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Most corps today are between 130-160 with subsets. 76 is very weak. I'd bet that info you have doesn't include subsets. I'm sure the number from Bucs does. Not an apples to apples comparison. Either way, the number of sets has little bearing on the judging. Only how they are utilized on the field.

Because, while they may have won overall that night, they wouldn't have won my caption if I was on Visual Effect. And based on the scoring this year, other Visual Effect judges would side with me, as they mostly did all season. All but 1 as a matter of fact. Even on the panel Sunday night the Vis Effect judges didn't see the same show as one had Cabs up and one had Bucs. It wasn't 9 of 9. It was 8 of 9. Semantic argument, yes of course. The night before, no Vis Effect judge had Bucs up, it was a split between MBI and Cabs. All season long Cabs were winning Effect except for Scranton, and the same judge that put them down in Scranton, had them up by a BIG number in Prelims. So, I feel like I'm on the right side of the fence on this one. "But all season doesn't matter, only Sunday night matters". Yes this is true for scoring, but the design of the show isn't all that different from what we see in Wildwood, just tweaks and execution. Content is not 100% different. Between Prelims and Finals, maybe one change... if that. This content conversation is something you and I could both have all the way to Wildwood 2015. If you really believe that Bucs had so much more content in their show, I'd love to see you post a head to head comparison of each impact-full moment as you see it... but you probably won't like the results in the end. I've studied both programs, as I have been a big Bucs fan in the past... this year, I just think was their weakest, show wise. Clearly, it was still strong enough to get the job done. At the end of the day though, both programs were entertaining. So it really doesn't matter who's had more content. What matters is that this year, DCA thrived with competition and the fans won. Its that fact alone that has me looking forward to 2015... That, and I want to see Fusion win their first DCA Open Class Championship.

Listen, I'm not here to try and convince two or three people to throw out all of their Bucs souvies and buy Cabs souvies. There is absolutely nothing wrong with enjoying their program. They had a hell of a show put together and they performed it very well on Sunday. If you scroll back a few pages, you'll see not only did I give them credit for their win, but admitted they were the better corps that night. Maybe the Bucs should be happy I'm not their judge, but the same goes for you and the Cabs. I'm not coming on here trying to argue the two programs, just peoples rationale and some of the silly comments. If what you wrote is what you took from their program, that is totally fine. I gave several specific examples about what Cabs did to support their theme and their show, and you gave several examples for Bucs. You helped prove my point. My initial post was regarding VOREASON saying Bucs had "A load more" content. My argument still stands. They didn't have a load more. They had exactly what they needed to support their show, just like Cabs. If I missed a few things, than that's just how I received it. I saw Bucs several times this year and still, even on Sunday, thought that the strength of their theme was weaker than in years past where you had no question what was going on. Conversely, in years past when the Cabs seemed to be just mashing a few classic Hawthorne titles together with no apparent theme, this year they had one of the strongest in the circuit. That was the basis for my whole discussion.

I think you've been watching a different set of shows all year. You were having this problem even back in mid July back in the Secaucus thread.

Well... this one I completely disagree with you on. A "Load more"? No not even close. I'll argue until the cows come home and the fat lady sings that Cabs had more content. Your eye line moves a lot more during their program, bouncing around the field in all areas because of the incredible variety that show had. In each moment, there was another concept taking place to strengthen the overall theme. I don't think Reading had that. Short of having sections move in front of the pit a few times during the show, there wasn't a whole lot of "Breaking through" that happened until the very end. But Cabs had an incredible seduction theme that took place and grew over the course of their entire program. Starting from the solo dancer in the beginning, to the color guard, the Tubas, Mellos, then the Baris,with their uniform change as they were seduced, than Drum line, all the way until the end... the whole temptress theme was very, very strong, even with the soloists and how they were used. I also didn't hear any type of musical demand from their hornline like Cabs had with all the runs and difficult musical passages, as well as the strong staging challenges lining those up in forms stretching across the entire field. Readings show was block form, open curve, block form, line, block form the entire show. For those that were hard on the Cabs for what they claimed "minimal moving", no one had much to say about Reading standing still the last 50 seconds of their show 10 feet from the front seats. It's not a problem they did this as its an AMAZING effect moment and absolutely propels the crowd off their feet... but lets not be hypocritical here. Its a very smart design to gain a big reaction.

