With 2 championships this year, its great that we can award more than 1 team this year. Every year, there is a growing list of teams that are deserving.
I’m not a judge in any capacity, but I believe that there are many teams who are very close and that it will come down to the student interviews AND video presented this year.
Top two teams: 3132 and 2468. I’m hoping that 1 of them decides to elect to attend St. Louis instead. Then I would predict both of them winning in 2017.
3132’s outreach is simply amazing. I’d argue that no one in the history of FIRST has accomplished the extent of what they have done.
2468 is one of the most well balanced teams in FIRST that isnt in the HOF. Their successes both on and off the field are equally inspiring.
There are just too many great teams in the North (U.S. and Canada) that it would be too hard to predict for St. Louis.
503 for St Louis for sure. They are absolutely fantastic and have been going year after year as chairman’s. Think of all the teams they have inspired!
Without 503, the Flying Toasters wouldn’t be here today.
For North Champs, I see 2056 or 503 as very strong contenders. 2056 is similar to 987 in the fact that they are well rounded-- an inspirational robot and dedicated outreach. 503 has been a steady representation, winning a Chairman’s Award at Michigan State Champs 2016, 2015, 2014, 2013, 2012, 2011, and 2010. That is simply amazing. Their record even goes farther to that. However, that is not to say a strong record like theirs is a deciding factor of who will become HoF, but I think it says a lot about 503.
For South Champs, 2486 has inspired other submissions to be strong contenders. Fun fact, 3309 based their executive question off of a format that 2486 has created, and then won in LA for the first time. That isn’t to say that South Champs is necessarily decided however. 1868 has strong outreach, 207 has earned Engineering Inspiration consistently, and may begin to have the same effect for Chairman’s, 604 has been a Chairman’s team in NorCal consistently. 1540 has had a strong streak as well by earning a CA at the 2016, 2015, and 2014 PNW Champs.
Personally, I do not have any guesses. I’m just observing who has consistently earned a Chairman’s Award and relaying that information. Over time, it can become harder for a team to have “streaks” because it can become increasingly difficult for said team to improve and represent themselves. I’ve heard it said that the first CA award is easier than the 2nd, 3rd, 4th, etc. So, for the teams that have these said “streaks” continuing to be role models in this fashion is very much in line with what it means to be HoF.
However! Winning a CA in your area can be completely different than winning it at a World or (North and South Champs). Maybe these teams will have different outreach strategies this year to push themselves over the edge to become a HoF. We’ll see. There is some time. 
To represent the Canadian teams it is Definitely 1241, 2056 has done quite a bit and is deserving of the many regional chairman’s awards they have won, but if you look at the scale of the what 1241 does in their region and across the province they are by far and away the strongest Canadian candidate for World Chairman’s in St.Louis.
Another vote for 503 for North Champs - I believe I’m right in saying they’ve won the Michigan District Chairman’s award every single year that it has been a thing.
At this rate, I’d be pretty shocked if 2614 didn’t win Chairman’s in St. Louis. They are the reason FIRST is even in West Virginia. They have provided $34,000 for FLL, FTC & FRC in WV, created & mentored 100+ FIRST teams (I think, can’t quite remember), ran the first FRC event in the state and are bringing FIRST to India and Zimbabwe.
That’s only what they could fit into their Chairman’s video from last year/some info from the website.
North
503 - Frog Force - 10 chairman’s, 25 total BBs, huge impact in Michigan and recognition with Governor Snyder.
1511 - Rolling Thunder - 7 chairman’s, 13 total BBs, hosts of Rah Cha Cha Ruckus, MEGA Drive.
South
1311 - Kell Robotics - 8 chairman’s, 11 total BBs, public policy advocacy, impressive outreach event list.
604 - Quixilver - 9 chairman’s, 15 total BBs, large impact from demonstrations
1540 - Flaming Chickens - 7 chairman’s, 15 total BBs, BunnyBots
I think that Team 337 would take some issue with that since they existed for 8 years prior to 2614, not saying that 2614 isn’t amazing but saying they are the reason FIRST is in their state is a little much
I feel like the issue that will keep them out isn’t something they really have control over, and it is that one of the questions that we were asked is how many FRC teams have we helped start in our state, logically the only answer that 2614 can say is 1, 3492; since they are the only team in the state younger then them. It sucks but until FRC sees a lot of growth in their state as a result of that, I feel that some of the teams going to the same champs as them (11, 503, 1241, 1511, 2056) have a leg up.
