Basketball, my first game ever in a YMCA

Dis afternoon, fo' de fust time ever, Ah' played in some hoopball game in some YMCA, de game wuz at da damn Waldam Y. Fo' de fust time, Ah' had succeeded in convincin' de Y-staffa' controllin' de situashun t'let me use da damn Group Exercise Room, but Ah' decided dat runnin' around playin' hoopball would dig me in shape betta' dan solitary drill. Ah' decided some mix uh solitary drill and runnin' around playin' wid oders gots'ta be optimal.

From 114 PM t'124 PM Ah' played in some ten-minute full court hoopball game, five on five. Ah' intercepted some pass, gots some defensive rebound, grabbed some loose ball, and passed t'a team-mate who shot and sco'ed, which maybe wuz an assist. Man! Ah' made some passes widout bein' intercepted. Several times, fo' 'esample when de oda' team dun did de fast-break, Ah' wuz put into situashuns where Ah' had t'defend against some playa' oda' dan de playa' I wuz designated t'guard; every time Ah' wuz able t'prevent da damn opponent fum sco'in'.

Afta' de game some sho't black-haired honky dude and some gray-haired chest, said t'me, 'You're getting up there'. He meant dat he thought Ah' wuz jumpin' high. Lop some boogie. Actually right now Ah' duzn't gots a strong vertical jump fum da standin' start. Man! But it be possible dat Ah' have developed a strong vertical jump fum a runnin' start, cuz' of de kind'a soccer practice Ah' do. 'S coo', bro. De pass intercepshun Ah' made durin' de hoopball game, featured me jumpin' high t'intercept da damn pass afta' sprintin' about twelve yards.

Den Ah' talked t'de dudes, while watchin' a game, about whut posishun some low scrub-type should play on offense. A brother dude said, dat everyone wantsa play guard, and da damn fo'wards is betta' dan de centers; so's I resolved t'play center, as some way uh startin' out humbly.

Next Ah' had t'shoot hoops t'compete fo' some spot on de next team t'play. Ah' made a dree-pointer, and also made a shot fum free-drow distance; hence, Ah' gots'ta play and at leasst one honky dude had t'sit out cuz' I whup' him in de shoot-out. Man!

In de second game Ah' played center on offense. Ah' co'rectly posishuned mah'self fo' about three offensive rebounds, but some sucka behind me wuz able t'knock de ball away every time. Dis game wuz tirin' a'cuz, playin' center, Ah' had some longa' way t'run compared t'when Ah' wuz playin' guard. Ah' reached da damn limits uh my current endurance at da damn end uh dis game, but dis wuz afta' neva' slackin' on defense fo' 20 minutes, guardin' opponents oda' dan de joker I wuz designated t'guard when necessary. And today wuz mah' fust day uh hoopball games.

Afta' I had played dese games Ah' heard dis honky chick who played hoopball wid de dudes today, say, 'he played good!'. Ah' knowed she wuz rappin' about me. Ah' wuz dinkin', today wuz de fust day Ah' showed interest in hoopball, and today wuz de fust day a chick played wid de Waldam hoopball dudes.

Afta' de game, Ah' felt dat in YMCA hoopball, dere be a ball-hog problem, similar t'de YMCA soccer ball-hog problem. Dough Ah' dun did some baaaad job uh runnin' around gettin' open fo' passes. still nobody passed t'me.

De hoopball resembled da damn YMCA soccer in de sense dat Ah' wuz able t'accomplish alot on defense. Overall, Ah' hustled on defense, dun did a few 20 yard defensive sprints, always dun did mah' job on defense. De joker I wuz guardin' only sco'ed once durin' de two 10-minute games, by shootin' a long-distance shot. Man!

De fact be dat in both hoopball and soccer, Ah' duzn't know de dudes Ah' am playin' wid, Ah' duzn't get de ball passed t'me, and derefo'e, fo' me playin' defense kin produce mo'e acshun compared t'playin' offense.

Commander Fleet Air Reserve Wing Atlantic, was my uncle

Yesterday I took possession of a brochure officially commemorating the appointment of my mom's brother to the position of Commander Fleet Air Reserve Wing Atlantic.  Photos of the brochure can be found at:
Hobbs Uncle appointed Commander Fleet Air Reserve Wing Atlantic

Soccer- new variations of 'Eagle' & 'Wildcat' aerial-attack patterns tested

Saturday for 3 hours, I closely observed the events while I performed 'Wildcat' & 'Eagle' type soccer aerial attack dribble patterns (David Virgil's Blog: Soccer- detailed observations made of Eagle & Wildcat pattern aerial-dribble runs). Sunday evening for 3 hours I experimented with and observed two new variations of 'Wildcat', & three new variations of 'Eagle': Wildcat-C, Wildcat-H, Eagle-T, Eagle-S, Eagle-D. Monday morning over the course of four hours, I repeated new variations introduced Monday, and tried out three even newer variations: Eagle-S-SD, Eagle-T-SD, Eagle T-SD-NC,  Eagle S-SD-NC.

Sunday and Monday, based on observations made on Saturday, the goal was to compress the patterns, so that they would move me a shorter distances in-between touches on the ball; and, I introduced a helium filled baloon on a string tied to a marker-cone, floating 6' high, to represent the position of the defender who I expected to beat on the move. I realized that prior to closely observing my own movements, I had without realizing it, been covering distances between touches on the ball that were much longer than the distances seemed to be during the runs.

By the end of Monday:

For the 'Eagle' pattern, the distance from start of air-dribble pattern to point at which ball is moved over and past defender had been reduced from 23' to 9'. One of the ways this was done, was to eliminate one or both of the two touches coming before the chip which lofts the ball over the defender's head.

For the 'Wildcat' pattern, the distance from start of air-dribble pattern to point at which ball is moved over and past defender had been reduced from 14' to 7'. One of the ways this was done, was to use the initial chip with the foot to get the ball over the hypothetical defender's head, as opposed to using the second touch of the run with the head, to get the ball over the defender's head.

The attempt to compress the distance between the start of the run and the point at which the ball is gotten over the defender's head, involved impairment of competence. It is more difficult to chip the ball up over a six foot high obstacle 8 feet away from you, compared to such an obstacle 20 feet away from you. It is more difficult to, move forwards just 5' with the ball from touch 1 to touch 3 while keeping the ball above the ground and using the feet, and then chip the ball up and over a 6-foot high barrier, compared to doing the same thing but moving 13' forwards before chipping it up and over. The compressed distance leads to bodily awkwardness during the chip up and over the obstacle.

