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Unread 20-09-2003, 11:52
Ryan Foley Ryan Foley is offline
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I've never been to championships, but heres my thoughts:

Base it off of performance at regionals for THAT YEAR ALONE (except for 2 things). Not off he previous year (so get rid of that points system)

Regional winning alliances
Any winner of a regional award (chairmans, motorola quality, engineering inspiration, etc)

If theres room (these are the 2 exceptions)
Any previous year championshp chairmans winners
Any previous year champions



Sure it would be great if everyone could go, but I dont think there is a place big enough to hold the more than 800 teams involved in FIRST.
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Unread 20-09-2003, 11:57
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If you'd rather that we didn't offer counterpoints to users' points here, please, tell me and I won't do that.

Quote:
Originally posted by Ricksta121
and M krass its called competition for a reason...
See my bullet about driving home the point, once and for all, that FIRST isn't about the robots. Some people don't get that.

Quote:
Originally posted by David Kelso
Presently, the focus of the Championship is the robot competition (does anyone disagree??)
Well, yes. The focus of any event, to me, has never been the robot competition. While I realize I'm probably in a small minority these days, I enjoy the Championship as a way of seeing other teams' work -- regardless of how well it performs on the field. There's a lot to be said for learning how not to accomplish something as much as there is for learning how to accomplish something. We don't just learn from the best, we learn from everyone. We're not just inspired by the best. We're inspired by everyone. So, why is there a focus on eliminating everyone but the best from the biggest event of the season? That seems self-destructive and counter-intuitive and not remotely indicative of the program I thought I signed up for.

Quote:
Originally posted by George1083
They need great teams for great competition to get great TV broadcast offers.
Is that really the message FIRST wants or needs to send to, potentially, millions of television viewers? I believe that it would offer a skewed perspective of what FIRST really is. There are some great teams, sure, and there are some terrible teams -- but I was under the impression that we valued them all equally. A TV broadcast that shows "the best of the best" says, to me, that we value the competition winners more than the competition losers and it sends that message bouncing off satellites and antennas and into the homes of many, many people. Those people might then enter into the competition with bad ideas about what FIRST was trying to accomplish.

The Championship Event needs to be the showcase for FIRST, I'd agree. But, then it all becomes a matter of what you believe FIRST is and it's clear that we don't all agree on that. So, to paraphrase Joel -- yes, I'm shamelessly promoting my agenda. I like it and want to see more people following it.

Finally. . .
Quote:
Originally posted by Joel J.
Accumulating points does sound like a good idea, at first; however, we see this as FIRST setting itself up for quite the fiasco in the long run. Eventually, all non rookie teams will have accumulated enough points to warrant them a spot that the National Competition. FIRST can only allow so many teams to enter, thus reducing registration for nationals to a true, "first come, first served" deal.
Say the Championship Event cost 10 points to attend. Well, over 3 years, team XXX never gets 10 points in a single season, but they do manage to get 14 points after 3 seasons. Well, during their fourth season, they should be eligible to attend the Championship -- spend their 10 points -- and go on with 4.

In fact, let me take that a step further and we can let this be my new, original
contribution to eligibility criteria.

During the pre-registration of each season, teams are given a pool of points. Regional events and the Championship Event each cost, in addition to the fee, a given number of points to enter. Popular regionals could be balanced against newer or more geographically isolated regionals by costing slightly more points to attend. The Championship would cost more points than any regional event. Winning events or awards throughout the season would earn a team extra points -- to be used that season or "banked" for the next. After that, they expire.

What if teams get 50 points per season? Imagine that each regional starts at 15 points and the Championship is 25. Most awards are 5 points.

A team could choose to attend two regionals (-30 pts.) and hope to win an Award (+5) to have the 25 points they need to register for the Championship. They could attend one regional and the Championship (-40 points) and save 10 points for the next season.

The point system could be periodically adjusted to account for the number of teams competing. Make points expire. This would accomplish a few things, overall:
  • It would reduce the advantage of attending multiple regionals. Teams could only attend a certain number of events before running out of points. Attending more events would lead to more chances of earning new points, but it could be balanced such that, after a certain threshold, it's nearly impossible to earn enough points to attend the Championship.
  • Team members decide where they'd like to be. Their robots don't decide where they deserve to be.
  • Teams will have a good idea, in advance, of their chances for attending the Championship event.
  • Points will expire, eliminating "veteran's advantage." Good teams will earn more points, but no team can achieve such an advantage so as to assure their attendance each year. The cycle will renew itself every two years, assuring each team at least one opportunity to attend (unless they gamble their points and lose them by attending many regionals and performing poorly).

