Back to Basics: The State of Film

Written By naresh edala

Authors: Naresh Edala

PC: Kielan Donahue

“Are these games being livestreamed or filmed?”, is an extremely popular question when it comes to organizing and attending tournaments. Ten years ago, the answer to this question would be a 360p livestream that was a better measure of your data plan than the product on the field. However, that was arguably better for the growth of the sport than uploading 720p film a week later.

Post-pandemic, quadball has seen established programs die out and dozens of teams making do with a handful of players. Rightfully, the focus has been on helping teams and players get back into the thick of things, and return to pre-pandemic levels of participation. However, that is a fallacy. The sport was already on a decline before 2020, and the pandemic sent the sport careening even further back than many anticipated. At this very moment, we are arguably at the exact same spot we were in the early 2010s, where building our target demographic was of the utmost importance. The sport, in its 18 years of existence, has seen so much growth and yet, in the span of the last two years, it has become abundantly clear it is being held together by a few overly enthusiastic people and duct tape. We are in a limbo where there are established teams that survived Covid-19 that want and need USQ to run a competitive sports league vs an organization similar to a club sports office, consulting and guiding actions for struggling teams. USQ is trying to cater to both, but actively failing all parties. 

So what should USQ do? Return to basics. The sport would be better served taking a step back to focus on rebuilding, creating college teams, and garnering a fandom, as the founder, Alex Benepe, and the IQA did in the early days. The open secret is that as we see more of the old guard retire, there needs to be a younger generation taking their place. But outside of a few select hotspots, that transition might not be enough, as a few MLQ franchises are realizing already. I’m not in charge of USQ, so I can’t force the organization to take its much-needed step back, but I do run this website. One of the perks of having a media website is it can host pieces written by me and other members of the community about our experiences. These experiences, explanations, and more can help you help the sport go back to basics because it's not just on USQ. It is a systemic failure that the actions of a few people are the only reasons for why the sport is staying afloat. It is a systemic failure that if Christian Barnes, Amanda Dallas, Harry Greenhouse, and Ethan Sturm all died tomorrow, the sport wouldn’t exist this time next year. But I digress. 

In this piece, I want to address streaming and filming. At a glance, this may not seem like something on your list of basics or actions that will help the creation and repopulation of collegiate teams, but it can, has, and will. Let’s return to the age-old question of “is this being livestreamed or filmed?”. For me, the answer was always film because I couldn’t stand watching the livestream when it was 360p—I would much rather watch the pre-recorded games in 4k (a few people would say I am a film snob) and enjoy the product. I still stand by this sentiment. However, in doing so, I failed to realize that the reason why I wanted better quality film over live film was because I did not have a coach until my senior year of college. Thus, the way that I got better was by watching film, choosing a player to try to emulate, and analyzing why they were doing specific actions in a given situation. This also helped me understand and recognize patterns in the sport. Because at the end of the day, this sport is just pattern recognition, and the best players in the sport are the ones that are able to recognize that quicker than other people. And now, as a coach, I would much rather have better quality film because I could use that to break down and understand what is going on with other teams and 4k makes film analysis that much easier.

All that said, if you look at the numbers, they reflect a different sentiment. The regional livestream of Michigan State University vs. University of Illinois at the recent USQ Champaign County Qualifier got 105 views over one game slot. That singular livestream did better numbers views-wise than 144 individual videos on the Fast Break News YouTube. This also means that the two different livestreams that USQ ran for the Champaign County Qualifier (brilliantly, by the way) combined for 1,482 views in the span of two days, and both streams individually would be the most popular videos on FBN. It probably isn't a coincidence that three of the top five videos on the FBN YouTube are all Rutgers games—meaning the real view counts of everyone other than myself are a lot lower. 

So what can we take away from the numbers? Coaches may prefer having high-quality film, but casual viewers and, simply put, fans prefer livestreams. And in order for the sport to grow, we need to start prioritizing livestreams again. I don't deny that I am very much to blame for the current predicament, but as I moved away from the role of fan and into the one of coach, I forgot as much as I would lament watching the pixelated blobs on the screen, there was something electric about not knowing the outcome and watching the game play out in real-time. The level of excitement and the unknown is something currently missing in the sport. A large part of the silence on social media is because of the inability to follow tournaments more efficiently and streaming is a key component of doing so.

