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Smithville Tournament

Tournament announcements, results, and discussion about specific tournaments.
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Charlie Dees
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Smithville Tournament

Post by Charlie Dees »

I've heard that Smithville is doing their tournament on November 10th. Unless they can produce an improvement in the question source from last year (hoses and nonsense in questions seemed par for the course, along with inaccuracies in basically every math question), I probably won't be playing. However NKC might send other players.

mujason
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Post by mujason »

Hey, Charlie, as long as you're boycotting Smithville, are you going to TRASH Regionals instead, or do you hate pop culture too much?

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Charlie Dees
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Post by Charlie Dees »

Not to play with you, that's for damn sure.

mujason
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Post by mujason »

I'm not even sure if I'm playing, although I would like to if there is a regional close to Mizzou and I can get a teammate with a car (I'd chip in on gas). Gee, Charlie, you seem to be quite adversarial to me, even though you've never met me in person. Besides, would you rather play with me or against me?

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Charlie Dees
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Post by Charlie Dees »

I'd rather play against you, on ACF questions. Just to make you feel dumb.

KentB
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Post by KentB »

hooooo schnaps

richbob
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Post by richbob »

Charles,

I thought you took that attorney general position that just opened up.

It's a better job than the Congressman's job in Idaho.

Seriously, it's great to see you back at NKC.

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Charlie Dees
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Post by Charlie Dees »

richbob wrote: It's a better job than the Congressman's job in Idaho.
Eww, no thanks.

I wish it were under happier circumstances then the fact that my family's crappy and couldn't make up their mind about who controls me and where I should go to school, because I didnt really know I was coming back to NKC for most of the summer, but I am back.

STPickrell
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Post by STPickrell »

ashkenaziCD wrote: I've heard that Smithville is doing their tournament on November 10th. Unless they can produce an improvement in the question source from last year (hoses and nonsense in questions seemed par for the course, along with inaccuracies in basically every math question), I probably won't be playing. However NKC might send other players.
Who's the contact there? Provided there's no overlap from Rock Bridge I could make a competitive offer for that tournament.

I'm assuming there'd be a lot of overlap between Truman and Smithville though.

My apologies for the relentless spamming -- I am able to charge the prices that I do by making it up on volume.

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Post by East Buc & UMR »

Shawn Logan

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Charlie Dees
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Post by Charlie Dees »

The questions are going to be by Bill Luce (the former coach of Savannah, and the former coach of Smithville's coach).

I really dunno if I'm gonna go, although if I do I'd probably play on the B team or something a la Yaphe.

Serroque
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Post by Serroque »

I don't know if I'm going.
In all probability, I am, but it's still up in the air.
I don't think I've ever been to the Smithville invitational before, so I kind of want to go.

hugatree1715
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Post by hugatree1715 »

Does anyone have any information on Smithville?

Sadly, we just started practicing TODAY, and I'm not sure our coach has all of his stuff together. We don't have a schedule out yet for what tournaments we are going to.

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Charlie Dees
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Post by Charlie Dees »

It's Nov. 10th, I think it's some variant of the Missouri format, and Bill Luce is writing the questions. I dunno who is going.

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Charlie Dees
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Post by Charlie Dees »

So I heard that only 12 teams are coming to this. What is it with fields sucking this year (at least this at this point in the year)?

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Charlie Dees
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Post by Charlie Dees »

