Breaking Brackets

[Chris Cooper]

Andy Kemp asks:

>Why do tournaments break brackets. It seems that breaking brackets gives a
>disadvantage to the teams that have to hit a higher seed because of it and
>to the schools that have to debate a round.
>
>Andy

But it seems equally disadvantageous to the squads that field a number of
very competitive teams.  Once you reach these later elims. the difference
in skill levels between individual teams is not that overwhelming that the
seeding differences cause a great deal of unfairness (remember seeding is
largely a result of speaker-points that are extremely arbitrary).  The
minimal amount of unfairness that results from having to hit a team that
MAY (remember, it could cut both ways) be in a higher bracket than the one
you WOULD have debated is far outweighed by the potential disadvantage to
the deeply competitive squads that is avoided by breaking brackets.

My .02 (a Jarvis-ism),

-COOP