ok my rant - 4 ways

[Phil]

So we come into the Vandy seeded #66. In our 4 way we have #25, 28, 63 and us. We knock off the 28 in the afternoon and the 28 beats the 63. 28 beats the 63 in the evening so we take the 63 seed. (wait, no they didn't LOL)

 

1st whine: if the #63 teams would have beaten the 28 they launch 35 spots to 28. LOL.

 

2nd whine: Fellow BBFers come in seeded high 70's. Unfortunately they lose their evening match to the #52 (very close at half time) but had they won they would have taken the 52 seed (3rd highest seed in their 4 way). So - they lose to a very high seed (#4 maybe?) In the afternoon which is likely and the 4 way follows form until the evening when there is a mild upset.

 

So; We beat the 25 and get 63rd.....

 

Another higher seeded team beats a team seeded higher than 25 gets 52nd.

 

Wtf?

 

I will post what I consider to be a solution later to both of my whines. Frankly its so damn simple that I cannot believe no one has considered it - so maybe it has been considered. .

 

Thoughts please :)

Edited March 18, 2010 by Phil

[paulg]

I can understand the reasoning that a short (32-board) match is insufficient to overturn five years of seeding points.

 

I don't agree, but I understand.

 

Paul

[Stephen Tu]

Well, the argument is basically either reseed or not reseed, different sports do different things, e.g. NFL reseeds, NBA/tennis do not. And if you reseed, do you reseed every round or just for the round of 64? Reseeding probably makes things more predictable, but I think some people like the idea of being able to get lucky and a top seed knocked out & an easier path to deep in the tourney, regardless of sport.

 

Also:

- it's not like the difference in ability between #1 and #16 is as enormous as it is in something like tennis where the top dogs will have tremendously high win percentages against players 10 spots down. And where a #60-80 player would have a much, much better shot vs. a #12-16 seed than they would against a Federer/Nadal.

 

Do you really think your chance of an upset is more than a fraction of a percent higher against USA 1 (Robinson-Boyd/Woolsey-Stewart/Doub-Wildavsky), whom I get to play, than against Jansma/Granovetter/etc.?

 

- although you have an arguably marginally tougher match in the second round, your better seed than us did give you an arguably easier first round group to get out of. And if you do pull off the upset, you'd have an easier path in the 3rd round. So these things kind of even themselves out, IMO.

[mike777]

?

 

 

 

25...26...63..66 seeds

 

I assume that 66 seed cannot go farther than 63 in this bracket with only one loser.

 

 

next round they can go number 2 seed.

 

Is 66 seed allowed to play....YES

 

 

thank you.

 

--------------

 

 

should 66 seed be 25 seed in future.....maybe....prove it..

[TimG]

Aren't the seeds shuffled in groups? So, the 66 and high 70s seed might have been in the same group and ended up in those spots due to shuffling?

 

I'd be surprised if there was a statistically significant difference between the abilities of the 63 and 66 seeds. The shuffling within groups concedes as much.

[Phil]

Disagree with pretty much everything here but Stephen makes some good points. NHL gets it right I think - reseed after the 1st round only.

 

Keeping the relative ranks of the field seems fairest not only to the low seeds but the high seeds as well. Its the middle seeds that can get unexpectedly lucky and face a very high seed that won their 4 way and have an easier path into the R32.

[TimG]

I see your point. Suppose you have a 32 team KO field. In the first round, #32 beats #1 and takes over the top seed. #32 now gets an easier path than the #2 and #3 seeds. The theory is that they earned this by beating the #1 seed.

 

The #16 seed now also has an easier path, but through nothing of their own doing.

 

If you reward #32 for their upset by giving them the #1 seed, you will also "reward" another team somewhat randomly. Which is better for the event: rewarding the team that pulls an upset or not rewarding a random team?

[ArtK78]

Interesting whine. I never considered this.

 

Some years ago, the last time I played in the Vanderbilt in Philadelphia, my team, seeded 58, was in a 3-way with the #8 team (Kaplan, Kay and others who I do not remember) and a low seed (somewhere around 110). We won both matches and Kaplan, Kay et al beat #110 quite soundly.

