174 @ NCAAs Discussion

[Pinnacle]

7 hours ago, CHROMEBIRD said:

It seems a little too convenient that CarStar gets a revenge match in the first round of his murder tour. But I'll take a feisty PK over a banged up Griffith and Starocci, if Starocci can get past Mekhi.

If Carter is healthy enough to beat Mehki then he is healthy enough to handily best Kennedy. 

[BloodRound]

4 hours ago, lu_alum said:

Mekhi should have the advantage over a one-legged Starocci.  

Only problem is Mekhi will have to actually take a shot.  The counter-offense crap from neutral isn't gonna cut it at NCAAs if Starocci doesn't shoot w a gimpy wheel.  Starocci will likely be content to go scoreless in the first period and take the match to the mat.

Or they both put on a stalling clinic for the ages the entire match.

[BAC]

5 hours ago, boconnell said:

Either seed Starocci correctly or don't let him in.  Putting him 9 just punishes wrestlers in his path who earned seeds.

This was exactly my feeling when I saw the brackets.  They're so concerned about adequately punishing Starocci and putting high conference finishers above him, all in the name of fairness -- but how fair is that to a guy like Lewis, who busted his butt this season to earn a top seed?  His reward is Starocci in the quarters.  I mean, does anyone seriously think Carter cares where he's seeded?  

I'm not saying you make Starocci the 1 seed, but I think they took it took far.  Sure, put him behind the B10 and ACC and B12 champs, those guys are legit and didn't face Starocci.  Behind Griffith too, if only because Griffith showed up at the PSU dual and Carter didn't.  But after that it all sort of falls apart.  Most of these guys seeded ahead of Starocci I had to Google to figure out who they were.

I think 5 is right but at least give Carter the 6 seed (not Welsh, who Carter beat), so he's opposite the Big 10 champ Ruth in the quarters, and the true King of the B1G can move to the semis.

[Pinnacle]

Worst part for Mehki is now he has to wrestle Carter Friday morning after making weight instead of on Saturday night. 

[lu_alum]

This was exactly my feeling when I saw the brackets.  They're so concerned about adequately punishing Starocci and putting high conference finishers above him, all in the name of fairness -- but how fair is that to a guy like Lewis, who busted his butt this season to earn a top seed?  His reward is Starocci in the quarters.  I mean, does anyone seriously think Carter cares where he's seeded?  
I'm not saying you make Starocci the 1 seed, but I think they took it took far.  Sure, put him behind the B10 and ACC and B12 champs, those guys are legit and didn't face Starocci.  Behind Griffith too, if only because Griffith showed up at the PSU dual and Carter didn't.  But after that it all sort of falls apart.  Most of these guys seeded ahead of Starocci I had to Google to figure out who they were.
I think 5 is right but at least give Carter the 6 seed (not Welsh, who Carter beat), so he's opposite the Big 10 champ Ruth in the quarters, and the true King of the B1G can move to the semis.

“They” didn’t punish anyone. The seeding parameters were created, agreed upon, and published for all to see. Like it or not, it’s a mathematical formula.

Starocci and Carl knew the guidelines, but still chose to wrestle a very limited schedule, resulting in no RPI (10% of the seeding formula). Heading into B1G with 12 bouts gave him an opportunity to get to the 15 bouts needed, but the injury prevented that.

No conference placement (10% of the seeding formula) further hurt his cause. Nolf understood the need to get a conference placement when he was injured - he wrestled to the semi-final before taking a three-bout MED FFT slide to sixth place.


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[lu_alum]

Hopefully he'll survive the downstairs drill session.

Suriano didn’t.


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[BAC]

19 minutes ago, lu_alum said:

“They” didn’t punish anyone. The seeding parameters were created, agreed upon, and published for all to see. Like it or not, it’s a mathematical formula.

Starocci and Carl knew the guidelines, but still chose to wrestle a very limited schedule, resulting in no RPI (10% of the seeding formula). Heading into B1G with 12 bouts gave him an opportunity to get to the 15 bouts needed, but the injury prevented that.

No conference placement (10% of the seeding formula) further hurt his cause. Nolf understood the need to get a conference placement when he was injured - he wrestled to the semi-final before taking a three-bout MED FFT slide to sixth place.


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You still don't get it.  It isn't Starocci's "cause." If it was up to Starocci, he'd be in the pigtail, and wrestle everyone in the bracket.

Its a cause of everyone else in the bracket.  Guys who worked hard for their seed, which is supposed to come with the right to not have to face Starocci right away.  THAT is who the seeding committee needs to look out for.

And you know full well it isn't solely a mathematical formula.  The formula sets a baseline, after which there is subjectivity to argue someone up or down if he's within a few points of other guys.

Edited March 14 by BAC

[lu_alum]

2 hours ago, BAC said:

You still don't get it.  It isn't Starocci's "cause." If it was up to Starocci, he'd be in the pigtail, and wrestle everyone in the bracket.

