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Contents

OF Our Featured Stories

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Sexism in Tennis 16 If You Have a Lane, You Have a Chance

22 Layout Like a Girl 30 Three Up, Three Down Front cover images courtesy of, in respective order from top left to bottom right: Lebedeva on Pinterest, MĂźller-Laschet DFV, University of Virginia, Olivier Poirier-Leroy, and The Odyssey Online.

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Back cover images courtesy of, in respective order from top left to bottom right: INC, University of Stanford, BBC, VOA News, and Refinery 29.

Alternative Stories

12 3 Most Common Injuries Caused By Swimming 26 The Basics of Cricket

14 8 Reasons Why Baseball is More Than Hitting a Ball With a Stick

28 What’s This All Aboat?

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Meet the Aaryan is an avid tennis player who also plays cricket. He is entertained by following India’s national cricket team on multiple media outlets. Aaryan enjoys playing any sort of outside games, video games, and above all, binge-watching Friends.

Helen has been swimming at Nitro for 8 years and has recently joined the LBJ Pool Jags Swim and Dive team.

In her limited free time after swimming Helen does her mounds of homework. She enjoys playing volleyball, hanging out with her friends and spending time with her family.

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editors Rhi enjoys playing Ultimate Frisbee and rowing for Texas Rowing Center.

When she’s not rowing, she is doing her loads of LASA homework, playing her violin, or spending time with her friends.

Will is a frequent baseball player who has played for over 8 years and plans to do so next year for LBJ Baseball. In his rare and blissful free time, he enjoys going to baseball practice and going to football games.

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Sexism in tennis

How sexism has decreased in tennis over the past few decades

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he is on the court, struggling to make each ball over the net.

She gets there in time, and slams the ball to the edge of the court, nearly making it in. The other player misses the shot, and walks back in disappointment. She yells in triumph, until the umpire calls the shot out.

She challenges the decision, but the umpire denies her challenge. She leaves the stadium in tears, knowing the decision was unjust.

Several decades ago, sexism was quite prominent among the tennis community. People like Billie Jean King stood up for equal rights for women and the LGBTQ+ community in tennis and in society. Ever since Sep. 20, 1973, when Billie Jean King beat Bobby

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Billie Jean King (left) and Bobby Riggs (right) have a press conference before their infamous “Battle of the Sexes” tennis game. King ends up crushing Riggs in the match, causing a major boost of activism for LGBTQ+ and women’s rights. Photo courtesy of Britannica.

Riggs during the infamous “Battle of the Sexes,” the tennis community started to become more accepting for any type of person, leading to a gradual increase in equal privileges in tennis.

Dennis Ralston was the No. tennis player in the world from 1963 to 1964. He gives his insight about how the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA), founded by Billie Jean King, operates.

“The WTA, the Women’s Tennis Association is always looking for ways to improve what the guidelines and regulations are, just as the ATP is, and they’re the ones that should set the criteria for what’s allowable and what isn’t on the court,” Ralston said. “They run the game.

They have the most power in the game.”

According to Ralston, the way the Women’s Tennis Association operates is by looking over the rules and guidelines of a certain tournament, and judging whether those rules are unsatisfactory to the Women’s Tennis Association policy. If they are, then the Women’s Tennis Association will not play in the tournament. This will cause the tournament to hardly gain any profits, forcing it to change its rules in order for the Women’s Tennis Association to play in the tournament.

“Great Britain runs Wimbledon, so they can make their rules and then the ATP and the WTA say, ‘Well we’re not playing,’ and they say ‘Okay, well we’ll abide by those rules,’ just like the color code at Wimbledon — it’s basically white, whereas

anywhere else, it could be anything,” said Dennis Ralston. “So, the players acquiesce to the conditions at Wimbledon, because it’s such an important tournament, but it’s not unreasonable — it’s always a tradition.”

In tournaments like Wimbledon, there are strict rules that are part of the history and tradition of the

this, Williams smashed her racket on the floor while calling Carlos a “liar” and a “thief.” She then received a fine of over $17,000 dollars in several court violations.