For South Champs, I’m going to borrow some words I said about potential winners for this year’s Championship Chairman’s Award:
I would definitely say that those two are the leading contenders in my mind for the South Championship Chairman’s Award. I’d expect each of them to rise even further this season, and have been combing social media for more info on what they’ve been up to. They’ve both continued to impress, and I would bet on one of them winning the big one in 2017.
North Championship is a bit hairier.
I have a hard time putting any team head and shoulders above the rest compared to South Champs-- there are a lot of very good Chairman’s teams (1511, 503, 1885, 525) that I could certainly see pulling out the win, but I can’t honestly say I would bet on one or two over the others. I need to get a better handle on what each team has been up to in the offseason in order to have an opinion I would consider well-supported here.
FRC 321, The Robolancers. Not only do they have a world class program, they do so in a school district that is chronically underfunded and short on faculty and resources. Where the Philadelphia public schooling system lacks the resources to step up, the Robolancers have become a beacon. And they have a track record of successfully demonstrating that impact, with back-to-back MAR Championship Chairman’s Awards. For reference, the two other MAR teams mentioned in this thread have yet to win a single MARCMP Chairman’s Award. I have little doubt that 321 will be MAR’s 4th Hall of Fame team.
Glad to see 321 get mentioned, really an awesome program. I think from MAR them, 1676, 1218, and 1923 are certainly contenders.
1519 for North Half Champs.
836 - The RoboBees, amazing team and outreach, and always in contention for Chairman’s!!
And of course 1629!
So I have this script I’ve been using for the past year now that calculates CPR (Chairman’s Power Rating) values for teams at varying events. It’s been pretty accurate for regionals (multiple 2016 regionals had 100% prediction accuracy), so I’ll post what it’s predictions are for North and South Champs. For Champs, it generates a list of a couple “possible candidates” and then vaguely ranks them. All CCA winners from the past 10 years (that’s as far as I’ve checked presently) have been on the possible candidate list my script generates. Note that rankings go off of the team’s award history and can’t take into account the “quality” of the team’s outreaches and Chairman’s submissions, and the teams processed by the script were all of the 2016 Chairman’s winners that attended Champs.
North (St. Louis):
1. 1241 (THEORY6) - 4.91 CPR
2. 1305 (Ice Cubed) - 4.5 CPR
3. 1710 (The Ravonics Revolution) - 4.33 CPR
4. 1885 (ILITE Robotics) - 4.0 CPR
5. 503 (Frog Force) - 4.0 CPR
6. 1511 (Rolling Thunder) - 3.92 CPR
7. 2614 (Mountaineer Area RoboticS (MARS)) - 3.83 CPR
8. 384 (Sparky 384) - 3.83 CPR
9. 537 (Charger Robotics) - 3.5 CPR
10. 1086 (Blue Cheese) - 3.25 CPR
11. 11 (MORT) - 1.5 CPR
South (Houston):
1. 2468 (Team Appreciate) - 4.33 CPR
2. 604 (Quixilver) - 4.0 CPR
3. 2486 (CocoNuts) - 4.0 CPR
4. 1311 (Kell Robotics) - 4.0 CPR
5. 1540 (Flaming Chickens) - 4.0 CPR
6. 1902 (Exploding Bacon) - 3.67 CPR
7. 3132 (Thunder Down Under) - 2.74 CPR
8. 812 (The Midnight Mechanics) - 2.58 CPR
9. 233 (The Pink Team) - 2.58 CPR
10. 932 (Circuit Chargers) - 2.25 CPR
11. 1868 (Space Cookies) - 2.0 CPR
Interesting numbers, thank you for sharing! It’s interesting to compare and contrast this list with the more qualitative evaluations shared on this thread. I’m a bit of a stat geek and have wondered about quantifying Chairman’s chances for a while now (just for fun, of course), so I have a few questions:
- How is CPR calculated? Is it based exclusively on Chairman’s or are other awards and factors considered?
