[klickitat jim]

I still submit that the only numbers thst count are how many 1st round placers and 2nd round medalers a club has. Not mere sheer numbers. If its just sheer numbers, that does not speak well of the BJCP. So yes, clearly its about numbers, but how can it matter how many losers a club has? Its simple isnt it? More brewers who placed and medaled wrote down BN. It really doesn't mean anything other than that. The BN isnt to blame, nor is the AHA. The way the COTY is set up defines it as not that big a deal.  Someone ought to do something about it I suppose.

[JT]

I still submit that the only numbers thst count are how many 1st round placers and 2nd round medalers a club has. Not mere sheer numbers. If its just sheer numbers, that does not speak well of the BJCP. So yes, clearly its about numbers, but how can it matter how many losers a club has? Its simple isnt it? More brewers who placed and medaled wrote down BN. It really doesn't mean anything other than that. The BN isnt to blame, nor is the AHA. The way the COTY is set up defines it as not that big a deal.  Someone ought to do something about it I suppose.

You're right, but the statistics game definitely applies here.  Put it in terms of a home run contest.  The team with 4000 batters is going to have both more foul balls and more homers than the team with 300.  Since only home runs matter though, they win every time. 

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[AmandaK]

I still submit that the only numbers thst count are how many 1st round placers and 2nd round medalers a club has. Not mere sheer numbers. If its just sheer numbers, that does not speak well of the BJCP.

Jim, it's too early here. Helps. Can you explain how this looks bad on the BJCP? Legitimately curious.

[hopfenundmalz]

I still submit that the only numbers thst count are how many 1st round placers and 2nd round medalers a club has. Not mere sheer numbers. If its just sheer numbers, that does not speak well of the BJCP.

Jim, it's too early here. Helps. Can you explain how this looks bad on the BJCP? Legitimately curious.

The judges just judge the beers blind, so

[udubdawg]

I just can't give that much weight to the First Round. That's where COTY is won, right?

Way too many subpar beers make it to the Finals. Everything else announced on Saturday was about the Finals, except for that First Round COTY award. 

[braufessor]

I still submit that the only numbers thst count are how many 1st round placers and 2nd round medalers a club has. Not mere sheer numbers. If its just sheer numbers, that does not speak well of the BJCP. So yes, clearly its about numbers, but how can it matter how many losers a club has? Its simple isnt it? More brewers who placed and medaled wrote down BN. It really doesn't mean anything other than that. The BN isnt to blame, nor is the AHA. The way the COTY is set up defines it as not that big a deal.  Someone ought to do something about it I suppose.

As JT pointed out, the number of entries absolutely matters.... just simple probability.  It would be like saying it would not matter if one individual entrant was allowed to have 60 entries, while everyone else had 5-10.  If the person with 60 entries got 4 medals and the person with 10 entries got 3....... you are essentially saying that it is only the 4 he got that matter.  I am simply not a good enough/consistent enough brewer right now to win 3 medals (or 1 for that matter ) at NHC with 5 entries..... give me 60 entries though, and I am starting to like my chances.

It would be interesting to know the actual numbers of entries as they break down from club to club... That would show if there is, or is not a huge disparity on entry numbers.

I don't know what the answer is...... but, ultimately the problem is pretty simple.  For a long time big clubs, in big metropolitan areas that have the ability to draw from a million+ people won the award.  Along came a club that had the ability to draw from an even bigger pool of people, has more members and gets more people to participate.... so, now they win all the time.  The clubs that are no longer the biggest want the rules changed so that they are the biggest clubs again....  In the end, you are simply swapping one big club with huge reach, for several big clubs with more reach than almost everyone else.  The VAST majority of clubs still have zero chance of winning the award in this structure.

Some combination of like-sized clubs, and/or reward for consistency of entering quality beer seems to be the only way to make this award meaningful and truly competitive from year to year.

[pete b]

I guess I just don't get the very existence of the award. Unless they are brewing entries together as a club or choosing as a club which beers to enter what is the point of giving an award to a club based on how many of its members won medals on their own? I don't think people should boo when the winners are announced, they should boo when the category is announced.

[brewinhard]

I guess I just don't get the very existence of the award. Unless they are brewing entries together as a club or choosing as a club which beers to enter what is the point of giving an award to a club based on how many of its members won medals on their own? I don't think people should boo when the winners are announced, they should boo when the category is announced.