Many people have different opinions of whether this fine was justified. Ralston gives his own.

“I think it’s well justified.”

Ralston said. “I mean, the rules state, you don’t abuse

the umpire--I think she got off lightly. I don’t think that it was the fact that she was a woman--she was out of line.

She broke the rules, and I think she would tell you that now. It happens, you lose your temper.”

Carlos Ramos is a highly trained umpire with a towering reputation of being very unbiased. He is also one of the only umpires to have

“WE LIVE IN A SOCIETY, AND THAT IS WHAT DEFINES US.” tournament. There are no biased reasons as to why these certain rules exist.

If the rules were unjust, then the Women’s Tennis Association has the choice the back out from the tournament.

“I don’t know that there are so many things that are happening in the game of tennis that are related to sexism in the game,” Ralston said. “I don’t think that’s the real problem. There are a few incidents, but I don’t think it’s a ma jor problem.”

In the 2018 US Open women’s finals, Serena Williams was playing against Naomi Osaka. During this game, Williams believed the umpire, Carlos Ramos, made a false call upon a specific point. Because of

Serena Williams throws her racket after calling the umpire a “liar” and a “thief.” Williams later recieved $17,000 fine in court violations at the game.

Photo by Danielle Parhizkaran.

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Carlos Ramos gives Serena Williams a $17,000 fine for several violations. Ramos has had many years of experience as an umpire. Photo privided

by CNN.

overseen the finals’ match of all five Grand Slams. In the 2018 US Open women’s finals, Carlos gave his most unbiased view of the game, making his calls against Williams justifiable.

Even though sexism in tennis has dwindled down over the years, there are still several events that spark signs of sexism. Recently, French tennis player Alize Cornet was penalized for fixing her top in a Grand Slam tournament.

Cornet had a sports bra on at the time, and even though many men change their shirts on the court, Cornet still received a penalty. Lina Padegimaite, a professional Women’s Tennis Association player, gave her opinion on this penalty.

“I don’t think her penalty is justified,” Padegimaite said.

“I think you can change your shirt as a women on the tennis court if you wanted to, just like men do. If you’re

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wearing a sports bra, I don’t think it’s a big deal.”

Ralston went on about this topic in a different point of view.

“I don’t think the penalty was because she was a woman, I think they just thought, “well she can’t do that,” because he hadn’t seen it before.”

“Sometimes, officials are out of line themselves. They get in a power trip,” Ralston said.

Another instance where sexism was currently found in tennis was when Padegimaite

Lina Padegimaite is an avid tennis player who frequently plays in tennis tournaments.

She graduated at the University of Texas and was on the U T tennis team. Photo provided by Instagram.

was playing a tournament in California.

“I played in this tournament in August; it was a USTA open tournament and there was prize money in the tournament,” Padegimaite said. “The men started receiving prize money if they got into quarter finals and the women had to make it into semifinals to start receiving prize money, so I thought that was weird.”

pay gap should exist,” said Padegimaite. “At the end of the day, it costs just as much to bring up an elite female or male tennis player.

I trained really hard, and it costs just as much for the girl or a boy to travel to all the tournaments, to pay the coaches, to pay for the courts, to pay for tennis balls. It’s not like bringing up a young male star or a female star costs any different, so why should the reward be different?”

Even though there are several instances of sexism in tennis today, the tennis community has come a long way from being what it used to be. Before influential tennis players like Billie Jean King, tennis was a sport that was almost designated for men.

The tennis society has grown its branches to become a more mature and developed sport. The future can only promise greatness for the tennis community.

In tennis, the pay gap between men and women can be quite significant in some cases. For whatever reason, men usually earn more than women in terms of prize money, and this can stir up controversy among the tennis community. Ralston gives his information on the gender pay gap.

“The way it is in the Slams, womens tennis is worldwide, and it’s liked by a lot, there is a lot of sponsorship,” said Ralston. So, people want to watch the women’s game.

Sometimes, they say the women’s game is better than the men’s, or more interesting.

So, there’s always been a pay gap that’s closing.”

