I have been a coach and consultant for the past 28 years and done every debate format available stateside and internationally. I also have taught at Stanford, ISD, Summit, UTD, UT, and Mean Green camps as a Curriculum Director and Senior Instructor. I think no matter what form of debate that you do, you must have a narrative that answers critical questions of who, what, when, where, why, how, and then what, and so what. Debaters do not need to be shy and need to be able to weigh and prioritize the issues of the day for me in what I ought to be evaluating. Tell me as a judge where I should flow things and how I ought to evaluate things. That's your job.

If you would like for me to look at a round through a policy lens, please justify to me why I ought to weigh that interpretation versus other alternatives. Conversely, if you want me to evaluate standards, those need to be clear in their reasoning why I ought to prioritize evaluation in that way.

In public forum, I need the summary to be a line by line comparison between both worlds where the stark differences exist and what issues need to be prioritized. Remember in the collapse, you cannot go for everything. Final focus needs to be a big pic concept for me. Feel free to use policy terms such as magnitude, scope, probability. I do evaluate evidence and expect you all to do the research accordingly but also understand how to analyze and synthesize it. Countering back with a card is not debating. The more complicated the link chain, the more probability you may lose your judge. Keep it tight and simple and very direct.

In LD, I still love my traditional Value and VC debate. I do really like a solid old school LD round. I am not big on K debate only because I think the K debate has changed so much that it becomes trendy and not a methodology that is truly educational and unique as it should be. Uniqueness is not the same as obscurity. Now, if you can provide a good solid link chain and evaluation method of the K, go for it. Don't assume my knowledge of the literature though because I don't have that amount of time in my life but I'm not above understanding a solidly good argument that is properly formatted. I think the quickest way to always get my vote is to write the ballot for me and also keep it simple. Trickery can make things messy. Messy debaters usually get Ls. So keep it simple, clean, solid debate with the basics of claim, warrant, impact, with some great cards and I'll be happy.

I don't think speed is ever necessary in any format so speak concisely, know how to master rhetoric, and be the master of persuasion that way. Please do not be rude to your opponent. Fight well and fight fair. First reason for me to down anyone is on burdens. Aff has burden of proof, neg has burden to clash unless it is WSD format where burdens exist on both sides to clash. If you have further questions, feel free to ask specifics.

In plat events, structure as well as uniqueness (not obscurity) is key to placing. Organization to a speech as well as a clear call to order is required in OO, Info, Persuasive. In LPs, answer the question if you want to place. Formatting and structure well an avoid giving me generic arguments and transitional phrases. Canned intros are not welcome in my world usually and will be frowned upon. Smart humor is always welcome however.

I want you all to learn, grow, have fun, and fight fair. Best of luck and love one another through this activity!!

I was a long-time high school coach of CX, LD, PF and Congress and was a college policy debater MANY years ago.

If you want to put a title on my debate philosophy, I’d call myself a policymaker.

When I judge a round, I pay attention to my flow. I care about dropped arguments, and I don’t like the neg to run time suck arguments and then kick out. That said, be sure I can take a good flow by speaking at a reasonable rate of speed. If you feel you must speak quickly, at least give me a chance to catch your tag lines and source citations, or, better yet, provide a link to your case.

I have no issues with theoretical debate or critical arguments, so long as you make me understand them. That said, I still prefer to judge a round about the resolution instead of a round about whether or not someone was abusive.

LD should remain value based. Although some recent LD resolutions cry out for the debaters to present a plan, please don't neglect the value framework tradition.

In CX debate, I consider T to be an important argument in the round but will not vote on it unless I judge there has been actual in-round abuse.

LD debate should have a strong value component and avoid overt policy-making.

I judge Congress on content and delivery. This type of debate demands a strong and passionate public speaking style. Questioning is crucial to final score. I strongly dislike rehashed arguments. Clash is important, but it needs to have actual refutation and not just mentioning the names of previous speakers. I object to the recent trend toward doing all prep work in-round and the abuse of in-house recesses to allow this.

In all types of debate, don’t be rude to your opponent. Respect the activity with professional demeanor.

I'm good with speed, slow down on tags. I will buy pretty much any argument as long as it's run right. I'm gonna flow pretty much everything that's said so don't drop args. make sure your arguments link to your cards.

Debate:

Please speak clearly and concisely. If you speak in a rush I may miss your arguments and contentions.

Be courteous, to your opponent and thank them for a good round.

I would love to give you instant feedback, but I like to make sure and review your case and performance before I render a decision. I will leave my comments for you on the ballot.

