AlexL

I assume mostly referring to this part by Mapes

Same. I loved Frank's work with Blue Stars his last time around.

Sounds like he already knows where he's headed next as well.

And i think that's where you're wrong. You cant read that much into the future of an organization from its current score. Hell, Cadets themselves were 4 points off the champ in 2010 and won in 2011. Bluecoats were 5 points off the champion in 2013 and won in 2016. The fact is, scores just tell us how a corps is performing on that particular date. They dont tell us what kind of talent the corps has coming in for next year or what kind of design staff are employed. In your example between BS and Cadets, Cadets are better set up because they likely have a higher talent level coming in than blue stars did in 2010. Theyre still The Cadets. Blue Stars were maximizing both from execution and design where they were at the time as an organization, whereas cadets, well.... arent. That leaves a lot of room for quick growth at cadets, where the growth for a corps like BS2010 is the type that takes longer.

Sure, but the capacity of the venue and recent historical attendance is what's relevant here. 81 was 35 years ago and irrelevant to current discussion.

This year was near record attendance, wasnt it? I think that's part of the problem. Less and less actually open seats for corps members to sit in on the sideline sections of the field, where it was less of a problem with more seats open in past years. (Wasnt long ago attendance was ~17000, where this year it was 22k. A lot of seats to fit the members\staff in) Place was packed. May have legitimately been people who grabbed a seat that was unclaimed earlier, and thought it was 'theirs' for the night, and not fair game for anyone else without a ticket to grab... resulting in those people asking for a ticket before moving.. That being said, the first rule of grabbing seats as a member\staff is that while grabbing seats is generally viewed as OK, you also give those back to someone if they have the tickets.

Yep. Not only do things that were brushed under the rug before get attention, oftentimes that starts a cycle where people who feared getting attacked (or ignored at best) if they revealed their issue with the program feel more free to start sharing as they can see people more receptive to hearing it.

Cascades: O part 2.

Were they though? That Houdini show was bad ###. And as you noted, it was mere tenths from being 7th place. Is it that surprising that a show that easily couldve been 7th would score only marginally below a 6th place show?

We dont know that it really 'expanded' per se. Being different judges and all. For all we know the scores wouldve been exactly the same thursday as saturday had the finals night judges been judging thursday night.

Bluecoats - Circus Blue Devils - Watery Carolina Crown - Chocobath. The Cavaliers - Ads The Cadets - Cake Blue Knights - Drugs Blue Stars - Sleepy The Academy - Fun Boston Crusaders - Possessed

Much like any other 'professional level sport', there are always changes each offseason, and speculation and discussion is always going to happen with them. Some people will be excited by those changes, others not. Welcome to the big leagues. As long as things dont get incredibly personal (big difference between 'this brass staff didnt perform' vs 'xyz brass caption head is terrible and sucks at life') its just to be expected.

Yep. As im sure most who have been on both sides of things (member\staff) can attest, things can be a complete dumpster fire behind the scenes at times but the kids may not even know it or at least have full wind of it, provided the jobs are being done to prevent it directly effecting them.

Knowing very little about the internals of the YEA organization, if all the reviews are true... the bad is that this situation existed for apparently many years without anything being done about it. The good may be that changes may be happening that while painful in the short term, may be better for the health of the organization long term. With that in mind... maybe those that seem a bit happy about this arent entirely in the wrong.

Indy seems fine to keep them secret, and it builds a little suspense for the caption awards (when you know how things were thurs\fri, mathematically oftentimes its already pretty much set in stone). Release them for the rest of the season though.

My area wasnt event management, but i'd assume at very least it'd be protocol to get backup involved (both for the safety of security, an additional show of force to encourage voluntary compliance, and to provide secondary validation for the decision) before attempting to physically remove someone.

Seconding this as another who also spent a few months working security. This guy's job is to verbally enforce the rules, then call in for backup if they are not followed (or potentially a supervisor couldve let the troopers continue as they were). Never, ever is it his job to physically enforce any rules. 100% in the wrong, and id give high odds on the reports of him being fired being true.

Somehow not surprised. I found the staff at LOS to be some of the worst all season about hassling corps members\staff as well. There was one in particular around sec 338ish that was visible being a problem both fri and sat.

That's not going to end well. But at the same time, I found the security at LoS to be some of the most annoying all season.

Agreed. I think they're improving and I think they can continue to. Of course as with every corps there's the proper analysis of what went well, what didn't, and what can be improved for next year is key, as it is for every group.

Exact dates, no. But if a whole state tends to be doing something, it shouldnt be that hard to see the winds blowing that direction.

The schools were obviously not a part of that contract, but it should have been on DCI to 'know the territory' before signing a 10 year extension.

I didnt say anything (not the original person). But anytime says 'no one likes\cares about something' it almost never means literally no one does. It just means that number is very small, which it is.

Some. But even as one who marched in open class\div2.. the number is infinitely smaller.