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Controversy at Rutgers
In one of our matches at the Rutgers regional, our alliance was DQ'd for illegally scoring a ball. I believe we were allied with 529. We were winning the match easily and throwing human player balls into the opponents' goal to increase our QP score. Now here's our dilema . We had one human player on our team shoot ballls. In addition, our ally shot balls with their human player and their controller(he only had a limited role from what I can tell). At the end of the match, it was announced that we were disqualified because 3 people shot balls onto the field. We were told that this was illegal. In fact, the ref even pointed out each person who shot the balls. However, no rule states that only human players may return balls to the field. Rule GM15 states that anyone on an alliance may handle balls except for the mentors. After pointing this out to the refs, we were not given a full explanation for thier ruling. We asked them to specify where the rule book stated that only human players can return that balls, but they could not. We never got a good explanation of the ruling against us. After further protest, the accusation against us was changed. Instead the refs now assumed that a mentor had to have either driven the robot or throw the balls in order to have 3 throwers. They arrived at the new accusation after deliberating over our plea during lunch. This change in position angered us greatly and showed the obvious weakness in their argument.After explaning to them that our ally's controller had thrown the balls, they said that simply wasn't possible. The refs explained that they could not create a scenario where 3 people returned balls to the field without using the mentor as a human player or driver. Our explanation did not satisify them at all, but instead seemed to anger them. We obviously shattered whatever logic they had used to justify the DQ.
We then asked them to point out to us where our error was on video tape, but they refused. While I understand that plays will not be reviewed, we only wanted an explanation of our alliance's mistake to avoid further conflict in the future. Nevertheless, we were denied a decent explanation. It seems that the refs screwed up and then tried to find whatever they could to justify the ruling. We were victim of a terrible mistake at our regional today. We lost over 50 QP's due to this ruling. I believe that the refs' altering accusations and poor explanations shows that they realized their mistake, but refused to fix it. In fact, we were treated fairly rudely and not even offered an apology. While I realize that mistakes are made, in the spirit of "gracious professionalism", which FIRST is so fond of, we should have at least had an apology given to us. We deserve an explanation of what we did wrong in that match. Trying to make up stories only worsens the situation. The is no reason why we shouldn't be told what really happened. A mistake was made, but was not even acknowlegded. Why is it necessary for the refs to conjure fantasy scenarios to try to decieve us? No team deserves to be lied to or be the victim of a bad call based on assumption. What I'd like to ask first of all, have other teams utilized 3 non-mentor human players to send balls into the field? Also, has anyone else been the victim of an obvious mistake? If so, how was the problem dealt with and what was done to fix the problem? |
okay, lemme get my impression straight:
each team is allowed three humans in the alliance station: -one driver -one human player -one mentor the mentor is not allowed to touch the balls or controlling devices, correct? if we have a student take the place of the mentor, i was under the impression that they were allowed to handle the balls. did your alliance have two adult mentors? if this is the case, the refs were correct in their ruling, according to my understanding. also, you said that the controller had limited participation in the ball shooting, how did that work? driving takes a bit of concentration, wouldn't that be hard? i agree that your alliance deserved an explaination of the ruling, it might even help other teams in other regionals to know why this is. it was wrong of them not to justify their ruling, but i vowed to myself not to side in cases such as these... ;) |
Admitedly...but
Hi,
While I admitedly am not sure what the rules regarding drivers throwing balls are. I do know that in pretty much every year since the human players moved behind the glass with the drivers, mentors have been allowed to hand balls to human players. I have noticed...that FIRST is really really pressing the limited roll of the mentor, and apparently the defined rolls of drivers, operators, and human players. This is all very ironic. Last year teams were upset because there were some mentors in the drivers's box that would get really heated, this was because of the nature of last years game...team's strategies were so dependent on precise timing, etc. So some asked if perhaps the number of adult coaches shouldn't be limited. FIRST listened...but the game also made this need uncessecary. Regardless of the rule's history...they are certianly enforcing it...with a villigence that I think is surprising many FIRST teams. I've see lots of teams DQed for mentors stepping out of the driver station, or touching controls. I think in both those situations, and your own, there should have been a warning. At least if they had told you to stop what you were doing during the match you could have played on...and researched it later...rather than DQing you. I sympathize, good luck with the rest of the comp., and I hope it doesn't ruin your expirence. -Justin |
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Rule 2.3 in the documentation:
"The students and mentors are permitted free movement within the alliance station. All alliance members are allowed contact with the balls. Mentors are not allowed to return balls to the playing field." Rule GM15: "Contact with the balls by all alliance members in their stations is acceptable, but Mentors are not allowed to return balls to the playing field." These are the only mention to the ruling in the manual. I want to say that in the driver meeting that they said *at least at VCU* that only one student was supposed to be returning balls to the playing field. I may very well be wrong though. I have to agree that this is a very ambiguous stating of the rules, all around. |
Clarification
Just to clarify what happened....There was one adult mentor on each driving team. At our regional, nothing was mentioned about the amount of people who could retrun balls onto the field. What was stated was that the alliance could be DQ'd if a human player threw a ball into a goal, while they were standing outside the alliance station (marked by tape). Hope this helps a bit.
