Tips on Starting a new Paintball Team.
When first starting a team you are bombarded with thousands of ideas that you never had involved with paintball when you would just show up to the field, pay your dues and go play with whatever team you were assigned. Now you are thinking of starting your own team, be it a national level team or regional/local team. The first question arises, who can I get to play on my team?
Well usually people start out with other people from their local field that are also interested in increasing their skills by forming a tournament team. First, I would talk to my friends at the local field if they would be interested. Find out if they can play on either day of the weekend or if they have enough money to practice and play a few tournaments. These are big issues when being on a team. You can always help train a player to become better on the field if they have the time, money, and dedication. I would suggest taking note of who is out at the field and as dedicated as you. The guys that aren’t there every weekend are usually the guys that won’t have time to practice or play tournaments. You don’t have to pick the people with the best markers but with the same dedication to the sport that you have.
Now a reality of the paintball world is, almost all practices and events are held on Sundays. If playing on Sundays is a problem then it will be very hard to form a successful tournament team. Most play is on Sunday for tournament players because most tournament players work during the week and on Saturdays also. Sunday you will find fewer walk-ons but higher caliber player’s at most local fields.
When you finally have all of your players together, you should all get together and decide what tournaments you would like to try to play. Some local fields have beginner tournaments that are very cheap and only for first time players or even for certain aged players. These are the tournaments I would start on and use them as a learning experience. Once you are ready to step it up start considering playing a regional or local tournament series in the Rookie division. But before hitting up tournaments I suggest getting some practices together.
When first starting out I would suggest starting with either a 3man or 5man squad and try having one or two extra people on your team so that you can cope with people missing practice and still have a full squad. There will always be an excuse for someone to miss a practice even at the Pro Level.
When first starting out, I suggest trying to get your whole squad together every other week and practicing to help keep the costs down. If you have some high caliber teams out there at your local field, maybe you could arrange to run drills with them and have them help teach you different skills that you might not have thought of. Now playing your squad against the walk-ons or recreational players will not be very productive for the team. In general you want to play better teams as much as possible because you get better playing harder teams.
If you are starting out and there is no team to really practice against I suggest when your team plays to split up with the walk-ons and have maybe two guys on one team, two on the other. Also try to organize which side of the field your guys are going on so you can at least play against each other and get a good practice out of it. Another great thing to do if you have a 5man squad is practice 3 on 2 or 4 on 2 with your players or other good players at the field.
Now when starting out I would consider everyone trying to talk to a few local fields and asking if they have a home team. You can also go to the local field’s website and post on their player’s message board/forum. If there is a local team maybe you could get their information and schedule something with them. From experience I have found that to schedule a practice you want to talk to the team captain at least two times the week of the set scrimmage date to make sure everything is still on.
Sometimes the truth hurts. Top notch teams are not going to want to play your beginning team. What would they have to gain from it? Just accept this fact and you will be ok. Of course it doesn’t hurt to ask, just don’t get upset if they tell you they are busy. Try to also realize that a team is not always at its home field, that’s why I suggest getting in touch with them and trying to schedule something. Before scheduling something confirm with your players that they are completely open to play on the given weekend you are trying to schedule. Other teams will not want to set something up with you if your team does not show up on the agreed date.
Be careful of field owners. They tend to bend the truth about who will be out at their field and always suggest you just show up and they will be able to fit you in. In all reality the field owner has no clue what teams will be there. If he thinks he does, politely ask for the contact information to the teams that are supposed to be showing up and call them. Ask if they don’t mind you coming out there and also ask about pricing at this field for teams. Usually teams get cheaper pricing than just regular walk-on players.
Paintball is an expensive sport and what most successful teams do is split the costs of paint amongst all of the players. Meaning the team buys a set amount of paint for the team and everyone chips in their fair share. If a three person team bought three cases everyone pays for a case of paint and everyone shares it. Front guys might think this is unfair, but in reality they would not be alive if their back man was not covering him. If your front guy gets testy, which they will at this stage feel free to rotate spots so they can shoot more paint. It will help the whole team out if each player can play every part of the field. Even back guys end up in the snake from time to time so the more experience in different positions on the field the better.
You can have a very cheap learning experience by helping ref a big scrimmage or just watching a tournament to see how things go. I suggest doing this just so you know what to expect when you play your first paintball tournament. You will see all sorts of weird things happen. Always read the rules or ask about them before starting so you don’t have any surprises come tournament time. And always remember the refs will make mistakes, they are only human. Good Luck with your new team and hopefully we’ll see you out on the paintball field one day.
~Andy Jordan
Captain Richmond Riot
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