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Post by thesinglerocketman on Nov 7, 2017 7:55:19 GMT -6
Morning coaches,
There has been talk in our area about a different playoff format. A tier system has been brought up. Some of the guys in the area have worries about what it would do to football. Some say it would "kill it". I would love to hear different playoff formats you all have experienced.
What are the positives and negatives to a playoff format like the tier system? Thanks. Hope you all had a good season.
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Post by Chris Clement on Nov 7, 2017 14:49:18 GMT -6
"Killing" football sounds a little dramatic.
What do they mean by tier system?
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Post by thesinglerocketman on Nov 7, 2017 15:45:43 GMT -6
"Killing" football sounds a little dramatic. What do they mean by tier system? Two divisions. Each division broken by previous years records. Move up to tier 1 if your record was "good". Move down if it wasn't so good. Split it down the middle. 1st and 2nd tier both have the opportunity to make the playoffs. I don't have a system in my head. I just know it's something being disguised in our area. |
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Post by Chris Clement on Nov 7, 2017 17:10:14 GMT -6
Yup. That’ll most definitely kill football. Nothing could be worse than giving weaker teams something to play for. Getting pasted in a hopeless campaign builds character, don’t you know.
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Post by coachwoodall on Nov 7, 2017 20:49:37 GMT -6
I've never understood the 'been good' versus 'been bad' historical line of thinking when it comes down to the meritocracy of being in the playoffs. If you're good enough to be considered one of the best, then you go play out the string versus the other teams that are considered the best.
If my team does really well/really bad for a season or two, why should the post season that I play in change? Or league? Or for that matter, why should the teams I play against have to move up/down?
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Post by thesinglerocketman on Nov 8, 2017 0:16:28 GMT -6
I've never understood the 'been good' versus 'been bad' historical line of thinking when it comes down to the meritocracy of being in the playoffs. If you're good enough to be considered one of the best, then you go play out the string versus the other teams that are considered the best. If my team does really well/really bad for a season or two, why should the post season that I play in change? Or league? Or for that matter, why should the teams I play against have to move up/down? I'm a bit confused coach, do you like the notion of a tier system? If it's the same league every year and you move up and down based on SOMETHING... I don't think some understand situations of programs. I ask... why are numbers going down? Just curious? |
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Post by coachwoodall on Nov 8, 2017 7:11:20 GMT -6
thesinglerocketman I might not understand what you mean by 'tier system', and I also probably shouldn't speak to things outside my experience. I can only go by what I have been around and what I have gathered from others. In my state we just added another classification to go 5. We don't have enough schools for 5 classifications, we barely have enough for 4. There were several reasons behind the move. 1- football had previously split into several sub-classifications for play off purposes only (the only sport to do so) so that we crowned 7 state champions. We had 4 classifications and then 3/4 split after the football season into a Division I and a Division II bracket. The 5 classifications created a level reward system for all sports. 2- the smaller schools got tired of a couple of private schools winning. They were league members for a very long time and it really didn't become a problem until the schools hired real good football coaches and had a string of decent athletes coming through. Fast forward to now, those 2 private schools are back to where they had been - decent football teams. ***Though these school do dominate the 'country club' sports still, they had always done that*** 3- About 25 years ago, our playoff structure expanded from the top 2 region finishers making the playoffs to the top 4 making the playoffs. So you had some in smaller regions making the playoffs with 1-2 region wins (some 2-8/1-9 overall). These teams then complained that there was too much of a disparity between the largest schools and smallest schools with each classification - so the DI/DII playoff brackets. 4- Big John. About 35 years ago there was 1 super sized school that was dominated the largest classification in football, and the DI/DII bracket started there to split that classification up. The problem was that it wasn't a merit based playoff, but simply the biggest 16 schools automatically made the playoffs regardless of record. The point I was trying to make was that with any classification division there will a smallest school and a largest school, a richest school a poorest school, a well supported school and a poorly supported school, genetically gifted school and genetically deficient school, etc..... I've read on here where there are some states that will make a school move up a division if they have success for several years in a row. This simply punishes or rewards a school's current talent/situation at the stake of the school's future talent/situation. I guess I need a better explanation of what your state's tier system entails.
