MMXI Mokena Big D Doubles

[MaryBeth]

On behalf of Mokena Park DIstrict I hope you don't mind if I weigh in. Bruce and family did an awesome job. About the fees - those were set up many moons ago by previous administrations. I am the new Superintendant of Recreation (1 1/2 yrs), I also have a new (for your purposes) Athletic Supervisor, and the Park District has a new Executive Director as of May. In the process of working with Bruce re: the Big D we were made aware of some things that happened in the past that soured the professional disc golf community on the Park Dsitrict. I have also been doing some research on how other courses, park districts, etc. handle tournaments and leagues. So please accept this olive branch - it's time to put the stuff that happened a few years ago behind us and move forward. We are very very open to discussions about more tournaments ( I think the norm or a reasonable fee might be in the realm of a couple of dollars per registrant instead of a flat ginormous fee) and leagues. My contact info is Mary Beth Windberg, mwindberg@mokenapark.com. My office phone is (708) 390-2409. I would like to re-open lines of communication with the disc golf community. That course is too nice not to be used to its fullest.

[pickax]

Mary Beth-

You are more than welcome to chime in here. I agree it is a great course and is a shame to not be used.  It was good to speak with you at the event on Sunday and I hope that we can we work on getting an event planned there next year. Good luck on your ace race in a couple of weeks.


btw It was great seeing that the park district promptly took care of the downed tree last week. That was very much appreciated.

[Bruce Brakel]

I would add that the park district did a nice job of painting all the tees so there was no confusion about the color of the tees, woodchipping around the muddier basket areas, cleaning up after the fallen tree on 22, raking up the trashy flotsam that accumulates around tees, fixing the wobbly bridge and doing all the other sprucing up things that they did.  I feel like the park use fee was spent on the course.  Sometimes we have not had that feeling after spending $2 a player X 200 players for a well attended IOS.  

[dana]

Congrats on the big turnout.

Judging by some comments on facebook, it sounds like some of the ADV Am's were confused on how the payout structure was going to work.

[stpitner]

On behalf of Mokena Park DIstrict I hope you don't mind if I weigh in. Bruce and family did an awesome job. About the fees - those were set up many moons ago by previous administrations. I am the new Superintendant of Recreation (1 1/2 yrs), I also have a new (for your purposes) Athletic Supervisor, and the Park District has a new Executive Director as of May. In the process of working with Bruce re: the Big D we were made aware of some things that happened in the past that soured the professional disc golf community on the Park Dsitrict. I have also been doing some research on how other courses, park districts, etc. handle tournaments and leagues. So please accept this olive branch - it's time to put the stuff that happened a few years ago behind us and move forward. We are very very open to discussions about more tournaments ( I think the norm or a reasonable fee might be in the realm of a couple of dollars per registrant instead of a flat ginormous fee) and leagues. My contact info is Mary Beth Windberg, mwindberg@mokenapark.com. My office phone is (708) 390-2409. I would like to re-open lines of communication with the disc golf community. That course is too nice not to be used to its fullest.

This is bar far some of the best news I think the disc golf community in this part of Illinois has heard all year!  The course definitely looked in great shape, and I could tell there were many players hungry to play a competitive round at Mokena again.  Thank you Mary Beth!

[Bruce Brakel]

Congrats on the big turnout.

Judging by some comments on facebook, it sounds like some of the ADV Am's were confused on how the payout structure was going to work.

I'm not on Facebook.  If anyone has questions, I'd be happy to answer them here. 

We went with more than ten teams in each flight because we took in more than 40 teams.  We put all the unrated teams in the fourth flight because there was no fair way to assign any of them to any higher flight.  Payouts were posted all day along with how many of each kind of player in each flight.  The flight each team was in was shown on their leaderboard card on the visible portion of the card.  So with eleven teams in each of the top three flights, we paid five in the top flight straight off the posted payout chart.  In the second flight and third flight there were half-ins and trophy-onlies that complicated matters and reduced the number paid.  Obviously you can't pay 5 of 11 when only four participated!  Anyone who played for half and cashed, took half.  Anyone who played for full took full or more.  All of the declined halves were paid according to the Half-in rules with one caveat:  There was an ambiguity about trophy-onlies since they have never been in the Half-in pools before.  In the third pool where we were paying 2 of 4, and they finished TO, TO, 1/2, Full, in that order, I skipped the two trophy-onlies and paid third and and fourth. 

In the second pool I originally calculated the half-in adjusted payouts thinking that the third place team was trophy-only.  Then I saw that their card had been mismarked and then corrected in my own handwriting showing that they were half-in.  So I had to re-re-do that payout to conform to reality.  That bumped a team out of the payouts. 

This probably answers all the questions out there, and I could post more if anyone wanted to ask me anything. 

