Hostrauser's 2022 DCI Power Rankings - Week 3 (7/18)

[Chief Guns]

12 minutes ago, greg_orangecounty said:

I can deal with Gold but getting beat by Blue Devils B and Santa Clara Cadets sounds much worse.  Ugh!

With all the band kids in Southern California I just don't understand why it can't field a Drum Corps that consistently makes finals.  It's been decades!  

I guess there's just too many other things to do here because of the weather.  That's all I can think of.

I think alot of the SoCal kids go up north to march BD/BDB/SCV/SCVC. Isn't RCC (Riverside Community College) known as Blue Devils South cause half of the RCC band marches BD in the summer?

Not to mention with the Mandarins rise and threatening to crack the top seven, that also can't be helping PC in keeping some of the SoCal kids home. 

Also, while everyone was affected by Covid in 2020, I believe no one was affected more from a competitive standpoint than PC. They were carrying alot of momentum into 2020 with the way they finished 2019. Not saying they would have made finals in 2020, but i believe they would have been in the conversation. 

Covid derailed any momentum they had, now they have to essentially start over. 

Of course this is all my opinion. I could be way off as to why they are struggling this year. 

[Chief Guns]

2 minutes ago, BlueStainGlass said:

What's considered south

Funny you ask. I was born and raised in SoCal and even I don't know where it begins/ends LMAO.

If you ask people from Bakersfield, they consider themselves SoCal, but we say they are central which pisses them off. LOL.

For me personally, on the 101 FWY, once you hit Ventura County, that's SoCal. On the I-5 FWY heading south, once you hit the Grapevine, that's SoCal. 

But you can ask ten different people and get ten different answers LMAO. 

[greg_orangecounty]

6 minutes ago, BlueStainGlass said:

What's considered south

Southern California = Between Santa Barbara and San Diego. 

[CAtenhut]

8 minutes ago, Chief Guns said:

I think alot of the SoCal kids go up north to march BD/BDB/SCV/SCVC. Isn't RCC (Riverside Community College) known as Blue Devils South cause half of the RCC band marches BD in the summer?

Not to mention with the Mandarins rise and threatening to crack the top seven, that also can't be helping PC in keeping some of the SoCal kids home. 

Also, while everyone was affected by Covid in 2020, I believe no one was affected more from a competitive standpoint than PC. They were carrying alot of momentum into 2020 with the way they finished 2019. Not saying they would have made finals in 2020, but i believe they would have been in the conversation. 

Covid derailed any momentum they had, now they have to essentially start over. 

Of course this is all my opinion. I could be way off as to why they are struggling this year. 

Agree... With the BD, SCV and Mandarins organizations all in Northern CA, I'm sure they are drawing most of the CA talent. And in addition to PC, I think Academy was also negatively-affected a lot by Covid. PC and Academy skipped the short exhibition tours last season and only went to Indy, which resulted in poor recruitment, and I think that carried over to 2022. BD and SCV didn't field corps last year, but they're BD and SCV.

[hostrauser]

1 hour ago, Chief Guns said:

Question with Open Class.

Is this saying that SCVC who scored 72+ last night...........will only improve one point the rest of the season............same with BDB who scored 71.700 last night, will only improve a half a point the remainder of the season?

Gold who hasn't performed since Stanford due to Covid and Illnesses, and is 3-0 vs SCVC.......and 2-1 vs BDB in head to head competition, won't even crack 70 by season's end?

1. Possibly the biggest weakness the algorithm has is time off. The longer a corps goes between performances, the harder it is for the algorithm to accurately make forecasts.  Gold and the Cavaliers have the two rankings with the largest margin of error right now.

2. That said, I believe SCVC was 0-fer against BDB until this past weekend. They made almost a 3-point swing in just a week (from almost 2 points behind BDB at Stanford to almost a point ahead at Bellflower). The early season volatility in Open Class is even more extreme than in World Class.

