a time when we had a “coach” for all of one tournament that encouraged more physical marking and it didn’t sit well with me then). Fouling might win you a few battles, but in the context of the larger war of the game, it is usually not sufficient (teams and players adjust). Experiment with spacing. Think about what might serve you best in various field positions, stall counts, matchups, weather conditions, etc. If you’re a team strategist, consider the vast potential of a team-wide dynamic mark for shutting down a team’s preferred offensive options. For bonus points, consider employing a marking tactic suggested by Ben Wiggins back in Winter ’06: stagger your feet one slightly forward, one slightly back) to facilitate better motion forwards and backwards, as well as to provide a bit more cushioning on a close mark to shield against the IO. This is hard to explain, and the UCPC site is apparently down now, so I can’t link any original materials either. I’ll try and flesh it out a bit more in a later post.
Marking Thought: The Hole-y Mark
(No Ratings Yet. Click to Rate!) Loading ...Patch up the holes in your mark!
When I was first learning how to play, I’d often ‘cheat’ in marker drill by throwing through my mark, rather than around it as the drill intended. At least, I thought it was cheating, until I realized that it only worked on some people.
If you’ve played much you’re probably familiar with the embarrassment that comes with getting broken through the hole under the arm. What leads to this?
Far as I can tell you have to be aware of a couple of things:
1) where you’re holding your arms. If you’re fond of the pteradactyl mark, arms fully extended out, I think you’ll quickly find that you lack the leathery membrane underneath your arm necessary to fly–or to stop throws.
This is a minor point of contention amongst ultimate players that I’ve seen–some people prefer to keep arms extended and/or up, and show a larger, more imposing mark, while some (myself included) prefer to keep elbows bent and hands low (unless you know the thrower to have a viable/effective high-release backhand, etc). Really, I think either can be effective given the right personnel and the right circumstances (a big guy with his arms extended CAN be pretty darn intimidating), but I feel like more experienced throwers will take holes that you show them (which you do by extending your arms) more often than they’ll be intimidated. Assuming you have the coordination and the spacing to react to throws (more on that in a later post), and assuming your thrower is not a rookie, I think the latter option is the better one. Bend your elbows and hide that hole under your armpit.
2) Your proclivity to reach while moving on the mark is an occasionally-overlooked hole. When a marker is beaten and knows it–the thrower has forced the mark into biting too hard on one side, and is winning the race back to the other–oftentimes the mark while, while shuffling, extend and try to reach as far over to the other side to pressure the throw. This can be effective sometimes, but with this extension you create a moving hole in your mark that can be exploited, turning your attempt to pressure an around into an easy inside break.
3) How close you are to the thrower will determine how easily you can be broken through your mark. If you’re riding up on my leg like a dog in heat, I’ll hardly even need to step to get my arm past your body. In such circumstances, a hole you present doesn’t need to be there for long–just long enough for the thrower to get past you. There are few things more demoralizing on the mark than being broken easily while you’re mentally trying to apply a lot of pressure. Be wary of being too close and too aggressive–#2 can combine with a small margin between you and the thrower to leave your mark very vulnerable.
Feel free to chime in with other relevant factors here.
Lifting: More on Deadlifting
(No Ratings Yet. Click to Rate!) Loading ...Somebody asked a great question looking for more information on deadlift technique similar to the clip I linked in my post on squatting.
Crossfit maintains an extensive and informative archive of clips that can help you get off on the right foot. Below are a handful of links I’ve culled from there:
Arm Position. This was a large bit of what I linked in my prior post on deadlifting.
Still unconvinced on the lift, generally? Listen to Coach Glassman talk and tell me you don’t think it’s a good thing.
Money Money Money Clip. For lifting generally as well as deadlifting. Note the differences in body types’ starting angles and correlate with your own body type. Note the cues that Rippetoe gives the lifters, and use them to cue yourself or (I’d recommend) your training partner, and vice-versa.
You can’t go wrong exploring the archives there. Especially if you’re looking to coach others, there’s a bit more theoretical dicussion, too.
Get lifting.
Defense Means "Dictate."
(No Ratings Yet. Click to Rate!) Loading ...Via Lean and Hungry Fitness, check out Josh Mullen to MIT on good defense. In short form, it sums up just about everything that goes into good defense.
Visualize situations, visualize adjustments, visualize taking the micro-charge and staying on the outside shoulder. Then try and apply it.
Marking Thought: Be Mobile
(No Ratings Yet. Click to Rate!) Loading ...I’ve touched upon this with my post about staying on your toes, but I didn’t really discuss how this applies to marking then.
The same basic idea applies though: when you’re shifting positions, in all likelihood you’re getting up onto your toes before you get off the ground, am I right?
