Fargo Ratings, Different Starting #s?

[Blaine B.]

There's been some discussion locally about Fargo Ratings.
Of course the sharks are over rated and the fish are underrated but one thing that caught my eye was that some players have different starting #'s.
I thought everybody started at 525, one very experienced player started at 400?
Can anybody shed any light on this? Thanks in advance!

 

[nine_ball6970]

There's been some discussion locally about Fargo Ratings.
Of course the sharks are over rated and the fish are underrated but one thing that caught my eye was that some players have different starting #'s.
I thought everybody started at 525, one very experienced player started at 400?
Can anybody shed any light on this? Thanks in advance!

Hey Blaine,

The starter ratings are supposed to be based on what singles division players had played in in the past at the state/national level for BCAPL. 400 for leisure division. 525 for open division. 625 for advanced division.

The player you are referring to is an anomaly in the system.

 

[Pacecar]

And I'm confused about the preliminary Fargo rating of someone (i.d. 924188) I played against at the Texas State Championships- Open B singles. He has a preliminary Fargo rating of 281, with a starter rating of ZERO, robustness of 11. Why wasn't he given a higher starter rating?
Would his bogus 281 rating affect the Fargo ratings of those he played against? Observing his play, I would have expected his preliminary Fargo rating to be in the 450 to 500 range.
And I wonder how many other "bogus" starter ratings are in the Fargo system....

 

[Blaine B.]

Hey Blaine,

The starter ratings are supposed to be based on what singles division players had played in in the past at the state/national level for BCAPL. 400 for leisure division. 525 for open division. 625 for advanced division.

The player you are referring to is an anomaly in the system.

Okay. Fair enough. So if there are anomalies in the system is there a way of correcting them?

I've never played in a BCA sanctioned league that I'm aware of, I started at 525.

Thanks!

 

[nine_ball6970]

Okay. Fair enough. So if there are anomalies in the system is there a way of correcting them?

I've never played in a BCA sanctioned league that I'm aware of, I started at 525.

Thanks!

Contacting Mike Page or CSI is your best option. They would need to review the player in question.

The scores are entered from some tournaments outside of BCAPL as well. League scores get entered if the operator submits them. I was in there with just a starter rating because I only played teams at BCA Nationals. Only the final score is given to the TD so no individual games can be entered.

 

[sbpoolleague]

And I'm confused about the preliminary Fargo rating of someone (i.d. 924188) I played against at the Texas State Championships- Open B singles. He has a preliminary Fargo rating of 281, with a starter rating of ZERO, robustness of 11. Why wasn't he given a higher starter rating?
Would his bogus 281 rating affect the Fargo ratings of those he played against? Observing his play, I would have expected his preliminary Fargo rating to be in the 450 to 500 range.
And I wonder how many other "bogus" starter ratings are in the Fargo system....

His (924188) preliminary rating was "N/A". His Fargo rating after 11 games is 281. You would have to ask Mike Page what an "N/A" preliminary rating means in their software. I'd be willing to bet they default the starter rating to around 425. 425 is what women are started out as, unless they have played in an advanced tourney. As for how a "bogus" rating affects other people, once again Mike Page has the answers. Most likely the software will weight the results against a person with only a few games less than a person with an established rating. Keep in mind, these ratings are re-evaluated almost daily, so when 924188 has more games under his belt and becomes more established (presumably he will rise to 500 as you say), the Fargo ratings of everyone he played should reflect that.

 

[mikepage]

And I'm confused about the preliminary Fargo rating of someone (i.d. 924188) I played against at the Texas State Championships- Open B singles. He has a preliminary Fargo rating of 281, with a starter rating of ZERO, robustness of 11. Why wasn't he given a higher starter rating?
Would his bogus 281 rating affect the Fargo ratings of those he played against? Observing his play, I would have expected his preliminary Fargo rating to be in the 450 to 500 range.
And I wonder how many other "bogus" starter ratings are in the Fargo system....

