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Subject: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: joiseyfan [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ] Date Posted: 19:36:48 05/17/24 Fri #1 seed Columbia and #2 seed Princeton both lose late on day one. https://ivyleague.com/boxscore.aspx?id=7ltyipP022aUJKmSgYVs3wXi7up73ghniwD5ElWyd07J7BNseBaMQePf0fY%2f3yUPdUDriuaUvhpfW1uSbOTSN6nKZ76s%2bMGV8FhZt6ljftHGrjm8E4ZeyoGBQh8%2fZ6cVllCMWlcXrPM0rBbO3inSyREXpmmlO5vD7BM6bSQ1f1I%3d&path=baseball https://ivyleague.com/boxscore.aspx?id=7ltyipP022aUJKmSgYVs3wXi7up73ghniwD5ElWyd07J7BNseBaMQePf0fY%2f3yUP7s%2fEprmxYbjai2243peTYgn5EKmeuE4AJn%2fBYEF%2bMfQZpyAIj%2bCVbgoAKDAQFfsiQsHR9wzuPhVTeT8mbOxZfE01ahvpAnjT3zHbEYMaJgNaOrIRznFeUeB%2fjvZY1EdJ&path=baseball [ Next Thread | Previous Thread | Next Message | Previous Message ]

Replies:

[> Subject: i care Author: lion rooter [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 08:07:52 05/18/24 Sat frustrating loss as we swept Penn in regular season - have to battle back - early in the game our pitcher seemed to have complete loss of control - was it 2-3 wild pitches over 3 batters ?

[> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 12:08:00 05/18/24 Sat In the space of a half inning which wasn’t over when I tuned out, you can see the problems plaguing Princeton. A relief ace having to start (second start of the season?), 3-2 lead, two out runner at first. Then: E SS, hit batsman, three run hit. Maybe P comes back, but who is left in the pen is a mystery to me.

[> [> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: joiseyfan [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 12:23:42 05/18/24 Sat Tigers back on top 10 minutes later 7-5. This game may run four hours, and that’s if it ends after nine…..

[> [> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: joiseyfan [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 14:18:06 05/18/24 Sat Pinch homer in the last of the ninth pulls Lions to within 16-6. Tigers advance. Let the recriminations commence.

[> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: Roar Lion [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 12:21:14 05/18/24 Sat Did Princeton hold back their ace thinking he'd face CU in the winners bracket? Or did he pitch weekend g2 all year?Interesting that now the Lions face one of the league's best pitchers in a loser's bracket game. Very steep hill for the Lions to climb given our thin bullpen.

[> [> Subject: don't much care for this at all Author: lion rooter [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 13:39:52 05/18/24 Sat so now I am no longer a fan of this here baseball tournie - the regular season means nothing apparently - baring a miracle we are going to lose this game on our own field? seems like last year - epic late season collapse - hate to get on this team after all their previous success but this leaves a bad feeling - also seems premature to annoint coach B as coach of the year and now this. really have to wonder if the fiasco on our campus played into this - either way - how can we sweep Penn and tigers in regular season then lose like this ?

[> [> [> Subject: Re: don't much care for this at all Author: Scoop85 [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 14:17:42 05/18/24 Sat As a Cornell lacrosse fan whose team got bounced from the ILT tournament as the #1 seed on its home field, I feel your pain.

[> [> [> Subject: Re: don't much care for this at all Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 15:30:42 05/18/24 Sat Don’t know about Penn, but while you swept a DH against P, you dropped the opener. But I share your befuddlement.

