It is similarly disparaging for you to suggest that the (honestly, limited) problems with this tournament emerged from a lack of interest or regard. I mean, good lord Tom Moore, surely you of all people should not be suggesting that having some problems with your event automatically indicates a lack of investment or commitment.
Huh? I have ran two events at your school. One more high school event than your club personally put on before last Saturday not just this year, but between last school year and this school year. Not only did each of those events draw a larger field than the one yours put on last January, but my events largely ran well. In fact, they were ran far better than this one and none of them had nearly a significant an issue in either time delays or other errata. I had a minor staffing issue in this previous fall's iteration of my event that was caused because one of your club members (who I had penned in as a reader) did not show up until 10:30am-11am, so I had to utilize the reading of a coach who overstated his reading ability. Nevertheless, I put on well-ran tournaments that I made possible despite the fact that both times you sent teams to events in Chicago and Ann Arbor the day of my event, well aware that an agreement was in place with me to co-host an event, (in which your club was given a $25/team cut – equating to a nice sum for providing free rooms and a few staff members) with zero consultation with me if I had any objection or concern about such conflict.
Concerning lack of interest or regard: it is perfectly reasonable to claim that you have a lack of interest for our accentuating and familiarizing yourself with our high school community. Or, at least until it was time to put NAQT states on, had. You are more than welcome to challenge the correctness of the following, but I do not believe I am mistaken when I say that...
You have directed zero Ohio high school events previous to NAQT states in the two years that you have been in Columbus, despite the fact you are a member of a well-respected and productive national organization whose stated objectives include “to promote and encourage the growth of high-quality tournaments”. In fact, I don't believe you ever been
seen at a high school tournament in the Columbus area or Ohio (except, possibly, the one that your club personally put on last year?!) in your time here. I think it is fair to say that you were awarded the bid to host NAQT states because of your stature in the quizbowl community that is outside of Ohio and on the collegiate circuit, and not because you had any crafted working relationships (or any track record in our community) with anyone in Ohio outside of Ohio State or were recommended by members of our community to do so.
Well, not really - I stepped in after one of our reader spots disappeared, but normally you don't adjudicate protests on the fly anyway. They can be handled in between rounds. Perhaps this is another Ohio culture I'm not familiar with, but NAQT has very clearly established protest procedures (that are followed, for instance, at nationals). Now, it IS true that readers weren't briefed on this point - had I been on hand to run the morning meeting, I surely would have. So, that's on me. But I am a little surprised that your 34 tournaments since 2014 didn't clue you into the fact that you can tell teams to go to their next round, and that staff would let them know about protest resolution...
I had zero protests in my room. I brought this up because a) had I a protest, especially one that would have determined whether or not a game would go into overtime, I would've been lost on what to do and it is highly illogical to assume, ad hoc, that such a resolution could've been done in between rounds or after the dismissal of teams in that instance and b) it was the case, in a room and bracket different than mine, that there was a significant protest in the afternoon that impeded the ability of rooms to change between the conclusions of (I believe it was) rounds 9 and 10. Indeed, I have a first-hand account from the coach of a team who finished their round 9 game but who was forced to wait to play in round 10 because the protest and room in question had failed to adjudicate the delay on the spot, let alone get teams out of the room, because you were reading when you did NOT need to be and thus rendering you unable to be reached and consulted by the staffers of the room in question to resolve the dispute and get things moving. I was told that it was a thirty minute wait from that coach to play their round 10 match because of that snafu.
I don't even know how to interpret this comment. Every coach who signed up to read served as a reader for this tournament. We indeed had 4 coaches staffing. I don't know what Coach Sedlack's status was, but I'm certainly not going to go pester a coach who might want to coach his team at the state championship and forcibly conscript him to read.
Not only is the latter a bad faith interpretation (“forcibly conscript” is a blatant misrepresentation of what it means to ask a coach if they'd be willing to volunteer – you of all people, since your experience is unmatched, should know that it is perfectly acceptable and commonplace to politely ask a coach with reading experience if they would be willing to read if the other option is the tournament director having to abandon their post and fill the vacancy, which is suboptimal) of my post, but this comment in particular is bothersome because of the very nature of the e-mail correspondence we had in January, in which I suggested to you a list of coaches that are great readers and who I know likely would not mind being politely asked if they could read if their services were needed. In fact, direct quote:
Mike Sedlack, Fisher Catholic (Mike is established as one of the best readers in the state of Ohio. I may be biased since he was my coach, but he’s read at HSNCT multiple times as well as countless top-brackets at NAQT States as well as the OAC State Tournament.)
