I wish I was in Kalamazoo

Never thought I would say that but that is where the Professional Disc Golf Association world amateur championship is held this week. Though I am qualified to play in the Grandmaster division (for those born in 1965 or earlier), I was unable to get the time off work to allow me to fully participate in the event. 752 people did and here is the breakdown by division as well as a couple of pics from a temp course created specifically for the event as 9 different courses are used with players playing up to 6 different ones in four days with the top half of many divisions playing more on Saturday.

Seeing the pics from the event as well as those from the player meeting and swag from the event was ok. However, the same person who took the pics (the one from my division whose performance caused me to change divisions as listed two posts ago) posted a video of his foursome being introduced. That broke me. Even before I started playing in events this year, I knew that I would be another face near the bottom of the leader board in the Amateur World Championship which was a reason I gave up the vacation time for someone worse than me in bowling who is participating in a similar event and due to handicap technically has a chance to win significant money.

Playing in the event is something I want to experience at least once. I was assured that if my weight is at 250 next May when I have to register having already qualified that I will get the vacation time. For me next year is not guaranteed. In my last year of league bowling and tournament ball golf, I was thinking next year and injury prevented me from participating. I have a year to try to stay healthy while still being able to afford to go to Madison, WI next summer.

Note: In all the men's divisions under 70, players went six rounds on six different courses. The top third plus ties played a round and the top four a nine hole final. The person whose play made me decide to switch divisions finished tied for sixth.

Walk like a madman

The title caused two different annoying songs to earworm into my head. My apologies if the same happens to you.

For the company healthy living week, my company had a 42 day walking challenge and they supplied pedometers for anyone interested in joining it. Since I was told that I would have to be put on a randomly drawn team to participate, I declined the offer since I did not want to blame other people if they underperformed causing the team I was on to lose since I know that the nature of my job along with playing tournament disc golf causes me to take a whole lot of steps.

Now that the challenge is over, one of the people in it was kind enough to let me have his pedometer so I will be monitoring my steps for 42 days starting on July 17 finishing on August 27. I only have one scheduled tournament in that time and due to elbow tendinitis, my participation in that is currently questionable. However, due to the kindness of my two best friends (a statement I would have never thought I would make in the 20th century), I will probably be going to Gencon Indy at the end of the month for the 13th and probably last time since future years should be at the disc golf world amateur championships which is also held about the same time.

Here is the list of the top 25 walkers out of the 106 entries. I removed names and replaced a couple spots with either what I would have won or significant goals to potentially better.

There are multiple buildings in my company as well as people who work at the customers' locations so that is why only one of the top 12 work in the building which I do. My goal is to finish with the second most steps of those in my facility which should be doable.

 

To be honest, I am not interested in wining a water bottle since I already have one gathering dust in my locker and the t-shirt that I could win are not made in 3X so it would not fit me. I will after the 42 days are over provide the total steps I take in a future post.

recalibration

I was eagerly waiting for the 2015 disc golf season since ages for divisions are based on year of birth  making me the young one in the 50+ age group thinking I would have a chance to win.

Before my first tournament, I looked at the entry list in my division and my expectations dropped. Every tournament round played is rated based on what propagators (players who have played in many rounds over the past 12 months) score in that round as well as everyone's score and the ratings of the others in my division are significantly better than me (anywhere from 5-8 shots per round)

In spite of that, I played against them and was pleased with the people I met and they were the people I was hoping to face in that division. Though I could compete for a 6-12 hole stretch, over a two round tournament, I was no match. Even though I was fourth out of 12 after one round in a tournament, I was still 9 shots out of first and after my second worst tournament round over the last two years, finished 12th 31 shots back. My overall rating after the three events I played in 2015 dropped the equivalent of 2 shots per round.

Over the Fourth of July weekend, I played in a club event which had one amateur division and after my best ever tournament round, was 7th out of 29. The second round was difficult for me and I ended up 16th. That event allowed me to gain enough player points to qualify for the 2016 world amateur championship next summer. I am eligible for this year's event but due to work/vacation issues, I can not go.

I decided to look at the play of the top amateur in the 50+ division. He has played 17 tournament rounds over the past 10 weeks. His worst rating of those rounds is better than my best one on July 4th weekend. Noticing that, I decided to for now play in the lowest rated open age division with players whose ratings are close to mine giving me a chance to compete.

Since the Illinois Open Series disc golf tournaments show hole by hole results on their website, I was able to create this showing the individual rounds both the top player in IL (and as far as player points #1 in the US) and me. (This was created a week after the original post after a tournament played on Sunday where I finished 16 shots out of first but one from cashing.)

 

(Click on it to read)

 

MG1 refers to Men's Grandmaster Amateur which is the name of the 50+ age division

MA4 is Men's Amateur Novice which is the lowest open amateur division

Spolied by perfection?

I have posted before about wanting teams that are the best in the regular season to win titles and unless there is a personal reason, I do that. This year's Stanley Cup finals is one of the personal reasons as the third place Chicago Blackhawks is playing the Tampa Bay Lightning who had the same number of wins as the division winning Montreal Canadians.

Thinking about the previous times the team I most wanted to win won a title, there is a pattern.

Note: Since the 2010 Blackhawks had more wins than the #1 seed San Jose Sharks, I consider them having the best conference record.

