Poslfit: Created page with "With the return to a '''playoff''' model in the '''2015 North American SCRABBLE Championship''' after several years of choosing winners based only on final standings after..."

2015-02-28T18:44:25Z

Created page with "With the return to a '''playoff''' model in the '''2015 North American SCRABBLE Championship''' after several years of choosing winners based only on final standings after..."

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With the return to a '''playoff''' model in the '''[[2015 North American SCRABBLE Championship]]''' after several years of choosing winners based only on final standings after modified Swiss play, it is instructive to consider how past National Championships would have played out had they included playoffs. In what follows, we use a '''simulation''' methodology.

== Summary ==

If we had had playoffs in 2009, and [[Nigel Richards]] had played
to expectation in them, he would most likely have successfully
defended his title rather than finishing in second place to [[Dave Wiegand]]
in Dayton.

In 2010, he would have been favoured to win in Dallas, as actually happened.

In 2011, because of his lifetime 1-6 record vs. [[Joel Sherman]], Richards
would only be the third most likely playoff champion, behind Sherman
and [[Kenji Matsumoto]], rather than winning the title for the third time.

In 2012, because of [[David Gibson]]'s historical domination of the rest
of the semifinalists, Gibson would have been much more likely to make the
finals than Richards, and therefore more likely to end up victorious than
losing in the final round to his evenly matched opponent.

In 2013, facing a more even field, Richards would have been most likely
to duplicate his actual win, thanks in part to fortuitously being paired
to eliminate [[Komol Panyasophonlert]] in the quarterfinals.

In 2014, we would most likely have seen an exciting finals match between
3-time champion [[Joe Edley]] and actual
2014 champion [[Conrad Bassett-Bouchard]], with [[Joe Edley]] favoured to
prevail.

In each case, the actual champion makes it into the quarterfinals,
never seeded less than 5th place, and in five of the six years
examined, the actual runner-up makes it into the quarterfinals too.
The quarterfinals typically consist of four or five players who would
have finished at the top of the field, with the rest having finished
barely out of the money.

The effect of returning to a playoff format is therefore to increase
the chance for players who typically finish in the top 20 to become
the champion, while preserving the ability for the most deserving
experts to reach the playoff stage.

== Methodology ==

Historical records were reviewed to determine Division 1 final standings and standings after Round 21. Head-to-head player records were used to estimate the probability of game outcomes in playoff matches, using historical win ratio where at least three head-to-head games were recorded, game point ratio where only one or two games were recorded, or rating-based estimates where there was no record of the players playing each other. The probability of a player advancing through a best-of-4 or best-of-5 playoff round was computed using elementary probability theory.

== Details ==
<style type="text/css">td { text-align: center; } tr.yearstart td { border-top: 3px double black }</style>
{|
!Event
!Actual<br>Rank<br>After 21<br>Rounds
!Actual<br>Final<br>Rank
!Simulated<br>%<br>Chance of<br>Winning<br>Playoffs
!Player
|- class=yearstart
|rowspan=8|2009
|1
|2
|35.3
|Nigel Richards
|-
|2
|1
|21.6
|Dave Wiegand
|-
|3
|4
|24.3
|Adam Logan
|-
|4
|15
|0.1
|Rafi Stern
|-
|5
|20
|11.6
|Sammy Okosagah
|-
|6
|5
|0.7
|Chris Cree
|-
|7
|32
|5.3
|Robin Pollock Daniel
|-
|8
|12
|1.1
|Marty Gabriel
|- class=yearstart
|rowspan=8|2010
|1
|1
|35.9
|Nigel Richards
|-
|2
|4
|1.3
|Orry Swift
|-
|3
|5
|27.0
|Dave Wiegand
|-
|4
|23
|1.7
|Rafi Stern
|-
|5
|2
|19.5
|Brian Cappelletto
|-
|6
|3
|2.4
|Laurie Cohen
|-
|7
|10
|7.7
|Evans Clinchy
|-
|8
|24
|4.5
|Chris Williams
|- class=yearstart
|rowspan=8|2011
|1
|1
|15.1
|Nigel Richards
|-
|2
|7
|8.4
|Nigel Peltier
|-
|3
|8
|13.5
|Scott Appel
|-
|4
|5
|3.3
|Jesse Day
|-
|5
|2
|19.4
|Kenji Matsumoto
|-
|6
|14
|35.5
|Joel Sherman
|-
|7
|24
|0.0
|Orry Swift
|-
|8
|3
|4.9
|Brian Bowman
|- class=yearstart
|rowspan=8|2012
|1
|2
|57.1
|David Gibson
|-
|2
|11
|3.7
|Jason Keller
|-
|3
|10
|1.5
|Robin Pollock Daniel
|-
|4
|9
|5.0
|Conrad Bassett-Bouchard
|-
|5
|1
|18.1
|Nigel Richards
|-
|6
|14
|10.5
|Jerry Lerman
|-
|7
|15
|3.8
|Komol Panyasophonlert
|-
|8
|5
|0.3
|Dave Wiegand
|- class=yearstart
|rowspan=8|2013
|1
|1
|29.4
|Nigel Richards
|-
|2
|5
|2.7
|Kenji Matsumoto
|-
|3
|10
|15.5
|Dave Wiegand
|-
|4
|4
|14.6
|Noah Walton
|-
|5
|3
|3.2
|Will Anderson
|-
|6
|17
|2.4
|Peter Armstrong
|-
|7
|6
|10.5
|Scott Appel
|-
|8
|2
|21.8
|Komol Panyasophonlert
|- class=yearstart
|rowspan=8|2014
|1
|3
|10.1
|Joel Sherman
|-
|2
|1
|21.2
|Conrad Bassett-Bouchard
|-
|3
|10
|20.1
|Jesse Day
|-
|4
|11
|30.8
|Joe Edley
|-
|5
|37
|0.0
|Leesa Berahovich
|-
|6
|9
|4.2
|Nigel Peltier
|-
|7
|7
|9.0
|Mack Meller
|-
|8
|25
|4.5
|Jerry Lerman
|}

2015 North American SCRABBLE Championship Playoff Simulations - Revision history

Poslfit: Created page with "With the return to a '''playoff''' model in the '''2015 North American SCRABBLE Championship''' after several years of choosing winners based only on final standings after..."