Why you did not impress into yourself, or your backup TD, that he was going to be one of the most-reputed and experienced readers available in the entire building that day and it wouldn't have hurt to ask him if he'd be willing to step in and read if a vacancy occurred, I have no idea. You were told of his credentials, and you assumed that he was reluctant to read when really you had no interest in asking him if he wanted to read. You could have asked me if I thought he'd be willing to, because I know Mike personally and I at the very least could have asked him to come to the control room so you could ask him yourself. But, since you are so unfamiliar with this circuit, you were unaware of the fact that he often reads at many events and would never refuse (or be annoyed at) a request to read if his service was needed. Additionally, he came up with me, I believe, to the readers meeting and I believe he asked if he was needed to read, to which he was told you guys were covered. Who were these four readers, by the way? I only saw Bellas and Meeron, but maybe Peter Bergman was reading too (I'm assuming that's who you are referring to in your acknowledgments above.) Who was the fourth reader? And what were his credentials?
I agree it was an unnecessary delay at all. When Joe told me the teams were ready to play the final, I told him I'd be right in; immediately after that, an extremely high-tension situation was brought to my attention. I don't wish to get into details here, but suffice to say that it was extreme enough that it totally consumed my attention. I didn't realize how long it had been until later. This is 100% on me, and was an entirely preventable mistake.
I was in the control room when the high-tension situation was being discussed, after the conclusion of the event. While I agree that the details of it are best not discussed publicly, the high-tension situation as best I as understand - through talking to (and over-hearing) several people who have more direct and first-hand knowledge of the dispute that boiled over into a high-tension situation - could've been dealt with earlier in the tournament (e.g. as soon as it happened), and probably would not have been as awful and nasty, had you been easily accessible in the control room (where you should have been in the first place.) You were the executive official in the tournament, and one of those responsibilities included being easily accessible in the event that your services as a mediator were needed. You reading unnecessarily, when you should have been TD'ing, inhibited your ability to act as the tournament official that the parties in question were relying on to be able to resolve the dispute central to the situation in the first place as soon as the issue arose.
I'm told that previous state tournaments had clearissues with this, and we were very proactive about reaching out to outside staffers and training up our own.
I do not support this account, at all. I have staffed every NAQT State event since I graduated high school, and I do not believe this to be even remotely correct. I have zero recollection of any reader issues, let alone reader performance issues at the events in question both as a player and reader. And if you're going to call out the previous state tournaments, you should know that the director of said tournaments in question did a far greater job than you did and has a reputation for always putting on high-quality events (something you have not built yet, here.)
And I really don't appreciate your very blatant misuse of how much you "care about the game" to justify it. You know, we all care deeply about the game - its integrity, its promotion, and the experience of participants. I have been caring deeply about the game longer than you have, and many coaches here have been caring deeply about the game longer than I. It would be, for instance, absurd and offensive for me to suggest that coaches who prefer the Page playoff schedule "care less" about the game because they'd rather have more teams with a shot than maximize games between the teams with the best shot.
This is complete bull. You have not, in fact, been caring deeply about the Ohio quiz bowl circuit longer than I have, let alone the Central Ohio one. This is a blatant lie and you know it. You're
not going to sit here and tell me that I have effectively not cared about the game in my area when you yourself have shown a complete lack of interest in even acquainting yourself with the participants and coaches of the game right in your backyard since you've been here.
That said, we did have one particularly infuriating drop literally an hour before the tournament; the reason stated was, "the day will run far too late and we will be unable to attend." Now, as the coaches who attended know, the email with the projected schedule was sent out weeks in advance, and the email with a firm estimated endline was sent out in the week prior to the tournament. So, either this excuse is nonsense, or (more likely), this team just didn't care enough to notify me in a timely way. It's unfortunate, but as you say Bob - we've all dealt with it.
Hey, this a terrible thing to happen to you and I completely agree that this is unfortunate.
To be clear, teams finishing second in this scenario get 2 extra games against top teams they would not have otherwise received. Teams that finish first in their bracket get 2 fewer games against top teams. It's a tradeoff. In typical Tom Moore fashion, you're speaking in these extremes, as if there is only one vantage point from which to see. Now, it's perfectly defensible to argue that those 6 teams getting a few more quality games and the top 6 getting a few less is a worthwhile tradeoff; I think it's better to go the other way, but it's a reasonable position either way. But that's not what you're doing. You're suggesting that these teams were just screwed, well, just because; that isn't the story here, and I wish you would stop spinning it that way.