The pay gap between men and women in tennis is getting smaller and smaller as the tennis community continues to grow. However, most people believe that there is no reason to justify men earning more money than women, especially in sports. Padegimaite gave her opinion about this.

This is the 1963 issue of Sports Illustrated with Dennis Ralston on the front cover. At this time, Dennis Ralston was the number one tennis player in the world.

Photo courtesy of Sports Illustrated.

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3 Most Common Injuries Caused

By Swimming The most common injuries caused by swimming, what causes them, and how they can be treated.

By: Helen Singletary

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Information provided

by UMPC Sports Medice; Medic8; Dr. Cathleen Laraman, 220 Triathalon, and Aspetar Sports Medicine Journal

Shoulder injuries are one of the most common injuries for swimmers. They can include tendonitis, irritation, inflammation, tears in cartilage and pressure on the rotator cuff.

Causes are overtraining without rest, poor technique or range of motion, decreased scapular muscle strength, and poor core stability. Treatments for shoulder injuries should include strength training for your rotator cuff, scapular muscles and core.

2 A blanket term for swimmer’s knee injuries is swimmer’s knee. Injuries can include patellar tendonitis, anterior knee pain, and joint overload.

Causes can include overtraining, poor technique in your kick, decreased leg strength, and over flexion. Some treatments are resting (taking stress off your knees), ice packs to reduce swelling, and physiotherapy to strengthen muscles.

Lower back pain affects 80% of swimmers at some point in their career. Torsional strain, overarching, and even Sciatica are some injuries that competitive swimming can cause in your lower back and hips. They can be caused by uneven rotation, tight hip flexors, poor core stability and weak glutes, and unnecessary pressure.

Some ways to prevent these injuries are, exercising your core and glutes, rolling out your shoulders and legs, fixing rotation technique and posture.

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Fielding 1. Throwing a Baseball.

Throwing a baseball with enough force to reach your target is close to impossible without extensive practice.

2. Throwing Accuracy.

The level of hand-eye coordination required to consistently hit a target, from the field or the mound, takes years of development.

3. Catching a throw or hit. Putting your glove where it needs to go while also calculating where to position yourself is no easy feat.

4. Fielding a Ground ball. To field a ground ball, you must not only predict the best location to intercept the ground ball, but also predict the bounces, adapt, and make a clean play. It is even more difficult to make diving plays, in which you must also accept the sacrafice of your body to make a play.

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WHY BASEBALL IS MORE THAN HITTING A BALL WiTH A STICK

By Will Strandwitz

Some people think baseball shouldn’t be a sport, because it "involves no skill" or "isn’t hard to be good at". Here’s 8 reasons why they’re wrong.

Hitting 5. Ball Dimension. The average baseball is 3 inches in diameter.

This makes it extremely difficult to make solid contact that will carry a long distance.

6. The Ball Comes Fast.

At just seven years old, the average pitcher has the arm potential to throw a baseball 40 miles per hour, and it only gets faster as the players grow older.

7. Pitch Movement.

When the baseball is thrown, it descends on a downward plane from the pitcher’s arm to the catchers mitt at the plate. This makes almost all pitches drop a significant amount.

8. Trick Pitches. Many, if not all, pitchers can throw at least one pitch that makes the ball move irregularly. This makes it even harder to compensate and put the bat on the ball, much less get a Infor m ation prov ided good hit.

by Wikipedia and The Com pl ete P itc her.

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hey march through the dark corridors of the giant stadium.

There was a balcony just before the entrance with the smiling faces of their loved ones cheering them on, chanting “USA, USA”. They pridefully marched into the full arena filled with eager fans awaiting their arrival. As they walked in, the crowd roared with spirit and congratulated the athletes for finally achieving their dreams.

Historically, Special Olympic and Paralympic sports have been given less coverage than the more mainstream Olympic athletes. The coverage is growing, but it is still a lot less than it should be. Many disabled kids don’t know that sports are an option to them; they don’t know that they could be paid to be an

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athlete and do something they love.

Swimming is a great sport for disabled kids who want to be active. Ron Zolno is a longtime USA swimming official.