Totally agree. Way too many gray areas, which can explain weekend to weekend swings in this caption. Brass/Percussion/and Color Guard are simple. How is the design, and do they perform it well. But this effect caption seems to be all about, how does the judge "Feel" about certain things. I will say this though, after reading through the whole post above, I truly have no idea how Cabs didn't win the effect caption. They had more of what is being asked for in that text than any other group. Variety, Integration, Highs and lows, visual communication of the music (dancing/choreo) and artistic staging of performers than any other show.

Honestly. They came out on fire. It wasn't a matter of one corps peeking before another. If your peeking finals weekend, your peeking at the right time. When we think they "Peeked too early" I think mid-season or Scranton weekend. That clearly wasn't the case with either of these two corps. I think part of it was the fact that, looking at the recaps all year long, Judges were giving the Bucs better top book numbers... it was the execution that hurt them all season. Given the energy they brought to the performance Sunday night, it would seem they cleaned up those execution numbers on the one show that really mattered. That being said, Cabs brought the house down as well with just as much energy. In fact, from a crown response perspective, the crowd was much more enthusiastic at the end of Cabs show. Bucs didn't get as much applause at the end in terms of performance energy other than what anyone would give for a big hornline that's right in your face 10 feet from the front set of seats. For that one night, the one that mattered most, Bucs were perceived by the judges to be a little cleaner.

You got me. In my quest to type a 2035 word post I type the letter O twice. Good thing you were here to catch it.

