Numbers Management

[vferrera]

It's no secret that early season scores tend to veer wildly out of control. But this season is off the charts.

I understand that the judges are excited about Crown. But at their current rate of climb, Crown is projected to score 113.2 on Aug 8. That's 14 pts higher than the highest score. Oh, and it's 13 pts higher than the maximum allowed.

Given that scores are all relative, it would not hurt for the DCI office to exert a little top-down control.

My suggestion is that DCI issue a memo stating a TARGET for the top score in the country for each day of the season. That would be the score for the best corps in the country on that date. To help with the math, they should also break it down into captions and subcaptions.

Given that the top score at finals is about 99.0 and that the season is about 50 days long, the top score on opening day should be about 74.0 and should increase about 0.5 each day thereafter.

Again, this would be a TARGET score. Judges could go a little over or under.

Today, July 4, is the 16th day of the season, so the target score would be 82.0.

[Dylan Ford]

And what happens if a corps legitimately should score better than the "target" score on any given note?

[Huntington Mallets]

*slams head on table*

[TerriTroop]

Who's to say that there isn't already an internal understanding in the judging community of the "target" score? Are the scores "wildly" out of control because Crown is, for the moment, usurping the usual top 3 contenders? Score projections don't mean anything. Maybe "numbers management" has a different look this year than in years past due to some off-season work by judges and DCI?

[brlucmo]

Trust me, the scores will slow down. If you look at 2002, Cavaliers were scoring a bit higher than Crown is now (less than a point) at this date. You can't go off the logic of "at this rate so and so will score this."

[chaos001]

once Visual performance, colorguard, and brass are added to the judging...things will simmer down substantially.

[barigirl78]

The scores aren't out of control. The angst about the scores is out of control.

In due course, the corps will have a full compliment of judges and corps from different parts of the country will face each other with the same judges.

Things will sort out. They always have and they always will.

To me, it's all very exciting and intriguing.

[Tez]

It's no secret that early season scores tend to veer wildly out of control. But this season is off the charts.

I understand that the judges are excited about Crown. But at their current rate of climb, Crown is projected to score 113.2 on Aug 8. That's 14 pts higher than the highest score. Oh, and it's 13 pts higher than the maximum allowed.

Given that scores are all relative, it would not hurt for the DCI office to exert a little top-down control.

My suggestion is that DCI issue a memo stating a TARGET for the top score in the country for each day of the season. That would be the score for the best corps in the country on that date. To help with the math, they should also break it down into captions and subcaptions.

Given that the top score at finals is about 99.0 and that the season is about 50 days long, the top score on opening day should be about 74.0 and should increase about 0.5 each day thereafter.

Again, this would be a TARGET score. Judges could go a little over or under.

Today, July 4, is the 16th day of the season, so the target score would be 82.0.

What good will this do at all?

What exactly is the problem with the way the scores are right now? Are you really afreaid that Crown will actually score above 100 if something is not done about it?

[audiodb]

It's no secret that early season scores tend to veer wildly out of control. But this season is off the charts.

I understand that the judges are excited about Crown. But at their current rate of climb, Crown is projected to score 113.2 on Aug 8. That's 14 pts higher than the highest score. Oh, and it's 13 pts higher than the maximum allowed.

Given that scores are all relative, it would not hurt for the DCI office to exert a little top-down control.

My suggestion is that DCI issue a memo stating a TARGET for the top score in the country for each day of the season. That would be the score for the best corps in the country on that date.

And how do the judges know who is the best corps in the country when they're not all competing head-to-head?

[paultxsa]

It's no secret that early season scores tend to veer wildly out of control. But this season is off the charts.

I understand that the judges are excited about Crown. But at their current rate of climb, Crown is projected to score 113.2 on Aug 8. That's 14 pts higher than the highest score. Oh, and it's 13 pts higher than the maximum allowed.

Given that scores are all relative, it would not hurt for the DCI office to exert a little top-down control.

My suggestion is that DCI issue a memo stating a TARGET for the top score in the country for each day of the season. That would be the score for the best corps in the country on that date. To help with the math, they should also break it down into captions and subcaptions.

Given that the top score at finals is about 99.0 and that the season is about 50 days long, the top score on opening day should be about 74.0 and should increase about 0.5 each day thereafter.

Again, this would be a TARGET score. Judges could go a little over or under.

Today, July 4, is the 16th day of the season, so the target score would be 82.0.

...except that scores really don't have the meaning that you're giving them at this stage of the season.

Until every corps performs at the same show with the same sets of judges/panels, this is all just like trying to measure how tall somebody across the street is by holding up your thumb and index finger at arms length and saying, "you're this big".....then taking your thumb and finger down the street to see if your other friend is taller.

High/low, East/West, inflation/deflation....none of it matters until everybody comes out of the same tunnel at the same show...until then, I think it's just subjective opinions based on small samples.

...anyway, my $0.02