I angrily walked out during our 3rd game against Lee’s Summit North. I apologize for spraying soda on the table when I slammed my bottle down. I left because the questions are perfect examples of why Missouri never ever gets better at quizbowl. Now, since around the nation players are demanding that questions should be held to a higher standard I will outline all of the problems I can remember with this set that made me so furious.
The tossups almost never rewarded anything beyond list knowledge of “can you buzz in faster on the one actual clue I’ll give you, which was invariably a giveaway.” In the “pyramidal” quarter often questions would consist of a line or two of clues that didn’t come close to uniquely identifying anybody, followed by the giveaway. The best example that jumps to my mind is the Henry Fielding tossup which more or less went “This 18th century Englishman wrote plays, novels, poems, journalism, and he is famous for writing the book Tom Jones.” However, this whole practice was very, very common. The reason this is bad is because it creates lots of dead space where it is impossible to buzz in and get something right, and then all of a sudden it becomes a buzzer race, thus defeating the purpose of writing tossups to reward the most knowledgeable team. Another problem with the “pyramidal” tossups were that often they would be written “This person was born on [date] and did [funn clue that has nothing to do with why said person is important]. He also did [giveaway].” The Hawthorne and Plath tossups were the best example I can recall of this problem. The reason why this is bad writing is because it does nothing to reward someone who actually knows about an authors works, or a scientist’s importance, or whatever, and I can’t see any reason why a person’s actual importance should not be emphasized over nonsense clues like “he was born on July 4th, 1804, and served as consul in Liverpool.” Instead, why not ask about plot details of some lesser known works of Hawthorne, or maybe some short stories or something that actually deals with why he is important. Another problem was tossups that make a statement in the opening that has nothing to actually do with the question. The best example of this was “John F. Kennedy was the youngest elected president, but who was the youngest president?” I mean, JFK’s status as youngest president has absolutely nothing to do with T. Roosevelt and when I say nothing I mean NOTHING. It is a totally worthless clue that should be replaced with something discussing, I dunno, TR’s policies or actions as a politician before getting into easier clues about him. There were other tossups that just showed lazy writing, or that were really really vague. Examples include one the was basically “They do stuff with calcium ions, and on one end they have an axon and on another end they have lots of dendrites.” At which point I buzz in and say neurons since, last I checked, those clues apply to neurons. Instead the answer they wanted was synapse. That is just bad writing. There were a number of math calculation errors. There were also lots of tossups that just had one clue, or else that were more or less bad list-association quizbowl. The one that sticks out is the one that prompted me to leave, where the tossup is read “What Joseph Conrad novel” and Lee’s Summit North buzzes in with “Heart of Darkness” and is right. This is just awful because 1) there is absolutely nothing in there to say it is actually Heart of Darkness, like, there were 0 uniquely identifying clues, and 2) Conrad wrote a ton of askable novels. So basically I was penalized for knowing that the answer could be a number of things while the other team goes “hurf nrr Joseph Conrad wrote Heart of Darkness” and gets it because it is a little more famous then his other stuff. This is the kind of quizbowl that teams played in 1990, and is a sad statement of just how truly behind the curve Missouri is because this is a “good” tournament here. The only sort-of highlight were the worksheets, which did actually reward some obscure knowledge. I guess I am going to be the big vocal character about this, but if your tournament offers a really crappy product then I am going to call you out and hold you to a higher standard, and that’s what I’m doing here. Yes my behavior was awful, but it was only a mirror of how frustratingly awful these questions were (made worse by the fact that I have slept for 4 hours in the past 2 days). But if you aren’t going to go through the effort to actually ask questions that reward the most knowledgeable team in a game (which last I checked was the main focus of quizbowl) then I will be angry, call you out, and vote for change with my feet.

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Post by KentB »

hooray chuq

Terrorizer
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Post by Terrorizer »

Results:
Savannah
NKC
Liberty
LSN

As for the questions, yes they were Missouri style format and most were buzzer races. You knew when you signed up for the tournament that these were not NAQT length. When I talked to some to some of the other teams they had no problems with the questions, and personally I though they were good. Last year, questions by the same person were
I really liked this tournament. This year more of the tossups seemed kind of pyramidal (moreso than some previous sets) which is always good. We had good competition (especially from Liberty, good lord they're talented). I have no complaints about the questions (as our scores suggest, we manhandled this set most of the day, so I like that









^_^ ).
That said, I would like to give props to NKC minus Charlie for staying for the rest of the tournament with only three players. The three who stayed were excellent players and managed to do very well. Liberty, also, managed well considering they lost their entire varsity.