The USQ Boston Qualifier, a premier event and one of the largest USQ tournaments, got absolutely no coverage by its host. A tournament with 12 college teams, including the USQ Cup 2023 collegiate runners-up, had no one talking about it during or afterward, and I have to assume it was predominantly due to the inability for fans and competitors alike to actually follow along. While the film from that weekend is trickling in, it was heavily reliant on borrowed equipment and one or two people who organized film of every pitch. I talked to multiple people who actively follow quadball, and they didn’t even know who won the finals until I told them the results hours after the final game.

My junior year (2018-19), when Rutgers was 1-14, I invested $20 on a tripod and $200 on a video camera (I got reimbursed by the sports club account) and quickly realized I didn't need a $200 camera to record—half the time the battery would run out anyway. I then spent an extra $4 on a phone mount and used a smartphone to film some of Rutgers’s games that year. But looking at our game archives since that purchase, the 2019-20 season saw nearly every game filmed (I know there are a few blanks, but I have the film, I swear). The reason I bring this up is not to pat myself on the back, but to point out that it is absolutely asinine that a 1-14 team can get games filmed, and I can’t count on one hand the numbers of active teams willing to invest $20 on a tripod and $4 on a phone mount and ask some random person at a tournament to film their games. 

At this juncture in the sport, accessibility to proper equipment is not the issue for a bare-bones stream. If your team can’t afford the $25 price tag for equipment, I guarantee there is an older community member who will donate that to your team upon seeing the ask in American Quadball Discussion. Cellular network technology has improved drastically since my days of pixel-watching, and Wi-Fi is more readily available than it was even six years ago. So whereas the trade-off used to be borderline unwatchable livestream vs 720p-4k pre-recorded game film, it’s now a “meh” quality livestream at 720p vs great quality 4-6k film. The former, however, comes with buzz generation and active engagement from spectators and players alike.

An example of a team doing it just about right (Dallas, please give them a tripod) is Creighton University. It doesn’t matter what tournament they’re at or whether there is a tournament-hosted stream with all the bells and whistles; this team is streaming. And their stream has engagement—mostly friends and parents, but, again, we’re trying to build a fan base. They even took advantage of that viewership type on day two of the USQ Champaign County Qualifier and asked for donations. You know that equipment you just guffawed at purchasing? They got that price tag and then some covered by the first donation they received. And you know what device they’re streaming on? Whichever Creighton player’s cell phone is available at a given time. As I mentioned, their stream isn’t perfect—sometimes it’s flipped the wrong way and it’s almost never stable. But, if I want to know how Creighton is doing that weekend, I can actually find out and watch in real time thanks to a group of players with no filming experience, just pure passion. 

Will players complain about the quality of your livestream? Sure. I did when I was just a player, but I would also be there every weekend watching the next game and listening or following along. Livestreams allow for storylines to be built and told. And for a sport that is sorely missing out on a true “character”, the ability to follow the action will help fill that void. For example, when Mizzou upset Creighton at Blue Jay Classic in February last season, a simple post by Ethan Sturm on American Quadball Discussion let people know that Creighton was on upset alert, and an influx of viewers tuned in to see how the game would end. There is a clear moment when the post was made because the livestream (again, hosted by Creighton themselves) views jumped from 171 to 338—this isn’t 100 percent reflective of of how many people tuned in over the course of the broadcast, but it shows that just one livestream and a quick social post brought more eyes to a game than any pre-recorded match on the FBN YouTube.

So what are the solutions here? In a time where everything feels so compartmentalized, a centralized place to know where all live streams are happening could be key for revitalizing interest. Sometimes a link will be on Twitch (hello, West Quadball), but most of the country is using Facebook or YouTube. Keeping track of all of these links is difficult and frustrating. That is where Quadball.One comes in. This tool is THE best source for all quadball-related information. It should not just be the place used for keeping score but rather a place that can pool all resources into one easy-to-find location.

If more people and teams took time to film their own games, the resources that are currently being used to film could instead be used to livestream; and maybe, just maybe, we can get people to start watching the sport again. Maybe, this will also lead to discussion again. But for that to happen, people and teams need to step up and actually take some pride in the sport that we all have invested so heavily in. Because honestly, if none of us care, why should anyone else?

If you’re interested in streaming games this season, contact fastbreaknd@gmail.com for access to the Fast Break News YouTube.

naresh edala
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