[> Subject: What happened to Columbia? Travesty of a bottom line Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 15:26:22 05/18/24 Sat A surprising, somewhat shocking weekend under performance by Columbia, concerning which a few observations: 1. Faulkner showed why he was a unanimous 1st Team All Ivy. Against a heavy hitting team he more than held his own. But for a 3rd inning infield error, he would have given up just 3 runs. A guy who pitched in relief all season long except for one start, going the distance against this line up. Must be his quirky motion. A truly gutty performance. 2. So, after a 17-4 season, what happened to Columbia this weekend?? I did not expect them to be swept in their first games. It would not have been a shock, given the vagaries of a ridiculous weekend playoff, to drop one game. But both, and a blowout loss today?? On home field no less. 3. This is one of the biggest travesties of these post-season tournaments in one bid Ivy sports. Over 7 weekends Columbia demonstrated not just that they were the best Ivy baseball team, it wasn’t even close. A 5 game better record than the second best League season — in a 21 game season. These post season tourneys, probably inspired in part by the galloping egalitarianism of League administrators, have plusses to them even in one bid sports, but they are outweighed in my opinion, by the unfairness of what just happened to a team that earned the bid with a body of work over the entire season just to lose out in one weekend playoff. 4. P will likely throw position players, who have pitched a few innings this season, on the mound in their next game.

[> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: Old Lion (We were outplayed) [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 15:28:08 05/18/24 Sat Both opposing pitchers stymied our #s1 and 4 hitters; our pitching was subpar to awful, and we just didn’t play good ball. We were flat out outplayed in both games. I feel for the guys who had such a dominating season and faltered so badly in the tournament.. Penn and Princeton deserved to win; congratulations to both of them. PS, the color commentators were excellent, especially the former Yale coach.

[> Subject: What??? Delay for Mound Maintenance?? Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 16:03:06 05/18/24 Sat Good grief. The schedule has been pushed back because today’s Penn-Cornell game is put off until tomorrow due to mound maintenance issues. What is this about? I did see them working on the mound late in the game while Faulkner was warming up.

[> [> Subject: Re: What??? Delay for Mound Maintenance?? Author: joiseyfan [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 17:08:44 05/18/24 Sat Too many bodies buried there? (OK, really sorry, mea maxima culpa, but there are really limits to the straight lines a sane quipster can pass up before he cracks like 75-year-old wooden bat...)

[> [> [> Subject: Re: What??? Delay for Mound Maintenance?? Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 17:48:38 05/18/24 Sat I think you are confusing Columbia’s baseball stadium for Yankee Stadium.

[> [> [> Subject: Re: What??? Delay for Mound Maintenance?? Author: Lion Rooter [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 19:40:35 05/18/24 Sat it has been rainy this PM and in fact NYC has had a lot of rain lately -so no surprise pitchers mound is sagging much like our Ivy baseball and NCAA tournie hopes

[> [> Subject: Re: What??? Delay for Mound Maintenance?? Author: An Observer [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 17:50:38 05/18/24 Sat Bengal, if the winner's bracket game is pushed off until Sunday, does that mean Princeton will not face the loser until Monday? If so, that would be a break for the Tigers, I would think, given their short pitching roster. I agree with you wholeheartedly about how ridiculous it is for Columbia to have to win a double-elimination tournament after running the rest of the League into the ground over seven weekends. If Brown had hung on for one more second against Yale in men's basketball, this would have been the academic year to remind everybody why a post-season tournament is dangerous in a one-bid conference. My own opinion is (now) if the players and the coaches want it, is it our business to be against it? But it wouldn't shock me if Brett Boretti started voting against the Ivy tournament from now on. In basketball, we play a fourteen-game regular season just to seed a two-round single-elimination bracket. In baseball, we play twenty-one games just to seed a double-elimination bracket. Sample size, folks, sample size.

[> [> [> Subject: Re: What??? Delay for Mound Maintenance?? Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 19:30:06 05/18/24 Sat I believe P will play the loser tomorrow, but have not checked.

[> [> [> [> Subject: Re: What??? Delay for Mound Maintenance?? Author: An Observer [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 20:39:09 05/18/24 Sat The Ivy League website is silent on when Princeton will play the loser out of the winner's bracket. I asked whether it would be Monday because one of the main features of the double elimination structure is that it gives the winner out of the winner's bracket an extra day of rest when the second elimination game is played. In baseball, that gives the winner of the winner's bracket one more day for pitchers to rest while the losers of course have to turn around and play the next day. If Princeton plays the second game of a double header tomorrow against the loser of Penn/Cornell, then the winner of Penn/Cornell would be denied its extra day of rest. Not the worst tragedy in the world of course, but it defeats one of the built-in features of a double-elimination baseball bracket.