I'll admit -- I stole this idea from a timeshare program -- but I think it could work for FIRST with some tweaking. Sorry about the length.
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Unread 20-09-2003, 12:34
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Rich Kressly Rich Kressly is offline
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While no system is perfect, the current system does attempt to achieve a balance between "earning a spot" and "getting a chance to attend" no matter what your performance is. The Championship number will always be limited and four divisions with more than 70 teams in each division is one heck of a daunting task to make happen well. My hat is off to the planning committee and logistics people for seeing this through each year. If you've ever organized a tournament you also know that any increase in the number of divisions has to jump by four in order for playoffs/elims to work correctly. An eight division arrangement isn't practical for number of reasons I won't bother listing at this time. I like the idea of being able to qualify a year ahead of time and I also like the fact that a team can qualify one week and attend the Championship a few days later. Money will always be a factor here, but the last minute qualifiers should be given the chance and they are.

With that said, in my opinion, any qualification system should retain these key elements that already exist:
1. A point system that allows a team to attend on a prior year's performance and/or the current year
2. The ability for any team to attend at least every other year regardless of performance
3. Credit (points) given for excellence in all areas of the FIRST competition
4. A system that reflects the mission and values of FIRST

- Good luck to Dave, the board, and the FIRST staff as they continually look to improve the quality and value of our experiences in FIRST.
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Unread 20-09-2003, 15:28
Steve W Steve W is offline
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Numbers seem tp be a factor. As time goes on more and more Chairmans and champions are getting free passes. I believe that we should only go back 4 years from a win for free passes. The whole team will have changed over in that time and they can now prove themselves. I also believe that 2nd year teams should also get a pass. Most rookie teams have a hard enough time in their 1st year. This allows time for learning about FIRST, gaining funding and learning about robot build.
I like the idea of picking a "Home" regional to qualify in. This allows better chances for all teams to qualify. Teams attending more than 1 event still have an advantage as they pick up a lot at each regional they attend. As with Chairmans I don't find a fault with that system.
All teams could be put in a lottery at the beginning of the season and a post will be made of those that can attend. Spots made available by winners qualifying at regionals and already having a spot, would be given to those on a posted waiting list. If a team wins a lottery spot and unable to attend then they would be given a spot the following year( only 1 year after).
Any team winning 2 lottery spots in a 4 year span will not be included in the next 2 lottery years.
I believe that this allows teams that win to compete, gives new teams a chance to attend (2nd year) and everyone else an even chance of attending.
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Unread 20-09-2003, 16:10
Ian W. Ian W. is offline
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One problem with "Home Regionals".

Team A has money for three regionals and championships. Team B has enough money for one regional, and if they win, they'll be able to barely get enough money for championships.

Team A goes to two other regionals as "practice" and just works on fixing the robot, not caring about the competition at all, since they can't win anything here.

At the third regional, Team A comes with a 100% functioning robot, and completely dominates Team B, who came with a working robot, but not a perfectly working robot. Team A goes on to the championships, while Team B still gets screwed over by their lack of money.

This is the biggest reason why the "Even/Odd" system is good. You will have a chance to go at least once, if not twice, during you time on the team as a high school student. Other systems still will favor the veterens and the teams with money, and there's no way around it, or none that I can easily see.
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Unread 20-09-2003, 17:19
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ahecht ahecht is offline
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^Yes, but the situation you discribed is endemic of any system where teams can attend multiple regionals, and this is not really the forum to discuss it. Even if team A may rank better than team B, don't forget that there are many other awards that team B could win that would get them to the Championship.
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Unread 20-09-2003, 17:21
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Nationals, er, The Championship,(which I see not as a international inclusion attempt, but to make it sound a performance based event) is a very different feeling event then a regional event. There are a myriad of things contributing to this, but most are because of the greater size of the event. More teams overall mean more teams travel there, so you may see teams that you don't see often.

I see the Championship becoming more of a actual "Championship". If you call it that, make it that. That said, other 'super regionals' should grow to take the large event setting that the National->Championship evolution left behind. Like the Canadian Regional, one in Annapolis(or other East Coast location) and somewhere on the West Coast. This is a process to get there, but taking small steps to get there will adjust people slowly to the change and make it more agreeable. Keep that in mind as you tweak this years qualification settings.


