🛠️ 2024 Season: Fixed or Flubbed?

Hello and welcome, this is The Players Meeting. The only newsletter that’s thankful to every one of you for reading.

Let’s get into it.

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NEWS
Champions Cup Rescheduled

There are 3 certainties in life:

1/ Death
2/ Taxes
3/ A PDGA decision met with strong opposition

And after the latest Champions Cup announcement, many pros made their disapproval heard. The PDGA is back on the hot seat.

Last Thursday, our governing body rescheduled its newest Major - 2024 Champions Cup…

• Due to a beetle infestation at the International Disc Golf Center (Appling, GA), the event was postponed until after the DGPT Championship. This was met with complaints of a back-heavy schedule and uncertainty of new courses

• Now because of tree removal delays, the new courses will not be ready in time

• The rescheduled dates (June 27-30) slot between Preserve & DMC but happen simultaneously as a DGPT Europe event - Swedish Open

• The rescheduled location will be Northwood Park in Morton, IL. All 4 rounds will be at the Northwood course with a new layout

• Note: This is an invite-only event with only the top players (if they decide to attend)

On the PDGA Radio podcast, Doug Bjerkaas explained that this was “our best option this year.” And that the event would be brought back to new “state of the art” courses at the IDGC for “2025 and beyond.”

Immediately after the announcement, pros and fans flocked to social media. There were some positive reactions like “Great news” or “I love this change”, but those were quickly overshadowed.

As expected, those who strongly opposed this decision have a very complicated touring schedule. European pros who have to plan for multiple trips across the pond weren’t happy.

Not only that but the brand-new Europe Tour gets disrupted with a Major smack dab in the middle of it. For many pros who can’t afford to miss it (not McLaren McBeth), this decision is now impossibly hard.

So who’s to blame - the beetle infestation or the PDGA? The situation definitely could have been handled better, but at least it’s only for one year and nothing is set in stone with the PDGA.

Days after the fallout, Ultiworld reported the organization is “considering another rescheduling.” Airline sponsorships never looked so worthwhile.

POWERED BY POWERGRIP USA
Fresh Plastic

👉 Powergrip’s Highlight: Black Friday Deals
It’s that time of year when your inbox gets slammed with marketing emails from every disc golf shop under the sun.

So let’s keep it simple… Powergrip USA takes Black Friday seriously.

• Many discs and accessories have already been marked down well beyond 25% off. Several are as low as $3.90

• For everything else, use promo code BLACKFRIDAY23 for 25% off (valid through next Sunday 12/3)

• Every order this week will receive a 20% off promo code to use on a future order

• If you’re lucky to be near their Bloomington, IL store, then there are GRIP-EQ bag sales

Here are a few gems:

• $3.90 Discmania Active Genius (7|5|-4|1) - I’m sure you’ve heard the phrase “Get out of Jail Free” disc on player vlogs before. This can be yours for under 4 bucks

• $11.90 DGA ProLine Quake (5|3|0|3) - This is the definition of underrated. In premium plastic, this OS mid is perfect for any Zone-type shot where you need an extra 30 ft

• $14.90 Discraft Z Captain’s Raptor 2021 First Run (9|3|1|4) - The OG Cap Rap for cheap

• $14.90 Clash Steady Salt (12|5|-1|3) - A destroyer clone in one of the most premium feeling plastics on the market

MYTHBUSTERS, STEP PUTT, & POPULAR PROS
Random Triples

1️⃣ This week there was a long-standing myth busted by living legend Scott Stokely: “When you throw a sidearm, you don’t keep your elbow next to your body.”

Some FH tutorials spread the advice of keeping your elbow close to your body as if holding a pillow. This is a poor shortcut to imparting spin onto the disc.

So listen to Stokely, ‘cause he knows a thing or two about FHs. From Brian Earhart’s recent DGN interview with The Champ…

2️⃣ Speaking of BEarhart… He’s back with season 2 of his “Level Up” series, but now it’s exclusively on the DGPT’s channel and DGN.

His 1st episode about C2 putts and the difficult-to-master step putt was insightful. He gave one tip that was so obvious I couldn’t believe I didn’t think of it.

If you can’t dial in the lethal step putt from 33-40 ft, then stop practicing them legally. Instead, step putt from 15 feet and move back as your comfort level rises.

Eventually, you’ll master the mechanics and be the one player who always asks, “Is this outside?”

3️⃣ The 2023 Ultiworld/StatMando Fandom Survey results are streaming in. Thanks to all 89 of you who bothered to put The Players Meeting down as your source.

We’re holding strong at a solid 3% percent of the media listed. Now onto the results from the 1st of several articles by Jesse Weisz.

If you’d like to read his 2.8k-word write-up, then you can here. Otherwise, here’s what I found to be interesting about pros’ popularities:

• Putting his Crush Boy life behind him, Simon Lizotte overtakes Kristin Tattar as the most “rooted for” player. His switch from Discmania to MVP has been VERY fruitful for both parties

• For the 2nd year in a row, Natalie Ryan, Nikko Locastro, & Joel Freeman remain the least popular

• McBeth, Wysocki, & Pierce have all had a significant fall from grace. The main hunch is that they had less screen time this season due to a mix of injury, worse performance, and more parity

Thanks to the Pro Tour, our sport will continue to be extremely player-centric with fans taking a liking to certain personalities. Who knew how important it’d be to be good at throwing frisbees and likable?

Meme of the Week

Thanks for reading today. Get out and practice putt this week!

- Charlie