Starter Ratings are not really part of the system. They are merely a mechanism to allow unrated or partially rated players to participate in events that are couched in the language of Fargo Ratings. The rating optimization doesn't even know about them.

What you call the player's "bogus" rating of 281 is his actual rating. All we know about that player is he went two and out against 500-ish opponents, losing both matches 5 to 1. If he played 30 more matches performing like that, he'd be an established 281--and rightfully so.

But when you think about it, his rating is like a player's batting average a few games into the season.

Regarding whether this guy's lack of a starter rating would affect his opponents. No not at all. The system, once again, doesn't know or care about starter ratings. Besides, because he has so few games, his rating doesn't really affect anybody else no matter how the match goes.

 

[mikepage]

Okay. Fair enough. So if there are anomalies in the system is there a way of correcting them?

I've never played in a BCA sanctioned league that I'm aware of, I started at 525.

Thanks!

Ah I was thinking you were Blain Burns from SK. I see you are a different Blain B. All we have for you are a couple matches from The Stampede Bar Box event in Calgary last year. So you are basically unrated. Again, our focus is on how you are rated when you've played hundreds of games. The "starter rating" idea is just a gap-feature. That number if it is there for you at all is 100% forgotten once you have 200+ games.

 

[Blaine B.]

Starter Ratings are not really part of the system. They are merely a mechanism to allow unrated or partially rated players to participate in events that are couched in the language of Fargo Ratings. The rating optimization doesn't even know about them.

What you call the player's "bogus" rating of 281 is his actual rating. All we know about that player is he went two and out against 500-ish opponents, losing both matches 5 to 1. If he played 30 more matches performing like that, he'd be an established 281--and rightfully so.

But when you think about it, his rating is like a player's batting average a few games into the season.

Regarding whether this guy's lack of a starter rating would affect his opponents. No not at all. The system, once again, doesn't know or care about starter ratings. Besides, because he has so few games, his rating doesn't really affect anybody else no matter how the match goes.

Thanks for joining the discussion Mike!

Question for you, what about a player with multiple entries in the database, such as Paul Potier? It seems counter intuitive to have results spread over three different entries.

Next question, If one were to say drop a whole season's worth of league stats on you for a region's players, would that help or hurt player apprehension in adopting the Fargo Rate system in your opinion?

 

[Blaine B.]

Ah I was thinking you were Blain Burns from SK. I see you are a different Blain B. All we have for you are a couple matches from The Stampede Bar Box event in Calgary last year. So you are basically unrated. Again, our focus is on how you are rated when you've played hundreds of games. The "starter rating" idea is just a gap-feature. That number if it is there for you at all is 100% forgotten once you have 200+ games.

Is there certain qualifications placed on reporting tournament or league results to "populate" a player's database?

 

[sbpoolleague]

If one were to say drop a whole season's worth of league stats on you for a region's players, would that help or hurt player apprehension in adopting the Fargo Rate system in your opinion?

I dropped seven years worth (over 50,000 games) at one time. This system only gets better with more data.

 

[mikepage]

Thanks for joining the discussion Mike!

Question for you, what about a player with multiple entries in the database, such as Paul Potier? It seems counter intuitive to have results spread over three different entries.

Next question, If one were to say drop a whole season's worth of league stats on you for a region's players, would that help or hurt player apprehension in adopting the Fargo Rate system in your opinion?

All Paul's games were attached to one record. In general multiple entries result from merging databases, and we want to be orderly about merging records because we don't want to break important connections. But these will be merged into one.

 

[Blaine B.]

All Paul's games were attached to one record. In general multiple entries result from merging databases, and we want to be orderly about merging records because we don't want to break important connections. But these will be merged into one.

Where can one submit stats for database entry?

 

[jalapus logan]

The starter ratings are supposed to be based on what singles division players had played in in the past at the state/national level for BCAPL. 400 for leisure division. 525 for open division. 625 for advanced division.