“One of the really great things about swimming, in my opinion, is that you can have a fully integrated meet, meaning you could have a meet with swimmers with all sorts of different disabilities swimming with swimmers with no disability,” Zolno said.

These swimmers can learn from each other and not affect each others races.

“This inclusion of all athletes is possible in swimming because everyone has their own lane and your own space,” said Zolno. “How someone in the lane next to you swims won’t

If YOU HAVE A LANE YOU HAVE A CHANCE Adaptive swim programs give anyone the opportunity to be a professional athlete.

By Helen Singletary

Ellie SImmonds winning one of her eight Paralympic medals, five of which are gold. Simmonds is a young british freestyler who has been to three Paralympic and hopes to make it four in Tokyo. Photo provided

by Getty Images.

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affect your race, you just have your own race against the clock.”

The independence of swimming makes it one of the best sports for a person with a disability to become athletic and competitive.

Publicizing and covering paraathletes, athletes with disabilities, can have an affect on everyone, not just those with disabilities.

“I think it’s better for those of you who don’t have disabilities,” Zolno said. “When you see someone, they’ve got to work, they’ve got to do everything you do as far as they want to be a good [athlete], but they also have to deal with certain specific issues that you

mainstream coverage of the Paralympics. The amount of coverage is improving but not the level of the Olympics.

Lindsay Grogan, 2016 Paralympic swimmer, said, “most of our sessions were sold out and it was 10,000 or 15,000 people there.”

The equality between not just coverage but between how the athletes themselves are treated is really important. Kyle Rea is a coach at Nitro swimming and one of the founders, along with Lindsay Grogan, of Atlas Adaptive Sports.

“For the Paralympic side, they’re

can help improve their quality of life in many ways.

“I would think that for disability swimmers the ability to compete is gonna give them greater confidence,” Zolno said, “Not just in the sport but in life in general.”

This greater confidence can help them socially and in school or their jobs.

Getting disabled people involved in sports can give them a community of people with similar goals and interests as them. “[The Paralympics is] a really unique experience because there were 4,000 athletes,” Grogan said. “Being around so many athletes from so many different countries, [and] they all had disabilities. So that was also actually pretty interesting seeing people like that, disabled people from all different countries.”

Many coaches might be nervous about the challenges of coaching a disabled athlete. All coaches need to do is treat the disabled athlete the same way they would treat any other athlete.

“You got to use common sense,”Grogan said. “It’s really not that hard when it comes down to it.”

Lindsay Grogan getting ready to race at the Can-am Para Swimming Championships in March of 2015 in Toronto, Canada. This meet was used as World Championship trials, qualifying for the 2015 World Championships was a big step in Grogan’s career. Photo by Jeremy Kohm from the U.S. Olympic Committee don’t have to deal with. It shows that these people are people are people who work hard.”

This starts to bridge a gap that may form between those without disabilities and those with.

going to pay their Paralympians the same amount that they pay the Olympians,” Rea said, “Paralympians always got paid less per medal that they won. And now they’re changing that, which is a big deal.”

A way to get more coverage on para-athletes would be more

Having people with disabilities join a sport, such as swimming,

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Coaching disabled swimmers can even help coaches gain experience in training able-bodied swimmers. Rea said that coaching and working with swimmers with mental disabilities really helped him break down skills and better teach it to all children. Working with these types of athletes can help coaches learn and become better.

“Sometimes you take simple things for granted,” Rea said, “If you were to teach somebody, you would just say, ‘Oh, it looks like this.’ And you’d kind of assume that [it] was an easy thing to

Paralympic swim meets are different from other swim meets you might go to. You will see Phall sorts of different types of equipment and people littereing the pool deck. Photo provided by Swimswam News and taken by Melissa Lundie.

learn right away, but that’s not always the case.”

Swimming can be a great sport for kids with any kind of disability and programs like Atlas Adaptive Sports can help introduce kids to the world of sports who might have thought they would never be able to be an athlete.

Rea said that swimming can accommodate for kids and adults on the Paralympic side, which is anyone missing a limb, deaf, blind, ect. and for kids and adults on the Special Olympics side,

which is anyone which is anyone with a mental disability, down syndrome, cerebral palsy, autism, etc.

