MZU Year Plan and UCC Slides

Some of you may remember our MZU Town Hall on February 17th. Some of you may want to relive the magic and confirm some dates for summer planning. Below are the two presentations that MZU presented that evening:

Winter BIY Lottery Results

We received overwhelming interest in our Winter 2016 BIY Team League. We had submissions from 27 teams, which is incredible growth for this offering. Unfortunately, we only have room for 24 teams in the league, and thus have to conduct a lottery to determine who will play in the league. The results of that lottery are as follows:

Teams in the league:

Handler Bing
Halfhorse- R.Gaudon
Crush
Limp Diskit
Ghetto Geppeto
Lobsters
Johnson Insurance
TBD- H.Spurrell
Scoober Dooober Doo
#Scoregasm
Murdercrow
Donkey
Electric Disccharge
Huck Up Huck Off
Team Slow Clap
Flickipedia
Rubber Huckies
Nighthawks
Hotline Fling
Stop Staring at my Disc
Biped
Awesomehorse
Flicky Minaj
TBD- A.Bill

Waitlisted Teams:

1. Young Guns
2. TBD- J.Webb
3. Scoober Heroes

We now enter phase 3 of the league registration process. Teams have until Wednesday March 9 to register and invite their players. After that point any team who has not submitted a completed roster will be taken out of the league and we will start contacting waitlisted teams.

You can relive the magic of the lottery here:

Thanks,

MZU Board

MZU Winter Build It Yourself 2016

You’ve been apart from your BIY Teams for awhile now, and maybe you’re missing them a bit? Or maybe you’ve met some people in Hat and you want to enter the league with a new team? Now is your chance! It is time to chat Build It Yourself. The details:

League Name: Indoor BIY League

Capacity: 24 Teams

Team Composition: 10 Player minimum, with a typical composition of 6 males, and 4 females. Teams may have 5 males/5 females, or 4 males/6 females

Field: Techniplex

Format: Wager Ranking System

Playoffs: 3 week 8 team brackets

Registration: (see below)

Time: Monday Nights from 8PM-12AM

Duration: March 21st to May 16th

Jerseys: Not included in registration

Cost: $650 per team

Registration Schedule:

• February 1st to February 16 – Captains express interest, submit team/partial rosters via Google Form
• February 17th – If there is interest from more than 24 teams, MZU will hold a lottery to see which teams gain entry.
• Waitlisted teams will gain automatic entry into the next (Fall) indoor BIY Provided that:
  • The submit a full roster of a minimum of 10 eligible players once waitlisted
  • 60% of the roster does not play in the current BIY league
  • 60% of the players are on the roster for the next league
• February 18th to March 9th – Captains registration, invite players to roster, etc
• March 10th – If teams fail to complete registration, contact teams on the waitlist until league is full
• March 21st – League play begins

So start building your teams, and getting ready for another action packed season of indoor build it yourself Ultimate.

If you are looking for a team, or a team looking for players, check out our  matchmaking form.

As always, any questions please email the league at Hi@MileZeroUltimate.com or reach us on Facebook/Twitter.

Jan 18 Games: Cancelled

The games for Jan 18 have been cancelled due to the road conditions. Tonight’s games will take place next week.

MZU Board

Winter Hat League 2016 Starts Tomorrow

Hey MZU!

Our Winter Hat League starts tomorrow at the Techniplex! The teams are made, the schedule is posted, and you should have received an email from the league introducing your team to each other. Now pick a captain, and we’ll see you on the field.

Don’t forget to bring a black/white tomorrow until the color situation is sorted out.

