Posted by ab90 on 6/28/2019 4:02:00 PM (view original):
How much of this was luck?
how much of these runs were people exploiting loopholes?
What is still realistically possible to aim for? I’ve had some 99th% success, but I want to join the pantheon, if such a thing is still possible with the current dynasty engines.
how much was luck? a lot. every 'great run', or at least almost every one, was a situation where luck and the overall circumstances were pretty favorable. whether a team is recruiting in an area with significantly lower than expected competition, or is one of the small % of teams who knows of pulldowns, or simply is playing in a division/world where competition is lower - its usually circumstances and luck both contributing to the outcome. think about even a 3peat, which has been accomplished a lot (15?) teams. the golden standard for teams (by my ridiculous standards) is to be 50% to win the title; i.e. even against the field. if you do that 3 times in a row, which is extremely difficult (the vast majority of very good coaches have never had such a team), you have a 1 in 8 chance of winning a 3peat. yet, so many people have done it - there is no chance most of those people had 3 50% to win teams in a row, 8 times, where on average they could expect 1 3peat (in fact, if half of the folks who have a 3peat even had 1 run of 3 straight 50% to win teams, i'd be shocked).
i don't think most of the above is based on exploiting loopholes - the dropdowns thing touches against that, but i think thats a small factor, or none, depending how you count it. its a combination of luck, skill, and favorable conditions.
what is realistically possible to aim for today? the sky is basically the limit. d2/d3 are obviously dominate-able, given the records posted above. d1 is as well, the top teams are so bad now, i cant hardly wrap my head around it. even though it is harder to be consistently excellent in d1, the ceiling is SO HIGH. i'd have to win multiple games against teams who would crush today's #1 team, just on the path to win 1 NT. i might face three 850 overall teams - now an entire world has zero pass 800. i look and think, sure, recruiting might be different - but the room for someone to separate from the pack and just absolutely destroy these d1 worlds - holy ****. that said, even if good circumstances lead to you being by far the best team, you still need tons of luck to win multiple titles in a row!
now, what do you have to do to join the pantheon? its hard, because all patheons are all about a community of higher level folks who get together and interact and talk, and identify those few among them who stand ahead of the group (potentially with those few joining with the few from other groups, and repeating the process). right now, it seems like the level of communication and interaction across worlds, of the HD community, just might not be heavy enough to determine such things. if we all played in 1 world, it would be different - but its like there are 10 communities, of which very few folks are a member of most/all. anyway, without enough interaction and enough of a 'very good coach' group who is highly engaged and interacting regularly, its really hard to define a pantheon. its like anything. i am a significantly above average chess player, but if i play with the #100 player in the world, i am going to get absolutely destroyed. if i then play the #1 player, i will get absolutely destroyed. i have zero capacity to offer an assessment of which of those two players is better. only the top players can even see enough to understand the difference between themselves and those who are elite among them.
outside of that abstract pantheon concept, i think it basically boils down to this - any very good coach could do something amazing based on luck and circumstance. it makes a massive difference how favorable a situation your school is in, and how favorable luck is over the period. so, to prove yourself apart from the pack, you have to be pretty damn impressive in a number of scenarios. i created those dynasty lists to try to create something that helps identify greatness, but even that is very lacking. a guy who won a single title at a d1 mid major in 2.0 would be ultra impressive. even a guy at a low end big 6 that is regionally poorly located, such as south carolina in a world where the acc rules (and unc/duke are unstoppable), winning a title can be way harder, where 1 in 10 years may be as impressive as 3 in 10 elsewhere.
regardless of that nuance, if you are a top flight coach, you know which accomplishments of yours other very good coaches could accomplish, and which ones are more elite-like. if you can get a couple or preferably few of those elite-like accomplishments, you will have good reason to believe you are there.