Proposal for the 2 Championship format

[PriyankP]

I had the same/similar idea when I looked at the IIHF ranking system two months ago. In that system, the countries are divided into different levels, with 1-2 teams earning their way to the next level when they qualify.

Such a system in FIRST would have two levels (let's say Division A and Division B).

At first, all teams are in Division B. Any team that reaches the finals of a regional or wins an engineering related award gets promoted to Division A status for next season (or even for the next regional if the team chooses).

This gives teams a nice sandbox environment to get going first before they face the more established teams with more resources. Of course, if a team wants to downgrade, they can do so at any time.

This could also be divided into more than two levels if it is better. Need to iron out the details, but you get the idea!

The "haha, your team is a Division B team" mentality seems like the inevitable downside to this.

[asid61]

This plan makes me uncomfortable. I want to see the winning teams at championships without having to win every event we go to. Teams that don't win who learn a lot from my experience there.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by PriyankP

I had the same/similar idea when I looked at the IIHF ranking system two months ago. In that system, the countries are divided into different levels, with 1-2 teams earning their way to the next level when they qualify.

Such a system in FIRST would have two levels (let's say Division A and Division B).

At first, all teams are in Division B. Any team that reaches the finals of a regional or wins an engineering related award gets promoted to Division A status for next season (or even for the next regional if the team chooses).

This gives teams a nice sandbox environment to get going first before they face the more established teams with more resources. Of course, if a team wants to downgrade, they can do so at any time.

This could also be divided into more than two levels if it is better. Need to iron out the details, but you get the idea!

The "haha, your team is a Division B team" mentality seems like the inevitable downside to this.

There is another one. I'm going to go way back into my memory banks for this one, and hope I'm remembering the anecdote right (it's on CD... somewhere--that's where I remember this from).

Back about a decade ago, during team forums after the season, someone (don't remember who) was at one in some location (don't remember where). And somebody in the room was really vocal about how all of FRC should be split in just about the manner you're describing (and remember, we're dealing with about half the teams we have today at this point in time). That's when a newbie team mentor--might have been a rookie team--who'd been rather quiet spoke up and said something about how beating (or was it playing with) Wildstang (FRC111) had been the highlight of their year, and they would lose that inspiration if the split happened. The rather vocal somebody promptly kept quiet.

[PriyankP]

Originally Posted by EricH

There is another one. I'm going to go way back into my memory banks for this one, and hope I'm remembering the anecdote right (it's on CD... somewhere--that's where I remember this from).

Back about a decade ago, during team forums after the season, someone (don't remember who) was at one in some location (don't remember where). And somebody in the room was really vocal about how all of FRC should be split in just about the manner you're describing (and remember, we're dealing with about half the teams we have today at this point in time). That's when a newbie team mentor--might have been a rookie team--who'd been rather quiet spoke up and said something about how beating (or was it playing with) Wildstang (FRC111) had been the highlight of their year, and they would lose that inspiration if the split happened. The rather vocal somebody promptly kept quiet.

Yep, there's also the financial downside too. Teams on the bigger stage would be able to get sponsorships much more easily because of the wider audience and the bigger impact of the team.

The same problems exist in the IIHF system. I didn't even know some of the lower tier countries had a team.

Would this help? I think so. But, there are just as many cons (if not more) as there are pros.

[MrForbes]

Originally Posted by Citrus Dad

Third, that separately into two championships really doesn't reduce the travel costs significantly for the vast majority of teams.

I think you might want to do the math on this one...and show your work.

Even for us in southeast AZ, moving from St Louis to Houston makes it driveable for me, and Detroit is way far away.

There are a lot of teams in Michigan...and Minnesota...and Ontario....etc. And in Texas...

[Boe]

Originally Posted by MrForbes

I think you might want to do the math on this one...and show your work.

Even for us in southeast AZ, moving from St Louis to Houston makes it driveable for me, and Detroit is way far away.

There are a lot of teams in Michigan...and Minnesota...and Ontario....etc. And in Texas...

Detroit will actually be a farther drive then St. Louis for the vast majority of Minnesota teams.

[MrForbes]

What about Houston?

[EricH]

Originally Posted by MrForbes

What about Houston?

Definitely farther for Minnesota. Detroit would only be a few hundred miles farther than St. Louis if it weren't for Lake Michigan. Houston is double that, give or take a bit.

[Abhishek R]

Oh man, am I a fan of the promotion/relegation system. As for confusion, there is precedence - I will say multiple sports and even some "eSports" use a similar system, and it works fine - it actually becomes quite simple to understand.

For example, in League, the bottom 3 teams in the League Championship Series (LCS) fight the top 3 Challenger Series (CS) teams for the spots in the LCS; to reclaim or debut, respectively. It's actually pretty cool, it ensures freshness in the league and allows up and coming teams to get into the spotlight.