Chris |
Ken and Adam,
thanks for clearing that up, I see I was wrong :) |
It's no problem. I was merely trying to help out the original poster by posting the ambiguous rules.
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NYC rulings
At Colombia (NYC) this weekend, the refs instructed the operator team that the mentor was not allowed to "touch" balls. This would result in a DQ.
Now, the rule quotes post above seem to indicate that a mentor can touch balls as long as he isn't the one throwing them back onto the field (ie. he can hand them to a human player). Also, there were quite a few DQs in NYC due to human players reaching over the wall to deliver balls. -Mark Team 41 NYC Regional Finalist |
Gd, i hate this sort of controversy.
I do not believe there is any basis in the rules for the call that was made against your alliance, K, HOWEVER, there is also no basis in the rules for changing a poor decision made by the referees. It was, needless to say, in very poor taste for your referees to change their reasoning behind that ruling. But the referees should never have had to give a reason for their ruling at all. The referees' decisions are FINAL, period, regardless of whether the ruling was justified. Now, maybe this is not the best way for a competition to be run, but the rules are very clear that this is how the comp. is to be run, and it's a bit too late in this season to be arguing that now. If you have a problem with it, make sure you let FIRST know, but wait until after this season is over, and do it before next year starts. Hope this doesn't make anyone mad |
Granted, all rulings are final, but on the sheet we received at Rutgers, play disputes were specifically mentioned. Instructions were given as to how to dispute a call made by the refs, and we followed these rules. A reason needs to be given for DQ'ing a team. How else can you prevent your alliance from breaking that same rule again if you don't know what you did wrong? By the way, I've seen the refs change the scoring last year after making mistakes. It happened to us in one match, where part of our robot touched the big ball on top of a goal. At first we were given credit, but after a few minutes the points for the big ball were taken away, which was the right call. So changing the scoring has happened in the past. In any case, thats not what we asked for. An explanation or apology would have satisfied us. I don't think that is asking too much.
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Re: NYC rulings
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last weekend, on LI, all members of the alliance were allowed to touch the balls, but the mentors were not allowed to throw them out of the player station. there was no mention about second drivers being able to throw or not. today, before our first match at NYC, one of the refs came up to explain about not reaching over the divider, which made perfect sense because of all the DQ's resulting from that. but, she also mentioned, "Mentors MAY NOT touch the balls". now, this conflicted with the LI regional, and with the rules in the manual. she went over to ask, and then did come back right before the match, but seeing as i was the driver, i was preoccupied getting into my "zone", so i never heard her response. if she did indeed say that mentors MAY NOT touch the balls, i belive that is a violation of the rules laid out at the beginning of January, and is in very bad taste. hopefully we'll get around this snafus before the nats. |
at NYC, there was a tie (30, 30) and the red tea mone by having more goals i think. as i looked down on the field, i saw the head ref run on shaking his head. a few minutes later, "opps, it's 32, 30, but the red still won". they had apparently missed one ball in a goal.
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At VCU, I recall one of our alliance partners operators stepping back from the controls, grabbing some balls and start throwing. I was a little leary because I couldn't recall what the rule was on that right away, but the ref made no move to flag or argument, and he was in full view of this happening (i.e. 3 students sending balls to the field).
There was no problem with it, nor DQ's at VCU... I don't recall it being a common thing though. |
I think its legal.
From my interpretation of the rules, I think it is legal for 3 people to put balls in. On my team, we only have 1 driver, the driver grabs the goal be the button on the joystick. So that leaves a human player and what we call a student coach. I don't think the coach threw a ball over the wall but I can see this happening in a match and I'd like to get this straight just in case we do it. The ref really needs to give an explanation. If they were wrong, why can't they just admit to thier mistake and apologize. I know they can't change what happened and change the score, but I would have been satisfied with an apology and them to admit to thier mistake, we all make mistakes, we're human, we understand that and they should too.