Lose is a four letter word

The title of the post refers to a song by a group called Power Salad which is about Cleveland sports futility as well as people who make spelling errors. http://www.thefump.com/fump.php?id=1423

Since the Cleveland Browns won the last title for the city in 1964 and with the Cleveland Cavs in the conference finals, I figured now or never to figure the mathematical odds of the three Cleveland sports teams in the top level of the sport not winning a championship for 50 years.

As in the past, I figured out the odds of the team not winning in a specific year and multiplied them. When divisions and conferences or leagues had equal number of teams, it was easy. When that wasn't the case, it was more difficult like when the Cleveland Browns were in a four team division in a 13 or 14 team American Football Conference from 1970-1981 and from 1983-1994.

When conferences had an unequal number of teams, I figured out the chance of winning the conference and multiplied by 2 like the Indians from 1977-1992 who played in a 14 team American League while there was a 12 team National League.

Cleveland Cavs

1971-1974 -  16-1
1975-1977 -  18-1
1978-1988 -  22-1
1989             24-1
1990-1991 -  26-1
1992-1995 -  28-1
1996-2014 -  30-1

Total odds - 6.64-1

Cleveland Indians

1965-1968 -  20-1
1969-1976 -  24-1
1977-1993 -  28-1
1995-2012 -  88-3
2013-2014 -  30-1

Total odds - 6.40-1

Cleveland Browns

1965             14-1
1966-1969 -  32-1
1970-1975 -  320-13
1976-1981 -  176-7
1982             28-1
1983-1994 -  176-7
1995             30-1
1999-2001 -  312-9
2002-2014 -  32-1

Total odds - 6.36-1

Complete odds 270-1

I was surprised that the Cavs who started playing 5 years later had the highest odds of the three teams of going without a title but the NBA expanding a few years later than MLB of the NFL along with no MLB champ in 1994 and no NFL in Cleveland from 1996-1998 was the difference.

No Canada

Yesterday, the Montreal Canadians lost to the Tampa Bay Lightning and became the last Canadian team eliminated from the playoffs. The Canadians were the last team to win the Stanley Cup in 1993. I decided to figure out the mathematical odds of that happening like I have did in the past with the Cubs, Lions and Blackhawks.(Cubs now at 237-1 with no title since 1908)

As the makeup of the NHL changed over the past 22 years, so has the yearly chance of a Canadian team winning the title.

1994, 95 -                8 out of 26
1996 -                      7 out of 26
1997, 98 -                6 out of 26
1999 -                      6 out of 27
2000 -                      6 out of 28
2001 through 2004 - 6 out of 30
2006 through 2011 - 6 out of 30
2012 through 2015 - 7 out of 30

Doing the math, it comes out to 214-1. I was surprised it was so high.

Logan analysis

The seven nine jurors have made their selections and the top five in each category have been announced and I have thoughts about them so I am writing this to get those thoughts out of my head.

For music video they are:

CBS Follies - Bitch in Business
Epic Rap Battles of History - Sir Issac Netwon vs. Bill Nye
Rhett and Link - I'm on Vacation
Weird Al - Tacky
Weird Al - Word Crimes

The ERB and Tacky videos I have seen and would have not been considered if I had a vote. There were only a couple of ERB vidoes over the years that I would have condsiered and this one is nowhere close to either of them even with Weird Al playing the Newton part. I found the Tacky video the 5th best of the 8 that Weird Al released last year. I did watch the CBS and Rhett and Link videos having not seen them before and found neither of them funny at all.

I was initially surprised Paul and Storm's video This Song was not a finalist and even more so when I was told Paul Saborin was added late to the juror list making all their 2014 work ineligible for the award.

Though Weird Al only appears in a drawing in the video, I found Word Crimes superior to the other nominees as well as any video made last year.

For original song they are:

the great Luke Ski — Fake Adult
Mikey Mason — Last Day at Work
Mikey Mason — Settle
Power Salad — Ama­zon Drone
Worm Quar­tet — Fueled by Angst

I was surprised that Dr. Demento's #2 song of the year, Monty Python's Silly Walks Song was not a finalist. I like all 5 songs but only Luke's and Worm Quartet's were in my top 5. Over the past couple of years, this has become the category with the most songs one would find worthy of winning.

Luke's song finished #1 on Dr. Demento in 2014 and I am hoping that like the previous year it ends up winning a Logan Award as well.

For parody song they are:

The Boobles - Have Natural Es
Carrie Dahlby featuring Wyngarde - Almost Parent Time
Devo Spice (feat. Power Salad) - Snack Bar
Kyle Kalligren and Tony Goldmark - Kill the Mouse
Weird Al - Word Crimes

When I first heard Carrie perform Almost Parent Time at Marscon 2014, I said the robot cat statue might as well be painted pink for the 2015 awards even knowing Weird Al was releasing an album in the summer. Then I saw the video for Word Crimes. Even without the video the song is far and away better than any parody I heard from 2014 including Carrie's song which I found better than any individual parody released in 2012 or 2013.

Having three out of the nine jurors being female left me surprised only 1 1/2 of the 15 finalists are female unlike last year where an all male panel (including me) produced 5 female finalists out of 15.