the blind draw

[bumstead 13]

I'd like to get some more opions about the draw. On the down side you could have the 2 best wrestlers meeting in the quarter finals or earlier. on the other hand many a tournaments have been won or lost due to seeding tacticts and politics.

[IWIN 49]

Put together a board comprised of the super brainiacs from the KHSAA, a couple of out of state refs, along with all the info from Track and seed this thing! Tired of seeing finals matches in the quarters. If you take the region champs and seed them like the middle school has done this year, (minus coach input) and go off the cold hard facts and numbers, seeding could be accomplished.

[ccbcdeke 43]

if you look at Ranger's current rankings, at 126, you have the top two kids both from region 1 and the third and fourth kids are from region 5.  And region 3 doesn't have anyone in the top 25 at all.  What would you do with this weight class if you seeded the regional winners?

[IWIN 49]

Great question. Being completely honest, I don't know. Is a Regional runner up more worthy of a seed higher than a regional champ from another region? Possibly. I guess a certain criteria would have to be voted on and approved by the majority to accomplish this. It's not a perfect plan, but neither is the blind draw. Not real sure what the answer is, but there has to be a better way.

[bumstead 13]

after seeding the regional winners 1-8, seed the second place finishers and place them in opposing brackets from their regional champ counterparts? could get confuseing.

[coachteater 70]

Do they seed in other sports? The sweet 16, football playoffs, or any other championships? I honestly do not know. But I'm thinking if not they dont, then we never will. If we do it, then you open a Pandora box for all sports. I'm sure the khsaa would not be in favor of that. And if other sports do, does anyone know who seeds them and how they determine them?

[fanofwrestling6 14]

With the KHSAA This is something we will never have to worry about because they won't seed it. Hate to say that but its fact because of coach Teeters exact thoughts.

[firemans34 33]

There are those that believe the "random" aspect of the draw may not be so random. When a random draw was established for KY we didn't have Track and it's capabilities. Having the top two meeting in the quarters may be a big reason so many kids run from each other.....which is a big letdown to everyone when it happens. With that said, I'm confident KHSAA won't budge.

[Wrestling Dad 99]

I have said this several times on this forum, however Tennessee does about as good a job seeding their state tournament as I have seen. It rewards returning placers and separates them in the bracket. It is about as fair and objective as I have seen and does prevent most great match ups until the semis.

[dagger 7]

I wish they would go back to four regions. If they did that and took the top 8 in each bracket you would still have your 32 man bracket and a more balanced bracket and tournement. This would help to separate your best wrestlers.

[grappler-of-old 44]

Dagger I have said a simalair thing in the past. In districts have the top 5 qualify for regional. Then the brackets can still be run in 1 day for region. Then have the top 8 go to state in region.

Some have balked at this because they say. "why add another post season, so wrestlers can get hurt?" My answer to that is why wrestle the last few weeks of the regular season then? A wrestler could get hurt then also.

[WristControl 49]

Seed the top 4 only. Only region champs are eligible for a seed. Blind draw the rest. This is fair and could be done in 2 hours, max.  Allows the semifinals to be some amazing matchups.

[bumstead 13]

again what if the top 2 seeds are from the same region and you can only seed reg.champs

[bulldog-leader 56]

The 2nd placer in the region would still be in the opposite side of the bracket.

[crazyotto 381]

Seed this thing already! Good proposals by a few folks listed above.

[8798 45]

In Indiana they have a sectional, regional, semi-state, and state.  The only portion of the tournament that is actually seeded is the sectional...the rest of the tournament is based on performance in the previous stage(s) of the state tournament series.  The top four are taken from the semi-state and placed in the state brackets based on a predetermined format.  This format is "drawn" at some time earlier in the season and it is not released until after the completion of each Semi-State to avoid someone loosing based on what they think will happen elsewhere.  After the semi-state they just fill in the names based on their placing at the four semi-states.  A semi-state champion will wrestle a fourth place finisher from another semi-state.  A second placer will wrestle a third placer from another semi-state, etc.  This format allows you to separate all wrestlers from the same semi-state so they do not meet in the second round...they can only meet in the semi-finals or finals.  This is how they also used to do it "back in the day" when we still had Districts and Regionals and it worked quite well.  They may even use this same format today...although I wish we still had the 16 man bracket.  I have not yet sat down to see how it would work out numerically with our current 32 man bracket (and again, they may already do this), but after the first stage of the state tournament series there is no more seeding or possible "politics", it is all left up the the competitors.  I am not saying this is right, but it is an option.   