A reminder: when I say “toes” I mean the balls of your feet, not the toes themselves. Common misconception that running on your ACTUAL toes works–you’ll wind up hurt and you’re hamstringing yourself, pun intended. It’s the balls–your heels might touch down slightly depending on how hard you’re running, but you’re never resting nor really pushing off your heels so long as you’re accelerating (stopping is a different story).
Take a second and visualize yourself on the mark. The thrower takes a big step to the backhand side, pretty clear windup, she puts her head down…
…and then throws a convincing fake before pivoting back over to the forehand side.
My question: how were you attempting to stop the huck? Is it a hand, an arm, your body that’s in the way? Yes yes, minutate will vary depending on situation and team defensive strategy. We’re talking generic you, no filters applied.
Are you standing still? Please tell me you’re not standing still. PLEASE tell me you’re not the person that makes me slap my forehead on the other side of the tourney complex standing there with a half squat, your butt stuck out, and your arms outstretched. Not to call out a whole demographic, but…rookie women’s ultimate players, I’m looking at you. Get on your toes!
Back to the throw. Are you reaching? Are you leaning? If you’re reaching, you’re toast. If I get a mark to reach on a fake like that I have a field day jacking it to the other half of the field.
Are you jumping over? If you’re jumping, you might be toast here too.
WHEN are you jumping over? If you’re waiting until her head is down and the throw is coming, you’re probably too late. You’ll be in time to force a bad throw, for certain, but to touch down quickly enough and with enough presence of mind to respond to the next throwing attempt?
Here’s what I think:
You move with the step. (Feel free to chime in if you feel differently).
Generally speaking, the only way a thrower is going to get the disc directly past you is if they can throw around you (they can throw through you if you’ve got holes in your mark, which is a topic for another post). The number one way to get around you is with use of the pivot (over-the-tops notwithstanding).
Great throwers don’t pivot needlessly, they just pivot when they know they’ve caught you over committed to the side you’re currently on and can freely pass the other way. You have to counter the motion of the thrower by being mobile yourself, and more often than not this means being proactive with your motion, rather than passively waiting for the thrower to exploit your vulnerabilities.
It’s a fine line to walk between being proactive, being overly aggressive (biting on a little pivot pump-fake makes the thrower’s job even easier than throwing off of one pivot), and getting beaten ’cause you’re too slow. Better still, this dynamic will shift depending on your tools and your thrower’s tools (more than anything short of perhaps the jump discs, size and reach disparities can make a big difference here). Your tall/long-armed wonders generally need to shift less than your shorter types, which tends to work out given that most of us littler guys tend to be a little lower to the ground and more responsive as a result.
Timing on when you move on the mark is crucial, but so is the margin by which you move when you choose to do so. How far over do you need to go to pressure the throw?
For big throw(er)s, you want to use your body to discourage the throw(insert caveat about situation and the consequences of over committing vs. allowing the big huck here). For most other situations, unless you have a clear read on your man or have the ape index advantage of an orangutan vs. a T-rex, I think you want to get your body to around the same alignment as your thrower’s hips. From there, your arms can cover at least enough to make an average thrower think twice (but don’t get caught reaching!).
Let’s look at the difference of this margin in crappy MS-paint schematic form:
This is more of what I’d recommend for a “normal” range of mobility. Blue player is obviously the thrower–I’m giving him something approximating normal pivot range for a good thrower. Red player is on the mark, and is just looking to match up with the hips here. Orange block is Red player’s hands, held close to the body. From this position, there’s some potential for the reach–I’m not saying don’t reach, I’m just saying don’t rely on it and definitely don’t over commit to stopping a throw with it–and that reach is within bounds to pressure your normal throws, stop an IO, etc. Your faster hucks, however, are likely to be deterred a bit less by the threat of simply the reach (again, assuming you’re dealing with a good thrower), and the general trajectory this permits tends to be pretty much what O and D would expect–a fairly decent leading throw with some float and some tilt, which generally goes the O’s way if they’re making good decisions.
That said, if you can move this far and move this far proactively, you’ve got a mark that’s good enough quality to play high-level collegiate ultimate, assuming your marking skills aren’t severely lacking elsewhere.
Now the huck-stopper mark. In this particular iteration I’ve got the mark going out to about elbow position, which is arbitrary but not without merit. You can very clearly see that this cuts off a much larger swath of trajectory–especially if this is a sideline marking position (more on that at some much later point), a throw that has to go this wide and arc that much is far more likely to fall the defense’s way, particularly when you consider that these types of throws tend to be forced into their paths due to last-second adjustment (anathema to successful hucks in particular).
