Predictions for AA?

[trans4761]

Are they planing on telling clubs where fight 2 playdownd are going to be before next year's try outs ?


Just cancel this stupid shit !!

[Pistonkev]

Are they planing on telling clubs where fight 2 playdownd are going to be before next year's try outs ?


Just cancel this stupid shit !!

Agree waste of time and money.

[lcadad]

Puck Yeah,


With all due respect back at you, I have offered up solutions repeatedly, starting with my opinion that Flighting was unneeded at the outset.  There were a good number of people who agreed with me.   I don't know what level your kid(s) are at or playing.  I grew up on the east coast, and youth hockey does quite well there, without flighting.  I'd love to know some traditional long standing youth hockey markets where anything like this exists.   


For our 2 seasons in AA CAHA has experimented on its participants with radical systemic changes.  Should I be thanking them?


If you have all the answers, feel free to provide your world view and correct the things I've stated which were factually incorrect.  I'm sure you know more than I do about the conversations I had with various club reps I know who have provided me with information, not to mention the discussions I had directly with a CAHA board member and the coaches of our team, manager and our club President.     

I don't think a win or a close game in a Flight 2 vs 8th place Flight 1 tells a story of a strong Flight 2 teams that would have been contenders.  Just the opposite.  It paints a picture of very weak Flight 1 teams at the bottom of the standings.

I really don't even understand your point in regards to the stats you cherry picked.  There were 10 Flight1 teams in PW and Bantam and if CAHA was right about flighting the #8 seeds should have won their games with ease.  You bring zero credibility to the argument when the season is over, and you can look at the stats and use them to support your own bias.  A lot of people were saying that the flighting choices were wonky during and immediately after the jamboree when the "internal rankings" were leaked.


The Flighting was supposedly necessary so that teams did not have to be subjected to a lot of blow outs of teams that they could never hope to beat or even challenge.  If CAHA can't get that right, then the whole idea is a waste of time, because, as you pointed out, there are always stronger teams and weaker teams in any grouping (easily measured over a season by goal differential).


At some point, it just becomes arrogant self congratulation that is often not merited and I find that personally distasteful.  CAHA can't legislate parity with 3 teams in AAA, and it certainly can't legislate it with 12 teams or 16 or 18 teams at AA.  Your bar for our team seems to be, that we can only be validated if we now win a state championship. 


If you don't think an organization is entitled to know before being summoned to the jamboree for an "evaluation" without it being disclosed by whatever decision making "cabal" was involved, that you have essentially no chance of being evaluated as a Flight1 team other than perhaps to win all your jamboree "games", don't you think that should have been communicated to the organization?   Maybe our coaching staff might have done some things differently. 


Feel free to point me to the information provided by CAHA on how the evaluation would work, what criteria would be involved, and how determinations would be made.  I'll save you time -- you can't because there wasn't any.


If people are satisfied with it at U16, they are welcome to that opinion and perhaps this season for U16, the flighting makes sense. 
It's a very different age group from U12 an U14 there are plenty of people who think the flighting was rigged in favor of the more powerful clubs who have people with decision making power within CAHA. 


In U12, Flight2, our team played 5 other socal teams.  Our goal differential was +70 and due to the fact there were only 6 teams, we also played one less CAHA weekend.  We played a good number of the Flight1 teams, not just the 8th place team, and we proved in those games that we would have been competitive.


I'm repeating myself, but we didn't get blown out by anyone in the Jamboree.  All our games were close, both in terms of shots, zone time, scoring opportunities and final score, and 3 of our 4 opponents went into Flight1 and all made the top 8.  If there had actually been an evaluation, we should have been in Flight1 from the outset.  There wasn't the legitimate evaluation process that was promised and that should change.


Your posts keep referring to teams in Flight2 as 'A' teams, which says a lot about where you are coming from. Maybe if a AA teams at the top of Flight1 are really only challenged by a team or 2 in their division, the problem is not with the other 90% of the teams, but rather that the top team ought to be moving up instead of complaining about having to play the majority of the division.

[trans4761]

Puck Yeah,


With all due respect back at you, I have offered up solutions repeatedly, starting with my opinion that Flighting was unneeded at the outset.  There were a good number of people who agreed with me.   I don't know what level your kid(s) are at or playing.  I grew up on the east coast, and youth hockey does quite well there, without flighting.  I'd love to know some traditional long standing youth hockey markets where anything like this exists.   


For our 2 seasons in AA CAHA has experimented on its participants with radical systemic changes.  Should I be thanking them?


If you have all the answers, feel free to provide your world view and correct the things I've stated which were factually incorrect.  I'm sure you know more than I do about the conversations I had with various club reps I know who have provided me with information, not to mention the discussions I had directly with a CAHA board member and the coaches of our team, manager and our club President.     

