Thursday Night Speedball...

[Skeeter]

will be canceled indefinately.

[alldugan]

is it due to a lack of participation? Will speedball be played on any other days in the future?

[Imnotmexican]

it should. i know it's hard but it would defenatly pay back for all the money you guys have spent on the field...what if it was on sunday when the recball days are slower then you wouldnt need as many reffs on recball and could sacrifice one for speedball. Just a thought.

[Skeeter]

How on earth will it ever pay back? The only way we will ever get more than a handfull of speedball players it to make it all free. We have been running our Thursday night games at a loss, just to give speedballers a chance to get on the field. Even at $5/$15, we only get two or three players a night. It is nothing more than a waste of our time and resources to keep the speedball fields up and running. Once again, we respond to a very vocal minority of the players by offering a requested format. All we get in return is a lack of participation.

[Skeeter]

is it due to a lack of participation? Will speedball be played on any other days in the future?

We will open up the speedball fields, or all fields for that matter, to any private party group. $395 for the first 20 players & $10 for each extra. This includes all field fees, all rental hardware (an air-fill for any players with their own equipment) 6000 paintballs for the players to share, and a referee for your group.

The speedball fields are available for games at ANY time, ANY day, ANY week, under the preceeding conditions.

[Brain]

Come on, I would like to hear the opinions of the regular players at PBC. Speedball is obviously our source of income for the field and it is a shame that we can'tget a better turnout even on a day when some may have issues with attending. When we first started we were getting 15-20 now it is zero. Skeeter is right that we would have to not charge people to play to get consistent numbers and that we will never pay for the investment put into them (not including my labor). I just need for my own peace of mind a reason to not drop the nets and turn it into scenario parking...

[Bermy]

Anytime speedball is open on Sunday's, I'll be there. If I knew of even 1 person going on a Thursday, I'll be there also, and there are plenty of others that can say the same. You have a dedicated, core group of regulars who will come out for speedball. We pay for air, entry, and paint, the money is there. I don't mind rec-ball, but I spend drastically more on speedball because for me, it's just that much more fun and I'm sure my peers will agree with me.

[DM5GUNNA]

i would go sunday as well, but we have already had this discussion in the past, weekends don't work due to lack of staffing correct me if Im wrong

[ironman!]

its just some pple at thurs. speedball are so rude and idiodic not many pple want to come

[Free.Lance.Murderer.]

ironman...i really doubt thats the reason...there are alot of cool, regular players that come...maybe its you...Skeeter (its Kalebh) IMO i think the reason we are not getting participation is due to the early darkness...in sunmmer i bet we will get handfulls of players...jut my opinion

[Bermy]

I'm always down to play, I really do not care if there are 10 people there or 100. I think every Sunday you will get guys that only want to play Speedball, who wouldn't be there otherwise. Buisness is buisness.

[SCBrian]

I think every Sunday you will get guys that only want to play Speedball, who wouldn't be there otherwise. Buisness is buisness.

Bermy, the problem with having it during the weekend is it kills our staff for rec ball. When you have Ref's that "Can't" work because they "Want" to play speedball, it becomes difficult to staff the 100+ who show up for Rec...

my $0.02

[killer05prostock]

im willing to play speedball and vol ref if yall need it

[Bermy]

Rotating trained ref's so that they can ref one game and play another seems to remedy the situation.

[DeepFreeze]

I believe what Brian was trying to say is that many of the regular speedball players are refs. If you have speedball on the weekends then it pulls trained refs from the recball fields because they would want to play speedball instead of work as a ref on the recball fields.

[Brain]

Rotating trained ref's so that they can ref one game and play another seems to remedy the situation.

We pay our refs to work and expect them to be professional. If they were to work and play the same day they would be wayyyyyyyyy more distracted by playing and safety would become an issue. This is not an option!

[himself68]

sux that it is cancelled

[alexmason123]

when summer rolls around and it stays lighter longer how about on a sunday after rec-ball ends?

[DM5GUNNA]

Ironman who are you talking about, because all the speedball players at PBC are actually pretty cool, unless you go around acting like your all that.

I like alex idea, it was like that for a while if im correct a few years ago too

[Skeeter]

Tried the Sunday PM thing a while back. Didn't work out real well. Had store staffing issues & the staff guys that were on that day were too tired to play. Poor showing, again...