To better deal with the compressed distance of the air-dribble prior to the chip that is part of the Eagle pattern, I decided to try touching the ball on every step as opposed to on every other step during the preliminary dribble; and I decided to try the skipping style while doing this. This produced surprisingly good results (after a few initial failures) such as improved less-clumsy body-position during the chip after the dribble, compared to what was the case when the ball was touched every two paces during the air-dribble prior to the chip.

I feel confident that I will be able to rapidly acquire the skills needed to beat defenders using variations of the Eagle & Wildcat patterns. I may not always make the wisest decision possible regarding which drill to practice, but whatever the drill, I always improve at a fast rate.

On Sunday evening there were teenage boys sharing the basketball court with me without complaining about my cones and my baloon and my presence. I had been there first and I tried to stay out of their way. After the practice, one of the teen-age boys, an East-asian, said regarding me, "he'll have them". I agree with him.

Drills done in practice Sunday and Monday:

Sunday dec 23 445 pm - 745 pm

Wildcat-C
Wildcat-H
Eagle-T
Eagle-S
Eagle-D

Monday dec 24, 719 am - 1120 am

Eagle-D
Eagle-S
Wildcat-H
Wildcat-C

Eagle-S-SD
Eagle T-SD
Eagle T-SD-NC
Eagle S-SD-NC

Google dropped my formerly famous page from its listings

My hit count on about 12 pages tracked by one of my trackers, has fallen to less than 10% of what it used to be a year ago. Apparently the Google search engine has for some reason simply stopped listing at least one of my pages. For years I used to get lots of hits through Google on "brotherhood prayer poetic prayer a poem prays the lord...". But now, the Google search engine does not even list the page "brotherhood prayer poetic prayer a poem prays the lord...".

The situation with Google used to be like the situation with Bing is now. "poems of brotherhood - Bing" returns my "brotherhood prayer poetic prayer a poem prays the lord..." as the 17th result out of 2.3 million.

Google used to give high rank to "brotherhood prayer poetic prayer a poem prays the lord...". But now, it does not even list "brotherhood prayer poetic prayer a poem prays the lord...". And now, Bing, which in the past did not list my "brotherhood prayer poetic prayer a poem prays the lord..." is listing it, almost on page 1, as the 17th result returned out of 2.3 million for a search for 'Poems of brotherhood' (search made without use of quotation marks).

"brotherhood prayer" poetic yayzoos - Google Search does not produce "brotherhood prayer poetic prayer a poem prays the lord..." ('Yayzoos' is an uncommon word used in the poem).

"brotherhood prayer poetic prayer" - Google Search also does not produce the page entitled "brotherhood prayer poetic prayer a poem prays the lord...".

This despite the fact that the Google searchbot visited "brotherhood prayer poetic prayer a poem prays the lord..." this year on August 27 (), August 29 , & September 11 .

I don't understand the disappearance of the page. For years the page was listed and displayed correctly in the browser. Google gives top rank listing to many pages a million times more 'offensive' than "brotherhood prayer poetic prayer a poem prays the lord...".

There are search engines that do not pretend that they are not selective in terms of pages listed, such as Bing. Google's stated policy best I can recall, is that pages that are linked to on pages listed by Google, will be listed by Google.

It reminds me of how for a few weeks Angelfire completely eliminated my website, before resurrecting it.

The word 'Yayzoos', is simply the word for Jesus as it is written in the original Greek.

Soccer- detailed observations made of Eagle & Wildcat pattern aerial-dribble runs

This morning I worked for 3 hours in the YMCA gym, on the two soccer aerial-dribble patterns which are most ready to be implemented in actual games, the 'Wildcat', & the 'Eagle' patterns. Both patterns involve 4 touches on the ball and one bounce.

I felt that though I had advanced far in my understanding of the application of aerial-dribble to actual games, I was in danger of using my sense of accomplishment as an excuse for resting from and avoiding further mental activity regarding the implementation of aerial dribble in actual games.

I wanted to measure out exactly what happens where on the court, during the Eagle & Wildcat aerial-dribbles. I had no access to an overhead camera to record my movements. I set up a grid using colored cones and colored rubber plate-like-things, to mark off various positions on the court. My intent was to, after each aerial-dribble run, note down the coordinates of where on the court each event took place during the course of the aerial dribble run. Before I started I felt like I would not be intellectually speaking be up to the task remembering the exact location of the four events in the run that come after the initial starting kick of the run.

I found to my surprise, that I was able to record each event in the run from the very beginning (I admit sometimes my memory of an event was relatively uncertain). At first I found it useful to map the events out on graph paper. I placed a chair with my notebook pen and pencil on it near the end of the course I was running, so that I would have access to the paper and pen immediately after the run ended as opposed to having to walk back to the desk at the start-point to start writing in the notebook. I worked backwards, noting down first the last event in the run, then the second-last, and so forth. The first event of the run was always the hardest event to remember.

I took notes on 27 Eagle-pattern runs, and 25 Wildcat-pattern runs.

My ideas were: Knowing what a typical natural Eagle or Wildcat run is like, will help me set up the cones and markers for practicing such runs; marker targets for such runs should at first reflect what such runs are naturally like; practicing using markers that reflect natural typical runs will strengthen the skills involved with such natural/typical runs; I will be able to use my refined improved natural/typical skills, to perform new variations of the Eagle and the Wildcat; I need to know how far away an opponent should be if I am to commence an Eagle or Wildcat run; I need to know at which point the ball is airborne above everybody's head during such runs.

In general I was thinking along short-term lines hoping to be able to implement the runs in games next month, as opposed to long-term development of dazzling new tricks that will not be ready for a year. Hence I felt inclined to focus on skills that are relatively speaking more ready to be implemented during an actual game compared to other skills.

Facts I discovered re how things are initially and naturally with the 'Eagle' & 'Wildcat' Patterns:

Eagle: ideally, ends in ball being trapped to ground as soon as it bounces; on average covers 33 feet in distance from start to end; on average ball is chipped up at point 13 feet from start point; average chip to re-entry reception distance-- 20 feet; direction imparted to run via chip; angle of turn or slant relative to direction at start-- 18 degrees [http://www.visualtrig.com] (in fighter-pilot lingo, given 12:00 as straight ahead, to 11:30 or 12:30); suited for use when no defender in direction of movement for at least 10 feet; ball is airborne above players' heads from point 16 feet from start of run to point 26 feet from start of run.

