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1
on: November 18, 2009, 01:08:19 PM
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Started by fliptoon - Last post by rbaker
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"Obviously, people are losing interest in our version of horseshoes nationwide. But most of them are still pitching horseshoes... they're just doing it somewhere else where they have more fun doing it! If we don't change something to attract more people to NHPA horseshoes, well, we won't have to be worrying about this kind of thing, will we? Or are we just going to be content with our system as is and just accept whoever plays, as many or as few as they may be? It seems this is the attitude here... "This is our way.. if you don't like it, leave..." Well, in case you haven't noticed, they are leaving! Is it a wonder why? I really don't think that jives with the NHPA's mission statement in the by laws but that's the feeling I get from most of the clubs and tournaments that I attend around the country."
I agree......
NHPA has to many rules that were adopted for two few of the members. A majority of horseshoe pitchers don't want to pitch competitive horseshoes, commit to a league every week for 2 1/2 months, could care less about the NHPA patches, the liability insurance offered at sanctioned events, NHPA newsletter, etc. They just like to pitch horseshoes and goof off a little bit at the same time. Maybe a couple of beers, laughing, telling jokes, yelling at your oppoent once in awhile, and working out scoring immediately after the shoes land instead of referring to a rule book that is way to detailed for horseshoe pitching. I've pitched in both and non-sanctioned league pitching is a lot more fun then NHPA sanctioned league pitching. It's a lot easier to get subs and it's fun to watch new pitchers get involved in the league. One or two time subs were impossible to get when they had to pay the $20.00 NHPA Fee to pitch.
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2
on: November 17, 2009, 09:19:25 PM
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Started by fliptoon - Last post by cobbler
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Good idea... it could help... but not everyone has an iphone...
But for those that do, maybe an app that can track a game or a practice session would be a nice thing? You could email yourself the results or store them in memory on the phone and monitor your practice that way and also play a game when you want... could be a very useful thing. Of course, why stop there? Why not make an app that can make up brackets on the fly or round robins... there's no reason you couldn't run a small tournament on an iphone if there was an app for it, right? Perhaps a programmer might want to work on something like that? Maybe something that's universal and useable for other games besides just horseshoes?
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3
on: November 17, 2009, 06:40:32 PM
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Started by fliptoon - Last post by smokepole
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How about an App for the iPhone or iPod touch which would send information wirelessly by bluetooth to the scoreboard and tournament director?
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4
on: November 17, 2009, 04:27:34 PM
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Started by Fred - Last post by Andre
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Hi Fred, Thanks for posting this very interesting information. Can you tell us the source where you took the inflation rates used in your calculations? I'm a little worried about the purchasing power's decline. As you mentioned the entry fees and membership fees have not kept pace with inflation. But yet I feel it costs more for our people to participate in tournaments and the price of gas is usually pointed as one of the main reasons. I remember many years ago one of our good players stopped going to tournaments because of the price of gas. Winning first place was not even paying for his gas. It got worse after that and will continue to get worse (as pretty soon demand will surpass suply). Tournament participation is and will be affected by it, no matter how we critic our organization's imperfections. However, we know there are a good number of pitchers judging by the horseshoe sales. Some companies are selling more shoes than ever, but most of them to non-members. They play mainly on a local level (less expenses), with a lighter structure and probably aiming at ..."just having fun". But having fun is not reserved to those parallel structures. I had a great horseshoe season as a member of a sanctioned club and as a member of my association. A season filled with "socialization" after the regular weekly night, usually around a drink while enjoying a great evening/night. Tournaments where we camped and socialized around the campfire, with the guitar and songs. Concluded with memorable year-end partys. We were almost unanimously saying the season ended too soon. Feeling we will miss those gatherings probably more than the game itself. We can't wait until next Spring  . Sorry Fred for taking the ball and running all over the place with it. Perhaps inspired by posts on other subjects, I wanted to take this opportunity to illustrate that: - our purchasing power's decline will affect the tournament participation and membership, but - despite those difficulties, more people will want to join if they realize that - we are part of a great social community (the horseshoe pitching family) and that - we can have fun too, despite our structures and rules More food for thought.  Andre. |
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5
on: November 17, 2009, 02:29:24 PM
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Started by Tony Mendoza - Last post by Tony Mendoza
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Hello Everyone, Wanted to let everyone know that there has been some interesting updates to our blog concerning the film. A quick rundown on the the updates are: "Pitching Hope" the movie and Dan Kuchcinski, founder of Horseshoes For Life have partnered in the production of the film. A formal proposal from Downright Digital Productions was submitted to the NHPA for consideration and should be discussed at the winter council meeting in January. "Pitching Hope" has been receiving a healthy number of skilled actors, interested in the film. All have enjoyed the script and will be submitting a video audition within this next month. For a more detailed description on these current events, go to: http://www.pitchinghope.org/Blog/Blog.htmlThank you. Tony Mendoza Downright Digital Productions |
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6
on: November 17, 2009, 01:03:08 AM
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Started by mogregg - Last post by cobbler
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Gary, you always have the best stories! You need to write a book or something! The high wire is a neat story, but I think that one is a foul shoe... but if the wire were moving in the wind or something, well, I suppose that's where the common sense comes in, right Jerry?
