[jdonn]

What do the mini spingolds have to do with it? The 65 seed (and any seed in particular) will be either equal to or worse than what the same seed would have been if more teams had entered. And obviously the 60 seeds will be better when 106 teams are entered than when 65 teams are entered.

[TimG]

I would expect the bottom few seeds in the Spingold are very often eligible for one of the mini-Spingolds, but choose to enter the Spingold. There have always been concurrent events a team could enter and there have always been teams with no chance which enter the Spingold.

[nigel_k]

jdonn, on Jul 28 2010, 09:23 AM, said:

nigel_k, on Jul 27 2010, 03:09 PM, said:

If it was 32,33,65 then I would prefer to be seeded 34 and play the 31 seed straightup rather than be seeded 33 and go in a 3 way with the 32 seed. OTOH 32,64,65 is clearly wrong because it is obviously better to be 32 than 31 in that case.

So maybe something like Josh's suggestion but with slightly lower seeds, e.g. 35,36,65.

Based on your first paragraph you should want it to be 1, 64, 65 then?

The principle I am trying to apply is that being seed 1 is better then being seed 2, being seed 2 is better then being seed 3 etc. 'Better' meaning having a draw that improves your chances of going through.

I wouldn't want it to be 1, 64, 65 because then I would rather be seed 2 than seed 1.

[NickRW]

Seems to me that you have 5 choices:

1) 1/64/65. Logical in the sense that #1 would have played the winner of 64/65 had there been a round of 128. Downside is that you put your #1 seed in a relatively high variance position.

2) The normal head to head matches are 1v63, 2v62.... etc ... up to 31v33, then the 3 way is 32/64/65. Some might think it is better to be 33rd seed than 32.

2a) Modifying 2 is that you make #33 seed or some arbitrary other seed above that point play 64/65. Not sure how you decide exactly which seed it should be, but at least none of the top 32 seeds have anything to complain about and at some point down the seeding order surely the, say, #40 seed has a better chance of progressing in the 3 way than they would have had in a head to head against the seed they would otherwise have been playing. Probably a mathematician can come up with a formula.

3) The normal head to head matches are 1v62, 2v61.... etc. up to 31v32, then the 3 way is 63/64/65. None of the top seeds 32 are inconvenienced and you avoid an aribtrary choice of who plays in the 3 way. One downside is that you then guarantee a very low seed a place in the round of 32.

4) The other way, making #1 play 64, 2v63 etc as per normal, leaves 32, 33 and 65 fighting it out and you're really then placing a top 32 seed in a bad position - even #33 would have preferred a head to head with 32. This one seems to really not be a flier to me at all. However:

4a) Alternatively making it say 36, 37 and 65 in the 3 way, there probably comes a point where the two higher seeds each have at least a good a chance of progressing in a 3 way with 65 as they would have had in their normal head to head match against a higher ranking team. This also needs someone to crunch some standard deviation numbers.

Nick

[TimG]

NickRW, on Jul 28 2010, 06:14 PM, said:

2a) Modifying 2 is that you make #33 seed or some arbitrary other seed above that point play 64/65.  Not sure how you decide exactly which seed it should be, but at least none of the top 32 seeds have anything to complain about and at some point down the seeding order surely the, say, #40 seed has a better chance of progressing in the 3 way than they would have had in a head to head against the seed they would otherwise have been playing.  Probably a mathematician can come up with a formula.

3) The normal head to head matches are 1v62, 2v61.... etc. up to 31v32, then the 3 way is 63/64/65.  None of the top seeds 32 are inconvenienced and you avoid an aribtrary choice of who plays in the 3 way.  One downside is that you then guarantee a very low seed a place in the round of 32.

Some top 32 team(s) will be inconvenienced since they can't all advance.

[jdonn]

TimG, on Jul 28 2010, 08:08 PM, said:

NickRW, on Jul 28 2010, 06:14 PM, said:

2a) Modifying 2 is that you make #33 seed or some arbitrary other seed above that point play 64/65.  Not sure how you decide exactly which seed it should be, but at least none of the top 32 seeds have anything to complain about and at some point down the seeding order surely the, say, #40 seed has a better chance of progressing in the 3 way than they would have had in a head to head against the seed they would otherwise have been playing.  Probably a mathematician can come up with a formula.

3) The normal head to head matches are 1v62, 2v61.... etc. up to 31v32, then the 3 way is 63/64/65.  None of the top seeds 32 are inconvenienced and you avoid an aribtrary choice of who plays in the 3 way.  One downside is that you then guarantee a very low seed a place in the round of 32.

Some top 32 team(s) will be inconvenienced since they can't all advance.

And they are all inconvenienced by having to play a better seed than they would otherwise (1 playing 62 or 63 instead of 64, etc.)

[NickRW]

jdonn, on Jul 29 2010, 01:20 AM, said:

TimG, on Jul 28 2010, 08:08 PM, said:

NickRW, on Jul 28 2010, 06:14 PM, said:

2a) Modifying 2 is that you make #33 seed or some arbitrary other seed above that point play 64/65.  Not sure how you decide exactly which seed it should be, but at least none of the top 32 seeds have anything to complain about and at some point down the seeding order surely the, say, #40 seed has a better chance of progressing in the 3 way than they would have had in a head to head against the seed they would otherwise have been playing.  Probably a mathematician can come up with a formula.