Ok- deep breath. Big post. So here it goes.... First and foremost, I want to congratulate the members and staff of the Reading Buccaneers on their win on Sunday. I have no doubt they worked very hard to get that win and no one can say they didn't earn it. Regardless of ones personal feelings on the outcome, you can't not acknowledge that they had a great show, and it is apparent that everyone within that organization was working at their max to make that show as great as it could be. I would say both MBI and Cabs were probably putting in the same work ethic so I don't think its a "one corps won because they worked harder than the other" thing. As said before in this and other threads, I think any of the three shows could have won that night. I am bias in that I was a Cabs fan all year and was routing for them to win, and they didn't. But it doesn't mean I can't acknowledge the team that did. The one and only thing George Hopkins says that I agree with is that there are real people in those uniforms, and they are just as emotional as the fans. Now for a few of my thoughts on the many topics being discussed on the boards currently. (Like any of you really care what I think anyway, but hey, it's a discussion forum for a reason right??) Penaltygate: I think the rule that caused the penalty needs to be addressed by the administrations during the next rules congress. I'm not saying it should be eliminated as a boundary is there for a reason. But 1 full point is a hell of a lot. I remember only a few years ago it was a 10th for each infraction. A penalty is a penalty and enforcing it does show that regardless of the situation of the corps, no one is immune. That being said, the amount of the detraction seems very high. I would also argue it needs to be consistent as I saw infractions with many corps that evening in one form or another. I was on the 30 yard line 3 seats up from the front wall and saw this happen right in front of me. The two observations I had was one: The line judge was in the perfect place to see this happen. He was furiously writing notes on his clipboard during the Cabs show from halfway through the show to the end. It looked to me like he was noting all the uniforms tops the performers took off as they all went over the front sideline. This is not a penalty as they are considered equipment I believe. But I did think it was interesting that the judge didn't write anything down for any other corps, but it looked like he was writing a book for Cabs before and after the infraction. The second observation is that I didn't see him move from the right side of the field the whole show. He pretty much floated between the 30-35 right were the dancer went out of bounds. For every other corps, he went all around the field. I'm not saying foul play... but I do think something fishy was going on there. I would not have been surprised if he was tipped off on where to look. If it's true this person was out of bounds in Prelims and in previous weeks, it wouldn't be hard for Corps A to say, "Hey, watch for this it might happen". Regardless of the fact that the penalty didn't change the placement, I do think it's still worth discussing. If he was tipped off, shame on DCA, the judge, and the organization that did the tipping. Every corps gets away with a little something, especially finals weekend. Just like how no one was supposed to use noise making tempo equipment in the warmup area and I was told both blue teams and the white team were wailing away on Gock blocks and Dr. Beats... no penalties there it seems. If the dancer did commit the infraction in previous weeks, that is on the Cabs for not catching it, and shame on DCA for not enforcing the penalty sooner to prevent this whole situation. Consistent Scoring: I never thought I would agree with him, but a few pages ago VOREASON said something about the judges keeping things close all year and getting free reign Finals day. While we don't and never will know what, if anything, were the instructions from DCA, there is no doubt in my mind, that the storyline between Cabs and Bucs made for some good profit this year. DCA is a business in the end and the more people following the story means more ticket sales, more merchandise, more coverage, more advertising, more everything. I don't doubt for a second that after Wildwood, when everyone knew something different was going to happen this year, that the judging panels were told to keep if close. I'm not saying that Corps A was setup to always win or loose to Corps B... but keep it interesting. Thats not fair to all the corps involved. It sets one up for a big blow and if this did in fact happen, its a big blow to a corps that really could have used the win after a long wait to get back to that spot. If they didn't earn it.. then they didn't earn it. But I do find it really interesting how they were within a half point all season one way or the other, than finals night... BAM, 1.02 down. Bucs had a big 1.7 point swing in 24 hours. Anyone who has been in drum corps long enough knows that you don't/can't clean that much out of your show in 24 hours. Bottom line, if Bucs could have cleaned that much THAT fast, they would have done it after Scranton when they were within a half tenth, and after Reading, when they were .55 down. I highly, highly doubt that their work ethic changed that