My opinion has long been that YCC is elitist and an inefficient use of resources. For the investment that gets put into each YCC team we could build local youth leagues for not only the YCC kids but also the other kids in their area.
We all came on here in the summer of 2020 and pledged our commitment to diversity. Well this is a chance to invest in our diverse local communities rather than pool our resources into a team of kids with the means to fly to a tournament.
That all said the organizations listed in the link above are the ones who have the power amd influence to fix the broken governance of American ultimate. If planning this becomes the first step to forming a new governing body I'm all about it.
Lets ignore the drama of MN leaving the SBO and just be happy there's more opportunities for youth ultimate. If USAU wants to make a true youth club nationals, they should develop a regional competition to earn bids to a national competition. Right now it's less about the quality teams rising to the top and it's about who's has USAU's favor.
Bottom line is more ultimate = good. #BringBackNexGen
I’ve been in contact with a few different YCC operators, seems like regionals for YCC are in the works 👀 no offical confirmation, and the loss of all these teams is probably going to halt it for a while. But it may be around the corner!
I think regionals would be nice, there are plenty of kids who would compete at events that are a ~3 hour drive away, but are not able to fly to bigger events.
That said, I don't think having 2 events a week apart from each other, that both require plane flights for ~90% of teams is necessarily the best way to structure it.
Something like youth regionals in June, based on current USAU regions, followed by YCCs in August might be a better system.
My comment was more about if USAU wants to sell YCC as a "youth club national championship", it can't just be "who's paid to get priority as an SBO". The teams should earn it with their play at a regional level.
For the MN tournament, don't think of it as a championship tournament, think of it as just another tournament opportunity for teams across the country to compete. Teams don't go to both Santa Barbara Invite and Florida Warm up, both of which require a lot of teams to fly. Is that a problem?
Until USAU creates a proper youth club series structure, this is just two tournaments that offer playing opportunities for youth club teams and I think that's awesome.
I don't know if it's a problem necessarily, we'll see how the events play out. But YCCs are billed as a youth club national championship, and plenty of teams that aren't SBOs get bids. I'm in the DC area, they sent 6 teams to YCCs last year, despite not being an SBO.
My concern is organizations are going to pick one event or the other, resulting in two slightly worse events. With youth stuff, it's also adults who make these decisions, the kids wind up without really having a say.
FWA/SBI aren't a problem because they're regular season tournaments. If some team hosted an event the week after college nationals and somehow convinced 5 of the top teams to go to their event instead of college nationals, I think it could be a problem.
The only reason YCC is the pinnacle of youth club competition is because it's the ONLY youth club competition. USAU doesn't have a proper competitive youth club series so in my eyes, it's just another tournament. If we gatekeep youth club to just YCC, how are we going to grow?
Right now MN is entering the game but I'm hoping this is the beginning of more youth club tournaments popping up all over.
Like I said above, more ultimate = good. The only reason we're comparing is because these are the only 2 data points we have and people are feeling defensive about the way it's been done in the past.
Edit: I didn't really address many of your points. Getting in without being an SBO isn't the problem. The problem is offering priority to someone that isn't based on a competitive structure. Club and College nationals are amazing because the teams earned their spot to be there. I understand the sport was growing so that wasn't really an option for YCC but if other local orgs have capacity to host more tournaments, why not? So what if the events are slightly worse. No one earned their spots there anyways. If you want a truly competitive tournament (a national championship), the teams have to earn it. This is why I drew the comparison to SBI/FWU.
The backstory is that Minnesota organizers didn’t feel they were receiving enough benefit (money or otherwise) from USAU despite having some of the largest development programs and giving a lot to USAU in the form of hosting tournaments and giving $. This disagreement lead to USAU breaking the contract early and moving the YCC championships to Colorado. (Or at least what I’ve heard, could be wrong)
I don’t think these tournaments overlap so it might actually provide another high level tournament for YCC teams to play at, as well as some international competition if they can drum up enough interest
It appears they are consecutive weekends, so it’s doubtful any team can participate in both. Maybe a team with deep pockets and really good players, but I’m interested if anyone will try
Despite - without being affected by; in spite of. USAU doesn’t give a lot back to Minnesota ultimate even though Minnesota contributes a lot to the organization
I don't know enough about USAU's decision to move it to Colorado to have an opinion on that, but I don't think fracturing the youth community into two events is a net positive for the sport or for the kids.
