Oz Tour Points Discussion

[kselrod]

"I do think it's bogus that twice as many ams are getting qualified as pros now. Ams have played as few as 5 events are getting in while Smitty has 15 event and some pros have 700+ points and are5n't in. I griped about this last year as well, but it sounded like most disagreed with me."

I'm confused by this statement? Aren't we all competing within our own divisions? 63% of the tour is made up of am's. So if two thirds are am's then twice as many am's would qualify.

The number of points a pro has is moot since they always get the most points per event by beating all the am's. So of course they have higher totals.

You can't penalize am's for making fewer events as we aren't playing for a paycheck. Due to my location (2-3+ hour drive to every tournament but one...my own) and all my family obligations as an am I can only attend a handful of events so I try to make the bigger tournaments since they are worth more.

All you hear all the time is trying to make this sport grow by bringing someone new out to play. If we do that aren't we getting more am's involved. So more am's equal more qualified spots, simple math. But if you expect am's to pay and not have a chance to qualify then the number of am's will decrease making the tour more 50/50.

The solution is getting upper am's to move into open and building that division up and getting more lower am's to move up too. But as a lower am you want to feel like you have something to compete for rather than donating money to give all the top players a free weekend on their dime. Then most of those am's will go back to playing on weekends with their buddies and not be a part of the tour.

Overall, doesn't that defeat the purpose of our sport? Just an opinion.

P.S. Didn't Smitty work the GBO rather then play which I would think would have given him more than enough points to qualify if he'd had played. Just goes to show you how selfless an act that was to not compete in one of the biggest tournaments in the country (which happens to be in his own back yard) and in return possibly cost him a chance to compete in the finals too. Maybe we should give a spot to one of the open players that didn't qualify because they give more to the sport than they receive. Call it the Smitty Sponsorship. Have all tour players submit a name as their vote and most votes get that person qualified. Something to think about?

[Schoen-hopper]

Can't argue with some of that. Looking back at the history, back when the skins match was in place, top 10, then top 12 players got in. That meant the ams had to beat out the pros to get in. When we killed off the skins contest and made the finals into a divisional tournament, we got what we have today. No doubt that the qualification system is more fair now for everyone than it was then.

My argument isn't that pro's shouldn't have to have more points. It's that they shouldn't have a smaller percentage of players qualified than the amateurs and they really shouldn't have to play that many more tournaments. These guys that are playing 12, 15, 20, 25, 30 tournaments a year are (any division) are the ones supporting the tour the most and they are the ones the points system is designed to reward. Yes, we make sure the top pro and am get in for each region and open up tournaments spots at the end of the year to give everyone a 2nd chance. But the idea is that those players who put a lot of their life into the tour get rewarded.

I don't think it's very far from being as fair as it can be. The main problem I see is that their is no incentive to move up. If you know it will take 800+ points to make top third, why would you sign up open? And when all the members who don't play any tournaments get put in intermediate by default, increasing the numbers in that field, why sign up advanced? I think the tourney bids keep it more than fair for the small divisions. Something small like 2 less spots in intermediate and 2 more in open might restore some balance in my opinion. It's not something I will push to see happen.

[kselrod]

I think one thing we can ALL agree on is it's probably impossible to come up with a perfect system. If you do then that person better patten it so they get paid...lol. I struggle every year trying to come up with a system to crown our club champion. I try to make it so the same person that blows everyone out at every tournament just isn't automatically the club champion. More likely he will end up being champion but I try to make the other members feel like they at least have a chance. It's not perfect either but at least they don't feel like they have to beat the best person in the club for a majority of the tournaments to just have a shot at the championship.

[iqbal]

This Chicago club gives plenty of incentive to move up.
http://www.pdga.com/tournament_results/97289

[Schoen-hopper]

$500 for DFL, yeehaw!

[kselrod]

This Chicago club gives plenty of incentive to move up.
http://www.pdga.com/tournament_results/97289

So what's the ruling from the PDGA on the guy that finished last but is listed as an AM? I guess he wouldn't be allowed to accept cash and can only accept merch unless he was able to up his membership before the tournament?

[Ruder]

"I do think it's bogus that twice as many ams are getting qualified as pros now. Ams have played as few as 5 events are getting in while Smitty has 15 event and some pros have 700+ points and are5n't in. I griped about this last year as well, but it sounded like most disagreed with me."

Who said that? I'm confused. Was it from another thread, or in person?

The number of points a pro has is moot since they always get the most points per event by beating all the am's. So of course they have higher totals.

True story.

You can't penalize am's for making fewer events as we aren't playing for a paycheck.

Penalize? There are plenty of pros (which includes Masters and GM) who sign up even though they may only play 2-3 events and essentially never have a shot to qualify and they are fine with that. God knows I never went to a tournament to win money. I did that a few times and its a recipe for disaster. Chalk up a disc golf trip as if its money I'll never see again. Anything I get back is just icing on the cake.

But if you expect am's to pay and not have a chance to qualify then the number of am's will decrease making the tour more 50/50.

What?

The solution is getting upper am's to move into open and building that division up and getting more lower am's to move up too. But as a lower am you want to feel like you have something to compete for rather than donating money to give all the top players a free weekend on their dime. (Practice, thats what all the top players did) Then most of those am's will go back to playing on weekends with their buddies and not be a part of the tour.

Overall, doesn't that defeat the purpose of our sport? Just an opinion.

You can't be afraid of losing players because they can't win or it gets too hard. I played a whole season in open and did nothing but donate money. I kept coming back because I wanted to place, then I wanted to win. I don't like the "Everyone gets to get home with a trophy, we're all winners today" mentality that seems to be appearing more often in general. Sometimes you lose and leave empty handed. Players packs take care of a lot, getting players a little something for their entry. Plus the KDGA points system really just rewards the people who play the most tournaments, as the more tournaments you play the more points you will get - which is exactly what it should do.