$395 buys you admission for 20 players & a ref. Since speedball players generally won't play unless everything is free, I don't see that happening.

[alldugan]

it's too bad. I tried to support the thursday night thing, (it was always only Robbie and I). I think that speedballers have some of the best attitudes and that is why I am so active in this sport.

[Bermy]

Tried the Sunday PM thing a while back. Didn't work out real well. Had store staffing issues & the staff guys that were on that day were too tired to play. Poor showing, again...

$395 buys you admission for 20 players & a ref. Since speedball players generally won't play unless everything is free, I don't see that happening.

I don't understand what your saying, I pay everytime, everywhere I go.

[Skeeter]

I don't understand what your saying, I pay everytime, everywhere I go.

That is why I said "generally". In the 10 years (or so) of owning/running a paintball field, there seems to be a certain crowd that feels like everything should be owed to them. Of course there are exceptions, but when Brain and I have tried dealing with speedball teams or groups of speedballers, there has ALWAYS been the "I want something for nothing" attitude. Not very realistic.

[El_Griton]

i think hes saying man up, come to him with 20 peeps and money in hand. then we go play some speedball. (im reading between the lines)

[Skeeter]

Not really a "man up" statement. We had a million requests for speedball, so we got a field running. We did have a few decent nights out there a while back, but not many players recently. We can have a stand-down for a while since we don't have the participation any more.

We had a similar situation a while back with a pump only tournament. A million requests for the event, and then only 10-12 teams (3 man) signed up. And this was for a free event.

Our bread and butter operation is rec ball. We seem to be much better served by focusing on our strengths, and not trying to appease everone all of the time.

[alldugan]

Would there be any way to subsitute any of the "includeds" of a private party, such as equipment and paint and substitute that for all day air fills. I know that if there were going to 20 or so players that were going to get together to play, most of them would have equipment of their own. I doubt that would be an option, but I think it would make it more appealing to me. I know that recball is where the $$ is, I just think that some players would benefit from speedball. I have enjoy it and started out playing a ton of recball.

[Skeeter]

Good idea, with a slight twist. Took this one off-line. Dugan, you have mail. For everyone else, link up with Dugan and lets get a speedball practice going... Dugan, let me know and we can start looking at available dates.

[Ech0]

I Just moved down here from columbia :-/ and havent played in 2 years and want to get back into it was up there Saturday just to visit the store but i know me and a few guys from the company i work for which is less then 5 mins from the field would probly come out for speedball any night that we can. Just moved down here and really wanting to get back into the sport so ide do w/e it took to beable to play during the week even if i had to pay extra for the field to stay open :-x

[eabguy]

less do it on sunday at $10

[alldugan]

1st - I was in no way saying that I was interested in taking over the ogranizational role of speedball at PC.

2nd - $10 is the stupidest price anyone could offer. What would that cover, nothing is what it would cover.

3rd - Good Luck if you guys try it

[SuPeRmAn]

i think one problem is attendance duh right well the only way to solve it is one advertise it not only on hear but as well at the field maybe i big sign saying speedball when were and price and another thing would help is picking a time when people can do it i cant play on thursday cause of school and sports not to mention parents so i think that when is a big issue and i think that maybe sunday afternoon would be good maybe even to spare one ref and i think that we could chip in and pay them idk but there are ways to solve it if it is truly looked at skeeter and brain and by all means i respect your decsision because it will truly be the final one

[Skeeter]

Dugan... You don't have to take the leadership role, but you brought up the best idea I have gotten re speedball in a very long time. MANY thanks for presenting a viable option. If someone else wants to coordinate speedball practices with me, that is good too. Contact me if you want to be the POC for speedball practices. If we work under the premise Dugan (with a twist in your favor) presented above, then we can all function together just fine. One caveat… Full payment for the private party rate at least 1 day in advance. PM me if you want to give this a try. I only want one POC. Someone else gets the joy of coordinating a batch of speedballers. Pick a date, check with me & lets move forward. I will create a “speedballers only” discussion board to help you get things rolling. If someone steps up, PM me and I will fill you in on the details I sent to Dugan earlier today.