Its a cause of everyone else in the bracket.  Guys who worked hard for their seed, which is supposed to come with the right to not have to face Starocci right away.  THAT is who the seeding committee needs to look out for.

And you know full well it isn't solely a mathematical formula.  The formula sets a baseline, after which there is subjectivity to argue someone up or down if he's within a few points of other guys.

I do get it. It is a mathematical formula, with some latitude to make adjustments within numerical groupings. But even the subjective aspect of the seeding process has guidelines, several of which he doesn't present favorably.

• He's not a conference champion
• He's 3-2 in his last five bouts
• He had two INJ DEF losses.
• The B1G tourney brought his availability into question.

Edited March 14 by lu_alum

[peanut]

11 minutes ago, lu_alum said:

I do get it. It is a mathematical formula, with some latitude to make adjustments within numerical groupings. But even the subjective aspect of the seeding process has guidelines, several of which he doesn't present favorably.

• He's not a conference champion
• He's 3-2 in his last five bouts
• He had two INJ DEF losses.
• The B1G tourney brought his availability into question.

I get the criteria and all that. But putting Lewis and Starocci in the same quarter is silly. The committee should have used whatever discretion it had to put them in separate quarters or halves. 

[lu_alum]

3 minutes ago, peanut said:

I get the criteria and all that. But putting Lewis and Starocci in the same quarter is silly. The committee should have used whatever discretion it had to put them in separate quarters or halves. 

(a little sarcasm here)... Maybe they used their discretion to put three banged-up returning champions on the same side of the bracket.  Let the best man survive and meet the best healthy guy from the bottom in the final?

[BAC]

43 minutes ago, lu_alum said:

I do get it. It is a mathematical formula, with some latitude to make adjustments within numerical groupings. But even the subjective aspect of the seeding process has guidelines, several of which he doesn't present favorably.

• He's not a conference champion
• He's 3-2 in his last five bouts
• He had two INJ DEF losses.
• The B1G tourney brought his availability into question.

I think you're misapplying the subjective criteria.

The number of injury defaults/MFFs is a favorable criteria, not unfavorable, as it reflects that a loss was not on the merits.  And here it negates the "not a conference champ" criteria, and also impacts the "last five match" criteria, as the two Ls were defaults.  He's undefeated in matches without an injury default.  Taken together, that's an upward adjustment.

Same with the other criteria.  He's not outside the top 30 in Coaches Rank:  he's #2 in the final rankings, behind Lewis.  No bad losses, numerous quality wins. And wrestler "availability" doesn't mean to speculate or scour Twitter feeds for rumors:  it means if the coach says he's expected to compete, as here, then he's available, without downward adjustment.

How can anyone apply this criteria and not seed Starocci over guys like Wolak, Welsh and Kemp?

Again, you're saying Cael shoulda done this or that, but no one at Penn State cares.  He ran the table three times in a row and he's going to do it again.  Its everyone else.  

Bottom line -- if the seeding committee didn't exercise their maximum subjective discretion to elevate Starocci's seed, then they screwed up big-time.  Because as it stands, the #1 and #2 guys in the final Coache's Ranking are going to meet in the quarterfinals, and that's a seeding felony.

[TylerDurden]

1 hour ago, lu_alum said:

I do get it. It is a mathematical formula, with some latitude to make adjustments within numerical groupings. But even the subjective aspect of the seeding process has guidelines, several of which he doesn't present favorably.

• He's not a conference champion
• He's 3-2 in his last five bouts
• He had two INJ DEF losses.
• The B1G tourney brought his availability into question.

Notably, being a conference champion is not subjective. Neither is the performance in the last five matches, being outside of the top 30 coaches rank / RPI top 30, nor a "bad loss" to a wrestler with a <.500 win percentage. 

The only relatively subjective things on the "Subjective Considerations" list are best quality win (unless that's defined elsewhere) and wrestler availability. 

Perhaps is was a poorly labeled slide, but all but of couple of these are objective considerations. 

 

 

[TylerDurden]

1 hour ago, peanut said:

I get the criteria and all that. But putting Lewis and Starocci in the same quarter is silly. The committee should have used whatever discretion it had to put them in separate quarters or halves. 

The side of the bracket isn't the issue. It's the actual seed line. 

[Dogbone]

1 hour ago, lu_alum said:

I do get it. It is a mathematical formula, with some latitude to make adjustments within numerical groupings. But even the subjective aspect of the seeding process has guidelines, several of which he doesn't present favorably.

• He's not a conference champion
• He's 3-2 in his last five bouts
• He had two INJ DEF losses.
• The B1G tourney brought his availability into question.

Now do Philip Conigliaro

[Dogbone]

How many AA's come out of the bottom?  Both semis are guaranteed.   I am putting the over/under at 2.5. 

[peanut]

13 minutes ago, TylerDurden said:

The side of the bracket isn't the issue. It's the actual seed line. 