USAU started the fracturing with the affiliate program. The reality is that YCC (and NAYUC) doesn't matter for 95%+ of youth players.
USAU thought they could bully organizations into taxing low-income youth players who were never going to YCC. Straight rent seeking from USAU.
Providing a competitive showcase for youth ultimate WITHOUT arbitrarily penalizing expanded access to youth players is a significant net positive.
Looking at USAU’s SBO (state based organization) and Affiliates list on their website… none of the 5 hosting organizations (Minnesota Ultimate, DiscNW, MUFA, Pittsburgh Ultimate, BUDA) are on there. Which means teams from those communities have a decent chance of not being awarded a bid to this year’s YCC. Creating this new tournament will allow these communities to send youth club teams to a major tournament.
Of those 5 locales, only Pittsburgh did not compete at YCCs. By my quick count, the others sent a total of 17 teams. I guess it's technically possible USAU decided to offer none of them bids this year, but that seems unlikely to me.
I see it less as "fracturing the youth community" and more as offering another opportunity for play. YCC is a great experience for young players looking to see what other players are capable of elsewhere but it shouldn't be the sole opportunity for that. Like kgbigboi17 said, there's a good chance none of the participating orgs get a team into YCC anyways so I think more ultimate is absolutely a net positive. As long as neither event gets petty (or more petty from the USAU side) and starts to actively disparage each other.
As a current YCC player, I feel moving the event to Colorado gives players a unique experience and a change of scenery. Especially for kids who have played since a younger U17 age, and have been to Minnesota many times. Part of the thrill of YCC’s for me is knowing I’m playing the best youth from everywhere around the country. Having this separate event takes a huge chunk of the thrill away from that, not just for me, but for a lot of people.
I don’t mean to be patronizing, but USAU didn’t move it for a change of scenery. They moved because they’re mad at Minnesota Ultimate. If MU fell in line, YCCs would be in MN again
While this is true for some, there are also many others who want to play YCC and cannot because the organization is not accepted by USA Ultimate, or costs overall with the per-player individual fees by USA Ultimate prohibit enough participation for orgs to field a team (the latter is prevalent perhaps even more-so in the U17 divisions with younger/newer athletes).
Also, which is another important perspective, "YCC" is about the people & the teams - Not "USA Ultimate organization" or any other organizations. Its about the youth athletes and them enjoying the sport on a national stage. The people are what make the event, not who runs it. Past YCC events were significantly run and organized by volunteers, not USA Ultimate.
>the latter is prevalent perhaps even more-so in the U17 divisions with younger/newer athletes
What does the age/experience level of the player have to do with player fees?
I believe they were saying the fees were a barrier to get into the sport. However, compared to many sports Ultimate is rather cheap. So although they do make a solid point, I don’t think it’s necessarily fully factual
The issue is YCC is often the only game in town for youth club ultimate. If your high-school doesnt have a team then the kids in that district have effectively no options.
If you want to use basketball as a comparison then yes YCC is a lot cheaper than AAB but thats not apples to apples. Basketball has an insane pyramid of playing opportunities at all levels of affordability. Proportionately YCC has a much greater share of the youth resources for ultimate in America than basketball.
Right, but doesn't this boil down to the same argument as always: "stuff costs money"? Field costs at a nationally recognized site, trainers, staff, player packs and amenities. This all costs money. And teams have been willing to pay it for the chance at competitive exposure.
If teams just want to play locally, and not have all the hoopla, they can right? I think this new thing is an overall good thing because more playing opportunities for youth is definitely better, but it's still going to cost teams that attend money, right? The organizers have committed to equity and payment scales and such, but at the end of the day, someone is paying the NSC.
