BB: General NY Region Talk

[pudge27]

Osh, didn't realize that they decided to do 6 or 8.  That's a move in the right direction.  I would agree with Scuba on the 64 team tourney.  As long as your going to have 50 some teams make the postseason, make it 8 8-team regionals.  The team on the wrong side of the bubble can and will always moan, but I can't imagine that any of the regions have 9 or 10 teams with a true and legit chance to win a regional tournament. 

[BaseB13]

Starvin and the rest of you that seem to feel NY should only have NY region teams.  I think people need to take a look at the bigger picture and actually have an understanding of Division III baseball on the national level.  Trinity may or may not have deserved an at large bid last year.  However, they received a Pool C bid.  Keep in mind how competitive the NESCAC is compared to any conference in NY.  And Starvin, Williams is not my favorite team, I just happen to have an understanding of programs outside of NY and I'm quite aware of how strong some of those conferences and programs are.  Someone please explain how you can justify New York region teams have the same amount of bids when New York has 37 programs and then say New England should have the same amount of bids when they have 66+ teams.  Do the numbers fellas, it doesn't add up.  This is why New York has a New England team shipped to its region.  There are too many automatic qualifiers not to do this.  As for which teams get shipped to New York, that depends on geography.  There are distance limits that D3 teams are allowed to travel for regions.  In essence the term "Regional" does not mean it has to only include teams from that region.  This is why Trinity and ECONN and Westfield have all been shipped out here.  It's no surprise that two are CT schools and 1 is a Western Mass school instead of the New England teams from say, Maine.  This is also why in 1999 U of Rochester was shipped to the Ohio regional.  Hands down New England has more quality programs than NY, and rightfully so, they have almost twice as many schools.  This isn't a knock on NY, it's just basic math and numbers.  If you really wanted to make it fair NY should have a team from:
SUNYAC, LL, E8, Skyline, NEAC (I guess this year), and one at large.  That would be a 6 team regional.  But then what do you do with the excess New England teams?  Have them play a 10 team regional?  Doesnt make sense, so instead they send a team to New York.. Seems like the best solution... 

[Ralph Turner]

The problem is that some conference's garner AQ's(automatic qualifiers, pool A) for winning the conference tournament like the SUNYAC and then you have the E-8 that doesn't get an AQ, rather they receive a pool B bid. Pool C are the leftover bids that are handed out to the teams that are most deserving that didn't win a qualifying conference tournament or get the Pool B bids. I really don't fully understand the process, but that is the gist of the ways teams can get in! This leaves a lot of political jostling room in the pool B and pool C areas.

The NCAA awards (and budgets) one playoff bid in most of the team sports at a ratio of one bid for every 6.5 participating schools.   (That is why we 54 bids in baseball, 63 in women's hoops, etc.  Some of the sports have a higher ratio, e.g., golf is 1:7.5.)  The money for this comes from the March Madness contract.  If a conference has at least 4  full and a total of 7 full and affiliate members (why the E8 changed the policy on affiliates in football), then the conference gets a Pool A bid.  The Pool B bids are allocated by taking all of the Pool B teams and dividing that number by the average membership of the 34 Pool A conferences to get 6 Pool B bids.  The remaining number of bids are allocated to Pool C.  Last year, the E8 got a Pool B (Ithaca) and a Pool C bid (SJF), not too shabby.  The Selection Committee determined by the crtieria that they (SJF) deserved a Pool C bid.  The selection criteria are listed in the Handbook.

The process is flawed because you can't give every conference winner a pool A because that leaves little or no room for the good teams that don't win their conference to get in!

Every full conference (7 members) has a Pool A bid.  The NWC and the SCIAC don't have post-season tourneys.  The conference winner gets the Bid.  The only conferences that do not have a Pool A bid are the Capital AC (Salisbury), the UAA (Emory and WashStL in 2007), E8 (Ithaca and SJF), CUNYAC, the Landmark and Northern Athletics Conference.  There will be 14 Pool C bids to the 14 best teams that did not earn a Pool A or Pool B bid.  In 2009, the Northern Athletics Conference gets its Pool A bid, taking one away from Pool B, and the Landmark in 2010, taking another one from Pool B.  The Capital AC now has 7 full members and probably gets a Pool A bid in 2010.