Having disabled swimmers as teammates can even help swimmers appreciate the way the do things and learn new skills.

Giving disabled children the chance to be active can be a big help for their parents.

The opportunity for disabled people to become athletes can boost their confidence in themselves throughout their lives, improve the techniques of their coaches and competition of their teammates, take some burden off the shoulders of their caregivers, and inspire others to dream big and do what others tell them they aren’t able to.

“One thing that we really pride ourselves on is the support that we give to the parents,” Rea said, “The ma jority of the time, it’s the parents or the caregivers that are really struggling.”

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TEA The women of the 2016 USA Paralympic swim team pose for a photo in their Opening Ceremony outfits provided by Polo. The Opening Ceremonies marks the beginning of their 2016 Paralympic journey.

Photo provided by Lindsay Grogan

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Three players jump after a disc at the 2018 Pro Championships in Middletown, NY. Photo by Sandy Canetti.

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layout like a girl H ow Wo m e n A re Ta k i n g O ve r t h e U l t i m at e Fr i s b e e S c e n e

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hey woke up early, stomachs full of butterflies, ready to run their hearts out. They arrived at the “fields” and were greeted by cow pies and grass up to their knees. These women had trained for months, preparing for their chance for glory, only to be told to play on a farm.

This is how the women of ultimate frisbee have been treated for years.

While the men of the leagues were playing on pristine intramural fields, the women were always relegated to fields that often weren’t even fields; it was all that they could get their hands on.

Ultimate frisbee is a selfofficiated sport in which 14 players, seven from each team, try to advance a frisbee down the field to score in their goal only by throwing passes to their fellow teammates. Players with the disc are not allowed to move their feet, so they must work together with their teammates to move the disc across the field. Due to the self-run nature of the sport, players are encouraged to call upon their best selves and make honest calls on their

By Rhi Spicer and the opposing team’s members.

Cara Crouch, a player on the Austin Torch (the first professional women’s team in Austin), experienced these sorts of inequalities when she first started playing on the University of Texas’ college team, named Lady Marmalade at the time.

“Our division was smaller, but that’s no excuse for those inequities,” Crouch said. “It’s ludicrous when I think about it now, the stuff that we put up with.”

Ultimate has since grown, both in the men’s and women’s divisions, and their perspectives on fairness have changed for the better, but not all of these injustices have been resolved.

“Some people were really pushing back at the idea of the AUDL not moving on issues of gender equity, which is why a lot of people signed a protest to not play in the AUDL a couple years ago,” Crouch said.

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1.

2.

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Fury Ultimate player Anna Nazarov lays out for a frisbee at the Fury/ Nightlock Doubleheader on July 26, 2016 at Laney College Football Stadium.

Photo courtesy of Rodney.

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has played a ma jor role in growing ultimate by providing exposure and streaming games for anyone to watch.

One of the problems that many people have with the league is that it only consists of men’s teams, so while the men were getting exposure and support from fans around the globe, women had no way of sharing their take on ultimate with the world.

Colleen Kepner has been playing on and coaching ultimate teams of all types for over 20 years, and she is well involved in the fight for gender equality in ultimate.

“Other organizations, like USA ultimate and the AUDL, are looking at what the PUL is doing and they’re saying, ‘Oh, we’re going to miss the boat. If we don’t ally ourselves with that, or if we don’t get on board, it’s actually going to be a disadvantage to us,’” Kepner said. “Get on board or get out of the way.”

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Cara Crouch lays out for a disc at the 2013 World Games in Colombia. Her team won a gold medal at these games. Photo courtesy of Cara Crouch.

The Premier Ultimate League (PUL), founded in 2017, was created to provide the same, or at least similar, exposure and playing experiences for women as the AUDL provides for men. The women of ultimate realized that they had to take matters into their own hands if they wanted to see change in the ultimate community, so they took the first leap towards equality by creating a league of their own.

“Ultimate Frisbee is truly a community and culture” “[There] is that sense of rebelliousness and fearlessness and visionary

thinking where we don’t have to do it the way anybody else is doing it,” Kepner said.

