Saturday, July 14, 1976

THE MICHIGAN DAILY

Page Seven

atduy016T G D


the Humbly disc wizards

r reaches the receivers' line. 21
ins the game.
etc isn't really much to guts," ex-
Scott Dickson. "It doesn't make
aty of the properties of a disc
cld do it with baseballs.
like to distinguish between ball
and disc sports. There are things
: do with a disc that you can't
ir: a bull."
pRON(OUNCENIENTS hardly sound
:ke tose of a man who revels in the
e h jovs of a guts frisbee match,
hey 'ren't -- Scott plays guts, but
the more subtle pleasures of a
ie tine. Soft-spoken and thought-
The tord jerk' is strong language
." ;:ys John), he sometimes has
I liself up to the emotional peak
'ts nmatch. "I left Scott a note on
ed telling him to get psyched up,"
confided to us as we were pulling
ot Ann Arbor for Houghton and the
i Scott and another Humbly, Vaughn
, all began playing the game together
attending the University three years
hn and I were just playing on the
one day and he (Scott) came along,
e said 'hey, we've got another good
player," reminisces Vaughn. "We
i all the way back home and he just
walking with us right to our house.
pointed a couple doors away and
I live there.' "
m then on, according to John, they
ced together, often throwing across
treet with a large black Master fris-
at met its end beneath the wheels
garbage truck.
t was the first of the three to join
umbly team, answering a newspaper
at asked for frisbee players who
University students.
USED TO GO DOWN to practices
n the middle of the winter, in the
and snow," John recalls with amuse-
"We all thought he was crazy."
asn't long, however, before all three
sined the team.

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TOM FIELD of the frisbee champion Air Aces flashes a winner's grin and a trophy after beating Ann Arbor's Humblies Sunday.
te players, an irony embodied by the shy away from is Jeff Dean, an 18-year-old here?" some spectator asked me. "We'i
FT, in which teams fight tooth and nail just out of high school who is blessed with winning," I said, "18-15." The hoarsene
r a trophy that is made out of cans. what John calls "one of the hardest shots of my voice surprised me and I realize
Humbly Chuck Schultz, who keeps his in the game today." that I had been shouting all day.
ang blond hair pinned down under a tight Jeff displayed his confident, almost cocky The Humblies got through the preliminar
ainter's cap which looks like a bandage, personality to me the first time we met. matches without losing a game, and mad
marked one evening, after a hard day "I'm Jeff Dean," he said. "I've got a a frenzied comeback in the semi-finalt
e hunt, You kid around with each other pretty good thumb shot t e edge out Houghton's hometown team, t
nd there's competition to see who can The Humbly "team" usually includes not 1974 champion Library Bar. But the e
g the biggest buck, but in the end you only the six first string members, but sev- chantment didn't last, and the Humblie
l share the meat." eral lesser lights; plus Walter Roberson, lost the championship match to the A
ASKED HIM whether he didn't feel odd a sort of freelance social worker who Aces, a Rochester team with whom the
to be playing seriously a sport which worked with Jeff in high school and calls practice frequently.
ost people take lightly. "You don't play him "the son I never -had;" Susan, John's Later, two of the Aces brought the troph
r everybody, you play for yourself," he girlfriend, who on the spur of the moment over to the van so that Chuck could s
plied. took part in a women's guts tournament; some beer from it. "I want you guyst
her four-year-old daughter Carmen and know I really appreciate this," Chuck sai
even a dog or two. Carmen, who had spent the day scurryin

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ir
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ip
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her three-foot frame around the field col-

at urday
agazine

AND THERE WAS still room for one lecting free frisbees, took a long look at
more, the trophy, then turned to Chuck. "Is that
By the last afternoon of the tournament, magic?" she asked.
I started to notice that even I was talk- Everyone smiled.
ing in terms of "we" - "our" players,
"our" van, "our" hotel. "What's the score S!t McConnell is a Daily staff writer.


otne ther member from those days
ts - Jerome Meiswick, who has been
the team almost since its first match
tkes credit for its name. "The IFT
o be a lot more social than it is
remembers Jerome, when I ask him
the early days of the tournament.
tns. "It used to be a breach of ethics
Vp up to the line without a beer can
cur hand."
e t has since grown into a mon-
"urist event drawing well over a
and spectators. As a result the sport
a transitional phase now, caught
ett remaining a perpetual novelty
DeCOming a big-money professional
a heady goal toward which the
Drelshknownmanufacturer, Wham-O
pushing hard.
>IIE \WE'RE ABOUT at the point
uehall was back in the 1890's, with
9 teams," John remarks.
I the game of frisbee should be is
ter of some confusion, even among

The beer - can trophies seem like the
height of silliness to casual tournament ob-
servers, but to the players they represent
the world's championship of guts frisbee-
a small world, perhaps, but one which is
exclusively theirs. "It's a worthless piece
of junk," Vaughn said of the first-place
trophy as he waited to play in the tourna-
ment's final match, "but it means so
much."
A great deal of grunting and straining
goes into each guts frisbee toss as much
of the "psyching" of the other team is
accomplished through taunts and war
whoops - but there are also more subtle
methods.
J EROME TOLD ME after one match, that
the Humblies' strategy had been to
throw at their opponents' best player. "I
think that's the way you should play every
game," he said. "If you throw right at
their best man, show them you aren't
afraid, they'll fall apart."
The man Humbly opponents generally

Dnity Photn oy1
CHUCK snagging a bullet-like toss during a semi-final match aga
ton's Library Bar team, as Vaughn and Jeff look on,