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Post by KentB »

hmm yeah in hindsight just walking out on your team is kinda lame .... it sends a msg but idk if it is necessarily the one you wanted to send

but you should get some sleep son ... shoot ... sounds like u didn't really need to be playing qb today









:P

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Charlie Dees
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Post by Charlie Dees »

I have seen speed questions that keep the same length and are much, much better written. The sets that David Bykowski produced for Arkansas prove that this is possible, and so does the set Shawn Pickrell produced for Truman HS last year however, as I said, this was a speed set with a reliance on bad writing techniques that were rife in old quizbowl and that would never fly anywhere decently competitive. I mean, citing that other players liked this set really does nothing but go to show how far behind the times our region is. These don't have to be NAQT-nationals length, but they could be like Shawn's question without a whole lot of extra work, and I would personally hold Shawn or an NAQT A-set level tournament as 100% appropriate for both speed and pyramidality. What makes it worse was that there was even an advertised "longer" quarter that was supposed to be pyramidal and that was no different then any other quarter, except there was even more excess verbiage that did nothing to actually give you clues. I know I was OK with the Savannah set last year because I had somewhat lower expectations going in (and I think that the questions were somewhat better anyway) but when Mr. Luce expressed an interest in lengthening some of the questions and since he's had plenty of experience with pyramidal questions as well as speed-based, I figured I would give this tournament a try even though I had pretty low expectations for it. I guess I still had a higher bar after Savannah because those questions were better then I expected, so now these were lower and made me angry.

It may be lame to leave my teammates, but it was even more lame to have to play these questions in the first place. I was just expressing a problem that my whole team was having (oddly, until I snapped, I wasn't the most aggravated member of our team about the question quality) and I think that, while it came off as me being a total hole, there really wasn't any better way for me to express my true disgust at this tournament wasting my Saturday morning. As I said, I am going to start demanding tournaments hold to a higher standard of basic writing rules (it doesn't have to be 7 line tossups all the time or anything like that, just questions that actually reward you for being knowledgeable about something). Whether or not other locals care about this is immaterial, and until they do I have serious doubts about their ability to judge worthwhile quizbowl.

Sweyn Forkbeard
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Post by Sweyn Forkbeard »

I also found the caliber the questions to be more than a bit disappointing. The buzzer races are not conducive to rewarding the teams which possess players who specialize in certain fields. Teams which have players with strong isolated research and academic backgrounds in fields such as biology or history etc. etc. are in effect punished for having extraordinary knowledge in their fields. Buzzer races reward those who know merely the basic gist of the question. The competitor that knows his or her genre in its totality has several avenues of possibilities racing through his or her mind.

That said, the worksheets were good. Deeper knowledge was rewarded, and the fact that the worksheets were nearly completed by the teams with specialized players bares this out.

NKCtrashman
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Post by NKCtrashman »

OK Charles,

First of all, I don't think "lame" is the correct word choice. I would prefer embarrassing. The shock that you actually did that created truly one of the most awkward moments in my life. You embarrassed all of your teammates(Especially Grant who spent the rest of the day with a large cherry coke stain on his shirt). You embarrassed even more your coach ( Mr. Allen is NOT happy at all and that's an understatement), and you embarrassed your school. Yet these all pale in comparison to the embarrassment you put on yourself. You came across as the most selfish, arrogant, and conceded person on the planet. It doesn't matter how bad the questions were, your actions were extremely disrespectful and showed immaturity at a level rarely seen in five-year-olds. People DON'T act that way. You owe us, Mr. Allen, and ESPECIALLY Mr. Luce an apology.

You also seem to think that you can decide what tournaments you can go to. You are on the TEAM. If we go to a tournament you need to go too. This is just common sense. If Mr. Allen wants to play a tournament at Podunk High School were their longest question is 4 words long, you are going.(Barring, of course, situations you ACTUALLY have something important to do)

[/QUOTE]It may be lame to leave my teammates, but it was even more lame to have to play these questions in the first place.

Bull Crap. It wasn't just lame, I considered it offensive. It showed to me that you didn't care about winning at all, when I can guarantee that the rest of us wanted to win.

I'm sure that your little tantrum will help pyramidal questions in Missouri.

Time to grow up.

I am ME
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Post by I am ME »

AMEN!! Well said.....

