|
Post by panicvb on Oct 21, 2014 18:52:49 GMT -5
|
|
|
Post by jtshaver on Oct 23, 2014 18:19:48 GMT -5
The PVL has traditionally been mostly tournament action, but I know they're trying to change that. Like you said, the issue is money for travel.
Our team (NorCal Premier) plays mostly in the bay area, but this year we'll be traveling a bit more for matches/exhibitions:
Playing Stanford in Fresno, CA (Nov 1) Playing University of Hawaii in Hawaii (Nov 25) Playing Pepperdine in Malibu (Double header on Dec 13) Exhibitions in San Jose, Reno, and Kansas City Nationals in Detroit
If we had more money we have a lot of other matches we could line up.
From my perspective, we need to get paying fans and sponsors to make it possible to travel, then televising matches would be possible.
|
|
|
Post by panicvb on Oct 23, 2014 20:26:59 GMT -5
Thanks for the info.
How many PVL teams in the NorCal area?
Money is always going to be the key. Need to keep travel within 2-4 hours - driving time.
|
|
|
Post by bAnthony on Oct 23, 2014 21:19:19 GMT -5
Thanks for the info. How many PVL teams in the NorCal area? Money is always going to be the key. Need to keep travel within 2-4 hours - driving time. The PVL is split up by region, ideally with each region fielding a team. Last year there ended up being 12 teams. Some of the teams came together in time for Nationals. Team Great Lakes ended up winning it (Coached by Dave Deuser). Some of those guys ended up playing in Finland this year. NorCal premier is the only PVL team in Northern California. Last year they played against rec teams in the NCVA men's adult league throuhgout the year. I think they hosted a tournament in Reno for other PVL teams, but not sure. JT would have more info on that. I know this year the NCVA is hosting a PVL President's Day Tournament and a Far Western in Reno. I am glad to see they are getting more scrimmages in against colleges. I plan on seeing them play against Stanford next weekend.
|
|
|
Post by panicvb on Oct 23, 2014 22:36:49 GMT -5
That's excellent that players moved into Finland.
Need to have a lot more teams, but it will come, hopefully sooner rather than later.
|
|
|
Post by bAnthony on Oct 23, 2014 23:27:19 GMT -5
That's excellent that players moved into Finland. Need to have a lot more teams, but it will come, hopefully sooner rather than later. Well, you have to realize it isn't that they started in the PVL and then moved to Finland, they came home after their season in Europe got together, played in the tournament. There were a handful of guys who had just graduated college, played in the PVL finals, then went to Europe. From last year's Great Lakes team guys who played 2013-2014 in Europe: Bitner (Switzerland), Eaton (Denmark), Klein (Finland), Lavaja (Greece, now Finland), Masterson (Israel, now FInland), Petty (Greece, now Finland), Stafford (Israel, not playing this year) The team that got second: Devanny (Belgium, now second division France), Rowe (had just graduated, now Finland), Quiroga (had just graduated, now I think playing in Argentina?) The teams that got third: Scott Touzinsky (SCC Berlin) Teams that got fifth: Iandolo (this year in Sweden), Riecks (Finland, now Czech), Smalzer (just graduated, now in Finland) Teams that got seventh: Tarantino (just graduated, now playing in Greece) Team that finished eighth: Dejno (just graduated, now in France) Teams that finished ninth: Crabb (just graduated, now in France), Aguiillard (was in Finland, now in Italy), Cook (graduated, now in Greece), Pollock (Finland), Ammerman (now in Sweden) Teams that finished 11th: Zornig (was in Sweden, now in the Netherlands) Unfortunately it seemed to end up as a replacement for the Men's Open division at Nationals. Most of the guys on the team that won were playing in lower leagues in Europe, then came home to play a tourney in the summer. It was cool to see Touzinsky, captain of a big team, playing. It was also neat to see Aguillard make the jump to the SuperLega. He will have his work cut out for him in Padova, but he did see the court last weekend. I applaud that NorCal is doing their best to run it like a professional organization. They put together their team early and get matches throughout the year. I wish other regions would do the same, and maybe they could play each other throughout the year. Though you can see that the success level of teams comes from those teams who get guys to come back from Europe for the summer.
|
|
|
Post by panicvb on Oct 24, 2014 8:38:06 GMT -5
Love the info. Keep it coming.
I'm checking your blog all the time, incredible info. I remember when Kiraly and Timmons went to Italy back in the 80's, and waiting for the next issue of Volleyball magazine to have a blurb about how they were doing.
