Why I love the coopertition bridge

[Grim Tuesday]

For many years, FIRST has been trying to push the message of coopertition and Gracious Professionalism. For many, it seems that Coopertition was simply a part of GP, and I was OK with that. But no matter what, it was never properly implemented into the game. I can't comment on the 2000 game, but looking at recent years, the latest implementation of Coopertition was in 2010, with the screwy ranking system. It would seem that the goals of the system were to help other teams off and on the field, to make the score as high as possible, and thus more fun to watch for spectators. However, it didn't really work out that way. People helped off of the field, but that's always been part of FIRST tradition. On the field, the coopertition, I feel, never developed in the way the GDC intended it to. No team fed balls to the other alliance for the goal of making a closer game, because that would simply be stupid.

However, this year, the GDC nailed it. The Coopertition bridge serves every purpose imaginable. It:

• Promotes Coopertition between teams, on and off the field
• Makes the game more fun to watch
• Rewards teams not for having just the best robots, but knowing how to play the game
• Because it shuffles the ranking system, it makes eliminations more fun to watch

The bridge this year opens every regional up to everyone, not just the powerhouses, and easily rockets this year into one of the best FRC games ever.