[bulldog-leader 56]

Yes we in KY still do it the same way the only problem is that there is only 1 tourney before the state tourney and you have 8 champions. That means that if all the number 1's win there will be a match up of number 1's in the quarter finals. 

 

This is where some people have a problem.  If the supposed two best wrestlers are in the same quarter bracket they meet in the quarter finals instead of the semi's or finals. 

 

I personally don't care about when the best two meet, as long as they meet. 

[8798 45]

I wish they would go back to four regions. If they did that and took the top 8 in each bracket you would still have your 32 man bracket and a more balanced bracket and tournement. This would help to separate your best wrestlers.

 

Dagger I have said a simalair thing in the past. In districts have the top 5 qualify for regional. Then the brackets can still be run in 1 day for region. Then have the top 8 go to state in region.

Some have balked at this because they say. "why add another post season, so wrestlers can get hurt?" My answer to that is why wrestle the last few weeks of the regular season then? A wrestler could get hurt then also.

 

This sure seems like a feasible alternative.  You can then separate all the Regional champions and if the two best kids are from the same Regional, they will be separated due to the Regional results.

[Takedown Machine152 15]

I think it is within reason to seed the top 8-10 wrestlers for each weight in state tournament irrespective of regional performance. Let's be real, we have a group of individuals who build very accurate rankings year in and year out. Now, clearly we would need to assign this responsibility to a committee of non-coaches. This would alleviate endless squabbling over trivial differences in records and so on. But I genuinely believe every year, we could comprise brackets that reflect the patterns of a given season. And so what if this practice translated into other sports? I also played baseball at a Lexington high school, so I'm familiar with the unfair postseason format. Baseball in Lexington has produced 5 of the last 10 state champions and Woodford County won in 2012 (Woodford is in the same region). It is also common to see five or six Lexington teams ranked in the top 10-15 all season, yet only one of these powerful programs each season will advance beyond regionals. in my opinion that renders all of our ranking systems useless. They mean nothing if they aren't used to fairly assign seeds for postseason competition. Let's bring it back to wrestling. There are a few instances where the top two wrestlers for a given weight class are from schools in the same region. Well one of them has to lose the regional final. Does that mean that wrestler is no longer the best or second best wrestler for that class? ABSOLUTELY NOT. Or even worse, The #2 at 145 wins his regional and the #1 at 145 has a bad day and places 2nd in a different regional. Now there is a non zero possibility that the two best from a weight class meet in the 2nd round of state. Is that a good thing? NO!!! Is that #1 at 145 suddenly a lesser athlete because he had a bad showing for one match? ABSOLUTELY NOT.  And that should be reflected in the state tournament. Let's give some practical meaning to the rankings. After all, several people spend a lot of time trying to get them right. They do an excellent job by the way. 

 

I believe I understand one of the big reasons seeding doesn't happen here. It has to do with fairness. But the KHSAA tends to focus on only one side of the fairness coin. And that's the side that feels seeding individuals can be demoralizing and can damage the psyches of our athletes. The other side (the one the KHSAA conveniently ignores) is two-fold. As an athlete, my goal was to win. Period. If I knew another wrestler was supposed to be better than me, it made me work even harder. Nothing feels better than beating a guy you're not supposed to beat. That is true in every sport. It's universal. The other point I would make in support of seeding these events is that it is equally unfair to intentionally or unintentionally punish two or more elite level competitors by (potentially) having them draw each other in the early rounds of a state tournament. Let's say #1 and #2 meet in the quarterfinals for whatever weight class. One of them will have to fight through consolations to at best finish 3rd when, on paper he is deserving of 1st or 2nd place. That isn't fair to the most talented competitors. If those wrestlers were seeded 1 and 2 and one of them lost before then finals, then so be it. But the top performers should be rewarded for their achievements during the regular season. Seeding is in fact the most fair way to organize a state championship. And that goes for all sports.

[bulldog-leader 56]

takedownmachine;

 

If we do it your way.  Seed everyone regardless of if they win a region or not. Why have a regional tournament? 

 

You would then have to require teams wrestling at certain tournaments or something like that.  We have numerous teams that don't compete in KY for most of thier season.  Should they be forced to participate more in KY? 

 

If so then that causes for more travel for many teams like those in NKY.  Once you leave NKY the nearest teams or tournaments are an hour or two away.  Whereas if they cross the river into Ind. or Ohio its only a 1/2 hour trip, and more competitive wrestling.

