Seeding or No Seeding?

If there is a structured tour with a credible ranking system. Then I see seeding as being very important.

The whole point is to,

A. Balance the draw. Otherwise you can very easily have a top or bottom heavy draw. One player in the final may have to play Johnny Archer, Mika Immonen, Shane Van Boening and Efren Reyes to get there. The other guy beats a couple of shortstops, the cook and the dishwasher. Obviously it's rare that it will be that lopsided, but it is to avoid similar situations where one guy has an obviously easier road.

I played in a qualifier for the Canadian Amateur Championships years ago and on my half of the draw was a couple of AA players, a semi pro and two more AAA players. The other half of the draw had a guy who didn't know how to play 9 ball, a few B players and a C player. I was little annoyed by the lopsidedness of it all, mostly cursed my luck as there was really nothing they could have done in this case. I only mention it as an example.

B. Save the better matches for later. Someone already mentioned this I think. The whole point of pro pool, is entertainment. If there are no spectators then it becomes little more than a league affair. It's easier to promote a final or even a semi final with Shane vs. Mika than Bill vs. Bob. Assuming there was a tour, with ranking points, these guys would have earned it by winning matches and tournaments. Anyone else who wants to get seeded just has to start at the bottom like everyone else.

I don't believe in leveling the playing field. Hence I don't like handicaps either. I think players who spent years and time practicing and polishing their game should reap the benefits.

All that said, without a standardized ranking system seeding becomes a matter of opinion. And the WPA rankings provide no help.

I also think that Snooker's Main Tour has one of the worst seeding system I've ever heard of.
 
JohnnyT, could you clarify what we are talking about here? I get the "balancing the draw" thing that Cameron is talking about, if you are only talking about spreading the top so many players across the opening bracket in order to prevent the top and bottom halves from being lopsided. But if your talking about all players being seeded (like in NCAA basketball) where the #1 seed in each bracket plays the lowest seed and so on, that's a whole different matter. Because then, while the top and bottom halves of the draw are more even, many of the first round matches will be lopsided.

We don't have to worry about TV at this point so the focus is more on what's good for the paying attendee. I don't think too many pool fans would not go to see a final of a big event just because it isn't SVB against Mika. But I do think a lot of fans wouldn't pay to attend the first round if there are NO good match-ups of top players. Who except my mother is going to pay to watch SVB vs. me?:o
 
I love the way the Derby does their tournament. There are some flaws, but for the most part it is the most exciting way to draw in my opinion. Every round is full of new possibilities. I love reading the draw because you never know what you're going to get.
 
Generally I'm against seeding.

The WPBA has players who are for it, against it, or don't care. The deciding factor was TV.

I'd have to say if there is no TV finals then it really doesn't matter when the two best players match up except to them and their wallets.
 
I don't think the WPBA should have seeding as there are 1 or 2 in the top 10 rating that that just might get a shot at taking one of them down.
 
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