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Charlie Dees
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Post by Charlie Dees »

While I am not disagreeing with Brandon on many details, there are 3 things I would like to address that he has said -
You came across as the most...arrogant, and conceded person on the planet.
Well, actually, in many ways I am arrogant, or more precisely elitist, but mostly about what kinds of questions I find acceptable for use in quizbowl. I personally see no problem with being elitist and preferring good questions over bad ones, and intensely disliking bad ones, which I do. If this mentality that bad questions/writers should be attacked and held accountable isn't good, then I don't understand why. So yeah, I am arrogant and conceited about that.
You also seem to think that you can decide what tournaments you can go to. You are on the TEAM. If we go to a tournament you need to go too. This is just common sense. If Mr. Allen wants to play a tournament at Podunk High School were their longest question is 4 words long, you are going.(Barring, of course, situations you ACTUALLY have something important to do)
Well, actually, yeah, I can decide what tournaments I want to go to. If it hits the point where it is nothing that actually rewards people for knowing things then it loses my interest, and I stop enjoying myself, which, really, once I stop enjoying it there really isn't any reason for me to spend my Saturday morning doing it when I could be home doing stuff like sleeping (if you didn't notice, I didn't sleep properly most of the week beforehand) or doing schoolwork (I have a number of essays due very soon, along with a makeup test in biology), all of those things I did do when I got home. Luckily for NKC, the gigantic bulk of the schedule is taken up by tournaments that I will get some kind of enjoyment out of playing, but if I'm going to put in my time for quizbowl I should be getting something satisfying back out of playing in it, which as we've established I did not get. I see no reason to waste my time doing something that is not enjoyable, and I won't go if all that's going to happen is me getting furious at the questions.
It showed to me that you didn't care about winning at all, when I can guarantee that the rest of us wanted to win.
This is incredibly true. When there is nothing meaningful about a tournament then I couldn't care less whether I win or not, and if there is something remotely meaningful about the tournament then I do, in fact, care about winning (well, to be more precise, about performing as well as I possibly can). Once again, luckily, the vast bulk of NKC's schedule consists of tournaments that are meaningful to me in some way or another.
As for my behavior, yeah, in retrospect it was way out of line and I do apologize for overreacting so horribly to the questions, interrupting the match, and leaving my team, which, by the way, congratulations on beating Liberty by a solid margin and proving that, with or without me, you are still competitive.

FishyFreshman
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Post by FishyFreshman »

I agree with Brandon on everything. I think what Charles did was rude, disrespectful, and uncalled for. You interrupted a tournament and left your team mates just because of the questions. It's Missouri and that's how most of the questions are here. Because you are on a TEAM you really shouldn't be staying at home to sleep instead of joining them at a tournament. If you think you are so important that you can just skip the tournaments you don't like and the rest of your team is going, maybe you just shouldn't be on the team at all. From what we saw, they can do just fine without you, and they are a lot more fun to play.

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Post by Charlie Dees »

Yeah, see, that "well this is Missouri and that's how we play quizbowl" argument is exactly the problem here as far as question quality goes. Everyone else from a decent area of the country who saw my post had the reaction "holy crap those questions sound awful, I'm glad we don't go to anything like that."
And you are still missing the point that if I am going to give up my own free time to do something, then I should get something positive out of it in return or else it's not worth doing. There wasn't really anything positive coming from my playing at this tournament.
I think I already established that what I did was rude and uncalled for, so there isn't really any point in just reiterating it like you did.

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Post by East Buc & UMR »

I'll I'm going to add. If Mr. Allen doesn't do something big over this matter all those who said he was the best coach in the state really don't have much to hang your hat on anymore.

johnboy81918
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Post by johnboy81918 »

Here is what bothers me most about this...
Deesy Does It wrote:Congratulations to my teammates for still pulling off 2nd place to the team who's coach wrote the questions. That was the other problem I had with the tournament, that Savannah's coach was writing the questions and that their players know all about how to decipher those questions. I have seen it firsthand where Savannah kids buzz in and get a tossup right before any actual clue is read because "that's how Mr. Luce always writes questions on [answer]."
This is from the hsquizbowl board, for those of you who haven't seen it. I sincerely hope you brought this up confidentially with someone (i.e. your coach) before posting accusations like that on a public board. Most of us have played on questions Mr. Luce has written in the past, if not as often as Savannah has. That'd be like saying one team is better at NAQT questions because they've heard more of them








:o . Also, he's no longer officially the coach (I'm not saying he isn't involved anymore, just pointing out that you said he was Savannah's coach, which he technically isn't), and even if he was, I'd be careful about making statements like that about one of the most respected figures in MO quiz bowl history.

