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Inaugural Final Standing
Inaugural Teams

by Jim Herrick

Winners: San Diego Ground Zero

The vertical blade knifed through the crowded arch like a cannon shot and the massive mitt of Big Stu Downs cleanly concluded its flight.  The awed onlookers delighted in the phenomenal snag by big play Stu and salivated at the impending comeback by the Wellesley Founders.

Earlier, as the Star Spangled Banner expertly filled the air, one could not but marvel at the emergence of the sport of Goaltimate.  Goaltimate—resplendently presented on a viridescent pitch festooned by a bright yellow goal, and staged amidst the natural beauty of the Rancho Santa Fe Polo Grounds—featured well uniformed, attentive athletes reverently lined upon the clear stripe; respectful of the spectacle created for their talents.

The public address system put forth the intelligent and humorous banter of an at ease local comedian and the venerably optimistic preeminent Ultimate champion, the elongated Steve Mooney.  The ESPN cameras covered and hovered and surrounded the action as if the sports consuming masses had settled in for “Sunday afternoon Goaltimate” a thousand previous weekends.

The sidelines were a veritable Gucci row of Frisbee and Ultimate icons including Tom Kennedy—Founder of the Ultimate Players Association and  Michelle Pezzoli—founder of women’s ultimate.

Local hero and professional football player and philanthropist John Carney was on hand to throw out the first disc.  Paul Higgins of ESPN and the producer of “Athletes in Motion” was truly at ease having spent a weekend interviewing articulate, passionate athletes who love their sport for the fustenlake—the pure joy of doing what one physically does best, and who reveled in the opportunity to compete for stakes beyond their wildest hopes.

Bibbi and Robert Herrmann were there.  They simply opened up their estate, their town and their Polo Club so that their daughter and son-in-law could follow a dream. “Be our guest, we’re elated to have you here” they repeatedly echoed as their natural hospitality emanated like the sweat off the players.

The veteran officiating crew of local ultimate players settled in to observe the game for which they’d sacrificed and repressed their own egos to insure its success.

Earle Nightingale once said that people with goals succeed because they know where they are going.  It has also been said that the secret of getting ahead is getting started.  Rick Conner has goals; plenty of them. And he knows where he is going.  Rick is blessed by having a fantastically irrepressibly cheerful wife Bibbi, who shares his vision. Along with a staff of Don Vanicek, Karen, Mario, Sally, and Head Official Don Wallace, Rick and Bibbi pulled off a superb tournament. 

They flew in the players, gave the captains a warm welcoming dinner, adorned the teams with outstanding uniforms, demanded conformity to their rules and lavished the teams with Del Mar Fair tickets, a Saturday night feast, services of trainers, laundry for the finalists, Goaltimate kits, obscene quantities of cashola for the victors, and a champagne breakfast on Sunday befitting royalty. 

And it was surely a royal feeling to be sipping mimosas and scarfing bacon and eggs while watching Sunday’s preliminary games.

But the best thing Rick Conner gave us was a framework of play enabling ourselves to abandon the path of uglimate.  “Pick, travel, foul!” along with a million arguments and fights have rendered the beautiful sport of Ultimate uninteresting, unwatchable and unplayable.  Head official Don Wallace stated the concept many times:  “We’ll make the best call we can, but we may not always get it right. Simply accept the decision and play on.”

What a concept; simply accept the decision and play on. I tested the axiom during the first minute of play on Saturday morning.  With my adrenaline surging like it was the 1977 Easterns, I allowed a screaming sidearm to bounce off my elbow. Frantically, I tried to swallow the rebound and desperately fumbled the exasperatingly elusive plastic platter down my body.  As I rolled around on the ground the disc ventured between my feet and I expertly trapped it between my ankles.  I sprang up insisting I caught it.  “It bounced,’’ my marker emphatically suggested.  We looked at Don Wallace—my close friend of 15 years.  “No catch” he booms.  I hand the disc to my opponent sans sneer, snarl or snide aside. I marvel at the liberating reality of “Play On.”  Even playing defense is infinitely more enjoyable than debating the wrong side of an argument.

So Rick and Bibbi financed a dream, and on Friday night Rick pitched it to the captains:

“We didn’t throw one-hundred-fifty thousand into this event to have it end this Sunday,” Rick extolled.  “Our vision is to use this tournament to create marketing materials to attract sponsors so that this becomes a viably attractive sport for television and spectators.  Along with your participation this weekend we are going to ask your assistance in helping with the distribution of Goaltimate kits in your region.”

Rick went on to describe a Goaltimate future which involved many more tournaments with big payouts and eventually league play on a national scale with abundant television exposure.  On a parallel track would be aggressive integration of Goaltimate into schools and youth sport curricula.  The sated captains—naturally selected on the basis of leadership, positivism and for having a “glass is half full” mentality, gapped in agreement.

The next morning the teams dutifully arrived on time, got their uniforms, signed their waivers and teed it up precisely at nine am.  With minimal griping, 6 teams exited by losing the morning pool series.  Six teams advanced to the 2 winners brackets while 6 others moved on to the consolation.  The most notable morning bracket featured 3 evenly matched teams.  When the dust cleared from 3 highly competitive matches all three teams had beaten another so the tiebreaker system was invoked.  Raleigh moved to the victory bracket, Seattle to the consolation and the youthful and scrappy “Border Patrol” from San Diego had to bail.