My suggestion would be:
-make a 64 team tournament, 8 regions, 8 teams per region and no out of region movement and have at it double elim style! (Why does the New York Region with 37 schools deserve 8 playoff bids and the New England Region with 62 schools or the Mid-Atlantic Region with 57 schools get only 8?  The member institutions in the NCAA tried that in the 1990's decided it did not like it.  That is why we have the Pool System in all sports.)
-the NCAA regional rankings would determine who gets in and who doesn't and that elevates the Pool A, B, C nonsense. (It was the Pool B and C system that gave Ithaca and SJF bids last year.  The committee also determined that there were no other candidates in 2007.  The same system gave Brockport and Cortland State bids in 2004.  This year, if Cortland is upset in the Post-season tourney and someone else gets the SUNYAC Pool A bid, then Cortland almost certainly gets a Pool C bid, and knocks out the 14th team.)
-you need to still play the hell out of your conference tournament because that directly effects the regional rankings.
The best part is you know going into the season that you have to be in that top 8 come the 2nd week in May and it takes into account your whole body of teams played during the season!  (It takes into account the teams in your region.  You are judged in head-to-head outcomes versus every other team in New York, one of the primary criteria.) 

The way I see it, this leaves way less to question than the current format and more teams get a chance!  Actually, the Pool System evolved to give every school in D3 a chance.  Every school knows what it needs to do to earn a bid.  If there is a game that you should not have lost, and you did not make the playoffs, that is probably the game (or games) you should not have lost.

Enjoy the Handbook 

[Ralph Turner]

Starvin and the rest of you that seem to feel NY should only have NY region teams.  I think people need to take a look at the bigger picture and actually have an understanding of Division III baseball on the national level.  Trinity may or may not have deserved an at large bid last year.  However, they received a Pool C bid.  Keep in mind how competitive the NESCAC is compared to any conference in NY.  And Starvin, Williams is not my favorite team, I just happen to have an understanding of programs outside of NY and I'm quite aware of how strong some of those conferences and programs are.  Someone please explain how you can justify New York region teams have the same amount of bids when New York has 37 programs and then say New England should have the same amount of bids when they have 66+ teams.  Do the numbers fellas, it doesn't add up.  This is why New York has a New England team shipped to its region.  There are too many automatic qualifiers not to do this.  As for which teams get shipped to New York, that depends on geography.  There are distance limits that D3 teams are allowed to travel for regions.  In essence the term "Regional" does not mean it has to only include teams from that region.  This is why Trinity and ECONN and Westfield have all been shipped out here.  It's no surprise that two are CT schools and 1 is a Western Mass school instead of the New England teams from say, Maine.  This is also why in 1999 U of Rochester was shipped to the Ohio regional.  Hands down New England has more quality programs than NY, and rightfully so, they have almost twice as many schools.  This isn't a knock on NY, it's just basic math and numbers.  If you really wanted to make it fair NY should have a team from:
SUNYAC, LL, E8, Skyline, NEAC (I guess this year), and one at large.  That would be a 6 team regional.  But then what do you do with the excess New England teams?  Have them play a 10 team regional?  Doesnt make sense, so instead they send a team to New York.. Seems like the best solution... 

Good post!  +1!

The thing that most likely determines a 6-team or an 8-team bracket is travel expense.  You already have at least 3 plane flights to Texas on the West Coast.  The NCAA doesn't like to buy plane tickets.

If they can put 8 teams into Auburn most economically, then it will likely happen. 

[scuba16]

Ralph,
Thanks for quoting the handbook.
So what you are saying is that the NCAA D-3 baseball commitee has it exactly dead nuts right when it comes to this process? No room for change or tweaking?
FYI, There are reasons why federal, state, local laws and guidelines change everyday, THEY ARE FLAWED. Just like this D-3 Baseball selection process in some instances.
Usually what happens is the people that came up with the process are more worried about keeping it the way they made it (arrogance)instead of changing it and getting it RIGHT!

