All-Star Let's Discuss Worlds Scoring

[King]

So the scoring this weekend is a large departure from what is used all season. The good news is there is a large top end to allow more clear separation for teams. The bad news is the scoring is completely comparative based. What does that mean? When scoring a judge has to predict if what they are looking at is at the top level or not. If it is at the top the judge will put the score closer to the limit, but if they believe that the team they are looking at is not near the top they will leave room for higher scoring later.

There are a couple issues with this.

1. Team name does play into bias of what is considered difficult and what not. If a judge knows a harder team is coming later even if the team in front of them is fantastic they will leave room for what is coming later in CASE it is better. PS - if your ball gets pulled #1 during the lottery it is almost not even worth going to Worlds because of this.

2. Judges are human and susceptible to the recency effect ( Serial position effect - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia). Whatever they see happening before or after a team affects that preceding teams score. See a bunch of low scoring routines in a row and then just a decent team will have an elevated score. This is reason we see rubrics and divisions split at other competitions. The smaller amount of teams a judge has to be concerned with the lower this effect.

3. Nothing can be learned from what won at Worlds this year to plan for next year. Because all scoring is strictly situational no coach can look at what was done to win and say next year I see our weak points and we will improve on them to have a better chance.

4. Difficulty and Execution scores are defined that day arbitrarily in a judges head depending on how well the judge interprets the intentions of the writer of the scoresheet.

 

[XtremeWpg]

While I understand comparative scoring, I personally hate it. It allows a lot more room for personal bias to enter into play, even unintentionally.

I love the "us against the score sheet" mentality. Does it create more cookie cutter routines? Probably. But it allows me to not have to consider what everyone else may be doing and focus on my teams strengths to hit the score sheet hard.

 

[platinumcheerashley]

I feel like the judging is very subjective. it also has a lot of leeway. I think it would be better if they had a little bit of a set way to score, this year seemed a little like some of the scores were hit or miss. and was there a cap to the scores?


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[King]

While I understand comparative scoring, I personally hate it. It allows a lot more room for personal bias to enter into play, even unintentionally.

I love the "us against the score sheet" mentality. Does it create more cookie cutter routines? Probably. But it allows me to not have to consider what everyone else may be doing and focus on my teams strengths to hit the score sheet hard.

I feel like the judging is very subjective. it also has a lot of leeway. I think it would be better if they had a little bit of a set way to score, this year seemed a little like some of the scores were hit or miss. and was there a cap to the scores?


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I think in cheerleading some parts of subjective and some parts are objective. We ask judges to do both parts on the fly. We should separate out and allow execution and performance judges to do what they need live (the only way to properly score that part) and the difficulty to be objective and by video later.

I also agree the issue right now as we have constructed a situation where its 'impress the judges' OR ' beat the scoresheet'. One or the other. With my proposed method of separation you objectively can beat the scoresheet and subjectively impress the judges. It disperses out the win or loss and who is at fault.

 

[L5cheermom]

I firmly believe that discussion should be encouraged and efforts should be made to remove as much subjectivity as possible from the judging of this sport. Unfortunately, the potential result of the objectification of the scoring is the evolution of the compulsatory routine that Jamie Parrish was lamenting a few weeks back. It's a slippery slope. I personally don't know how the judges do it. We expect instantaneous results in these highly complex routines. I'm a proponent of delayed scoring and allowing judges the opportunity to "digest" a routine before posting scores. In these high level routines I sometimes feel like there is a lot of smoke and mirrors and sometimes flashy is disguised as skillful. Giving the judges a moment to step back from the emotion of the routine and disect it a bit more thoroughly would insure more accurate results. In the meantime I think it is important to avoid the "the judges got it wrong" discussion. The judges did what they were paid to do and I have to believe did so without conscious bias. To believe otherwise would make it difficult to write that check every month. So, as we continue this conversation we need to recognize that problem is with the process and not with the judges.


