I was discussing this with Shimbo over the summer.
Some of what I've read online has lead me to believe that American Football and Basketball seem to be the sports that have skills and tactics most relevant to our own. For instance: a Sockeye player mentions that their "offense uses basketball terminology" and here are some other ultimate blog references to these sports.
Considering that these are popular American sports, it almost seems like an advantage to the American teams. They can take concepts from these games to innovate in ultimate, in ways that those not as familiar with the games, can not. And perhaps individual players with backgrounds in these sports might be at an advantage.
But of course, one of the main reasons why the comparisons get made, is that all of these writers are from North America. These are the sports they know.
Perhaps there are Irish sports with which analogies can be made? Of our 2 main native games; Hurling and Gaelic football, I think Gaelic might be more useful. Hurling is too fast. Man-marking a guy in Gaelic could be a fairly similar skill as man to man defence in Ultimate, right? There does seem to be quite a few decent Irish ultimate players that used to play Gaelic. So I can speculate that it helps.
Now I wonder if there are any tactical concepts or even terminology we can take.
Some of what I've read online has lead me to believe that American Football and Basketball seem to be the sports that have skills and tactics most relevant to our own. For instance: a Sockeye player mentions that their "offense uses basketball terminology" and here are some other ultimate blog references to these sports.
Considering that these are popular American sports, it almost seems like an advantage to the American teams. They can take concepts from these games to innovate in ultimate, in ways that those not as familiar with the games, can not. And perhaps individual players with backgrounds in these sports might be at an advantage.
But of course, one of the main reasons why the comparisons get made, is that all of these writers are from North America. These are the sports they know.
Perhaps there are Irish sports with which analogies can be made? Of our 2 main native games; Hurling and Gaelic football, I think Gaelic might be more useful. Hurling is too fast. Man-marking a guy in Gaelic could be a fairly similar skill as man to man defence in Ultimate, right? There does seem to be quite a few decent Irish ultimate players that used to play Gaelic. So I can speculate that it helps.
Now I wonder if there are any tactical concepts or even terminology we can take.
I think with regards individual activities basketball and american football are very similar, though I've never played GAA so they might be even more relevant. Having started watching NBA last year I'd say that point guards are the closest equivalent to handlers in any sport I've seen. Then for NFL I'd say that wide receiver cuts are the closest you'd find to ultimate cuts.
ReplyDeleteDefensively again I think both basketball D and cornerback D (guys that mark the receivers) in NFL are the best equivalent. You'd learn a lot from watching their body positioning if you studied them closely enough.
Sam
looks to be advantage North America then!
ReplyDeleteOf my non-ultimate playing friends, 2 took to throwing backhand's very quick. Their common denominator, they both play Tennis at a high level. Guess throwing a backhand is similar to hitting a backhand.
ReplyDeleteBut for defense, definitely American Football. Zone D is almost exactly the same. On offense, the routes that receivers sun are very similar, and handlers/quarterbacks have a lot of the same principles.
I thought most sporty people take to throwing backhands quite quickly. But tennis is definitely a sport I had forgotten about...
ReplyDeleteDo you think any non-american sports might be useful?
Is American Football really have many similarities? The points above aside, every phase of play starts from the centre of the pitch, from static, which doesn't happen very often in Ultimate.
ReplyDeleteThe closest thing I ever saw to a Zone D point was the Barca - Inter game in the Nou Camp last year. 3 players constantly putting pressure on the player with the ball, with the emphasis on pushing it to the side of the pitch and not allowing it to be played forwards or towards the centre rather than aggressively trying to win it back. Behind that 'cup' the defence was organised to prevent anything getting into the passing lanes. Interesting to watch but obviously a freak game caused by Inter having no interest in winning the ball back.
Fielding high balls in GAA seems to translate very well to Ultimate, not surprisingly