P.S. Didn't Smitty work the GBO rather then play which I would think would have given him more than enough points to qualify if he'd had played. Just goes to show you how selfless an act that was to not compete in one of the biggest tournaments in the country (which happens to be in his own back yard) and in return possibly cost him a chance to compete in the finals too. Maybe we should give a spot to one of the open players that didn't qualify because they give more to the sport than they receive. Call it the Smitty Sponsorship. Have all tour players submit a name as their vote and most votes get that person qualified. Something to think about?

That was awfully nice of him, but he would need more than GBO to get in this race. It would be easier Just to give Smitty and Mace an automatic bid every year into the finals as they are the backbone of the KDGA.

No matter how this weekend shapes up, there will be a few pros that deserve to be in the finals that won't be. Thats just how the dice roll sometimes.

[b]

Way back in the beginning of the Oz Tour we debated these same points; how to balance between participation and ability. Our soulution at that time was participation points. However, with only 10-15 events, and some of them only about 10 players, it was easier to maintain a balance. If you went all or most events you could place high in your division w/o winning any event
As the tour got bigger, and with some events drawing over 100 players, the participation points weren"t enough to offset the better players points. We then began trying double points for the smaller events to try and balance it out again. That worked for a while, but it didn"t help much with participation at the small events. Somehow, it was decided to reward the larger events with double and then triple points. This seems to create an even larger unbalance in the points. With 40+ events, you still must play in 1 or 2 of the larger events to have a chance in the point totals. I would like to see the points totals without any doubling or tripling. Simply playing well at a large event will give you many pts. over someone who doesn't play in it.
As for participation, if every event had a minimun points value, then those players who don't make many events would at least know they could stay in the chase. For instance, 10 pts. for last Oz member on up to 1st. This seems fairer than an across the board bonus to every player. Or possibly a guarantee of 15-20 pts. for 1st in the smaller events on down to last. I don"t believe the system should be imbalanced to allow a player who can only make 2 or 3 events to be in the point chase with someone who makes 10 or more, whichever events they may be.

Regarding the finals qualifiers, we are now allowing 1/3 of the total registered players, even though some do not participate at all. Most notably in the Am II, or INT, where 1/4 the field has 0-2 events. yet as many as 14 could qualify for the finals. With last chance, regional, and Friz-Rocker options, we are pushing 50% qualified for finals. I propose bunching all players in one totals list and then qualifying top 1/3 of those for the finals. I believe this would include 5-6 more pros and eliminate 4-5 ams, some of whom are now qualified with as few as 7 events. Yes, I believe those who play the tour should be in the finals.

[Schoen-hopper]

Way back in the beginning of the Oz Tour we debated these same points; how to balance between participation and ability. Our soulution at that time was participation points. However, with only 10-15 events, and some of them only about 10 players, it was easier to maintain a balance. If you went all or most events you could place high in your division w/o winning any event
As the tour got bigger, and with some events drawing over 100 players, the participation points weren"t enough to offset the better players points. We then began trying double points for the smaller events to try and balance it out again. That worked for a while, but it didn"t help much with participation at the small events. Somehow, it was decided to reward the larger events with double and then triple points. This seems to create an even larger unbalance in the points. With 40+ events, you still must play in 1 or 2 of the larger events to have a chance in the point totals. I would like to see the points totals without any doubling or tripling. Simply playing well at a large event will give you many pts. over someone who doesn't play in it.
As for participation, if every event had a minimun points value, then those players who don't make many events would at least know they could stay in the chase. For instance, 10 pts. for last Oz member on up to 1st. This seems fairer than an across the board bonus to every player. Or possibly a guarantee of 15-20 pts. for 1st in the smaller events on down to last. I don"t believe the system should be imbalanced to allow a player who can only make 2 or 3 events to be in the point chase with someone who makes 10 or more, whichever events they may be.

Regarding the finals qualifiers, we are now allowing 1/3 of the total registered players, even though some do not participate at all. Most notably in the Am II, or INT, where 1/4 the field has 0-2 events. yet as many as 14 could qualify for the finals. With last chance, regional, and Friz-Rocker options, we are pushing 50% qualified for finals. I propose bunching all players in one totals list and then qualifying top 1/3 of those for the finals. I believe this would include 5-6 more pros and eliminate 4-5 ams, some of whom are now qualified with as few as 7 events. Yes, I believe those who play the tour should be in the finals.

Those are some good thoughts Buddy. I especially found interesting the concept of a minimum point value being like 5 or 10 instead of 1. That would more heavily reward participation. But I think the participation / ability balance is already pretty good. There may be a few ams that would qualify instead of being knocked out by more skilled players who should be playing advanced. But for the pros it wouldn't help much. Smitty and Bo and Nate have all played a lot of events, more than most of those qualified in the divisions other than Open, but those that are currently top third in Open have even more tourneys than they do. Interesting thought moving back to qualifying without divisions. I think if you increased the participation factor, this could be reasonable. But more pros would get in for sure.

As far as giving more points to the events that are already the biggest: the idea is actually to make it so that people don't have to play as many events to compete. So that actually rewards ability over participation. It may hurt smaller events some, but it also drives smaller events to become larger to get the double points the following year. What if instead of double points, the minimum number of points was 10 for bigger events instead of 5? Best way to look at this might be to draw up some scenario's with this years tour points. I probably can't get to it until after the finals, but I could make some revisions to look at. Single points only, a higher minimum # of points, top third overall qualifying instead of divisional, etc.