Cool Photos from Saturday's Game

I’m not a hugger.  Maybe because I was born up north and Yankees don’t hug?  Or I’m Scandinavian; I’ve heard Scandinavian’s aren’t good at displays of affection.   Last Saturday I got in a year’s worth of hugging at the Outlaws game.  And I didn’t even mind it.  Not very much.

After nearly a full year away from the team I was reminded Saturday just what cool people gather around Lily Messina (team founder and general manager).  Players and fans alike, even the officials, even opponents – really nice people.  Many are frequent readers of my blog posts – I think some of the hugs were because of the blog.

Enough chitchat.  I have some great photos to share with you.  My three favorites for today will be near the end of this blog post.  Because I want to publish them large and to do that I have to wait until my posting is long enough to get below the sidebar so the photos don’t cover sidebar words.  Must be a better way to handle that but I don’t know what it is. 

So let’s start with some fun photos.

That's Patricia Kincheon pushing the stroller.  And
QT Preston in the foreground.  I always like
to include QT because she I love her smile.

Have you ever been to a football game where the team makes a grand entry pushing a baby stroller?  With a baby inside?  I’m pretty sure the baby is Ava, daughter of Coach Narlen Baker and his spouse, defensive linewoman, Jessica.  Ava got a lot of attention.  Well deserved, I might add.

 

 

 

I think this is Ava Baker, daughter of coach Narlen and
linewoman Jessica.  Ava got lots of attention.

 

How about a few photos of some nice people.  I’ve found Outlaws and fans to be among the nicest people you could ever want to meet.  A possible exception is on the field.  Maine Jackson and Toni Fuller may be nice at work or in social settings but you wouldn’t want to meet them on the football field.  Hint – I have photo evidence of this below. 

Ski Tejeda

One of my favorite Outlaws is Ski Tejeda, linebacker on the field, grandma and amazing hard worker off the field.  I’ve admired the level of her play from the day I first saw her.  Football is a tough sport and she’s plays it that way.  She is playing her thirteenth season as a pro football player.  Wow.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

I love when fans notice I’ve turned the camera toward them.  I’ve never met these young ladies so I can’t give their names.  But I can tell I’d like them if we did meet.

Some Outlaw fans.  Hint to wannabe photographers -
good subjects make good photos.

 

Now for the feature photos.  First two photos were taken about a half-second apart.  The first predicts something bad is about to happen (or good if you’re an Outlaws fan).  The second shows it happening.  The sequence features two of the Outlaws all star players, Maine Jackson(#22) and Toni Fuller (#1). 

Coming from the left is #1 Toni Fuller.  Coming from the right is #22 Maine Jackson.
Houston runner #2 is in trouble.  I wonder if she knows it.

 

Football is not a contact sport, it is a collision sport.  Whew!  Glad I'm a photographer and
not a running back.

 

The next feature photo is the offense in action and features Shadana Hurd (24).  Shadana started the second game Saturday running the kickoff back for a touchdown.  Later in the game she ran through all kinds of would-be tacklers and almost made the end zone.  I thought she did make the score but the officials disagree and placed the ball on about the two yard line.  What impressed me about the photo is that Shadana isn’t all that big but she sure is strong.  I have a half-dozen shots of this run and I’ll give the whole sequence in a future post. 

This play went on for maybe tweny yards for about a ten-photo sequence of shots.
Shadana just wasn't going to be denied the end zone.  She dragged several Houston
tacklers with her.  I thought she scored; the officials didn't.  They were wrong.

 

So much to cover.  The wins against Houston qualifed the Outlaws to host the Little Rock Wildcats in the first round of the playoffs.  My next post later this week will give my analysis of that game coming Saturday, June 15.  Future posts will feature fans action photos from this weekend.  And from next weekend, too, if I manage to make it to a second game this season.

This is "Next Year"

Wait till next year. 