THIS is the “sack up” message. Lets get a batch of hard hitting / motivated players on the speedball fields. I will staff it accordingly. If nobody wants to take the role of event coordinator, then the whole group needs to drop it. If someone is brave enough to take the role, and the rest of the speedball crowd does not step up, then the whole group needs to drop it. All I ever here is “why can’t we have this?” Now is your chance. I will hold up my end, and I hope this works. If it does not work, the crowd needs to drop it…

[Paco]

Thanks Skeeter. You too Dugan. Let me know if you guys need help. I'll do what I can from here to help get this up and running.
I think the forum is a great place to start. Once we get people to commit to a schedule, then put their money in to "reserve" a spot we'll know just what to expect. Like you say, I imagine we'll still have trouble with this (commitment) but at least you guys won't have the headache of coordinating it.
Maybe we can find an appropriate time and make it a set thing (say, once a month or something) once we get some people to show up. Another thought is to have more than one person to organize it. Maybe one guy is responsible for setting everything up for one time, then it rotates to the next volunteer. Before you volunteer though you need to find out just what goes into this from start to finish. Schedule a field, make a sign up sheet, have the field set up and taken down and so on. We used to handle all of this every week for team practices and it's not that bad if it's a group effort. The question is how bad do we want to do this? Everybody is all for it on the internet but when the time comes will we even have enough people to play?
A good starting point may be to get a list of the people who are serious about doing this, and what they can commit to.

[Bermy]

I'm one of the guys that has no problem showing up any night of the week, or on Sunday (I work Saturdays). Getting the money in advance is also not a problem, we just need to pool together the players.

[Obrien1]

Try friday nights. everyone has just gotten out of school or work or anything else you do but just try that for a few weeks. We have about 10 people at pbfreak and I schooland we might even start a team depending on cooperation from everyone:biggrin9gp:

[icemanja]

hey skeeter its josh. if you need a ref or two to work some extra for speedball on the weekends give me a holler. i can do it a couple of times a month. just let me kno cause id be happy to help keep speedball runnin

[Ech0]

Like i said I dont have a problem doing it any time of the week as long as its after 5pm m-f cause of work but i work on Dorchester so im only 10 mins away so it wont be but a thing to be there when ever its able to be scheduled. I used to Ref up in Columbia and wouldn't mind volunteering down here if its what needed to get things started at least.

[killer05prostock]

im willing to play or vol ref anytime after 4 on mon-fri and sat and sun anytime ya just got to let me know ahead of time.

[datavamp]

How about we start this with a poll on which day people would like to come play speedball. That you have a better sense of when it would be conveniant for the majority of the players.

[lolipop-tithead]

Not trying to be the lamer that sits from his keyboard and complains, but my issues are the following: I am a full time student. Being a senior high school student i have learned that my time is very valuable on an afternoon after school. Any time during the week is NOT an option for me. I realize that i am not the majority of the "speedballers", but being someone who realizes afternoons during the work/school week are a hard time for most to fit in play time, i think that weeknight play time is not a good idea. The reason for lack of participation is lack of.... well, participation. The size of the "speedball group" has steadily dwindled since the conception of "thursday night lights". Who wants to come out when your playing a 1 on 2? Why not have speedball when you WILL have at least 10 persons? Ok! Mgmt.'s solution to this problem was to have it once a month. Great idea if you ask me, but still no show. My guess is once again the School/work week night problem. Alright, we move along to our next part in the saga that is the speedball story. Private groups only? alright again, sounds like an OK idea to me. Can't be that much money split up between 20 people, right? sure. Again i think this plan will fail. The lack of motivation to pay the group fee rate and the lack of consistancy of players is going to bring it down. Regular weekend "rec-ballers" don't pay a group fee. Rec-ballers can choose weekends they would like to come out because they HAVE that option without penalty. The mere inconvinionce of not having many days to choose from is bringing the speedball scene down. Were just going to have to tuff that one out. My solution is this: Lets have 1 saturday and or sunday a month to pool players (that means money) with a regular admission fee and allow speedball. Now i'm comfortable enough to speak for the majority when i say that most people are free on weekends. since we arent losing any money staying dormant, why not try? All i have to say about the staffing issue is that we neeed more staff i guess. Furthermore i seek nothing else but the ability to enjoy and or practice speedball with a larger group of people on the weekends once a month. staff and mgmt. at paintball of charleston can't help me with the issue of the turnout but they can help all of these sad saps looking for some speedball.

[SuPeRmAn]

well said

[Skeeter]

We can provide speedball fields at any time, 24/7 under the previously listed conditions... Here they are again.

