derby little musings

Yell at a Ref and I will take you out back and beat you in a way that there are no bruises. Promise.

In no particular order, and in my opinion:

CHAOS ON THE BENCH

Chaos on the bench leads to mistakes in lineups, pantie issues, overlooking of penalty box and skaters with penalties, anxiety, frustration, rage, and everything bad! keep it calm on the bench! how? well, in my experience self run benches with two lines and stagnant skaters on each line run themselves very smoothly with even game play for all and next to no stress.  This leaves your coach to coach, fancy that! and your bench manager to track penalties and panties.

STRATEGY BEING YELLED AT YOU FROM THE SIDELINES

“Get on her!” “Man on man!” “Call it!” Plan your shit out before you step out onto the track, ‘cause you know what, sideline coaching doesn’t work. and if your main strategy is ” Get Annie Sk8r “, guess what, you’re going to lose - Annie Sk8r has 4 other girls playing with her.

YOU’RE NOT BRINGING IT BACK TO THE BASICS

Strategy is a HUGE part of derby, huge! But, if you can’t perform a simple booty block, if you can’t differentiate between offense and defense, and if you can’t sustain a good derby stance - you’re going to be outskated. and you’re going to lose. (yes, I enjoy the oxford comma)

YOUR JAMMERS DON’T TRUST YOUR BLOCKERS

Jammers who don’t trust their blockers look for the dark side, they battle through walls impatiently and pull minor penalties on every pass, they end up in the box, and then you lose. 

YOUR BLOCKERS DON’T TRUST YOUR JAMMERS

Blockers who don’t trust their jammers will end up bridging out of play skaters, they will take their eyes off the prize (opposing jammer, what!), they will block ineffectively, and then you lose.

YOUR WARM UP/INTRO SUCKED

The way you warm up is the way you’re going to play.  If you’re a lazy FUCK warming up, guess what? you’re going to get outskated and outplayed and you’re going to lose.  Your team introduction serves as a tool for the audience to know who you are, but it should also get you amped and ready to go.  If you’re not amped, you’re going to lose.

YOU DIDN’T TAKE ADVANTAGE OF HALF TIME

You better quit kissing on your man/ladyfriend and get to the locker room.  Half time is still game time and you need to stay in the game.  It’s good to point out positives, but criticisms had better be present or else you will change nothing. and you will lose.

YOU’RE A “SECOND PERIOD” TEAM

Hey! Guess what? It takes 60 minutes to win a game - not 30. You lose.

Welp, those are my opinions, what are yours?

p.s. I googled and found the image here and photoshopped it.. at my desk.

Has anyone plopped down next to you while you’re gearing up and said ” YOU’RE WELCOME ” …. “Yeah, I finally washed my gear last night”

This is a huge pet peeve of mine! Why do I have to thank you for being a hygienic, functioning member of derby society? Wash your shit before you catch some sort of flesh eating bacteria!

most unlikely thing to happen in a derby huddle?

The #1 Unspoken Rule in Derb

Are you a noob?

Are you Jewish?

Are you unable to come up with a clever derby name?

Please be Mandy Shoveitz.

Delicious and sweet but watch out, put a bottle or two to your face and you’re on the floor.

Show me your best bruise - it’s NSFW for me to show mine.

*This is not my arse! Just a fitting image I googled for my musing. :)

I want to take a minute to chat a bit out noobs -

At this point we’re getting more girls than there are spots on the team, so the girls who don’t get drafted to a team have an opportunity practice and learn and get better throughout the season in preparation for the next season’s draft, yadda yadda. These girls get opportunities to go out and bout and work with all of the wonderful guest coaches that our league brings in, etc.  Pretty awesome compared to back in the day when you would just get turned away.

I heard one of these girls complaining that that no one goes to watch them when they go away to bout, so how do we know how well they play? and how are we supposed to be able to make good draft decisions if we don’t go?  I agree that we should be supportive of our sisters in training, but I wholeheartedly disagree with making draft choices by watching them bout on a team of noobs, against noobs. let me tell you why:

I’ve been making draft decisions for my team for the past three years,

NO, I do not stalk boot camp for draftees, that’s silly!  Most of the girls are just learning how to skate, how can you make a decision based on that?

NO, I do not want to make my decision based on the way you play with a team full of new recruits - because I am not drafting you to a team of new girls, and you will not be playing teams of new girls.

YES, I do base my decision on the work I see you do at league practices with veteran skaters.  I want to see how you take encouragement, tips, criticism, a solid hit to the outside on turn 3, the challenges of a yoga freak, slavedriver, masochist run league practice.  I ask girls on my team to go to you and offer help and see how you react.  I don’t want to hear excuses.  I want to see you step up to the jam line against a pack of veteran skaters.  I want to see you playing with your feet while you’re not in a drill.  I want to see you being comfortable in this thing called derb.

And that’s just the way that I do things, you think we’re not watching, but we are.

And if I EVER, EVER, see a noob hollering at a ref - you get an automatic NO on your forehead.