garfield Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 Safe for another year! Still waiting on Spirit, Boston or Blue Knights to disprove the theory! Heck, Competitive Inertia is so strong, we haven't even had anyone new in the Top 6 since 2007 (Crown). One more thing: The CI Theory would get a lot of credit if Bluecoats would win soon, lol. I was really hoping it would've happened this year. But with 2 yrs straight in the Top 3, maybe next year is their "allowed" year! It took Crown 4 years from their first Top 2/3 placement (2009) to finally win (2013), but that was preceded by in 2012 by another Top 2/3. C'mon, Bloo! :) Things change, though, even if slowly. It wasn't too long ago we were talking about CADEVILIERS holding Top 3. Now Cavies are nowhere to be seen, and Cadets are making midseason uni changes that make no sense. Understanding the definition of "their allowed year" is critical to understanding this post. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
N.E. Brigand Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 (edited) One more thing: The CI Theory would get a lot of credit if Bluecoats would win soon, lol. I was really hoping it would've happened this year. But with 2 yrs straight in the Top 3, maybe next year is their "allowed" year! It took Crown 4 years from their first Top 2/3 placement (2009) to finally win (2013), but that was preceded by in 2012 by another Top 2/3. C'mon, Bloo! :) Since CI isn't disproved by the failure of the medalist Blue Stars ('72-73), Troopers ('73), 27th Lancers ('80), or Bridgemen ('80) to win the championship, I don't see how Bluecoats' failure to do the same would hurt the theory. And of course it took Phantom a long time to go from medaling ('77) to winning it all ('96). Edit: Revisiting your original post of 2007, I am reminded that you already mentioned all these corps. Also that you wrote, eight years ago, that Carolina Crown was on the right track to win a championship in the near future, but that they'd have to medal first to do so. Which is just what happened. Edited August 10, 2015 by N.E. Brigand 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ouooga Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 Alright, I think this is my first post in several years. I'm 100% behind the CI theory. I'll admit, I haven't read the whole thread, but I do have issue with the term "allowed". CI is an argument for marketing more than anything else. Winning a championship is a combination of two things: the talent of your members and the talent of your design team. CI heavily impacts that first one. When a corps cracks the top 6, and then the top 3, it cues something in current and future members. Current members are much more likely to stay (I'm assuming) following an amazing season. We know retention is huge. And as for new members, kids are much more likely to join a corps following a successful season. This is how you increase talent. A successful year markets the corps for membership purposes for the following year. Top 6 is huge because it means "this corps is on its way up", and top 3 is huge because it means "this corps might win next year" (and who doesn't want to be a part of a corps' first championship?). Now even if a corps doesn't win right away, that great season can hold out for a few years, but not forever. A corps can slip from 2nd to 4th or 5th and hold onto that marketing momentum, but eventually it'll lose something. The other half of the championship coin is the design team. When all corps are performing roughly equal, the design of the show pushes one corps over the edge. I liked this year's Bluecoats show, but it wasn't Tilt. Tilt was great. I can think of a few other shows by Bluecoats that were a little more championship worthy, but the execution just wasn't there from the corps. It was close, but not there. Design is super hard to nail down completely. There's been a lot of shows that just don't "come together" as we've seen, and I'm sure no design team thought that would happen going into the season. It's somewhat of a crapshoot to be able to design a championship-worthy show. Yes, you can mitigage risk with the right design team, but nothing is ever sure-fire. My point: you need to remain high enough in the rankings over a period of time to ensure you attract interest from the championship-caliber members, and hope that in one of those years where you have the high-caliber members, you also get that special-sauce show design that is championship worthy. Thus, competitive inertia. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ShortAndFast Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 My point: you need to remain high enough in the rankings over a period of time to ensure you attract interest from the championship-caliber members, and hope that in one of those years where you have the high-caliber members, you also get that special-sauce show design that is championship worthy. Thus, competitive inertia. This is a very good explanation of how to get your first title. Bluecoats are now plainly good enough (just like Crown was plainly good enough by 2012) to win, they just need the right show in the right year. It was very exciting to see both of the "new kids" medal this year. It is interesting to me how CI applies to former champions like Cavaliers and Phantom that have fallen in placements. What must happen before they will win again? Could the Cavaliers come out with the right talent & show next year and jump back to the top, or will they also have to rebuild their CI? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