[> [> [> Subject: Re: What??? Delay for Mound Maintenance?? Author: sparman [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 20:04:29 05/18/24 Sat I don't believe "voting against the tournament" is a thing anymore. I have no issue with repairing a mound damaged by heavy use following steady rain, in fact I greatly support it. If you saw the effect on pitcher's legs and ankles, you would too.

[> [> [> [> Subject: "A Tarp, A Tarp. My Kingdom For A Tarp." Author: An Observer [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 20:59:46 05/18/24 Sat sparman, no doubt you're correct that the coaches and/or ADs don't vote every year on whether to conduct a postseason tournament. But obviously they do revisit the topic from time to time, no better exemplified than in baseball where we've gone from winners from two geographic divisions play each other (even if the two best teams are both in the North or the South), to the two teams with the best regular season records play each other, to four teams in a double-elimination format. So the topic is clearly revisited as requested by coaches and/or ADs. Baseball is a special candidate for dropping a postseason tournament for the simple reason that the best team in baseball has a much greater chance of losing any single game or pair of games because there's simply more randomness in baseball. That's why Columbia's 17-4 season was so amazing. In this sport, it's hard to go 17-4 against Little Leaguers. At some point, the pendulum could swing back the other way where a guy like Boretti would say, "No mas!" It would be the equivalent of Penn and Princeton agreeing in the early 1970's to experimenting with a four-team men's basketball tournament before realizing, "Hey wait, this is terrible for us." Question re: the pitcher's mound at Columbia. Don't they cover the darn thing with a tarp when it rains? Isn't that Groundskeeping 101?

[> [> [> [> [> Subject: Re: "A Tarp, A Tarp. My Kingdom For A Tarp." Author: sparman [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 22:23:18 05/18/24 Sat My opposition to the basketball tournament for reasons cited above by Bengal is longstanding, but I cannot see the IL putting this tournament idea back up for a vote, if for no other reason than it would open the door to calling off tournaments in other sports in which they are too invested.

[> [> [> [> Subject: Re: What??? Delay for Mound Maintenance?? Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 21:42:29 05/18/24 Sat Oh, I have no issue with repairing a damaged mound. I’ve just never heard of a game postponement due to a defective mound before.

[> [> [> [> [> Subject: Re: What??? Delay for Mound Maintenance?? Author: joiseyfan [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 10:21:05 05/19/24 Sun Yeah, didn’t Yogi say you can’t think and pitch at the same time? No, wait…..

[> [> Subject: Re: What??? Delay for Mound Maintenance?? Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 10:41:25 05/19/24 Sun Think and hit. Let’s get Yogi right!

[> Subject: Flash! Author: Brngal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 22:02:27 05/18/24 Sat This just in: P plays the first game loser at 4pm— at Yogi Berra field Montclair state.

[> [> Subject: Re: Flash! Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 22:20:05 05/18/24 Sat The Penn-Cornell loser, if it beats P in the second game tomorrow, could wind up playing another DH on Monday. TBD

[> [> Subject: Re: Flash! Author: An Observer [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 23:13:07 05/18/24 Sat It's not just the Princeton game which got moved. The whole tournament will now take place at Montclair State University because the pitcher's mound at Columbia is defective. No more games will be broadcast on ESPN+. We always say that the umpires' desire is to not be noticed. I would guess the same applies to groundskeepers. This is a new one.

[> [> Subject: Re: Flash! Author: joiseyfan [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 23:40:55 05/18/24 Sat In the “it’s an ill wind that blows no good” department, this will give everybody a chance to stop by the adjacent Yogi Museum, a real smalll gem with his ten World Series rings and lots of other wonders from mid-century, also stuff from local favorite Larry Doby, great video selections and wonderful staff. My son and I were docents there when Yogi and Carmen were alive, and it remains a treasured memory. They’re open until they close, as he said. https://yogiberramuseum.org/ The only problem with the gorgeous stadium is it gets late early out there.