Ha!  I love it!   

[HoosierBrew]

I guess I just don't get the very existence of the award. Unless they are brewing entries together as a club or choosing as a club which beers to enter what is the point of giving an award to a club based on how many of its members won medals on their own? I don't think people should boo when the winners are announced, they should boo when the category is announced.

Ha!  I love it!   

+2  I feel the same.

[reverseapachemaster]

I don't know what the answer is...... but, ultimately the problem is pretty simple.  For a long time big clubs, in big metropolitan areas that have the ability to draw from a million+ people won the award.  Along came a club that had the ability to draw from an even bigger pool of people, has more members and gets more people to participate.... so, now they win all the time.  The clubs that are no longer the biggest want the rules changed so that they are the biggest clubs again....  In the end, you are simply swapping one big club with huge reach, for several big clubs with more reach than almost everyone else.  The VAST majority of clubs still have zero chance of winning the award in this structure.

+1

Excluding the BN just means the same group of large clubs go back to battling over a prize only they are able to win and seemingly feel they are only entitled to win. The award is no more exclusionary and no more of a popularity contest. These clubs just want to rig the rules so they go back to winning. It's an extremely elitist perspective and I don't see how the GC can fairly think redesigning the rules specifically to exclude BNA or other internet groups is consistent with the AHA's mission to expand homebrewing.

The underlying implication of changing the rules to exclude the BNA, aside from giving the urban clubs back their COTY award, is the message that the relationships and involvement of people in the BNA is inferior to those who associate with a physical club, no matter how organized or involved that physical club may be. Again I do not agree that creating rules designed to exclude or devalue the participation of some people in the hobby is consistent with the AHA's mission.

Some combination of like-sized clubs, and/or reward for consistency of entering quality beer seems to be the only way to make this award meaningful and truly competitive from year to year.

I don't know that the award is really meaningful in any way but balancing multiple awards against club sizes is probably the best way to create some fairness that doesn't turn the award into an exclusive game of internet and large urban clubs. It doesn't, by itself at least, do anything to avoid BN winning the largest tier and I can't imagine the large urban clubs not throwing a huge fit over that. So I guess the GC could create an internet club section in which BNA will always win. There's also going to be a fight over where the lines are drawn between tiers. Nobody is going to want to be on the bottom of a tier when they could be on the top of the lower tier.

The probability for gamesmanship still exists here where clubs will inevitably contemplate cutting off membership numbers or rolling people off the roster to cut size to gain a numerical advantage in a lower tier. There has already been talk in this thread of clubs discouraging new brewers from entering NHC to avoid poor numbers against the Gambrinus so the probability of this gamesmanship occurring for COTY is almost certain. Again I can't see how the GC can adopt rules that has such a high probability of making people feel unwelcome in homebrewing.

[udubdawg]

The clubs that I know are about training, sharing, education, encouragement, camaraderie, feedback.  Those are things worth cheering for.

...so I'd say an award for best competition club seems perfectly natural.  *shrug*  but I get that its not for some people.

[pete b]

The clubs that I know are about training, sharing, education, encouragement, camaraderie, feedback.  Those are things worth cheering for.

...so I'd say an award for best competition club seems perfectly natural.  *shrug*  but I get that its not for some people.

I agree with your first sentence and come to the opposite conclusion.

[dbeechum]

I agree with your first sentence and come to the opposite conclusion.

Hence the creation of Radegast - to reward and recognize the non-competition side of "Best Club". Also, to publicize what the heck clubs are doing out there - like the Carolina Brewmeisters for raising unbelievable amounts of money for charity or the Falcons (woo) for not imploding after 40 years and still going strong.

[udubdawg]

The clubs that I know are about training, sharing, education, encouragement, camaraderie, feedback.  Those are things worth cheering for.

...so I'd say an award for best competition club seems perfectly natural.  *shrug*  but I get that its not for some people.

I agree with your first sentence and come to the opposite conclusion.

The opposite conclusion being that they aren't worth cheering for?

[pete b]

The clubs that I know are about training, sharing, education, encouragement, camaraderie, feedback.  Those are things worth cheering for.

...so I'd say an award for best competition club seems perfectly natural.  *shrug*  but I get that its not for some people.

I agree with your first sentence and come to the opposite conclusion.

The opposite conclusion being that they aren't worth cheering for?

Of course not. The conclusion that it naturally follows that there be a competition award.