Net is really cool

Josh B · Post by **Josh B** » 10 Nov 2004 22:55

it shocks me that a lot of you are saying that the splitting up of net and freestyle would actually be a good thing, that's just rediculous.

Stoke: i will soon be competing open for net AND freestyle, i just need to get my net game up a litte more. i currently compete in open freestyle and intermediate net.
About Kenny freestyling- he competed in freestyle competition just last weekend!! as a matter of fact, hes very close to some new sick tricks. he was not freestyling at worlds because of his knee.

Mosher: maybe you'd be a good candidate for singles net? i prefer singles over doubles.

Seath: yes i practice my spikes on both sides, if you can only scuff spike from one side and you find the bag being set on the wrong side of your body, you're fuct.

To everyone out there who hasnt given net a fair chance: you're missing out on a great discipline of footbag. it's as much fun and rewarding as freestyle but you have to give it a chance! imagine someone trying to learn freestyle for only 3 days and saying "screw this, this is no fun!" most of you would probably say something like "you cant bash shredding, you've only been playing for 3 days!" thats how i feel when a freestyler immediately denounces net without giving it a chance. give it a REAL try, actually practice for an hour after your freestyle sessions for a month or so. hang out and talk to some net players at the next tourney you're at, watch some matches, hell.. maybe even play a pick up game with another newb. i promise you wont be disappointed.

also, if you ever see me at a tournament and are interested in learning some net basics, i will gladly try and help you learn.

mosher · Post by **mosher** » 10 Nov 2004 23:20

Josh B wrote:Mosher: maybe you'd be a good candidate for singles net? i prefer singles over doubles.

....

imagine someone trying to learn freestyle for only 3 days and saying "screw this, this is no fun!" most of you would probably say something like "you cant bash shredding, you've only been playing for 3 days!" thats how i feel when a freestyler immediately denounces net without giving it a chance. give it a REAL try, actually practice for an hour after your freestyle sessions for a month or so.

Good points!

I think that maybe I would really like net, but my main problem is the difficulty encountered when trying to get a game together. there are not alot of availible people to play with. And as lame as it sounds.. if I have spare energy and I spend it on anything *other* than freestyle I feel really guilty and think about the new tricks I could have hit with that energy.

I will for sure give net an honest chance.

I have been playing a version of mini-net in my house for a few weeks now. We have a whole elaborate set-up of pillows that make a wall and a carpet that makes boundaries and great long games ensue.

We can get quite heated!

Thanks for convincing me to try, I'll let you know how it goes.

Elliott · Post by **Elliott** » 11 Nov 2004 09:32

It only takes 2 people to play net... four if your luckly. i know it seems like a lot of trouble: measuring the dimensions, painting the lines, setting up a net, and getting kids out to kick it with you. believe me, it is worth it! it's easy to like & dislike something based on your own ability. when i first started playing net i hated it cause it was so damn hard. we learned how to play on a tennis court, or we would play against a wall by passing the bag off the wall. finally, we bought a crappy badminton set from wal-mart. we broke at least 3 different sets and just kept returning them saying that the posts snapped while we were adjusting the tension on the net. my point is that net is fun, and breaking things can sometimes be fun too.

Jeremy · Post by **Jeremy** » 11 Nov 2004 17:06

What I was saying before had nothing to do with enjoyment or lack of enjoyment playing net. I am sure I would enjoy playing it - I can't think of a sport I haven't enjoyed playing.

I just think that despite the history - freestyle footbag and net footbag are now completely different sports and I think basketball and Ice Hockey have more in common -with the actual rules of the sports -not who plays them

mosher · Post by **mosher** » 11 Nov 2004 18:55

I played some half-scale net tonight.

It was fun for the most part but rallies rarely lasted more than 2-3 exchanges which wasn't that fun. I know I know, this will come with time, but we weren't even trying to kill it on eachother!

