Don't put off for tomorrow what you can attempt to smash through today.

Today's wrestling media production adventure consisted of a lot of data entry into a new google documents spread sheet.

Hooray!

Perhaps that's not the most exciting adventure to report about, from most readers' points of view, but it is these sorts of matters deserve to be discussed as much as others. Perhaps? Anyway.

Yesterday saw the official release of our "Amazon Annie vs Sherry Stunns" Showcase match from June 19. I'd placed that into the store before officially announcing it as released. Same with the "VeVe Lane vs Rachel Sinclair" match from June 20, which I will be officially announcing as released within the week.

Following the massive "video shoot fest" of the Showcase weekend, I immediately sat down and banged out all of the matches, processing them as fully as I could, as quickly as I could. I worked for 2 days straight, nose to the grind, and had a tremendous work turn over as a result. While I was working, I was also releasing matches according to my tentative schedule and sending e-copies of matches to participants.

That was last week.

At the start of this week, but 2 days ago, once all the dust had cleared, I looked at what I had on hand. And I realized why I like to get a ton done in one big push - everything was clearly laid out for me upon my return to work! I thanked my last-week-self for that.

For the last Showcase in January, instead of making a big push to do everything immediately, I made a work schedule to stretch the processing out over time. Not the best idea. The further away we got from the event, the less I found I had to say about the matches; the words to describe them were not immediately on the tip of my tongue, especially as I got caught up in later shoots, travel, and other work.

Now, about 6 months after that first trial, I had learned my lesson. Armed with some large USB storage drives, I ramped up and ran headlong into the pile of camera-generated AVI files.

And now, here I am, out on the other side of the storm. Coasting a bit, since most of the work just involves gentle organizing (as opposed to heavy editorial lifting).

Cleaning the queue. More like tidying, actually.

Cracking my knuckles to dig into managing a fairly heavy travel season coming up for the wrestlers. And I'm thankful the video file pile is well under control!

Rules Variations for Video Matches

Recent e-mail discussions with a customer and then further discussions with VeVe have yielded a great point regarding "scoring" a wrestling video match:

Many viewers watching the matches think in terms of pin-to-win, especially since we are producing wrestling matches. And to many people the word "wrestling" implies that there should be some importance placed on pinning an opponent.

Now, we score our matches based on number of submissions attained. And sure, that makes perfect sense, since we are engaged in submission wrestling. However, what if we created a rules variation that allowed for scoring of dominant positions as "pins."

I am not talking about just implementing standard no-gi grappling scoring rules; such as 2 points for a dominant position, 2 points for a sweep, points for submission attempts. Of course, we are putting these no-gi scoring rules into effect when it comes to overtime, in order to prevent a tie.

But how about a match-long rule regarding "pins"?

How about a scoring rule that...

1. Gives viewers the satisfaction of seeing a successful pin rewarded

2. Prevents wrestlers from staling on the bottom

3. Pushes the pace of the fight

4. Does not straight outright penalize BJJ fighters who can score submissions from being on their backs during a match.

Here is the proposal:

Continue to score the matches based on number of submissions. However, also score the matches based on number of "pins" and stand those scores up side by side.

What is a "pin," though?

In our rules, we could say: if one wrestler keeps her opponent in a controlling position (aka "dominant position") where her back (both shoulders) is on the floor, such as side mount, mount, scarf hold, perhaps even half guard!, for 10 seconds, then the top player is awarded a "pin."

After a "pin" the match would be restarted from a neutral position (knees or standing).

Now, I don't think this rule would hurt BJJ fighters. First off, even though BJJ fighters can work from the ground or from their backs, none want to be flat on their backs when on the bottom. If the BJJ fighter cannot get at least one of her shoulders off the mat in 10 seconds, some sort of advantage should certainly go to the controlling player.

This would not apply to full guard, which, although one player is on the bottom, is a neutral position, not a "dominant position." However, if the bottom player using the guard cannot mount a successful attack, nor the top player pass the guard, within, say, 20 seconds, then the match will be restarted from a kneeling or standing position. There will be no scoring as a result of this restart.

So!

The proposal here is just this: add a score for "pins" based on a top player effectively pinning her opponent flat for 10 seconds.

BUT!

What about stalling?

What if the top player pins her opponent but does not attempt a submission? It's "safer" to pin and hold than to attempt a submission.

Here's a possible solution:

Score the pin at the 10 second mark. But do NOT stop the fight. Instead, award the pin and let the match continue.

If the top player does NOT attempt a submission or change position within 10 seconds AFTER the pin is awarded, then the top player will be warned and/or penalized for stalling.

This sort of mirrors the BJJ scoring, where a player will be warned for stalling after 20 seconds of "inactivity" while holding an opponent in a dominant position. In my proposed rules, the "stalling" player is awarded at the 10 second mark for her demonstration of control, but she will be penalized at the 20 second mark if she has not started working toward a submission.

You get the score for a "pin" and then you need to start working for a submission.

Again, this mirrors BJJ rules, which require a player control her opponent for 3 seconds in order to be awarded points for a dominant position.