[pickax]

I have no idea on Facebook where those comments are, but I'm going to guess the questions may have been more with the fact that there was no Pro/Am distinction in the flighted side game.

[dana]

Here:

...Todays tournament was pretty cool.. for anyone above or below a 940-950.. we took 4th in our division of all the am players, but the pros got everybodys money.. something about different flights.. which was really the players from both divisions rating's averaged out.. how does that even make sense to have two totally different divisions, but the payouts from advanced players went to the open players and the lower rated players.. how is that legit?

that was some bullshit i signed up for am ripped it up and got nothing ____ bruse brakle worst tournament ever but i had a great time giving my 50 buck to the pros

ya it was awesome.. lets just take the good advanced players who signed up for advanced.. and make them shoot doubles against the pros and not tell them about it til the end when all the money is given away.. great tactic for pissing people off.. the pros are probably real happy.. they just got all our money. but 4th place got nothing.. thats understandable.. but people worse than us got paid out.. stupid

[Bruce Brakel]

That's why I'm not on Facebook!   

[Sayer Jackson]

Sounds like this event was a blast! Pretty bummed Case and I did not get to participate.

I know it takes a lot of work to run a tournament especially a huge one like this with a unique course layout and it seems like you did an amazing job at it.  If I may offer one tiny bit of criticism on the cashless pre-reg.  Case and I showed up about 9:10 (we took a wrong turn on the way) - Five minutes before the players meeting and were turned away because the field was full even though we had cashless pre-registered.  I completely understand the reasoning behind this in the idea that you have no idea if a cashless pre reg will show up and you want to go with a guaranteed player that is present.  

My tiny criticism is that cashless pre registrations were never told if they did not check in by 8:45am that their spots would be given away to other players.  I certainly take full responsibility for assuming that if we were there before the players meeting we were good to go and that is totally my fault, but at the same time I think a little disclaimer sentence in your original posting about pre reg spots being given away after 8:45am would have helped us out a lot.  Had Case and I known our spot would be up for grabs after 8:45, we would have planned to be there much, much earlier.  

Thanks for listening and Congrats on a great tournament!

[CEValkyrie]

On behalf of Mokena Park DIstrict I hope you don't mind if I weigh in. Bruce and family did an awesome job. About the fees - those were set up many moons ago by previous administrations. I am the new Superintendant of Recreation (1 1/2 yrs), I also have a new (for your purposes) Athletic Supervisor, and the Park District has a new Executive Director as of May. In the process of working with Bruce re: the Big D we were made aware of some things that happened in the past that soured the professional disc golf community on the Park Dsitrict. I have also been doing some research on how other courses, park districts, etc. handle tournaments and leagues. So please accept this olive branch - it's time to put the stuff that happened a few years ago behind us and move forward. We are very very open to discussions about more tournaments ( I think the norm or a reasonable fee might be in the realm of a couple of dollars per registrant instead of a flat ginormous fee) and leagues. My contact info is Mary Beth Windberg, mwindberg@mokenapark.com. My office phone is (708) 390-2409. I would like to re-open lines of communication with the disc golf community. That course is too nice not to be used to its fullest.

Welcome to the site Mary Beth. Looking forward to seeing an event there next year. The park is looking great.

The only suggestion I have for the course is trimming the top portion of the rough on blue tee #3. It's been a few years since i've played and you used to be able to see the basket from the tee.

[pickax]

Case and Sayer, I'm sorry you guys did not get in. Bruce actually waited until 9:00am. For any tournament, even if you pre-register with cold hard cash, you must checkin during the registration/check-in period. Even with a paid pre-registration, if you do not show up by the end of the checkin time you can lose your spot and be considered a no-show with refunds being paid soley at the TDs discretion. Once checkin is done, the TD needs to make sure that there are sufficient players on each hole, make scorecards, etc. In the case of the doubles event, we needed to make sure that there were two doubles teams on each card. For singles events, we cannot put players on a card hoping that they might show up. This is all done before the players' meeting so that once the meeting is done, everyone can start playing rather than waiting around again.  Showing up at the last minute makes things difficult for the TD and can delay the entire event.

[Bruce Brakel]

What Mike said.  I thought that by specifying in the very first post that check-in was from 7:45 to 8:45 it was clear enough because the Competition Manual provides,

"1.4( B ). Any player who does not check-in by the time specified by the TD shall forfeit their official place and entry fee. Exceptions will be made only at the sole discretion of the Tournament Director."

I'm truly sorry we could not get you in.  I know how disappointing that is.

[greiman]

Speaking of payouts...

We (Greiman / Smith) got a call from our partners that apparently we had won something.  I fully expect that we forfeited the money when we ducked out right away afterwards, but I'm curious.  What did we win?

