Scrub Sesh
General Information about Item:
- Customary Folklore: Sports Custom
- Language: English
- Country of Origin: United States
- Informant: Aron Rudich
- Date Collected: May 21, 2020
Informant Data:
Aron Rudich was born in Long Beach, California and has lived there his entire life. He is 22 years old and is of Russian and Hungarian descent. Aron has played soccer for 17 years, including three years of varsity soccer at Dartmouth. He also played baseball and flag football while growing up. At Dartmouth, he is a member of the Varsity Soccer team and a member of Chi Heorot fraternity.
Contextual Data:
Social Context:
Aron was injured early in his Dartmouth soccer career, and thus, has not gotten the chance to play during many matches. While he was not able to play in games, at times, he has been healthy enough to practice with the team. After his first game with the team in August of his first year at Dartmouth, he experienced a team tradition. The day after this game, he went to practice at Burnham Field, but practice was not run normally. Over the years, Aron has really enjoyed practicing this tradition because he believes that it allows the non-starters to have fun (because they are not playing in the games) and feel like they are truly a part of the team.
Cultural Context:
College soccer teams usually have about thirty players on their roster, but only about fifteen typically play over the course of a game. Thus, there are many players on the team who rarely (if ever) get to play in a game. Furthermore, because the starters and normal players need to prepare heavily for the games, they receive more attention and playing time in practice, too.
Item:
Whenever the Varsity Soccer team has a match (home or away), they always have a practice the next day. However, this practice is not a normal one because the best players do not play. The practice is called the “scrub session”, and during it, all the “scrubs” (players who rarely play in games) get to scrimmage each other, while the starters sit on the bench and watch. The coaches, along with one or two seniors, helps organize the scrimmage, but then let the “scrubs” play their match. The match gets extremely competitive and is exciting for the “scrubs” because the starters cheer for them throughout the game.
Collector: Jack Mascali