Hi Mike. Can you please confirm or deny that this is accurate? Just curious.

Also, I appreciate what you are bringing to our sport with this effort.

 

[mikepage]

Hi Mike. Can you please confirm or deny that this is accurate? Just curious.

Also, I appreciate what you are bringing to our sport with this effort.

Yes, nine_ball6970 is correct

Clearly we want everybody to be established and let the system take over.

The starter-rating idea is kind of a hybrid of the old system (where people were categorized open, advanced, master, etc) and where we want to be.

So for unrated or partially rated players, we may assign a "starter rating." That starter rating is just a guess--It's like classifying a player as "open." The actual play range for these people is broad--we know that. The influence of this starter rating gets smaller and smaller until at 200 games it has no more influence at all.

The starter rating plays no role in the Fargo Rating optimization.

 

[Will Maynard]

What are the formulas for computing a Fargo Rating? How is a Fargo Rating calculated for someone without a rating who plays one game with a player with a rating?

Thanks

 

[Will Maynard]

I understand that Fargo Ratings are not used for 14.1 (straight pool). If this is true, why not? Is there a universally accepted rating system for 14.1?

Thanks,
Will

 

[sbpoolleague]

I just did an analysis of the Fargo ratings of the 155 players currently signed up for the Mens 8-Ball Singles at the July BCAPL Nationals. I was curious which division the players with unknown (525) ratings would fall into. CSI has publicized the following division breakdown based on Fargo ratings:
top 15% = Platinum
next 35% = Gold
next 35% = Silver
bottom 15% = Bronze

So far (and keep in mind the total entrants will probably grow 8-fold) the Fargo breakdown of the four divisions is:
585 - 720 = Platinum
524 - 584 = Gold
431 - 523 = Silver
0 - 430 = Bronze

I like this because the unknowns get put in the Gold instead of the Silver. This could change if more top players sign up than lower players.

Here's an open question for Ozzy Reynolds or Mark Griffin...suppose there are 200 unknown players (525 Fargo ratings) out of 1200 total and the cutoff line between Gold and Silver divisions falls right smack in the middle of this unknown group. Will you be putting all the unknowns into the higher group or will you split the unknowns into the two groups to keep the divisions even?

 

[tucson9ball]

I understand that Fargo Ratings are not used for 14.1 (straight pool). If this is true, why not? Is there a universally accepted rating system for 14.1?

Thanks,
Will

Fargo ratings are basically used for 8ball. 9ball. and 10ball.
One Pocket and 14.1 are completely different games. I have seen some handicap formulas used in One Pocket and we used to use a local 14.1 handicap system but I'm not aware of any National 14.1 ratings.

 

[tucson9ball]

I just did an analysis of the Fargo ratings of the 155 players currently signed up for the Mens 8-Ball Singles at the July BCAPL Nationals. I was curious which division the players with unknown (525) ratings would fall into. CSI has publicized the following division breakdown based on Fargo ratings:
top 15% = Platinum
next 35% = Gold
next 35% = Silver
bottom 15% = Bronze

So far (and keep in mind the total entrants will probably grow 8-fold) the Fargo breakdown of the four divisions is:
585 - 720 = Platinum
524 - 584 = Gold
431 - 523 = Silver
0 - 430 = Bronze

I like this because the unknowns get put in the Gold instead of the Silver. This could change if more top players sign up than lower players.

Here's an open question for Ozzy Reynolds or Mark Griffin...suppose there are 200 unknown players (525 Fargo ratings) out of 1200 total and the cutoff line between Gold and Silver divisions falls right smack in the middle of this unknown group. Will you be putting all the unknowns into the higher group or will you split the unknowns into the two groups to keep the divisions even?

This is why I'm just playing on Mixed Teams this year. I want to see how singles shakes out this year.....I think there are many players with very little data to get a Fargo rating. I'm keeping an open mind but watching the results carefully...