1. Group rate (slightly less than the normal rate, will include air but no rental hardware). The group rate will cover the first 20 players. You can have less than 20, but the rate still stands. Easy to add palyers, for the same pro-rated rate.

2. Payment of the group rate at least 1 day ahead of time

3. Can't drain my staffing pool or create a ref shortage for rec ball.

You guy choose the date.

[Imnotmexican]

How about we start this with a poll on which day people would like to come play speedball. That you have a better sense of when it would be conveniant for the majority of the players.

every one will vote "yes"...and that isint the problem. it has taken 3 threads with the same title for people to understand that speedball looses pbc money.
in the other hand josh has a pretty good but really long idea

[Bermy]

Offering Speedball as a private group is the best we can do? There are guys volunteering to Ref, and I don't understand rule #3. If we pre-pay as a private group, and there aren't enough ref's for the walk-on's, do we not get to play? I don't believe I even know of 20 regular speedballers that I can depend on to collect money in advance from to come play at PC.

[DM5KILLA]

volunteer refs, although helpful, do not have the training and necessary dedication that we have. I am positive that if u guys pay the private group rate that u would be guaranteed a ref. he MEANS that the refs cannot see that speedball is running and all "quit" working to come play as many of our staff qould be inclined to do.

[Imnotmexican]

Offering Speedball as a private group is the best we can do? There are guys volunteering to Ref, and I don't understand rule #3. If we pre-pay as a private group, and there aren't enough ref's for the walk-on's, do we not get to play? I don't believe I even know of 20 regular speedballers that I can depend on to collect money in advance from to come play at PC.

Just stop posting. I have never seen you at speedball on thursdays anyway...plus the owners just dont wanna hear what you have to say they already said speedball is closed,if you wanna play so bad pay $395

[Bermy]

Just stop posting. I have never seen you at speedball on thursdays anyway...plus the owners just dont wanna hear what you have to say they already said speedball is closed,if you wanna play so bad pay $395

You don't even know who I am bro, because if you did you would know that I have not even been in the country since the inception of Thursday Night Speedball. I've been back in Charleston for about a month now, and am trying to get something together so that the guys that like speeball can get together and play. You tell me to stop posting because I'm trying to bring the field a little bit of extra buisness and have a good time? Do yourself a favor, Negative Nancy, and only post when you have something positive to contribute, stop trying to speak for everyone else.

[DM5KILLA]

lets just end this nonsense now...and propose more speedball ideas if u have them and if not just shut up

[Skeeter]

Private party rates for the speedball fields are the best we can do right now. We are open to realistic ideas, if someone presents other options. I am letting someone else step up and organize things. If nobody in that group is able to get things going, then you will have a slight taste of my frustrations over the past many years. For some reason, many of the speedball players think they are entitled to play for free. Not quite sure where this sense of entitlement comes from, or why they think it is justified, but this is what I have to deal with. Not interested in dealing with it any more.

We have only had one speedball team that has truly held up their end of the bargain, and pulled their weight at our field, EVER. As a testament to their dedication, several of them will be reffing this weekend.

As for staffing requirements. I will staff the speedball field appropriately, ahead of time. If I don't have the required refs for rec ball or private parties, then we won't take payment for the speedball event. Once you pay for the speedball event, then I will have the field inflated and a ref present. If I loose too many of the rec ball staff (to the speedball games), then I won’t let anyone book the speedball field on the date in question. This will be known several days ahead of time, so there won’t be any last minute cancellations on my part. Only players that are on the list (waivers turned in prior to the event) will be allowed to participate. Any ref that is on staff that day, who abandons their reffing responsibilities to play speedball with be fired on the spot and asked never to return!

I am enjoying this experiment. I would like to see someone step up and get this going, and it will be very entertaining to watch someone else try to deal with this particular subset of players. Easy to do (on paper): Get a list of potential players, select a date, reserve the date with me, collect the waivers and $ from each participant, make the payment, show up and play. Couldn’t be simpler.



Offering Speedball as a private group is the best we can do? There are guys volunteering to Ref, and I don't understand rule #3. If we pre-pay as a private group, and there aren't enough ref's for the walk-on's, do we not get to play? I don't believe I even know of 20 regular speedballers that I can depend on to collect money in advance from to come play at PC.