I don't think a win or a close game in a Flight 2 vs 8th place Flight 1 tells a story of a strong Flight 2 teams that would have been contenders.  Just the opposite.  It paints a picture of very weak Flight 1 teams at the bottom of the standings.

I really don't even understand your point in regards to the stats you cherry picked.  There were 10 Flight1 teams in PW and Bantam and if CAHA was right about flighting the #8 seeds should have won their games with ease.  You bring zero credibility to the argument when the season is over, and you can look at the stats and use them to support your own bias.  A lot of people were saying that the flighting choices were wonky during and immediately after the jamboree when the "internal rankings" were leaked.


The Flighting was supposedly necessary so that teams did not have to be subjected to a lot of blow outs of teams that they could never hope to beat or even challenge.  If CAHA can't get that right, then the whole idea is a waste of time, because, as you pointed out, there are always stronger teams and weaker teams in any grouping (easily measured over a season by goal differential).


At some point, it just becomes arrogant self congratulation that is often not merited and I find that personally distasteful.  CAHA can't legislate parity with 3 teams in AAA, and it certainly can't legislate it with 12 teams or 16 or 18 teams at AA.  Your bar for our team seems to be, that we can only be validated if we now win a state championship. 


If you don't think an organization is entitled to know before being summoned to the jamboree for an "evaluation" without it being disclosed by whatever decision making "cabal" was involved, that you have essentially no chance of being evaluated as a Flight1 team other than perhaps to win all your jamboree "games", don't you think that should have been communicated to the organization?   Maybe our coaching staff might have done some things differently. 


Feel free to point me to the information provided by CAHA on how the evaluation would work, what criteria would be involved, and how determinations would be made.  I'll save you time -- you can't because there wasn't any.


If people are satisfied with it at U16, they are welcome to that opinion and perhaps this season for U16, the flighting makes sense. 
It's a very different age group from U12 an U14 there are plenty of people who think the flighting was rigged in favor of the more powerful clubs who have people with decision making power within CAHA. 


In U12, Flight2, our team played 5 other socal teams.  Our goal differential was +70 and due to the fact there were only 6 teams, we also played one less CAHA weekend.  We played a good number of the Flight1 teams, not just the 8th place team, and we proved in those games that we would have been competitive.


I'm repeating myself, but we didn't get blown out by anyone in the Jamboree.  All our games were close, both in terms of shots, zone time, scoring opportunities and final score, and 3 of our 4 opponents went into Flight1 and all made the top 8.  If there had actually been an evaluation, we should have been in Flight1 from the outset.  There wasn't the legitimate evaluation process that was promised and that should change.


Your posts keep referring to teams in Flight2 as 'A' teams, which says a lot about where you are coming from. Maybe if a AA teams at the top of Flight1 are really only challenged by a team or 2 in their division, the problem is not with the other 90% of the teams, but rather that the top team ought to be moving up instead of complaining about having to play the majority of the division.

DUDE


You must be a pain in the ass when your drunk.


Blah....blah.....blah.....yack......yack.....yack.....fuck !!

[lcadad]

I do it all for you trans, you know that.

[RW]

I can tell you for sure that the top 2-3 teams in 16U Flight 2 were NOT satisfied with the flights.  They could all compete with the bottom 3-4 teams in flight 1 and did so on occasion in SCAHA and various tournaments.  In fact, I believe Flight 2 OC1 beat a couple of Flight 1 teams in SCAHA games.

It was pre-determined that there would be 8 Flight 1 teams regardless of what happened at the Jamboree and the eventual 8th place Flight 1 team was given a gift schedule at the Jamboree....any guesses where they were from?     

[rmackintosh]

While I agree, the flight system is not perfect, and may, in fact need significant improvement next year. I CAN say that I have heard nothing but positives from folks in Midget and Bantam Flight 1 teams. Our son played in Bantam Flight 1, and I can tell you this season was a dream compared to the past two seasons of PW AA. While I by no means have a large sample size for the Midget families, all Flight 1 families I have spoken to were very favorable to the flight system in their case.


I will admit the PW parents I have spoken to DID NOT have a favorable year in the flight system--seemingly in either Flight 1 or 2.



In our case in both of the past two years of PW AA, our team would typically have say a 20 game CAHA schedule--4 of those games would be quality, 6 of those games would be decent, and 10 games--half of the year--would be worthless blowouts. This year, in Bantam Flight 1...EVERY GAME was contested, or at least we faced an opponent that could or did beat us. Of course, there is the Bears....but they have been discussed ad nauseum...but we have had great games almost every game. Beaten teams we shouldn't have and lost to teams we shouldn't have along the way...but GREAT competitiveness.