I like to see all teams have the option to go, as often as possible.
I think that the Even/Odd for automatic qualification is a good idea, at least for now. (size dependent)
I don't think the 10 teams from '92 should get a automatic bid. (elitism)


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Unread 20-09-2003, 18:23
Jnadke Jnadke is offline
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Quote:
Originally posted by Ian W.
This is the biggest reason why the "Even/Odd" system is good. You will have a chance to go at least once, if not twice, during you time on the team as a high school student. Other systems still will favor the veterens and the teams with money, and there's no way around it, or none that I can easily see.
The problem with the Even/Odd system is that FIRST has grown so large that it cannot support such a system anymore (which is probabaly why they are asking for our advice). Furthermore, you cannot move into divisors such as 3 or 4 because of the gaps in the system due to inactive teams. One year you could end up with 300 teams and the next have 500.

I don't believe in a pure performance system, because a team should have a chance to go to nationals at least once in a 3 year period. It's an experience that just must be had.

A lot of solutions I see are ignoring the facts I laid on the table.

Quote:
Originally posted by Jnadke
If you look at the Event Page, it seems to have been established that only 210 teams will be able to pre-register for this year's nationals.

Remove the Chairman's award winners and the original teams and you're left with roughly 200-190. Last year 787 teams competed in the FIRST competition. Furthermore, only 285 teams competed at the Championship Event. Even if the Championship event were expanded by 100, there would not be enough room for even half of the teams to attend, with the expansion of FIRST. However, by my calculations, there are 1,186 available spots at regional competitions. With the facts at the table, it's safe to say that not everyone will be able to go to the Championship Event every single year.
This is why I'm in favor of the combination lottery/performance system proposed here
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Unread 20-09-2003, 18:29
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Gui Cavalcanti Gui Cavalcanti is offline
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In my experience with FIRST, I have seen two sometimes-competing messages that have to do with the Championships. Some people would like to see every team be able to go to every Championship event if they so desire, because in FIRST's and our own eyes we're all winners and we deserve to be there. Then there are others who believe that the Championships should live up to their namesake, and those that are the best should attend.

For the past couple of years, the Championships with their even/odd system, combined with their registration system, seem to be playing to both views, and personally I don't believe that's right. I think that FIRST should either emphasize that the Championships are truly the "superbowl of smarts", where the best of the best come to play, or they're completely open to everyone. Unfortunately, having championships completely open to everyone won't work.

Here's my idea. At the beginning of the season, FIRST should offer "interest registration" in Championships. This would require a downpayment ($1000?) on the part of teams to make sure they would be able to attend the event, but would not guarantee entry (unless the teams are Chairman's Award winners or original FIRST teams). Once this registration is complete, FIRST would know what teams would attend Championships if they had the chance.

Here's the tough part. From this, taking a census of the number of team members each team would bring from the "interest registration" (or limiting teams to a certain number of people), FIRST should pre-reserve hotels to accomodate their maximum number of team members attending the event. This would make last-minute travel plans that much easier, which will be discussed later in this section.

Now, the awards should be made so that any award FIRST deems worthy to be given out is worthy enough to qualify a team for the Championships. I agree with the idea that a team should only be eligible to receive awards from one regional; why should a team be honored by multiple regionals for the same action? The theme here should be "if you can't do it for the Chairman's award, you can't do it for other awards". Obviously this doesn't work for first seed and all that, but those are different types of awards.

Once a team qualifies for an award, and they have registered their interest with FIRST, all that is left to do is claim their number of hotel rooms. Yes, travel plans have to be accounted for, but I do not believe that can be avoided.

Once all the regionals have been completed, there may be spots open in the Championships after all the awards have been given out. FIRST can then use it's "interest registration" pool, choose teams at random lottery-style, and inform those teams at a certain date that they can go. If a team chooses not to go after they have filed their "interest registration", FIRST could choose not to return their downpayment. Otherwise, all teams that have filed their "interest registrations" and did not get a chance to attend Championships should get their downpayments of $1000 back.

Sorry for the length!
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Unread 20-09-2003, 18:44
Andrew Andrew is offline
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The worst thing that FIRST could do would be to make a drastic change in qualfiying criteria just a few days before registration opens.

FIRST should release its eligibility criteria at least six months in advance so that teams have a chance to prepare.

FIRST should figure out what it intends to accomplish with its Championship. It seems that we are vascillating between an open championship (which encourages lots of teams to get together and inspire each other) and a competitive championship.

If FIRST intends to continue to swing the dial from "OPEN" to "COMPETITIVE" then here are my suggestions for this year.

1. Keep the past chairman's award winners and the original ten teams as pre-qualified.

2. Eliminate the Odd/Even open slots.

3. Increase the number of competitively pre-qualified slots. This can be done by lowering the pre-qualifying threshold.

Teams which made it to the semi-finals, design award winners, chairman's award winners, etc. in 2003 would pre-qualify for 2004.