“We don’t have to play by anybody else’s rules. We just have to think about what our priorities are and go for it.”

Rachel Yeager, who also plays on the Austin Torch, understands the importance of providing female role models in ultimate. Watching women play is a great way for her and many other ultimate players to become more knowledgeable about the sport.

“It inspires me to watch women and learn from them, to see how other women play,” Yeager said.

Another way that ultimate women are increasing their numbers is through the youth scene.

“Things like free Girls Ultimate Movement clinics, helping facilitate the open practices

for Tango, supporting and volunteering for all the other events in town, like the Sol academies that happen on the weekends or running camps, and recruiting for Tango, those kinds of things,” Kepner said. “So just trying to put as many opportunities out there for kids play, especially targeting the girls. We’re really trying to make sure that the girls feel included and welcomed and seen, and then I think beyond that, trying to facilitate some mentoring opportunities.”

Kepner, along with many other male and female ultimate players, have been doing whatever they can to make girls feel included in the ultimate community. Kepner is actively participating in and creating opportunities for girls to play alongside with boys, and on their own, in hopes of creating an environment that they will fall in love with and want to continue being a part of. Tango is the girls U-19 Ultimate Youth Club Championship team of the central Texas area.

“One thing that those young players can do is to continue to see each other as allies and peers across gender lines to work together,” Kepner said.

“That hard work of really challenging each other to be better people.”

Through her work in the youth scene, Kepner is also making sure that young girls and boys are developing their skills at an early stage with

gender equity already stirring in their brains. If they come into ultimate knowing how they can make a change to make it more equal, they will be more likely to facilitate change when they take over the professional leagues.

“Ultimate really promotes self-reflection, which I think is incredibly powerful in kids,” Crouch said. “To be able to think about how they’re doing things; here’s a set of rules and then reflect on your actions about the rules.

Instead of an outsider, like an official or referee, just telling you, ‘You did this wrong, you did this right,’ I think

2. it’s way more powerful for kids to have to self-reflect. ‘Did I do that right? Did I not?’ and then be honest about it, or if they’re not they’ll wrestle with that morality issue.”

Crouch helps coach a middle school team alongside Kepner, and together they are teaching beginning players about the morals that come hand in hand with being an ultimate player. They believe that ultimate has the ability to change players’ view of the world.

“Well, I think it can teach you pretty much everything important in life,” Crouch said.

“I wish I had learned a lot

younger, in terms of how to be a good teammate, how to be a competitive and fierce athlete, but also respect yourself and your opponents.”

The social skills and life lessons taught through ultimate can be applied to all sorts of other everyday situations. “[Ultimate is] a different culture than a lot of sports,” Crouch said. “I think that because of that, we have an incredibly powerful chance to make change in the world. I think most sports are too far gone professionally, or they’re too monetized to make those changes in real ways, whereas right now the professional leagues are just building in ultimate. We have a really unique chance to make really, really meaningful decisions about equity, so that when we formalize those in a club or professional capacity, that’s just how it is.

That’s how it’s always been.

I think ultimate naturally would be a good sport for that because of the spirit of the game, and other values that we that we value as a community.”

Ultimate has incredible potential to create change in the way the world runs, and the addition of women to the ultimate scene is only going to encourage gender equality worldwide.

“Yeah, I really think [ultimate frisbee] can make the world a better place,” Crouch said.

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T H E B A S I C S OF C R I C K E T The People in Cricket Cricket is played with two teams. Each team has their respective batsman and bowlers. Batsman are the people who hit the ball with the cricket bat, and bowlers are the people who throw the ball.

The team that is bowling will bowl the ball to the other team. The people who are not bowling are fielding. The fielders are on the bowler’s team.

The fielders have to catch the ball that the batsman hits, or get the ball to hit the wicket as fast as possible. Information provided by the British Broadcasting Corp.

The Objective of the Game The objective of cricket is to get more runs than the other team, with a limited amount of over. Runs are the points in cricket. One over is a set of six balls bowled.