Any ideas when Bein Sport will start airing Serie A matches?
|
|
|
Post by jtshaver on Oct 24, 2014 10:32:22 GMT -5
To expand on what bAnthony said, yes, there's only 1 team in NorCal. There isn't even another California team at all, unless you count SCVA Paul Mitchell, but they only came to nationals.
It's funny how the traditionally best volleyball region doesn't have a full time PVL team. The talent and fan base is definitely there, but I'm sure there's other reasons.
I think the PVL has potential, especially since many players are back in the USA from their overseas playing around mid season and want to keep their skills sharp. Nationals showed that there is some good talent here, with the #1 seed made up of olympic/national team and equivalent players not even making the gold bracket in playoffs, and plenty of other "upsets". I felt like 8 or so of the 12 teams had a chance at winning.
Our "regular season" is the adult league, which is odd. There are a couple of good teams, but it's definitely not the same as playing DI or other pro teams. That's why this year is exciting. 3 of our first matches are against Stanford, Hawaii, and Pepperdine, and we have a lot more out of state stuff than last year. They're working hard to get good exposure against high quality teams.
We all have our ideas on how to grow the PVL, but I've got enough to worry about so I'll just keep playing until I get old, LOL.
Off topic, but last time I talked to Stafford I thought he was going to play in the middle east this year. Things may have changed though.
|
|
|
Post by aranhahunter on Oct 24, 2014 20:58:29 GMT -5
The PVL has traditionally been mostly tournament action, but I know they're trying to change that. Like you said, the issue is money for travel. Trying to change that how and when? Can you elaborate on that? Last time I asked Steve Bishop, he said they had no plans to change from a tournament format for the foreseeable future, as "league/season" format were tried and all failed in the US We all have our ideas on how to grow the PVL, but I've got enough to worry about so I'll just keep playing until I get old, LOL. Can you elaborate on what ideas you (or other people involved with PVL) have in order to improve the product? I'm rather curious to hear ideas from players, coaches, staff etc that have had some experience with the PVL.
|
|
|
Post by jtshaver on Oct 27, 2014 11:30:14 GMT -5
Here are some thoughts from a mixture of myself and other players and people involved with the league. Some of it is in the works already, some not. - We need more big matches. This year we're playing 3 good DI teams in places with great fans, which is a big step in getting exposure for the league. Last year, the majority of our matches were tournaments with no fans apart from maybe my wife and 1-year old in a JC gym.
- We need to play other PVL teams during the season. Obviously, the money is not there to travel out of state every week, but we can't consider it a pro league if we don't play other professional teams apart from nationals.
- We need to do local clinics run by PVL players for exposure and to raise money.
- We need exhibition matches at places like college tournaments, club tournaments, etc to show domestic players that there is volleyball beyond college within the US.
- We need to be flexible with sponsors if having the money allows us to do the above things. The two thoughts are that we need money to do everything, or that we need to do everything first and the money will come.
I'll post more if I think of anything else that people say. I'd love to hear feedback on each bullet point if anyone has the time.
|
|
|
Post by panicvb on Oct 27, 2014 16:40:28 GMT -5
Are the players paid in the PVL?
|
|
|
Post by jtshaver on Oct 27, 2014 20:28:48 GMT -5
Our team gets paid for travel, practice, and events. I'm sure other teams are not paid, and some may make more.
|
|
|
Post by aranhahunter on Oct 27, 2014 22:35:18 GMT -5
Here are some thoughts from a mixture of myself and other players and people involved with the league. Some of it is in the works already, some not. - We need more big matches. This year we're playing 3 good DI teams in places with great fans, which is a big step in getting exposure for the league. Last year, the majority of our matches were tournaments with no fans apart from maybe my wife and 1-year old in a JC gym.
- We need to play other PVL teams during the season. Obviously, the money is not there to travel out of state every week, but we can't consider it a pro league if we don't play other professional teams apart from nationals.
- We need to do local clinics run by PVL players for exposure and to raise money.
- We need exhibition matches at places like college tournaments, club tournaments, etc to show domestic players that there is volleyball beyond college within the US.
- We need to be flexible with sponsors if having the money allows us to do the above things. The two thoughts are that we need money to do everything, or that we need to do everything first and the money will come.
I'll post more if I think of anything else that people say. I'd love to hear feedback on each bullet point if anyone has the time.