 

If you seed you should only seed the regional champs.  And I think the only criteria you use is like Tenn.  Returning placers in the state tourney last year, then draw the rest. 

[IWIN 49]

The topic of teams that mostly compete out of state came up in the middle school forum as well when talking about the seeding process. My answer to should we force teams to wrestle X amount of times KY is no. Nobody should force anything. But what we should do is if the teams that mostly compete out of state doesn't have seedable in state criteria, then I guess they get the lesser seed. I know I am going to get beat up over this, but I don't care if lil Johnny has best the who's who from whatever state. What has he done here? Who has he beat here? Etc. we should make tournaments like the WCI, the Rumble, the Dragon, and so forth, somewhat staple tournaments. Certainly a team that prefers to mainly wrestle out of state can see fit to make one these tournaments, and give us some type of criteria to base our seeding off from.

[8798 45]

Some refer to the State Tournament Series as the second season.  Others will even go as far as to tell their athletes their record is now 0-0.  The state tournament series is a separate beast from the regular season.  I understand if we want to make it less intense on the younger athletes (youth and middle schoolers), but we are talking about high schoolers.  The pressure of the situation is a huge part of this sport and that pressure intensifies in the state tournament series.  Those who have created the rankings have done an outstanding job.  It is a very difficult, and often unappreciated, job.  But the rankings are just that..."rankings"...they are based on results, but are they to be used to influence the results? 

 

One of the great things about our sport is that the results are placed securely in the hands of the participants.  Nobody else can miss a shot, whiff on a block, or drop a fly.  (Other than the occasional referee mistake.)  There are consequences and they are the result of individual performance.  When the second ranked wrestler in the state loses a match he should not have lost in the Regional, we are not penalizing him by putting him in the second or third place slot for the State Tournament Bracket.  He has placed himself there through his performance.  (I am not making light of upsets, but they happen and are part of the sport.)  Is it then acceptable to move him based on his prior performance when his most recent performance was not up to par?  Possibly penalizing a kid who got on a roll in another regional and placed first as a result?  I realize we want to see the best matches in the finals or semis, but shouldn't that decision be made by the kids through their wrestling rather than a committee that creates the most favorable bracket to that end?  I am not trying to be harsh, and I understand that these are still kids, but let's keep the results of these tournaments, as much as possible, in the hands of the kids and not try to reshape the brackets based on what we think should have happened.

[bulldog-leader 56]

     You make those tourneys special tourneys then you are opening another can of worms.  Why should those programs get the prfits of a big tourney and not other programs. Do you ask the non-ky teams to not attend these tourneys anymore since they are not part of the state? 

 

     Then what happens when that schools drops their program?   For years in KY we had the high school state tournament held at a high school that did not even have a wrestling program.  Up till the mid 90's i believe.  All this for the sake of seeding the state tourney?  What happens when Ryle schedules the Dragon and then they are not allowed to attend because they had snow, or one of their studs is hurt on that tourney day, or sick, or does not make weight?  Or just has a bad day?

 

     Then what happens on those days when these tourneys are held?   Look at last weekend.  If you are not a team in the state duals, you have an exceptionally hard time finding a tournament to attend.  Do we need to do this on 3 or 4 other dates during the year? 

[crazyotto 381]

In Indiana they have a sectional, regional, semi-state, and state.  The only portion of the tournament that is actually seeded is the sectional...the rest of the tournament is based on performance in the previous stage(s) of the state tournament series.  The top four are taken from the semi-state and placed in the state brackets based on a predetermined format.  This format is "drawn" at some time earlier in the season and it is not released until after the completion of each Semi-State to avoid someone loosing based on what they think will happen elsewhere.  After the semi-state they just fill in the names based on their placing at the four semi-states.  A semi-state champion will wrestle a fourth place finisher from another semi-state.  A second placer will wrestle a third placer from another semi-state, etc.  This format allows you to separate all wrestlers from the same semi-state so they do not meet in the second round...they can only meet in the semi-finals or finals.  This is how they also used to do it "back in the day" when we still had Districts and Regionals and it worked quite well.  They may even use this same format today...although I wish we still had the 16 man bracket.  I have not yet sat down to see how it would work out numerically with our current 32 man bracket (and again, they may already do this), but after the first stage of the state tournament series there is no more seeding or possible "politics", it is all left up the the competitors.  I am not saying this is right, but it is an option.   

 

 

Yes we in KY still do it the same way the only problem is that there is only 1 tourney before the state tourney and you have 8 champions. That means that if all the number 1's win there will be a match up of number 1's in the quarter finals. 

