The Rest Of The Best

[TheMadCADer]

I think we could fix a huge part of this using a sort of "post-season Judges Award". Here's how I think it would work:

A few teams from each regional that did not qualify for Championships are nominated by judges (or even other teams could submit a story about a team they think is deserving, if you want) based on something exemplary displayed at that regional, be it on or off the field. In my mind there would be 4-5 awarded per regional, with 2-3 being teams very close to winning the regional (the 118 and 177 award, if you will) and the remaining 2-3 being particularly inspiring teams, a sort of RCA/EI "runner-up". At this point it is basically your typical Judges Award, but with maybe a few more of them given out.

After week 6 a group of judges would then select teams from this pool to fill the slots opened by teams winning multiple events/awards (leave a few slots for teams nominated out of the districts, I assume you would award these spots after that region's local Championship event). If any of these teams cannot attend for whatever reason, their spot goes to a waitlist, which could prioritize other teams from this Judges Award pool or be styled like the current waitlist.

My original thought was to have this be decided completely within the regional, with any spots won by teams that are already qualified being given directly to winners of Judges Awards. However, this would be unfair to any teams that compete only in a Week 1 event, as no teams would already have a slot except teams from the Hall of Fame, original teams, and the defending champions.