Keith Laubhan

Awesome... Thanks! We have Sports Authority Stores out here— didn't know that SoCal had them, too. I thought about going to Carson, but that looks to be on the complete opposite side of the area from where I'll be spending my time, so finding a Sports Authority seems to be the best answer.

2001 Cadets rendition of Moondance was great... I love that section of their show. I kinda miss that Cadets style of show that they had in 01 and 03... I hope that they'll do something like that, like, next year.

Classy...

Ditto.

Anybody know a good place for me to pick up a Beckham jersey while I'm out there? I'll be staying with a friend in Riverside, so advise on a sporting goods store out there from a local would be great. Thanks!

It's an audio visual medium, and as such, they should both be rewarded. As for the way it's weighted, I have no problem with it currently, though at the end of the day, it's all about the spreads, anyway. It could be 80/20 music to vis, and if you keep in close in music and open up a big spread in vis, you'll win.

The fact of the matter, Wes, is if our corps were to clean up visually, it wouldn't be an issue. The drill seems to be written in a way (again) that requires them to be dead-on the whole show to generate effect. Right now, that's far from the case... and as much as I'm rooting for them, I fear that, like last year, the vis captions will be their weak links. I just hope they can find a way to polish it up in the next couple weeks. It's such a tough year to try to have a weak card in your deck. So, after watching the webfeed, was I surprised by the spread? Maybe a little bit, but I have a hard time faulting the judges. :( Here's to cleaning up a very demanding visual book! :mmm:

I agree that DCI/Tom Blair should shoot in HD, if for no other reason than archival purposes. Even though it's cost prohibitive to release on HD-DVD/Blue-ray right now, eventually it won't be, and it would be useful for DCI to start having this footage available for re-release and pojects like the Classic Countdown. Either way, I agree... widescreen is the way to go. It's the perfect format for drum corps, and it's definitely going to be the standard in a few years' time.

I agree with Dan... our boundaries of elite corps needs to be fluid year to year. Clearly Crown is in that range and it's a "Top 7" this year. I think it's a bit of a strech to put BK there this year, though I would never write off my old corps. I do think that as the pressure builds from the 10-17th range like it's seeming to this year, the "elite" designation will definitely start to expand... at this rate, making finals in a couple years will be an incredible feat for just about every corps.

There's a handful of other Div I corps that should be so wise.

I agree that it's all in fun and shouldn't cause any harm. I think more than anything, this community has a lot of former marching members, and with that comes loyalty, but also sensitivity, to their corps. It seems that the people who take offense are the ones who are former members of corps that are getting predicted lower than their expectations. I suspect that if there was a discussion forum made up of a lot of former pro football players, you'd see a lot more sensitivity to those preseason polls like you see here.

The people who think Academy's reduced tour schedule is an advantage baffle me. Sure, they have more quantity of rehearsal time, but they're missing out on the opportunity to receive important judge feedback, and more importantly they're missing out on what makes competition valuable in the first place: motivation. There's nothing like knowing that you're X number of points behind or ahead another team and that you need to squeeze that much more out of rehearsal to make up ground. It's difficult to synthesize that in rehearsal when you're not engaged in regular competition. I'd much rather have 4-8 hours of rehearsal from a corps in a dogfight than 8-12 hours of rehearsal isolated from competition, especially when it's a corps that membership is young. I wish the Academy all the luck in the world, but I'd argue the limited tour is actually a competitive challenge, not an advantage.

...or bias? :P Just kidding... I do wish them well... I know it's early, but I just don't see it happening for them this year... I had the same feeling in the offseason, and their opening scores have only reinforced it.

I could absolutely see that happening... infact I could see it happening as soon as this year, with Crown and maybe BK/BAC rounding it out.

Subjective... more accessable? Probably, but I thought both shows were just about equally well designed and executed.

Ah... this line of thinking never gets old. ---- I do think Crown looked pretty good on the Annapolis webcast. While I like their show better than just about anyone else's, in terms of entertainment and personal taste, I agree that it's going to be pretty difficult to usurp the corps that finished ahead of them last year. Bluecoats and Cadets seem to be the most vulnerable as far as I can tell at this point of the season, but they're still excellent corps and will be tough for anyone to beat. If I had to guess, (and this pains me to do so, as this puts them over my corps) I'd suspect Crown will finish 7th.

Haha... nice. :P

Maybe, but the fact that they're seriously knocking on the door instead of battling for last place or completely inactive is a huge step up for the corps. Good for the Troop. There's a lot of excitement and energy surrounding them, and I'm thrilled for them. I'm glad the Mountain Time Zone is having a great year so far. :)

Oy, BK... when is my corps gonna learn that blue doesn't match their uniforms.... 05 shoulda been a lesson in color theory for them. ...Alright back to work at my job as an anal retentive graphic designer. :P

Ah... so that explains the 15.9 :) I love Rennick's writing. Especially those quick hock-it accent licks. They sound great. Can't wait to see them live in August.

Bingo... when it's an essay with drum corps accompaniment, it's entirely different than one line here and there. And for the record, I thought the narration was the least of the design problems in Cadets' show last year.

That would make me the happiest man on earth... I've lived across the street from the stadium for the last 3 years. In 2004, some of the warm-up zones were closer to me than the stadium... what a blast! Being as impartial as I can, I'd love to see the Finals return to Denver in the one year that they're not in Indy. I thought Invesco was a great stadium for the event, there's plenty of other tourist attractions, and even if it's hot, there's very little humidity to make it miserable. Throw in DIA being a hub for several airlines, and you've got somewhat less expensive airfare than some other locales. Here's hoping that it'll be Denver in 2014!

Easy there, ace. I'm not compaining that the podcast is free, just as MN DCI Fan said. I'm just expressing a little bit of buyer's remorse, I guess. All I'm saying is that features such as the Field Pass are what made me enjoy the Season Pass the past couple years, and are what inspired me, against my better judgement, to drop $90 on the Platinum Fan Network. When 2 of the largest reasons I antied up the hunk of change turn out to be free to everyone (Field Pass and the opening night webcast), I don't feel one bit bad about wondering what in the hell my $90 is getting me. So far, absolutely nothing.

That's cool that everyone can listen... I've enjoyed the podcasts the last couple years. It does make me wonder what I paid $90 for, though... I guess I shouldn't have assumed that Field Pass was part of the platinum service.

Don't forget BK '92 :) I'm still partial to Cadets 96... I love that show. One of the 3 that got me hooked on the activity that year.