Now, it seems many of the biggest complaints here come from Flight 2 parents that think their team "coulda, shoulda, woulda" been in Flight 1 IF they just got a fair shot from big bad CAHA. And this is PROVEN FACT because they played this team, who played that team, who scrimmaged with the other team and won a practice against yet another team.


Face it, we are NOT going to know if the 3rd seed Flight 2 team could have taken down the 9th seed Flight 1 team 9 times out of 10. It might be true...but we will NEVER know.


What we DO know is blowouts DO NOT help anyone involved. I know it is the prevailing thought on this board that the "Goliaths" should have just sucked it up and beat down a few "Davids" during the year in order to "grow hockey in California". The thought being that these "blessed" kids should suffer through the blowouts for the greater good. You are kidding yourself if you think that the Goliaths are the only ones suffering in the blowouts. Hockey is such a confidence game and if your player is on a team that is getting beat by 8-0 and 10-0 week in and week out--trust me, they ARE NOT getting anything out of this. They are getting frustrated, they are not having fun and they are more than likely to be the next kids to quit hockey and go chase girls or try a new sport that might be more competitive/fun!


So, I have little insight into what happened in any of the Flight 2 leagues this year, perhaps as good as the flight system was for Bantam and Midget Flight 1, it was equally bad--I don't know. There has not been much discussion about how competitive the second flights were, only pining for CAHA to admit they screwed up and this team or that team coulda, shoulda, woulda been in Flight 1 if only.....

[Rub One Out]

Well said...a different perspective.


I haven't heard from anyone how competitive the games were within the realms of Flight 2 divisions at any age group.  Most people have complained about the unnecessary travel to NorCal or not getting a fair chance to play in Flight 1.  One of you stats guys needs to do a breakdown on the game-by-game goal differentials in Flight 2 to see if their games were predominantly competitive.  My son's team is Flight 1 Bantam and ALL of their CAHA games were competitive.  That was the goal, right?

[Santino]

You know why you never see Icadad and Nancy Pelosi at a party together?  Both are the same gas bag.  Blah blah blah.

Puck Yeah,


With all due respect back at you, I have offered up solutions repeatedly, starting with my opinion that Flighting was unneeded at the outset.  There were a good number of people who agreed with me.   I don't know what level your kid(s) are at or playing.  I grew up on the east coast, and youth hockey does quite well there, without flighting.  I'd love to know some traditional long standing youth hockey markets where anything like this exists.   


For our 2 seasons in AA CAHA has experimented on its participants with radical systemic changes.  Should I be thanking them?


If you have all the answers, feel free to provide your world view and correct the things I've stated which were factually incorrect.  I'm sure you know more than I do about the conversations I had with various club reps I know who have provided me with information, not to mention the discussions I had directly with a CAHA board member and the coaches of our team, manager and our club President.     

I don't think a win or a close game in a Flight 2 vs 8th place Flight 1 tells a story of a strong Flight 2 teams that would have been contenders.  Just the opposite.  It paints a picture of very weak Flight 1 teams at the bottom of the standings.

I really don't even understand your point in regards to the stats you cherry picked.  There were 10 Flight1 teams in PW and Bantam and if CAHA was right about flighting the #8 seeds should have won their games with ease.  You bring zero credibility to the argument when the season is over, and you can look at the stats and use them to support your own bias.  A lot of people were saying that the flighting choices were wonky during and immediately after the jamboree when the "internal rankings" were leaked.


The Flighting was supposedly necessary so that teams did not have to be subjected to a lot of blow outs of teams that they could never hope to beat or even challenge.  If CAHA can't get that right, then the whole idea is a waste of time, because, as you pointed out, there are always stronger teams and weaker teams in any grouping (easily measured over a season by goal differential).


At some point, it just becomes arrogant self congratulation that is often not merited and I find that personally distasteful.  CAHA can't legislate parity with 3 teams in AAA, and it certainly can't legislate it with 12 teams or 16 or 18 teams at AA.  Your bar for our team seems to be, that we can only be validated if we now win a state championship. 


If you don't think an organization is entitled to know before being summoned to the jamboree for an "evaluation" without it being disclosed by whatever decision making "cabal" was involved, that you have essentially no chance of being evaluated as a Flight1 team other than perhaps to win all your jamboree "games", don't you think that should have been communicated to the organization?   Maybe our coaching staff might have done some things differently. 


Feel free to point me to the information provided by CAHA on how the evaluation would work, what criteria would be involved, and how determinations would be made.  I'll save you time -- you can't because there wasn't any.