That’s the mantra of sports teams after a losing season.  It ranks right up there with “the check’s in the mail” as a hollow promise.

Not so hollow with our Outlaws. 

Last season was about as bad as a season can get.  The 2012 Outlaws were well over half rookies.  Record of 1 and 7.  Totally demoralizing?  Nope. 

They said “Wait ‘til next year.” 

And they meant it.

This past Saturday the Outlaws defeated Zydeco, a Louisiana team, 49-0.  They opened this season defeating Tulsa 50-10.  They whipped the Lonestar Mustangs twice, 28-14 and 39-0.  (Last season the Mustangs trounced the Outlaws.)  Saturday, June 8, we’ll play the Houston Power to determine the winner of both our games against them this season.  The first game, in Houston, was suspended because of weather with 8:36 left in the fourth quarter and Houston ahead 14-12.  Saturday we’ll finish that game and then play the full second game.  If the Outlaws win both, they’ll end the season 6-2 and will qualify for the playoffs. 

Do you realize the Outlaws have outscored opponents by 140 points! 

That is - If  you don’t count the Dallas Diamonds.  And you shouldn’t count the Diamonds.  They’re in a special elite class – scoring 388 points this season while allowing only 14 by opponents.  Unreal.  They’re in the top four Women's Football Alliance teams nationally. 

The Outlaws are a very good team. 

Shadana is back, averaging 15.5 yards per carry (!).
  This an older photo but gives you the idea -
the Outlaws are once again a very good team.  Just like the photo.

 

Rubi Reyna averaging 4.8 yards rushing this year.

On offense Shadana Hurd is leading the team in rushing and scoring, averaging 15.5 yards per carry.  Four other runners are averaging over 4 yards per carry, Charmeine Jackson (7.7), Rubi Reyna (4.8), Marq Avery (5,8), and Toni Fuller(6).  I use 4 yards per carry as a standard because it takes 10 yards in three plays to get a first down.  Average 4 yards per play, x 3 plays = 12 yards.  If you can make your 4-yard average on every series of downs, you’ll score a touchdown on every possession.

Charmeine Jackson averaging 7.7 yards rushing
this year.  This photo is an old one you've seen
before, shot while she was playing defense.
I really really love this picture.

On defense, we have three defenders with over twenty tackles and seven with ten or more.  Leading tacklers are Toni Fuller (28), rookie Francesca Stabel (22), and Lakisha Jones (22).  Rookie Jennifer Taylor has accounted for 3 sacks and four other Outlaws have 1 sack each, Jessica Baker, Bridgette Brown, Alexis White, and Marq Avery.  Sacks are good.  (If you’re on defense.)

Toni Fuller leading the Outlaws with 28 tackles this season.

Lakisha Jones is credited with 22 tackles this year.

 



Lakisha making a tackle.

It is fun browsing stats on the league website.  Here's the link if you’d like to give it a try.  This gets you to the league-wide stats.  If you click on any team, you’ll get the stats for that team. 

Come to the game Saturday.  The Outlaws are a very good team and you'll see some good football.  And  if you cheer and shout and support the Outlaws, you just may help them make the playoffs.

Two More Games; Future of this Blog

The Outlaws are having a great season. 

Impressive wins against Tulsa and the Lone Star Mustangs. 

A close and as yet undecided game against the Houston Power.  The first game at Houston was cut short because of weather and will be settled June 8.  They'll play the final five minutes of that game before playing regularly scheduled contest.  Houston has a slight lead but my money is on the Outlaws to record two wins on Saturday June 8.

The Outlaws lost twice to the Dallas Diamonds.  Everybody loses to the Dallas Diamonds.  They are among the top teams in the league, likely to play in the league championship game. 

Two games left to play, plus the final five minutes of that Houston game.  This weekend they're away at Zydeco, somewhere in Louisiana.  Then June 8 they're home against Houston.  The Outlaws could wind up with a 6-2 record.  A serious improvement over last year's 1-7. 