Wildcat: on averages covers 32 feet in distance from start to end; on average ball is naturally headed at point 9 feet from start point; average header to kick distance-- 11 feet; average kick to bounce distance-- 7 feet; average bounce to kick distance-- 5 feet; direction imparted to run via header; angle of turn or slant relative to direction at start: 18 degrees (in fighter-pilot lingo, given 12:00 as straight ahead, to 11:30 or 12:30); suited for use when no defender in direction of movement for at least 6 feet; ball is airborne above players' heads from point 6 feet from start of run to point 16 feet from start of run.

Looking at the facts I now can see, that I should experiment with changing the Eagle pattern, so as to reduce the distance an opponent who is in the direction I intend to go, must be from me when I start the run. Such changes could involve changing events in the run, or changing how those events are performed.

Long distances between touches are glamorous and something I naturally strive for. Attempting to achieve long distances between touches produces acceleration in rate of skill improvement. Yet paradoxically in actual indoor games, conditions are crowded and short distances between t0uches are advantageous.

During the practice I discovered that I now have a natural ability I never knew I had: the ability to chip the ball up in the air to a point so it eventually reaches a point on the floor 20 feet away, sprint at full speed, and then trap the ball as soon as it hits the ground. Of the Eagle pattern runs done during the practice, the following numbered runs featured both sprint at full speed and also the ball being trapped as soon as it hit the ground, after the chip: 12, 13, 16, 18, 19, 21, 22, 23, 24, 26, 27. 11 out of 27 or 41% of the Eagle runs, manifested high speed and the ball trapped against the ground after the chip. This skill/ability does not manifest until I have been warmed up, but after I have been warmed up, becomes almost ever-present.

I was thinking, how did I develop this ability to chip the ball up, sprint at full speed, and then trap it against the ground at a point about 20 feet away as soon as it hits the ground? Then I realized that previously for a long time, my practices had consisted of air-dribbling the ball, keeping the ball under tight control whil I ran, without letting it bounce. When the ball is in such fashion air-dribbled without bounces, the foot usually hits the ball when the ball is close to just a foot above the ground. Similarly, when I trap the ball to the ground after I chip it, the timing is such that my foot reaches the ball when it is close to the ground.

Soccer @ Oak Square Y December 18

12:03 AM 12/20/2012

Yesterday, I put up a new web-page, that describes what happened during the Tuesday Dec 18 evening soccer games at the Oak Square Y:

Soccer indoors Oak Sq Y Brighton Dec 18, 2012

The page contains a brief summary of the events from my own personal perspective, and a table showing what happened during each game.

If I have anything further to say re the games of Dec 18th I'll add them here.

Vision of Cop Angel Letter I wrote and sent out during College

When I was in college, I had written up a religious exhortation and distributed it. Then I had a vision about the letter I had written. The vision about the first letter, and the content of the first letter, composed the second letter.

Page 1 of the letter can be found at:

Vision of Angelic Christian Cop I had in College Letter

Page 2 of the letter can be found at:

Page 2 Vision of Angelic Christian Cop I had in College Letter

One reason I have kept this letter to myself for several years, is that I feel people have been misinterpreting it.

The words re 'Christ vs marijuana etc' mean that I feel that Christ can help people to overcome the problem of overuse of marijuana, and problems such as the wrong person using it at the wrong time. The words are not intended as a blanket-condemnation of all cannabis use.

Words such as "Can the Soviet Union stand before a Spirit-filled army?", were never intended to stir up violent bloodthirsty hatred for the Soviet Union. What I meant was that a spirited army would be able to help the Soviet people move on to higher more mentally transcendental levels, without violence.

The general tenor of the main paragraph emphasizes how the Spirit can be attained to mentally without first having done so-called 'good works'. But it should be kept in mind that the audience I had in mind, was composed of fellow-college students, youths just starting out in life who had not had much of a chance to do either good or bad.

Regarding the fact that St. Paul received the Spirit three days after he repented of persecuting the Church, I point out in the 'Additional Notes', that St. Paul persecuted the Church in good conscience, and had always been a conscientous man prior to his moment of Christian epiphany.

Seems some people have failed to appreciate this letter. Personally, I have come to believe that one of the good qualities of the letter, is that it illustrates how all the different qualities of God, or all the different qualities of a prophet-like person, are combined into one personality, similar to how various ingredients are combined into a soup.

Soccer Day-before-game Practice Routine

My soccer practice routine as planned, for the next day before a games-day practice. All drills involve shooting/kicking/passing; most involve dribbling:

W0D, 5 variations, 18 H/variation
W1D, 4 variations, 16 H/variation
W2D, 4 variations chosen at random from 9 possible, 15 H/variation
C0D, 5 variations, 4 H/variation
C1D, 1 variation chosen at random from 6 possible, 10 H
C2D, 1 variation chosen at random from 10 possible, 10 H
AHC0D-A, 30H
AHC0D-B, 30H
AHW0D, 30H
SLKR-RT-kat, 10 H
SRKL-RT-kat, 10 H

W0D-aerial-WT, 5 variations, 8 H/variation
W0D-aerial-NT, 5 variations, 6 H/variation
W1D-aerial-NT, 4 variations, 30 H/variation

C0D-aerial-NT, 5 vars, 10 H/variation
FB-Wildcat 8H
FB-Eagle 8H
SB-Wildcat 6H
SB-Eagle 6H

Soccer Chip Off-Dribble Progress since Dec 11 Games

After the games of Tuesday December 11, I realized my skill-deficiency in terms of angled shots & chips off-the-dribble, especially angled aerial chip-passes of the sort that need to be soft and slow. I understood that my methods of training had overemphasized zero and ninety degree angled kicks.

By the evening of Wednesday December 12th, I had invented optimal drills designed to correct the deficiencies I had noted.

Wednesday, Thursday, Friday & Saturday evenings I shot/passed the ball 120 times in 73 minutes, doing the angled kicks off-the-dribble drills I had invented to cure the weaknesses. After these 73 minutes, I felt certain that I had achieved very significant progress in terms of chipping the ball up off the ground-dribble. Of the 73 minutes, only 40 kicks during 23 minutes, involved chipping the ball off of the dribble. The other 50 minutes involved, kicking the ball low off the dribble.