Looking to sub? Here’s the sub form

Thanks,

MZU Board

Winter Hat League 2016

So our Indoor Build It Yourself League ends this Monday. Which begs the question? What now? Well, stuff your faces with treats, spend time with friends and family, and catch up on television shows. However, save some time on December 17th to register for our Indoor Hat League, as that’s just around the corner. The details are:

Capacity – 240 players (144 Male, 96 Female)

Team Composition – 10 player minimum, with a typical composition of 6 males and 4 females. (Note: Based on registration numbers, teams may have 5 males/5 females or 4 males/6 females at the Board’s discretion)

Field  Composition – 5 on 5, with a male to female ratio of 3:2 or 2:3, other team no required to match

Field – Techniplex

Format – 24 Teams, Speed Point, Wager Ranking System

Playoffs – Playoff structure will be determined by registration numbers. we are planning for a 2 or 3 week playoff

Team Building – MZU Board Team Building

Registration – Starts December 17th 12 Noon, Ends December 24th 12 Midnight

Signup – Register as individual or in pairs

When – Monday Nights from 8PM – 12AM

Game 1: 8:00PM

Game 2: 9:00PM

Game 3: 10:00PM

Game 4: 11:00PM

Duration – 11 weeks (January 4 to March 14)

Jerseys – Not included

Cost – $85 ($10 UNL fee if not already a member)

Get excited!

Also, don’t forget this Monday is the last day for the MZU Turkey Drive, please bring your donation to the game.

Any questions about the above, hit us up on Facebook, Twitter, or Hi@MileZeroUltimate.Com

MZU is Catching Turkeys Again

How Does MZU Schedule Games For Our Indoor Leagues?

We’ve been getting a lot of questions about how we make the schedule, how we allocate the various time slots, and just “how does it work?” We haven’t discussed this league operations issue in a while so we figured it might be time to chat about the schedule:

How does MZU schedule games?

1.  One of our top priorities when creating a schedule is ensuring that opponents are of a relatively even skill level. You’ll never see a scenario where 1^st plays 16^th, as we control for that using a rating system (described below).  We’ve also set the no repeats rule to 3 weeks, such that if you play a team in Week 1, you shouldn’t see that opponent again until at least Week 5. This ensures teams get to play a variety of evenly skilled opponents over the course of the league. At the click of a button, Zuluru can generate a schedule that matches two similar opponents, keeping in mind the no repeats rule. But we don’t stop there…
2. After Zuluru creates this schedule, our primary focus is balancing that 11 pm time slot. This current league is 11 weeks in duration and there are four possible time slots (8, 9, 10, or 11 pm), with the exception of a few teams every team should get three 11 pm games. Given that we are going into Week 10 in the schedule, teams should now be expecting to play their third game in the 11 pm slot. We try our best to ensure these games are evenly distributed and that there are no repeats in that slot (i.e., teams do not have back to back weeks at 11 pm).
3. Given how much effort goes into balancing 11pm games, we know it’s not possible to balance all four time slots evenly for all teams. Our compromise is to look at the 8-9pm games and 10-11 pm games together, trying to balancing the number of “early” vs. the number of “late” games a team has to play. Again, this is an ideal scenario but most teams should finish with a minimum of five games in the 8-9 slots, and five games in the 10-11 slots.
4. Final reminder that this is an 11 week league, and the hope is that at the end of the league, everything should balance! Trust that the League Committee takes balancing the schedule very seriously and that every effort is being made to make a fair schedule for all teams.

The Wager Ladder System

Also, while we’re talking about scheduling… We’ve recently moved away from the USAU Ranking system we’ve used in the past, and have adopted a new methodology called the Wager Ladder.

(Copied from the OCUA web site)

In this system, games are worth a variable total of points, based on the final score. Each team contributes some number of points from their ratings value towards this total, but the amount they contribute is not fixed — it depends on their relative ratings. This contribution is that team’s wager contributed to the pot. The losing team wins back the number of points they scored, and the winning team takes the remainder of the pot.

Here’s how it works in detail:

1. A team’s percentage chance to win is computed based on the pre-game ratings values. This will determine what percentage of the game’s value the team must contribute. For example, if both teams are evenly matched, they will each contribute 50% of the total. If instead, Team A has a 60% chance of winning, they contribute 60% of the total value.
2. After the game is complete, the pot value is computed. The pot value is double the winning score plus 10. For a normal game to 15, this would make the pot worth 40 points.
3. Each team’s contribution is calculated by multiplying the pot value by the team’s percentage chance to win. This represents the maximum number of ratings points that team could lose.
4. The losing team then gains back the number of ratings points equal to their score. In an evenly-matched game ending 15-10, the losing team would gain back 10 points for a total loss of 10
5. The winning team then gains the remainder of the pot. So, for example, if their contribution was 20 points, and they won 15-10, they would get a pot of 30, for a net gain of 10.

