Will The Triple Crown System Hurt The “Almost Elite?”

November 1, 2012 by Matthew Auletta in News, Opinion with 33 Comments

This is the first article in a series on USA Ultimate’s new Club Division restructure, the Triple Crown Tour. We will be publishing comments from various teams and players about the new system and how it affects teams from the various tiers. We recommend reading this first to understand the Triple Crown plan.

New York’s 7 Express finished in 7th place at Northeast Regionals in the Mixed Division, relegating our team into the Select Flight of the new USA Ultimate Triple Crown system. As a captain of this year’s team, I would like to offer some insights and opinions about the new system by taking a look at our season and showcasing how it would be different under the 2013 changes.

This season 7 Express was fortunate enough to participate in some of the most competitive mixed tournaments in the country, playing in the Boston, Philly, and Chesapeake Invites. Participating in these tournaments provided us with invaluable opportunities to measure up against some of the best teams in the division. The experience gained from these events cannot be overstated especially for a team with a very young core.

Our season may have ended earlier than we wanted when we stumbled at Northeast Regionals, but if there is a silver lining at the end of a promising, yet disappointing season, it is this: being beaten by the best helps prepare you to become the best, and there is always next year. Except now there isn’t.

In 2012 we played a total of 13 games — with a record of 3-10 — against teams that eventually qualified for USAU’s Club Championships (and are now placed into the Pro and Elite Flights for 2013). One of those losses came on universe point against perennial powerhouse Slow White (Boston), who finished 10th in Sarasota. Another came in the finals of the Philly Invite against Overhaul, another universe point loss. Our average margin of defeat in those thirteen games was -2.8 points. Rounded up that would mean we basically played the top sixteen teams in the country to scores of about 15-12.

We also played 10 games against teams that will be relegated with us to the Select Flight (tier 3). In those games we were 8-2. With an average margin of victory at +3.6 points. In those ten games we only allowed teams to score in the double digits three times.

That makes 7 Express’ record 11-12 against Tiers 1-3. We played a bunch of close games against the top teams despite losing most, but we also showed we could easily handle our peers in tier 3. Statistically this puts us right at the border of tiers 2 and 3. In the past, this would matter little, as the following season would offer plenty of opportunities to continue competing against the teams who placed above us. However, under the new Triple Crown system, I fear many of these opportunities are going to be lost as teams at this year’s Club Championships will be required to mostly participate in segregated, tier specific events where a “lowly” team like 7 Express will not be allowed to participate.

One of USA Ultimate’s stated goals of the new system is to encourage more meaningful competition among teams. It is my opinion that the new system will have the exact opposite effect on my team next season. The new structure will force us to play against teams that do not offer us the best in terms of competition. There is also the glaring problem of geographic diversity. By making it much harder for 7X to play against upper tiers, we are losing the opportunity to play against to following teams: AMP (Philadelphia), The Ghosts (Boston), Slow White, Wildcard (Amherst), and Odyssée (Montreal).

This season we played those teams (all located within about four hours of New York) a total of ten times, which accounts for a third of all our officially rostered games. Under the new system we would most likely need to travel significantly farther to play enough tier 3 teams. As a captain, I do not think it would make sense financially to require my team to travel significant distances to play competition that is weaker than what we were accustomed to playing this year. Yet I would have no issue with a West Coast trip if championship qualifiers were going to be in attendance: we have proved we can play with the best, and in some cases come out on top. The experience would be well worth the cost.

Until next season starts it will be impossible to see how tournaments and teams in all tiers are affected, but I am deeply concerned that good teams that narrowly missed out on the Club Championships are going to face unprecedented and unnecessary hardships in 2013. It is my opinion that this new system is going to stifle the growth of the “almost elite.” I hope I am wrong.

Tagged 7 Express, Club Championships, Elite Flight, mixed, Pro Flight, Select Flight, Triple Crown Tour, USA Ultimate

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Jake

The triple crown only requires you to play, or restricts you from playing, in certain tournaments. I don’t see why all the other tournaments you went to last year wouldn’t happen exactly the same as before?