The 40 chip-kicks done in 23 minutes resulted in: ability to consistently chip the ball up off of a slow dribble, at a high angle, with a soft velocity, to a point close to the intended target point, a point about 13 feet high on the wall and 24 feet away. This despite the difficulties of chipping a ball up off of a wood floor.

After I noted the improvement, I was thinking: as a result of the aerial-dribbling work, I have developed the ability to quickly improve to an impressive level, doing semi-aerial stuff like chip-passes, that are more often actually encountered during games. I should consider the possible alternatives when it comes to working on semi-aerial type stuff commonly encountered during games. Some such alternatives: flip rolling ball up into aerial control; flip bouncer up into aerial control; multi-bounce aerial dribbles; ground-trap bouncer; ground-trap volley. Idea being that hence the aerial-dribble work I have done in the past can be exploited, so as to produce extraordinary progress in such semi-aerial type stuff.

Soccer- Evolution of a Drill Designed to Correct a Weakness

I described in the blog-post, my mentally and physically hectic activity in soccer in the days after the Tuesday December 11 games, how I had to face the challenge of devising optimal drills to correct weaknesses detected.

'House' Pattern for practicing kick of ball at 45 degree angle to right contains text and graphic describing the first drill I came up with, for the purpose of practicing angled kicks off the dribble. The 'House' is the drill that occurred to me in the locker room and that I went on to try out first on Wednesday evening.

However I realized, that there are certain problems with the 'House' pattern: the ball has to be kicked softly at point A, or there will be problems collecting the rebound at point B; I am able to get off only about 4 kicks per minute when I run this pattern; for every kick I get off I have to run 18 yards; 6 of the 18 running yards are hard-running yards involving chasing after and controlling an angled rebound of the ball; the exhaustion of the running involved eventually reduces the kicks per minute rate.

Continuing to study the situation, sitting at my desk after the Wednesday evening practice, I was able to come up with a new drill for the purpose of practicing angled kicks off the dribble, that is superior to the 'House' pattern. This new drill I call, SLKR-2-low-RT.

When doing SLKR-2-low-RT I am able to get off 8 kicks per minute, compared to 4 kicks per minute doing the 'House' pattern. With SLKR-2-low-RT: the only running involved is dribbling 10 yards per kick, as opposed to the 18 yards per kick with the 'House' pattern; there is no urgent chasing after the angled rebound; I can kick the ball as hard as I want at the wall.

The kicks per minute rate is 100% greater doing the SLKR-2-low-RT; the yards run per kick is 44% less doing the SLKR-2-low-RT. I find there is advantage to a drill that focuses on angled kicks off the dribble ( SLKR-2-low-RT), as opposed to sort of equally focusing on three different things, running speed/endurance, dribbling without kicking, & kicking off the dribble ('House' pattern).

I already have drills that focus on conditioning and on dribbling without shooting an angled shot off the dribble. When a drill focuses on one thing instead of on two or three things, it can be used more efficiently to target a weakness or to build a strength. For example, if I am in a situation where I do not need to add conditioning work, but need to add work on angled shots off the dribble, the drill that focuses on angled shots off the dribble is a more efficient cure for the deficiency involved.

Soccer: 1st 24 hours response to Dec 11 games

After the soccer games of December 11, I knew I was faced with a challenge. I had to devise drills that would correct weaknesses that I detected in my performance. Suspiciously, these weaknesses were in areas that are such that it is difficult to practice the skill involved when by oneself or when without a retinue of servants. In the hours after the game, I did not feel up to the task of coming up with the necessary new drills. I felt tired, time seemed to be flying by, the prospect of devoting my mental energy to coming up with drills that mimic activities that are difficult to mimic, did not thrill me. I tried to figure out what would be a good drill in my head, but basically I just drew a blank.

Then I arrived at the Waltham YMCA around 8 PM, the evening after the games of the evening before. At this point, I still had not figured out which drills would be an antidote for the weaknesses discovered the previous evening. During the previous 24 hours I had decided that I would not waste time trying to figure out what the necessary drills would be, while sitting at a table far from the gym, with a notebook and pens. I had decided that I would figure out the drills while working with a ball in the gym.

First I tried to figure out a drill that would mimic the action involved in dribbling forwards and then kicking the ball, not straight ahead, and not sideways at a 90 degree angle, but at a 45 degree angle. I began to come up with a solution mentally in the locker room. In the gym I continued working out this solution and implemented it. Then I realized after about 20 minutes, that this solution was an inferior solution and that the second idea that I had come up with, was better than the first idea. The first idea involved too much of activities that are unrelated to the primary purpose of the drill.

Next I ran my conditioning drill without the ball. This was unusually painful in the calves and the soles of the feet, I suspect because for the first time, I ran the drill wearing two pairs of socks on each foot.

Next I returned home and realized I still had plenty of work to do, simply to accomplish the goal of planning out an optimum practice for the next day, which would correct the weaknesses discovered Tuesday. I felt that it would not be wise to procrastinate perfecting the antidote to the problems discovered the previous day. Days rush by and suddenly the next week's game is upon me.

I gave the drill I invented in the gym, the second one that was the 'better' one, a name, and sketched it out in a notebook, and gave the notebook page a number. I invented a good drill for countering the weakness of not being able to accurately chip a ball that rolls towards me, on the first touch, and gave the variations of this drill names. I re-established a drill that I had done more than a year ago, which counteracts weakness when it comes to accurately kicking a bouncing airborne ball on the first touch, and gave the variants of this drill names. I researched my practice notes of Monday December 10 the day before the most recent games, so as to be able to estimate how long it would take to do a given number of variations with each of the new drills. And I planned out an optimal practice for Thursday December 13th.

The practice notes schedule me to do the following during the next approx four hours of practice:

SL-KR, low, 16H (p61)
SL-KR, high 16H
SR-KL, low, 16H
SR-KL, high 16H
AHC-0D-A 80H (p62)
AHC-0D-B 80H
(note: above drills are new)
C0D-H, 5 vars, 30H/var
(note: this drill was done in the past, but not recently)
Condit run with ball

Soccer games of December 11

Tuesday evening, December 11, I played in the 4-minute soccer games at the Oak Sq Y. The results of the games are at Soccer indoors Oak Sq Y Brighton Dec 11, 2012.