How Scoring Works Cricket is scored by runs. When the batsman hits the ball over the boundary without any bounces, then the batsman’s team receives six runs. If the batsman hits the ball and the ball touches the boundary in any way, then the batsman’s team receives four runs. If the batsman hits the ball and the ball does not hit or go over the boundary, then the batsman can run to the other side of the pitch. The number of laps the batsman makes from his side of the pitch to the other side of the pitch is how many runs the batsman’s team receives. Information provided by the Chicago Tribune.

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COMPONENTS OF THE PITCH This is the popping crease. If the batsman passes the crease, then the batter has a chance of getting out. If he stays within the crease, then the batsman is safe.

The batsman stays within this rectangle.

If the batsman himself hits the wicket, then he/ she is out. The batsman cannot safely get out of this rectangle.

Note that all of the parts of the pitch are repeated on both sides.

Everything in the top of the pitch is present in the bottom of the pitch.

These two lines are the bowling pitch. When the baller bowls the ball, the ball must come in between these lines for the bowl to be valid.

If the ball is bowled outside of these lines, then the bowl is redone.

The wickets are placed in between of the bowling pitch. If the batsman is outside of the crease and ball is thrown to the wicket, then the batsman is out.

Not to mention, the entire cricket field’s diameter varies from 450 feet to 500 feet. Information provided by Sports Know-How.

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WHAT IS THIS ALL ABOAT? Learn the ins and outs of a rowing boat and oar.

By: Rhi Spicer

PORT The left side of the boat.

COXSWAIN The Coxswain commands and steers the boat.

STERN The back of the boat.

OAR The oar is what the rowers use to propel the boat through the water.

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SEAT

SLEEVE BLADE

SHAFT

The blade is the part of the oar that is submerged inthe water throughout a stroke.

GRIPS The grips are what rowes hold on to while they row.

COLLAR The collar keeps the oar in the oar lock.

OAR LOCK The oar lock helps keep

BOW

the oar in place and

The front of the boat.

attached to the boat.

DECK

BOW BALL SLIDES The slides are what the seat sits on, and they enable the rolling motion of the seat.This allows for proper rowing technique.

RIGGERS The riggers provide support for the oars and allow for a boat to have different combinations of oar types.

Protects the boat from head on collisions.

STARBOARD The right side of the boat.

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Three Up, Three Down

Combating Social Pressure in Today’s Baseball

By Will Strandwitz

Pitcher Alex Phillips prepares to strike out his opponent for the Minnesota Twins. He has continues to play for the AA team during this coming spring and summer.

Photo by Alex Phillips.

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he Ma jor League pitcher of everyone’s favorite team is on the pitcher’s mound. Two runners have come up to the plate, two were put back into the dugout with strikeouts.

The count is one ball, two strikes for the biggest hitter on the visiting team. The coach of the fielding team is yelling at the pitcher to throw the ball harder, faster, to hit his spots. The pitcher winds up, delivers and immediately clutches his elbow with the pound of the baseball hitting the catcher’s mitt. He has suffered a torn UCL ligament in his elbow.

That is the position many Ma jor League Baseball pitchers find themselves in regularly during games: pushed to do more than they can, more than their arms will allow them, and they end up becoming injured because of it. They are expected to always throw three batters up to the plate and three Joe Cramp Poses for a picture for his Athletic Directory photo. He works at Haddington Heights High School. Photo by Joe Cramp.

batters down in the dugout.

Oftentimes, it can be difficult to block out the comments and orders.

Athletic director Joe Cramp at Haddon Heights High School

who suffered a torn labrum (a muscle in the shoulder) during his sophomore year of college, as well as a careerending UCL tear in his elbow during his Minor League years. He mentioned that,

“But it takes time, and it’s not a one day thing to change” Michael Mertz explaining the process of strengthening your arm to throw.

in New Jersey oversees all athletic activities for juniors and seniors. When he watched baseball games, he noticed that there was a large amount of pressure, but not from the people he expected.

“There definitely is a social pressure and it comes from the parents and the youth coaches,” Cramp said. “The funny thing is, kids don’t want to listen to high school coaches, your high school coaches, for this, are the smarter ones. They look out for your well being. You get on these club teams and they just want you to play year round.”