[> [> Subject: Re: Flash! Author: Old Lion (No excuses) [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 07:00:42 05/19/24 Sun We played against the two best pitchers in the league; both of them shut down our #s 1 and 4 hitters. The Princeton coach made a brilliant move in holding his ace fro game 2, assuming that whatever happened in game 1 he would see either Penn or Columbia in game 2. So we can go 17-4 over a season in which we only see one ace a weekend, yet in a short series we saw 2 in 2 games. But that is no excuse; our starters pitched well enough in both games; but the relief pitching was awful, especially in game 2. Yet we threw too many pitches in the dirt in game 1, gave up too many walks in both games, and were just flat out outplayed. Despite our record, we really did not have a lights out starting pitcher all year, and if we want to go further in the tournament we will need one going forward. Maybe Andy Leon will be that guy, but we lost him for the season in week 2. Nonetheless my hat is off to this team—17-4 is still a great season.

[> Subject: Cornell 7 Penn 6 Author: Cornell '97 [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 15:19:10 05/19/24 Sun Nicecomeback win, Cornell 7 Penn 6. Cornell was down 6-1 going into the bottom of the 7th, but the Big Red scored 6 runs the bottom of 7th to go ahead and win.

[> [> Subject: Re: Cornell 7 Penn 6 Author: Penn Nation [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 17:21:45 05/19/24 Sun Tough loss, but congrats to Cornell.

[> [> Subject: Re: Cornell 7 Penn 6 Author: Floridared [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 17:56:35 05/19/24 Sun I wish the game was televised. Great start to the tournament.

[> Subject: Penn 9, Princeton 4 Author: joiseyfan [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 20:16:56 05/19/24 Sun Quakers back against Big Red on Monday finals.

[> [> Subject: Re: Penn 9, Princeton 4 Author: John Harvard [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 16:12:54 05/20/24 Mon I'm thinking that after being eliminated Columbia just didn't want to be responsible for hosting any longer. Told the ungrateful guests to leave.

[> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: The Mountain LIon [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 08:35:02 05/20/24 Mon The pitching mound fiasco is still another embarrassment to an athletic department which, inter alia, has failed miserably in regards to its supervision of the men's basketball program. The folks running Ivy League Athletics must be shaking their heads over the Columbia Athletic Department's latest screw-up.

[> [> Subject: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: Patriot_Lge1-fan [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 15:19:12 05/20/24 Mon ESPN+ carrying the Penn/Cornell game now from Montclair St. It's 6-6 in the 4th inning. If Penn wins this game the final game follows immediately.

[> [> [> Subject: Congratulations Quakers Author: joiseyfan [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 22:24:24 05/20/24 Mon A one-of-kind two week 87-pitcher bi-state circus to determine the best team in the league, which everyone knew going in, who got bounced even before they changed time zones, following which the league came to a fork in the road and took it. The only impediment was that Yogi Berra Stadium is so popular nobody goes there any more. If the Ivy powers that be (who?) observed a lot by just watching, let us hope that the future is not what it used to be.

[> [> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: joiseyfan [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 18:07:30 05/20/24 Mon Penn wins game one 11-9 Final final underway, Penn leads 3-0 after the first.

[> [> [> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: The Mountain LIon [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 19:44:26 05/20/24 Mon Penn is cruising in Game 7 and now leads Cornell 7-2 in the fifth inning. Beautiful stadium in Montclair although very few people in the stands to witness the final game of the Ivy League Championship Tournament. Incidentally, a little known fact is that back in the 1970's or so, Columbia actually awarded a scholarship in Yogi's name to a member of its baseball team. I am uncertain what happened thereafter

[> [> [> [> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: Know-it-all [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 21:04:15 05/20/24 Mon Final: Penn 12, Cornell 6.

[> [> [> [> [> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: Ivy Inquisitor [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 21:29:40 05/20/24 Mon This was a better game than the score indicated. Cornell was down 6-2 and stormed back to be down 7-6 in the final two innings they ran out of gas as Penn won 12-6.

[> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: David Perry (Sheepish) [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 22:36:07 05/20/24 Mon OK, I'm not going to be a hypocrite here: I actually didn't mind having a two-team final in baseball, because 21 games is not a lot to decide a pennant given the randomness that can happen, but I was not in favor of expanding to four, and this is why. Great result for Penn, and given that these are the rules I won't refuse it, but lousy result for Ivy baseball. Columbia had the lineup and the pitching to make some noise in the NCAA's, and the bracketology had them playing the equivalent of a #4 seed, which was certainly doable, whereas Penn, who barely broke .500 in league play, made the tournament on a tiebreaker, and was at .500 overall, will be at best the equivalent of a #15 seed and is going to get wiped out by someone like Tennessee or Oklahoma. At #190, we may end up with the worst RPI in the tournament. Combine that with the embarrassment of the mound malfunction and the Ivies did not cover themselves in glory this weekend.

[> [> Subject: The counter-argument is... Author: Go Green [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 07:19:44 05/21/24 Tue ... softball. Dartmouth lost player of the year Jensin Hall for two weeks and went 1-6 in Ivy play during that stretch. We finished fourth by a lousy half game. It's hardly a stretch to claim that we would have been the number one seed if she hadn't missed those two weeks. Hall was healthy for the tournament, and I don't think anyone would have objected if Dartmouth won it. Unfortunately, she didn't have her best performance and Dartmouth's season ended after three games.

[> [> [> Subject: Sorry, we went 1-5 Author: Go Green [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 07:20:39 05/21/24 Tue Wish this Board had an edit feature #567

[> [> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 13:33:36 05/21/24 Tue Not much of a counter-argument. If she had been healthy, you can claim DC might have gone 21-0 or otherwise finish in first. If she got hurt before the Ivy tournament and DC was eliminated, which team deserved to go to the NCAAs? Injuries are part of sports. All teams are susceptible to them. You play the 21 game season and take your chances. Cannot agree with David on a two-team playoff. 21 games is not a lot to decide a pennant? Really? Compared to what? And why -- because of the randomness that can happen during 7 weekends and 21 games? Compared to the randomness of a second place team, in this case a 12-9 P, upsetting a 17-4 Columbia team in a 3 games series after Columbia dominated the League by 5 games? When the League was split into divisions, and, if I remember correctly which I may not, teams did not play an equal number of games against all league opponents, a divisional playoff is justifiable to me to determine the NCAA bid. But, IMO, not in the current configuration. "What is the point of being Spanish if you can't tilt at windmills?" Pete Carril. I am not Spanish, but I like the thought.

[> [> Subject: Not Covered in Glory, Indeed Author: Ott Lake [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 13:51:22 05/21/24 Tue Moving the tournament twenty miles in the middle of the playoff due to a problem with the pitcher’s mound is one of the most laughable events in the history of site management. Seriously, can anybody remember anything else quite so ridiculous? The timing was such that it appeared Columbia’s facilities team just said, “If we’re bounced out, we don’t give a damn. You fix the mound.”

[> [> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: observer [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 07:20:49 05/22/24 Wed So funny that the people who move heaven and earth to say that NCAA post-season play isn't worth spit in football are now pulling out their hair to say that the "best" team didn't get a bid to the NCAA baseball tournament, and the selection process is unfair. Either competing at the national tournament is important for the league, or it isn't. Make up your minds.

[> [> [> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: sparman [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 09:34:12 05/22/24 Wed I don't think you are reading the NCAA Bylaw correctly: https://web3.ncaa.org/lsdbi/bylaw?ruleId=9206 "31.3.4.1 Requirements -- Division I Championship. To be eligible for automatic qualification in a Division I Championship, a member conference must meet the following requirements: ..... (c) In sports other than championship subdivision football, a conference may establish subdivisions and conduct competition within each subdivision to determine a conference champion, as long as each subdivision consists of at least four members. A conference with subdivisions of four members must conduct double round-robin competition within each subdivision, plus a postseason tournament, to determine its champion. A conference with subdivisions of five or more members may conduct either single or double round-robin competition within each subdivision, plus a postseason tournament to determine its champion." As I read it, the IL uses a tournament only because it has chosen to have 4-team subdivisions. For such subdivisions,a conference MUST have a league tournament. If it reverted to a single 8-team division - as it is permitted to do - it MAY elect to have a conference tournament, but it is not required to do so. The Big West has not previously held a tournament, yet it has an automatic qualifier. They have chosen to launch a tournament in 2025. https://www.ncaa.com/news/baseball/article/2024-05-17/2024-college-baseball-conference-tournaments-schedules-brackets-auto-bids https://bigwest.org/news/2023/12/4/the-big-west-announces-sites-for-softball-and-baseball-championships.aspx https://gopoly.com/news/2022/12/9/postseason-championship-returns-to-big-west-conference-in-baseball.aspx

[> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: Boston Lion [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 14:05:36 05/21/24 Tue Building on point 3 in Bengal's first comment above and An Observer's earlier "sample size" comment, the Ivy baseball tournament outcome really points up the dubiousness of the rationale for these four-team tournaments. Making this discussion general in nature, not focusing on Columbia, and just spotlighting what the data tells us, I humbly submit that determining anything based on a larger, more statistically significant sample size is preferable. If one accepts that, then banking a 21-game result against a two-game result and having the two-game result overmaster the 21-game result is, on its face, ridiculous. To state the bleedin' obvious, a 21-game sifting is likely to yield a more reliable truth than a two-game drive-by.

[> [> Subject: Will respectfully disagree with you and Bengal that... Author: Go Green [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 17:51:40 05/21/24 Tue ... a regular season will give us a more reliable indicator of the "best" team when a team finishes a game behind the regular season champ, but was without its star player for two weeks.

[> [> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: John Harvard [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 10:29:21 05/22/24 Wed Season ending single elimination tournaments are introduced to baseball players back in Little League. Assuming a kid plays through Senior League ball, he/she will have participated in eight such post season tournaments from ages 8 to 15. Post season tournaments are the rule, not the exception. In the little league I coached in, champtionship trophies were handed out for the tournament finalists. The entire community gathers for an end of year celebration to watch the tournament championship games (for each age/skill level). The glory goes only to the Tournament Champion. I managed both of my sons throughout, winning championships with mediocre (7-9) and first place (14-3) teams. Despite having managed other competitive and even first place teams, only those teams will be remembered as champions. That's how it's always worked in baseball. The 2023 Orioles, Twins, Astros, Braves, Brewers and Dodgers will be be forgotten in favor of the World Series participants Texas and Arizona. If anything, those division champs that did not reach the World Series are viewed as disappointments (Houston, LA) or, at best, building blocks for future World Series aspirations (Baltimore). To be honest, I was a strong opponent of the Ivy League Basketball Tournament. I know that could be viewed as inconsistent with the reality of a baseball championship tournament, and it probably is.

[> [> [> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: Old Lion (Columbia) [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 20:28:07 05/22/24 Wed While I am disappointed that we flopped in the tournament, we have nobody to blame but ourselves. Baseball more than most sports is a game of streaks. We had a great streak during the season. But we just didn’t play well during the tournament. Hard to win if your two best power hitters go a combined 1 for 18, or if your all Ivy starting pitchers get shelled.

[> [> Subject: Re; GoGreen comment Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 10:48:59 05/22/24 Wed Thanks. But you are essentially comparing team rosters on a day of your choosing, presumably when your team is at full strength (and as if you can make 7 more such analyses to determine the best team). I am comparing team performance on the field, where it counts. You are what your record says you are. As I mentioned above, sadly, injuries (and other game day absences) are a part of athletic competition, every team is susceptible. In any event, in this context, best team to me means who deserves to play in the NCAAs. That, to me, is the team which outperformed the others during the season. In a multi-bid League sport, a playoff can be ok and even beneficial, except when it isn't (ask the undefeated Cornell men's lax team) But until men's lax becomes more frequently a one bid League, personally I am ok with it. Meanwhile, the Columbia baseball team outperforms the League by 5 games. I don't need to calibrate their loss of Leon for the Ivy season or P's vanishing starting pitching staff to believe Columbia deserves to be in the NCAAs. Just my opinions. Cheers.

[> [> [> Subject: Of course, in other contexts... Author: Go Green [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 10:55:39 05/22/24 Wed ... some define "best team" as the team that has the best chance to advance in the NCAA playoffs. A team that is at full strength in a conference tournament but wasn't at some points during the regular season can certainly fit that bill.