[Sayer Jackson]

What Mike said.  I thought that by specifying in the very first post that check-in was from 7:45 to 8:45 it was clear enough because the Competition Manual provides,

"1.4( B ). Any player who does not check-in by the time specified by the TD shall forfeit their official place and entry fee. Exceptions will be made only at the sole discretion of the Tournament Director."

I'm truly sorry we could not get you in.  I know how disappointing that is.

That is my mistake for not knowing exactly what the Competition Manual provides, and I take full responsibility for not knowing that.  Definitely a learning experience for me, and something I will keep in mind moving forward.  I appreciate you guys waiting until 9:00am, that was not necessary, but you did it anyway and I thank you for that.  Once again, congratulations on a successfully run tournament.

[stpitner]

haha, I like having that brush on blue #3 and unable to see the basket.... said the leftie that threw the easy hyzer route

It's unfortunate that people complained about the flights, I guess that's expected whenever it's a brand new concept.  There's always going to be confusion to some degree.

From Bruce's original post to this thread:

Optional Flight Awards.  The field will be divided into four equal sized flights sorted by combined team rating.  You may enter the Flight Awards game at $80 per team or $40 Half-In per team using IOS Half-in rules.  Assuming a full field with full participation, the top four teams in each flight will receive a graduated payout.

It doesn't mention anything about separated by divisions.  I know earlier in the thread it says that if someone signs up that is over 970 they have to sign up as a pro team - not sure how that plays in other than how it gets reported to the PDGA.  I'm guessing that's where the confusion came in.

I also know that since flight 4 was all of the non-members, that made it not an equal size to the other 3 flights (which is why there were a ton of flight 4 ctp's out there).  Subtract the non member groups, divide the rest by 3, and there's your 3 flights.  All of the registration cards were marked with what flight you were in.  Did the person that "ripped it up" win any of the CTP's?  There were plenty of ways to win some cash.

Bruce - do you have the numbers as far as what flights had what values for combined PDGA ratings?  Maybe for flight 3 you shouldn't include me and John since we were probably combined to be 100 points lower than the next lowest group   You almost need to do 2 sets of flight numbers - one set for who qualifies for the ctp's, another set that excludes the trophy only.  That would have just made things that much more confusing!

[Bruce Brakel]

Diana and I played the tournament on Saturday and I took that lefty hyzer route on 3 the second round.  It seemed to me that the lefty hyzer route forced a drive to go screaming into the 8 tee area before hyzering, but I could be mistaken.  So I am curious if not cutting those bushes might create a safety issue.  Maybe the lefties and righty forehand players who played the course when it was busy could comment on whether they were throwing at the 8 tee area. 

With the flight split, my intention was to have four equal flights with the unrated teams in the bottom flight.  Since I was not promoting the tournament to first-time tournament players, it did not occur to me that more than a few unrated teams would show up.  So naturally the inconceivable contingency occurred.  When it became clear after 15 minutes of registration that the last flight was going to be almost all unrated teams, I started explaining the flight game a little differently, pointing out that the fourth flight would probably be all the unrated teams.  I thought 11-11-11-15, with all 15 unrated teams together was in keeping with the original intent of the game, and was not that much different from 12-12-12-12, and less inherently unfair to the three unrated teams that otherwise would have been randomly moved to the next higher flight. 

What really makes me sad is that the team that is complaining had the flight game explained to them thoroughly.  They asked questions indicating that they understood that they might be in the bottom of flight 1 or top of flight 2.  And I confirmed that there would be no way to know until we sorted the leaderboard by ratings.  I suggested that if they were not comfortable with the uncertainty, they could simply decide not to play that sidegame.  They went and had a team meeting to decide whether to get in.  Their Facebook posts suggest that they did not understand the game and that simply is not true.  I suppose the bright side is that if I run this tournament again, I won't see them again.   

[tacimala]

It's a new concept though, so to be fair, hearing and fully understanding everything may be two different things.

[Dan Michler]

Their Facebook posts suggest that they did not understand the game and that simply is not true.  I suppose the bright side is that if I run this tournament again, I won't see them again.  

Some people always need an excuse when they don't play well.

[CEValkyrie]

Diana and I played the tournament on Saturday and I took that lefty hyzer route on 3 the second round.  It seemed to me that the lefty hyzer route forced a drive to go screaming into the 8 tee area before hyzering, but I could be mistaken.  So I am curious if not cutting those bushes might create a safety issue.  Maybe the lefties and righty forehand players who played the course when it was busy could comment on whether they were throwing at the 8 tee area. 

I played with a long throwing lefty on that hole. He went right down that gap next to #8's tee. He made sure to notifly the group on that tee. He made 2 really nice shots but any bad hit would have bounced right on them. I would trim that rough up and make a fair route. It doesn't need to be clear cut but it does need to be trimmed.