All-Star "name" Of Gym Affecting Placement?

[JulieP]

How could people not involved in the sport ever be good judges? And if you don't want to be involved in cheerleading, why would you want to travel away from your family for 3-4 days, potentially take a day off work, and watch cheerleading for 20 hours, all for a couple hundred bucks?

I think the best judges are the ones that are in the gym all the time and thoroughly understand the technical intricacies of the skills. The ones that understand, from real life experience, what skills are harder and why, and how they should look.

There are so many people saying they "KNOW" this happens, does anyone have ANY actual examples to share? Some scoresheet numbers we can talk about, or some videos to watch? I'm not saying EP's, judges, or scoring systems are perfect, because they're not, but I am saying if you have some unbiased eyes looking at the situation I am VERY sure at least 9 times out of 10 we could find the reason for the placements logically and without using the excuse of foul play, or an unfair advantage. When people say things like that it is so inflammatory! There isn't any evidence to back it up, it's only opinion. Even the accusation of cheating or unfair scoring is then drawing the personal integrity of the judges on the stand into question, as well as the representatives from the EP. These claims are the last thing a young sport working hard for respect need to be putting out for people to read! Not to mention the fact that you are saying a group of athletes and coaches who undoubtably worked very hard for their success didn't deserve what they earned, which is rude and selfish. If you don't understand results it's VERY easy to make excuses and say why you got cheated or what was unfair, but IMO that's unfair to your opponents, it's unfair to the system, and quite frankly it's lazy. Focus that energy on UNDERSTANDING the scores and why you received them, what areas you were likely beat on. Focus on getting EP's to release scores so we can actually see where we got beat or where we out scored our opponents.

I have had a few experiences the last few years that have left me shaking my head, and my team(s) haven't always been on the losing side of it. It's hard to post video though without feeling like I'm calling out the other teams, my team, etc. Mostly because I know that my athletes are on fierceboard and so are some athletes on those other teams- I just don't want to sound like a sore loser or anything like that. If your team is better than mine, then I hope you win. Not to mention that I don't want to de-legitimize our competitions, judges, and results in the eyes of our athletes/parents. Maybe a better post for the coaches' room, now I just need to get some of my kids/parents to FINALLY post their vids... :banghead:

 

[WorldClassFame]

No it wasnt me they beat. I was just saying from a judges standpoint when a team drops 3 stunts and has a tumble fall it should be very difficult to get 2nd at worlds. It didnt affect me at all nor am i upset about it. Just makes me think that indeed a name does help. God knows i would NEVER discount Cali or their amazing teams. Just used it as an example that came to mind. I actually thought they had the goods to win with a hit routine.

 

[KB_Legend]

Well for your particular example you see the second place team had two drops and a girl over rotate a 2 to double... I see the silver team did a 1.5 up and a full around, the bronze team did a full up, the silver team did 5 jumps to back, and the bronze team did 3, the silver team had more tumbling standing and running, the silver team had a faster moving routine, and a very intricate dance... And every time I have had a team compete at worlds the dance has always been a place where people can create separation... Off the top of my head I don't remember how deductions work at worlds specifically, but isn't it very possible that the second place team created enough of a scoring gap to still beat the third place team with the deductions?

 

[yojaehs]

Here is my take on the "big gym" advantage and to me it's simple math. I'm going to use lvl 2/3 tumbling as an example ( yes often times there are many other variables when choosing a team but I think you'll get the point)

Let's say I have 60 kids tryout for lrg sr 3, ALL have lvl 3 tumbling. As a lrg gym/team you can select the BEST 32 and the other 28 make either a sm 3 or a 2 (many variables, I'm just trying to be as basic as possible). A small gyms team that has 32 might not have squad skills so the advantage goes to the lrg ALSO and I think this is often times missed. YES, small gym coaches are good and pushing to have the "squad skill" advantage large gym bc they aren't having to work on that. They can focus on other areas or perfect the skills smaller gums are getting so now the lrg gym has a solid lvl 3 team and potentially an even more solid sr 2 or sm 3.

I've been fortunate to grow with a gym and see the small woes and the benefits of being bigger. As a coach it just makes your job easier. You can hate me for being lrg if you want but I know what it took to get there and if you work hard lrg or sm I have faith you'll get success.

