For North Champs, I think that 1511 and 503 have strong chances, and I expect both of them to be finalists, at the very least. Team 503 needs Chairman’s at the FiM Livonia District this weekend to be considered for Chairman’s at MSC, so good luck to them this weekend!
My call has been 503. I’d be honored if 1511 won, but 503 has a longer running streak than we do! Good luck to them this weekend! We’ll be looking forward to hearing of their WIN!
For South Champs: I do love Team Appreciate! Kell Robotics is also freaking awesome! 
I like that they’re bringing back CA Finalists. It’s a wonderful honorable mention for those teams and to let teams know where they stand.
Lot of folks from Minnesota tend to forget about 2169 and 2220. Both have done a tremendous amount of outreach in Minnesota. 2169 has won a total of 6 RCA’s and 1 EI and 2220 has won 3 RCA’s and 4 EI’s. I hope both of them end up in contention for North Champs.
Are there any teams who have earned CCA or Worlds EI that only earned less than five regional/district-level Chairman’s Awards before winning at Worlds?
191, twice 
597 in 2015 won it 4 times at the regional level
While I hate to say it, Frog Force has been in a tough spot. They haven’t earned Chairman’s at either of their district events, meaning they won’t be competing at MSC. Keep in mind that this is their first year that they haven’t won at MSC. They hold the world record for most DC/Regional Chairman’s wins, at 10 times. However, they unfortunately have been struggling recently. I’d like to talk with someone on FF at MSC to see what’s going on for them. They really do deserve to enter the HoF, and my vote would go to them otherwise.
Instead, my vote is to Quixilver (604). I don’t know which championship they are at, but they definitely have made an impact.
Two quick things:
503 still has one more event to qualify at. Their first one was in an Indiana District event.
Also, 604 did not win an RCA this year. Definitely an exemplary program, though.
503 has only been to one district in Michigan so far this year, so they have one last chance to pull it out at Livonia this weekend. Their first district was in Indiana, where they were not eligible to win the award, as per inter-district play rules.
All this being said, my vote is still for 503. I have confidence they will win at Livonia this weekend and again at MSC!
Edit: Liam beat me to it
CCA - 597 and 365 are the only two in the past ten winners. You find a lot more when you dig back further than that because the Chairmans Award was not awarded at the regional level until 2002.
EI - quite a few, especially since the expansion to giving an EI award in each division
Last year Team 987 (The High Rollers) won Chairman’s at World’s after 4 RCA wins - 2008 at the Las Vegas Regional, 2009 at the Las Vegas Regional, 2015 at the Dallas Regional and in 2016 at the Las Vegas Regional.
Yep, Liam’s right. We were ineligible at Indiana - new rule this year about cross-District award wins. Also, Frog Force didn’t win the very first MSCCA in 2009 
South CMP is 3132’s CA to lose. Their program is incredibly wide-reaching and impactful. If I had to bet money on anyone else, I’d put it on 3309 and 2468.
I’m excited for Chairman’s Finalists to return. Frog Force got an “Honorable Mention” in 2006, which seems like pretty much the same thing. I was in kindergarten then, though, so hopefully this whole thing can go full circle!
My bad - they won a 5th RCA in 2013 at the Las Vegas Regional as well. Regardless, it’s impressive.
For north champs, I think 503 has a strong chance (assuming they win this weekend…if not, it’s open).
For south champs, I have to think 3132 has a really good shot – their video this year is easily the best I’ve seen since 27’s, and how many other teams can claim that they’ve started FIRST on a continent? 1311 is a bit of a dark horse with an amazing program, and I think a lot of people underestimate 1540 (though of course I’m a bit biased). 1902 also has an solid program.
(The one caveat I see to 3132 is that they’re still significantly younger than pretty much every other elite Chairman’s team. 1538 to my knowledge holds the record for youngest team to win Chairman’s in the modern era – 9 years old – and 3132 is 8 years old. Most of the elite teams are at least ten years old, many quite a bit older, but 3132 has packed a lot into their 8 years, to their credit.)
A few broader thoughts…I think that you probably need a minimum of 4 RCAs to be competitive at the CCA level these days (might even be 5 or 6). Additionally, I think there’s a bit of an imbalance between the two championships in terms of Chairman’s competitiveness, so I’m wondering if in future years we’ll start to see elite (top 5) Chairman’s teams picking which championship to attend based on other Chairman’s teams there. Particularly if 503 wins in St. Louis this year, north champs will be significantly less competitive than south champs moving forward, so a weird little meta-game could emerge there as the top programs pick which event to attend.
I’ll be very interested to see finalists for this reason-- it might confirm or debunk theories about who is and isn’t a top competitor for CCA each year.
I’m not sure I agree about North becoming less competitive-- there’s still 1885, 1511, 2614 at least, which, while they may not quite have the same streak, are (based on reading their essays in previous years) on a similar level. While predicting regional/district Chairman’s can be somewhat accurately narrowed down to a pool using historical data, I don’t think it quite transfers over for CCA. Finalist data will be an excellent step towards at least vaguely understanding who the judges would consider competitive at that level, which up until now requires broad research of every team competing, their essays, videos, and if released, their presentations.
I’m going to say right now that the only team whos essay is on the FIRST website that I would consider to be on a level of their own is 3132. Quite simply, they exemplify the concept of measurable impact on the world, and their impact is at least an order of magnitude larger than anyone else who has won this year. Age may be the only reasonable thing that might be held against them, and even then, I’d say they’ve done more in 8 years than most teams older than them have done over their entire existence.
1511’s goals never waver; they just continue to expand.
Their standard of excellence continues to expand as well.
Jane
Would not surprise me to see 1676 as a finalist if they win this weekend.
Although only having just won Chairmans at SVR, I’d still bet on 971 being a finalist. The program has been doing lots over the years for all of FRC, even contributing to the KOP (sort of) and by selling the Spartan Board.
67 only won 1 Regional Chairman’s award (2005 West Michigan Regional), prior to winning the World Championship Chairman’s Award (2005).
So…the you do not have to win a bunch of regional/district Chairman’s awards to come up big at the World level.
If you have the right message and present it in the right way, anything can happen!
-Adam
Since we’re talking about amounts of Chairman’s awards won before a team got it at Champs, I’d like to point out that since 2011, every winning CCA team has had at least four Chairman’s awards. Not saying it’s a requirement, but it’s looking like the new standard.