Thank you for competing, I appreciate your time and effort.

For speech:

Clear expression of your characters and ideas, Show your emotions and help me to feel your connection to your selection.

Thank you for competing, I appreciate your time and effort.

Updated January 2024

About me:

I am currently the speech and debate coach at Theodore Roosevelt HS.

I debated policy and LD for four years at Winston Churchill HS and qualified to the TOC senior year.

I have been judging debate (mostly policy and LD) for over 5 years.

My email is benwolf8@gmail.com if you have any questions before or after rounds.

TL;DR version:

I have no preference to any sort of specific types of arguments. Sure, some debates I may find more interesting than others, but honestly the most interesting rounds to judge are ones where teams are good at what they do and they strategically execute a well planned strategy. I think link and perm analysis is good, affs should probably be topical/in the direction of the topic but I'm less convinced of the need for instrumental defense of the USFG. Everything below is insight into how I view/adjudicate debates, its questionably useful but will probably result in higher speaks.

Public Forum: Be polite and courteous during cross fire. Make sure to utilize your evidence and warrant arguments. I am open to whatever arguments you would like to make (obviously avoid racist, sexist, etc. arguments). I am open to all styles and speeds of delivery, but if your opponent is not speed reading, it would help your speaker points if you can avoid speed reading too. Everything else is more relevant to policy and LD debate, but you may find it useful for PF too.

Evidence Standards:

Share your evidence before you deliver the speech. If you ask to see multiple cards from your opponent after they have given their speech, I will start running your prep time.

Speech Drop is great, please use it. https://speechdrop.net/

You should always follow the NSDA evidence rules: https://www.speechanddebate.org/wp-content/uploads/Debate-Evidence-Guide.pdf

You should do your best to be honest with your evidence and not misconstrue evidence to say something that it clearly does not say.

Theory interpretations and violations, plan texts, and alternative advocacy statements should all be included in the speech document.

If you are reading a card and need to cut it short, you should clearly state that you are cutting the card and put a mark on your document so that you can easily find where you stopped reading that card. If you are skipping cards in the speech document, make sure to mention that and/or sign post where you are going. This should avoid the need to send a marked copy of your document after your speech if you do these things, unless you read cards that were not included in your original speech document.

Prep Time Standards:

Prep time begins after the preceding speech/cross-examination ends.

If you have not transferred your speech document to your opponent, then you are still taking prep time. Prep time ends when the flash drive leaves your computer. Prep time ends when the document is uploaded onto speech drop. Prep time ends when the email has been sent. Once the team taking prep time says they are done with prep, then both teams need to stop typing, writing, talking, etc. The speech document should then be automatically delivered to the opponents and judge as fast as technologically possible.

Speaker points: average = 27.5, I generally adjust relative to the pool when considering how I rank speakers.

-Things that will earn you speaker points: politeness, being organized, confidence, well-placed humor, well executed strategies/arguments, efficiency.

-Things that will lose you speaker points: arrogance, rudeness, humor at the expense of your opponent, stealing prep, pointless cross examination, running things you don’t understand, mumbling insults about myself or other judges who saw the round differently from you.

-Truth v Tech: I more frequently decide close debates based on questions of truth/solid evidence rather than purely technical skills. Super tech-y teams probably should be paying attention to overviews/nebulous arguments when debating teams who like to use a big overview to answer lots of arguments. I still vote on technical concessions/drops but am lenient to 2AR/2NR extrapolation of an argument made elsewhere on the flow answering a 'drop'. This also bleeds into policy v policy debates, I am much more willing to vote on probability/link analysis than magnitude/timeframe; taking claims of "policy discussions good" seriously also means we need to give probability of impacts/solvency more weight.

-Evidence v Spin: Ultimately good evidence trumps good spin. I will accept a debater’s spin until it is contested by the opposing team. I will read evidence if said evidence is contested and/or if compared/contrasted to the oppositions evidence. I will first read it through the lens of the debater’s spin but if it is apparent that the evidence has been mis-characterized spin becomes largely irrelevant. This can be easily rectified by combining good evidence with good spin. I often find this to be the case with politics, internal link, and affirmative permutation evidence for kritiks, pointing this out gets you speaks. That being said, there is always a point in which reading more evidence should take a backseat to detailed analysis, I do not need to listen to you read 10 cards about political capital being low.

-Speed vs Clarity: If I have never judged you or it is an early morning/late evening round you should probably start slower and speed up through the speech so I can get used to you speaking. When in doubt err on the side of clarity over speed. If you think things like theory or topicality will be options in the final rebuttals give me pen time so I am able to flow more than just the 'taglines' of your theory blocks.