I'd like to add that yes you can punch holes in my example all day, but I was just trying to shed light on a simple mathematical and more important scoring advantage large gyms often times have that regardless of what you do or change won't go away.

I'm a "cheer fan" large or small I love it all!!!

 

[KB_Legend]

You're right I think that does happen, but my question then is, why do smaller gyms put the kids with lower level skills just to have a full team of 32?? It doesn't matter how many kids you have no one can force you to put certain kids on your team. Here is where we get the 1000 replies saying we didn't have another team for them, or you have to have a full team to be competitive but it's just not true. That's the reason the number got lowered to begin with, so your 25 person team can be competitive with the full team. We have a large gym and are lucky enough to have many team options for our athletes, but we still have quite a few teams that aren't full at tryouts because we put people where they belong regardless of numbers. I coached at a brand new gym too about 9 years ago, only 43 kids in the whole program, we made it work, didn't make excuses and that gym now has over 400 athletes... I just hate to see the word "advantage" we are all playing by the same rules!

 

[mia4life06]

We would love to be better as coaches, too. I feel that I have an above average experience level with cheer scoring and there are many times when I simply have no idea why our teams win/lose. I can guess, but I would much rather know.

I agree with this statement because at one competition there is no way a large mini level 2 can win grand champions with only 11 bhs and not do any extended stunts and beat 29 other youth senior and junior level 2. this was an example of what had at a competition just because the gym is just now starting to get well know

 

[cupieqt]

Here is my take on the "big gym" advantage and to me it's simple math. I'm going to use lvl 2/3 tumbling as an example ( yes often times there are many other variables when choosing a team but I think you'll get the point)

Let's say I have 60 kids tryout for lrg sr 3, ALL have lvl 3 tumbling. As a lrg gym/team you can select the BEST 32 and the other 28 make either a sm 3 or a 2 (many variables, I'm just trying to be as basic as possible). A small gyms team that has 32 might not have squad skills so the advantage goes to the lrg ALSO and I think this is often times missed. YES, small gym coaches are good and pushing to have the "squad skill" advantage large gym bc they aren't having to work on that. They can focus on other areas or perfect the skills smaller gums are getting so now the lrg gym has a solid lvl 3 team and potentially an even more solid sr 2 or sm 3.

I've been fortunate to grow with a gym and see the small woes and the benefits of being bigger. As a coach it just makes your job easier. You can hate me for being lrg if you want but I know what it took to get there and if you work hard lrg or sm I have faith you'll get success.

I'd like to add that yes you can punch holes in my example all day, but I was just trying to shed light on a simple mathematical and more important scoring advantage large gyms often times have that regardless of what you do or change won't go away.

I'm a "cheer fan" large or small I love it all!!!

I love being small and mighty! And we always welcome the challenges it brings. We have a long term plan to grow and be large one day. We know that the work we do now will make that happen so it will all be worth it. I've been coaching for 15 years and for those first few years it was just for fun. Then I got more serious about it but at that point I was head coach of a program that was good but we were a "hobby gym". It was not a program built for long term success.

Currently, our goal is to just be as awesome as we can be. To be fun to watch and to compete with anyone.
We study. We learn. We critique. We watch. We work.

"Big or small I love it all" This. This is me too!

 

[cupieqt]

You're right I think that does happen, but my question then is, why do smaller gyms put the kids with lower level skills just to have a full team of 32?? It doesn't matter how many kids you have no one can force you to put certain kids on your team. Here is where we get the 1000 replies saying we didn't have another team for them, or you have to have a full team to be competitive but it's just not true. That's the reason the number got lowered to begin with, so your 25 person team can be competitive with the full team. We have a large gym and are lucky enough to have many team options for our athletes, but we still have quite a few teams that aren't full at tryouts because we put people where they belong regardless of numbers. I coached at a brand new gym too about 9 years ago, only 43 kids in the whole program, we made it work, didn't make excuses and that gym now has over 400 athletes... I just hate to see the word "advantage" we are all playing by the same rules!

I love my itty bitty bad a$$ teams of 10 and 14!!

