#1 seeded teams

[Tim Delles]

So i decided to go through each regional just to see how many number one seeds went on to win the regional. well out of the 18 that have been played so far, only 9 #1 seeded teams have won the regional. Now this makes me ask does it pay to be the number 1 seeded team anymore?

BAE
non-#1 seed won

NJ
#1 seed won

VCU
non-#1 seed won

Pacific NW
non-#1 seed won

Arizona
non-#1 seed won

Buckeye
non-#1 seed won

FLR
#1 seed won

Florida
non-#1 seed won

GLR
#1 seed won

Pittsburg
#1 seed won

St. Louis
non-#1 seed won

UTC
non-#1 seed won

Boilermaker
non-#1 seed won

Chesapeake
#1 seed won

Detroit
#1 seed won

Mid-West
#1 seed won

Peachtree
#1 seed won

SVR
#1 seed won

*** this data came from the FIRST website. If it is incorrect please let me know or post it***

[Rick TYler]

Originally Posted by Tim Delles

Now this makes me ask does it pay to be the number 1 seeded team anymore?

You ask, "does it pay to be the number 1 seeded team anymore?" The answer is, "it depends."

[Elgin Clock]

Originally Posted by Tim Delles

Chesapeake
No Data

#1 seed won.

[Joe Ross]

Originally Posted by Tim Delles

So i decided to go through each regional just to see how many number one seeds went on to win the regional. well out of the 18 that have been played so far, only 7 #1 seeded teams have won the regional. Now this makes me ask does it pay to be the number 1 seeded team anymore?

Since more #1 seeds won then any other seed, there is still an advantage.

It would be interesting to see a histogram of all seeds and their number of wins, and compare that to the last few years.

[K.Shaw]

the #1 seeded team can make an alliance with a good robot but then may have a not so great robot for a 2nd pick because of the way alliance selections go. by the time it gets back to the first seed 23 robots are already chosen giving the #1 seed a pretty hard decision.

my point here i know the data shows the #1 seed is better but the upper seeds like 7 or 8 could actually have a better alliance since they are picking their 1st and 2nd robot at the same time.

[Kims Robot]

I think that the serpentine draft this year is definitely evening out the alliances. Its making for much more interesting matching, and its making it almost impossible to have the #1 seed be an overpowered alliance of three amazing robots. It would be interesting to compare this data to previous years with the regular draft.

So now, being the number one seed means you get the first pick and the last pick, so unless your robot is completely unstoppable, my guess is other alliances still have a chance against you.

Now what would make it even crazier would be if they did a serpentine draft, and then set #1 to play against #5 instead of #8 (ie 1vs5, 2vs6, 3vs7, 4vs8). If FIRST is trying to even out the alliances, I think they've succeeded, and to be honest, I think I like it more than I thought I would!

[dlavery]

Originally Posted by Tim Delles

So i decided to go through each regional just to see how many number one seeds went on to win the regional. well out of the 18 that have been played so far, only 7 #1 seeded teams have won the regional. Now this makes me ask does it pay to be the number 1 seeded team anymore?

As expected, there has been quite a bit of discussion about the "serpentine draft" process for selecting alliances. Now we are starting to have some actual data to support those discussions.

Historically, the traditional selection process has had the highest seeded team pick first within each round of selections. That made for a significant number of very, very strong alliances during the finals (some would argue, unbeatable). If the alliances were all of equivalent capability and skill, then you could logically conclude that each of the eight alliances in the finals would have an equal probability of winning the competition. There should be an even distribution of wins vs. seed position at the conclusion of the competition season. A #1 seeded alliance should win 12.5% of the time, as would a #2 alliance, a #3 alliance, etc. But the data showed that was not the case. The #1 alliance typically won more than half the time. Yes, there were occasionally upsets and "underdog stories." But the reality is that if you were the #1 seed team, you knew you had a 1-in-2 probability of winning the event, while the lower seeded alliances (which nominally should expect a 1-in-8 chance), had considerably lower probability of winning. Being the #1 seed should allow an alliance to come into the finals with some advantage. But the concern was that the old alliance selection process gave them TOO MUCH of an advantage and it was killing the competition.

The new selection process was, in part, an attempt to slightly even out the competitive level for the finals. No one believes that we will ever reach the point that each of the final alliances will actually have a real 1-in-8 probability of winning the competitions, and that was not the intent. But the desire was to move a little bit away from the point where the #1 alliance position was almost an assured win every time.