Last year we didn’t have elite flight/pro flight/ elite-pro flight tournaments at all. Now we will, but if teams still participate in all the tournaments they did before, you should still have almost the same amount of playing time against them. (I’m guessing a few might not go to some traditional tournaments because they have to save for/plan for the newly mandatory ones, but mostly I think teams would still attend the usual tournaments as well.. giving “almost elite” teams nearly the same opportunity to play against them.

Unless I’m missing something?
Rama

Jake,

Your argument is a common one – there is nothing in the plan that prevents pro and elite teams from attending other events, and playing select or new teams.

The problem is one of time and money. A pro flight team has 3 required tournaments, at least 2 of which are likely to require a flight. Very few teams attend more than 3 regular season tournaments. There just isn’t enough time in the season to justify attending that many tournaments and still properly balance practice vs tournaments vs time off.

It seems unlikely that teams are just going to add these new tournaments to their schedule. More likely, these new tournaments will displace tournaments they currently go to (and some current tournaments will become these new events with more restrictive entry requirements).
- Jake
  
  @rama
  
  Thanks! That is a good answer. And I understand the concern there then.
David

Teams in the elite flight are only mandated to play in 2 tournaments, one of which is the elite/select challenge where you would probably be one of the teams playing in it.

I think most people bringing up this concern are overstating the case. Their is exactly one tournament that the elite flight teams will be playing that you will be shut out of.
pete

My team is in the same boat. We were 3-7 against tier 1-2 with an average margin of -2.5. Breaking that down further, we were 1-5 against Pro (1-4 against the top 2 teams) and 2-2 against Elite.

In fact if you take away games against the top 16, we only played 4 games. Not only is the tour taking away better competition, it is making it harder to get 10 sanctioned games. Select teams will be less likely to want to travel multiple times to play against each other. It is asking them to travel more times to play worse opponents.

In my opinion it will also be harder for the rankings system. There is only one crossover tournament between tiers, and Select will never play Pro unless the Pro teams choose to play a non-tour tournament. This means that the balance between tiers as far as rankings go will be entirely dependent on just a few games. And what happens if the gap between Pro and Elite becomes bigger than the gap between Elite and Select? It seems like the last few bids to nationals will be harder to accurately determine with this system.
Matt

Triple frown
Rama

David,

There is an elite select crossover tournament, but only one select team from each region gets to attend. Next year it might be 7express, but it might not (they finished behind 2 other select teams at regionals). Plenty of teams might not be the best select team in a region, but still could play competitively with elite teams.

There is a good chance that either D5 or 7express won’t play any elite or pro teams. Similarly either Oakland or Southpaw are shut out. Sprawl and Condors, Safari and Rally, etc.
Pooh

I see this as a far bigger hurdle for mixed as opposed to either Open or Women’s – as has been stated many places, the “tours” basically codify a de facto schedule that’s been in place since the early 2000s at the top level while mixed competition has been much more geographically based (which is why a non-zero percentage of people who are playing mixed are doing so rather than open/women’s to begin with).

And it DEFINITELY hurts teams with long travel distances. I captain a team in Alaska, and I;m very concerned about our ability to find tournaments which are A) sanctioned; B) Realist for us to attend logistically and C) to which we can secure a bid/invite next summer. Obviously, we’re a unique example, but I do wish there had been more apparent thought put into the degrees to which the 3 divisions differ in ways which might call for different solutions. Especially since the touted benefit of the realignment is ability to get increased exposure, a benefit which IMO is FAR more likely to be realized in Open than Women’s and again more likely to be realized in Women’s than Mixed
Stephanie

I agree. I have several concerns with the new format. The first are my thoughts around the mandated travel for the pro/elite teams. I understand that there will be the added incentive for cash prizes to be awarded at *some* of these tournaments, but what will be USA Ultimate’s approach to mitigate the tournament costs? As written above, many of these tournaments/events will require teams to fly to destinations. If a player on one of these teams happens to be under financial hardship, how would they hope to pay for flights, accommodation, tournament fees, etc for not one but three different events? How about the time off from work/school? These aren’t professional athletes and no one is guaranteed compensation. With that in mind it seems silly that USAU could “mandate” any level of participation in any event. After all, these aren’t employees, these are people who are choosing to dedicate their time and money to do something that they enjoy.