drastically in 24 hours. I'm sure they were pushing hard the whole time. Yes, Bucs had a hell of a show Sunday night, and it WAS better than Saturday afternoon. But so was MBI, and so was Cabs. It was consistently better all the way across. Fusion and C2 also had better shows. So I am absolutely scratching my head on how Prelims was consistent with June-August and Finals was like drawing a number from a hat. (And for the record, the Judge in Scranton who made it close between Cabs and Bucs, gave Cabs a big/proper Vis Effect number in Prelims well above Bucs.... so yes, Scranton was the exception. Plug the standard 2/10ths or 3/10ths above number in the way it was all season and Scranton was .50 ish spread between the two. Not .05) Any by the way- that kind of happens every year. Finals always see's big swings that are inconsistent from the rest of the year. Why is that? Is it because the finals panel doesn't see the Prelims recap when during the year they can see the week prior? If that's the case, make it consistent throughout the year. If it really is supposed to be a clean slate each day, than change how this system operates. And for those saying "Hey it's any given day" just remember this could effect your team too. I've been watching/marching in DCA for a while. There are ABSOLUTELY times where a team got credit they probably shouldn't have gotten. Case in point, in Wayne, I sat next to a friend of mine who has judged DCI for a few years and has been in Music for 2 decades. He wholly felt that Fusion should have beaten Bucs in Wayne. But they weren't really that close in the numbers. The same goes for Kingston. Truthfully, Fusion should have topped Cabs in Kingston. They were better visually and musically. I'm not saying they would have stayed on top after, but for that weekend, they had it all. Each teams outcome could be different. Its all a matter of opinion anyway. Which brings me to point three.. How do we get judging to be less vague and subjective: I know it's not easy. But the CRAZY numbers swing between the Blue and Red team this weekend is a head scratcher. I would say the same thing if it went the other way too. It's just too inconsistent. How do we make it less so..? We don't know whats on the sheets so it's completely speculative, but what thoughts have you? Judges that said most of the year that Cabs had the better program suddenly and drastically felt differently in Finals. Even judges that saw them two weeks prior? Lets be honest... other than being cleaner, the programs didn't change that much at all. The design was still the same. The only difference is each team had less errors. How the blue team received a few perfect numbers Sunday night when their show didn't earn those design numbers the day before really makes me question the integrity of the entire system. No I am not a judge, I never have been. But I'm a huge drum corps fan with many years of experience. I know what a good hornline/drumline sounds like. I know what a good corps looks like on the move in todays day and age. All the corps had the same show between the two nights, just a tad more energy once the sun went down. Where do we go from here??: Over the past few years, it seems like DCA has gotten locked into a certain style show that they prefer. This year was the best year in a long time for competition and drama. It was fun no matter what the outcome was. But what happened Sunday night to the Cabs was a blow to them, no question. And it was a blow to a big fan base. I've seen many groups take a hit Finals weekend between the two nights (more often than not, it's the Cabs, even when I hated them). Could I suggest maybe a three night weekend? Move to a Quarter, Semi's, Finals type of format. Sure the number of corps competing makes it hard to dwindle over three days. I would suggest Prelim's no one gets eliminated. Allow each corps a second change in Semi's. Semi's dwindles down the pack into who goes into Finals like we do now. And Finals is setup like we do, on Sunday night. Yes, that makes the weekend one day longer, yes that poses a financial problem for some corps, as well as more of a strain on the crowd for hotel, food etc... I see all the dynamics. But in the end, it's not THAT much more expensive. In fact, with an extra night, this allows hotels to give bigger discounts. The city would benefit from one more day of increased revenue. And lets be honest.... we all can budget one more day off of work via vacation or sick time. If we had a three day weekend with an extra show, these big 50/50 swings we saw this weekend and from the past would be minimized. With one more day, Cabs may very well have been the winners. Or MBI, or Fusion for that matter. If Bucs were really the best team, than performing one more night wouldn't have impacted their ranking at all. Ok- Post over. Hopefully it didn't come across as bias. I think I spread it out evenly. I do feel like this year should have belonged to Hawthorne. In the end, I hope they continue on with the path they were on and light everyone up in 2015. With Fusion growing leaps and bounds each year, and C2 maybe deciding to put some effort into the rest of their program... next season might be, dare I say it.. EPIC. If nothing else, Cabs have returned to their former glory and should have earned the respect of everyone in the circuit again.

