Moving Finals to earlier in the year

[Kenji Cline]

MEOWS!

[Josh Connell]

I can think of someone who bolted this year at finals. People will drop out and bolt no matter what format.

True. At a normal stroke play event, though, the worst thing that happens if someone bolts is a group or two get re-shuffled and everyone plays on. But in a match play tournament, dropping out directly affects another player (the bolting player's opponent). I guess you can argue that the opponent gets to move on by default, but they're still left with nothing to do for a few hours, and if they traveled with others who are still playing, they're probably also stuck at the course...4 hours from home.

Of course, this is usually only a problem in consolation/losers' brackets, so the solution perhaps is just doing single elimination with no consolation brackets. Then you run into possible one and done scenarios that might be reason for players to choose not to travel from afar.

[Matt Stroika]

Maybe you do not play off the 13-16 places but with added money there would be a significant difference between every place. You also add that if you do not finish the tournament your winnings are ZERO. Not many people are going to leave behind $50 or more.

[John Hart]

Reading this post and looking at the link Josh provided has brought back many memories as to how and why things all changed. I was the NEFA Points guy in 2004 & 2005, then became Prez in 2006 and also was the TD for the 2006 Finals, which was the first year of single day stroke play, as defined in the Charter since then up until 2012. When things changed to being a fully stroke play event, there was much discussion involving the Board including all the State Reps, and that was also the year that we started the State rotation for Finals.

Most people loved match play at Finals. The 2 main reasons against continuing with match play were that 1) It took 2 days and 2 days was tough for many people, especially after a long season of playing, and 2) Players would bail after they lost a match because they couldn't win it all. So after you committed to going for 2 days, if you lost a match you might just keep sitting if your opponent decided to bail. I specifically remember 2 instances in 2004, one where a player lost the first round and then decided to sit around and play video games instead of playing in the afternoon, leaving his opponent without a match. Another similar drop out caddied for someone else instead of playing.

If you read further in Josh's link you will discover that in 2005, Day 1 was all match play, and Day 2 was match play for those that were winners on Day 1 (usually 2 or 4 per division) and a stroke play event for all those that had lost on Day 1. So if you had lost on Day 1 in the round of 16 or 8, you could come back on Day 2 and win the losers side taking 5th place, and getting some cash. If you didn't want to show, you weren't leaving anyone hanging. I thought this worked well, except for the fact that it rained for 2 days solid.

There is good reason to go back to match play. Most everyone is much more familiar with the format and the strategy of match play with the Team Challenge over the last 5 (?) years. Going to the format of the 2005 Finals would work, or something similar with match play again on Sunday for those that show (still could leave out an odd person). Some would still find it tough to commit to 2 days.

As far as counting the Finals towards the NEXT season, why not make it a double points event for THIS season that it is finishing, and total up the seasons points after Finals, then it would really be worth more, with the possibility of many shuffling spots.

Also, I believe NEFA started paying for final standings in 2005 or 2006 at the 50/50 rate with Finals. Before that Jason made up some laminated certificates. I think the payout should weigh more heavily towards the Finals tournament rather than the final standings, but sometime after 2008 it went the other way to 60/40 in favor of the final standings.

It would be great to get a Point Series Sponsor, and have smaller tiers available for other sponsors to raise money for the series and finals. Last year or a couple years ago Vibram was a series sponsor and gave some discs to every NEFA Points event, but it never was the "Vibram NEFA Points Series" which could have raised money for Finals. I am not sure how much extra the "Preferred Vendor" idea raised this year. The 20% off is a given from just about any good disc retailer, so what advantage did it gain above that? I am sure many people appreciated Justin being at the events, but is there more fund raising that can be done? I was in favor of raising the event fee to $2 per player, but it has stayed at $1.

Todd Brodeur, Marshall Street and Prime Discs have apparently continued advertising on our main NEFA page since 2008. Where does this money go, general fund? I think that if it was possible to add active advertising to the discussion page, this would be the best location.

I would also be in favor of an earlier Finals, say the last weekend in September. A push to get TD's to have some Points Events prior to April would help, since the schedule is so crowded these days. How quick will the 2013 scheduling start?

[Chris Mayone]

That is one of the most pleasant discussions I have ever followed on this forum. Thank you everyone involved!

When the finals were coming to VT a few years back (Sugarbush) we lobbied hard to get them moved forward into early or mid September. We were unsuccessful in doing that and they fell on the 2nd weekend of October. Some folks may remember .... It was most unpleasant. For ME, NH, & VT at least, Oct can be very unpredictable. Sept is often beautiful. I think it is well worth any effort it might take to push it ahead a few weeks. Great to see all of the thoughtful and intelligent options and ideas put out there.

Chris

[Chris Young]

I agree Mayone. John layed out several things that we here in Vermont have discussed and moved forward with....

1. Our GMPS fee started at $1/player and after a couple of years the GMDGC agreed to raise it to $2/player and payouts went up a bunch as a result. The $1 extra per player is not asking very much and we received virtually no negative feedback about the change.

2. The GMDGC has reached out in the Vermont community in the past few years and now has title sponsorship for our Green Mtn Points Series and our website sponsorship involvement is growing with funds going towards new courses and course improvements throughout the state. Title sponsorship for the Points Series allows us to give out custom trophies to all divisions, adds cash to each event in the Series and also adds to the Series payouts. Website sponsorship funds go towards our Course Development Fund that we created this year and those that sponsor our website directly support new and improved courses in Vermont.

3. We also have a local Series in the Burlington area and are having Finals count as 2x points this year. I think this idea could be a good way to weight Finals as an important event that could still swing many divisions. Having the final event be part of the Series is something we have always done and if NEFA could pull it off I think it would make Finals even more attractive.

Thanks to all of NEFA land! I had yet another fun year....

Started on the Vineyard. I was able to play Hop Head Fest at Hylands for the first time. The rest of the season was spent in Vermont and New Hampshire. See ya all next year!