I spent much of my free time today reading all of Kenny Dobyns' blog and learning a lot about those who came before.  Earlier this summer, I read most of Parinella's current blog, as well as his old website and absorbed a lot of history from it.  To my high school self and even my college self, real competitive ultimate started with DoG.  To look back and see NYNY and before, reaching back into the 80s, the time when I was born- the styles were awful, the ultimate was...not.  It was real, balls-out ultimate.  As far as I can tell, it predates the Ho, the clam, the you-name-it scheme that is commonplace today, but it wasn't easy or lazy or any of those things we think of old players as being now. Unsophisticated, perhaps, but unsophisticated like a hobo fight- if you're not on your toes, you'll be on your ass.  The real thing I pulled from it was a recognition.
 More on that later.

As I said, ultimate started and ended, for me, with DoG (with Parinella, really).  Meeting your heroes is always a shock and he turned out to kinda be a douche.  Not a huge one, but I cared a lot more about being a good guy when I met him and he's not a "good" guy.  Great competitor, perhaps, but those are often far away from each other.  I should clarify- he is, at heart, a competitor and someone who wants to win.  He is, usually, reasonable, I think, and from my few interactions with him, not outwardly douchey.  But there is a part of me that would like the Patriots to just dick around and have fun with the guys if they're playing against Wesleyan University and I feel like in him, that part is much smaller.  No matter, the point is, on Parinella's blog, there was a long and involved discussion of Dobyns' place in the hall of fame.  I considered the forum pretty respectable, despite the chinese language spam in the comments (not Jim's fault).  In it, Henry Thorne was putting up an impassioned fight to keep Dobyns out.  Pretty much everyone else of note was fighting to put him in.  Henry Thorne is an ultimate figurehead of major note in Pittsburgh so, knowing essentially nothing about anybody in this debate, I sided with him.  However, Parinella was pretty emphatic that Dobyns belonged, so I was at least partially torn.

Today, I read Dobyns' side and I have to say, I think I side with him now.  He made some terrible choices on-field about aggression that I wouldn't make and would despise another for making, but through the rosey glasses of history, he comes out as...just another high-level player.  Perhaps he paved the way, but I don't think so- there have been players intentionally toeing the line of appropriate in every sport since forever.  Perhaps he paved the way in ultimate, but somebody had to and nowadays it seems practically a given that all teams will have That Guy.  KD seems to have embraced the title at the time, but now looks back with...not remorse but an admission that it was, perhaps, immature.  Would I play with him?  Probably.  Almost certainly.  Would I want to line up against him?  No clue.  It would depend on what he's actually like nowadays.  I'd give him his shot, though.

That wasn't really the point, though.  The recognition.  The recognition is that Mike must have been a huge NYNY and likely even a KD fan.  The time is _about_ right (not exact, since he's a little late for them, instead catching DoG in its early heyday) but the legend must have still been around.  But I look at Dobyns and I see a shorter, more athletic, more successful Mike.  Hard competitor, clearly smart and eloquent, convinced of his superiority, but only to the extent that he feels quiet pride in his accomplishments.  Dobyns spent a deal of time as a teacher and clearly was in the Dead Poets Society- he cared about the successes, not the averages. The inequities of the world ate him away and he left.  If I can't see Mike doing that, I can't see him doing a damn thing.  Except he'd probably make the decision beforehand and just never go into teaching.  The way he conducts a discussion, at least a one-sided one, is exactly the way Mike would/does.  It's...uncanny.

Anyway, just a thing I noticed.  It was weird, but worth noting.  I've got gym time tonight and I'll have to buy protein before it so Ken doesn't kick my ass (well...in a way not involving getting stronger).