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One other possible thought....
I know at VCU, there was one of the 4 badges handed out that had a little green dot on it. This was supposed to represent that the person wearing it was the coach/mentor and was supposed to be an easy way for the refs to identify them. Now, at least at VCU, there were plenty of teams who weren't following this sceme, but I don't think there were any DQs for anything like this. Could the player who got called for it have been wearing that badge with the green dot?? I dunno, food for thought.... |
529's DQ
I think that the disqualification of team 529 and their alliance partner, team 102, in match 27 at the Johnson & Johnson Mid-Atlantic Regional was justified. From the four people on each team on the field, one is a mentor, allowed to touch but not throw balls and allowed to observe the field and control system but not interact with these. The operators are intended to manipulate the robot and only that. And the human player is intended to move the balls from the alliance area to the field. This is what FIRST assumes that most teams will do anyway, so it's an interpretable rule. Anyway, that really cool volunteer that everybody checked in with on the red side was saying all day long that the judges were going to enforce that only one person from each team throws and the mentor can definitely not throw, so you had fair warning. Anyway, congrats on getting to the quarter-finals.
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NJ regional
At the regionals on Friday, we were DQed for an interesting reason. The engineer that went up to get the badges thursday was told by someone that the badge with the green dot was for the captain of the team. Well I was wearing the pin with the dot and we were dqed because I was driving. Now I am a student and we were dqed after completing about 6 qualifying rounds. We asked for the clarification from the judges but they really didn;t give us the time of day. I'm not sure who told him that the badge with the green dot was for the captain but i thoought it was unfair they dqed us for it. Especially since I never heard an announcement about it.
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Our robot this year is a drop down design with a large basket on top. It takes us approx. 5 seconds to reach the ground and then another 5 to load up all 10 (our human player tosses them in two at a time). Once or twice during matches balls have fallen on me (our robot's driver) and I've tossed them into the basket as well. There's never been any issue with this, and I don't think that there should be. The rules say that mentors cannot return balls to the field. Our on field mentor (also a student, btw) hands balls to our human player but never tosses them over. The rules do not state that the driver cannot return balls to the field. If I'm not driving (which I'm not when loading up) is there any reason why I shouldn't be allowed to toss one or two in?
~Tom Fairchild~ |
its legal
it is legal. It can be proved by theoperator badges. The coach's operator badge has a yellow sticker on it, which tells the refs they cannot throw a ball onto the playing field. Therefire, any team member w/o this dot is allowed to shoot. |
There are only two "kinds" of people in the alliance station: mentors and students. If drivers couldn't shoot or h. players couldn't drive, they would receive a pin with a colored sticker too, and there would be a very clear rule about that in the manual.
My team wants the human player to operate a part of the robot that will be used only in the end of the game, so we'll have 3 students interacting with the robot. From what I heard from you, I'm sure that the refs. thought the mentor drove the robot. And it's strange to me that they couldn't see a scenario with the driver shooting. What if the robot was stopped while the driver was shooting? And I agree with Anthony's reply. ------------------- Rodrigo #383 |
Re: I think its legal.
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"Mentors who happen to be pre-college students are not considered “students” with respect to rules of Gameplay and may not engage in activities reserved for students." So, in this case your student coach can't throw balls to the field. However, nothing in that rule (that's just a part of it) states that the other student operators can't throw balls, or maybe switch positions during the matches (ie driver becomes human player). |
174 Coach Driving
174, you were DQ'd for legitimate reasons. The Q'ing line voulenteers were checking to make sure that everyone knew what they were doing in regard to the coach pin. Maybe they just didn't talk to you, I don't know; you should have at least paid attention to whoever spoke to your team about the buttons when they were handed out sometime before the practice rounds began on Thursday. But it's okay.
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the marked badge.