Before the games started, we had 5-10 minutes of warmup time which we do not usually get, because of the gym schedule. I did a few of the aerial runs I've named 'Wildcat' & 'Eagle'; they worked well from the beginning, without warmup. After the games ended we had a few minutes on the court, and I did a few more 'Wildcat' & 'Eagle' type aerial runs, they worked well again. Best I can recall one of these aerial runs did not go exactly as it is supposed to go, but the ball remained under tight control anyway.

I played in four games. I was on defense during three of the games, during this time the opponents scored one goal--a player to my right in the corner, centered the ball through my legs and they scored. I guess I have to be more alert about swinging a leg forwards to block such passes. Then when I was on offense during one game, the opponents scored 2 goals on us. As I expected, our team fell apart defensively when they put me on offense.

The main lesson of the games today: skills that do not get practiced during games degenerate. Although it is true that sometimes, when skill A is easier than skill B and similar to skill B, mastery of skill B can automatically produce mastery of skill A without skill A being practiced, nevertheless, often mastering a skill fails to produce mastery in a similar skill. Along this line, one can see looking at 'April 2012 Conditioning Drill Stats', which contains data regarding my progress in conditioning, that my improvement in terms of running the conditioning drill without the ball, did not automatically lead to improvement when running the conditioning drill while dribbling the ball.

At one point I dribbled forwards down the left wing, and fired a shot at a 45 degree angle towards the goal. The shot went wide. During practice I have not been working on 30-45 degree angle shots off the dribble. In another instance, I attempted a first-touch chip-pass off a rolling ball. The pass did not go where I wanted it to go. During practice I have not been working on chip-passes off of rolling balls.

In a couple of instances, a bouncing ball came at me, I attempted to kick it on the first touch, and the ball did not go where I wanted it to go. This despite my competence in terms of 'aerial dribbling', which involves me running at a fast speed while keeping the ball close to the body and under control. During practice, this week, I did not get a chance to work on first-touch kicks of bouncers that come at me, though I had planned to do this.

In general, there are certain skills that are difficult to practice when practicing alone. This evening I learned the importance of practicing these skills anyway. I cannot allow the fact that it is like a difficult chess problem, a headache, to invent ways of practicing certain skills when alone (there is little interest in soccer in my area), to dissuade me from practicing those skills.

On the 'positive' side:

After stilling the ball, I sent an almost-perfect 25 yard aerial pass, that reached an apex of about 8 feet, forwards to a team-mate. The pass led the team-mate perfectly. But since the man defending him was perfectly positioned, and since the pass was about a foot too high, the defender knocked the ball away with his head. If the pass had been a foot lower, it would have been a perfect pass.

After dribbling the ball down the left wing into the corner, I crossed the ball inwards and backwards to the same teammate, a 40-foot aerial pass. The pass was almost perfect, but a little too hard and a little too high-- the team-mate could not reach it. If this pass had been 6 inches lower and softer, it would have been perfect.

These passes would have been perfect passes if thrown to receivers who can use their hands to catch the pass; perhaps, I've been effected by watching American-style tackle-football. It is indeed an achievement to be able to pass so accurately, but I believe I have to learn to compensate for slight inaccuracy by taking a little bit of power off the passes. Seems the overpowered passes are a result of the way I've been practicing: in practice I 've been forgetting that aerial passes need to be toned down in terms of velocity, to compensate for the fact that the passes are usually slightly off in terms of targetting.

When I gained possession of the ball on offense, I did not panic and pass prematurely. I waited until I had lured the defender into thinking I was about to dribble to my right. This opened up the teammate to my left. Then I passed to my teammate to my left.

On defense as usual, I was disrupting dribbles, blocking shots.

Regarding my teammates:

We had a new guy on our team. As we settled into the usual pattern of me on defense alone and the rest on offense, this guy spent alot of time playing right in front of me, which rendered me somewhat redundant. He did not play in any one position at all. Sometimes he was to the left, sometimes to the right, sometimes on offense, sometimes on defense. Between games I questioned him, he retorted that he was not playing any position. I mentioned this to a teammate I do not usually play with, and the teammate said that the court was too small for playing positions.

Their weird words/actions shocked me. I have played in many of these soccer games on basketball courts; everyone always plays a position; nobody ever says that the court is so small that nobody needs to play a position; everyone understands that it is beyond debate, that if people do not play a position, chaos erupts.

True, I've often been annoyed at the inflexible failure of teammates to change their positions so as to compensate for me leaving my usual position when such is advantageous, and so as to allow me to leave my usual position when such is advantageous. However this does not mean that we should play without generally speaking adhering to a particular position such as defense, offense, left, or right. I don't understand this weird idea that the court is so small that players should not attempt to play a position. The court is about 60 feet wide, which makes it difficult to play on both sides. The court is about 100 feet long, which makes it difficult to play both offense and defense.

Soccer achievements impeded Due to Team-mates Clogging up the Middle

Seems unbelievable and weird, but I think I heard a TV announcer the other day, mutter between his lines, "they're clogging up the middle".

Then I got to thinking about what has been happening on the indoor basketball court with the soccer games. I realized that my own team has been clogging up the middle, making it impossible for me to score.

When my team-mates stand around in front of the opponent goal, they bring the defenders assigned to them with them. The result is that my dribbling and shooting pathways towards the goal, become obstructed with both my team-mates and also those guarding them.

In such circumstances I could plunge ahead on a dribbling run towards the goal anyway despite the crowding, and perhaps enjoy a reasonable percentage of some kind of success (either scoring, or passing advantageously, or causing a loose ball in front of the opponent goal). Problem is that since the clogging-up reduces the success-percentage level, my going on the attack could result in people considering me to be someone who recklessly loses the ball on the dribble.

This clogging problem is compounded by the fact that when I move towards the clogged area of the court on the dribble, my team-mates tend to make the situation worse by not getting out of the way. They stand there, like a toll-collector on the highway, and expect me to hand the ball off to them. Whereas from the perspective of my team's success as a whole, I have the momentum as I approach the defenses and my team-mate who is clogging up the middle does not, hence he should get out of the way and wait for something like a loose ball or a shot-rebound. I have the momentum because if I make say a 30 or 45 degree turn, I will tend to be moving faster than whoever attempts to guard me.

To me it is just a matter of simple common sense, that when an indoor soccer team is positioned such that any of the non-goalie players can score by way of dribbling or shooting, this is superior to only two of the four non-goalie players out on the court being able to score by way of dribbling or shooting.

