I've read with interest the other thread about playoffs in this forum. Let me just throw another idea into the mix:

It's always bothered me from the point of view of balance and elegance of design that the regular season is 7 rounds but that the playoff is only 1 round of 4 games. The two teams in the playoff would be playing a match identical in length to their regular-season mashup, and there is an arbitrariness to the fact that the only reason this second matchup is given more weight than the first is because it is the "designated" championship round. There's almost a feeling (and I realize it may be peculiar only to me) that if 2nd seed beats the 1st seed, it would be because the performance is within the "statistical margin of error". After all, the regular season on which the seeding is established lasts 28 games -- a reasonable sample for a statistician -- but 4 games leave a lot of "sample noise".

I realize this has nothing to do with fairness in the strict sense of the term. However, I do esteem elegance just as much -- I'm funny that way :-p

So what I suggest is, why don't we expand the playoff final match to 2 rounds, making a total of 8 games in the match? That way, there more "gravitas" to the final event - something that suggests it is bigger and more epic than being just an additional round.

When talking to Smallblackcat, I realized that this would make the schedule tighter and the TL season longer, so it occurred to me that the change will have to be considered in conjunction with another: having 6 teams per section, rather than 8 as now. It not only goes well with my hypothetical beefed up playoff, but it also solves other problems!

Right now, we have 8 teams per section. What I notice is that because of the sorting mechanism and having no fixed section caps, Team no. 1 and Team no. 8 could have a pretty big rating gap -- sometimes it's nearly 200 rating points. The bottom team could easily be discouraged. If we reduced the size of the group, we can make sure that each section have a narrower range and is therefore more evenly matched.

So, to sum up, my proposal is:

A) Increase the length of the playoff match to 2 rounds of alternate colors
B) Reduce size of each section from 8 to 6, making the regular season last 5 rounds rather than 7.

I don't have a strong opinion about this proposal, but I like such an aspect of it, that having a 5- or 6-players team I could give playing chances in the final to all the players.

Hey ByTheCliff,

Just get some experience playing this format. :)

I dont think cutting off regular season in favour for playoffs makes sense.
That would mean less chess for ones never have a chance to make playoffs.

Personally, I don't see the need for a playoff at all. It's either too short to matter i.e. 1 rd, against the top 2 teams, often leaving out a 3rd team based on tie breaks, or it becomes too long if you try to include the top 4 teams. And either way, it's not significant enough to "negate" the regular season results, i.e if #2 beats #1 in a 1 rd playoff, what does it prove over the regular season. And it even becomes less significant if during the regular season, the top team wins on match points, but had lost the match with the second place team during the season.

I would rather see the longer 7 games season stand on it's own merits, with the first tiebreak being the head to head results, and the second tiebreak being the total game points, and if desired, the third tiebreak being the total game wins, i.e. 1 win being more valuable than 2 draws.

This would allow for as many as 7 TL tourneys is a year, or of course, less with longer breaks in-between. Currently there are 4 TL tourneys a year, each 8 weeks with the 1 rd playoff, for a total of 29 games (9 weeks, 30 games if a 2 rd playoff were adopted).

Alternately in a year with no playoffs, you could choose one of the following:
4 TL tourneys 28 games 7 weeks with at least 6 weeks break
5 TL tourneys 35 games 7 weeks with at least 3 weeks break >>> my favorite
6 TL tourneys 42 games 7 weeks with at least 1 week break
7 TL tourneys 49 games 7 weeks with no breaks, except over the holidays.

The 5 TL tourney over 7 weeks would take 35 weeks total playing time, compared to 32 weeks under the current system. So, no playoff would mean more games for everyone.

OldRaptor

I remember the time when was no playoffs;
some teams were mathematically eliminated earlier in the tour,
and was hard to keep everyone interested until the end.

In the actual formula, more teams has mathematical chances to win until the last rounds,
and it encourages peoples to not quit before the end. (avoiding an annoying amount of no-shows)

Dont' change the formula please, and dont touch to OUR playoffs!

- Pat.

hi i have a suggestion for the next team league tournament ...Why not ad a round for the playoff.Team who finish 1st pass directly to the final and team who finish 2nd play teaM who finish 3rd in the semi final and the winner play team who finish 1st in the final.