 

Should we have obtained the #8 seed? It never occurred to me.

 

The next day, we played the #7 team (Sukoneck, Ekeblad and others) in the round of 64. We lost in overtime. Had we won, we certainly would have taken over the #7 seed (LOL).

 

The funny thing about us taking the #7 team into overtime was that it barely got mentioned the next day, because Kaplan and Kay were playing against a team which included Robin Kay, Norman's daughter. That got all of the headlines.

[hanp]

Interesting whine.

I disagree.

[McBruce]

The NHL reseeds in every playoff round, not just after the first. Of course, they have two separate playoffs, an East playoff with eight teams and a West playoff with eight teams. But if the #1 seed goes down, the team that knocked them out always starts the next series on the road.

 

If you don't reseed, the concept of "taking over a seed" is a bit of a misnomer. What seeding does is to decide the starting positions and set the path of teams you may play on the way to the final. You don't actually become the #1 seed by knocking out the #1 seed: you simply play the teams that the #1 seed would have played.

 

In a competition where you play to determine seedings, like the NHL or NBA, it makes sense to re-seed after each round. The top seeds have played 80+ games to earn the right to face the lowest-ranked team. In fact, it might be taken even further, allowing top-ranked teams to choose their opponents from the bottom half, so you can avoid having to play a team that has "got your number."

 

But in a bridge competition, seeds are decided on what -- past performance and masterpoints? Maybe in this sort of competition it makes the most sense to set the brackets with your seeding process and just start playing.

[the hog]

Phil, what's the problem? If you want to win the event, and I assume you do, you have to play top teams along the way. Wouldn't you rather play agains Lavazza or whatever than Fred Nerk anyway?

[awm]

I think the view is that the seeds are assigned based only on the set of survivors, not based upon what exactly happened "internally" to the four-way match. Thus what happened in Phil's match leads to the same seeding as if his team had lost to #25 and then beaten #63 to get the identical survivors.

 

There are several reasons why this approach makes sense. The shorter matches are inherently more random and therefore don't really count as "beating" a particular team -- rather the format generates a single "loser" who actually played 64 boards with a poor result. This also makes sense for a three-way match, where it's not necessarily clear who deserves credit for beating whom (i.e. suppose all three teams go 1-1, the team which beat the top seed in a short match might not even advance).

[PeterGill]

I think Phil's team should inherit the 25th seeding when they beat the 25th seed in the first 32 board match, and that Phil's whine is valid.

 

It's not as if the original seedings are all that accurate. The original seedings out of 88 teams included "Bulgaria" (Trendafilov - Karainov who made the last 4 of the Bermuda Bowl last year I think, with Val and Vlad and Dennis Dawson - Walter Johnson ranked only 38. Four of Argentina's best players, 9th in the 2009 Bermuda Bowl in which Woolsey et al were never in contention, and playing without a sponsor for the first time in ages, ranked only 42nd. Teramoto, Yokoi etc from Japan ranked 68. Venkatesh's Indians ranked only 57. My point is that several teams are ranked lower than they should be, often due to lack of Seeding Points from not playing in America enough.

 

It's not as if Americans dominate the Vanderbilt nowadays.

The last all-American team to win the Vanderbilt was Nickell in 2003.

The last non-Nickell all-American win in the Vanderbilt was in 1998.

 

I think current results are more accurate and important than seeding points.

 

The administrators might negatively affect the seedings of their own teams if they change how they assess seeding, or if they use results from the four-way matches instead of seeding to detemine seeding in R64.

[Aberlour10]

[short-out-of-topic]

 

Both high-seeded teams (10Jacobs & 7Welland) in Justin's direct bracket are already out of Vanderbilt....so...GO Phantom GO! :angry:

[Phil]

The NHL reseeds in every playoff round, not just after the first. Of course, they have two separate playoffs, an East playoff with eight teams and a West playoff with eight teams. But if the #1 seed goes down, the team that knocked them out always starts the next series on the road.

 

If you don't reseed, the concept of "taking over a seed" is a bit of a misnomer. What seeding does is to decide the starting positions and set the path of teams you may play on the way to the final. You don't actually become the #1 seed by knocking out the #1 seed: you simply play the teams that the #1 seed would have played.