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Post by Chris Clement on Nov 8, 2017 7:27:18 GMT -6
If you have a group of reasonably mature coaches then you can sit down and hash it out every season. Usually most of the teams will be obvious fits and you quibble over the last few. They fixed this by having 10-team divisions but dropping the bottom two teams into the lower draft vision for the playoffs. I don’t believe they’ve ever had a case where the D2 team legitimately had a case that they could have won D1.
However, coaches have considerably more job security, so they’re incentivized to think about more than their immediate job security and to make decisions in the long term interest of their programs. I don’t know if the culture there would result in people sandbagging or not.
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Post by joelee on Nov 8, 2017 13:56:22 GMT -6
"Killing" football sounds a little dramatic. What do they mean by tier system? Two divisions. Each division broken by previous years records. Move up to tier 1 if your record was "good". Move down if it wasn't so good. Split it down the middle. 1st and 2nd tier both have the opportunity to make the playoffs. I don't have a system in my head. I just know it's something being disguised in our area. Basing the tier on last seasons record is dumb. |
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Post by Chris Clement on Nov 8, 2017 15:31:05 GMT -6
Year to year records would definitely not be my way of splitting the tiers. There are lots of leagues that use relegation and promotion systems so look into those for insight.
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Post by thesinglerocketman on Nov 8, 2017 21:20:40 GMT -6
Two divisions. Each division broken by previous years records. Move up to tier 1 if your record was "good". Move down if it wasn't so good. Split it down the middle. 1st and 2nd tier both have the opportunity to make the playoffs. I don't have a system in my head. I just know it's something being disguised in our area. Basing the tier on last seasons record is dumb. I don't have a solution. Just questions. |
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Post by thesinglerocketman on Nov 8, 2017 21:21:56 GMT -6
Year to year records would definitely not be my way of splitting the tiers. There are lots of leagues that use relegation and promotion systems so look into those for insight. To be honest I don't know where to start on that research. Can you lead me in a direction? |
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Post by Chris Clement on Nov 8, 2017 21:33:52 GMT -6
European pro soccer?
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Post by carookie on Nov 10, 2017 17:16:25 GMT -6
Here in SoCal we use something similar to the tier system.
There are 13 divisions (nothing new, has been that way for decades). In the past divisions were divided up by leagues (usually 4-7 teams); leagues with bigger- more populated schools- tended to be in higher divisions while small school leagues went lower. Geography also played a role.
However, lots of large schools that never won in the playoffs complained. National powers like Long Beach Poly and Corona Centennial were in leagues with schools that constantly were losing in the playoffs. Moreover, there were a number of smaller and mid sized schools who were too good for their leagues and winning too much.
So now what they do for the playoffs is place teams into divisions based on their previous 2-years- combination of record and SOS. Division 1 has 18 teams, so all but 2 teams make it; all the way down to division 13 which has 66 teams. Leagues no longer play a role in what division a team is in; you can literally have all of your leagues teams play in a different playoff bracket.
Making it to the playoffs is done as such: teams that win their league are placed into the playoffs for their given division, then second place finishers, then third, then at large. HOWEVER, there are so many teams in the lower divisions that many third place finishers don't make the playoffs. IN essence smaller schools who would normally make playoffs as third seeds are forced out to make more spots for bigger schools in harder leagues.
I do not like this method, it punishes success and rewards failure. It is a ploy utilized by big schools who can't compete relative to their student population (which is the most logical variable for division when looking at public schools). The state tries to justify it by using the word "equitable" in that more diverse schools will make the playoffs- everyone gets a trophy type crap. But really its just giving in to the big population schools who can't compete; and allowing state organizations to justify their existence.
That being written, its gonna happen; I'd put up a fight to extend the window to 4 years as opposed to 2 and redo only every other year. If this was really about balancing out for those programs that are traditionally bad or dominant then a larger sample wouldnt impact them. Small two year sample sizes just punish schools for having a good class now and then.
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