I've read that in top-level full-field competitive soccer, the teams that attack up the middle have the advantage over those that attack up the wings. But indoor soccer is different. The density of players per square meter is higher. The goal is smaller.

To illustrate the situation, I have created three pages containing graphics:

Un-Clogged Middle Example 1

Clogged Up Middle Example 1

Clogged Up Middle Example 2

Clogged Up Middle Example 3

Soccer Pre-Game Practice Routine

So there is an evening of games coming up on Tuesday December 11. So I decided to get the practice-work designed to prepare for the game on Tuesday, done Saturday. That will leave Sunday and Monday to take it easy and do any pre-game practice that does not get done on Saturday.

I distinguish game-preparation practice-work, from the type of practice I have been doing past three days, aerial-attack-pattern work. The game-prep routine is focused on developing the kinds of skills that I commonly use in games. The aerial-attack-pattern work focuses on skills that I hope to one day implement in games.

Saturday Game-Prep Soccer Practice Routine, to Prep for Tuesday Game

1. 35 minutes conditioning run, + 20 minute post-run cooldown

2.- Corner 0, 5 vars, 21 H/var
2.1- Corner 1, 6 vars, 15 H/var
2.2- Corner 2, 4 vars chosen at random from 10 possible vars, 15 H/var; vars 10, 8, 6, 8 chosen at random
Note: there are now 10 variations of 'Corner 2'. Doing all 10 variations in one practice, is problematic because of: time spent understanding a variation before executing it; and, time spent switching from one variation to the other. Hence I for this week selected at random 4 of the possible 10 variations.

3.1 Aerial Attack Pattern 'Eagle', 8 FB, 6 SB
3.2 Aerial Attack Pattern 'Wildcat', 8 FB, 6 SB
Note: the 'Eagle' (88%) & the 'Wildcat' (88%) have had the highest successes/attempts percentages recently. Both these patterns advance me about 40 feet forwards using one bounce and a few touches, and, involve a chip sending the ball to an unusually high apex. In this type of practice I focus on the upcoming game, not on working on things I expect to be ready for games say a month from now.

4.1- Straight 0, 5 vars, 24 H/var
4.2- Straight 1, 4 vars, 26 H/var
4.3- Straight 2, 4 vars chosen at random from 9 possible vars, 22 H/var; vars 8, 7, 4, 5 chosen at random
Note: there are now 9 variations of 'Straight 2'. Doing all 9 variations in one practice, is problematic because of: time spent understanding a variation before executing it; and, time spent switching from one variation to the other. Hence I for this week selected at random 4 of the possible 10 variations.

5- 1 wall chip drills, 45 minutes.

Note: I find that I perform better, and accomplish more per minute, when I schedule myself to do a given number of repetitions with a drill, as opposed to scheduling myself to do a drill for a given number of minutes.

Arrogant Aggressive individuals & Groups

What can you say about the young man Bonedork Bumpcorn? Bonedork Bumpcorn wanders around from town to town. He moves into a town. He proclaims and believes, that everyone is subhuman compared to him, and that he has a right to commit crimes against people, a right to rob & murder and lie to people. Then the people of the town turn against Bonedork Bumpcorn, and become enemies of Bonedork Bumpcorn. Then when Bonedork Bumpcorn learns that the townspeople have turned against him, he develops the unjustified feeling that he is being unfairly persecuted. And then after Bonedork Bumpcorn has decided that he is being unjustly persecuted, Bonedork Bumpcorn decides that henceforth, Bonedork Bumpcorn will do whatever is necessary in order to defend himself; he decides that nothing will be off the table with regards to his self-defense; he decides that he will resort to any crime to defend himself; and he proceeds to live his life based upon the doctrine, that he is unjustly persecuted and that he, Bonedork Bumpcorn, has the right to commit any crime in the name of self defense. And then he goes out and slashes people's tires, just for looking at him the wrong way. Although the townspeople feel that Bonedork Bumpcorn is behaviorally but not racially inferior, Bonedork Bumpcorn considers the townspeople to be racially inferior to himself.

And what can you say about the ethnic group known as the Ballsnarks? The Ballsnarks lived on the planet Aeririadil. The Ballsnarks considered themselves to be the superior race amongst all the races living on planet Aeririadil. These races that the Ballsnarks considered to be inferior to themselves, meaning all the races other than the Ballsnarks on planet Aeririadil, were known as the Ethranarn. The Ballsnarks wandered amongst the Ethranarn on Aeririadil, wandering into the nations of Ethranarn, looking for a living for themselves. The Ethnic group Ballsnarks proclaimed itself to have the God-given right to murder, rob, and lie to the Ethranarn. The Ballsnarks proceeded to live according to the doctrine that they enunciated (note: 2nd law of Hobbs-- a group is always behaviorally at least as bad as its religion). This resulted in the Ethranarn becoming angry at the Ballsnarks. Then when the Ballsnarks saw that there was enmity between the Ethranarn and the Ballsnarks, the Ballsnarks proceeded to decide that henceforth, nothing would be off the books when it came to Ballsnarks defending themselves against the Ethranarn; the Ethranarn's enmity simply re-inforced the Ballsnarks' original contemptuous attitude that Ballsnarks had the right to commit any crime against the subhuman Ethranarns. The Ethranarns consider the Ballsnarks to be inferior in terms of behavior and beliefs, but the Ballsnarks consider the Ethranarns to be racially inferior.

What comes to my mind is that Bonedork Bumpcorn and the Ballsnarks are examples of brats that should be spanked and not tolerated.

True, we expect that individual males should occasionally stand up and fight. True, we expect that honorable ethnic/racial/national groups, should sometimes fight. But if a boy is always fighting with everyone, we rightly conclude that something is wrong with the boy. And if a nation or people or race or ethnic group is constantly fighting with and committing crimes against everyone, again we rightly conclude that something is wrong with that racial/ethnic/national group.

Soccer Aerial & Ground Dribbling Percentages Compared

This evening I tried out six of my leading aerial attack maneuvers-patterns, 8 attempts per maneuver. By leading I mean they are at the top in terms of successes/ attempts, when a success is counted as me doing exactly what I intended to do prior to the start of the run.

Key to stats: FB start= I flip ball up, it bounces, I commence aerial attack pattern. SB start= I kick ball at wall, it bounces back, I stop the ball, it bounces, I commence aerial attack pattern.