Based on these initial numbers, it appears that that effort may have been only partially successful. Out of 18 events, a truly even distribution would have the #1 alliance winning 2.25 times, or 12.5% of the time. But these data shows that they have won 8 times, giving a 44% probability of winning the competition. Given that the #1 alliance is still out-performing pure probability by a factor of more than three, I think that we can safely conclude that being in the #1 alliance position is still a very good place to be. The teams are obviously able to still build strong alliances, and play the game successfully. While the sample size is still a little small for an accurate small number statistics analysis, it does appear that the #1 alliance position still wins the competition a disproportionately high number of times. Picking first during the draft still provides a strategically important advantage to the #1 alliance position that is only slightly affected by, and absolutely not overshadowed by, the serpentine draft process.

-dave

[Tim Delles]

Originally Posted by Kims Robot

I think that the serpentine draft this year is definitely evening out the alliances. Its making for much more interesting matching, and its making it almost impossible to have the #1 seed be an overpowered alliance of three amazing robots. It would be interesting to compare this data to previous years with the regular draft.

So now, being the number one seed means you get the first pick and the last pick, so unless your robot is completely unstoppable, my guess is other alliances still have a chance against you.

Now what would make it even crazier would be if they did a serpentine draft, and then set #1 to play against #5 instead of #8 (ie 1vs5, 2vs6, 3vs7, 4vs8). If FIRST is trying to even out the alliances, I think they've succeeded, and to be honest, I think I like it more than I thought I would!

I will see what I can do about getting some information from a few years ago competition and comparing it to this years. I just have to find the time.

[billbo911]

Originally Posted by dlavery

The new selection process was, in part, an attempt to slightly even out the competitive level for the finals. No one believes that we will ever reach the point that each of the final alliances will actually have a real 1-in-8 probability of winning the competitions, and that was not the intent. But the desire was to move a little bit away from the point where the #1 alliance position was almost an assured win every time.

-dave

I believe the new process has achieved an excellent balance of rewarding the teams that have earned the highest ranking and not guaranteeing them that they will win the event.

These high ranking teams have earned their position, not by luck but by hard work, perseverance and solid planning and design. I don't think it would be right to force them to a position of having to choose alliance partners that would bring their chances down to the point of only having a 12.5% chance of winning. I also don't think having a 75% or greater chance of winning is right either.

Personally, I wouldn't want to send teams to Nationals that were not representative of our Regionals best! By having the #1 seed teams running at about 50% winning rate, I think we actually are seeing the Best of the Best advancing. Here's why: During qualification rounds, quite often a really good team will be allied with teams that are, well, not so strong. Ultimately, their overall ranking may not be reflective of how well that team can really perform. Then during the alliance selection process they are chosen by a team that has paid attention and seen what the different teams are capable of doing and therefore, assemble a team capable of winning the Regional.

All in all, I say leave the process how it is. It is a good balance of "Fairness" without too much "Bias".

[Gene F]

While I do think that the alliance selection process has made a difference and made the alliances a little more even, I thnk the bigger impact is the three on three seeding rounds. It is now much more difficult for a single team to control the outcome of every match they are in. I have heard a lot of stories of teams that say they have as a team failed in almost every match and still end up being a seeded team because their alliance partners in the seeding rounds have carried them. This makes the scouting process all that much more important. I like it!!

[Joe Ross]

Not only does the #1 seed win 50% of the time, none of the other seeds are even close.

[Jeff Rodriguez]

Originally Posted by Joe Ross

Not only does the #1 seed win 50% of the time, none of the other seeds are even close.

Are you going by the teams seed before alliance selection or their seed at the time of selection?
Your chart has no 5 seeds winning, but the winning alliance at UTC was the 5th seed alliance. They were headed by 177, who seeded 8th, but due to picking within the top 8, ended up picking 5th.

[Joe Ross]

Originally Posted by Ogre

Are you going by the teams seed before alliance selection or their seed at the time of selection?
Your chart has no 5 seeds winning, but the winning alliance at UTC was the 5th seed alliance. They were headed by 177, who seeded 8th, but due to picking within the top 8, ended up picking 5th.

That's correct, I did it by original seed, as that is what teams can control. (It's also easier to quickly gather that data )

[Beth Sweet]

Here's my take.

#1 seed only matters if you know what you want. You can be #1 seed all you want, but if you have bad scouting data and thus select either an inefficient or uncomplimentry partner, there's no point.

I think that it has been made tougher this year for #1 seeds because of the new selection process. As I've voiced before, it's not my favorite change however probably does make things more fair.

[MikeDubreuil]

Here's my 2 cents...

The #1 seed is still dominant because their first pick could be the #2 seeded robot. When 2/3 of an alliance are composed of the best robots at the regional it's guaranteed success.

I think FIRST should re-instate the rule that requires the top 8 seeded teams to pick teams outside of the top 8. Adding that rule back in and keeping the new serpentine rule should make for some exciting finals.