You won't want to miss the Houston game.  If you can travel, the Zyedco game should be fun, too.

I won't be making the trip to Louisiana.  Maybe I'll make it to the final home game of the season. 

Maybe.

This blog has been neglected in 2013.  I've been distracted by some family responsibilities and I haven't been to a single Outlaws game.  Or practice.  I missed the tryouts. Much as I love football, I just haven't had time.

Now my family projects are mostly complete and I'm ready to go back to blogging and writing and shooting photos.  But I don't have current material for this blog.  If I make it to the June 8 game, I'll have a lot of action photos but probably not enough to keep the blog going until next season.

Unless I focus on profiles.

Justine Wolfanger

I've never met Justine Wolfanger.  She played for the Outlaws in at least one season, 2009, but I'm pretty sure more.  As with many of the Outlaws, Justine is one of my Facebook friends.  Though I haven't met her I feel as though I know her just because of her Facebook posts.  She is amazing!  Most recently she backpacked in some mountains, sleeping in a tent.  She has participated in marathons.  She has done whitewater rafting.  She did something called the TransRockies Run in 2012.  Just visiting the photos on her FB page wears me out. 

This blog started with a series of player profiles I wrote for the Outlaws website.  My theory was that if people got to know the players, they'd come to the games and support the team. As the team grew in popularity, my career as a photographer of professional football would grow, too.  I believed that women who play football might have interesting lives.  Might be interesting people. 



I haven't met Justine, #88, but I can tell I'd
like to interview her for this blog.

Like Justine Wolfanger. 

Lily Messina

Like Lily Messina, whose Facebook posts are just as amazing as Justine's. She hunts hogs, runs marathons, keeps the Outlaws playing.













Ske Tejeda, #8

Like Ski Tejeda who is still playing her eleventh (I think) season and who was a cop in Dallas targeted by some bad people who shot bullets into her home.

Cookie

Like Cookie, Outlaws quarterback who is working full time and on the deans list at college.

Malia Capers-Cristobal

Like Malia Capers-Cristobal, who impressed me with her dedication to make the team while battling to lose weight (I identify with that).  She is one of the Hawaiian sisters, whose mom just got her college degree, and Malia has remarkable stories to tell about her life here and on the Islands.



The blog evolved into a photo blog and is as much about football in general as about individual players.  To keep it going requires my going to games, and there's only one home game left this season.  It requires interviewing players.  I have a lot of interviews in my files but most are of former players.  I haven't kept up, haven't interviewed current players.  I've interviewed Malia and just need to do some follow-up before I can post her profile. 

Right now I'm debating.  Do I have the time, and more importantly, the energy?  To set up meetings at Starbucks, to interview, photograph, edit, post?  And do I have enough material?  And will there be an audience for a blog about football published in the summer months?  Should I change the focus from the Austin Outlaws football team to interesting people in general?

I don't know. 

Let's see if I make it to the June 8 game.

And I'd love input from anyone who visits this blog.  What do you think?

Putting Saturday's Loss in Perspective

The Outlaws are part of the Women's Football Alliance.  The alliance includes something like fifty-eight teams from all across the country and from big cities like Boston, Chicago, Dallas.  (I'm fudging on the number of teams because the WFA websites says forty-five but I count fifty-eight team logos in the website banner, and fifty teams in the standings list.)

A lot of teams.  Drawing from some serious population centers with large talent pools from which to recruit. 

The Dallas Diamonds finished the 2012 season as one of the top four teams in the league.  They were one game away from the national championship, losing in the semi-finals to the San Diego Surge. 

Look at the protection the O-line provides for the Dallas
quarterback throwing a pass.  They are good.

In 2012 the Dallas Diamonds scored an average of 74 points per game while allowing an average of only 4. 

And they completed a lot of their
passes. 

They were also pretty good at the run game.

They started the 2013 season with a 41-6 victory at the Houston Power. 