The two-flight system has been standard practice for the NAQT state tournament here for sometime now. I will grant that you likely did not know this, but this is beside the point. The impression given to teams was that it was going to be two-flights. And that underlies my point on why teams got screwed... I talked to a coach whose team finished second in their (rather unbalanced) bracket and thought that their team was going to be in a championship flight. According to that same coach, the coach of another school who also finished second was disappointed (if not, unhappy) to find out that his reasonable assumption that his team was going to be playing in a championship flight in the afternoon, based on what was explained in the opening meeting, was incorrect because of this change. And I wish that you would stop spinning coach's reactions and discontent of their teams being dis-serviced by the format change as “if there is only vantage point from which to see.” They are your customers. Their vantage point > your vantage point. Full stop. You do not know better than the coaches about what the coaches wanted and expected, and it is apparent that you thought you knew better in this case. Evidently, you did not.
Wait, what? There was no computational math in this set - a single bonus that said pencil and paper ready. And really, it shouldn't have - you didn't need pencil and paper for that question, and it's unclear why NAQT thought it would be particularly helpful. That said, NAQT doesmake quite clear that some bonuses will ask for pencil and paper (I'm surprised you didn't encounter this at your "34 events since 2014"). You should not have skipped this question - though I understand why, in the moment, you decided it was best to do so. Really, the fault lies with NAQT here - I think they should stop having these instructions in bonuses, it just confused people.
I had no idea whether or not there was going to be computational math in the set or not. Your club, who played this set, didn't convey to us (or at least all of the readers) that there would not be any comp math or for that matter
pencil and paper ready. I admit that this complaint may be somewhat pedantic, but I found it worth bringing up based on the instance I mentioned. And I did not read take the time to read through the bonus to discern whether or not it needed “pencil and paper for that question.” You want to know why? One of the schools in that round was a new-to-quizbowl school, and it would have come off as rather shady (if not patronizing) had I taken the 10-15 seconds of examining the bonus to examine its “answerability.” It was quite reasonable for me to offer the solution to both teams to just skip the bonus, because I was in no position (based on my limited math knowledge) to determine if the bonus could actually be
solved without pencil and paper and it would not have been fair to the team receiving the bonus (who didn't have any, nor who I could provide with some because we weren't given any at any point in the tournament – which is generally standard practice).
I have no idea what your statement, that I put into bold, is supposed to mean. I'm aware that NAQT sets usually have
pencil and paper ready bonuses. Are you? If so, why weren't we given paper and pencils to provide for the teams so that said bonuses could be answered? You're assuming that teams, especially have new-to-quizbowl teams (which was the case of the team who received the bonus), have the wherewithal to know to bring pencil and paper ready to a tournament.
Though I'd say in this case it's fair to point out that the compelling, clearly-fitting finals series between Beavercreek and Dublin would essentially never have been possible under the Page format.
So I want to touch briefly on this. In one of the earlier posts, you said “This year,
where we had two teams far ahead of the rest of the field who played a truly remarkable finals series,that would have been quite the significant detriment to the tournament.”
I contest this, and I think everyone in attendance would contest this. Why? Because anyone who has paid ten minutes of attention to Ohio high school quizbowl this year knows that we have/had three teams in Fred Morlan's top 25 nationally. Anyone who had been paying attention to quizbowl in the Buckeye State before last Saturday would've known that, in addition to Dublin Scioto and Beavercreek, there was also Miami Valley who was very good. Indeed, you should look at their PPB in comparison to those aforementioned two teams as well as their margin of loss to Beavercreek in the afternoon. You don't think they deserved a shot at the title? I don't believe it would be fair to say that they deserved to be eliminated from the title with just one loss in the afternoon (or, N+1 loss of the second place team in the afternoon.) This is why the two flight-system would've been a more fair way to adjudicate the state champion in addition to a page playoff.
You're writing this colossal screed against this tournament, and it... started 30 minutes late. It also still finished on time (early, actually).