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[f5forever]

I hate the way worlds is scored. Teams have gone all season working toward a scoresheet only to have it basically not matter at the biggest competition. Even if a seasoned judge knows that a good team is coming up (so they hold back on giving higher scores), who's to say that a noname team doesn't deserve a higher score? I'll say that Rockstar Beatles is not a household name when compared to the "status" of a Brandon or California, but their stunts (and whole routine) was IMO just as clean/difficult. So had Beatles gone after Cali the results might have gone differently. Not taking away from Cali, they did a great job! That example could go for almost EVERY division. Performance order played a big part in some divisions. (As King mentioned)
While I may not love certain rubrics, they at least give you some idea as to how you SHOULD score, at worlds I felt like there was no explination for scores. I almost wish they had seperate judging panels. One to judge the way it was now, and one on a skill set, then average the two scores. I listened to the USASF youtube video on the "intro to worlds scoring" and was just shocked that there was no basis for skill sets. How are you (as a coach/choreographer) supposed to design a winning routine without knowing the criteria or what will score the best.

 

[NEliteSteven]

I was most confused by some teams having extremely similar performances and scoring drastically different. If a team has 1 or 2 bobbles on Day 1, and hits perfect on Day 2 let's say, I still don't think that warrants a 25-30 point jump.

 

[cheermommaRN]

I don't know much about Worlds scoring but it doesn't make sense to have a different scoring system then the one you used to award bids. I think the one thing Varsity has done right is push their scoring rubric.
I was shocked at some of the teams left out of finals even though they hit better than the teams that made it through. I'm NOT saying they were robbed but what exactly happened there? Take South Elite, they had one of the hardest stunt sections seen at Worlds this year, maybe their tumbling wasn't up to snuff with T&S or SOT but is tumbling all there is?
Edit: Oh and why are we competing 2 days if none of the score carries over? I can see the purpose behind doing it for the IO divisions but if your not going to carry over a percentage than just compete one day and be done with it!

 

[gymcatmomx2]

Edit: Oh and why are we competing 2 days if none of the score carries over? I can see the purpose behind doing it for the IO divisions but if your not going to carry over a percentage than just compete one day and be done with it![/quote]

Every other 2 day competition uses both scores in determining the winners. It rewards consistency! I am in favor of using both days scores but I am probably in the minority.

 

[Ren]

I was most confused by some teams having extremely similar performances and scoring drastically different. If a team has 1 or 2 bobbles on Day 1, and hits perfect on Day 2 let's say, I still don't think that warrants a 25-30 point jump.

I don't know a huge amount about the scoresheet, but from what I've picked up I guess it's because it's essentially a comparative scoresheet, rather than a "score" scoresheet. So each team's score will vary depending on who goes before/after them and how they all do, as well as how they themselves do. I don't necessarily agree with it, but I think that's why it happens.

 

[OakleyXO89]

Our judges are fans of the sport if they weren't they obviously wouldn't sit through twelve hours of judging with that as a fan all of them have gyms they're fans of or even alumni of! With the scoring system that was used this year a judge could score gym a higher just bc they like them on a general basis and not based on their routine being any higher than their competitors! Can we please bring back a generalized rubric so that teams that do work their butts off to achieve and do well more difficult skills will be rewarded and that they won't loose to teams just because they were showy!


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[f5forever]

I wish they would produce a rubric that was specific enough to allow coaches/choreographers to know what they needed to do, but with enough VARIETY in skills per skill set that creativity can still be a part of the sport. In stead of restricting and saying "you have to do a 1 1/2 up to one leg" (just for example) to score in the "high range", list a variety of skills that would score in different ranges and let the gyms decide which skills they put on the floor.

 

[cheernerd5678]

I don't know much about Worlds scoring but it doesn't make sense to have a different scoring system then the one you used to award bids. I think the one thing Varsity has done right is push their scoring rubric.

This is what I don't understand. If they have to compete twice (and all the other 2 day comps make both scores count) to get a bid, why do they only have to compete once at worlds? It doesn't reward consistency, and why do you have "requirements" for the bids that are completely different from what they have to do at the actual competition... You could (and they do) end up giving bids to a team that has no chance at worlds because their routine "hits" the varsity scoresheet to score decently, but then scores like 100 on the Worlds scoresheet...

 

[sigmalovee]

any scoring system that put wcss in third after that is clearly flawed (oh im totally bias btw) haha

 

[yojaehs]

Please watch ALL of the videos Les put out about the scoring system before commenting. It will explain why scores were different from day to day.


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