I understand that you're trying to make a change in the way things are run, but you seem to want everything in MO to be like it is on the coast...if it ever happens, it's going to be a LONG time. Sure, you can help start things off, but you (as a player) will never see MO play like the coast. One person can't do that. Once you accept that, you can accept the fact that steps are being taken in the right direction, and learn to be happy with them. Will it be exactly what you want? Of course not. Will it be somewhat closer to what you want? Yes.

Now I ask myself, why in the hell did I come here and write this? I'm not sure, to be honest. I guess I just saw that post and wondered how people can accuse Mr. Luce and Savannah of cheating. Perhaps the fact that I like them made me feel the need to speak in their behalf. What's done is done, so I'll end this and get back to watching Heroes









^_^

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Post by Awehrman »

I'm not sure that it's fair to detract from Mr. Allen's coaching credentials becuase of this incident. Certainly not all of his players and former players have acted this way. In fact, I'm pretty sure this is the only time in his 15 or so years of coaching that one of his players has walked out on a game like this. I have contacted Mr. Allen and given him my thoughts (from an alumnus's perspective), but I will not repeat them here on a public message board.

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Post by East Buc & UMR »

If anyone that has played at NKC has acted like this before I would be shocked.

Lets look at it this way. How would a basketball player or football player be dealt with at the High school level for leaving his team in the middle of a game? Let alone in the 2 year old temper tantrum manner as it appears happend on Saturday. Even TO in his time hasn't acted like this.

With that said I would lose some repsect for coach Allen (and I'm sure other coaches would as well) if he let Chuq play agian.

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Post by Awehrman »

This is what I thought you were getting at, Bill. I agree that in most circumstances an athlete who became upset and left the field during a game would not see the field again any time soon. That said, I think that the decision belongs to Mr. Allen, the team, and the school. If they can come to an agreement to satisfy all parties with the understanding that this sort of tirade is abhorrent and intolerable then I think that any second guessing by outsiders like you and me should be disregarded.

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Post by redliberte »

I understand that you're trying to make a change in the way things are run, but you seem to want everything in MO to be like it is on the coast...if it ever happens, it's going to be a LONG time. Sure, you ver see MO play like the coast. One person can't do that. Once you accept that, you can accept the fact that steps are being taken in the right direction, and learn to be happy with them. Will it be exactly what you want? Of course not. Will it be somewhat closer to what you want? Yes.
i concur with this statement particularly, in addition to most everything else john said. i for sure wouldn't want to see savannah and mr. luce maligned (or mr. allen for that matter).

i just wanted to add, though, that as charles is trying to act as an agent for change, he certainly didn't help his case through his actions. i know you apologized for how you acted. but your presentation of your displeasure doesn't really advance your cause any. no one wants to buy from a salesman who is rude and inconsiderate. there are many other people in missouri who would like to see the system changed... use your can help start things off, but you (as a player) will neposition as a leader of the movement to represent those people well.

i'm not entirely sure why i came here to post this either. perhaps just to throw in my two cents and to speak in behalf of some people that i like as well. ah well, no use in trying to influence what's already done... but maybe something positive can come out of all of this drama in the future.

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Post by MikeWormdog »

Dear Charlie,

Guess what? Some tournaments aren't that great. It doesn't really matter whether your precious "free time" isn't being put to its utmost efficiency and enjoyment. Other than writing your Matt Weiner fanzine or buying locks of Chris Ray's hair off ebay, I'm not sure what would qualify as your perfect free-time activity.

You went to a tournament with people on your team who wanted to win said tournament, whether it was "meaningful" or not. Make the occasional snide remark about the questions to Mr. Allen or your teammates, even go on the message board and say you didn't like them, whatever. Criticism is often expected. The changes you and others seek can come from criticism. Don't, however, act like you didn't know what you were getting into, and don't expect every tournament to fit your definition of awesome, especially one you play at a semi-rural Missouri high school.