First done this evening: 'Eagle' pattern was at 75% at FB start, and at 88% SB start.

Done second, 'Tiger-1' pattern was at 100% at FB start, and at 100% SB start.

Done third, 'Tiger-2' pattern was at 88% at FB start, and at 75% SB start.

Done fourth, 'Wildcat' pattern was at 100% at FB start, and at 100% SB start.

Warmups: for each segment, until a run succeeded, the runs were considered warmup-runs, and not counted in the score. All-told there were 7 'warmup' runs, and 64 counted runs, of which 58 or 91% were counted as successes. Aside from warmup-runs at the beginning of each new segment (sometimes) there was no warmup.

These results surprised me because, though the order of results was Wildcat best, Tiger-1 second best, and Eagle & Tiger-2 tied for 3rd best. Before the start of the practice I had expected that the results would be: Eagle best, Tiger-1 2nd best, Tiger-2 3rd best, & Wildcat 4th best.

I suspect analytically clownish persons, judge aerial attack maneuver the same way they judge ground-dribble maneuver, meaning that their incorrect presumption, is that if a player can perform exactly as intended an aerial attack maneuver X percent of attempts, and a ground maneuver exactly as intended Y percent of attempts, then if X is less than Y, the ground maneuver is superior.

This fails to take into account, that different dribbling maneuvers, produce different results in terms of goals scored or territorial advancement (advancing closer to opponent goal).

I can imagine some groundhog boasting that 100% of the time, he succeeds in doing exactly what he intends to do with his ground-dribbling maneuver. The groundhog's ground-dribbling maneuver consists of slowly dribbling straight at the defender, touching the ball every 4 paces. Problem is, that the groundhog fails on 100% of attempts, because the ball is easily taken from him.

By way of contrast, there are aerial maneuvers, regarding which I can achieve exactly what I intended to achieve, 67% of the time. These aerial maneuvers, when performed exactly as intended, produce a goal a higher percentage of the time, compared to the groundhog's ground-dribbling maneuvers. And then you have the fact, that even when these aerial runs are NOT performed exactly as intended, they are often sometimes high-quality runs anyway.

You can end up with a situation something like:

Me: % of time I perform maneuver exactly as intended: 67%; % of time my maneuver results in goal: 7%.

English Premier League: % of time they perform maneuver exactly as intended: 85%; % of time their maneuvers results in goals: 3%.

Groundhogs: % of time they perform maneuver exactly as intended: 100%; % of time their maneuver results in goal: 0%.

Based on such data one can encounter mistaken opinions (folly that focuses on one aspect of the data alone) such as: the Groundhogs were the best, because they were able to perform their ground-dribbling maneuvers exactly as intended 100% of the time; the English were the 2nd best because their ground-dribbling maneuvers went exactly as intended 85% of the time; and Hobbs was the worst because his aerial-dribbling maneuvers went exactly as intended only 67% of the time.

Aerial Soccer Tactics Studies Nov-Dec

I experimented at length with various methods for starting & continuing aerial runs (I run with the ball kept off the ground and under control), with the first touch of the aerial run involving me stopping an incoming ball. Looking at the data, an abbreviated pattern that contained what I for now have labeled the 'Alpha Sequence' sequence, showed a successes/attempts percentage of 89%, which was clearly superior to other tested patterns. I call this pattern, the 'Shark' pattern. The 'Shark' pattern contains the alpha sequence.

This 'Shark' pattern, involved less touches on the ball compared to most of the patterns tested. I decided to add on to it at the end, a bounce and a touch. I call the 'Shark' pattern with the added bounce and touch at the end the 'Megashark' pattern. Then I decided to test the 'Megashark' pattern, with the start involving me flipping the stationary ball up in the air ('FB' start), as opposed to the start involving me stopping an incoming ball ('SB' start).

I felt surprised at how the success/attempts percentage rate for 'Megashark', with 'Megashark' being launched with the 'FB' start, was at first only 66%, whereas the successes/attempts percentage for its predecessor, 'Shark', when launched with the 'SB' start, was 89%.

When I had been testing 'Shark' with the 'SB' start, I had been striving for long fast runs, which actually reduced the successes per attempts percentage as opposed to increasing it.

'Megashark' is 'Shark' with a bounce and a touch appended at the end. Apparently, this bounce and touch results in a reduction of the successes/attempts percentage, a reduction of an extent that I had not anticipated or expected.

I suspect that the general body-motion mechanics of starting with the flip-up of a stationary ball ('FB'), is different enough from such for starting with the stop of an incoming ball ('SB'), that what works well with one type of start will not work as well with the other type of start.

Using the 'FB' start, I tested out new and different patterns that contained the 'Alpha-sequence' structure, and that ended with a bounce and a touch.

Also I tested out patterns that bore a general resemblance to the patterns I had tested that contained the 'Alpha-sequence' with the bounce and the touch appended at the end. Some of these patterns did not even contain the 'Alpha-sequence', although they were modelled on patterns that did.

My plan is to by practice maintain my skill on the patterns that are scoring high enough to be deployed during games, while at the same time improving the successes/attempts percentage on patterns that have been producing lower scores until these lower scoring patterns are good enough to also deploy during games.

Generally I estimate that as of now my lowest scoring patterns, are producing success rates of about 67%, two out of three. If just one tenth of the 67% that succeeded resulted in goals, this would give me a goals per possessions rate of 6.7%. And this does not even take into account, that often the runs are of good quality even though they cannot be counted as 'successes', because of technicalities such as wrong part of body used at wrong time, or ball bouncing at wrong time.

By way of comparison, the goals per possessions rate in the top English League is about 1.5%, meaning you could guess that the rate is about 3% for possessions in the opponent half of the goal.

Soccer Offensive Teamwork Notes

My thoughts as of 9:16 AM 12/4/2012

Seems many of the young men participating in soccer games at the Oak Square YMCA, are not adept at the art of pass receiving, even though pass receiving requires minimal physical or mental talent or skill.

This is because of mental error; they have not devoted any thought to the art of pass receiving. They have never been on hard-driven, uniformed, official, coached, soccer teams.

Everyone on my high school soccer team knew that if a pass to you did not come directly at you, you still chased after the ball. Everyone chased after the ball when the pass to them was a little off. This often ended up in goals being scored by us, or us preventing them from scoring goals.

Chasing After balls passed to you that are slightly 'off-target'

Not so the Oak Square boys. If You pass the ball to them and the ball misses the spot on the floor that is directly under their behind by more than one foot, they will make no movement in the direction of the ball.