I propose requiring 10 seconds. Will that be too long? Somehow, I don't believe that 3 seconds is enough time to convey the "pin"... but then again, it takes 3 seconds to gain a pin in Pro Wrestling.

So maybe 3 seconds to gain a "pin" point? The match would definitely not restart then. The point would just be awarded to the pinning player.

Actually, as I attempt to make the rules feel more satisfying to wrestling oriented people, they start to mirror BJJ rules even moreso.

Time to fish for feedback!

Report: VeVe vs Ginger (Hot Muscle Mom)

And what a GREAT and exciting match it was! Ginger Martin, the Hot Muscle Mom, is totally fit and explosive at 5'6" and 140 lbs. A totally athletic and dynamic wrestler with great muscle definition. She gave VeVe a run for her money.

They rolled for three 8-minute rounds and created such a sweaty mess on the mats that by the third round, it looked like they were oil wrestling - and at high speed! As a matter of fact, the pace of the match was outstanding from start to finish. I was amazed at the furious movement within the first few minutes of the fight, and I was impressed that they carried through and finished strong into the 24th minute.

Great fight, good submissions to be had, not a draw (no more draws allowed, anyway), tremendous energy. And we'll have the video ready very soon.

Here's a picture of the ladies after the match (VeVe needs a haircut at this point)

Ginger was an absolute pleasure to work with, and VeVe, as always, was on point and ready to roll.

Great job VeVe and Ginger. Tremendous work tonight, ladies. You really made me think "old school" competitive when I saw this one.

*************************************************************************

Added 7/7/10:

Here's a trailer from the full match of "VeVe Lane vs Ginger Martin"

Wrestling Filming Tonight with VeVe and Hot Muscle Mom

I'm here in the lobby of our Manhattan studio space, sweating in the NYC heat wave, about to go get the mats for a competitive female match I am shooting tonight. 6:40 pm, right now, Friday.

VeVe will be wrestling for 24 minutes against a figure contest competitor / wrestler by the professional name of "Hot Muscle Mom" from Houston, TX.

Here's her wb270.com profile: http://wb270.com/ind/hotMuscMom.htm

Hot Muscle Mom hit a bit of traffic on her way into Manhattan from her hotel in Newark, and that is why I have time now to write this note now.

We'll be setting up a 10' x 15' mat space for this match, which is a closed shoot. VeVe just ran down to get the mats (so industrious of her). She gave me no guilt trippin' for my staying here and blogging. What a trooper!

Here's hoping that Hot Muscle Mom gets here soon. And, while I'm at it, I wonder if the studio we're in tonight will have an air conditioner... and whether or not we will use it. Nothing like letting them get sweaty real fast in a non-A/C environment; that'll lead to some real hot muscle action, to be sure!

Wrestling Blog Begins: Identity Considerations

I've decided it's high time I start blogging about my adventures as a media producer in the female and mixed wrestling realm.

As far as a start to the journaling, I haven't quite figured out how I want to present myself on the greater internet - what I would call myself, how I would depict myself in images, and so forth.

I do have some degree of concern for my personal information on the internet. I don't care about my name and image being out there for all to see, but, like most people, I am a tad concerned about identity revelation in connection with my wrestling media production work. I may get over that, since, in all likelihood, most people probably don't give a shit.

Of course, my real item of concern, above my own blogging presentation, is the personal information and identity of my wrestlers. Many people see me in person with my female wrestling friends, and certain dot-to-dots could be done to figure out just who these wrestle-ladies are in their day-to-day lives.

That's no issue for the ladies who are "out" about their wrestling careers. However, it is troublesome to the ladies who need to keep a closer watch over their namesakes and images. The real trouble, you see, is that the "out" wrestlers and the "double life" wrestlers tend to hang out together, travel together, meet people together, friend each other on facebook (or attempt to), and call each other by legal and professional names interchangeably in mixed company.

Why, at this past weekend's NYC Wrestling Showcase, we had a mix of "out" wrestlers and "double life" wrestlers. And there was a whole spectrum going on amongst them, between the polar extremes.

In any case, I won't wander too far on the discussion of wrestlers being discreet about their personal information. I will save that talk for a different post, perhaps. However, it is a topic that can be worth a lot of comment - but without really saying too much, in the long run.

What we do know is that some lady wrestlers have more flexible lifestyles than others, and, so, this influences their level of comfort with respect to plastering themselves across the internet. OR they are heavily into promoting themselves in "legit" fighting circuits and have a lot of pictures out there with their "real" names attached, thus causing them to hesitate in a big way when it comes to promotion for "underground" wrestling such as ours... even if there is nothing dirty going on about it! After all, words like "underground" and "mixed wrestling" tend to frighten a good many people, I've observed.

But considering this does little to help me decide what I will do regarding my presence and such on the web. I'm still in a stalemate here.

More consideration necessary. I suppose I could always make a pseudonym and use a vague image to represent myself. But vague images don't help readers to relate to me as a human, and pseudonyms can become confusing when dealing with people in the flesh.

Yeah, some more consideration is necessary.