As far as NY having 8 teams, I could care less, it should be a 4 team tourney. The problem I have is that you leave out Brockport last year, bring in a team from NE that didn't qualify for its own conference tournament and have a 7 team double elim tournament with byes? Makes no sense not to include Brockport and make it a 8 teamer with no one getting a bye!

I guess its a step in the right direction to go to either 6 or 8 teamers for this year.
Quick question though, If this happened last year(only 6 or 8 teams), I would assume Brockport or another NY team would have been the 8th team in the NY regional and if so that proves my point.

[BaseB13]

Thanks for the post Ralph.  It's very beneficial to have all of this explained so that people are aware of why certain things happen.  Are Pool C bids divided up evenly amongst regions?  In other words, did New York have one Pool C bid to receive, and SJFC was chosen?  And therefore Trinity received a pool C bid that was allocated for New England?  Or are Pool C bids simply handed out regardless of a teams regional location.  If this is the case then it sounds like Scuba's unhappiness with Brockport being left out should last year should be directed toward SJFC.  If this is not the case then Scuba would have to look at each Pool C bid that was handed out and see who Brockport was stronger than.  If Trinity had played in the NY region and got bounced after two games I could see there being a legitimate case.  However, Trinity did happen to beat the team that won the region.  Tough to say they didn't belong in NCAA's at all.  Unfortunately teams do make the tournament based on reputation sometimes.  A perfect example of this is IC in 2005 with a record of 22-13-2 going in to regional play.  Not usual IC numbers.  But guess what?  They made it to the regional final so clearly they belonged.

I'm not saying the current setting is perfect, and I have said the massive expansion of the tournament field does seem to water it down.  However, at the end of the day, a lot of it has to do with $$, especially at the D3 level where almost no revenue is generated.  Ideally every team should be seeded from 1 to 64 or however many teams are in the NCAA tournament and teams should be shipped all over the country (similar to D1) so that the best teams play the weakest teams in regionals.  This would be extremely expensive and that's why it doesn't happen.

[scuba16]

Rummy, Read my post!
I am not redirecting any of my angst!
I don't care about brockport, I don't even like brockport. The point is Trinity didn't make their conference tournament and gets a regional bid to NY, fair or unfair it made NY a 7 team regional which is retarded because you get 1 bye in the opening round, then another bye in the loser bracket and 2 other loser bracket teams have to play. It gives somebody an unfair advantage in the 1st round and the losers bracket.
NY should have been an 8 team last year incuding Brockport and Trinity and
no one would be complaining.

Question: why only go 6 or 8 team regionals this year??

Answer: BECAUSE IT WAS DUMB TO HAVE A 7 OR 5 TEAM REGIONALS LAST
YEAR and some suit at the NCAA realized it and made the right call for a change!

[AlleyCat]

Trinity did not make their own conference tournament. Because of that they shouldn't have gotten an NCAA bid, no matter what! So they beat Cortland last year. Cortland still came back and showed them who was boss. Cortland should have won that game if it wern't for poor officiating.

I'm with scuba.

If Trinity was so good they should have stayed in NE.

[StarvinMarvin]

Thanks for the post Ralph.  It's very beneficial to have all of this explained so that people are aware of why certain things happen.  Are Pool C bids divided up evenly amongst regions?  In other words, did New York have one Pool C bid to receive, and SJFC was chosen?  And therefore Trinity received a pool C bid that was allocated for New England?  Or are Pool C bids simply handed out regardless of a teams regional location.  If this is the case then it sounds like Scuba's unhappiness with Brockport being left out should last year should be directed toward SJFC.  If this is not the case then Scuba would have to look at each Pool C bid that was handed out and see who Brockport was stronger than.  If Trinity had played in the NY region and got bounced after two games I could see there being a legitimate case.  However, Trinity did happen to beat the team that won the region.  Tough to say they didn't belong in NCAA's at all.  Unfortunately teams do make the tournament based on reputation sometimes.  A perfect example of this is IC in 2005 with a record of 22-13-2 going in to regional play.  Not usual IC numbers.  But guess what?  They made it to the regional final so clearly they belonged.