And we all know what happened in Austin Saturday:  Diamonds 49, Outlaws zip.

Don't let that loss get you down.  We lost to a great football team.  Lots of talented athletes.  Lots of experience.  A large Dallas/Fort Worth community from which to recruit athletes.  A top-four team in the league.  A lot of teams will lose to the Diamonds this year.

We should be proud of the Outlaws holding Dallas to under 50 points.  The Outlaws are a better team this season than last. The Outlaws will be a match for every team we face.  Maybe even a match for the Diamonds when we visit them on May 4.  But don't start looking ahead to that game. 

On April 27 we'll travel to Houston where we'll meet a strong team.  A team we can beat.  Winning in Houston won't be easy.  Like Dallas, they have a large community from which to recruit talent and they have had a great history, marred with some ups and downs.  But they are a team we can realistically expect to defeat. 

Forget about Dallas.  Get ready for Houston. 

Roster Reading

I didn’t visit a single tryout, a single practice, a single team meeting.  I missed the season opener, a 50-10 victory over Tulsa. 

But I did read the roster.

And the roster says 2013 could be a very good year for the Austin Outlaws.

This is an older photo of Shadan Hurd, wearing her original jersey
number.  Now she's #24.  She is one of my all-time favorite
Outlaws.  One of these days we'll feature her in a player profile.

 The roster says Shadana Hurd is back.  Shadana is good!  Great!  She is both quick and fast.  She was the nicknamed BoPeep because she didn’t want to get her uniform dirty.  Everyone gets tackled but Shadana ended a lot of her runs in the end zone, standing on both feet, uniform untarnished.  She’ll be wearing #24.  Watch her.  Watch fast.  She moves so fast she sometimes looks like a blur on the field.

Bridgette Brown is back.  Unlike Shadana, Bridgette wants her uniform dirty, as long as she brings an opposing runner to the ground with her.  I first noticed Bridgette a few years ago when I saw runners go from up to down so fast I almost missed it.  Bridgette is an amazing tackler.  She is listed on the roster as on the defensive line.  I like her better at linebacker but wherever she plays on defense, she will be a force for opponents to reckon with.  She’ll be wearing #42. Watch her when the Outlaws are on defense.  She’ll be around the ball.

Bridgette covers a lot of the field.  If you've played football you
know the open field tackles are difficult.  Bridgette brings runners
down wherever they are, open field or in a crowd. 

 

I don't have many clear shots of Patricia
because she's always in the middle of
a bunch of players.  I like this shot because
it shows the kind of determination I like,
making the tackle even from the ground.

Patricia Kincheon is back.  She joins the Capers-Christobal sisters to make three three-hundred pound players in the line.  I’m pretty sure this is a first for the Outlaws.  And a welcome first.  Football loves big.  She’ll be wearing #54.

 

My friend Tiffany “Crash” James is gone.  She was one of the early Outlaws who retired for a couple years and returned in 2012 for one more season.  I’ll miss her reckless-abandon style of play, that earned her the “Crash” nickname.  More, I’ll miss her positive personality and ever-present smile.

Tiffany James inspired a blog posting titled "Socks."  It was so much
fun I did several other posts along the same line.  She is one of the
first Outlaws I profiled on the Outlaw website and she will always
be one of my favorite people.

 

Tara Andrickson, #33 and the 2012 defensive
player of the year, chasing down an
opposing ball carrier.  She did a lot of that.

Tara Andrickson is gone.  She was the 2012 defensive player of the year and she will be missed.

I don't think Ski likes this shot as much as I do.  I like it
because it shows her determination to make the play.  In this play the
runner was going  up a lane not Ski's responsibility but Ski responded,
dove to the ground, grabbed what she could, a foot, and hung on while
teammates joined her to finish the tackle. 
Great down and dirty football!