The real drama arrived late Saturday in the form of the contest between Santa Barbara and the Wellesley Founders.  Since San Diego had effortlessly swept through their side of the draw in short 3 game matches, the Wellesley versus Santa Barbara series was all that was left to determine San Diego’s finals opponent.  With a large crowd watching, Wellesley gradually moved up on Santa Barbara utilizing their, by now, famous “4 in the box” zone defense and their “clump ball” offense.  Captained by Paul Sackley, the Wellesley Founders featured a mix of original Wellesley Goaltimate players from the late 70’s and supplementary Bostonian Ultimate legends.  Sackley and fellow Wellesleyian Scott “Masher’ Hollinger put together a great squad which included super handler Jordan Haskell, DoG veteran champions Jim Parinella, Gary Lippman and Ultimate's finest receiver, Jeremy Seeger.  Big Play Stu, Masher and Sackley’s strategy prevailed.  Essentially, the “four in the box” zone gifted the Condors both the clear and the march to the crease.  Penetrating the goal, though, was extremely elusive.  Repeatedly Wellesley would hand block the Santa Barbarians at the goalmouth.  Then they would utilize their 4-man clump to patiently work back to the clear and advance to the goal.  From there, they made an abundant handful of spectacular throws and catches for goals that allowed for a comfortable lead and, eventually, a time cap victory.

As the match unfolded the sideline “monkey chatter” grew voluminously.  It was well known that San Diego’s team was the most experienced at Goaltimate.  The had an all-star squad featuring “Jim Daddy” Ingabritzen — a potent offensive power, Steve Ferguson — a dominating punishing athlete, Greg Pinz —talented blade whipper, the self proclaimed “nicest guy in Goaltimate” — John “Bullet” Cione.  Also, Goaltimate scoring specialist — Cliff Smith, the emotional yet gifted — Mike Blackard, and the best all around Goaltimate skilled player of all — the uniquely rational captain — Mike “Frenchy” Boisvert.  It was widely acknowledged that these two teams had invested the most energy into the Skills particular to Goaltimate”.  Inflips, vertical dumps, searing blades, pin point hammers aggressive goal mouth play, selective scoring shots and comprehensive Goaltimate strategies separated these two teams from the other would be finalists.  Wellesley had played 160 games into the two months leading up to the tournament.  San Diego had been playing Goaltimate weekly for 10 years.  The development of the arch emerged in San Diego 5 years ago after the fellows had been playing between 2 famous trees in Mission Bay Park for an eternity.  The roots and turf destruction at Mariners Point had caused the Park Ranger to boot the locals to greener pastures so Greg Pinz and Peter McCabe started building arches. 

San Diego had had more than a few cups of coffee at Ultimate Nationals during the last 12 years but their emotionally combative style never fostered a championship atmosphere.  As the years wore on, Goaltimate emerged as the game of choice.  Truly, the arrival of Rick Conner and his emerging dream was a panacea for San Diego.

Nonetheless the debate ensued.  Could “4 in the Box” and “clump ball” defeat experienced and fundamentally sound, athletic play.

Sunday morning armchair handlers predicted San Diego would contest the clear vigorously.  The real unknown was whether they could penetrate the box.  They answered that by scorning on their first possession and methodically winning the first game. Wellesley roared back in game 2 but San Diego again dominated and took game three.  Wellesley was having trouble clearing and despite an explosive block of a rarely contested clear by Stu, San Diego marched towards their third win.  All of a sudden Jeremy, Masher and Stu came to life in a fantastic flurry of goals and tied the game at 4.  Inexplicably, Wellesley throws back through the goal for a turnover.  Blackard finds Ingabritzen with a fundamental in flip from the goalmouth to the middle of the back endzone, and the Bankroll and Glory goes to San Diego.

In an emerging sport it’s often difficult to define the fundamentals.  San Diego played seven guys who were very familiar with how to score.  Cliff Smith for instance, hovered around the goalmouth and quietly caught 8 for scores. Wellesley’s abundant hand blocks of the day before were non existent.  Despite a high count, San Diego handlers did not panic.  They combined the rotating dump pass with decisive blades, in flips and backhand shovels from point blank range into the goalmouth.

In one day San Diego buried 20 years of ugly Ultimate history, and transformed into Champion Sportsmen.  By dedicated practice and respect for the power of positivism, they are now custodians of both the championship and Goaltimate’s creed of civility.  May they wear it well!

The truth of the matter is that the finalists matched the two greatest teams in the history of the sport.  The other sixteen teams were comprised of Ultimate players with a Goaltimate makeover.  Ground Zero and the Founders were comprised of Goaltimate players from birth, with some who had been biding their time by playing Ultimate while awaiting Goalty’s inauguration.

Beautifully, the best team won, the second best came in second. Santa Barbara beat San Francisco for 3^rd place.   New York (or Bicoastal Spree) as they were know as, with Kenny Dobyns, Cribber—who unfortunately broke his arm while falling on a cleat-- and Tully vanquished over Seattle in the consolation bracket.

Simply stated, we all lucked out by having a guy with a dream and enough pocket depth to kick Goaltimate into gear.  Rick Conner provided us an unforgettably fabulous experience, and in so doing, we realized just how perfectly joyously fantastic the game is to play.  And so as we await the treatment by ESPN, the continuation of Goaltimate in West Palm Beach, FL in February, the acceptance of the sport in the schools and most importantly, experience the terrific joy of playing a sport replete with running, diving, catching, throwing, blading, layingout, blocking, and just plain playing with the big arch, I implore you all to simply PLAY ON.

As a member of the Boston Rude Boys in 1982 and 1983, Jim Herrick is a former National and World Ultimate champion. Along with Mark Ide and The Wellesley Ultimate Frisbee club he is credited with inventing Goaltimate.