The other side is of course what the article relates. With the tiered approach, you’re effectively segregating teams- according to the previous year results no less. One of my biggest concerns (to be added to those noted in the above article) is the overall growth of the sport between generations of teams. Young players have traditionally learned proper cutting/throwing/strategies from the more experienced players, and traditionally have learned them through playing in the club circuit. Could you learn some techniques by watching a game and gaining the increased exposure that the triple crown format is promising? Of course, but there will always be a difference between watching and doing. The triple crown circuit is favoring players who have been playing the sport through youth/college teams (players who have the knowledge and the athleticism and can try out and make the higher level teams), but I fear that they may be cutting a lot of opportunities out from the players who (like most of the older players now) switched to ultimate after playing other sports before and learned from the experienced/competitive players before them.
Keith

This article seems to be the general feeling that losers of games-to-go/almost elite teams are feeling. As Jake stated, it doesn’t prevent teams from playing in more tournaments but why would a team in the Elite flight play any more games than they must against a team in the Select flight. It’s the same reason big name college football programs don’t play quality out of conference teams, especially lesser names, they have nothing to gain and everything to lose. Alabama doesn’t gain anything by playing NCSU in football as Truck Stop doesn’t gain anything by playing Florida United in Ultimate.
Jet

Would someone please tell me what is the purpose of the Triple Crown ? As simply as possible. Is the USAU spinning out of control ? Are rumors of a mass exodus of elite teams to go pro true ?
David

I play on a team in the elite mens flight.

We had 4 tournaments leading up to the series, not including a tryout tournament before that. In one of these, ECC, there was only one team there that is not in a pro/elite flight next season. Select teams that are worried they’d be shut out already were to begin with in this case. Functionally, this was sort of like the Pro/Elite challenge this year.

I could see us pretty much reproducing our schedule next year in this system. I think select teams will have just as much access to facing us. In our other three tournaments we faced nearly all select teams. Maybe select teams won’t have the same access to the pro teams, but how else are we going to showcase the top 8 if they aren’t focusing their time and money on playing each other.

Yeah, getting to see those teams in the pro flight a little less next season may not be amazing, but its going to make me work perhaps even harder to break into that level for next season. I also think it’ll bring a ton of cool story lines and narratives about teams rising and falling.
Brent

Jet, it was explained by USA Ultimate as a way to better promote the sport, which is a big part of their strategic plan. The previous structure didn’t allow them to do that very effectively. Haven’t heard any rumors of teams not playing in USAU. I would be surprised if that’s the case.
Rama

Brent,

Did USAU explain why they think they will be able to promote the Triple Crown effectively when they haven’t proved very successful at promoting the existing Club Championships?
Liz Middleton

Former mixed player, current women’s player (Bent)

My biggest issue (that hasn’t really been raised yet) with the new system is that it’s based entirely on last season’s results and there is no way to move up a tier during the season. That means if a new team forms (incredibly common in mixed) they’ll be stuck in the lowest tier until the second year.

Also, there was a flaw in the way nationals bids were allocated this year. Only teams that played in the regular season could earn bids to nationals for the region, but other teams could earn spots at nationals. That resulted in teams ranked in the top 16 (including Bent) not receiving a spot at nationals because of teams that didn’t play during the regular season. That means the top 16 teams in the country aren’t actually the same as the teams in the top two tiers, and there’s no way to fix it for another whole season.

While in open and mixed there are a number of good third tier teams, most women’s regionals tournaments can’t even find 16 teams to compete. Being locked out of the top two tiers means playing a much lower caliber of teams throughout the season.
- Travis
  
  Liz,
  
  Toward your first point I think it was the USAU’s intention that there be no way to move up in a single season. During an interview at nationals a spokesman said the system is designed to discourage teams from forming then breaking up and reshaping under a new name quickly.
  
  I might not agree with it but I don’t think they overlooked the issue when making the new plan.
  
  There is NO question that Bent got screwed by the 10 game requirement. If there is going to be a game requirement it should be in order to compete in the series at all. Bent put everything they had into regionals and were clearly a national caliber team.
Brent

Rama, yes they did. Have you read the materials on their website? Have you read any of the interviews they’ve done? They’ve addressed some of the things that make Club Championships a difficult thing to promote
Jet

Thanks Brent. Sounds simple enough. Go USA Ultimate ! !
Dan

So, its seems like this is an early call for 7 express to own Select Flight next year, get a promotion and play Elite Flight the year after…

You want to beat the best? You gotta beat every chump standing in between you and them first.