4. Increase the number of slots based on performance in 2004 regionals
a. Both Finalist Alliances at a Regional qualify.
b. Chairman's Award and Runner Up at a Regional Qualify

5. Require teams which attend Nationals to submit a Regional Chairman's Award. This criterion would use the slots at Nationals as an inducement for teams to do what FIRST is trying to get them to do. Since the registration deadline is so close, it would be impossible to implement this before this year's deadline. However, the submission might be required by the time that the second payment deadline occurs (in mid-February). Failure to pay and submit a Chairman's Award means that FIRST starts going down the wait-list. If FIRST really wanted to make this serious, it could also use the quality of the submission to decide who got in and who didn't.

These criteria would greatly reduce rookie teams from nationals, since most of the pre-qualifying slots would be taken by teams which had competed for a year. However, only about 10-20 rookie teams signed up for nationals in the pre-season last year based on the odd/even open system. Perhaps a more rigorous Rookie All-Star award could serve as a qualifying award.

6. After a certain date, any remaining spots could be signed up for on a first come/first served basis, including wait list.
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Unread 20-09-2003, 19:49
indieFan indieFan is offline
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A number of people have commented about having a "home" regional to possibly get points from. Ian W. wrote how this would be unfair to a team that is at its first regional competing against another team at its third for the year. In order to balance this, I propose that the "home" regional is automatically the first regional that a team attends in the competition season. As a quick example, if team 666 attends the Arizona Regional and the Los Angeles Regional, it's "home" regional would be the Arizona Regional since it is the first regional of attendance.

indieFan

P.S.- M. Krass, thank you for saying everything (and then some) that I was thinking when I first read this post.
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Unread 20-09-2003, 20:50
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Jeff Waegelin Jeff Waegelin is offline
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Well, I'm not going to get into this much, but I do have one suggestion. If Odd/Even is going away, then perhaps the points required to qualify for the Championship (based on previous performance) should be lowered. Perhaps it could be adjusted so that any team who won a major award or was a finalist/winner of a given event (regional or Champ. Division) would get enough points to qualify, and any team with a few smaller awards would as well. For example, a partial point scale:

Regional/Championship Division Winner/Finalist: 5 points
Regional Chairman's: 5 points
"Major" awards (i.e. the ones that currently get an automatic bid): 5 points
"Minor" awards: 3 points
Championship/Division Semifinalist: 2 points

With 5 points required, this would give most teams that performed well a shot. I'm not saying this is a perfect scale. In fact, I know it's flawed in a couple of ways. However, it would give a fairly large and diverse number of teams a chance at the Championship, while removing Odd/Even.
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Unread 20-09-2003, 21:05
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dlavery dlavery is offline
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Folks, please, please read the original post in it's entirety!!!

Quote:
Originally posted by dlavery
... Specifically, we would like feedback on the performance of the current system, and – if a new system were to be put in place – what characteristics of a new Championship qualification system would be considered most appropriate by teams.

...

- Specific, highly detailed descriptions of alternative selection criteria are not needed – a few alternatives have already been identified and are under consideration
- We particularly DO want to hear your comments and ideas about the attributes that a fair, robust, and appropriate set of qualification criteria would have (i.e., you don’t need to tell us “here is my suggestion of an alternate points scheme for registration…” – but we really want to hear things like “a good registration process will let us know six months in advance if we are registered for the Championship, so we can start raising funds – and an excellent process will let us know a year in advance” etc.)
To repeat, we are NOT looking for detailed descriptions of specific alternate qualification criteria. We ARE looking for your "meta-criteria" - the characteristics of a qualification process that are desirable. What things do you look for when deciding if the qualification process is a good or bad method for qualifying for the Championships (beyond "does my team get to go?" )? Do you care if the process is entirely performance-based? Should the process allow every team to get an (occasional?) opportunity to attend, regardless of their performance? Should the process limit the number of rookie teams attending, and encourage them to focus on the regional events? Do you like methods that are based on just the activities of the current year, or should teams be able to "bank" criteria elements from one year to the next? Is it a good thing or a bad thing if the criteria allow only teams from west of the Mississippi with team names that start with a vowel to attend? In other words, what is important to you about the methods used to qualify teams for the Championship?

Does this help clarify what we are looking for? A good example of the type of input being sought is Rich Kressly's message, repeated below. This is the type of response we need to receive.