[Citrus Dad]

Originally Posted by wilsonmw04

I think that FIRST is trying to get back to what it did best: to inspire a generation of students. The board feels that increasing the number of students that attend Worlds is the best way to do that. After going to Worlds this year, I can agree that we can't fit in one location and accomplish what the board wants to do. The only reservation I have about the split is if there were some sort of year after year geographic split between the teams. It would be a shame if west coast teams never got to play with east coast teams.

I absolutely agree with that sentiment. I have no problem going to 800 teams. However, I really haven't seen what FIRST is proposing on how to manage those 800 teams. What I've proposed is an organized method to ensure that a geographic mix of teams continues to go to both venues. A geographic split will not achieve that goal. It will be Michigan/Ontario/MAR at Detroit and Texas/CA/PNW at Houston unless FIRST institutes a system something like I'm proposing. I've thought about the problem of geographic rotation, but there's really no way to achieve it with the venues anchored in 2 of the most prominent FRC regions. Really, Michigan teams are going to Houston? Nothing I'm proposing here is inconsistent with FIRST's goals.

And I'm a mentor, not a student. What FIRST decides will affect my team in 2 years when I'm still working with them.

[Citrus Dad]

Originally Posted by asid61

This plan makes me uncomfortable. I want to see the winning teams at championships without having to win every event we go to. Teams that don't win who learn a lot from my experience there.

I would hope that your team would learn a lot from other great teams at the Challenger event. For example, 971 and 701 whom you know well would have been at the Challenger event this year under system A. Our team learns a huge amount from them--they probably contributed more to our team than any other over the last few years. Are they not great teams? I expect that many other teams of their caliber would be at the Challenger event.

And you wouldn't have to win "every" event that you go to. In fact I can see how under systems B or C that teams that place high continually could go to the Premier event.

[waialua359]

Its too bad FIRST cant just find a venue (and city) that can hold 800 teams. Problem solved.

[dodar]

Originally Posted by waialua359

Its too bad FIRST cant just find a venue (and city) that can hold 800 teams. Problem solved.

There's tons of those. But then you'd have to give up the luxury of holding them in stadiums.

[waialua359]

Originally Posted by dodar

There's tons of those. But then you'd have to give up the luxury of holding them in stadiums.

Is this really true? Sorry, not familiar with facilities across the US.

[EricH]

Originally Posted by Abhishek R

Oh man, am I a fan of the promotion/relegation system. As for confusion, there is precedence - I will say multiple sports and even some "eSports" use a similar system, and it works fine - it actually becomes quite simple to understand.

For example, in League, the bottom 3 teams in the League Championship Series (LCS) fight the top 3 Challenger Series (CS) teams for the spots in the LCS; to reclaim or debut, respectively. It's actually pretty cool, it ensures freshness in the league and allows up and coming teams to get into the spotlight.

I understand it, to some extent, at those levels. Here's the problem I have:

How in tarnation do you deal with a team that just got relegated last year and now has 3 regional wins, one EI, and one RCA, or somesuch impressive resume? Do you put them in the relegated CMP or in the top CMP? Eh? How about the team that won the whole thing last year, and is nowhere to be found this year? Eh? Fair warning, I'm going to keep asking this until I get an answer. It shouldn't be all that hard to figure out--it'd happen often enough, no? And it's happened often enough with one CMP already, somewhat.

To put it mildly: Relegation works fairly well when there is NOT a lot of "churn" of teams joining/exiting a league--you can assign a team once, they go up and down, and maybe eventually they fold and leave completely. Relegation fails miserably when there IS a lot of "churn"--and in FRC, there's a lot of "churn" going to the Champs. The top teams will tend to stay the same and make a lot of trips to the top event (read: Poofs, Simbotics, HOT, etc.). The not-so-top teams won't--and that's where you have to make a lot of tough calls. Probably a third--a full third--of the teams at CMP this year won't be there next year. So now you have a new X teams to assign, and then relegate, that may or may not end up to be relegated in the long run because they just plain don't make it the next year.

That's why I just plain don't like any sort of promotion/relegation system from year to year. It's going to create a lot more problems than it's worth. Just assign based on "current" qualification (even if that's last year's award) and go from there. Sure, maybe you have one or two teams that switch due to not doing as well, but that's "normal".

One final thought: If some sort of promotion/relegation does happen, any and all talk about "reducing travel costs" needs to be expunged from the record, completely. If it is in fact cheaper for a team to travel to one event, but they are assigned to the other due to the promotion/relegation system, travel costs are not reduced. Can you imagine if a Detroit CMP-bound team ended up in Houston? Or if Mr. Forbes (just to pick on him) and his team ended up going to Detroit when Houston was closer? And if that wasn't just the exception, but the rule?