Despite your well-established "fact" that "there's no point" in "reiterating" what others have said, I'm going to reiterate it: Don't be an ass. Let me re-reiterate it: Don't be an ass. Just because you admit that you did something stupid and childish doesn't mean people should no longer comment on it. Your behavior reflects poorly on others and makes you, your parents, your teammates, Mr. Allen, and Northtown look bad.

Sincerely,
Mike

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Post by East Buc & UMR »

Good post Mike

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Post by CherryCokeStain »

You don't seem to get it do you Charles. You can't decide that you're too good for a tournament and walk out. Just because you don't like the questions, you don't have the right to storm out of the room. Let's pretend you were actually the size of man and could play football. The ref makes a call you don't like, and you respond by yelling in his face, and throwing the water cooler at him. Do you think you would be back. You would get some kind of suspension and you deserve one. You left your team hanging, and you acted like 4-year-old girl.

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Post by Charlie Dees »

Hey Grant, yeah, I will admit again like for the 10th time in various places that I was acting like an ass. Mike's writeup of it is pretty appropriate. But, like, if you decide that an appropriate way to respond is to make a nonsense account and tell me to take some midol, then I'm done with any discussion with you about it.

Back to real points -

As for Luce's role coaching, he has had a significant amount of coaching for at least 2 of the people on Savannah's team, and probably all of them since he may/may not be still involved in their team. Either way, that means that the players working under him have some expectation as to what kinds of subjects he will put a little more emphasis on, and I have noticed before that Savannah players playing on Savannah-written questions often have the ability to get tossups before any real clue has been read. In one of those situations, an ex-player noted "that's always how Mr. Luce asks tossups about [the answer]." So yeah, I don't think it's that ridiculous to say that Savannah players come into a tournament like that with more of an edge then they usually do. It's the same reason that we would have an advantage in a tournament Mr. Allen writes, we know what he tends to give emphasis on and how he likes to write about things.

I thought I made it pretty clear that I don't expect things to be like they are on the east coast at the best tournaments. I mean, if they were then these would be tossups more then 5 lines long. But within the 1-3 lines worth of questions there is no reason that there can't be at least questions that have more then 1 buzzable clue, or stuff that isn't ultra vague, or any of the other problems I lined out with the set. If you want examples of decent, short Missouri questions just look at stuff Rolla's written for their spring tournament, or Shawn Pickrell's product. So It's not actually impossible to have a set using OK questions and use the Missouri format at the same time. This is not at all like expecting everything to be NAQT/mACF and similar to D.C. and that general area.

For my eligibility, if I were not allowed to play for NKC again, then oh well. That would just mean I get to play at a decent amount of college tournaments (which would actually screw with the rest of NKC's MSHSAA eligibility a lot more then it would screw with me). So I mean if it would detract from your impression of Mr. Allen that's your own problem I think, and either way I'm fine with the result because I do think that I behaved horribly and should get some kind of punishment for it.

Also, let me restate this point again - I behaved like crap (I would use stronger language) and I accept that I should never have overreacted to anything this strongly and that it was all around a bad decision.

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L-Town Expatriate
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Smithville Tournament

Post by L-Town Expatriate »

There's a provision in MSHSAA by-laws that states that if coaches leave the field of play (in Academic Competition's case, the room) during a match, they have to explain themselves before MSHSAA's directors the next morning. Maybe a similar rule should be in place for players who storm off the basketball court as well as those who spill Cherry Coke on their teammates. (And while at it, why were those allowed at the table to begin with!?)

I've had issues with moderators before. I've had issues with questions before. I've actually blown up at someone (usually myself) during at match on a few occasions. But this act just makes all that pale.

Missouri quiz bowl isn't going to change from (using hyperboles here) hicks with buzzers in their mouths to Oxford-bound mind-reading savants overnight. And tantrums like this could negate efforts to achieve higher quality questions. I seriously hope this has been dealt with among not just Coach Allen, but potentially the administrative staff at NKCHS, as this also reflects negatively on the school.

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