-Permutation/Link Analysis: this is an increasingly important issue that I am noticing with kritik debates. I find that permutations that lack any discussion of what the world of the permutation would mean to be incredibly unpersuasive and you will have trouble winning a permutation unless the negative just concedes the perm. This does not mean that the 2AC needs an detailed permutation analysis but you should be able to explain your permutations if asked to in cross-x and there definitely should be analysis for whatever permutations make their way into the 1AR. Reading a slew of permutations with no explanation throughout the debate leaves the door wide open for the negative to justify strategic cross applications and the grouping of permutations since said grouping will still probably contain more analysis than the 1AR/2AR. That being said, well explained/specific permutations will earn you speaker points and often times the ballot. In the same way it benefits affirmatives to obtain alt/CP texts, it would behoove the negative to ask for permutation texts to prevent affirmatives shifting what the permutation means later in the debate.

The same goes for link/link-turn analysis I expect debaters to be able to explain the arguments that they are making beyond the taglines in their blocks. This ultimately means that on questions of permutations/links the team who is better explaining the warrants behind their argument will usually get more leeway than teams who spew multiple arguments but do not explain them.

Argument-by-argument breakdown:

Topicality/Theory: I tend to lean towards a competing interpretations framework for evaluating T, this does not mean I won't vote on reasonability but I DO think you need to have an interpretation of what is 'reasonable' otherwise it just becomes another competing interp debate. Aff teams should try and have some offense on the T flow, but I don't mean you should go for RVIs. I generally believe that affirmatives should try and be about the topic, this also applies to K affs, I think some of the best education in debate comes from learning to apply your favorite literature to the topic. This also means that I generally think that T is more strategic than FW when debating K affs. I've learned that I have a relatively high threshold for theory and that only goes up with "cheapshot" theory violations, especially in LD. Winning theory debates in front of me means picking a few solid arguments in the last rebuttal and doing some comparative analysis with the other teams arguments; a super tech-y condo 2AR where you go for 15 arguments is going to be a harder sell for me. Other default settings include: Topicality before theory, T before Aff impacts, T is probably not genocidal. These can be changed by a team making arguments, but in an effort for transparency, this is where my predispositions sit.

Kritiks: I have no problems with K's. I've read a decent amount of critical literature, there is also LOTS that I haven't read, it would be wise to not make assumptions and take the time to explain your argument; in general you should always err towards better explanation in front of me. I do not enjoy having to sift through unexplained cards after K v K rounds to find out where the actual tension is (you should be doing this work), as such I am more comfortable with not caring that I may not have understood whatever argument you were trying to go for, that lack of understanding is 9/10 times the debater's fault. Feel free to ask before the round how much I know about whatever author you may be reading, I'm generally pretty honest. I generally think that critical debates are more effective when I feel like things are explained clearly and in an academic way, blippy extensions or lack of warrants/explanation often results in me voting affirmative on permutations, framing, etc.


CP: I have no problems with counterplans, run whatever you want. I think that most counterplans are legitimate however I am pre-dispositioned to think that CP's like steal the funding, delay, and other sketchy counterplans are more suspect to theory debates. I have no preference on the textual/functional competition debate. On CP theory make sure to give me some pen time. If you are reading a multi-plank counterplan you need to either slow down or spend time in the block explaining exactly what the cp does.

DA: I dont have much to say here, disads are fine just give me a clear story on what's going on.

Performance/Other: I'm fine with these debates, I think my best advice is probably for those trying to answer these strats since those reading them already generally know whats up. I am very persuaded by two things 1) affs need to be intersectional with the topic (if we're talking about China your aff better be related to the conversation). 2) affirmatives need to be an affirmation of something, "affirming the negation of the resolution" is not what I mean by that either. These are not hard and fast rules but if you meet both of these things I will be less persuaded by framework/T arguments, if you do not meet these suggestions I will be much more persuaded by framework and topicality arguments. If you make a bunch of case arguments based on misreadings of their authors/theories I'm generally not super persuaded by those arguments.

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Public Forum: Be polite and courteous during cross fire. Make sure to utilize your evidence and author qualifications. I am open to whatever arguments you would like to make (obviously avoid racist, sexist, etc. arguments). I am open to all styles and speeds of delivery, but if your opponent is not speed reading, it would help your speaker points if you can avoid speed reading too. Everything else above is more relevant to policy and LD debate, but you may find it useful for PF too.