1. I agree, I saw some matches on youtube (https://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=premier+volleyball+league and www.youtube.com/results?search_query=usa+pvl). No offense, but having concurrent games on multiple courts happening at the same time reminds me of my teenage years when I played basketball tournaments at the Y. Big matches is a must, both for men's and women's 2. What do you mean by 'season'? As far as I know it's a tournament based league that first takes place at regionals and then winning teams go to nationals (feel free to correct me if I'm wrong). When I think of season, I think of something like 3 months of play + 1 month of playoff + finals etc. I don't think of the PVL as a season. 3. I won't consider it a pro league until its format are in line of a pro league (NBA style, obviously not as big, so let's use women's soccer, NWSL style). Maybe a pro circuit or pro tournament, which works fine for beach volleyball, but not fine for indoor where people want to rally behind a team. How to solve that (i.e. the money issue)? Not up to me because I'm not in charge, but options vary from only having teams that are geographically close to each other to try and get big sponsors and possibly have a money losing venture initially 4. Well first you need to ensure that this is a pro league in the veins that americans know what it is. I'm sure more exposure is a good thing, but no one will think of it as professional until the presentation is more professional. You don't see MLL players playing simultaneously in multiple courts with uniforms that look very amateurish. 5. Egg and chicken. It's a combination of both IMO. No one is gonna invest 100 million dollars on such a new venture, and the new venture is not going anywhere unless some money is invested and sacrifices are made. I think you also need to have a stronger social media presence: Look at this: twitter.com/usapvl (last tweet Oct 3rd, before that July 1st). www.facebook.com/usapvl (not that much better) No youtube channel to speak of. Compare that to more successful leagues and you'll see how much more engaged they are with their fanbase, including a lot of minor leagues. Speaking of youtube, a dedicated channel with livestreaming, and possibly a TV deal, would go a long, long way towards professionalizing this league. A better, more professional made and presented website (http://www.usapvl.com/) looks really subpar and amateurish. I think I could make that site and I'm not a good coder. Looks like it was made by a couple of college interns using Microsoft Frontpage. Looking at the site, I also see there are almost no sponsors to it, something that some PVL people desperately need to work on (getting more sponsors). I also think having more professionally made uniforms is a must. Standardize like all professional leagues. Seriously, I saw one team that had a uniform that looked like the one I used when I played intramural indoor soccer in college and we all bought our shirts at Target. And don't shy away from sponsors on the uniforms and the courts/nets. My .02
|
|
|
Post by jtshaver on Oct 28, 2014 10:17:10 GMT -5
1. Those are my thoughts too. Reminds me of high school club volleyball. 2. Our season is from November to about May. We play tournaments each month for rankings, then there is a regional championship, then nationals. I consider that season. 3. I agree. We definitely need to play other PVL teams during the season or it's just a bunch of guys getting paid to beat up on adult league teams. 4. Our team is probably one of the most professionally presented. We have good uniforms and gear. Many teams are self funded and don't want to spend that money, which is an issue.
As a web designer/developer myself, I know what you mean about the web presence. The problem is that they'd have to pay people to develop and maintain that stuff, but no one is willing to pay for it until the league makes money. Like you said, egg and chicken.
|
|
|
Post by vbc1 on Oct 28, 2014 11:48:58 GMT -5
That's excellent that players moved into Finland. Need to have a lot more teams, but it will come, hopefully sooner rather than later. Well, you have to realize it isn't that they started in the PVL and then moved to Finland, they came home after their season in Europe got together, played in the tournament. There were a handful of guys who had just graduated college, played in the PVL finals, then went to Europe. From last year's Great Lakes team guys who played 2013-2014 in Europe: Bitner (Switzerland), Eaton (Denmark), Klein (Finland), Lavaja (Greece, now Finland), Masterson (Israel, now FInland), Petty (Greece, now Finland), Stafford (Israel, not playing this year) The team that got second: Devanny (Belgium, now second division France), Rowe (had just graduated, now Finland), Quiroga (had just graduated, now I think playing in Argentina?) The teams that got third: Scott Touzinsky (SCC Berlin) Actually, the team that got third this year at the PVL tournament at the adult nationals was from Pennsylvania, the Keystone Blast. That team beat Pineapple for that finish. Current pro players on that team were Josh Walker, Nick Castello, Ben Wolff, and Jordan Varee. They were not a big team but had some good players on it.
|
|