 

[JulieP]

You're right I think that does happen, but my question then is, why do smaller gyms put the kids with lower level skills just to have a full team of 32?? It doesn't matter how many kids you have no one can force you to put certain kids on your team. Here is where we get the 1000 replies saying we didn't have another team for them, or you have to have a full team to be competitive but it's just not true. That's the reason the number got lowered to begin with, so your 25 person team can be competitive with the full team. We have a large gym and are lucky enough to have many team options for our athletes, but we still have quite a few teams that aren't full at tryouts because we put people where they belong regardless of numbers. I coached at a brand new gym too about 9 years ago, only 43 kids in the whole program, we made it work, didn't make excuses and that gym now has over 400 athletes... I just hate to see the word "advantage" we are all playing by the same rules!

I agree. I coach a senior 3 team with 10 kids and a junior 2 with 15 kids. Between those teams we have 5 crossovers and our senior team only has 3 senior-aged athlete. I know that there are people that will be judgmental that it's abusing the option of crossovers, but it allows my small gym to have a level appropriate team at both age groups. In addition, it allows us to continue to have a team for those senior aged athletes that have grown up in our gym. Having teams that don't have the full 20 kids is not a disadvantage in my eyes. We concentrate on putting together the best routines and making sure kids are happy and successful with us. Every program was a small program at some point. Maybe someday we'll be a "big gym", but as long as our kids are happy we will be too.

 

[tumbleyoda]

One of the challenges I have seen happen many times in the type of situation yojaehs put out there is that regardless of the # on the team, the smaller gym struggles to really have athletes at true level be on their true level team. They will accept being on a level 2 team at a bigger gym, but pitch a fit, threaten to quit, not be happy unless they are on a level 3 team at the smaller gym. If they quit/leave it truly affects your business so that is why IMO some smaller gyms make the concessions they do, then complain they are not competitive later. But if you select a division because of parental pressure it is not nor should it ever be blamed as an industry issue; it is a you issue.



I have seen many kids happy to nugget on a higher level team or the popular big gym that wins more than losing, then actually work on a team that is their true skill level that may not win as much. Being on a winning team takes precedence over them as individuals truly working for it. Of course I am not saying that does not happen at larger gyms too, just that when it happens at a smaller gym it potentially upsets so much more because you don't have the options to quickly fix it. It takes time to be able to fix it, but IMO after 5 years of business you need to be able to adjust and adapt better.

I have mad respect for people like BlueCat, yojaehs and KB_Legend because I know they have not always been where they are now and they are not totally without understanding or compassion of the struggles small gyms deal with. The struggles are real, but making excuses don't help. An old motivational quote holds true: Losers make Excuses; Winners make Adjustments.

 

[WorldClassFame]

Its totally possible and youre right the scoring gap was most likely big enough even with deductions. But i guess my point is that had it not been california... Lets say it was a small gym first time at worlds, doing same exact skills just as good...They woulda been hit way harder and thus out of contention. Again im not saying anything bad about cali cuz i think the whole program is insanely talented and they are a fav of mine for sure.

 

[KB_Legend]

Ok, this is where it gets really frustrating to me... We just agreed that it was probably scored accurately and the teams probably got the placements they deserved. Why then would we suggest something different would happen if different programs were involved? Is there some reason to believe that? Is there some situation where this has happened?

 

[debbie]

I believe a universal score sheet would go along way to helping everyone be able to understand why teams score the way they do. For parents especially its hard to see the same routine scored differently at each competition. I've heard parents so often say "the coach is changing the routine again?" because they don't understand that different comps judge with different score sheets.

 

[debbie]

I may be speaking out of turn here but its also probably true that the big gyms that have been around a long time are more knowledgeable on how to hit the score sheets at the different comps better than the new gyms that haven't been around as long.

 

[kristenthegreat]

I agree with most of the people on here. I think it's not the 'NAME' exactly that gets better results, but the perks that earning that name has brought! Such as, access to better choreographers, better music, etc. If you gave two teams the same dance, let's say, F5 and Podunk Allstars..how many of you would automatically favor F5 because you associate a good dance with them? Not necessarily a bad thing, these gyms are talented at what they do!, but it's something you don't always realize. It goes both ways..there are perks for either!