The Triple Crown is a long term solution. It may slow down the development of some teams, but in the long term, if teams are serious, they won’t be disadvantaged.

This is the best thing USAU has done in a long time and will carry our sport a long way into the future.
Rama

Brent,

I’ve gone through the (extremely limited) materials and watched the video. The only concrete answers I could find are that advertisers can’t get excited about Ironside vs Revolver, but can for Boston vs San Francisco. Which doesn’t see to have anything to do with the Triple Crown.

Story lines were alluded to, but we already have this. We could already talk about how Ironside was the winner of the regular season. Is the reason Nationals is hard to promote because we can’t say who won the US Open?

Could someone be concrete about a criticism advertisers had, that is solved with the Triple Crown?
Delaney

Dan,

That is the basic idea of the whole tier system, but I also fear that this encourages the top players to go try out for a team in a more “showcased” tier to play against better competition.

I think this actually weeds out some of the teams on the cusp, as their talent could easily go to other teams. And when the top players leave, the team stagnates.
Handy

Hey Pippin (and others),
I am NOT in any way shape or form speaking for the USAU, but a few years ago when this plan was starting to get hatched I was on the committee that discussed what the community wanted. This included a wide array of players from many backgrounds, both in terms of experience, geographic location, age and division (and work background).

The top complaint from all parties was the desire for “more meaningful opportunities” for the exact teams you are talking about–teams that will not win their region and are usually battling to place top 8 in the region but are less likely to make nationals. For teams 12-16 in a region, the best part is making regionals, that’s a reasonable goal. For teams 1-4 (depending on number of bids and regional parity) you maybe had a shot at nationals at least. But for teams 5-11 (or more broadly perhaps even 4-12 for regions with smaller bid amounts and less parity) what incentive is there to get better? How much chance is there that you are going to make such a huge jump that you are going to make nationals? It is more likely that you will lose players to other teams or that your team will break up trying to “shake things up” and make it that way, something we’ve definitely seen happen plenty in mixed.

Exposure to the best teams will still exist at non-Triple Crown tournaments, and speculating about what teams will go to what tournaments before the season starts is asinine–those teams don’t know so you don’t either. If this season really is such a drag because you are blowing teams out then everyone needs to sit down and have this discussion, but as it stands, now you have something serious to work towards that you seem to think you will get–upgrade to the next level. My guess is there are at least five other teams who legitimately think they are better than you and they will get it, and they will be busting there asses to do just that (and considering you lost to the 12th and 13th teams at regionals, I don’t think this is an absurd concept (full disclosure: I like a lot of 7X players and was rooting for you guys hard to make the show–I was really bummed when you lost but be proud of a great season)).

I have played on teams where we had no shot at that next level achievement this year (nationals for example) and it’s really hard to, for a few years in a row, try to improve with your eye on “eventually” making it. Meanwhile, incremental improvement isn’t so bad.

To be clear, one of the other concerns was from elite level teams about injury in blowout games. Now this doesn’t affect 7X because they can put up a fight against those top teams, this does affect other teams that are further down the chain. Exposure to the top teams is a treat for those lower teams but for the top teams this is a waste of time and money and worse still: a chance for injury. For example, how much benefit do you think Ironside gets out of Sectionals? Best case scenario: they give their role players some PT and get a workout in. Worst case scenario: someone tears an ACL or breaks an arm (e.g. Jeff Graham when he was on Twisted Metal) and then is injured for regionals (as I recall JG played against GOAT in a cast, throwing only with his off hand, it was awesome to watch but probably sucked for him considering I believe they lost on universe point). While people are focusing on the expense, the fact is that better quality tournaments for the teams involved (i.e. tournaments with more competitive balance) will make tournaments more valuable for the teams that play in them. If I have one tournament that is going to have three close games and one that is going to have 6 close games, the second one probably is worth twice as much.

Anyway, these are just some thoughts behind what the initial conversations were (a few years ago now). Again, I don’t know why the USAU chose this method in particular or what they’re thinking all the time, but from where I’m sitting this looks like a really exciting development for a lot of teams and players in all stratifications. And I hope 7X does go undefeated and has a unbelievable season because I’m sure the parties will be great.

