Posted by brygold on 4/24/2014 1:20:00 AM (view original):
Quote post by kcden on 4/23/2014 9:25:00 AM:
The most rewarding recruiting occurs at DIII.
What is your basis for this statement?
Personal opinion and experience based upon multiple seasons of HD and a few seasons of GD. The playing field is so much more level at D-III and you have such a limited area to recruit versus making your way to the top of the D-I ladder where you simply aim and fire with little difficulty finding what you want.
Quote post by kcden on 4/23/2014 9:25:00 AM:
Now we are putting DIII on auto-pilot so every team is essentially gameplanned on par with a SIM AI.
How is this statement true? Even basic mode coaching mode (or whatever it is called) is still FAR more advanced than Version 1 or even Version 2 of this game.
Having not played V.1 or V.2, I have no idea. But in my mind, regressing to simplicity makes us all much more like SIM AI game plans (which is essentially no game plans) as opposed to the actual customization that makes you possibly win or lose games on anything more than pick your best 22 guys and go on auto-pilot.. If your game plan is essentially "Offense: Balanced - Aggressive; Defense: Pass Heavy - Nomal" how does that: A. Teach new coaches anything, B. Improve the experience, C. Give you any reason to ever even check in from day to day besides check your scoring? Sure, I can switch it up from Balanced to Pass Heavy or Normal to Conservative, but how do I even really know what those words mean, or care, when I know there is so much more behind the curtain.
I don't have any qualms necessarily about moving to D-II. I do have a problem with spending 5 seasons learning the game and making my team pretty decent only to have WIS tell me it was potentially all for naught if I want to play the full version of the game. Sure, WIS, give me the next 5 seasons on you and I'll happily close my mouth and move to D-II. I think it's fair to say there would be a lot of ****** off D-IA coaches if WIS said, "You know, the elites are just too strong, we're going to take away advanced game planning options to level the playing field.....unless you want to move down to D-IAA."
Not a personal attack.....don't know you from Steve......but if WIS told you that if you wanted to stay at Washington....where you have coached for an impressive and very successful 72 seasons...you had to give up advanced game planning and go to cookie cutter practice plans, would you be happy? Your alternative is move to a different division all together. Your thoughts?
If WIS forced me to move from UW or revert to basic mode and there was a level above (i.e. an NFL level) I would move up. In fact, I would have already moved up, so this question would be moot.
If my team was at the highest level of the game and they were to force me to shift to basic coaching mode, that would mean the entire game was reverting to basic mode and I would have to decide if I wanted to continue playing with less control of my team. But it would be everybody that would have less control of their team, so it would at least be a level playing field.
I have no qualms with spending a few seasons rebuilding a team. If I was not already at my Alma Mater and favorite school, I would have moved to an elite a while ago, and may have bounced around trying new things at a new team every dozen seasons or so (back when the rewards structure was, well, rewarding, I took Hawaii in one world and tried that out for something like 10 seasons and the worst BCS team in the history of the world in another).
My real problem with all of this "sky-is-falling" attitude about this change is the complete lack of understanding of the situation. There are a lot of dominant DIII coaches that are, no-doubt, very good at this game that have their little fiefdoms that they've built (and I'm sure that they did have to work hard to build them) at the entry-level to the game. I know that they have SOME competition from their peers at that level, but that probably only amounts to 1-3 regular season games, and the 2nd or 3rd round and beyond in the playoffs.
New players come in to the game and either play a computer controlled team or a team that is going to beat them 70-3 (if they're lucky and get that FG... maybe they'll have the odd 55-17 game against a less experienced DIII coach). I'm sure some stick it out to learn the game, but the vast majority won't, and probably a decent number of those might have if their initial experience with the game gave them some hope that they could compete.
DIII was never intended to be a place in this game to camp-out and pick off the newbies, season-in-and-season-out. WIS has shown that intent in the past when they severely reduced the rewards available at that level if you made the playoffs more than, I think, three times (obviously that also had something to do with their bottom-line, but I wonder if that change actually did improve it).
And, the fact is, there really won't be anything different for the coaches that move up to DII and build their programs there, in the same manner they did at DIII. The only caveat to that is those coaches that are coaching someplace that they have some real ties to. I can completely understand that, but there's no reason that they couldn't just stay where they are and deal with the Basic Coaching mode like everyone else they would be playing. I'm sure they would still dominate the level if they did.
Just my opinion on the matter. I'm personally hopeful that this will push more coaches to move up the ladder and to DIA (as well as have worlds more full, in general). In spite of this uproar from some coaches, I'd be stunned if this change ultimately significantly reduced the overall number of coaches in worlds. I'd be far less surprised for it to increase ownership, as they intend (although I doubt that, as well).