Josh B · Post by **Josh B** » 11 Nov 2004 20:13

id say it takes atleast a month to develop basic net skills mosher, keep at it

. you'll also want a net bag, and net shoes would be nice, but anything with flat surfaces will do. i would also reccomend practicing alone at first to get the reaaal basic skills down. (you're right 2-3 rallys over isnt much fun) just practice consecutive kicks, but set them well over your head. kick it off of a hard wall, this will help you learn harder trajectory on your shots. theres also some spike videos on footbag.org, these are REALLY fun once you learn them (takes some flexibility too). i really have as much fun nailing a sweet flying toe hammer that my opponent cant dig as i do when i bust atomic torque.

To jeremy, i think the point youre trying to make about basketball and hockey does not even relate to footbag freestyle and net. for one, THEY ARE BOTH FOOTBAG. at rope jumping tournaments they dont segregate the freestyle jumpers from the speed jumpers, yet the rules are tooootally different, they are played in the same manner (jumping over a rope). net and freestyle are also played in the same manner (manipulating a footbag).

btw, has anyone seen competitive rope jumping? Haaaardcore

rye · Post by **rye** » 12 Nov 2004 16:33

why don't we get a net game going and see how we do, and if we're really good enter a competition and win a lot of money and buy new cars?

acxel22 · Post by **acxel22** » 20 Nov 2004 19:08

I got a net this summer since all my friends saw how cool net is and they wanted to play
Result: played 1 game since I bought the net total

I really enjoyed it, but getting 4 people is really hard!

C-Fan · Post by **C-Fan** » 24 Nov 2004 18:14

I always thought to myself that if I hadn`t gotten into freestyle footbag, I would have tried to take up skateboarding. But now that I freestyle, I know I won`t take up skateboarding, because I don`t have the time to dedicate to it to get real good, and I don`t want to jeopardize myself by potentially getting injured in something I suck at (skateboarding), which would fuck up something I`m good at and really enjoy (footbag.)

I`ve played net maybe 10 times in my life, and I`ve always really enjoyed it. But back at 2000 worlds I pulled my right hamstring playing intermediate singles net, and that fucked up my freestyling for the whole week. That really showed me that I need to prioritize my goals. I was at World Champs so I could play freestyle, but instead I injured myself dicking around in a game which is fun, but I wasn`t passionate about. At the moment, I love freestyle, and I have some ability in it. Therefore, I don`t play net, I don`t skateboard, I don`t do anything which will take away time/energy from my freestyle development, or could potentially injure my legs.

I agree with Jeremy that freestyle and net are 2 completely different sports. I don`t feel strongly either way that splitting up the tournaments would help or hurt either scene.

I think back in the day it was possible to play both net and freestyle, because neither was as physically demanding as they are now. The fact is, high-level freestyle in 2004 is way harder on the body than high level freestyle in 98. Everybody is expected to do longer, harder combos, and some of the common sets and concepts require a lot more strength and energy. If you are consistently doing 20+ contact runs with superflies and barraging sets, you won`t likely have the energy to play a long net game.

Personally, I always admired the path that Eric Wullff took. He was a bad ass shredder, invented several tricks, popularized ducks (which are now standard), hit a 4 dex, became world champion, and beat Vasek in competition, and then moved on to play net. I`d love to follow a path like that. If I can play freestyle at a high level for a few more years (maybe til Im 30), then I`d be fine `retiring` to playing net.

krawallier · Post by **krawallier** » 26 Nov 2004 14:27

as a freestyler from a club where people play net and freestyle it makes me really upset to read jeremy's posts.... actually i think the most important thing matti mentioned: there are no net players in australia, and jeremy, you have never even been to a tournament with some serious net competion! why do you think you can tell how far apart n and f are apart?

not many freestylers are good net players and vice versa, but those ppl exist, and that shows a lot about the similar root both disciplines have.

and to be honest about all the bragging of how tough it is to get enough players to get a game going and stuff, well it obvously isn't made for geeks who learn about a sport on the internet, practice their whole life in their garage at mummy's, and don't go out into REALITY, but spend their whole time posting videos of themselves and thinking of a "community" that is made up of bits n bytes.... guys, the internet is cool, but it is not real!!!! the people are not your friends until you meet them... (they often turn out to become your friends though,ie jeremy)! and most net players you can even meet without talking to them on the web before, and they are cool nonetheless

!

actually after re-reading this i must admit this was quite a rant! i appologize for being so rude but i guess that had to be said...

krawallier · Post by **krawallier** » 26 Nov 2004 14:32

ps: our berlin net-rookie (5.op doubl euros), ullrich haase is coming to australia for one year in two weeks, and he'll be eager to dig n spike, so he might show you some badass netskills....