 

This is where some people have a problem.  If the supposed two best wrestlers are in the same quarter bracket they meet in the quarter finals instead of the semi's or finals. 

 

I personally don't care about when the best two meet, as long as they meet. 

 

  The seeding takes care of itself with the addition of one tourney after regionals (I think that is what it is called?). Seed each regional. Top eight from region 1 and 2 go to a district. Top eight from region 3 and 4 go to a district. Seeds in accordance to finish at regionals. 1 and 2 from each regional are separated. Top eight from each district fill state tourney brackets. Again, separation for top two from each district. More separation if desired. Ohio and Indiana have similar structures. As do many other states. 

[Takedown Machine152 15]

takedownmachine;

 

If we do it your way.  Seed everyone regardless of if they win a region or not. Why have a regional tournament? 

 

You would then have to require teams wrestling at certain tournaments or something like that.  We have numerous teams that don't compete in KY for most of thier season.  Should they be forced to participate more in KY? 

 

If so then that causes for more travel for many teams like those in NKY.  Once you leave NKY the nearest teams or tournaments are an hour or two away.  Whereas if they cross the river into Ind. or Ohio its only a 1/2 hour trip, and more competitive wrestling.

 

If you seed you should only seed the regional champs.  And I think the only criteria you use is like Tenn.  Returning placers in the state tourney last year, then draw the rest. 

Regional tournaments would still factor into the seeding. I like to consider the way the NCAA goes about seeding the national championship for wrestling. Look at the Big 12 championship at 174 lbs. The finals there will almost certainly be Andrew Howe vs. Chris Perry. They are ranked #1 and #2 respectively in their weight class. If Chris Perry wins the Big 12 final over Howe, Perry will earn the #1 seed at nationals for sure, but Andrew Howe will not suddenly become an unseeded wrestler. He will get the #2 seed for nationals. My point is that regionals should still matter, but should only be one piece of the puzzle in regard to putting together the most fair and accurate brackets for our state tournament. 

 

And as far as out of state competition goes, it is one of the most valuable things a team or individuals can experience. It should not be limited and, frankly, it often helps qualify an individuals skill level much more definitively than in state competition. The teams that get to wrestle in Ohio and Indiana get to face higher levels of competition. Let's face it, collectively those two states foster huge amounts of talent in this sport; more talent overall than Kentucky. I don't say that to be insulting, I say it because Kentucky is improving very rapidly and that is in part thanks to Ohio and Indiana. Getting back to my point, we can factor wins and losses versus outside competition into seeding. For instance, If Brock Ervin and Sean Fausz both wrestled 132 for regionals and won their region, we could then use their overall records along with results from major tournaments and results against nationally recognized opponents to determine which of them deserved the #1 seed at state. In this case, Brock was runner up at Iron Man and has huge results against other nationally ranked opponents. Sean, who is an extremely talented wrestler, just hasn't had the same success as Brock, so Brock would easily earn the #1 seed. That's just one example that we won't encounter this year, but you get my point. 

 

The problem I have with seeding regional champs is that some weight classes in some regions are much weaker than others. It's not fair to have 3 guys from one region all ranked in the top 5, while another region may only have one ranked wrestler in that class and that guy may be ranked #17 or so. Does that really seem fair? To me it doesn't. To me that is punishing 2 of those top 5 guys because they are in a tough region, when they clearly are among the strongest wrestlers in that weight class. It seems like only seeding regional champs is robbing Peter to pay Paul. This is also why I believe a committee of non-coaches should be delegated for this. They would use a specific metric to determine accurate seeding. And the job would be taken very seriously. Just look at how well Ranger does with his rankings. There are a couple disagreements here and there, but the consensus is that he does a fantastic job. So we know which wrestlers are at the highest level around the state. It isn't meant to be an insult to a kid who wins a weak region. That kid works hard too, but he isn't suddenly an All-State caliper wrestler because of it. 

 

I think the solution to this problem would be extending the number of seeds per weight class. For instance, every regional champion is guaranteed a seed, but that weight class may have 10 or 12 seeded wrestlers while another may have 9 seeds, and another may have 8. Let's say at 126 region 6 has 3 guys who would deserve a seed at state and every other region has one guy who deserves a seed at state. Now we would have 8 regional champs earn a seed plus 2 non region champs for a total of 10 seeds as determined by a committee. 1 or 2 of those regional champs may may be seeded lower than the non regional champs per criteria, but all would be guaranteed a seed. Thoughts?

 

No system is perfect, but we could certainly improve upon the current mode.