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BGonline.org Forums
How about "reverse-seeding" for byes?
Posted By: phil simborg In Response To: How about "reverse-seeding" for byes? (Joe Russell)
Date: Tuesday, 30 June 2015, at 1:58 p.m.
Joe, as usual, your ideas make sense to me, but I have suggested similar ideas in the past and most Giants have resented the idea that there are side pools and bets that they are not allowed to participate in...they feel it takes away from the money they can win, and deserve to win. While their arguments make sense mathematically for a given tournament, what is being missed here is that if we do something to encourage more non-giants to enter open division tournaments the total prize pool will get significantly higher and Giants will walk away with more money simply because they win more.
Anyone who looks at the winning odds for Mochy vs. the lower-level players can see why lower level players are coming to fewer tournaments. I believe we had Mochy at 18 to 1 in San Antonio and the lower-level Open players at 100 to 1. And we didn't get very many bets on the 100 to 1 players.
I have given lessons to many players who have won the Intermediate division at ABT events and I used to see them often at tournaments. Now that they are forced to play in the Open, I see those same people only at the tournaments in their home territory. Most of them don't want to spend the money and time to go to tournaments where they know they are going to get clobbered. We need to do something to make these tournaments more attractive to them...give them a bye, give them a side pool or lower entry fee or some incentive to feel like they have a reasonable chance to at least get their entry fee back or win something.
I have been doing something like this myself for years. I always have some side bets on who goes further with other open players who are non-giants so that I have some more action that is "fair" action for me where I have a reasonable chance to win. For example, this weekend in Novi, so far I have 5 $100 side bets with people who are not giants. I can assure you that at least 2 of those people are clearly better than me (in PR) but I still have better equity on those bets than I do generally in cashing in the tournament.
The problem is that the cost to go to tournaments and the entry fees for the Open Division are simply a horrible financial bet for people in the lower half of the open division. The difference in PR and winning chances between a 9 PR player and the top players is just too great. One answer would be to have a Pro Division for the top ranked players, but I think that would hurt the prize pool for the giants even more and it would also ruin some of my fun of playing giants, which is some of the fun of playing in tournaments for open players.
So the answer is to do something to make it more enticing for low open players to compete. This is not only better for them, but for the game and for the Giants. I would estimate that we could easily increase the Open division at most major tournaments by 25 percent or more if we did things to make the tournament more financially attractive to low open players.
As for giving them a bye, or a better chance for a bye, all of your arguments are right. Yes, they are getting a better shot at ABT points, but so what? Yes, they will win a few more ABT points than otherwise. That is precisely what will get them to come back more often! How do you think it feels to go to 5 or 6 or more tournaments a year and not even get listed on the ABT point list? This, along with the cost, is why they are not coming to many tournaments.
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