Ok, we've pretty much strayed into tomorrows email but here goes... Benji has my thoughts spot on. There is a fundamental question about whether the rules over ride spirit or spirit overrides the rules.
My view is absolutely concrete that Spirit of the Game is paramount. It is the first and most important rule and any rule beyond that is merely trying to be clarification of how to restart when something that affected play did happen. A lot of people seem to take the opposite view, which is that Spirit is only there to adjudicate *after *all the other rules have been applied. That is why we need this debate, because already there is a fundamental disagreement about whether Spirit is the most important thing in our sport. Hiding behind the rules is not playing with Spirit, and there is no way you will EVER get the rules to the position that they are unambiguous and uncontradictory. English simply isn't up to the job for a start (let alone translations into other languages). So my point is to make it absolutely clear to everyone that Spirit is the most important rule, and we should all play by that rule (and the Spirit of that rule) first, with all other rules considered secondary. Spirit is not simply "playing by the rules" it is attempting to take an honest and open viewpoint about what happened in the game. Hope this makes sense, Dave. 2008/7/10 IndoorsDOC <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>: > Derryk Boyd wrote: > > In the scenario you described 17.2 or 17.3 do not apply, therefore the > rules starte quite clearly that there cannot be a turnover, it should also > mean that any completed pass should be returned regardless of wether the > call affected play. I think this is easier to police than having people > argue over what did and didnt affect play, and the solution to the problem > could be for players to think a second longer before making an unnecesary > pick or foul call. > > > Difficult, though - I often wait a second before calling a pick, to see > if it affects play, and all I get is argument that the guy was 8 yards > away from me when I made the call - which of course is true, but only > because I was picked a second earlier than the call was made... > > I think the rules need to be written the way they are, that the game > should stop when a call is made unless continuation is in effect. But > Dave G's point (I think?) is about whether spirit overrides the rules or > the rules override spirit. Is spirit something we use only when the > rules aren't clear, or do we appeal to it to override rules such as this > even when they are clear? > > The rules about stoppages need to be written so as to offer a simple > solution on those occasions when it's not clear whether play was > affected - like you say, this is easier to police - but when it's > /absolutely/ clear that play was /not/ affected, do we override those > rules with an appeal to spirit or not? I doubt that everyone would give > the same answer to that. > > B > __________________________________________________ > BritDisc mailing list > [email protected] > http://www.fysh.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/britdisc > Staying informed - http://www.ukultimate.com/staying-informed > __________________________________________________ BritDisc mailing list [email protected] http://www.fysh.org/cgi-bin/mailman/listinfo/britdisc Staying informed - http://www.ukultimate.com/staying-informed
