Quote:
Originally Posted by dlavery
You are making a pretty big assumption that FIRST did not take reasonable steps to plan for team access to game pieces. Not to be an apologist for FIRST, but this one really was not their fault. The game piece was selected early last summer with the specific goal of making sure that they would be available through a ubiquitous outlet such as Wal-mart. Both the manufacturer and the outlet were consulted and informed of FIRST's intentions. Wal-mart indicated they could handle the expected distribution without disturbing their channels. All was considered well and good. But then one week before Christmas Wal-mart announced they were discontinuing sales of Orbit Balls, with no prior notice. That late in the process, two weeks before kick-off, there was no opportunity to negotiate an alternate distributor with the manufacturer or identify an alternate game piece. FIRST had planned to ensure that reasonable access to game pieces could be realized by those teams that wanted to obtain additional them. But they were caught at the last minute by forces beyond their control.
The current situation is one that, painful as it may be, we just have to deal with. In that regard, kudos go to Team 228 and their development of the GUS balls. They are an excellent solution to an unfortunate problem, and it is a wonderful move to share that solution with the entire FIRST community.
-dave
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Thank you Dave, you have gave us insight into what happened that we didn't have before. I still believe that it will be hard for teams to properly design with limited amount of balls but what has been said here so far about all the teams that are winning about lack of balls there are twice as many that are just going to engineer ways around it is completely true. Once again, Thanks Dave for helping calm the situation down.
And wow last summer you had the game piece already picked out? Nice