[DM5KILLA]

god tim your so repetitive lol jk

[SuPeRmAn]

skeeter will it be any different during the summer seeing as how kids will be out and having time during the week

[lolipop-tithead]

Just stop posting. I have never seen you at speedball on thursdays anyway...plus the owners just dont wanna hear what you have to say they already said speedball is closed,if you wanna play so bad pay $395

lol lucas thats aaron dumbass

[RecBallKing!]

Private party rates for the speedball fields are the best we can do right now..

could we possibly request you as our ref? would you do it? just curious..

[bluemidget123]

could we possibly request you as our ref? would you do it? just curious..

we? you mean people who would actually play speedball?

<3

[Skeeter]

Sure! Just 'cause I doubt you bunch of cheapskates will pony up your part of the bargain. Might be a little harder to schedule, but i'll ref if that is what you want.

If that is not being called out, then I don't know what is. Any other requests?

I could use the $10 per day raise, as a head ref!


could we possibly request you as our ref? would you do it? just curious..

[kirra2365]

ill vol ref for rec

[DirtyD123]

this is a old thread

[bluemidget123]

ill vol ref for rec

this makes no sense. and this thread is about 3 months old...

[RecBallKing!]

and the speedball thread...not the rec ball thread

[green_rapper]

ya sundays would be a lot better i cant go on thurs. due to school football and homework overload!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[icemanja]

once again plz look at the posts b4 you and the dates on the threads

[RecBallKing!]

ya sundays would be a lot better i cant go on thurs. due to school football and homework overload!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

no1 can go on thursdays cause we dont have a speedball field. it seems the time it takes to type would also be sufficient time for you to determine weither or not what you're trying to say would be worth saying or not...i guess not in ur case.

[xxcrazybrannonxx]

How on earth will it ever pay back? The only way we will ever get more than a handfull of speedball players it to make it all free. We have been running our Thursday night games at a loss, just to give speedballers a chance to get on the field. Even at $5/$15, we only get two or three players a night. It is nothing more than a waste of our time and resources to keep the speedball fields up and running. Once again, we respond to a very vocal minority of the players by offering a requested format. All we get in return is a lack of participation.

people are scared to play with the all the glk and good players if we could somehow tell people that speedball isnt a wast of paint and money then more people will play

[DM5KILLA]

people are scared to play with the all the glk and good players if we could somehow tell people that speedball isnt a wast of paint and money then more people will play


At this time we dont entirely have speedball fields... And when we do get them back up theirs no telling on what a schedule will look like...

And people dont need to be told that speedball isnt a waste of money and paint... There arre plenty of people who love to play speedball but ust dont get oppurtunities... ALSO, There are even more poeple who WOULD love to play speedball but never have had the oppurtunity due to lack of an organized local speedball field

[bluemidget123]

oh god, this again?

don't be scared to play paintball against better players. the only thing it will do is make you better. learn from mistakes and keep going back for more.

[splat]

Aww I remember saying that to you.....

[FreedomFighter]

OK... so this thread is really old but I do want to know what the scenario is with speedball now. I haven't played yet at PBC but am very interested in playing soon and often. Is there speedball on Sat. and Sun.?

Aside from that, are alot of people gonna be out on Sat.?

[Wubby]

OK... so this thread is really old but I do want to know what the scenario is with speedball now. I haven't played yet at PBC but am very interested in playing soon and often. Is there speedball on Sat. and Sun.?

Aside from that, are alot of people gonna be out on Sat.?

the speedball field is not up yet but i will be in 2008 sometime i think.

[TheRun&GunGuy]

the speedball field is not up yet but i will be in 2008 sometime i think.

but you can still play recball.

[DM5KILLA]

OK... so this thread is really old but I do want to know what the scenario is with speedball now. I haven't played yet at PBC but am very interested in playing soon and often. Is there speedball on Sat. and Sun.?

Aside from that, are alot of people gonna be out on Sat.?

As previoiusly mentioned, the speedball fields are still closed at this time, but they will reopen this year sometime hopefully, as for reball("woodsball") SEE the calender for our current hours of operation, this time of year(cold) there are usually always a good number of people at the field of course with Saturday being the Most popular day... any Questions feel free to pm me or call the store @ 843-552-1115

[pink boy]

pbc should start a speedball league and you could have a team with your friends and play in a tournament

[simple_condolences]

They didn't get good enough speed ball turnout if i remember correctly. There weren't nearly enough people to run any sort of tournament... maybe enough for two five man teams... that was about it... things may have been better before i got out there but I wouldn't know.