He wasn’t the only one who felt that coaches were breathing down players’ necks. Michael Mertz is a Tier 1 Baseball Club coach and a former Minor League player

as a player in the minors and in his youth, he felt a similar pressure on him during games as a pitcher.

“There’s this pressure to throw as hard as you can, which is great,” Mertz said.

“That’s what we want to do, but, in the right technique, in the right way that’s going to work for yourself… There’s definitely pressure to try and do more than what you might be capable of in that moment, [but] I’m not saying it can’t be like that.”

Minnesota AA Team pitcher and Tier 1 coach Alex Phillips was also afflicted with a devastating UCL tear from overuse. He thinks that the pressure is there, but is justified and not overwhelming.

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Sam McDonnell gives all of hs energy nto a swing for the Los Angeles Angels A Team. McDonnell played there for several years before retiring.

Photo by Sam McDonnell.

professional baseball, if you want to continue to have a job, you have to throw the ball hard,” Phillips said. “So, to that point, I’ll say yes [there is a pressure]. The MLB teams are not required, but I mean, you have to throw the ball pretty hard and in the MLB, the average fastball is 92.5, something like that. So you have to throw the ball hard if you’re going if you’re going to play Ma jor League Baseball.”

Cramp also discussed the injury comparison from not only pitchers, but infield and outfield players as well; he has found infielders to suffer the most. When prompted about a reasoning for his injury

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frequency choice, he talked about the speedy transitions that only get quicker as players get older.

“I would have to say that it’s just probably they throw more, the throwing motion is like you said: the transition from from getting the ball out of the glove to throw to first base or whatever base they’re throwing to, is a shorter throw, it’s a quicker throw,” Cramp said. “It sometimes is from the side. So I would have to say part of that is transitioning from glove to throw, part that they do throw the balls… more often than the outfielders do.”

Former Los Angeles A Minor League team corner outfielder and current Tier 1 coach Sam McDonnell has seen many injuries, UCL tear included, during his time as a player and a coach. He agreed that many parents and coaches are prime enforcers in the pressure the players feel on a consistent basis.

“I feel like a bunch of parents are way too involved in their kids lives, especially at a young age,” McDonnell said. “They’re only there to have fun and play baseball…

Whenever I’m in the dugout… you’ll hear these parents coaching and yelling all these

things, which is nice. You want to help your kids, but most of the time, just saying ‘good luck’ or ‘here we go, so-andso’ or ‘hey, square something up right here’ is better than yelling mechanics [at them].”

However, McDonnell did not think that the pressure from his Minor League coaches was overbearing. “[My coaches] obviously pushed me and they wanted to max out my ability, of which I totally understand,” McDonnell said. “I want to do the same thing, [and] it never felt like it was a pressure. I felt like it was my duty to make sure that I got the best out of my ability, so whenever I was pushed, I didn’t see it as a problem.”

gave solutions that were not easy, but workable to bring baseball back to the favorite pastime that youth know it to be today. Phillips suggested that a physical approach would lead to the most success in the pressure issue.

“College recruiters are going to want what they want, there’s really no way around that. You do have to throw the ball harder if you want to continue to play baseball, however, one big one is just monitoring the amount you do it, just the way you train needs to be efficient and healthy and not dangerous,” Phillips said. “My best answer would just be to get your body in the best shape it can be.”

about mental patience and discipline.

“You can just not listen to [the parents and coaches],” Mertz said. “You can just go to practice, go to the games, to do what you’re meant to do: have fun. This game is for winning and having fun and learning and growing as a person and [it] helps you learn struggles in life through baseball.”

Though baseball continues to be one of the most popular sports in the nation, the pressure situation is not about to change. But over time, with effort and discipline, both coaches and players can work together to shift expectations away from the perfect three up, three down.

Mertz’ solution was more The situation is not, however, unsolvable.

Both Mertz and Phillips

Michael Mertz delivers a ptch for the Oklahoma State Cowboys. The team went on to win the Regional and Super Regional Championships. Photo by Michael Mertz.

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