5) The Gold meeting dragged on due to the GOBs whining about territory tournament directors alledged mistreatment of SoCal Gold teams. Should have been a one-on-one conversation between the whiners and the age director....nobody else in the room cared and it extended the meeting needlessly.
Sam:
First, I feel your pain. I will NEVER again attend an ASA Association meeting. I will live with being held hostage for obtaining a FREAKING RULE BOOK by not attending (absolutely unbelievable). At least in our area, it is an absolutely mind-numbing waste of an evening. The whole thing could be reduced to about a 3-slide PPT presentation, and instead, I have sat there for 4 hours listening to coaches babble on about some of the most ridiculous examples they could devise to show me how much smarter than me they are.
Fine, point conceded, you're brilliant. I am intimidated and will just stay away in the future.
And obviously, as a NorCal coach, I wasn't at the SoCal Association meeting you are referencing. And the ASA policies are what they are. I think we all know that nothing is going to change because of input at an Association meeting. Perhaps a separate forum could / should have been arranged for the Gold teams.
All that said, I understand - and like many, share - the concerns about Gold qualifying. And can't imagine where else those concerns could be as meaningfully aired.From my perspective, and for whatever reason, ASA
is making a purposeful attempt to limit Gold qualifying from the Western Territory (which includes more than SoCal, obviously - 6 teams from NorCal - including ours - and about 3 from the Northwest qualified last year). Plus Arizona and Colorado, wich are now PART of the Western Territory.
The elimination of returning berths - new this year - is certainly a consideration. From this point forward, this will throw 2-4 Southern California teams each year back into local qualifying. And there may be good reasons for it - debatable - but the effect is that there are less net berths available to strong - but not National Power - teams elsewhere in the West. By "less," I mean less than in the past.
Also,
The Southern Territory has 24 berths, inclusive of the 4 Regionals (Regions 4, 5, 6, & 7) and the 2 Territorial Qualifiers.
The Western Territory has 21 berths (including the Regionals in 13, 14, & 15) and the 2 Territorial Qualifiers. But there are far more teams in the Western Territory than in the Southern Territory. (There are about 150 teams in the Western Territory, and about 115 in the Southern.
In fact, the entire rest of the country has about 170 Gold teams compared to the 150 in the Western Territory). 47% of the teams, one-third of the berths. How can that possibly be appropriate? This is a HUGE change for 2008.
As for going out of the Territory to qualify: There are very few Territory Qualifiers outside the West on dates different than the Western Qualifiers. And those that are scheduled may not allow teams from outside the territory to enter (basically, if 24 teams are entered by April 14, the qualifier does not have to be opened up to out of the territory teams. And last year, the Sector 1 (NE) tournament did NOT have 24 teams entered by April 14 - by mandate, it should have been an open qualifier. But entries were refused by the TD, and ASA did nothing to stop it). But the Beach Girls were in Oregon (to their credit). The Western Sector DID run an open qualifying tournament.
The National qualifier (2 berths) conflicts with a Western Territory qualifier. It's a stretch to say that is an opportunity for teams from the West.
So anyway, there are 21 berths from the Western Territory. And realistically, there won't be too many more Western teams than that qualifying any other way. So, roughly 1/3 of the total berths, but far more than 1/3 of the registered teams reside in the Western Territory. And I think it could at least be argued that FAR more than 1/3 of the really elite teams reside in the Western Territory.
And you know, so what? It is what it is. We'll all show up and play whoever is in the other dugout. But it
has changed dramatically, and exactly NONE of the changes are in the favor of the Western Territory which has obviously been the backbone of ASA. But as it turns out, ARE in the favor of parts of the country where ASA really has to compete for mindshare. This may / may not be a coincidence. And for all I know, is in the best interests of the game as a whole (though that would have to be explained to me).
And I would submit that perhaps, people in divisions other than Gold probably SHOULD care. Most of these changes happened in the Gold division almost overnight, and it could certainly trickle down to the other divisions in the near future.As always, best regards,
Scott