Don't not get thrown to
A lens for examining your offensive effectiveness
Here's an idea for some cutting advice I've been playing around with in my head lately:
Don't not get thrown to.
What do I mean by that? I mean that any time you make a cut and you don't get the disc, you should consider reflecting on what went wrong and could be better next time.
A cut isn't just a thing you do when it's your turn, and whether you get thrown to or not it doesn't really matter. When you make a cut for the disc, especially if it's an "under" cut, you're monopolizing the "strong space" your team has access to. The thrower only has 10 seconds with the disc (or less in other formats!), so an unsuccessful 3-second cut is 30% of the way to a turnover. A offense flows significantly better when it minimizes the number of cuts that aren't thrown to.
So: don't not get thrown to. A cut that tries and fails to get the disc is bad offense. Take pride in figuring out how to play good offense instead.
There are two paths to minimizing the amount you're "not thrown to". The first, obviously, is getting better at getting open. You can read most of my other posts on cutting for tips on that.
But you can't always get open, so great players pick their spots and learn to not waste the offense's time on cuts that are doomed to fail. Here are a few way good cutters minimize the time they spend making unsuccessful cuts:
They have a feel for where their defender is. By noting your momentum and your defender's at the moment you commit to your cut and look towards the thrower, you can get a feel for how open you'll be a moment later. (I think this feeling is partially based on literally hearing your defender's footsteps, too.)
They feel their defender behind them and use hand signals to show the thrower the spot where they want the disc (i.e. away from the defender). For example, the thrower can easily see a defender trailing on your inside hip, but they won't feel confident throwing a pass two steps past your outside hip unless you show them that you, too, know that's where the pass should go & are ready to adjust for it.
Or: they'll clear out earlier (but won't check out) when they know they haven't generated enough separation, but will hold their path in the lane longer when they're open enough for the pass.
They notice & adjust their play style when they're matched up against a more-athletic defender. You need to use different tricks against defenders who are faster than you. Don't just make the same cut you make against slower defenders and then act surprised when it doesn't work.
They predict where the thrower will be looking. If your cut isn't timed to a moment the thrower is looking to you, you won't get the disc even if you're open. Great cutters develop an intuition for when the thrower will look towards/away from different parts of the field. (Stop-and-go type moves are very helpful for timing the cut to the thrower's readiness, as I mentioned in that essay.)
They'll verbally tell other teammates to cut—or tell the thrower to look for a different pass—if they feel they're not in a favorable situation to get open themselves.
They'll cut hard to the break side when they don't like their chances of getting open in the strong space. This lets your teammates know immediately that they shouldn't be waiting for you to attack the strong space, and can attack it themselves.
It feels like a general theme here is: don't just "make your cuts" and let the thrower decide whether you're open or not. A good cutter is spending the pre-cut moments deciding whether they think they can get open. Then, during the cut, they're monitoring whether they feel they are open.
On a system-level
Beyond individual skills, unsuccessful cuts are also frequently the result of poor offensive strategy. If your team's only idea for how to start an offense is to have someone make the world's most predictable cut from the back of the stack, well, they're not going to get open unless they really know what they're doing and/or are really athletic.
In that case, I encourage you to convince your team to figure out better ways to play offense. But that's not always possible. My go-to move when I'm stuck at the back of the stack on a team running an un-inventive offense is to just cut hard to the breakside on stall zero (as mentioned above). The quicker I'm out of the way, the quicker the next player can cut. And I've at least added a little uncertainty to the defense, as that 2nd defender may not be totally prepared for their assignment to be cutting into the strong space so soon.
What's a reasonable amount to not get thrown to? That would be an interesting data collection project, but I don't have any good answers for you today. I imagine there's actually more cases of not getting thrown to at the highest levels of ultimate: the spaces are smaller and the defenders are more athletic, so offenses are forced to just try things until they find a crack in the defense.
Don't take the title of this essay completely literally—of course there are going to be times you don't get thrown to. But I hope you'll use the "don't not get thrown to" idea as a new way to think about refining your game.
In designing your team's offense and in analyzing your individual offensive skills, ask yourself: how can I minimize the number of ("strong space") cuts I make that don't get thrown to?
PS, I know there are a few jerks out there who won't throw to certain players even when they do get open. This post isn’t about that phenomenon.