I'm not saying the current setting is perfect, and I have said the massive expansion of the tournament field does seem to water it down.  However, at the end of the day, a lot of it has to do with $$, especially at the D3 level where almost no revenue is generated.  Ideally every team should be seeded from 1 to 64 or however many teams are in the NCAA tournament and teams should be shipped all over the country (similar to D1) so that the best teams play the weakest teams in regionals.  This would be extremely expensive and that's why it doesn't happen.

By the way, Trinity did not make it to the regional final as that would be Ithaca who was beaten twice on that day by Cortland.

[scuba16]

Keep in mind how competitive the NESCAC is compared to any conference in NY.   

You mean the same NESCAC that has hamilton college in it?  Every year the NESCAC is very competitive but in what way does that make them better overall teams than NY teams? Just because the teams are competitive only makes them around the same ability and in no way reflects how they stack up against teams from different regions

Hands down New England has more quality programs than NY, and rightfully so, they have almost twice as many schools. 

You are going to have to give some better concrete evidence of this bonehead statement other than they just are! Have you seen all of the teams in both regions play? How many inter region games have been played between NE and NY, who played them and what were the scores?

If teams don't play it is pure speculation on what conferences and/or regions are better in any given year. The only measuring stick you have is the WS and a few early/spring break or mid week games later in the year to base your opinion on!
If you are going to make a statement that NE in hands down better than NY, back it up with facts!

[BaseB13]

Starvin, I never said Trinity made it to the regional final.  I said they beat the regional winner.  As for who should have won the Trinity/Cortland game, whichever played for Cortland from the left side of the infield that threw the ball 10 feet away from first base when the baserunner was already by the bag, that cost them the game.  Ball should have never been thrown, who knows what happens after that though, regardless things worked out for Cortland.

This is very simple, if Pool C bids are allocated evenly between regions then Trinity may have very well been the next best overall team in New England regardless of making their conference tournament.  If this is not the case then I can see how there very well may have been other teams throughout the country who could complain that they did not get in and Trinity did.  However, it's difficult to say Trinity didn't "belong" in the regional when they did beat the regional winner one of the games.  If Trinity had not been shipped to New York, another team from New England would have if that team received Trinity's Pool C bid.

I did not say the best team in New England is better than the best team in NY.  I did say that New England has more top teams than New York.  To debate this would be ridiculous.  NY has half the teams that New England has so this makes perfect sense.   I agree 7 team regions are stupid, but clearly this happened because the field was expanded from 42 in 2005 to 53 in 2006.  An odd number like that requires weird regional numbers.  I do not believe there were ANY 8 teams regionals that year.  See Ralph's post as to why these weird number of teams are selected. 

Scuba look at your own regional rankings.  Look at the programs ranked in New England and compare them to New York.  Seriously who is so amazing in New York other than Cortland?  Let's say Cortland and Trinity are equally as good , they're the top two teams in each region.  Wheaton is 31 - 8 with losses to Cortland, Montclair, TCNJ and EConn, that makes up like 6 of their losses.  So theyve basically beat every other team theyve played.  I don't know exactly how good each team theyve played but winning 31 games is pretty legit.  I'd say theyre atleast as good as Ithaca.  After that in NY who is so great?  Rochester just got swept by SJFC, and SJFC has played almost no one this year.  RPI got their ass handed to them by UR so whats that say about them?  I suppose you want to say that those teams are better than EConn? Maybe but I highly doubt it.  Then you have Amherst who plays in the tough nescac.. Let's not forget Williams isnt even ranked in their region and they just beat RPI.  And yes Hamilton does play in the NESCAC but look at the bad teams in the SUNYAC, E8, and LL.  Theyre pretty bad too.  I have seen many of these NE teams play in the past, and if their programs are similar to how they were a couple years ago then the region must be pretty strong if a team like Williams is not ranked (beat Brockport).  Top to bottom New England is deeper.  They have twice as many teams. 