3. The SoCal scores this past weekend were badly inflated, and judges will leaving spacing margins at Quarterfinals. Corps surge past 70 (or even 80) only to fall behind that mark at QF almost every year. The scores for 14th and lower so far this season are quite a bit behind what we usually saw in pre-Covid days. Are those corps just a little dirtier than normal after having a couple of years without a full tour? Will they clean up and make a surge closer to the Top 12/13? We'll see what happens.

[brassboy]

40 minutes ago, greg_orangecounty said:

I can deal with Gold but getting beat by Blue Devils B and Santa Clara Cadets sounds much worse.  Ugh!

With all the band kids in Southern California I just don't understand why it can't field a Drum Corps that consistently makes finals.  It's been decades!  

I guess there's just too many other things to do here because of the weather.  That's all I can think of.

Both BDB and SCVC have won DCI Open Class multiple times and have bested many world class corps before. Not sure why being beaten by them should be that big of a blow compared to Gold. 

[greg_orangecounty]

11 minutes ago, Chief Guns said:

I think alot of the SoCal kids go up north to march BD/BDB/SCV/SCVC. Isn't RCC (Riverside Community College) known as Blue Devils South cause half of the RCC band marches BD in the summer?

Not to mention with the Mandarins rise and threatening to crack the top seven, that also can't be helping PC in keeping some of the SoCal kids home. 

Also, while everyone was affected by Covid in 2020, I believe no one was affected more from a competitive standpoint than PC. They were carrying alot of momentum into 2020 with the way they finished 2019. Not saying they would have made finals in 2020, but i believe they would have been in the conversation. 

Covid derailed any momentum they had, now they have to essentially start over. 

Of course this is all my opinion. I could be way off as to why they are struggling this year. 

First, thank you for serving our country!

Kids from Southern California have gone up north since the time the Kingsmen were prominent and later the Velvet Knights.  I can buy COVID, but didn't it hit everybody?  Certainly a rising Mandarins won't help, but I'm happy for them as they've paid their dues.  I'm super disappointed but the years not over.

[hostrauser]

17 minutes ago, Chief Guns said:

Funny you ask. I was born and raised in SoCal and even I don't know where it begins/ends LMAO.

If you ask people from Bakersfield, they consider themselves SoCal, but we say they are central which pisses them off. LOL.

For me personally, on the 101 FWY, once you hit Ventura County, that's SoCal. On the I-5 FWY heading south, once you hit the Grapevine, that's SoCal. 

But you can ask ten different people and get ten different answers LMAO. 

South of the Grapevine/San Bernardino Mountains is Southern California. Anything in the San Joaquin Valley is Central California. Northern California starts with the SF Bay Area and the inland delta region, so around Stockton and North of that. My qualifications: Born in San Diego and raised in Sacramento. Spent about 17.5 years total in Sacramento region and 20 in San Diego region (two stints). So I like to think I'm bringing both the NorCal AND the SoCal perspective on this. 

[Chief Guns]

Just now, brassboy said:

Both BDB and SCVC have won DCI Open Class multiple times and have bested many world class corps before. Not sure why being beaten by them should be that big of a blow compared to Gold. 

I don't want to speak for directly for greg_orangecounty, but i read it as more of a dislike/rivalry. Kind of like Red Sox fans could probaly stomach losing to the Mariners to get to the World Series..................but not the Yankees lol. 

But again i could be wrong. 

[Chief Guns]

3 minutes ago, greg_orangecounty said:

First, thank you for serving our country!

Kids from Southern California have gone up north since the time the Kingsmen were prominent and later the Velvet Knights.  I can buy COVID, but didn't it hit everybody?  Certainly a rising Mandarins won't help, but I'm happy for them as they've paid their dues.  I'm super disappointed but the years not over.

You are welcome brother. Thank you so much! 

Covid certainly hit everyone, but PC doesn't have that "Street Cred" that the NorCal corps has.......if that makes sense. 

Plus with Gold right down the FWY, they took away some kids that might have marched PC this summer. I know for a fact that several kids marching Gold right now chose them over PC. My son being one of them.