Best,
Jack “Handy” Hanlon
Tom

What I got out of this was that the Triple Crown makes the sport showcased at a higher level that is easier to follow and get involved in for fans.

I’d imagine that advertisers were looking for something more structured that could promise a larger following to make sure that they weren’t investing in something that only a limited amount of people were going to watch (based on the past structure).

It looks like the new structure will allow USAU to sell its product more effectively to advertisers. It promises that the best of the best will be playing each other on certain dates at certain venues, and that there is something at stake (a peice of the Triple Crown).
Mason

First of all, before you get to run with the big boys, you need to pay your dues by housing the lower divisions. That’s how TCU moved up, it’s not an overnight process. (CFB)

Honestly, this sounds like a problem for the mixed division where there’s high turnover rate and less organization. Why not eliminate the mixed division all together?
Pooh

@Tom, I see that argument, my question is how well it applies to all 3 divisions. In terms of “market appeal” I think it’s fair to say that Open >> Women’s >>>> Mixed (not intended as a value judgment). And given that the change is most drastic in the mixed division for the least apparent benefit, I wonder how well thought out it was in those terms.

@Dan, I think the point is that the new system makes it significantly harder for 7 Express to do that by likely restricting access to the teams they need to beat. Additionally, I worry that the combination of the bid process/ranking algorithm will, to a large extent “lock in” the bid allocations, which I think everybody recognizes as being skewed in Year 1 of the new system by the dearth of teams from many regions traveling to sanctioned/rated events.

Again, the system makes great sense in principle for Open/Women’s where it’s simply formalizing what largely already was. I worry about the execution as it would have been nice to be able to announce the “pro tour” tournaments at the same time so that everyone can see that yes the folks who run ECC/Heavyweights etc will still be involved putting on quality events.
Jerome

Thank you for writing this, it is a major problem that many teams will be facing. Again the top people in an organization are making it tougher for the slightly less top to succeed.
Entrepreneur

So what exactly is the qualifier for you team “being” the same team for the next year? For example, you are Mixed team X in the pro flight, all of your captains retire and but you retain the name and 50% of the roster. Are you still Team X? Ok now you have 85% turnover, are you still Team X? Your two captains have a blowout and each decides that they are the sole captain for next year, taking exactly half of the roster each, who gets to be Team X in the pro flight and who is starting over? What if tryouts roll around and just by some crazy coincidence 27 new players win out spots over all the returners, with the captain even acknowledging that the new players just played too damn well for him to retain a roster spot. Are you still Team X?

So if you’re the captain of a disbanding Pro flight team… can you essentially sell your rights? You could be 7 Express next year… or you could buy the rights to Team X and compete in the pro flight. Who’s to say you’re not Team X if last year’s captain says you are?

What are the rights to the pro flight worth?
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Jim

this system is going to encourage stronger clubs.mixed teams flickering in and out of existence is so damaging to communities as it removes the leadership from the various open and women’s teams leaving a trail of prospective male players unable to find a team to play on. A team is now strongly encouraged to stay together year after year. I’m sure everyone reading this can think of a few examples where teams with a lot of potential fall apart due to petty squabbling.
mcm

I am new to ultimate, but in the soccer world there are many people who love the promotion/relegation system. Were the last game of the season is just as important for the bottom 6 teams as it is for the top 6. I am excited that ultimate is using this model. Seems much more natural than the typical us method of buying a spot in the top league. I believe the majority of sports leagues in the world work this way.

It does seem that the issues are different for mixed and the other two. One being the ability of teams to not play all season and swoop in and steal a bid. Would like to have seen that handled. What if a bunch of NBA stars could sit out the whole season, then jump into the playoffs. Seems lame to me.

I agree with the post that teams can have goals each season. I just read an article about an american basketball player who went to italy and played on a lower division team. They keep winning and adding new players and working their way up.

Of course the tournament model makes this difficult. Having the top teams need 28 players really saps the strength of a region. For a one off game teams could field 10-15 players. That would mean the bay area could have 2-3/4 pro/elite teams. Portland could have 2, Seattle 3, etc (men’s).

So many things. At least it should all be fun to watch and play no matter how it shakes out.
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Will The Triple Crown System Hurt The “Almost Elite?”

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