If you were around for last year, you may remember that I posted Event Previews, Weekly recaps and Top 25s every week of the 2023 season. Culminating in a list of Top 64 teams for MSC. I said at the end of last season that I would be continuing the next season, for 2024, but a lot can change in a year. Due to my work schedule and the increasing amount of Saturday/Sunday events, limiting my timeframe for compiling data and posting what I need to in a given week, there will be a downsizing to the content I post this year. Additionally, and more importantly, I finally have started an FRC scouting project that I have been wanting to start since 2021, and will be what I choose to focus on for the future (Hoping to start posting about the project on a new account after Champs). So at least as of now, this year will be the last year of these posts, or at the minimum this iteration. Now to look at the plans for this season of posts.
Event Previews
These will continue but I have updated their format to standardize the format. For each district I will list a number of teams into certain categories, and since we had a lot of questions about these last year, here are the definitions as a reference.
Category (Teams per Category) - Definition
Favorites (2) - Teams that have shown they are most likely winning the event and/or going to be the best performing robots at the event.
Challengers (2) - Teams that are most likely Finalists or 3rd place finish alliance captains or 1st Picks.
Contender (2) - Teams that I don’t necessarily see winning, but definitely have the capability to do so as a captain or 1st pick.
Dark Horse (2) - Teams that could make the finals of the event as a lower seed with some luck and strategy.
Outside Looking In (4) - Alliance captains or 1st Picks during alliance selection.
Cinderella Stories (2) - Teams that don’t fit any of these categories, but you should keep an eye on them.
The Favorites and Challengers will have descriptions as to why they are in that position. The rest of the categories will just be listed, and after the first few weeks, their performance at their previous event as well. The last update is that last season I released these previews in ranking order of what I believed to be most competitive, this season it will be by order of event, so Fri-Sat Previews will release before Sat-Sun events.
Event Recaps
Sadly this is the end of the dedicated recap posts, this is the main problem when it comes to the increase of Saturday/Sunday events, because it essentially means I need to make the Recap, Top 25 and all Previews within 3-4 days, which I can’t keep up with my current schedule, and honestly I am surprised I stayed on top of it last season. If you are looking for event recaps, I recommend listening to the FUN recaps for those events, as they have more resources than a single person.
Weekly Top 25s
This is the category with the most updates as these posts by far had the most community interaction. Every week I will post the FIM Top 25 list. The difference from last season will be that I will be adding descriptions as to how they ended up in that spot. A lot of this data will be what was included in the recaps of last season, so instead of losing the recaps entirely, think of them as being combined with the Top 25. Even more true when you consider the recaps focused on the district winners, which most likely will be on the Top 25. Then after Week 5 we of course will have the Top 64 teams at MSC exactly the same as last year.
Summary
Event Previews have been standardized as a format, Recaps have been removed and Top 25s have been expanded upon. Last thing I want to note and reiterate, last season I kept mostly anonymous as to what team I was a part of and later revealed it in the MSC preview as I was planning on changing teams anyways. I have indeed changed teams, but want to reiterate that if you do know what team I am now a part of, that I try to keep these posts as data driven and unbiased as possible. The opinions and writings have no association with my team and are my personal thoughts and opinions. I look forward to the last season of this version of previews and top 25s. I wish the best of luck to all teams this year, and the next post from me will be the Event Previews for Milford and Kettering 1.