[> [> [> [> Subject: Re: Of course, in other contexts... Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 11:25:28 05/22/24 Wed Such a team may or may not fit that bill, but so what? That definition is largely a dodge, easily illustrated. That definition would require a philosopher-king in the sport in question. Back when Princeton men's basketball played the full Carril style, and even as late as into the 2000s as the style was slowly tweaked, one could make the case that in some years when P come in second, or worse in the League, it would have fared better in the NCAAs than the League winner. Why, because more talented teams who had not seen this style of play would have been more susceptible to an upset than to a more conventional style League winner. So what? You play 14 games, a one game playoff on a neutral site if there is a tie, and you earn your bid.

[> [> [> [> [> Subject: Re: Of course, in other contexts... Author: observer [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 14:42:58 05/22/24 Wed The team that "deserves" to go is the one that wins the games required to qualify. Ask the Carolina Hurricanes if their superior Corsi made them deserve to reach the Eastern Conference Finals this year. Or the 1981 Cincinnati Reds about being the most deserving. The teams knew the stakes going in. You have to win the games that count.

[> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Re: Of course, in other contexts... Author: Bengal [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 17:50:20 05/22/24 Wed Thanks. But the issue I have been addressing, which your statement evades, is what games should be required to qualify for the NCAAS in various Ivy sports, i.e. which games should count? Just the regular season record? A playoff or tiebreaker in tie situations where there is no Ivy tournament? An Ivy tournament? What do you think? BTW, I am unaware that any Ivy championship eligible sport uses a divisional system today with different or more games played against some Ivy rivals than others, as Ivy baseball once did, which necessarily presented a different scenario. I might be missing something there. Or where strike induced adjustments impacted post-season bids.

[> [> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Re: Most Valid Way of Determining Best Team Author: Boston Lion [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 15:50:38 05/23/24 Thu Fully concur. The issue really IS, as stated by Bengal, "which games should be required to qualify for the NCAAs in various Ivy sports, i.e. which games should count? Just the regular season record? A playoff or tiebreaker in tie situations where there is no Ivy tournament? An Ivy tournament?" Examining that, one way of looking at this is to ask, holding all other things (e.g., injuries) equal, which of the of the following is likely to reveal which team is better: 1. Having two teams play each other 1,000 times; or 2. Having two teams play each other only once. IMHO, the question answers itself. And by holding all other things equal, I don't mean to disregard the effect of injuries. What I mean is that if one seeks to determine, in the purest way, which team is best, assuming for the sake of that determination that all contenders had either no injuries or were dented equivalently by injuries, what would the result be?

[> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Re: Of course, in other contexts... Author: observer [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 17:58:22 05/23/24 Thu I guess you guys hate March Madness and the Stanley Cup Playoffs.

[> [> [> [> [> [> [> Subject: Re: Of course, in other contexts... Author: Boston Lion [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 20:10:43 05/23/24 Thu What we like is having our semester’s grade being based on an entire semester’s body of work and not just a 10-minute pop quiz. As was stated by Bengal earlier, if the games that determine Cup playoff or March Madness eligibility are sufficiently well chosen, then those kinds of playoffs are fine. The rub occurs if teams with decidedly inferior win-loss records scrape into a playoff only to play a couple of title-determining games before carting off the hardware.

[> Subject: Re: Anybody care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: Boston Lion [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 15:36:55 05/21/24 Tue Correction: Bengal's third comment above.

[> Subject: Re: Anybody REALLY care about the Ivy baseball tournament? Author: joiseyfan [ Edit | View ] Date Posted: 17:20:23 05/21/24 Tue Pardon the repetition, but in this discussion it bears repeating: A one-of-kind two week 87-pitcher bi-state circus to determine the best team in the league, which everyone knew going in, who got bounced even before they changed time zones, following which the league came to a fork in the road and took it. The only impediment was that Yogi Berra Stadium is so popular nobody goes there any more. If the Ivy powers that be (who?) observed a lot by just watching, let us hope that the future is not what it used to be.