3) The normal head to head matches are 1v62, 2v61.... etc. up to 31v32, then the 3 way is 63/64/65.  None of the top seeds 32 are inconvenienced and you avoid an aribtrary choice of who plays in the 3 way.  One downside is that you then guarantee a very low seed a place in the round of 32.

Some top 32 team(s) will be inconvenienced since they can't all advance.

And they are all inconvenienced by having to play a better seed than they would otherwise (1 playing 62 or 63 instead of 64, etc.)

I could have made tl;dr post. I was glossing over minor detail. Perhaps you'd all like to sit around while 64 and 65 scrap it out in the round of 128??

[WellSpyder]

I don't believe there is any pre-determined way of doing this that would satisfy the basic requirement people seem to thing is reasonable that the higher your seeding (ie lower-numbered seed!) the easier path you are given through the draw.

So why not make it random? Personally I think there is a case for saying that each of seeds 1-32 should play a randomly drawn seed from 33-64 in the first round, but even if you prefer 1v64, 2v63, etc there is no reason why you can't randomly draw a number from 1 to 32 to decide which match you add team 65 to. You have still ensured that ex ante it is always "better" to be seeded higher.

[TimG]

If the three-way is 1-64-65, that means #2 has an easier time heads up with 63.

If the three-way is 2-64-65, that means #3 has an easier time heads up with 62.

If the three-way is 3-64-65, that means #4 has an easier time heads up with 61.

If we extend this all the way to down the list to:

If the three-way is 32-64-65, that means #33 has an easier time heads up with 31

We end up with a false statement (#33 would actually prefer to be in the three-way than in the heads up match).

So, somewhere along the line there must be a place of near equilibrium. Maybe 12-64-65 is nearly the same as 13-52? 20-64-65 is nearly the same as 21-44? 25-64-65 is nearly the same as 26-39?

It is true that the equilibrium spot will vary from event to event, but it seems to me that a reasonably accurate long-term guess could be made for the appropriate three-way.

Tim

[paulg]

Something to remember is that the Spingold seedings are randomised in groups.

After the holders and next top ranked team, seed numbers three and four by lot. Then, the next four teams will be assigned seed numbers five through eight by lot. Similarly, seed numbers will be assigned by lot for positions 9-12, 13-16, 17-20, 21-24, 25-28, 29-32, 33-40, 41-48, 49-56, 57-64, 65-80, 81-96, and so on in groups of 16.

[TimG]

cardsharp, on Jul 29 2010, 10:46 AM, said:

Something to remember is that the Spingold seedings are randomised in groups.

After the holders and next top ranked team, seed numbers three and four by lot. Then, the next four teams will be assigned seed numbers five through eight by lot. Similarly, seed numbers will be assigned by lot for positions 9-12, 13-16, 17-20, 21-24, 25-28, 29-32, 33-40, 41-48, 49-56, 57-64, 65-80, 81-96, and so on in groups of 16.

I don't think that changes things much, if at all. I think part of the reasoning is that there really isn't a difference between 14 and 15 or 42 and 46.

[FrancesHinden]

Sorry to sound dumb, but can someone explain something to me. Are there really only 65 teams that enter the Spingold?

[kfay]

FrancesHinden, on Jul 29 2010, 11:26 AM, said:

Sorry to sound dumb, but can someone explain something to me. Are there really only 65 teams that enter the Spingold?

It seems to have been a down year for the summer nationals in general.

This year's Spingold had only 65 entrants, compared with 83 in 2009 (Washington DC) and 106 in 2008 (Las Vegas).

This year's table count on the 7th day is 7,821 tables. In 2009 the table count on the same day was 9695. In 2008, 13,926.

[pooltuna]

FrancesHinden, on Jul 29 2010, 11:26 AM, said:

Sorry to sound dumb, but can someone explain something to me. Are there really only 65 teams that enter the Spingold?

Still takes 6 days to finish it(56 or 64 bds/day). Do you want it to take longer?

[jdonn]

FrancesHinden, on Jul 29 2010, 11:26 AM, said:

Sorry to sound dumb, but can someone explain something to me. Are there really only 65 teams that enter the Spingold?

Clearly too many, if there were 64 it would have been perfect.

[Mbodell]

jdonn, on Jul 29 2010, 08:37 AM, said:

FrancesHinden, on Jul 29 2010, 11:26 AM, said:

Sorry to sound dumb, but can someone explain something to me.  Are there really only 65 teams that enter the Spingold?

Clearly too many, if there were 64 it would have been perfect.

The Spingold II was the only "perfect" number event. 28 teams!

[aguahombre]

Yep, after 3 rounds it would be down to 3 1/2 teams.

[Fluffy]

I am impressed with the long debate about this thing, are people jsut bored or you do really care about the seeds and the stuff here?

[kfay]

Perfect Number

[NickRW]

Fluffy, on Jul 29 2010, 06:12 PM, said:

I am impressed with the long debate about this thing, are people jsut bored or you do really care about the seeds and the stuff here?

Some of us are nerdy enough to be fascinated by the merits of different movements etc.