 

In a competition where you play to determine seedings, like the NHL or NBA, it makes sense to re-seed after each round. The top seeds have played 80+ games to earn the right to face the lowest-ranked team. In fact, it might be taken even further, allowing top-ranked teams to choose their opponents from the bottom half, so you can avoid having to play a team that has "got your number."

 

But in a bridge competition, seeds are decided on what -- past performance and masterpoints? Maybe in this sort of competition it makes the most sense to set the brackets with your seeding process and just start playing.

Wow you must have been channeling Greg Hinze who suggested the identical concept of 'choosing your victim' after every round. I like the concept of the teams in the top half picking their opponents. It would take some time but there can be a captain's breakfast every AM to do this. However to give the #1 seed this right on every round seems inequitable.

 

Post script to yesterday. In our match against Schwartz, Sathya and I entered the 2Q stuck 40. I guess I was feeling the pressure since I pulled the wrong card on the 3rd board which cost us bigtime.

 

Got tired in the 3rd and only picked up 20 when teammates had a big card. Played very well in the 4Q (after downing a Red Bull lol) and the final margin was -46 The only thing worse than the long drive down 395 is having to replay a few boards in your head. :)

 

This was a good tourney for us. After a good finish in the IMP pairs (although we were actually 2nd with 4 boards to go) Sathya and I and teammies just flat crushed the #25 on Day 1 which was a big confidence builder.

 

The next three months I will be working on intangibles like getting myself into better shape. Even playing 6 handed I felt myself getting sapped since day 1 of the Vanderbilt was my 4th day (skip the regional Sunday swiss next time?).

 

I definitely felt like our bidding and cardplay was on par or better than our opponents assuming they were giving their all so that isn't the emphasis it seems. Met some new teammates for future events too that we are very well matched with.

 

Looking forward to Nawlins :)

[xcurt]

The NHL reseeds in every playoff round, not just after the first.  Of course, they have two separate playoffs, an East playoff with eight teams and a West playoff with eight teams.  But if the #1 seed goes down, the team that knocked them out always starts the next series on the road.

 

Wow you must have been channeling Greg Hinze who suggested the identical concept of 'choosing your victim' after every round. I like the concept of the teams in the top half picking their opponents. It would take some time but there can be a captain's breakfast every AM to do this. However to give the #1 seed this right on every round seems inequitable.

The NHL had to do something about random teams that finished a few points above average and then rode a hot goalie deep into the playoffs. Not so applicable to bridge.

 

On the other hand, the NHL and NBA have 82 games of data to rank the teams. The ACBL seeding system, while better than the masterpoint system used to bracket KOs and the like, is flawed in that there are always a few very tough draws for the seed -- usually foreign stars who get insufficient SPs, or teams of good young players who haven't had time to accumulate enough SPs to get properly ranked. Doing something like this

 

(1) seed the field using SPs.

(2) no 4-ways, just give as many byes as needed

(3) allow teams from n-64 (n is the first team playing on day 1) to pick their opponents, those teams are given the seeds from 65 to ....

 

might produce a fairer set-up.

 

Also, the difference between one seed and the next can vary a lot:

 

* about the top 20 teams are international stars, usually with a sponsor

* there are hardly any weak teams, few enough that I wouldn't expect any to make it to R64

 

So:

 

* for R64, in general, there is a significant difference between being in the low forties than the high forties

* for R32, there is a significant difference between being about 12 or higher, vs 13 or lower

[jjbrr]

An honest question:

 

Do you think the top players have a very good idea of who the foreign and/or junior players are for whom you think the current system is treating perhaps unfairly?

 

I mean if Team Precocious Somalian Juniors registers for the Vandy and gets a terrible seed despite being very, very good for their level of experience, do you think the Nickell captain would be able to accurately identify them as a team that deserved to be seeded much higher than they actually got and thus would avoid picking them? Are captains well equipped to make these kinds of decisions?

 

Obv this is all subjective... I'm just wondering if you think the captains are better barometers of skill than the system of seeding points, given the collective knowledge of the seeders and the potentially limited knowledge of the captain.