Quote:
Originally posted by Rich Kressly
While no system is perfect, the current system does attempt to achieve a balance between "earning a spot" and "getting a chance to attend" no matter what your performance is. The Championship number will always be limited and four divisions with more than 70 teams in each division is one heck of a daunting task to make happen well. My hat is off to the planning committee and logistics people for seeing this through each year. If you've ever organized a tournament you also know that any increase in the number of divisions has to jump by four in order for playoffs/elims to work correctly. An eight division arrangement isn't practical for number of reasons I won't bother listing at this time. I like the idea of being able to qualify a year ahead of time and I also like the fact that a team can qualify one week and attend the Championship a few days later. Money will always be a factor here, but the last minute qualifiers should be given the chance and they are.

With that said, in my opinion, any qualification system should retain these key elements that already exist:
1. A point system that allows a team to attend on a prior year's performance and/or the current year
2. The ability for any team to attend at least every other year regardless of performance
3. Credit (points) given for excellence in all areas of the FIRST competition
4. A system that reflects the mission and values of FIRST
Identifying the right meta-criteria will require some real big-picture thinking. If you came up with a specific set of criteria, now tell us what makes the criteria usefull and worth considering. With up to 1000 teams expected to register for the 2004 season, and the potential for that number to go up to 1500 in a few years, there simply is not enough room at any venue for all teams to be able to attend the Championships. As you develop your meta-criteria, you have to consider how they will impact all 1000 teams, and not just your team. Developing the method for selecting what teams will attend will not be an easy problem, and there are a lot of pit-falls. To solve the problem (share the blame? ), we do want your input and ideas, but they need to be at the right level. Thanks for the responses received so far, and keep writing!!!

-dave lavery
FIRST Executive Advisory Board

Last edited by dlavery : 20-09-2003 at 21:35.
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Unread 20-09-2003, 22:09
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I feel that all members on a team should have the experiance to go to nationals once, if not twice during their high school years. Nationals isn't all about competing. FIRST isn't that.

It is hard to try to explain to first year or now even second year members the feelings associated with Nationals. The environment is awesome. Only one other team member other than myself has been lucky enough to attend 2 nationals, only six more got to attend the one in 2002 - this on a team of currently 39 students. Through nationals - if not the other regionals people get to connect. I met some of my closest FIRST friends thanks to nationals, and I hope my younger team members will get to experiance that too.

Not every team is going to be as good as the others. Not every team is going to have a good design, creativity, spirit and such. Some teams are lucky if they can get 5 students to be active. Should those 5 students be not allowed to experience Nationals even though that lack in the award areas?

Even if a team doesn't get to compete, maybe, allow for all teams that want to go to be able to at least come and watch the event, with special packages available from FIRST.
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Unread 20-09-2003, 22:40
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Quote:
Originally posted by dlavery
Folks, please, please read the original post in it's entirety!!!
Sorry, Dave. I may have been too specific. I'll try better this time.
Quote:
Originally posted by dlavery
What things do you look for when deciding if the qualification process is a good or bad method for qualifying for the Championships (beyond "does my team get to go?" )?
Well, as long as the process recognizes all ways that a team can succeed, I'm satisfied. (i.e. success in the qual rounds, the elims, winning other awards, and previously winning a national Chairman's award)
Quote:
Originally posted by dlavery
Do you care if the process is entirely performance-based?
I'd rather that is was. Young teams can get a complete FIRST experience from the Regionals and Super Regionals. We don't have to worry about that.
Quote:
Originally posted by dlavery
Should the process allow every team to get an (occasional?) opportunity to attend, regardless of their performance?
No. Like I said, the Regionals and Super Regionals provide teams with a complete FIRST experience. I can comfortably say this because last year was the my first time working with a team who didn't attend a Championship. The kids on that team were (and still are) just as inspired as any other group I've worked with in the past.
Quote:
Originally posted by dlavery
Should the process limit the number of rookie teams attending, and encourage them to focus on the regional events?
No, it should have no biased against or in favor of rookie teams.
Quote:
Originally posted by dlavery
Do you like methods that are based on just the activities of the current year, or should teams be able to "bank" criteria elements from one year to the next?
Current year only.
Quote:
Originally posted by dlavery
Is it a good thing or a bad thing if the criteria allow only teams from west of the Mississippi with team names that start with a vowel to attend?
Funny, but I'd prefer simpler criteria! =-]
Quote:
Originally posted by dlavery
Does this help clarify what we are looking for?
Yup! Thanks. ;-]

And I hope my thoughts and ideas have been clarified as well.

One last thing: is there any chance of getting a sneak peak at the alternatives that have been identified?

George
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