Announcement: Minnesota Open, October 18 2008

[Sir Thopas]

Results of the meta packet have been compiled at http://www.hsquizbowl.org/meta/meta_standings.html .

holy shit rob carson stop stalking all of quizbowl

[CarletonQB]

Leaving a tournament early is obviously undesirable; I was quite surprised when I dropped by the tournament following a family commitment for most of the day, to learn my team had just left with many rounds to play. But for the record, they didn't leave "because the questions weren't ultra-easy or they weren't playing well." (They were doing "OK" at 3-5.) They left because after being there from early morning until dinner time, only half the round robin had been completed, and it clearly was going to last way into the night, which wasn't what they had expected, given that there was a whole add-on tournament scheduled for "the evening" following the regular event. (I signed on for the Lit-only event myself, assuming it would start at 7 or 8 or something; play in fact began at 11:45 pm. I'm not complaining; I came back and played, and stayed till it shut down just before 2. But it wasn't at all the schedule I was expecting.) It was parents weekend at Carleton, one of the players had both parents following them around at the tournament, with mom and dad becoming increasingly glazed by rounds that took 45-50 minutes each to play, and with other plans for later in the evening. The players saw themselves as taking pity on the parents by making a collective decision to leave when they did; it was about the time they kind of assumed going in that morning that the tournament would be approaching its end, and staying for hours and hours more just wasn't going to be possible for them. Going just before one of them was supposed to read for a bye round was wretched timing, and would have been worse if I hadn't happened to drop in at just the right time and do the reading myself. Go ahead and whale away on them for going at all ... but the unexpected length of the tournament was their reason, not dissatisfaction with question difficulty or how they were doing, both of which were in line with expectations.

Eric Hillemann (Carleton coach)

[naturalistic phallacy]

I would hardly call the length unexpected. The tournament was advertised as lasting until 9pm, and it did, wrapping up a few minutes after that. The players were certainly aware of that, and if they weren't, you did a horrid job as a coach for not telling them that. And seeing as how you have played events similar in length and question style before, you have no excuse to pretend you had no idea that such situations were possible. To not give visiting parents some idea of what they were getting into is not only inconsiderate but rather stupid of you and your team; to leave without notice because of them was even worse, disrupting the flow of the tournament and giving each team one less game than was advertised.

[marnold]

Obviously they fucked over the tournament, but the line of argument "you knew what you were getting into when you signed up" leaves Carleton in a pretty terrible double-bind. Let's say they see the tournament information talking about the tournament going until 9 and they decide that's too late for the 'rents and don't come to MO. Is there any question that everyone would throw their backs out trying to get to the forums to castigate them for skipping a good tournament within 45 minutes of them? Given that they don't want to be out until 9:00 on parents weekend, they can either fuck over the tournament or not come at all and in either case they're being dragged over the coals.

There were lots of better solutions to the problem than the one they took and I think some annoyance with Carleton is reasonable and deserved, but it seems like just a tough situation overall and I'm a little surprised at the frothing-at-the-mouth fury this inspired.

[Cheynem]

I can't speak for others, but I have would far, far, far less of a problem of a team honestly saying (within a reasonable interval) "We can't make the tourney because of conflicts" and not showing up at all than showing up and then ditching halfway through.

[Mechanical Beasts]

I think Marnold's talking about how some vocal members of the circuit who tend to criticize teams for doing obviously stupid shit (like leaving in the middle of a tournament) would also take the opportunity to mock Carleton gleefully for having prioritized Parent's Weekend over a great, close tournament, and saying that they shouldn't have done that. You're just more understanding, or less actively predatory, or something.

[grapesmoker]

Ah yes, the "Matt Weiner being mean in a hypothetical situation" excuse.

If a team can't come because it's parents' weekend or whatever, I don't think anyone will care. What people do care about is when your actions affect the tournament experience for everyone else. You can't just do whatever you want because you didn't know what you were getting into (you did) or because you've got parents hanging around, or whatever. Come on, if everyone takes 10 minutes to think about these things, we won't be having these discussions.

[theMoMA]

I guess I'd have a much easier time believing there was no ill will involved if I hadn't heard (both firsthand and through players and moderators at the tournament) that the Carleton team was being negative to the point of disrupting other teams. I really don't want to belabor this discussion, because I talked to Eric, and I know he was a bit blindsided by the fact that his team left, and he apologized to me sincerely. For now, I would like to consider this matter concluded.

[No Rules Westbrook]

Well, I don't know about Weiner, but I'll be honest - had Carleton declined to come because they prioritized Parents Weekend over playing an awesome tournament - I'd have fired up my death ray of venom and unleashed it mercilessly. For Pete's sake, I once proposed that people should only be allowed to ditch a tournament to get laid if they first submitted a picture of the girl to a panel of judges and she was deemed to have a high enough Hathaway rating to justify the frolic. I'm not sure if I'd have posted on the message board (probably not), but you can bet I would have repeatedly mocked Carleton for being a lousy excuse for a QB team whenever it seemed germane to the conversation.

That said, my mockery or that of anyone else is not the issue.

What Carleton did here was just plain stupid. They had every reason to know that the tournament would end when it did, or at least close to when it did - and they came with parents in tow, acted like it was a big surprise, behaved in a generally whiny fashion, and then hit the road without telling anyone. This conduct is condemnable regardless of whether I or anyone else respects Carleton or thinks that they are a serious quizbowl team (which they're not).

[Mechanical Beasts]

I guess I'd have a much easier time believing there was no ill will involved if I hadn't heard (both firsthand and through players and moderators at the tournament) that the Carleton team was being negative to the point of disrupting other teams. I really don't want to belabor this discussion, because I talked to Eric, and I know he was a bit blindsided by the fact that his team left, and he apologized to me sincerely. For now, I would like to consider this matter concluded.

I endorse this sentiment; I'd only wanted to clarify Marnold's position, not endorse it.

[Captain Sinico]

...consider this matter concluded.

[fleurdelivre]

I'm deliberating whether the deluge of "STOP SUMMARIZING THINGS THAT ARE FREELY AVAILABLE ON THE INTERNET ABOUT ME" complaints will be a worthwhile price to pay for posting it.

of course it is. what else are these message boards for, anyway?