Mitchell,+Ben

Ben Mitchell Kinkaid 09-13 University of Texas 13-17 Currently coaching Austin SFA

While debating for Kinkaid I spoke all four speaker positions. On the negative, I both extended and went for a variety of arguments, from topicality to politics to conditions to psychoanalysis. On the affirmative I have read both hard right affs and more critical affs while still defending a plan text.

1. While debating, my coaches would always tell us "have fun, be smart, and debate well," and if forced to choose, I would chose the first. As a debater, I found the being smart and debating well were frequently positively correlated with how much fun I was having. And as a judge, if you're having fun, I find the debate more engaging and am likely to reward that with higher speaker points. A corollary of this is be nice. Very few things hurt your ethos more than when you're unnecessarily mean to your opponents and/or your partner. You don't all have to be best friends, but it also shouldn't feel like a war zone. 2. For the Oceans topic - I've judged the grapevine tournament, the greenhill round robin, and the greenhill tournament proper. I was not involved, however, in summer camp on the oceans topic, so outside of the aff's I've seen I know fairly little about the topic. If you're reading some hyper specific strategy on the neg or a small squirrely aff assume a fairly low level of background knowledge on my part. Try to be extra crisp on explanation, if you do so I will be happier and more likely to vote for you. 3. While I have done all speaker positions, I've found that when reading evidence and evaluating rounds I can sometimes think like a 2N. This is something I try to avoid as much as possible, however it still lingers. What does this mean for you as a debater though? I find that my 2N tendencies come about most in rounds where the final rebuttals include very little evidence comparison or impact analysis, and I'm left to decide with very little weighing mechanisms provided by both teams. If either the 2nr or the 2ar are able to provide me with a lens to view the debate (try or die, timeframe, which impacts control the escalation of others, filtering the entire link debate through the permutation, necessary vs sufficient, etc.) then I will be much more sympathetic to their position, less likely to intervene, and more likely to vote for them. 4. Evidence is not necessary or sufficient to make arguments. Many positions can be mitigated substantially by pointing out logical inconsistencies or reading ununderlined portions of the cards, and cross-x is probably the best time to set this up. Similarly, if all you do in the 2ar is tell me that X piece of evidence is super hot and I should call for it after the round without explaining its warrants or impacting it, you have not made an argument, and would have been better off substituting that for analytics.

I find myself judging clash of civilization debates fairly often. It's safe to assume that I would always prefer to hear a negative strategy that attempts to engage the affirmative in these debates, however I am sympathetic to the framework position and am willing to pull the trigger if I think the negative has done a better job in that debate.


 * Speaker Points**

Basic rundown of how I view speaker points 29 and up = I think you should be top few speakers 28.7-28.9 = Impressive debating, high speaker award, definitely should clear 28.4-28.6 = Few technical problems, in the running for clearing 28-28.3 = A number of technical problems, still excecuted a coherent strategy
 * Paperless**

You should have a viewing computer available if the other team needs one If your computer crashes, we can stop the debate, however I highly encourage you flash your speeches to your partner and will be marginally impressed if you can do a smooth transition in the event of your computer shutting down

You don't need to take prep to flash, please don't abuse that privilege though Pleaseeee keep track of your own prep, I'm lazy and usually won't write it down
 * Prep**