Thoughts on the competiton balls

[Petey]

Like many teams, Team 1073 was forced to practice with non-competition balls all year. Comparing those stiff, heavy, sticky balls to the ones we used today at Manchvegas would be like comparing a well broken in basketball to a greased water balloon.

However, this turned out to be a blessing for our robot, which didn't ride up on many balls, and our human players adapted well enough.

Since all this hubbub has been made about the balls...what do you think? Was it overblown? Is the discrepency in the ball types overwhelming for your robot or human players? (I saw a lot of HP's overshooting their goal with these lighter, greasy balls).

Personally, I think that I could improve even upon my already good accuracy had I practiced with comp balls all year long. And we would have not had to design and implement such elaborate countermeasures for the stickiness of the practice balls had we had the idea that these comp balls are so greasy.

Love to hear your thoughts.

--Petey