Not sure she was that far over. I saw it happen and it looked like she went over the sideline by a foot at the most and was back on the field within 2 seconds. It didn't look like a staging or design issue, but rather a pathway issue due to equipment in the way.

This multi-quote tool is handy man. So we are all allowed to have our own opinion on this. I don't agree they are "Trying to get by without moving their feet", as all of their choreography that I saw the last time I saw them (two weeks ago) involved lower body and foot movement. So, they are moving their feet quite a bit. There is also something to be said about the demand on the performer when dancing all around the field vs moving. The demand, when designed well, is about the same as moving at a big step. So, if the demand is the same... then really the question of difficulty is really just your opinion vs the next guys. What grabs you the most? It doesn't mean the judges are awarding improperly. The choreo- also helps to improve their "communication" with the audience as it helps strengthen the theme. That, i'm guessing, might be why they are getting credit where you don't understand why. I know the last time I saw them, the dancing helped strengthen the show for me. But to each their own right.

Was the judge from Scranton bias/on a mission also? Seems like the logic can be applied both ways no?

And were .65 away from them in 07 at the Clifton show. Just looked it up to see the Prelims score and saw the Clifton score too. The point still stands however.... it's been a long time since Bucs have had some real competition. I'm sure they're fired up for it.

Well, IMO- 1) I do not believe that Cabs stand still any more than Reading. In fact, I think they are about the same. The difference is, when Reading is moving, they are MOVING. It's worked well for them in the past so why not keep doing it? The difference this year, is that they are a younger group with less experience to tap into. I think that shows up when your looking at Body Carriage, dirty feet, and dirty forms. Thats what I saw from Reading in Scranton. Many of the forms they were in when standing still were much dirtier than when Cabs stood still. I had heard that it may have been due to the high school hashes on the field and the lack of College hashes, but Reading put down their own hashes before the performance so I dont buy that. So it becomes a question of demand vs execution and what should they truly be getting credit for. If their show design requires them to run a lot, but in doing so their feet phase badly and people had their horns swaying left to right when moving... then I don't see why they should get credit there. 2) By my count, Reading had three engaging audience moments from the brass line. One is a spin move that they do where individually the performers rotate 360 degrees on the move within a few counts. The second was when some of the hornline "broke on through" to the front area ahead of the pit. The final moment comes at the end of their show. Conversely, Cabs had 9 different moments where their upper body and lower body were bringing different levels of demand to their playing. Starting from the opening set, then their first hit dancing, their second hit dancing, and so on and so forth. The only two that were the similar where the first and second hit in their 1st piece. Every other time was different considerably. So from a variety and demand standpoint, I can see the credit there. As far as me not being their visual judge. Sure, we all have our own opinions. I do not know what criteria the judges use so I don't know specifically what they are looking for. But based on what I saw at the show, one team runs a lot with a few moments of audience engaging choreography. The other show has more content and has more to watch at every minute that isn't just drill for the sake of drill. In the end, having their Guard score in 3rd and 7/10ths below Cabs, I question how they could be 5/10ths better than them in Visual Effect. Unless the two aren't at all linked... i dont know. I would think the Guard should play some part in that number. As for the standing O. I saw people stand up sure. The same amount of people that stood up at the end of Fusion, Cabs, C2. I didn't see one team with a better audience reaction than the other really. I will give Bucs the credit of having their hornline 5 feet back from the sideline to end the show. It is very engaging and I'm sure is a good part of the audience reaction at the very end. It will certainly be interesting to see what happens this Saturday. I'm sure Reading will be tough to beat at home.

It's not fear. If they are the better corps than they are the better corps. Thats the name of the game. I've been widely entertained by Reading for years and have some of their souvies at home. It's not a fear thing.

Cabs 93.55 Bucs 93.20 Fusion 91.80 C2 90.35 Gold 84.00 WS 82.90 I don't see Reading topping the Cabs this weekend. In fact, I see the spread opening a little. The Visual Effect score from Scranton was WAY out of wack from what it has been like all season. I don't give that number a whole lot of credit, especially when Readings color guard was scored as low as it was. For that Vis Effect number to stand you'd have to think they were flawless but thats far from what I saw. Readings visual book isn't close to even Fusion or Hawthorne. They run for the sake of running, but not for any intent other than two big moves. They added in two different choreography visuals from the last time I saw them in Wayne... both of which are the same, so it' doesn't bring much variety. And they didn't make a clean form the whole night in Scranton. When I saw this number on the recap i was in complete shock. There were plenty of moments in the show where you were looking around for something interesting and there was nothing there. With Fusion and especially Hawthorne, you are constantly entertained at just about every moment. I know effect isn't about "entertainment" but content and variety should certainly be a factor.