[Ralph Turner]

Thanks for the post Ralph.  It's very beneficial to have all of this explained so that people are aware of why certain things happen.  Are Pool C bids divided up evenly amongst regions?

No, there is no specific allocation to one region, just 14 Pool C bids for all of D3.

In other words, did New York have one Pool C bid to receive, and SJFC was chosen? 

No, SJF, a Pool B team did not receive one of the 6 Pool B's and therefore was still able to get a Pool C bid.

And therefore Trinity received a pool C bid that was allocated for New England?  Or are Pool C bids simply handed out regardless of a teams regional location?

Yes!

If this is the case then it sounds like Scuba's unhappiness with Brockport being left out should last year should be directed toward SJFC. 

He might as well pick on SJF as anyone, or Oneonta or RPI or Rochester Tech.  In the third regional ranking and the last one that we saw in 2007, Brockport was no where on the map in the NY Region going into the last weekend of play!  I have their in-region record at about 21-11.    Under .667 is way back in the pack!


New York
1. Cortland State 28-4 35-4
2. Ithaca 19-7 24-11
3. St. John Fisher 21-10 23-10
4. Oneonta State 21-8 23-9
5. Rensselaer 20-8 23-8
6. Rochester Tech 17-8 21-10


If this is not the case then Scuba would have to look at each Pool C bid that was handed out and see who Brockport was stronger than.  If Trinity had played in the NY region and got bounced after two games I could see there being a legitimate case.  However, Trinity did happen to beat the team that won the region.  Tough to say they didn't belong in NCAA's at all.  Unfortunately teams do make the tournament based on reputation sometimes.

This is happening with much, much, much less frequency, if at all with the new objective criteria in the handbook!   I repeat...if you have doubts about a loss being a "good loss", then for the sake of the selection committee, that was a bad loss!  What may be a good loss?  Splitting a series 2-2 on the road at Cortland or Ithaca.  What is a bad loss?  Here, and here.    

A perfect example of this is IC in 2005 with a record of 22-13-2 going in to regional play.  Not usual IC numbers.  But guess what?  They made it to the regional final so clearly they belonged.

I'm not saying the current setting is perfect, and I have said the massive expansion of the tournament field does seem to water it down.  However, at the end of the day, a lot of it has to do with $$, especially at the D3 level where almost no revenue is generated.  Ideally every team should be seeded from 1 to 64 or however many teams are in the NCAA tournament and teams should be shipped all over the country (similar to D1) so that the best teams play the weakest teams in regionals.  This would be extremely expensive and that's why it doesn't happen.

Yes!  Every team has equal access.  Every team knows what it needs to do to earn a bid!

[Ralph Turner]

Rummy, Read my post!
I am not redirecting any of my angst!
I don't care about brockport, I don't even like brockport. The point is Trinity didn't make their conference tournament and gets a regional bid to NY, fair or unfair it made NY a 7 team regional which is retarded because you get 1 bye in the opening round, then another bye in the loser bracket and 2 other loser bracket teams have to play. It gives somebody an unfair advantage in the 1st round and the losers bracket.
NY should have been an 8 team last year incuding Brockport and Trinity and
no one would be complaining.

Question: why only go 6 or 8 team regionals this year??

Answer: BECAUSE IT WAS DUMB TO HAVE A 7 OR 5 TEAM REGIONALS LAST
YEAR and some suit at the NCAA realized it and made the right call for a change!

Actually the NCAA budgeted and allocated 53 bids according to the formula in 2007.  They have budgeted 54 bids in 2008, because of the growth in D-III. 

[BaseB13]

Thank you Ralph.  Maybe you can talk some sense in to them because I clearly cannot.

[StarvinMarvin]

BaseB13, reread the last sentence of the first paragraph you posted and you clearly state that Trinity made it to the regional final so clearly they belonged.  You're telling me you didn't say that?