The rule does sound like you could accept the result of the deflected pitch rather than re-pitch the shoe. If it ends up a ringer, why not keep it?
OK... the dead cat story was pretty good too!
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7
on: November 17, 2009, 12:41:01 AM
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Started by fliptoon - Last post by cobbler
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Mike,
A thousand bucks for just a generic scoreboard and remote is pretty steep. But I don't think those manufacturers are used to selling them twelve or twenty-four at a time. Prices could come down a lot if they were purchased in lots of twelve or more. Also, if the system was portable enough, numerous clubs could band together and purchase enough for one facility and then just share them, as they don't usually all have tournaments on the same weekends. Obviously though, without shoes and ringers and without a data collection option that tracks the game inning by inning, this first one mentioned does not replace the scorekeeper, which is the goal of my imaginary scoring system.
The other one you described is an improvement, but still, it seems the scoring info has to be called out to a scorer and entered by them, right? Well, you've eliminated only some of the scorekeepers with that... Albeit much improved and you do have the electronic scoreboard with this but still it's not what I'm talking about. But you know, it is a step in that direction and is certainly worthy of mentioning somehwere on this website, isn't it? Why is there no story of this breakthrough on this site or in Newsline? Perhaps I missed it? Are there other people working on this sort of thing out there?
Well, there are lots of factors that go into this... a big stumbler I see is making the whole thing weatherproof. That alone could make the cost skyrocket. Obviously, this whole thought works much better indoors than outdoors, but most of our play is outdoors, so it has to work there and it has to be portable. Also, as usage spreads, access to electricity could be an issue in some places... There are many things to consider, but we have to start somewhere right?
I would love to know if there are other ideas out there on this... anyone that works in this field, feel free to chime in... there has to be someone out there that can enlighten us further on how something like this could be done... please, tell us!
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9
on: November 16, 2009, 07:03:05 PM
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Started by fliptoon - Last post by cobbler
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WE NEED ELECTRONIC SCORING... PERIOD! I envision a nice, two sided scoreboard with big LED displays controlled by a little wireless controller that one of the players carry along in their pocket and they just enter the score at each end by the touch of a few buttons. The running totals for score, shoes pitched and ringers for each player show up on the board. At the end of the game, the players go to the scoreboard and it prints out a copy of the scoresheet for each of them them much like a gas pump gives you a receipt today after prepaying and pumping gas... they review it and when they approve it, it is automatically wirelessly transmitted to a main computer that is tracking all the games of that class and the entire tournament... Someone should be working on this system now... all the technology exists to do this. It is silly that we don't have some sort of a working model for this already... It is absolutely imperative to utilize this technology to our advantage ASAP. If you make it capable of scoring other types of games, it could be sold for use in cornhole tournaments, washers and any place where multi courts are in use like they are in horseshoes. If I had the knowledge and the time to put into something like this, I would do it because I know I can sell them! I wish it already existed... I would want to be a national distributor for them... where are the people that can get this done???
Back to reality...
In the meantime, it would help a lot if host clubs went to the trouble of arranging for scorekeepers in advance and went to the trouble of teaching them how to do it correctly... what ever happened to that? At the Eastern Nationals here in Erie, PA, I have been organizing scorekeeping for the tournament for years now... Right now, I have a local high school sports team that does it for a fund raiser and it works great. We rarely ever have to go to the crowd for scorekeepers and the tournament stays on track. There are lots of organizations that would love a chance to do this... easiest ones are boy scouts and girl scouts and they are everywhere! It's not that hard, but it does take an effort. We pay out about $1,500.00 in scorekeeping fees and that team gets the majority of that money... Why don't the host clubs just organize their own membership and keep the money for themselves??? That's really not that bad of a take, is it?
Conversely, this year, at the World Horseshoe Tournament in Springfield, IL, I pitched in one of the Men's B Groups, which all pitched at the same time as the Men's Class A and over the span of three nights, five games a night, I only had two games where I wasn't sharing a scorekeeper with one or more other courts! This was prime-time... the top men players in the world and we're out there sharing scorekeepers just to get through the shift at a World Tournament, no less! Talk about ridiculous!
The problems in scorekeeping throughout the association go way beyond just these one game or one-line screwups on a single scoresheet. It is the fault of poor tournament management, period. Some of the worst scorekeepers I have ever encountered have been at the world tournament. I hate to keep picking on the WT, but if you can't get it right at that level, well, what do you expect from everything beneath it?
Our tournament in Erie still attracts a couple hundred entries every year... But typical tournaments are getting so small now that it's hardly a worthwhile fundraiser for a group anymore. We've got to stop this landslide away from our tournaments before there's nothing left to fix!
Obviously, people are losing interest in our version of horseshoes nationwide. But most of them are still pitching horseshoes... they're just doing it somewhere else where they have more fun doing it! If we don't change something to attract more people to NHPA horseshoes, well, we won't have to be worrying about this kind of thing, will we? Or are we just going to be content with our system as is and just accept whoever plays, as many or as few as they may be? It seems this is the attitude here... "This is our way.. if you don't like it, leave..." Well, in case you haven't noticed, they are leaving! Is it a wonder why? I really don't think that jives with the NHPA's mission statement in the by laws but that's the feeling I get from most of the clubs and tournaments that I attend around the country.
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