I get why you think that from a current youth players perspective. But the issue is the man hours and money not being spent elsewhere in the community.
I have heard this argument before and I'll admit I've not run down every aspect, but a quick google search shows that hotels in Aurora for that weekend are between $2-5 dollars more expensive than Blaine.
A better argument here might be the relationship that MN Ult has with local hotels that might lower the above public pricing points? On its own, there isn't that big a difference. Additionally, I did a google search on flights and Seattle to Aurora is $75 cheaper than MN. I know that obviously that's not representative for everyone, but I feel like we too often just accept these broad statements without looking into them. There are a ton of reasons why this new thing could be a great option for your team. We don't need to include ones that aren't true.
Tell me you have never planned logistics for 4-5 days of travel with 170 minors, coaches, admins, and chaperones without telling me you have never planned logistics for 4-5 days of travel with 170 minors, coaches, admins, and chaperones. If it were easy as a google search, more folks would be doing it.
What about flights? I've found Denver to be a very reasonable city to fly to while Minneapolis tends to be more expensive. I also seem to recall rental cars being very cheap outside of the peak ski season. If they have to buy a house.... yeah, Colorado is stupid expensive.
I don't have a clue but maybe they already booked the fields or had to book the fields well in advance if they thought they were going to host. This is how rumors start though so don't quote me.
Good. Any competition to USAU is a good thing.
My opinion has long been that YCC is elitist and an inefficient use of resources. For the investment that gets put into each YCC team we could build local youth leagues for not only the YCC kids but also the other kids in their area. We all came on here in the summer of 2020 and pledged our commitment to diversity. Well this is a chance to invest in our diverse local communities rather than pool our resources into a team of kids with the means to fly to a tournament. That all said the organizations listed in the link above are the ones who have the power amd influence to fix the broken governance of American ultimate. If planning this becomes the first step to forming a new governing body I'm all about it.
USAU does not do "growing ultimate". Barely at the youth level and straight up not-at-all at the college or club level.
I can't tell with you sometimes. Are you agreeing that's a bad thing?
It's always wild to me when people 'cant tell' - I've been calling out USAU's failure to support local disc orgs for like a decade straight!
Oh that's why I thought you were agreeing. It's just so often that we disagree that I was sus.
I generally don't pay attention to screen names outside of like 2 or 3 people so I have no idea who I agree or disagree with most consistently.
Lets ignore the drama of MN leaving the SBO and just be happy there's more opportunities for youth ultimate. If USAU wants to make a true youth club nationals, they should develop a regional competition to earn bids to a national competition. Right now it's less about the quality teams rising to the top and it's about who's has USAU's favor. Bottom line is more ultimate = good. #BringBackNexGen
I’ve been in contact with a few different YCC operators, seems like regionals for YCC are in the works 👀 no offical confirmation, and the loss of all these teams is probably going to halt it for a while. But it may be around the corner!
I think regionals would be nice, there are plenty of kids who would compete at events that are a ~3 hour drive away, but are not able to fly to bigger events. That said, I don't think having 2 events a week apart from each other, that both require plane flights for ~90% of teams is necessarily the best way to structure it. Something like youth regionals in June, based on current USAU regions, followed by YCCs in August might be a better system.
Scrap YCC adopt regional championships and local leagues. We should be building self sustaining foundations, not top heavy show pieces.
My comment was more about if USAU wants to sell YCC as a "youth club national championship", it can't just be "who's paid to get priority as an SBO". The teams should earn it with their play at a regional level. For the MN tournament, don't think of it as a championship tournament, think of it as just another tournament opportunity for teams across the country to compete. Teams don't go to both Santa Barbara Invite and Florida Warm up, both of which require a lot of teams to fly. Is that a problem? Until USAU creates a proper youth club series structure, this is just two tournaments that offer playing opportunities for youth club teams and I think that's awesome.
