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Originally Posted by Ken358
We apologize for tipping 56 in the finals. We inadvertently cheated everyone out of exciting third match. I just want to make sure that no one thinks that we did it purposely. We would have much preferred to keep them upright so that the matches could have been settled on the field rather than in the judge’s huddle.
My disappointment comes from the feeling that the announcer and judges seemed to paint us as an overly aggressive team in the finals. I hope that everyone understands that that is not what we are about. We are an offensive robot. We rarely play defense.
In the qualifying matches our drivers always erred on the side of caution. Our motto is “It’s more fun when everyone plays.” Since we are not a “home town team” and not very well known at the Philly regional I am concerned about perpetuating this perceived image of extreme aggressiveness. I hope the teams that we played with and against can attest to the fact that we played our matches fairly, graciously, professionally and with integrity. We did not win the SBPLI Chairman’s Award by being a rouge team.
Team 358
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Ken, believe it ot not, Team 365 knows how disappointed you are. Two weeks ago, we lost the Pittsburgh Championship on an identical DQ. Our alliance was DQ'd for unintentionally tipping another robot. It indeed leaves an empty feeling when an unintended and unexpected result decides a match.
Anyone who believes that Team 358 was "extremely aggressive" wasn't watching the competition. Your robot was one of the best there, a fast, capable capper with an intelligent, experienced driver who played the game cleanly every time out -- including the one unfortunate call in the finals. After studying the scouting sheets Friday evening, we knew that if you weren't picking teams, you would be picked early for playoffs. You have a high quality team, and it has been fun to visit and compete with you. We hope you are able to come back to Philly next year and keep this Regional one of the highest competitive Regionals FIRST has.
If the announcer seemed to emphasize that aggressive play would not be tolerated, he certainly did not mean that to be personally directed to you or your team. Ron Partridge is one of FIRST's best announcers, and he is just as disappointed that a match has to be decided on such calls as you are. If you ever get the opportunity to meet him (Championships), please do. You will find he is one of the nicest people you have ever met. Ron also is responsive to making changes to how he calls the games. A few years back someone pointed out to him a comment that he made announcing that reflected negatively on a team. When he realized how his comments could be misunderstood, he changed the way he made those calls so that they would not be offensive to the team. He cares very much about FIRST and also about the teams at his competitions, and he would not say anything that would bring discredit to any team.
Good Luck at Championships, it would be fun if we were in the same division, but I think our Team numbers may be too close to allow that. I'll have to check out Koko Ed's latest update of the possible divisional breakdown and see.