[Cascade]

An honest question:

 

Do you think the top players have a very good idea of who the foreign and/or junior players are for whom you think the current system is treating perhaps unfairly?

 

I mean if Team Precocious Somalian Juniors registers for the Vandy and gets a terrible seed despite being very, very good for their level of experience, do you think the Nickell captain would be able to accurately identify them as a team that deserved to be seeded much higher than they actually got and thus would avoid picking them? Are captains well equipped to make these kinds of decisions?

 

Obv this is all subjective... I'm just wondering if you think the captains are better barometers of skill than the system of seeding points, given the collective knowledge of the seeders and the potentially limited knowledge of the captain.

If they have Peter Gill on their team or giving them advice they will.

[xcurt]

An honest question:

 

Do you think the top players have a very good idea of who the foreign and/or junior players are for whom you think the current system is treating perhaps unfairly?

Looking over the rosters I would guess that #30 (team Poland) and #42 (more or less team Argentina) are probably underseeded by 5-10 places.

 

As it happens #30 went out to Fred's team and #42 went out to Justin's team, so maybe they can comment on whether they felt they had a particularly tough draw for that stage of the event.

[Aberlour10]

Looking over the rosters I would guess that #30 (team Poland) and #42 (more or less team Argentina) are probably underseeded by 5-10 places.

 

As it happens #30 went out to Fred's team and #42 went out to Justin's team, so maybe they can comment on whether they felt they had a particularly tough draw for that stage of the event.

Three interesting facts before QFs begin,,

 

-only two of top8-seeded teams entered the QFs

 

-very strong performance of both "french" teams

(strongest in V ever?)

 

-28 of 48 players coming from the overseas

[Mbodell]

And into the semifinals it is hte original seeds 11, 12, 15, and 16 with 10 players with

US addresses (this counts Fallenius and De Knijiff as US) and 4 from Sweden, 4 from Norway, 3 from France, 2 from Italy, and 1 from Switzerland for 14 players from Europe still in the event.

[Phil]

-very strong performance of both "french" teams

(strongest in V ever?)

There were 3 French teams. Gignoux didn't make it to the R64.

[sathyab]

 

 

* for R64, in general, there is a significant difference between being in the low forties than the high forties

* for R32, there is  a significant difference between being about 12 or higher, vs 13 or lower

I am not sure I agree with your assertion about seeds below 40 being significantly better than their counterparts above 40. In the last three big team events I have always played on teams seeded 66 or worse and yet beaten seed #26, #29 and #25 in Nashville, Washington D.C and last week in Reno. Unfortunately all these were 4-way matches and we were seed #62, #64 and #63 going into the second day. Had we had the chance to play these teams in 64-board matches I have little doubt that we could have beaten them and acquired their seeds. That happened only twice, once in Las Vegas when we lost to Fred's team and once in Toronto 2001 when we beat seed #15 (were seeded #114).

[jdonn]

I don't like letting teams choose their opponents. I don't much care how the seeds are chosen as long as it's reasonable, but everyone deserves the same random chance to play anyone else.

 

The other change I would make is to never have some 4 way matches and some 2 way matches in the same round. Have all either 2 or 3 or 4 way matches with some amount of byes. It's really unfair to teams in a 2 way when others get 4 ways.

 

As for the re-seeding I don't really mind how they do it. If someone is that good then they will either win enough to improve their own seeding, or be known by better players and get on a better seeded team, etc.

[the hog]

An honest question:

 

Do you think the top players have a very good idea of who the foreign and/or junior players are for whom you think the current system is treating perhaps unfairly?

 

I mean if Team Precocious Somalian Juniors registers for the Vandy and gets a terrible seed despite being very, very good for their level of experience, do you think the Nickell captain would be able to accurately identify them as a team that deserved to be seeded much higher than they actually got and thus would avoid picking them? Are captains well equipped to make these kinds of decisions?

 

Obv this is all subjective... I'm just wondering if you think the captains are better barometers of skill than the system of seeding points, given the collective knowledge of the seeders and the potentially limited knowledge of the captain.

If they have Peter Gill on their team or giving them advice they will.

I would certainly agree with this. I would find it difficult to think of a better captain.