The downside? As I alluded to at the beginning of this post, this generally leaves you overextended. You don’t often see a mark in this sort of position, and when you do, it’s only for a second or a half second (generally aided by a “strike!” call or similar help), just enough to discourage the huck. You can tell with a simple look that the distance to cover both ends of that spectrum easily double the more conservative range–this is why it is important to get to a position like that early, and to be ready to quickly move back to respond to the other side. Be mobile. Don’t even attempt to do this if you’re not mobile enough to get back and do your primary job of not getting (heinously) broken. Chances are, you’re not mobile enough to get in the way quickly enough to pressure the huck, either.
This is the sort of marking capability that gets you an assignment against the other team’s no. 1 throwing threat, that allows your mark to be a lynchpin of the defense rather than simply a very large piece of the puzzle. In short, a game-changer.
With good mobility on the mark, you can take away a much larger swath of the field than a stationary mark can, and perhaps even take away a bit more of the field than the other team anticipates–otherwise known as good defense. Using your mobility as a weapon is the pinnacle, but the base is being mobile enough to avoid getting fooled and used by the thrower in front of you.
Start by getting on your toes. The last thing you should do on an ultimate field is take a break on the mark (pun intended! That might be my favorite one yet. I’m filing it away for future coaching use, it’s so good). (It’s too important to take a break and risk letting down your teammates) Through practice, learn how and where and when to be proactive. With diligence, learn how and where and when you can get away with being aggressive(ly proactive). There’s very little that substitutes for experience here–I can’t give a ton of specific advice here because body types and game situations really can make a significant difference. That said, more basics to come.
UPDATE: Gwen adds some more great pointers on marking in the comments.
Is College Ultimate "IT?"
(No Ratings Yet. Click to Rate!) Loading ...Given the recent news of the NCUA (thus far getting an admittedly lesser response than the initial C1 announcement–which is sure to change once the weekend is over), and this particular post by Dusty (even if the blogging has stopped, he’s still worth reading), I’ve been pondering this question over the last couple days.
Is it all downhill after college? Certainly the level of play rises, but the excitement is different there. While I can watch elite ultimate and think to myself, “So long as I keep working, I can do that too,” I think it’s a lot easier for your typical ultimate fan (? maybe I should put “player” here instead) to look at collegiate ultimate and feel more connected/relate more to the game. If we’re looking for a showcase with potentially broad appeal, perhaps college ultimate IS the way to go. In the long run, perhaps packaging and selling collegiate ultimate will lead to the most “success” (here defined as increased public awareness and some semblance of “legitimacy” in terms of more broad-spread recognition as a varsity sport). I really don’t have enough of an education in the way ultimate has grown so far or a good understanding of potential markets to say anything about these developments with any certainty, but it’s certainly an exciting time to be an ultimate player! I’m very interested to see where this period of relative turmoil leads–the bet here is that by 2010 we see a stable system commonly accepted as the norm, but 2009 remains a very clouded picture and what happens this year will determine what becomes “acceptable” in the season following.
Rather than such grandiose notions, my main contemplation has been more personal. Namely, in my post-college-partum depression, will elite ultimate really be something I want to pursue?
It was easy for me to be motivated and work hard in college–I wasn’t working just for myself, but I knew that my own work contributed to the team and that team was something more than simply a team–the team was (and remains) my family. You probably read all of Hector’s goings-ons about Wisconsin, despite he himself being years removed from playing there. It speaks volumes to the pull that the Alma Mater can have, even while playing at the sport’s supposedly highest level.
Is it even close to possible to recapture some of that fire and passion playing with a group of guys who I don’t live with and learn with and stay up much later than is appropriate to play Smash Bros. (the N64 original–Ness and PK Thunder saves 4eva) with? I don’t think so.
I think Dusty is spot-on in assessing the motivations of the two divisions. Club is elite, but college is passionate. Until ultimate as an entity is big enough to support full-time elite players, we absolutely can and should focus on building at the grassroots level, building at the collegiate level.
Whoops. I did say I don’t really know what I’m talking about…I’ll leave it there.
Please feel free to chip in with your thoughts here–apologies to my Aussie readers, I’m not sure how much of this actually has relevance to the way you structure things over there.
A bit behind on the updating lately…
(No Ratings Yet. Click to Rate!) Loading ...…my apologies. Work has been busy lately, with a couple school events on Saturdays cutting into my usual writing time.
I’m likely to cut back to 2 posts a week for regular posting, Likely M/Th, with Saturday/whenever for when I feel like doing more. Though I happen to keep coming up with new things to write about, I’m pretty positive that there’s a limit to fundamental skills talk, so this is also partly an attempt to extend the life of this blog.