Amazingly, Grandma Ski Tejeda, #8,  returns for her thirteenth season, a women’s pro football record.  I absolutely love her style of play ranging far and wide on the field in pursuit of the ball carrier, hitting with power, getting her uniform dirty. 

Scanning the roster gives Outlaw fans reason to be optimistic about this season.  Lots of last year’s rookies are this year’s veterans.  The year of experience will make them more competitive this season.  Want proof?  Look at the first game win, 50-10 over Tulsa. 

The roster lists eight coaches!  Including the return of Frank Brown.  I recognize some of the names but three are new to me.  Football is a complicated sport.  Many Outlaws hadn’t played the game before joining the team.  Football is a sport traditionally reserved for men (and boys).  The Outlaws ladies are eager to learn more.  They’ll take all the coaching they can get. 

I want to compliment whoever is doing the Outlaws website this season.  I especially appreciate  the roster providing more player information.  It is giving me subject material for this blog.  Expect at least one more posting inspired by what I noticed “roster reading.” 

Personal Note:  This blog has been idle for about four months as I’ve been involved in some family projects.  The blog has been fun and I hope to keep it going.  There are some obstacles.  More on this later.

Getting Low; Tackling Dummies; Learning from the guys

Imagine how you'd position yourself if you were asked to push a car or pickup truck.  Something like the ladies in the photos, right?  You wouldn't stand up tall.  You'd bend at the waist. 

 

 

 

 

Lily came up with a cool drill for her line.  It is the kind of thing you do when your budget won't buy a blocking sled.  Push a truck.  It builds strength and makes a point.  The point is you have more power with a low profile.  You want head and shoulders higher than hips, back fairly straight.  But this posture produces power. 

 

 

I've been screaming (softly) at television images of the pros and college players missing tackles.  Seems at that level of play they should rarely miss.  But even at that level they seem to go high, grab for the runner's shoulders and try to wrestle him to the ground. 

 

No no no no no no no!  Get low.  Shoulder into belt buckle.  And wrap the runner up, shoulder in middle and arms wrapping around the legs.

 

Go low.  Grab the legs.  Runners can run fast with dragging
a two-hundred pound tackler.

The photo here isn't a perfect illustration but the tackler is low and is wrapping arms around runner legs.  Low.

  

 Tackling dummies have been around forever to help football players practice tackling without having to hit teammates. Tackling dummies are about four feet high, while people are closer to six feet. What does that tell you? It tells you designers of tackling dummies expect tacklers to hit the lower part of the runner's body.

The Outlaws share their practice field with a men's team, the Austin Wolfpack.  At one of the Wolfpack practices, I did some photos of the guys practicing tackling on the tackling dummy.  The photos are kind of fun.  I'd like it better if they got even lower but you can see there is a tremendous amount of power in these hits. 

The ball you see in this picture had been placed on top
of the dummy.  I think coach set it there to make the point
you hit the runner below the ball.  In his middle.

Big guy.  You wanna bet whether he'd bring the runner down.  He is hitting low because
the tackling dummy is only four feet high.  A whole lot of power in that hit.

 

Tackler isn't so big but he's driving through the dummy.

 

 

See the tears (rips) in the tackling dummy?  It is taking a serious beating as the guys practice getting low and powering their bodies through it.  The coach to the left is bent over a bit.  You can still see
that the power is aimed at the midsection of a typical opponent.

Now I'm going to get in a little trouble.  After shooting the Wolfpack abusing the tackling dummy, I thought I'd like to get some photos of Outlaws doing likewise.  And I didn't do so well.  I did get them working the dummies but somehow this lacks some of the energy I saw in the guy's practice.

Low, engaging the dummy, but I don't think there is much power in these hits.

 

Remember I'm not a coach.  Also remember that some photos distort whatever is happening on the field.  I suspect there's a really good reason for this drill.  Certainly the Outlaws are getting low as they engage the four-foot dummy.  But beyond that, I'm not sure what is going on.  I liked it better the way the Wolfpack did it.

