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Author Re: Ratings experts: Please explain
David Kane

2005-04-11, 5:59 pm


"Mike Nolan" <nolan@gw.tssi.com> wrote in message
news:d2s6tf$3o0$1@gw.tssi.com...
quote:

> "David Kane" <davidekane@comcast.net> writes:
>
threshold[vbcol=seagreen]
>
> Only around 25% of the scholastic players in events held and rated

in
quote:

> 2005 earned any bonus points from their performance. Among regular
> adult members, around 13% earned bonus points. Thus it appears the

bonus
quote:

> formula is doing what it's designed to do, rewarding young and

improving
quote:

> players to keep them from deflating the ratings pool.
>


The figure I gave was for students in my club who
I'd guess are much more active than the average USCF
scholastic player (1-2 events per month). The point is
that bonus points can be earned for activity independent
of any improvement. It seems quite common for someone
to get bonus points one week and then lose points the next,
but still come out ahead of where he would have been if the
two events had been rated as one. Of course, it is quite
possible that more active players do in fact improve faster
than less active players, so *should* be earning more bonus
points. Maybe we need to enter a few dumbed down
computer players in each tournament and track their
ratings as a function of activity.

I suspect that the main objective of the rating committee
is to pump points into the system at a rate that keeps the
adults happy, with other consequences being mainly
ignored. I'm not complaining about that but was only
raising a theoretical issue that has puzzled me.






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