The point of seeding is simply to spread out the wrestlers who are expected to perform the best. It doesn’t really matter how it gets done.

[TylerDurden]

Just now, peanut said:

The point of seeding is simply to spread out the wrestlers who are expected to perform the best. It doesn’t really matter how it gets done.

They failed at that task. 

[feet2back]

Upset special

round 2

Turley over #1 Lewis

Lewis beat Turley 2-1 at last years NCAA

[Silver]

17 hours ago, Pinnacle said:

Manning did this bracket, right?

I took the comment as meaning the big ten bracket was a mess after Penn State knew Starooci wasn't going to compete, essentially Sparks (9seed) was an o.t. takedown away from being big ten champ? With  a win, ff, ot win in semi then ff in finals, if you follow me? 

[Pinnacle]

24 minutes ago, Silver said:

I took the comment as meaning the big ten bracket was a mess after Penn State knew Starooci wasn't going to compete, essentially Sparks (9seed) was an o.t. takedown away from being big ten champ? With  a win, ff, ot win in semi then ff in finals, if you follow me? 

My comment was tongue in cheek. 

[ILLINIWrestlingBlog]

6 hours ago, BAC said:

  He ran the table three times in a row and he's going to do it again.  Its everyone else.  

Wrestlers are awesome! We live in a culture that prizes toughness. Expects it. Our motto is not "Chop Suey, Carry the One" for a reason. We expect our champions to have almost super-human powers and abilities. Other sports fans see it differently. 

MMA fights get canceled all the time for less serious injuries. If a two-year old pulled a tendon two weeks before the starting gate at the Derby, that animal would be a scratch and would not be allowed to race. Would not be allowed to race. 

We expect our wrestlers to fight through pain and injury. That's why so many folks believe in Spencer Lee, even though he stands on two Jenga towers. One Austin Powers Judo Chop in the right place, and he would have to injury default. 

I 100% get it. 

Back in 2015, Jesse Delgado was a returning three-time All American and two-time NCAA Champion. Yet, he had an injury that year. That injury caused him to be unseeded in the 2015 NCAA tournament. It especially sucked for the #8 seed Tyler Cox of Wyoming, his first round opponent. 

As a Delgado fan, I wanted to believe that he would win. I'm sure he believed he could win. 

And he did in the first round. Poor Tyler Cox lost a close 2-3 decision to the two-time NCAA Champion. Then, in the next round, Jesse lost 2-4. In the wrestlebacks--something the ILLINI hadn't seen since his redshirt freshman year--he was forced to injury default at the 2:52 mark to a 17-9 wrestler. 

Not only are Starocci and Griffith a risk to default their first match, but they are at heightened risk every match after that as they face increasingly better opponents. It is a shame. Injuries suck. The NCAA should not allow them to happen, but somehow injuries still happen. 

What I see in the top portion of the 174 bracket are a lot of "ifs." 

If Starocci and Griffith have sufficiently recovered from their injuries. If they have had the ability to get into match shape in time for the tournament. If their timing isn't off. If they don't injury default before, during or after their first-, second-, third- or fourth-round matches. The big "What If" in my mind, though, is this: What if the top bracket just got two injury defaults? 

I will be in the Main Concourse of the T-Mobile Center in Kansas City to sign my book Chop Suey and Carry the One. 

[fishbane]

17 hours ago, lu_alum said:

Mekhi should have the advantage over a one-legged Starocci.  

Only problem is Mekhi will have to actually take a shot.  The counter-offense crap from neutral isn't gonna cut it at NCAAs if Starocci doesn't shoot w a gimpy wheel.  Starocci will likely be content to go scoreless in the first period and take the match to the mat.

Is Mekhi the last wrestler to take Starocci down in NCAA competition? 

[Le duke]

Is Mekhi the last wrestler to take Starocci down in NCAA competition? 

He gave up a TD to Ethan Smith of tOSU last year.


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[ILLINIWrestlingBlog]

Let's say you have a bank vault with a timed-lock that won't open until March 21 at 11:35 am. Inside the bank vault--if you could see inside the bank vault--is Carter Starocci and Shane Griffith. But you can't see inside the vault because it's made of good Pennsylvania steel. 

Can we tell the wrestling condition of the wrestlers?

No. Not until that bank vault is opened. Their condition could range anywhere from "A" (perfect wrestling condition) to "Z" (on crutches). There's no way of knowing. 

[Wrestleknownothing]

40 minutes ago, ILLINIWrestlingBlog said:

Let's say you have a bank vault with a timed-lock that won't open until March 21 at 11:35 am. Inside the bank vault--if you could see inside the bank vault--is Carter Starocci and Shane Griffith. But you can't see inside the vault because it's made of good Pennsylvania steel. 

Can we tell the wrestling condition of the wrestlers?

No. Not until that bank vault is opened. Their condition could range anywhere from "A" (perfect wrestling condition) to "Z" (on crutches). There's no way of knowing. 

Is Starocci's Cat in there, too?