If people are satisfied with it at U16, they are welcome to that opinion and perhaps this season for U16, the flighting makes sense. 
It's a very different age group from U12 an U14 there are plenty of people who think the flighting was rigged in favor of the more powerful clubs who have people with decision making power within CAHA. 


In U12, Flight2, our team played 5 other socal teams.  Our goal differential was +70 and due to the fact there were only 6 teams, we also played one less CAHA weekend.  We played a good number of the Flight1 teams, not just the 8th place team, and we proved in those games that we would have been competitive.


I'm repeating myself, but we didn't get blown out by anyone in the Jamboree.  All our games were close, both in terms of shots, zone time, scoring opportunities and final score, and 3 of our 4 opponents went into Flight1 and all made the top 8.  If there had actually been an evaluation, we should have been in Flight1 from the outset.  There wasn't the legitimate evaluation process that was promised and that should change.


Your posts keep referring to teams in Flight2 as 'A' teams, which says a lot about where you are coming from. Maybe if a AA teams at the top of Flight1 are really only challenged by a team or 2 in their division, the problem is not with the other 90% of the teams, but rather that the top team ought to be moving up instead of complaining about having to play the majority of the division.

[rmackintosh]

Well said...a different perspective.


I haven't heard from anyone how competitive the games were within the realms of Flight 2 divisions at any age group.  Most people have complained about the unnecessary travel to NorCal or not getting a fair chance to play in Flight 1.  One of you stats guys needs to do a breakdown on the game-by-game goal differentials in Flight 2 to see if their games were predominantly competitive.  My son's team is Flight 1 Bantam and ALL of their CAHA games were competitive.  That was the goal, right?

I too would like to hear how the Flight 2 divisions did amongst themselves without any bias about whether or not they "belonged" there.


As good as the flight system was for Bantam Flight 1, I don't doubt the whole thing could have been improved--but CAHA bashing doesn't help in my opinion. Find out who to talk to in your club or on CAHA itself and contact them and let them know your feelings/input. They did the best they can, and they can't improve next year without input that actually HELPS and is not just bitching.


I would agree after the flights were made and it turned out Flight 2 was all So-Cal, the travelling up north was a bit much--but I also understand the bidding system they do to get rinks signed up. I am sure CAHA could do the bidding later next year, or in a different manner if it turns out similar. But, what would happen if there are 9 So-Cal teams and 1 Nor-Cal? Where do you draw the line....more room for unhappiness....it is NOT easy...

[Puck Yeah]

I can tell you for sure that the top 2-3 teams in 16U Flight 2 were NOT satisfied with the flights.  They could all compete with the bottom 3-4 teams in flight 1 and did so on occasion in SCAHA and various tournaments.  In fact, I believe Flight 2 OC1 beat a couple of Flight 1 teams in SCAHA games.

It was pre-determined that there would be 8 Flight 1 teams regardless of what happened at the Jamboree and the eventual 8th place Flight 1 team was given a gift schedule at the Jamboree....any guesses where they were from?   

I think that is is entirely predictable that the top couple of teams in a Flight 2 are going to be dissatisfied.  It would make no difference where the line was drawn.  The first couple of teams behind the line are not going to care for the decision.  It is like standing in line for 2 hours for a Kopi autograph and having them tell you that the guy if front of you is the last one that will get in for a signature tonight. 


As far as it being "predetermined that there would be 8 Flight 1 teams regardless of what happened at the Jamboree" I can say with complete certainty this is False.  I spoke with the board about this specifically before and after the Jamboree, and they concluded that both Flights could contain any number in either flight.  It could have been 12-4 or 6-10.  It was not predetermined. 


I am sure it is a bitter pill to get relegated to Flight 2.  That doesn't change the reasoning behind the flight system being implemented.  A teams continued to play AA every year.  This was an attempt by CAHA to address the issue.  Was it successful?  Apparently it all depends on which Flight your player was assigned to.....

[Rats13]

It was actually stated that there was a max of 10 teams in flight 1.

[Pistonkev]

The bottom line in Bantam AA you had one AAA team and maybe two or 3 teams that could of done well in A.

CAHA doesn't have the balls to drop teams down a level where they should be because they have connections.
So they came up with flights to try and make these clubs happy.

[Puck Yeah]

The bottom line in Bantam AA you had one AAA team and maybe two or 3 teams that could of done well in A.

CAHA doesn't have the balls to drop teams down a level where they should be because they have connections.
So they came up with flights to try and make these clubs happy.

I can see that you can't force a club up, but CAHA should have an extended preseason and send down teams that obviously don't belong in AA.  There will still be bitching that the teams sent down could have been contenders given time to develop.  But there is no bitch free solution.

[Puck Yeah]

It was actually stated that there was a max of 10 teams in flight 1.

Where? and by whom?  I have email documenting that was not the case.