2010 - The most BORING DCI championships ever!

[Bob J]

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but was this the first year in DCI history that no corps placings changed between Quarters, Semis and Finals? What is with that? Were the performances SO consistant between the 3 shows that no corps deserved to move up or down? Is it slotting? Is it a conspiracy? Is this a byproduct of competitive inertia? What the heck is going on?

[chris ncsu]

It was rather undramatic from that perspective. What year was it recently where it felt like EVERYONE changed on finals night...2006? That was exciting, even if "my" corps moved down.

[ouooga]

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but was this the first year in DCI history that no corps placings changed between Quarters, Semis and Finals? What is with that? Were the performances SO consistant between the 3 shows that no corps deserved to move up or down? Is it slotting? Is it a conspiracy? Is this a byproduct of competitive inertia? What the heck is going on?

The season was so competitive that come finals week, everyone had made their moves. I agree, lame finals week as far as placements go.

[Getintoyourcolor]

The judging is a mess. Overhaul is necessary. IMO, 4 of the top 5 performances on Saturday night were not as good/clean/energized as performances on Thursday or Friday. But it made no difference in the outcome. Sad...

[Michael Boo]

Someone please correct me if I'm wrong, but was this the first year in DCI history that no corps placings changed between Quarters, Semis and Finals? What is with that? Were the performances SO consistant between the 3 shows that no corps deserved to move up or down? Is it slotting? Is it a conspiracy? Is this a byproduct of competitive inertia? What the heck is going on?

I've long subscribed to the theory that given enough years and samples, many different scenarios of anything may well occur.

It's entirely possible that this year, the judges really did get it right three times in a row, that they called it as they saw it and put down the numbers they really felt each corps deserved. There were switches between captions, which I noted in my recaps analysis. Individual judges allowed themselves to call captions up and down the board differently than other judges had done in earlier shows. But when all these captions were added together, sometimes they cancelled each other out or the point spread between certain corps was big enough that this didn't make a difference.

It would be sad if judges worked with their scores to make things look more interesting if they believed they had to make things look interesting for skeptical fans.

If this hasn't happened before, maybe it was just its time to happen this year. And maybe it won't happen for many years to come.

If one sends in an expense account for approval and the expenses just happen to add up to $100.00, then that's the way it goes. To change it to $99.98 or $100.23 just to look good wouldn't be right. I'm not saying you suggested anything like this...I'm just suggesting that maybe that's just the way it turned out this year.

[skevinp]

I'll take exciting shows over exciting scores any day.

Some things are best if not exciting. Like air travel, for instance.

[jwillis35]

I don't want to bash the judges. I know that job is demanding and not very glamorus. And I agree with Mr. Boo that we don't want the judges changing their scores or fudging things just to make people happy.

But I do think some folks feel there should have been movement based on what we witnessed.

This is just my opinion, but at quarters I had it this way: 1. BD, 2. Crown, 3. Cadets, 4. Cavaliers (Cavies were flat and dirty), 5. Bluecoats

I also had Blue Stars in 6th, then Phantom, then SCV.

I felt placements 2 - 5 should have been closer, at least that night.

At semifinals I had Cavaliers back in 2nd, Crown 3rd, Bluecoats 4th (Blooo had issues with electronics and very dirty feet at times), and Cadets 5th. I also had Blue Knights over Madison at semifinals. Madison was super exciting, but not as good as the night before.

At finals I felt it was BD, Cavaliers, Bluecoats, Crown, Cadets, Phantom, Blue Stars, SCV, Boston, Madison, BK, Glassmen.

Now, that's just me. But I sometimes wonder if we're afraid to call it like it is on any given night, or do judges just see how the placements were at the last show and use that as a guide.

[MikeN]

Brass judge ranked 'em 1-12 down the line on Finals night.

Mike

[skevinp]

But I sometimes wonder if we're afraid to call it like it is on any given night, or do judges just see how the placements were at the last show and use that as a guide.

Maybe, but the things we notice may be only a part of their overall criteria. Also, how many people are more qualified than the judges in every single caption as opposed to merely having expertise in one or a few captions? And most of us place more importance on the things we know the most about. Not to mention they are in different physical positions than we are (especially the field judges) and so see and hear different things.

But I have wondered myself, especially when so many individual categories deviate so little from the overall order. One year a corps is 3rd and so is their color guard, and the next year they are 8th and so is their color guard. It seems like they would be more independent. I know there is overlap, I imagine areas of weakness get more work, and sometimes there are exceptions, but it seems like they categories seem to move together to a greater extent than I can find logical explanations for.

[MikeN]

I just looked at every single caption from Finals week. There were less than a dozen total instances where a corps's ordinal for a caption deviated from their placement by 3 or more. Half of them were due to Phantom's percussion being ranked 1, BD's drums being ranked 4 and Colts drums getting dropped. So for percussion judges!

Quite honestly, I am coming around to the idea that we just need to drop scores and move to ordinals. Let's let the judges not have to worry about leaving spreads between corps and instead focus on which group is better.

Mike