[Kevin Sevcik]

While the timing of this decision is extremely unfortunate, I don't think you can argue much with the rationale. The nets are several feet back from the field, meant to protect the crowd and venue. Inside the nets are refs, scorers, field reset, etc. The refs in particular have to work right next to the field to properly ref the game. Particularly in the end game when they need to make calls on the legality of climbs. The GDC had to make the call of whether to let the rules stand or let the refs decide between properly observing and calling a match or getting clocked in the head by errant HP frisbees.

I think the call is the right one from a safety and game management standpoint, I just think it should have been blindingly obvious to the GDC from the start that the original rules were going to result in this. Give a HP even a small chance at a scoring a point, and they're going to take it. You only have to look at the cross court shooting attempts from last year to see that.

EDIT: My mistake, nets are right on the guard rails. On the other hand, the nets don't cover the area over the goals. Which means lots of frisbees flying over the player stations, which is presumably what they're worried about. So trade clocking a ref with clocking a queued team/robot instead.