[Daniel Brim]

I like this year's balance. In 2003, the Human Player had almost no importance, because what they did could be destroyed in a few seconds, and they were only involved for 10 seconds. In 2004, I felt that there was too much Human Player dependence. I could see where Dean was coming from in his reasoning, but I thought that there was an unequal weight (like us at SoCal - we had an outstanding Human Player, but almost no robot, and yet we made it to 20th seed when we probably should have been towards the bottom).

This year, the Human Players may or may not be used. Is there a safety issue? A little bit. Can other robots avoid this safety issue and be Graciously Proffesional? Yes. Could FIRST have included more safety features on their playing field? Probably, but hindsight is 20/20. The only issue I have is that a Human Player isn't used on some teams. I hope that in future years, the Human Player balance is improved by keeping the same importance, but having all Human Players doing the same task.

-Daniel