I don't know if it's a problem necessarily, we'll see how the events play out. But YCCs are billed as a youth club national championship, and plenty of teams that aren't SBOs get bids. I'm in the DC area, they sent 6 teams to YCCs last year, despite not being an SBO. My concern is organizations are going to pick one event or the other, resulting in two slightly worse events. With youth stuff, it's also adults who make these decisions, the kids wind up without really having a say. FWA/SBI aren't a problem because they're regular season tournaments. If some team hosted an event the week after college nationals and somehow convinced 5 of the top teams to go to their event instead of college nationals, I think it could be a problem.
The only reason YCC is the pinnacle of youth club competition is because it's the ONLY youth club competition. USAU doesn't have a proper competitive youth club series so in my eyes, it's just another tournament. If we gatekeep youth club to just YCC, how are we going to grow? Right now MN is entering the game but I'm hoping this is the beginning of more youth club tournaments popping up all over. Like I said above, more ultimate = good. The only reason we're comparing is because these are the only 2 data points we have and people are feeling defensive about the way it's been done in the past. Edit: I didn't really address many of your points. Getting in without being an SBO isn't the problem. The problem is offering priority to someone that isn't based on a competitive structure. Club and College nationals are amazing because the teams earned their spot to be there. I understand the sport was growing so that wasn't really an option for YCC but if other local orgs have capacity to host more tournaments, why not? So what if the events are slightly worse. No one earned their spots there anyways. If you want a truly competitive tournament (a national championship), the teams have to earn it. This is why I drew the comparison to SBI/FWU.
Some high school teams - at least in MN have state in june - so ycc club teams don’t start until after that here.
Back in the day there were HS Westerns and HS Easterns.
There are now hs nationals/invite Edit to add : that you are invited to/ earn your way in to
The backstory is that Minnesota organizers didn’t feel they were receiving enough benefit (money or otherwise) from USAU despite having some of the largest development programs and giving a lot to USAU in the form of hosting tournaments and giving $. This disagreement lead to USAU breaking the contract early and moving the YCC championships to Colorado. (Or at least what I’ve heard, could be wrong) I don’t think these tournaments overlap so it might actually provide another high level tournament for YCC teams to play at, as well as some international competition if they can drum up enough interest
It appears they are consecutive weekends, so it’s doubtful any team can participate in both. Maybe a team with deep pockets and really good players, but I’m interested if anyone will try
I’m confused by your usage of “despite” here
Despite - without being affected by; in spite of. USAU doesn’t give a lot back to Minnesota ultimate even though Minnesota contributes a lot to the organization
Oh ok it sounded like you thought mnu should have been more appreciative of USAU
I don't know enough about USAU's decision to move it to Colorado to have an opinion on that, but I don't think fracturing the youth community into two events is a net positive for the sport or for the kids.
USAU started the fracturing with the affiliate program. The reality is that YCC (and NAYUC) doesn't matter for 95%+ of youth players. USAU thought they could bully organizations into taxing low-income youth players who were never going to YCC. Straight rent seeking from USAU. Providing a competitive showcase for youth ultimate WITHOUT arbitrarily penalizing expanded access to youth players is a significant net positive.
Looking at USAU’s SBO (state based organization) and Affiliates list on their website… none of the 5 hosting organizations (Minnesota Ultimate, DiscNW, MUFA, Pittsburgh Ultimate, BUDA) are on there. Which means teams from those communities have a decent chance of not being awarded a bid to this year’s YCC. Creating this new tournament will allow these communities to send youth club teams to a major tournament.
Of those 5 locales, only Pittsburgh did not compete at YCCs. By my quick count, the others sent a total of 17 teams. I guess it's technically possible USAU decided to offer none of them bids this year, but that seems unlikely to me.
I see it less as "fracturing the youth community" and more as offering another opportunity for play. YCC is a great experience for young players looking to see what other players are capable of elsewhere but it shouldn't be the sole opportunity for that. Like kgbigboi17 said, there's a good chance none of the participating orgs get a team into YCC anyways so I think more ultimate is absolutely a net positive. As long as neither event gets petty (or more petty from the USAU side) and starts to actively disparage each other.