In a perfect world, I would agree with you. Unfortunately, the world today isn't perfect. Corps have a standing policy against DCP posting not because of being embarrassed by its own participants, but because of the message it sends across the community. In this day and age, Social Media is incredibly powerful. You can change an entire public perception on something in 160 characters or less these days. Sure, it would be interesting if current corps members came on here and engaged the DCP community and opened themselves up, We'd be able to learn more about a specific idea of their show, why they did this or that, how they are achieving this or that... etc. But the problem today is that wouldn't happen. Instead, we as a community would think of that person as a direct representative of the corps. I think back to the Secaucus thread. A current member of Reading posted about how they were actually getting closer in a couple of captions and how they have a better ceiling than Cabs. I remember thinking at the time, "Is that what the staff is telling them? Did they have this conversation with the members, because that's not correct information?". I'm sure I'm not the only one. The bottom line is we as a society are very accustom to drama. Its why reality TV shows today have the highest ratings. We'd like to believe we wouldn't hold what one person says against an entire organization but we would do it anyway. It's not worth the trouble. Better to just do the talking on the field for now IMO.

I know what I'm about to write is going to offend some people, and that is not my intention, but I would like to voice my opinion. I have a tremendous amount of respect for the alumni segment in DCA. I think they serve an important purpose, have a specific following, and deserve a great amount of respect. That being said, I think there are those in the alumni circuit that are taking their commitment too seriously. The video was a competitors montage. It's not a "Hey, this is DCA" video, or a "Hey, here is what drum corps is" video. The definition of this video is clear. And not for nothing, but QUITE a few corps who competed didn't even make that video. Lets not sit here and go back and forth on these issues. The video was done very well. It captured the emotion and the experience of the weekend and recognized a few groups along the way; some more than others but that's OK. I appreciate as much as anyone else the work that some Alumni groups put in. But I think some people need to take it down a notch. It drives me bonkers when a regular season show just ends and the first thing we see online is an alumni member asking for an alumni review. You did great... the show was awesome, raw power, blew us away, crowd was on there feet, brought the house down... Do those sound familiar? Because they apply to every alumni performance across the board. I have never read, and likely will never read, a review that writes, "boy you guys could have done better.. I'm worried about the brass line and the battery has some work to do". In the words of Deon Sanders, C'mon Man! Lets be real here. In my opinion, lets show the alumni corps the respect they deserve, but lets not take away from the competing corps either. Now, back to your regular scheduled riveting conversation.

A valid point. But it is important for the voting members to be vetted and experienced with DCA. If all participating corps championship weekend had voting rights, it's possible, in a voting year, you could have too many "New" votes that could change the whole scene. Kind of a knights of the round table kind of thing. If me and 10 of my friends could get a seat at that table just by showing up, we could make some big changes and not really have any experience in what we are doing.

I know it was mentioned earlier but traveling to Massachusetts every year should be considered outside their radius. Personally, I would like to see them stop hosting the Kiwanis show in August and do something different that day. That show is probably the worst on the schedule honestly. Then again, it's not like there are other shows going on that day anyway. I would love to see them travel down south once a year.

Not sure what this had to do with the quote you referenced in your post about Cabs being Top 3.. but I.don't agree the judges can't hear what's going on at field level. The crowds are very respectful. And applaud when needed in most cases. Besides, the brass judge on the field gets the best brass read with little crowd noise.

The problem is the Navy football schedule. Yesterday they played Notre Dam over in Ireland and next year I think they are away as well on Saturday. I don't know the particulars but I would imagine the teams home/away schedule is one of the bigger hurdles.

Well we knew all year long one good corps would be pushed out of the top 5. Didn't think it would be Empire though. Just goes to show not every year is predictable.

One of the things I admire most about the Cabs is that they have a very welcoming atmosphere to all walks of life. It's an extremely rare case for them to turn away anyone especially due to fitness. They give everyone regardless of age, gender, financial status, talent, or fitness level an opportunity. This may or may not hurt them this weekend but I'd rather see them in third with this policy than in second if they had previously cut said players. IMO I also believe they are dot to dot marchers instead of form marchers so it's likely these people weren't trying to keep up as much as adjust from a previous dot. Either way. It's been a great season for them. Better than all of us predicted after Wildwood.

Yes. Different panel.