Jeremy · Post by **Jeremy** » 26 Nov 2004 15:03

Cool - we can convert him to freestyle

In all honesty the only reason I posted what I said before was in an attempt to get people to actually post in this forum. The reason it exists is because when I ran the modified feedback survey it seemed like there was a bit of interest in a net forum - and once we implemented it - there are hardly any topics or posts in the forum - I was hoping that by dissing net - it would encourage net players to defend their sport.

However frankly that hasn't happened and I wonder if this forum is a good idea afterall - all the topics here could be put in the "general footbag" forum instead. I think less sub forums would make things much more user friendly - especially when we have subforums that get about 1 post a week.

Elliott · Post by **Elliott** » 26 Nov 2004 19:04

net players are generally older guys with full-time jobs & families. older kickers do not travel cross country to compete in tournaments like the young players do, and they certainly do not spend their spare time in forums yucking it up with a bunch of teenagers. most net players are content to play in their own city of residence with their old buddies and teach those newbies that show interest. have you ever looked at the net forum on footbag.org? someone might post a topic once per month. just because net players are less internet savvoy doesn't mean we're not interested in talking about net; it means we're outside playing net.

Jeremy · Post by **Jeremy** » 26 Nov 2004 19:30

So you agree we should get rid of the forum then?

Elliott · Post by **Elliott** » 27 Nov 2004 17:20

it matters not.

eR-mine · Post by **eR-mine** » 01 Dec 2004 04:30

word, elliot.

net is not the thing to talk about, net is a game. and games should be played, not talked about =) .

C-Fan · Post by **C-Fan** » 01 Dec 2004 15:43

About a year ago, the online freestyle community had a bit of a dilemna regarding the boom in freestyle forums. At that time, .org forums were new, flipsider forums were still running, and of course modified was around too. Some people in the online freestyle community were torn about so many freestyle online forums, since they thought it was redundant or diluted the online discussion of freestyle. People wondered if they should post the same topics/videos on each of the forums, and most people ended up choosing a forum and sticking with it, because it was too much of a hassle to check 3 forums for the same topic.

My point? The internet already has a forum where net discussion takes place: footbag.org/forum. Modified seems happy enough being a freestyle forum, so I say end this forum, and let net discussion make its home on .org.

qphox · Post by **qphox** » 05 Dec 2004 05:16

eR-mine wrote:net is not the thing to talk about, net is a game. and games should be played, not talked about =).

Maybe I'm mis-interpreting, but take a minute to wonder where footbag would be today if no one talked about it. I'm pretty certain that the sport's development and evolution doesn't take place due to a lack of discussion.

Also, I agree entirely with Ken.

Benny · Post by **Benny** » 06 Dec 2004 22:52

WEll, THis is my first post on Modified and I will use it argue that the two communities are symbiotic, freestyle too gaining in some ways. FOr instance, at any given tournament, if both sports are going on at one time, it is a more attractive and interesting site for passers-by. Passers-by might be Adidas marketers out with their sons who are soccer players.
Secondly, It is definitely true that players cross over diciplines which would not be as easy if the tournaments were not together. People as cool as Eric Wolfe and The Disco Ninja, not to metion the incomperable Kenny Schults will not be able to exist anymore. So I hear that there are not pros at both. This is not so. I think that there are a couple of Europeans who are already and I plan on competing Open at both by next after this SUmmer. Tournaments liike Funtastik are very fun, with their Iron-Man, Service Poaching, and SUperman, an event I like very much this year.
Also the point is a good one that Freestyle became Powerful under the protection of Net. Now, Net is riding a bit on Freestyles back. It sort of reminds us of the history of our country and our relations with our former colonizer. Here I have to ask you more hardcore freestylers, Is it SO bad to have us along? WHAT about it is not goodness?

Benny · Post by **Benny** » 06 Dec 2004 22:57

I think that there should be net on the forum. I think that there will be an upsurgance in young net players,. REally. No $hittin'.