It's weird when playoff time rolls around. I mean, on one hand, it is what you've been waiting for the whole season. On the other hand, it feels rushed, almost like you can't enjoy it before it's gone. With all the preparation, daily practices/weights, scouting, traveling the last five days feel like a blur. We've been to Unterhaching and back, lost, practiced a little bit and won our match at home. Now, we're looking at a match this Tuesday that has all sorts of implications.
If we win, we finish in the top four no matter what. On top of that, the season lasts another month, during which, we'll play the semi-finals and the finals or 3rd/4th place qualification no matter what. If we lose, the season's over and we're more or less finished. On top of all that, if we win, we're qualified to play European cup tournaments next year. If we lose, we're not. So, you could say that this match means a lot - in a lot of different ways.
In any case, it feels weird to be sitting here, waiting for a deciding third game that carries so much baggage. It just feels like we could have done without half of the regular season games and just gotten down to business with the playoffs. I mean, we play all of these matches over seven months and everything gets decided in about a week. There isn't really anything to be done about it except win!
Besides all the playoff stuff, this time of year is always an interesting time for a volleyball professional. It's the time of year where you sit and wonder about what you're going to be doing at this time NEXT year. And since the majority of volleyball contracts last one year there are a whole lot of athletes in the same situation.
I'll write more about this process soon. For now, worrying about the playoffs and finishing this season is enough without adding the invariably convoluted contract negotiations.
One more day at home before we hit the road for the long trip down to Munich on Monday and hopefully the triumphant return trip Tuesday night!
4 comments:
Good luck in the all-important next match, and hopefully in the semi-finals as well.
I know it is true about the 1-year contracts, but it seem quite odd to me. Even danish handball clubs have contracts for several years.
Could it be due to the vast amount of available players, that volleyball clubs rarely sign players for more than one season??
I suppose Jens knows about that. Please ask him and post his answer on the blog ;-)
I'm not an expert on this one, but I think that the answer is pretty simple: MONEY. There are clubs that sign players to longer contracts, two and possibly three years, but those clubs are the extremely stable and well known clubs in each country. They can do it because they know what their budget is going to be like in the next couple of years. Most clubs don't really know how much money they will have to spend in the future and a lot of times they don't even know if they will have any money.
I'm sure there are lots of other reasons. Like you say, there are a lot of available volleyball players, there are also a lot of clubs and many players don't like to tie themselves down. More importantly, the average volleyball contract isn't worth enough to make someone want to commit to a long term obligation. Finally, a lot of foreign players (at least from the states) are just in it to travel a little bit, experience a different country and enjoy themselves for a year. They don't necessarily want to be in the same place for a number of years.
I'm sure there are plenty of other reasons, but those are the ones that I know of. Thanks for the good luck wishes...
Hove,
Tough one to go out on it looks like. Hope everything is going okay in the DL and I will shout at you soon.
Ses on the ses,
Chad
Hi Jordan
Sorry that my first comment has to drop after your loss. I had hoped for some Danish Semi's.
It's been exciting to follow you and the bundesliga on your blog. You make volleyball living interesting to read about. Perhaps you could start a trend in the danish papers? Fyns Stiftstidende just tries to hard, but probably that is not in your mailbox anymore.
BTW. Congratulations with the good setter stats. Do that in Italy and you'd be offered more than a one year contract for sure. But to beat both German national team seters (and one of them winning CL) is still pretty good! I remarked it on Eurosport the other day when we had a short program series about CL, just to keep our Danish fans updated on our former stars.
Could I write half as good as you in danish I'd settle down and write a volleyall novel. Perhaps the title should be "Deepdishing the northern hempisphere".
Well probably only works in English. Damn that language!
Send my regards to the guys down there!
See you on sand!
Olafsen
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