[Joe3]

Great, the annual "we got beat, so I'm going to complain about bad reffing on cd" post has cropped up.

I would like you to show me where exactly in the FIRST rules manual it says the playing defense is illegal. When 469 put their arm over/into your ball catcher, do you really think that their intention was to get entangled in your net? If you've ever been a driver, you'd realize that not only is it tough to see on the other side of the field, coordination between arm and chassis driver is extremely difficult on the field, and 469's chassis driver probably just jumped the gun and tried to get going before the arm got all the way up and out of the way. Oh, and by the way. Since 469 got entangled in YOUR robot, YOUR robot presented the entanglement hazard, and would have been the one disqualified. 469 employed the same strategy against our alliance (177, 27, 365) in the finals: they picked up a 2x ball and held it over 177's catcher when the balls dropped. The only difference here is that in your match, they dropped the ball.

For the past three years, FIRST has said that vigorous interaction between robots is to be expected, but it seems that some people still haven't listened. Yes the games have become higher contact than they have in the past, but whether that is a good thing or not,that is the way that it is.

You also keep talking about some "problem" that people are ignoring. What problem do you see? That teams are playing the game on the field to win, and are competing to the best of their ability. If you expect FIRST to go back to a 2001 style no-contact game, I think you'll be waiting a very long time. Each team can play the game however they want to, as there are infinate strategies to employ against any robot. Just dont complain when a team comes up with a strategy to beat you that you didnt expect. Get over it, and get ready for next year.