A Rule for this year's Competition

[Mike Soukup]

Originally posted by Mr.Volcano
Well in response to this i have to say is you are absolutly right.
BUT FIRST doesnt think the way me and you and so many others.
they have turned the wonderful regionals into qualifications.

You sure found a way to selectively quote me & twist the point of my statement around. I see nothing wrong with FIRST turing the Regionals into qualifiers for the Championship. The point of my post was that people should not get upset at pre-qualified teams for winning at Regionals.

how are they going to tell us about gratious proffesionalism if teams are going to be fighting over getting to Florida

I love this quote. You're assuming that just because Regionals now help determine who goes to the Championship, they will become rutheless & teams will only look out for themselves. If that happens, my opinion of many teams and FIRST in general will drop, and I'll probably quit. It means that all this gracious professionalism practiced by teams was hollow and not sincere. It's easy to help your competition out if there's not much riding on it; the true test of gracious professionalism comes when you've got something to lose. But I believe that most (if not all) teams are sincere and gracious professionalism will still exist, and will be stronger than ever, since it will mean so much more now.

Mike