Football Rules - A Little Fun; Personal Note

Personal Note First -
It has been nearly two weeks since my last post to this blog. Where have I been?  Dealing with elder care.  My mother-in-law is 98 years old and doing pretty well except she needs 24/7 care.  In the past few weeks we've had problems with caregivers - had to release two.  So we've been interviewing replacements.  In the process we've found a personal care home which was suggested to us as an alternate to our keeping mom in her own home and also an alternate to a nursing home.  We've been doing lots of interviewing and evaluating and considering and money-counting.  And not much blogging.  The care home is really nice with very fine owner and caregivers; we'll be moving mom there around the first of December.  Maybe after that I'll get back to frequent posting.

Football Rules
I've disliked field goals ever since November 8, 1970, when I watched in horror as field goal kicker New Orleans Saints Tom Dempsey beat my Detroit Lions with two seconds left in the game by kicking a 63-yard field goal for a final score of 19-17. I believe 63-yards remains the record now over forty years later.

Which football rules would you change if you were in charge? 

In his autobiographical book Terry Bradshaw suggested some rules changes.  One of Terry Bradshaw's ideas was to increase points for long field goals.  I don't remember the details - maybe award 4 or 5 points for an over-fifty yard field goal. 

Dumb!  And I'm a Terry Bradshaw fan.  But that struck me as a terrible idea. 

A field goal attempt is an admission of failure.  Failure to get ten yards for a first down.  Failure to move the ball into the end zone for six points.  A long field goals is evidence of a bigger failure.  Not only didn't you get the ball into the end zone, you didn't even get it close.  Why would we want to reward failure?  Long field goals should get fewer points than short ones.  Over fifty yards maybe one point.  Over forty, two points.  Over thirty, three.  Closer than thirty, four?  Nah, never more than three points.

If I were making the rules, I'd fiddle with field goals. 

I'd also get rid of the false-start penalty.  I don't know the statistics but it feels as though this penalty is called a dozen times in a typical game.  False "start" isn't quite accurate.  If a lineman moves after being set, it is a penalty.  "Move" means leaning a little tiny bit, shifting his down hand, raising his head.  The rule was instituted because the O-line used to try to draw the defense off sides by appearing to start a play before the snap of the ball.  Okay, if a lineman does a serious move in an obvious intent to fool the defense, maybe a penalty.  But if he just blinks an eye, no penalty.

How about the illegal block in the back on kick-offs and punt-returns?  It seems as though three out of four returns draw this kind of penalty.  A kick receiver runs eighty yards and the play is called back because a blocker touched a defender's back.  There has to be a better way.  Maybe take the penalty from the end of the run, not the point of the foul.  On kicks, you have twenty-two players racing toward each other at top speed, trying to get a bead on the guy with the ball.  A blocker may aim at the front of a defender and miss because the defender turns to expose his back.  That shouldn't be a penalty should it?

Another idea - at the end of the game when one team has the ball and the lead and the other is out of timeouts, why waste time taking a snap and a knee to kill the remaining 80 seconds?  Why not just call it a game and everybody go home?

Couple more silly ideas and then I have to get back to my elder-care duties:  On the opening kickoff, kickers are routinely kicking the ball all the way through the end zone.  A couple years ago the league moved the kickoff line closer to mid-field with the intent of reducing run-backs because those special teams situations invite injuries.  This has inspired  a couple ideas.

One is to have the kickers trying to split the uprights.  If he succeeds, award the kicking team a point.  Effectively kicking a field goal.  And applying my graduated field-goal point system noted above.

The second idea is why kick off at all?  Why not just give the receiving team the ball at the twenty yard line?  That would avoid the injuries and blocks in the back and all the other troubles with kickoff returns. 

Of course it would also eliminate those thrilling 99-yard kickoff returns.

Actually, football rules are pretty good overall.  I probably wouldn't really make changes.  Would you?