Re: The Economy and Club Ultimate

On Mar 10, 7:49 am, akira <a-yamaguch...@xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx> wrote:
Thanks for the thoughts. Maybe other folks care to speculate...?

Or perhaps it's too early to be asking these questions.

Focusing on the economy, I do agree that our sport isn't in danger /
at-risk. Maybe parts of the game though -- the nature of the landscape
is bound to change.

Club... is expensive, especially to play outside of certain geo
clusters. If you're unemployed you might have the time to drive across
the country, but money is going to make things hard if not impossible.
Nevermind the scary if you don't have health insurance. If you have a
job, who can get the time? So you're stuck paying hard costs like
airfare and rental cars that are hard to reduce.

Maybe best-of-breed type tournaments can hang on to their bases..
assuming teams are willing to save and sacrifice to go to a couple-few
best events per year, but maybe the more local and regional events get
hurt? Or the other way around -- maybe the local/regional events that
can remain more personal and tailor the experience to a small base can
thrive and the bigger events struggle to draw the dollars required to
gain economies of scale?

Perhaps more local events will sprout up, as teams need to take on
more activities to have opportunities to play as well as fund other
parts of their season.

Or maybe teams will start putting together more of their own scrimmage
days -- 4 teams, 2 fields permitted from the local park district,
driving and meal costs only, no hotels or people crashing couches,
etc.

More non-practicing teams.. interesting...

Much like the real economic crisis, I think the group most affected by
the economy will be the "frisbee middle class." Oh yes. Here it goes.

So, broadly defined, I see this frisbee-class conflation much the same
way as one would traditionally think about class in America. If the
frisbee elite are those with both (a) the skills to compete at the
highest level and (b) the finances to fund their travel expenses, and
the frisbee lower class are those who don't have the skills to compete
at the highest level (thus making their finances essentially
irrelevant in this context), the frisbee middle class are those with a
mixture of (a) and (b). That is, a member of the frisbee middle class
may have the skills to contribute to an elite team, but not the time/
money, or they may have the time/money, but not the required skills.

With that in mind, it seems the vast majority of UPA series
participants are in this (admittedly poorly defined) middle class.
These are the teams that round out pool play, will occasionally give
an elite team a good game, and fight hard in consolation brackets.
These are the teams that, before the economy lost its pants, would be
willing to wear the same type of jerseys as the elite teams, go to the
same tournaments (albeit against different competition), and generally
participate in the same sort of activities with the understanding that
while a nationals berth was unlikely, ;iving the lifestyle was more
than enough motivation. In the interest of clarity, I consider teams
that routinely compete against elite nationals-qualifiers elite even
if they don't make nationals themselves.

For this season, these types of players will have to ask some tough
questions, and make tough decisions. Most of these focus around one
basic question: given that nationals is basically impossible, does the
experience supersede the cost of playing club frisbee. Ultimately, it
comes down to personal preference, finances, and ability. As a member
of both the frisbee and real-world middle class, I consider both short-
term investments (real life = lunch out, frisbee = cleats, gas to
pickup, etc.) and medium-to-long term investments (real life = repairs
on my car, frisbee = team dues, travel expenses). I don't know about
you all, but my car repairs are currently on hold. There are far fewer
charges on my bank statement for coffee and $5 foot longs. It stands
to reason that that type of decision making will carry into
recreational habits, where frisbee (among other things) hold an
important place.

So, will the crisis affect Frisbee? Hard to say about the logistics. I
think that tournaments will look basically the same, perhaps with a
more local teams than in years past. Even at its highest level (UPA
club series), Frisbee is very socially fluid; teams change year-to-
year with little-to-no effect on the national level. As long as people
WANT to play, this sport will survive, and tournaments will get
filled. I want to play, so I will play; I'll look at money as we get
closer to the start of club season.

However, in a sport so closely tied to personal finances and class
affiliation, I find it hard to believe that Ultimate culture will
remain the same. Undoubtedly, Ultimate has benefited greatly from the
expansion of the middle class. More baby boomer kids can afford
college, so the college game exploded in the 1990s and into the 2000s.
Middle class parents (and, by extension, their kids) had pretty safe
liquid assets, so it was a lot easier to make somewhat superfluous
purchases. $10 cotton tees became $35-$40 jerseys (not to mention
shorts, hats, headbands, etc.), $15 soccer cleats became $80 Nike
football cleats, and lets not forget all the countless Underarmour arm
sleeves and calf braces that mask mediocre skill behind dryfit
material. In more ways than one, Ultimate has reflected the middle
class' decadence, inability to save, and willingness to spend money on
non-essential items.

Like the country, it's on Ultimate to reinvent itself and make itself
sustainable. I think it's possible as the middle class tightens its
belt and retreats into protecting assets, so too will the Ultimate
middle class. While this comes at an unfortunate time, as we attempt
to establish "legitimacy" (whatever that means) through mainstream
marketing, athletic wear, television deals, faux professional leagues,
one wonders if we're asking the right questions. Ultimate has always
been supported by its members both athletically and financially. In a
time where marketers and sponsors are wary to financially commit to
ANYTHING, it may be time to ask not what others can do for Ultimate to
help vault it to some undefined level that's perceived as legitimate
to others, and instead find ways where we can continue to economically
support the sport, attract new players, and sustain our community in
an manner that's both economically responsible and socially dynamic.
.

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