- Exactly how accurate is it in predicting Regional/District/DCMP Chairman’s Awards?
- How does it do with predicting historic Championship Chairman’s Award winners?
- How much of an improvement is CPR over more naive metrics, such as total previous Chairman’s Awards?
- How well does it anticipate “outsiders” who have never won Chairman’s receiving the award at the Regional/District level?
I’d love to tinker with your algorithm/code if you’d be willing to share.
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To quickly summarize, CPR is calculated based off of Chairman’s and Engineering Inspiration wins in the past four years (inclusive of the current one). Chairmans and E.I. both have base point values (currently 1 and .33) that are reduced then added to a team’s CPR based off of when that award was won (i.e. winning Chairman’s in 2016 is 1 point, winning Chairman’s in 2015 is 0.75 points, 2014 is .5, ect…). There’s also a point bonus for winning Chairman’s at an event with another “high” CPR team present. I’ve experimented with also awarding points for streaks (winning multiple Chairman’s and/or E.I.'s in a row), but I’ve found it tends to cause fluctuations in accuracy. I’m always tweaking the point values for everything and attempting to add new ways of increasing accuracy, but this is currently the most accurate combination of factors I’ve gotten.
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For regionals and district championships, the script is fairly accurate at guessing the winners/likely winners. It guessed the correct Chairman’s and E.I. winners (1st on the rankings being the Chairman’s winner, 2nd often being E.I.) for numerous events and when it was wrong, was within a rank or two of being 100% correct (i.e. rank 3 winning Chairman’s). It tends to be more inaccurate at guessing district events due to the larger amount of “upsets” and sometimes lack of any teams with a Chairman’s background. As a typical rule, the more Chairman’s history that exists for the teams at an event, the more accurate the predictions will be.
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Champs predictions are more difficult because at champs, the winner is chosen based off of the quality of their submissions and outreach, which my script doesn’t (and can’t) consider when computing CPR. However, the script is very good at supplying a small list ranging 10-20 teams that “might” win the award. For at least the past 10 years, the HoF winner has been on the list the script provide, and is usually in the top 10 at the very least. For example, 987 was 8th for 2016’s predictions, 597 was 10th for 2015’s, 27 was 4th for 2014’s, and 1538 was 3rd for 2013’s.
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I would say CPR is quite a bit better than just counting Chairman’s awards. The script actually started off initially as a way to quickly display how many Chairman’s awards the teams at an event had won, and the “predictions” it helped generate then were a lot more inaccurate then what CPR gives now.
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This is probably the biggest weakness of the current script. All of it’s stats are in some way based off of the team’s Chairman’s and E.I. history, so it never expects a team with a very weak (or non-existent) Chairman’s record to win.
I’ll be making the code public soon. I’m actually in the process of re-writing most of it to be user-friendly and readable by another developer. If you have any more questions about it (or want to see predictions for certain event(s) in the past or future) just let me know I may start posting CPR predictions for 2017 regionals once they start getting closer, though I’ve already been running some internally.
Some great summary reads today!
How could I forget about 1311, 604, 1540, and 2486? So many great teams in the running for both championships…
I know you may not have meant to, but this implies that Chairman’s at other events is not chosen based on the quality of their submission.
I know at regionals and districts the judges may know the teams more personally, but I feel like the award is still given based upon the submission and outreach quality, right?
I was a little confused by this statement, too. The Chairman’s Award is based on the submission at all levels. While it is easy to assume that a team with a streak or a lot of relevant wins would be the “best”, Judges are trained to do their best to objectively decide who will earn each award based on their submissions.
You guys are taking part of fast response to questions about my script waaay out of it’s context and intended meaning. I was referring to how there’s usually a gap in the teams at regionals and that makes it easier to predict wins for the script. At champs the teams, statistically, are tied and the script doesn’t know who to predict, since the deciding factor (submission quality) isn’t considered by the script. I was in no way implying regional Chairman’s (or any Chairman’s for that matter) wasn’t quality or submission based. Hate to cause confusion, would never disrespect the award or the people judging it