West Coast Inflation

[geluf]

NEVER GIVE UP! Some people really do hear you.

I want it understood that I don't harp about it because I somehow think there's an injustice being done. I have simply compiled data and drawn the appropriate conclusions. In the end, it doesn't matter a lick once everyone gets together because at that point everything levels out how it should.

My only point is that it isn't totally imaginary, and the data supports that. Heck, just look at what happened to PC, Mandarins, Cascades and Academy yesterday.

[Phirefenix]

I want it understood that I don't harp about it because I somehow think there's an injustice being done. I have simply compiled data and drawn the appropriate conclusions. In the end, it doesn't matter a lick once everyone gets together because at that point everything levels out how it should.

My only point is that it isn't totally imaginary, and the data supports that. Heck, just look at what happened to PC, Mandarins, Cascades and Academy yesterday.

I didn't wanna dump all over the data, my bad if I came off that way. I agree that west coast scores tend to be higher when you look at raw numbers. Though I tried to never focus on it until we met up head to head.

[Lance]

On July 3, The Cadets competed in Indiana and got an 84.9

On July 3, The Devils competed in California, scored 83.3

That's a difference of +1.6 for the Cadets compared to WEST COAST INFLATION BLUE DEVILS.

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7 days later in Denver, the Cadets and BD competed against one another for the first time on the same day. West Coast inflation would dictate that the spread in favor of the Cadets should have grown from that +1.6 differential. The opposite happened....in a HUGE way when they competed head to head:

Cadets: 85.7

Devils: 88

That's a +2.3 difference in favor of BD

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If WEST COAST INFLATION were at play, the spread in Denver should have GROWN in favor of the Cadets once they came out west. Instead, BD Gained a ton on the Cadets over a week when the Cadets came out west for a head to head competition.

Please stop with the petty whining about WEST COAST INFLATION. There are examples of inflation on all sides of the country....unfortunately, not a whole lot of corps come East to West so we don't get to see as many examples of it. But that doesn't stop the whining from people who just HATE HATE HATE some corps on the west side of the country.

[CorpsRelic]

Once again I'm going to have to explain this. I do it every. single. year. and for some reason people just don't let it stick. Maybe I'll use bold letters on the pertinent parts this time.

*sigh*

Here we go:

The term West Coast Inflation is a descriptor to describe an ACTUAL MATHEMATICAL PHENOMENON that occurred very often in the early 2000's and still happens to a LESSER EXTENT today.

The *reason* for it was because in the past, there were fewer corps within the same "tier" competing out west as opposed to the ones out east (BD and SCV were in their own tier, Mandarins, Cascades and others were in a different tier, etc.). The fewer corps you have competing head-to-head within a given "tier", the more wildly scoring tends to fluctuate.

Academy is a good example of this. They have essentially been competing against themselves for a little while out west, scoring in the range of the Glassmen, and even above them. But when they competed at the Texas show last night, the score range dropped, with Glassmen comfortably ahead, This is because without anyone to compare them to, the judges out west were having to make educated guesses about where they would be if other corps were there competing.

This used to happen with Pacific Crest all the time. They'd spend about 2 weeks longer out west than everyone else and start popping HUGE numbers. Fans would get excited only to be let down when PC came east, competed against the field, and dropped like a stone score-wise (no offense intended to PC, this is simply the model).

Because raw scores are meaningless unless compared against the spread, it is easy to see how "inflation" happens when there are very few corps competing head to head. Spreads matter. Scores do not.

But yes, even BD and SCV used to have this happen to them, though not as severely.

Now, this has dropped off somewhat in recent years as more corps compete out west in a closer range (Troopers, for example, are definitely in a higher tier then they used to be).

The take-away is this: At any show in which a corps is competing by itself within it's tier, the chance of their score from that show being overvalued is very high.

edit: I'll clarify one thing by saying that the only reason it is called "west coast inflation" is because the east has more corps, and thus is far less likely to have a situation where a corps is competing against only itself within it's tier.

Thanks for such well written and thoughtful explaination. Being a transplant to Phoenix (And an Academy fan), from the Boston area, I now better understand the "West Coast Inflation" history and its ramifications.

[geluf]

Thanks for such well written and thoughtful explaination. Being a transplant to Phoenix (And an Academy fan), from the Boston area, I now better understand the "West Coast Inflation" history and its ramifications.

Thanks.

I feel the label of "West Coast Inflation" is a misnomer actually, I simply use it because it's the term everyone is familiar with. The proper idea is simply "Score Inflation/Discrepancy". It isn't exclusive to the west coast, it's just easier to find examples there precisely because of the way the corps out there split into tiers and how they compete before coming east.

But no one should think that this can't or doesn't happen out east. Because it most definitely can and does.

All this is meant to show is that comparing scores is, by and large, not helpful unless it's completely head to head.

[geluf]

On July 3, The Cadets competed in Indiana and got an 84.9

On July 3, The Devils competed in California, scored 83.3

That's a difference of +1.6 for the Cadets compared to WEST COAST INFLATION BLUE DEVILS.

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7 days later in Denver, the Cadets and BD competed against one another for the first time on the same day. West Coast inflation would dictate that the spread in favor of the Cadets should have grown from that +1.6 differential. The opposite happened....in a HUGE way when they competed head to head:

Cadets: 85.7

Devils: 88

That's a +2.3 difference in favor of BD

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

If WEST COAST INFLATION were at play, the spread in Denver should have GROWN in favor of the Cadets once they came out west. Instead, BD Gained a ton on the Cadets over a week when the Cadets came out west for a head to head competition.

Please stop with the petty whining about WEST COAST INFLATION. There are examples of inflation on all sides of the country....unfortunately, not a whole lot of corps come East to West so we don't get to see as many examples of it. But that doesn't stop the whining from people who just HATE HATE HATE some corps on the west side of the country.

You aren't understanding what I mean at all. But ok.

[Lance]

It's not history, it's mythology.

[geluf]

It's not history, it's mythology.

OK Lance, sure. I'll continue to work with facts and numbers though if that's ok.

[Lance]

You aren't understanding what I mean at all. But ok.

I understand you say that a lack of higher tiered competition makes it so top level corps get higher scores out west than they'd be getting if they competed head to head with top tiered east coast corps.

I gave you 1 example that shows that what your'e saying is nothing resembling a fact.

I'm sorry that you don't understand this.

[Lance]

OK Lance, sure. I'll continue to work with facts and numbers though if that's ok.

You mean like the facts and numbers I showed you about the Cadets and BD...you know, the ones where BD with its west coast inflation scored 1.6 points lower than the Cadets, and then a week later in Denver, when facing each other at the same competition, BD scored 2.3 points higher than the Cadets?

Both are high-tiered corps. BD is a WEST COAST INFLATED corps. What happened here simply doesn't fit into the mythology you've created.

That's a simple fact.