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for everyone who is confused........ 4 people are aloud in the driving area....... 2 drivers, one human player and one coach...... they are all aloud to handle balls but the coach cannot return them to the field....... its pretty clearly stated in the rules (go check adams post above)
the reason i think some people are confused is that in the past only the human player could return the balls to the field, this year the drivers are aloud to asd well the refs at rutgers made a mistake, it happens, and its dissapointing but theres not much you can do Becky |
Let me reiterate our point as their seems to be confusion. There was 1 adult mentor on each team. Each team also had 3 students. Each mentor did not touch the balls or controls at any time during the match. Only the students drove or returned the balls to the match. And in contrast to what Dan_550 on team 550 said, at no time before this incident was any statement made concerning the return of balls to field made. I remember that a specific example of a DQ was shown before the competition started. It regarded stepping out of the box, not who could throw the ball. Dan_550 unfortunately for you, there is no basis in written rule for your claim just like the refs had none. And no team is required to have 2 people to drive their robot. It may be common practice, however the role of each student on the driving team is NOT defined anywhere. We could, in theory, decide to switch human player and driver in the middle of a match without penalty. A mentor from team 25 even recalled Dean Kamen saying at the Kick-Off that having more than one person on a team returning balls to the field was allowed this year. The bottom line is that if FIRST intended that only 1 human player return balls to the field, then they should have laid it out in the rules clearly. According to the written rules in the 2002 manual there is no basis for the refs' claim in match 27 and I would like to see written evidence that says otherwise. While some may disagree with our position, that have failed to provide written rules, any public statement before match 27, or previous precedents set in prior matches that can support their claim. I apologize for my harsh tone, but this one match severely impacted our final seeding and dropped us out the top 8. While I don't mind people disagreeing with me, I can't stand it when they don't have proof to support it.
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All I have to say about this controversy is this. Being one of the refs at the NJ Regional and having spoken to the two Mentors I can assure you that the story your getting is not what actually happened. The call that was made was well justified. Someone mentioned that we talked about it over lunch as if we had doubts as to the validity of our decision. At no time did the validity of the call come under scrutiny. The only thing that changed was the several ways in which we tried explaining our reasoning to the Mentors who seemed to be the only ones who couldn't understand it. I would like to extend a thank you though to the student members of the team who apologized for the behavior of their mentors. Obviously a mistake was made by the Mentors and a frantic attempt to cover it up followed.
Concerning the team who had the wrong pin on the wrong member of the drive team. It was very unfortunate that we had to make that decision but it was our responsibility to uphold the rules and regulations of FIRST to the best of our ability. It is unfortunate that we have to learn from our mistakes from time to time but its the way it had to be. The team who was DQed because of the sticker did move onto the quarterfinals so all was not lost. I am not going to take the time to clarify the rule concerning the handling of the balls by the members of the drive team primarily because it isn't that difficult to understand. A little bit advice to the teams who are going to more regionals or Nationals........While you may not always agree with or understand the calls of the refs, arguing will not get you anywhere and badgering for explanations of a relatively easy rule to understand only takes away from our ability to do our job. |
Refs are Human
Just to let you know, it was not only the mentors of our teams that had strong issues with the refs call. Both teams were very much angered by the DQ and I personally talked to two of the refs after the competition. From all that I saw and heard with my own senses, the refs made a mistake. On the other hand, I don't wish to fuel any heated debates, so am just going to a say a few words.
We completely understood that the call was already made and the score could not be changed. When we went up to the refs, we only asked for a little gracious professionalism on their part and we were greated by a very nasty response. Personally I ref for soccer and fencing and I understand the pressures that are involved with the job. It is not too diffucult to make an honest mistake, but it is also not too diffucult to admit this mistake. The only thing we asked for was an apology or an explanation of why they changed the fate of our team. Despite this controversy, I would like to thank them for even coming out to the competition in the first place. I understand that this competition would not take place without them, but it wouldn't be hard to fix this problem. One apology is all we asked for. They are human after all and they do make mistakes. |
I realize the refs had to make the decision they did. I just wish we would have known about it sooner or someone had realized our mistake. I guess we learned and now will never had the problem they did. I know some members of my team were not happy, but refs can't please everyone. I admit I was angry at first but then i knew there was nothing else we could do and that we screwed up. We learned. I thought the refs made very good calls throughout the weekend and it seemed like everyone was happy with the outcome. See everyone at Nationals.
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I thought that you all should know that the poeple at the helm of the scoring computer were messing up all day. Every time that I brought the score over after I tabulated the points they messed it up. Oh and by the way. I was the ref who was haking my head, but I wasn't the head one.
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My team has been lucky enough to avoid being disqualified so far, or meeting any bad calls either way (we prefer to keep a fair match, so we don't hope for a disqualification of our opponents).
So far I'm shocked to hear some of the stories about the refs... I know the pressure involved with the job, even though I have very little reffing experience. And I also would like to thank them for volunteering... But we should at least be able to talk to the refs without a sneer. Why is it that the teams full of highschool children, going up against an equal amount of pressure maintain their gracious professionalism and the refs are not capable of doing this. This is, of course, presuming that you approach the refs politely, not trying to dispute the call but understand the nature of the call. |
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