garfield Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 Alright, I think this is my first post in several years. I'm 100% behind the CI theory. I'll admit, I haven't read the whole thread, but I do have issue with the term "allowed". CI is an argument for marketing more than anything else. Winning a championship is a combination of two things: the talent of your members and the talent of your design team. CI heavily impacts that first one. When a corps cracks the top 6, and then the top 3, it cues something in current and future members. Current members are much more likely to stay (I'm assuming) following an amazing season. We know retention is huge. And as for new members, kids are much more likely to join a corps following a successful season. This is how you increase talent. A successful year markets the corps for membership purposes for the following year. Top 6 is huge because it means "this corps is on its way up", and top 3 is huge because it means "this corps might win next year" (and who doesn't want to be a part of a corps' first championship?). Now even if a corps doesn't win right away, that great season can hold out for a few years, but not forever. A corps can slip from 2nd to 4th or 5th and hold onto that marketing momentum, but eventually it'll lose something. The other half of the championship coin is the design team. When all corps are performing roughly equal, the design of the show pushes one corps over the edge. I liked this year's Bluecoats show, but it wasn't Tilt. Tilt was great. I can think of a few other shows by Bluecoats that were a little more championship worthy, but the execution just wasn't there from the corps. It was close, but not there. Design is super hard to nail down completely. There's been a lot of shows that just don't "come together" as we've seen, and I'm sure no design team thought that would happen going into the season. It's somewhat of a crapshoot to be able to design a championship-worthy show. Yes, you can mitigage risk with the right design team, but nothing is ever sure-fire. My point: you need to remain high enough in the rankings over a period of time to ensure you attract interest from the championship-caliber members, and hope that in one of those years where you have the high-caliber members, you also get that special-sauce show design that is championship worthy. Thus, competitive inertia. Nice analogy, and I'd like to expound on the type of player to gravitate to those championship corps. We were just having this conversation Friday night - there's a certain "type" of MM that wants to be championship caliber and do anything and everything necessary to become champions. There's also a significant portion of the MM community that places a higher value on other aspects of their experience in corps than just simply winning. It seems to me that competitive inertia as you describe it includes attracting the former type of MM, and having the magic of design overlay that group desire to win above all else. Winning isn't everything to everyone, but winning corps attract kids with the drive to win, not just sleep, eat, and tour well and they best attract those types of kids when it becomes apparent that the corps CAN win. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ouooga Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 This is a very good explanation of how to get your first title. Bluecoats are now plainly good enough (just like Crown was plainly good enough by 2012) to win, they just need the right show in the right year. It was very exciting to see both of the "new kids" medal this year. It is interesting to me how CI applies to former champions like Cavaliers and Phantom that have fallen in placements. What must happen before they will win again? Could the Cavaliers come out with the right talent & show next year and jump back to the top, or will they also have to rebuild their CI? My thoughts re: Phantom and Cavies, it would come down to how they market themselves and their past championships. They hold clout, but that can dwindle (just like a 2nd-place season can propel you for a few years, even after a 4th or 5th place, but not forever). The perfect example of this: you didn't mention SCV or Madison. But if they came out and marketed themselves to future members as "join the 7-time world champion Cavaliers", or hypothetically "witness the return of JD Shaw (or Michael Gaines)", there'd be a chance. An extremely low chance, but a chance. I always thought this was how Blue Stars propelled themselves from D3 contenders to D1 finalists in only four years (05 to 08). I remember hearing a lot from them about being a 1970s powerhouse during this time period, and that's how they picked up steam so quickly. They marketed their legacy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
oldbandguy Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 Could be part 3 of the Bluecoats trilogy... Presenting their 2016 show "Competitive Inertia...theory becomes paradigm" 3 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
