Hi All, as many of you know I have been researching competition structures with a view to how we can improve the BJA competition structures. All the big successful sports leagues have a few things in common and I wanted to ask peoples opinions about how these traits apply in our context. 1. Inter-club competition. All the biggest sports are based on inter-club competitions, and mainly based on a round-robin system with one o=home and one away match against each team in either the league or in your division/area. 2. Playoffs. Especially prevalent on USA. This is where the top two teams (or so) from each division/conference go into a new round of competition to decide the two teams that play a grand final/superbowl styel finale. 3. Relegation/Promotion. This is a mainly european system where the worst team(s) in a league get relegated to the next level down. And the top team(s) from the lower league go up to the next one. 4. Franchises. As opposed to the relegation model (3), this is the model of NBA, NFL, SuperRugby. The teams stay in the division no matter what result they get. For me, I am torn on the franchise vs relegation models in relation to British Judo. Relegation/Promotion is more common over here and allows a club to grow and prosper and earn its way into the higher levels. It is kind of like what the EJU club system is like (except the EJU club system is not yet a proper league, just a one off event per year). The Franchise model gives stability. But if one team is weaker than the others it could be rough. Unless we adopted a NFL style structure whereby worst team of the year gets first pick of players etc in the new year. But that seems to rely on a financial infrastructure we dont have. The Franchise model does however seem more supportive as profits are often shared and importantly even if you have a bad year(or two) you dont get kicked out of the big time. In football obviously relegation can be financially crippling. Home and away... when we launched the Hampshire Team Championships we wanted to try this model. But what we found is that basically Judo clubs are not really prepared for hosting events. Its a very foreign concept to many in our sport and we striggled to gain traction and ended up in a single venue with clubs fighting round-robin each month. Which leads to seasons. Most sports have a season and so might we, when would be a good season for a domestic league? Personally I am looking at this research with a view to team based competition. Though a individual league could work... though it would take some thought. Would that suit us better? A series of competitions in which we keep track of the results and have a playoffs and a finals? Or just an overall winner at the end of a series of individual events? If teams, what format? 5 players seems the best as it is the new international standard. But seven player is traditional and events like Bev price have used interesting total weight across team type models. Would 3 player teams be more practical for the clubs to achieve regularly? Kyu vs Dan leagues. Elite and developmental. COuld we build around the existing BJA competition levels? So plenty of low level inter-club (level 1-2) a smaller level 3 league and a level 4 league of the big clubs (Camberley, Edinburgh, Bath and co.)? Over the Christmas period (when I actually have some time available) I hope to write up a proper report/proposal/plan. So I would really appreciate any and all input ranging from dont be daft through to here is a cheque, go make it happen. All opinions on format, timing, levels and so forth appreciated. Please comment below or drop me a personal message or an email ( lw@judocoach ) with your reactions, ideas, experiences etc. Thanks, Lance.
Posted on: Sat, 20 Dec 2014 18:16:31 +0000
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