Summary

The schedule is one of the most painstaking tasks the Board does. We work really hard to create fair match-ups and have a fair distribution of time slots. As always, if your team has questions or concerns please do not hesitate to contact us at hi@MileZeroUltimate.com OR on Facebook/Twitter.

See you at 11 😉

MZU Board

Mile Zero Ultimate Annual General Meeting Summary

The Mile Zero Ultimate Annual General Meeting (AGM) yesterday evening at The Elk’s Lodge was filled with great league news. It was one of the most attended AGM’s in MZU history with around 75 people eligible to vote (in person or by proxy). The passion for Ultimate in St. John’s, and in our league is incredibly strong. These are very exciting times for our league. The two main points of business was a bylaw amendment vote as well as the election of the new board.

The bylaw amendment passed with a 98% approval rating. This is an overwhelming mandate from membership that they wanted our eligibility requirements changed. Additionally, MZU is a membership run league. If you see a bylaw that you do not agree with, you as a member have the power to change that.

The Board of Directors election was also conducted. The new board are as follows:

President – Allan Johnson

Vice-President League – Chris Whittick

Vice-President Spirit – Cameron Segger

Vice-President Communications – Jeff Lush

Vice-President Finance – Adam Drover

Members at Large:

• Jessica Wade
• Mark Flynn
• Alex Bill
• Rob Langridge
• Sherry Lythgoe
• Drew Barnes

Additionally, with the election of the new board this marks the end of two MZU Board member’s exceptionally long tenure.

Michael Walter, served on the MZU board for the last 9 years. When he started, if you had asked him what he thought of Southlands Field he would have looked at you very confused, as the field hadn’t even been conceptually developed. Michael was involved in league and spirit initiatives throughout his tenure and helped grow the league immensely. With his decision to take a step back and be a regular member the board loses a tireless volunteer who always brought a positive attitude. See you around Mike.

Sophie Harrington, served on the MZU board for the last 8 years. She was very much the voice of the league, and has probably sent you a dozen emails. She was instrumental in creating the current league communication strategy as well as most of the back end infrastructure implementation. She was VP-Finance for a bit even though she “draws pictures for a living”.  The league runs as efficiently as it does because of her work over the last 8 years. Thanks for all your hard work Sophie and hopefully we can trick you into making a few more Valentine’s this year.

Thanks to those two volunteers specifically for their outstanding contributions to MZU.

Also thanks to the following outgoing board members for their contributions: Karen Lawlor, Mark Young, and Nick Hounsell.

If you have any further questions about last night’s AGM please email hi@MileZeroUltimate.com or write us on facebook.

Annual General Meeting Reminder

Hey MZUers,

As you know our Annual General Meeting (AGM) is this Wednesday, November 25th at 8PM at The Elk’s Club. We are all very excited to share with you a summary of what we have accomplished this year, and also elect our new board. Additionally, we will have a bylaw amendment vote. Here’s a few things to keep in mind in advance of our AGM:

1) Are you able to make the meeting? If you can’t make the meeting, you may vote by proxy. To do this, please indicate in writing to the VP Communications (Hi@MileZeroUltimate.Com) who is voting on your behalf. You can read all about proxies in detail here

2) Have you read about the proposed bylaw amendment? One of our members has submitted a bylaw amendment regarding MZU Player eligibility. You can read about the amendment here.

3) Have you considered running for The Board? MZU is operated by a group of dedicated volunteers, and it’s super easy. If you’ve wanted to get more involved in running the league now’s your chance! It could be as simple as “I’d like to help with administering the leagues”, or “I’d like to work on spirit of the game with MZU”. There are lots of commitment levels and roles available. You can read more about the positions  here . Also, if you have a specific question about a role, email any of the specific directors or hi@MileZeroUltimate.Com and we’ll work to get you the best answer.

Look forward to seeing everyone at our AGM!

MZU