Don't plan for perfection
...
I've been trying to put into words something that frustrates me about frisbee strategy, especially after watching PoNY vs. Rhino Slam! at 2024 US Nationals. And I think I've come up with a a way of thinking about it that makes sense to me: too many frisbee teams, in too many ways, plan for perfection.
But nothing will ever be perfect. Saying "we'll just be perfect and then we'll win" isn't a plan—it's just wishful thinking. Instead, choose strategies that reflect your team's inevitable imperfection.
I'm sure Sun Tzu already said all this 2500 years ago1, but here's my (frisbee-specific) version.
O-lines and perfection on offense
I'm not a fan of teams having O- and D-lines2. I prefer the method used by San Francisco Fury (and Seattle Tempest in the WUL, among others) of having multiple lines of players who play both offense and defense. Announcer Evan Lepler mentioned Fury's strategy on a recent stream:
Many players think it's fine if the O-line is weaker on defense. I hear comments like: "If we play the offense we're capable of, we can get clean holds and win the game". But, that's just wishful thinking. Your team will always turn the disc over. Your offense should be ready to play defense, and your defense should be ready to play offense.
In the UFA, the best offenses score on roughly 60% of their possessions.
I'm not aware of any equivalent statistics available for the club division, but for a rough estimate, we can look at Rhino's 2024 Nationals. Over 6 games, they scored 87 goals and had...43 turnovers. Obviously some of those turnovers were by their D-line—but their D-line scored a fair number of those goals, too. As best we can tell without watching all the games, their O-line conversion rate is similar to—possibly slightly higher than—what we see in the UFA: 60-70%3. Offenses are going to end up playing defense.
Another upside of "planning for imperfection" on offense is that it's easier to stay calm when things go wrong. If your plan is "let's play good offense and score every time", players might play tight, and then get even tighter when the plan fails and your O-line gets broken. But if you come into the game with a mindset of "hey, even if things go great this weekend, we'll probably still average at least 74 turnovers a game"...well, then any one turnover is not much to worry about. It's already been accounted for—you've planned for imperfection.
"Shut down" defense
Another place where it often feels to me like teams & players are "planning for perfection" is in their defensive philosophy. Take, for example, this clip of Kami Groom on an Ultiworld podcast that a friend sent me a while back:
The relevant quote from Kami (starting around 20 seconds into the clip):
Mike [not sure of the last name] always said "there's no plan B for I can't get open". And that is kind of my mantra [as a defender], and a mantra for a lot of the teams I've been on, I really believe in person defense, and a particular brand of person defense where it's so tight, and you're responsible for your person and just absolutely shutting down your person.
So...I really try to be as close as I can all the time. I fail a lot, but that's kind of always the goal.
And, on one level it kind of makes sense, right? We'll just stop them from getting open and they'll have nothing left to do but throw turnovers. But it's just...such an obviously impractical strategy.
We have data for the UFA, where teams average about 250 completions per game (just eyeballing the numbers). Kami's DC Scandal team recently lost to San Francisco Fury in the 2024 national championship game. How many passes did San Francisco complete in that game? I again don't have data for the club division, but I'd expect it was similar (perhaps a bit lower since club games go to a max of 15 points).
The fact is, you can't expect the offense to not get open. "Just shut them down" is wishful thinking. Team's don't need a plan B for "I can't get open", because every team on a level similar to yours will be able to get open. Their offense is going to complete ~200 passes against you, and your game plan should take that into account.
Only one team in the entire division can be the most athletic (r/TechnicallyTheTruth material, right here). And since the offense has the advantage of moving first, even the most athletic team in the division might not be able to successfully play "just shut them down completely" defense.
I appreciate that Kami recognizes her plan doesn't actually work all the time. But although she doesn't expect perfection, I feel like she's only gone halfway. Once you recognize your plan isn't going to work, it's time to start asking questions like wouldn't it be nice if my teammates were there to help me when I failed? And wouldn't it be nice if I was prepared to help my teammates when they fail to completely shut down their matchup?
NBA teams don't play pure 1-v-1 defense against top offensive stars like Giannis, Luka, or LeBron. There's rotating, there's switching, there's help-and-recovering. There's giving up some options (letting Giannis shoot 3s, for example) to commit more resources to shutting down other, more important, threats (Giannis's drives).
It's harder to play help D on a much bigger frisbee field, but it's still doable. Why do frisbee teams think it's smart to play pure 1-v-1, no-help defense against Player of the Year Raphy Hayes?
Fast breaks
I've focused on offense, and I've focused on defense, so maybe let's have a quick section on "special teams", too.
I get the feeling that one reason teams don't embrace fast breaks is that they feel like, "hey, if we play our offense, and we run our system, we can score every time". But, as we've seen, that will never actually be the case. Offensive opportunities, while not as rare as they are in sports like hockey or soccer, need to be cherished. Giving up the strategic advantage of a fast break just to run your system against a well-prepared defense sounds less appealing after you've admitted to yourself that your offense isn't perfect.
Wanting it
Another mindset that, to me, is setting yourself up for failure, is when leaders in the huddle say something like "we just need to want it more than they do!"
I'm not saying wanting it is a bad thing—of course you should play with intensity. But don't forget that the other team also recognizes the importance of wanting it, and, on average, you should probably expect opposing teams to want it just as badly as you do.
NFL football has a reputation as a sport characterized by testosterone-driven violence and intensity. But that intensity and that wanting it is still channeled through complex offensive and defensive strategies. Wanting it badly is important, but it's not a replacement for actual strategy.
Final thoughts
Perfection will never be the norm in a frisbee game. Choose strategies that don't expect perfection:
Plan for your offense turning the disc over 7+ times a game
Plan for your defense giving up ~200 completions
Plan for the other team to want it just as badly as you do
Expect your marks to get broken sometimes. Expect your cutters to double-cut sometimes. etc etc.
See also: Think about what your opponent is thinking
One reason I feel that way is just that I think touching the frisbee is one of the funner parts of ultimate, and players that feel empowered and trusted to have the frisbee in their hands will generally work harder and feel more fulfilled. But that's a separate point from the focus of this article, so now that I've mentioned it, let's get back to today's argument.
A Rhino Slam! player tells me via email: Rhino’s O-line had 58 scores on 89 possessions at Nationals, a 65.2% conversion rate.
If you're not one of my readers who play for Rhino Slam!, adjust this number to your team's skill level.