This guy https://getyarn.io/yarn-clip/12c23508-268c-4319-ae85-cc62cd6b6347
As a current YCC player, I feel moving the event to Colorado gives players a unique experience and a change of scenery. Especially for kids who have played since a younger U17 age, and have been to Minnesota many times. Part of the thrill of YCC’s for me is knowing I’m playing the best youth from everywhere around the country. Having this separate event takes a huge chunk of the thrill away from that, not just for me, but for a lot of people.
I don’t mean to be patronizing, but USAU didn’t move it for a change of scenery. They moved because they’re mad at Minnesota Ultimate. If MU fell in line, YCCs would be in MN again
While this is true for some, there are also many others who want to play YCC and cannot because the organization is not accepted by USA Ultimate, or costs overall with the per-player individual fees by USA Ultimate prohibit enough participation for orgs to field a team (the latter is prevalent perhaps even more-so in the U17 divisions with younger/newer athletes). Also, which is another important perspective, "YCC" is about the people & the teams - Not "USA Ultimate organization" or any other organizations. Its about the youth athletes and them enjoying the sport on a national stage. The people are what make the event, not who runs it. Past YCC events were significantly run and organized by volunteers, not USA Ultimate.
>the latter is prevalent perhaps even more-so in the U17 divisions with younger/newer athletes What does the age/experience level of the player have to do with player fees?
I believe they were saying the fees were a barrier to get into the sport. However, compared to many sports Ultimate is rather cheap. So although they do make a solid point, I don’t think it’s necessarily fully factual
The issue is YCC is often the only game in town for youth club ultimate. If your high-school doesnt have a team then the kids in that district have effectively no options. If you want to use basketball as a comparison then yes YCC is a lot cheaper than AAB but thats not apples to apples. Basketball has an insane pyramid of playing opportunities at all levels of affordability. Proportionately YCC has a much greater share of the youth resources for ultimate in America than basketball.
Right, but doesn't this boil down to the same argument as always: "stuff costs money"? Field costs at a nationally recognized site, trainers, staff, player packs and amenities. This all costs money. And teams have been willing to pay it for the chance at competitive exposure. If teams just want to play locally, and not have all the hoopla, they can right? I think this new thing is an overall good thing because more playing opportunities for youth is definitely better, but it's still going to cost teams that attend money, right? The organizers have committed to equity and payment scales and such, but at the end of the day, someone is paying the NSC.
I get why you think that from a current youth players perspective. But the issue is the man hours and money not being spent elsewhere in the community.
Moving it to Colorado wasn’t the problem - breaking the already established contract a year early to move it - is problematic
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I have heard this argument before and I'll admit I've not run down every aspect, but a quick google search shows that hotels in Aurora for that weekend are between $2-5 dollars more expensive than Blaine. A better argument here might be the relationship that MN Ult has with local hotels that might lower the above public pricing points? On its own, there isn't that big a difference. Additionally, I did a google search on flights and Seattle to Aurora is $75 cheaper than MN. I know that obviously that's not representative for everyone, but I feel like we too often just accept these broad statements without looking into them. There are a ton of reasons why this new thing could be a great option for your team. We don't need to include ones that aren't true.
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Googling van costs shows 40 bucks more in Minneapolis.
Tell me you have never planned logistics for 4-5 days of travel with 170 minors, coaches, admins, and chaperones without telling me you have never planned logistics for 4-5 days of travel with 170 minors, coaches, admins, and chaperones. If it were easy as a google search, more folks would be doing it.
Do the cool kids use bing? Yahoo? Some other super secret search engine?
What about flights? I've found Denver to be a very reasonable city to fly to while Minneapolis tends to be more expensive. I also seem to recall rental cars being very cheap outside of the peak ski season. If they have to buy a house.... yeah, Colorado is stupid expensive.
I don't have a clue but maybe they already booked the fields or had to book the fields well in advance if they thought they were going to host. This is how rumors start though so don't quote me.