I'm sorry that you failed to realize that if the only flaw of the event was that it started 30 minutes late, we wouldn't be having this discussion. What do you have to say about the fact that some teams weren't able to have a practical chance at having lunch because of the fact some brackets (or, bracket?) ran way further behind than the other brackets? Or the fact that I very clearly indicated that this tournament's dysfunction in its organization (in the final product), its inability to follow the established criteria conveyed from the beginning, and its lack of timeliness were three things that likely would leave a negative impression of pyramidal quizbowl to these new-to-quizbowl teams. For as much time as you spent thinking of these passive-aggressive jabs, you spent absolutely zero time nor carpal movement acknowledging that this tournament did not have the makings of a good first impression for these teams... which was one of my primary complaints in the first place. I'm reasonably worried that some of these schools will not come out and give pyramidal quizbowl, whose outreach in the Central Ohio area I have done far more of than you have, a second chance. And that's what probably has burnt me up the most about this tournament's screw-ups.
I put on my OAC Fall events at your club specifically because I felt that your club deserved the chance to prove themselves and build up their reputation as invested, capable people who care about their role and image within the Ohio quizbowl community... because frankly after Jarret Greene and folks graduated, this was not the impression anyone really had of your club. And no one thought that because you joined Ohio State, that all of the sudden everything was magically fixed because we don't know you and we are a community that believes that you have to
earn a reputation. I truly believe that a strong, reputable Ohio State academic team is for the benefit of our community, and I find your passive-aggressive bulls*** to be a poor public reflection of your club and to the outsiders reading this.
There was indeed an exceptionally detailed backup plan in place; you're simply wrong about everything you're saying here.
Apparently, it wasn't employed then. So, that's not my problem; that's yours.
This is inaccurate, unfair, and makes presumptions you are grossly misinformed about. I was indeed at a conference the week before the event, but I left plenty of time to get back - indeed, I told my teammates that I would not be reachable until "late Friday night" because I explicitly did not want to even be unavailable when I said I would be, in case I had travel delays. What I did not expect, nor I doubt reasonably could have, was nearly 24 hours of repeated disasters and airline screwery. This does not "typically happen in the airline industry." This was an absolutely freak occurrence, and I take issue with your characterization that it was somehow attributable to my "bullishness" (about what??).
I am not disputing that academic conferences are important, and, in case it isn't clear, I am not questioning your necessity for attending said conference. What I was calling into question is why you decided to be the tournament director, given that you have no track record in Ohio, when it was possible that you would have been unable to be in Columbus the morning of the event.
Now... I was under the impression that what happened, based on what I was told from several people, was that you originally had one flight leaving Chicago on the return trip to Columbus and that it was canceled, thus rendering you unable to be in Columbus until the next morning. I would've asked you myself, Chris, what happened but frankly I had no idea how much sleep you had (and, having not met you before, have no indication as to your temperament in-person) and given that it appeared your glasses had broken recently (like, that day... maybe I'm wrong/not the point, though), I thought it was best to stay clear away from anything that could have potentially annoyed you. That is why I did not voice any of the criticisms that I posted here to you at the time – I thought that it could cause a huge fight at a time that, frankly, was not appropriate for one. And I recognize also that you were faced with the unforeseen and particularly disadvantageous circumstance of dealing with the anti-abortion people and their deal. That sucked, I agree and frankly I'm sympathetic that you had to deal with that crap.
If, indeed, it was more than just a simple flight cancellation (which it now appears to be the case), then I sincerely apologize and recognize that it was wrong of me to assume and post so. The impression I got was that you were expecting one flight to come into Columbus and not get canceled, not multiple ones and whatever other factors caused that misfortune you experienced. For the record, I mentioned the bullishness with regard to changing the schedule (which you yourself admit was you being bullish, based on your belief that the one-flight system was fairer to certain teams and thus okay to rid of the two-flight system), the finals incident, and the fact that you left HQ/control room/”war room” to go read in the vacancy of a reader when there was no good apparent reason for you to do so (you not wanting to politely ask Mike Sedlack if he'd be willing to fill the vacancy, when it would have been perfectly reasonable to do so and Mike would've been understanding and possibly, if not likely, to heed to the request, is not a good nor apparent reason) which did cause an issue for some teams (going back to that protest that took forever to resolve, thus forcing the delay that I described earlier in this post) and their ability to play their final game and get going. That is what I'm referring to: your insistence on things being done
your way, without considering the impact it could have had on the tournament experience for teams in attendance, made for unnecessary snafu's that could have been otherwise avoided.