These same boys rush up to play offense at the start of a game and never participate in playing defense. Their excuse is that they are allegedly more perky than us defenders, so they should play offense. If indeed they have more endurance than us, why then do they fail to show any hustle with regards to balls passed to them that are even just slightly off-target directionally?

In part it's because they are obsessed with dribbling, and shooting. Being obsessed with dribbling and shooting, they have forgotten the art of pass-receiving. They despise making passes, and pass-receiving is the partner of passing. Defenders contribute to offense by passing but the boy-wonders have become enamored of 3-second video clips showing stars dribbling and shooting. The 'bigot' within wonders whether their little brown ethnic mommies spank them.

By failing to show any hustle with regards to balls passed to them that are not perfectly on-target, these sluggards make great passers look like losers.

Often the perfect pass is not sent directly to the recipient, but to a spot a little away from the recipient, so that the pass-recipient can hook up with the pass on the run. But the sloths will not chase after a pass that is not sent directly to them.

Could be that their reflexes are simply slow. You send them a lobbed lead-pass. It sails to the perfect point where, if their reflexes were quick, they could have caught the pass on the run. But by the time the ball gets to that perfect point a few feet away from them, they have not moved and are still standing there watching the ball.

They reserve their energy for dribbling and shooting; they refuse to chase passes or play defense because such would leave them with less energy for dribbling and shooting.

Last week or the week before, I was on the right side in my half of the court. I chip-passed the ball, the ball sailed about 30 yards into the opponent's right half, diagonally across the court. Such is hard to do on a basketball court, because there is no grass to hold the ball up so the foot can get beneath the ball.

The ball reached an apex height of at least 20 feet, and maintained that 20-foot altitude for a few feet of horizontal movement through the air. The ball 'hung' in the air, the way American tackle-football players try to 'hang' the ball in the air when they punt the ball, so as to allow their team-mates to catch up with the ball. One of the players watching on the sideline gave a hoot as the ball sailed through the air.

The ball finally bounced, but almost straight up towards the ceiling. As the ball bounced, my team-mate closest to where the ball bounced was still watching the ball and had not moved from where he was standing when I first kicked the ball. Finally he started chasing the ball, and got the ball away from the defender, who had to deal with a bounce straight up with my team-mate on top of him just after the bounce. Next, the ball was loose, neither team had possession, the ball was near the opponent goal, the other team was in chaos. But nobody from my team had run forwards to follow up the action behind the player who was closest to the ball.

Following your team-mate's dribbling charge

Similarly when I went on runs of at least 30 feet in distance last week from my defender position, both times, in the end I and one of the second line of Dutch defenders got our feet on the ball at the same time, and the ball ended up loose, not in possession of either team, close to and in front of the opponent goal.

If a team-mate had followed me even at a slow jog as I sped up the Dutch middle on the dribbling runs, he could have pounced on an open ball in front of and close to the opponent goal and scored.

My team-mates did an impressive job of falling back on defense to compensate for my run up to offense from my defensive position. But they overcompensated. Seemed my whole team dropped back to defense, when I went on a dribbling run that carried me into the Dutch territory. All it takes is for one of my 3 non-goalie team-mates on the court, to fall back when I go on an offensive run. If just one of the 3 had followed me on my dribbling run, both dribbling runs could have ended in goals.

Finished this essay in 34 minutes, @ 9:50 AM 12/4/2012

SJC-1103 minority police versus state exam

My thoughts regarding LOPEZ v. COMMONWEALTH Pedro LOPEZ & others v. COMMONWEALTH & another. SJC-1103 (decided November 9, 2012).

Case is described at 'Minority officers win round in legal battle over promotion exams - Metro - The Boston Globe'.
Assuming that exams in use do not predict job performance, shall those who utilize exams that do not predict job performance be at this time punished by way of plaintiffs and courts and financial penalties?

How guilty shall an employer be, if he utilizes exams that do a moderately effective job of predicting employee performance, if the exams he uses are inferior in terms of predicting job performance compared to exams he does not use?

Should government agencies be obliged to measure job candidates, using measurements that do a superior job of predicting job performance?

How shall it be possible for govt to discover which exams predict job performance, if govt is inhibited in terms of experimentation, due to fear of being sued for making a mistake in choice of exam?

An exam might be a success, in terms of weeding out those who are unfit to be sergeant, even if looking at those who score high enough to become sergeant, the score differences do not correlate with job performance.

What if a situation is created wherein performance on the exam corrrelates with job performance, but also results in persons unfit to assume the post, being promoted to the post?

What if the exam that correctly predicts job performance, costs a hundred million dollars more than the exam that does not predict job performance? Would it be worth it to utilize the expensive exam?

You could probably find those who evaluate performance in a certain way who find a correlation between job performance and the exam in use. And you might also find those who evaluate performance in such a way that they see no correlation between job performance and the exam in use.

One could argue that performance as a police sergeant is not a thing wherein sergeants end up being ranked from 1 the best, to 2 the 2nd best, to 3 the 3rd best, all the way down to 100 the worst. Rather one might say, that with police sergeants, performance as realistically measured is a simple split between the inadequate and the adequate.

The number of performance-level classes you create in your stats (i.e., 'excellent', 'very good', 'good', etc), could effect your conclusion regarding whether the exam accurately predicted performance.

An exam that is good at weeding out misfits could be a bad predictor of job performance amongst those whose performance is at least adequate. An exam that is bad at weeding out misfits could be a good predictor of job performance amongst those whose performance is at least adequate.

Elimination of an exam in use, because the exam fails to correlate with job performance could result in the use of an exam that is even worse, one in which high scores correlate with low job performance.

Could be, that plaintiffs and courts exerting power over the decisions re what is considered to be an exam that predicts job performance, by way of intimidating multi-million dollar lawsuits, would produce inferior results compared to simply demanding that government agencies make good faith efforts to develop exams that accurately predict job performance. Did anybody higher up in the command-chain, ever order Mass Human Resources Division to develop exams that predict job performance?

In police-type systems, persons get promoted to the next grade up in rank. Could be that the exams don't predict sergeant performance well, but do predict lieutenant or captain performance fairly well.

A person's value to society could be said to consist of more than simple 'job performance'.

By exams I mean in this context, all systems that weigh various criteria used in judging who shall be given a job.