Protests that don't matter until later

[NoahMinkCHS]

At a high school tournament, after five rounds of preliminaries there was a close call for the #1 playoff seed and the #2 playoff seed. The coach of the #2 team then said he wanted to protest a math bonus from round 3 (which they won by almost 200 points). Granted the question was painfully wrong, but the absurdly late protest which would've been dismissed anyway, having no bearing on the winner of the game, was made simply to attempt to get his team the #1 seed and avoid some of the teams on that side of the bracket.

This post in another thread brings up a question I've been wondering about for some time, and end up discussing at almost every tournament I go to. I figure I'll bring it up now and see if there is any semblance of consensus.

At every level and nearly every tournament I've played at, good etiquette and possibly tournament rules state that protests may be lodged but will only be judged if they have a bearing on the match's outcome. Keeps things running, shows good sportsmanship, etc. It makes sense.

Except... when it doesn't. Like in the example above. Ten or twenty or forty points here and there could be the difference between being a 1 and a 2, or a 7 and an 8; between going home with a trophy or not.

It seems somewhat unfair to me that a team can be, essentially, penalized for winning by too much. For example, let's say that at Some Tournament, there is one atrocious toss-up in Round 1 that's missing a common, right answer. Team A is dominating Team Z, and drops their protest to that toss-up after winning by 300. Team B, meanwhile, is in a tough one with Team Y, and ends up protesting (and getting credit for) the crappy toss-up, 30ing the bonus, and winning by 20.

At the end of the day, A and B share the same record and haven't played head-to-head. One team will play a nationally-ranked, dominant opponent; the other will get a weak program that had a lucky pool and a good day. By points, B has 10 more -- meaning that the protest in round 1, though it didn't affect A's match, has now cost Team A a higher seed and probably a chance to advance. (You can rewrite this to fit your favorite playoff format; maybe it was the difference between being in the 1-8 pool and the 9-16 pool.)

Anyway, the point is, the disputed question did matter to someone, and it seems unfair to me that Team A got screwed out of points they deserved. At the same time, it's obvious we can't adjudicate every single protest, especially "just in case" ones that end up wasting everyone's time. So is being a Team A just a fact of quiz bowl life, just something you have to deal with as part of playing? Or is there a better way to handle this? Thoughts?

[Stained Diviner]

I prefer dealing with all complaints as they arise. I don't like the idea of coming back to something only if it makes a difference because it makes it more controversial when the protest does matter. It leads to teams thinking, "If we can just get the last two toss-ups and win our protest..." It also leads to situations like the ones you describe.

If you deal with every complaint, there is a time issue. With good questions, however, complaints are fairly rare. With mature coaches, decent moderators, an agreement that the Tournament Director's decisions are final, and an internet connection, complaints can be dealt with in under five minutes. That is, they do not have to cause a major delay in the tournament.

[bigtrain]

I don't see why protests that don't affect a game's outcome but do affect playoff seeding shouldn't be settled just before the playoffs. I know of at least one case where this happened this year to another team at a tournament we were at (Princeton).

[jonpin]

To answer all of the preceding posts:
For all intents and purposes, being that Team A is, in fact, just unlucky to be. It isn't <b>likely</b> to make a decisive difference, and in the unlikely event it is, dem's da breaks.
Resolving protests as they come is frequently not doable, especially if the moderator is clueless in the field of the question. At ACF Regionals, an answer was "manifold." I said "algebraic manifold" and the moderator had a puzzled look on his face, but accepted it, adding "I don't know the slightest thing about manifolds." If the other team had protested, there would be no way to actually resolve that until the end of the match.
At that point, resolving every protest is TOTALLY impractical. At our HS tournament, we had 20 games going simultaneously, including our head TD and another member of our protest-hearing committee. If we were to listen to every protest, that would be one or two people who would have to sit in the room, going through each protest and saying "No. Yes. Let's look that up."
Resolving them before announcing playoff seeding is just as bad. As it was, we had the teams waiting for quite some time before the last round was in and we could announce the bracket. If we had to go through 5 rounds of 10 points if it makes a difference protests, there would have been a riot.
Unless it's the matter of advancing or not, it's almost always going to be a relatively minor difference. By being consistent in not hearing the protest unless it decides the game, we avoid excessive delays, with the potential but unlikely drawback that a team which is out by 5 points might deserve to be in by 5 points. If it IS a matter of advancing or not, that's an argument for NAQT-style tiebreakers determining who advances out of a Circle of Death. This, however, requires another packet, as well as riot-causing delays.

In my opinion, it's the least of a good deal of choices of evils.

[dschafer]

At Science Bowl Regionals this weekend, they settled every protest as it happened (even if it was clear the protest didn't matter). I don't have a problem with this system, and it certainly avoided the problems mentioned with unresolved protests, but there was a major downside; the flow of the game slowed down greatly as they phoned the war room to resolve the protests.

Settling protests before the playoffs to determine seeding would be quite disruptive. If teams know virtually any protest will be resolved, they might accrue many, many protests over the course of a tournament, trying to scrounge as many points as possible. Even if only 16 teams make the playoffs, with each team having 3 protests throughout the entire tournaments, 48 protests before announcing playoff seedings would be very inconvenient.

Although it is unfortunate that unresolved protests can occasionally affect seeding (or even playoff qualification), it seems to be to be a neccesary evil.

[First Chairman]

Ideally, if you have multiple games going on at once, it is a lot of effort to get your "protest committee" together to rule on every single challenge that might come up. Consequently, having the rule that protests are resolved at end of matches if it matters is a deliberate one to expedite the direction of the tournament.

Ideally, yes, we ought to resolve every single protest that pops up, but that's when we justify having a panel of judges sitting in every room looking up information that comes up in a protest as the game is going on. But for maybe 90% of the matches out there -- assuming the questions are not written with wrong answers -- having such a "Supreme Court" in every room is impractical and a waste of (hu)manpower.

At PACE Nationals, we try to be ready to look up information on any protests that pop up in the championship final. Internet computers are always on and ready to search for reputable sources to uphold or deny protests. But 99% of the time, protests can be avoided with good question-writing and editing.

[STPickrell]

From Pickrell's Commentaries on Sun VHSL's Art of Scholastic Bowl:

Section 126-9-10: On Contesting

"If questions are raised about the correctness of an answer a player gives and there is easy agreement of players, coaches and/or judges on the appropriate response, the issue may be resolved immediately and the score adjusted as appropriate."

...

"If agreement is not easy or immediate (10-15 seconds), once a decision has been made, a coach or player active in the game may make a formal protest."