N.E. Brigand Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 Alright, I think this is my first post in several years. I'm 100% behind the CI theory. I'll admit, I haven't read the whole thread, but I do have issue with the term "allowed". CI is an argument for marketing more than anything else. Winning a championship is a combination of two things: the talent of your members and the talent of your design team. CI heavily impacts that first one. You're not wrong, but I thought that Bruckner's C.I. theory was about the judges: the best corps are essentially indistinguishable in some categories, so when it's too close to call, the judges subconsciously default to the corps that's a proven champion. If the Bluecoats are really one-tenth better than the Blue Devils in category X, the judges will rate the Blue Devils two-tenths better than the Bluecoats. In order for Bloo to score one-tenth better than B.D. in category X, they have to perform five tenths better. Bruckner specifically compared drum corps judges to baseball umpires or basketball referees who give the benefit of the doubt to star players. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HPUEuph Posted August 10, 2015 Share Posted August 10, 2015 This is all reminding me of NCAA football and basketball recruiting. You hear of football programs for example like Alabama and Ohio St. who continually challenge for championships year in and year out, recent newcomers like Auburn, and then you have programs like Michigan, Notre Dame, USC and Texas who are obviously still meccas for football yet are falling off the radar due to several years of failing to reach the championship. Then we have upstarts like Oregon, and even more so TCU, Boise St. along with some flash in the pans like Hawaii for example. Likewise, we see several corps that fall into similar categories Continued success: BD, and Cadets Recent success: Crown Past/historical success: Phantom, Cavies, SCV, Madison Rising success: Bluecoats, BK Right there we have 10 of our top 12 finalists, and all hinging on different marketing avenues. All but BK I would say are more or less destination corps (some more than others) but each is vesting their marketing at different audiences. I would say all are capable of championships, maybe not right now but in the near future. In particular Bluecoats and BK are theoretically marketing themselves as we're the next BIG thing, be apart of something special. Group 3 is more in the camp of help us recapture our former glory and this is a place that can win again...kinda like Michigan and Notre Dame football. *I marched with a girl who spent her drumcorps career with four different corps, each time moving up the ladder year after year.* This type of corp member is what Garfield reminds me of in terms of a certain kind of corpsmember looking for a corps that CAN win. You're not wrong, but I thought that Bruckner's C.I. theory was about the judges: the best corps are essentially indistinguishable in some categories, so when it's too close to call, the judges subconsciously default to the corps that's a proven champion. If the Bluecoats are really one-tenth better than the Blue Devils in category X, the judges will rate the Blue Devils two-tenths better than the Bluecoats. In order for Bloo to score one-tenth better than B.D. in category X, they have to perform five tenths better. Bruckner specifically compared drum corps judges to baseball umpires or basketball referees who give the benefit of the doubt to star players. I do agree with the subconscious. Just look at all our prediction threads year after year in which we most generally pick the top 10 corps to be a mix of the above, and most often the top three in recent memory are the top three I have listed even without knowing anything about next years corps. Just like in football we assume Ohio St. and Alabama will contend for a title as well as a few others like Oregon, TCU, and USC. That being said, one will subconsciously give the benefit of the doubt to the group with the stronger resume. It is a little different compared to sports in that judging is subjective, but I theoretically already know going into competition that Crown is going to have a great hornline and guard, and a so-so drumline comparatively speaking; SCV will have a strong drumline; and BD will be strong across all categories. Herein lies the hump that corps like Bluecoats, BK and others have to break through, or re-breakthrough. They have to prove themselves. It's hard to believe a corps is capable of the next tier when they haven't achieved it in the past and more importantly, recently. This is part of the reason I feel some lower tier corps like DCPs sweetheart the Mandarins were vastly underscored for much of this season. Recent success is soo important I believe for a corp to move up no matter their tier. You have to run with that recent success and more importantly, be consistent. Once one is consistent/shows relative upward movement it provides one with the foundation to move up to the next level. Crown has recently become a consistent top four finisher as are the coats, and that's showing to future members and those in the activity that they are or as in Bloos case, poised to be the new kid on the block. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
HornTeacher Posted August 11, 2015 Share Posted August 11, 2015 Do the results prove the rule...or does the rule determine the results? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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