Jop Tournament Round 1, FITE 5

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I have a day off today, which is grebt, but I forgot to note down the various FITEs for today's poll. So no poll. EXCEPT! I can remember the very next one - because it is an MONSTER.

So this is the televised centre court pick-of-the-round tie, if you like.


[Poll #917645]


Crikey! Maybe this afternoon I will do the rules for the League Of Pop. Or maybe I will go and get a haircut.

Comments

[koganbot]

Are you willing to tell us "Freak On's seeding? (Was surprised "Common People" hadn't been in the original 32, and I'm assuming that "Freak On" is closer to 32 than to 1 or it wouldn't be battling "Common People" so early.)

Always happy to talk methodology!

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

"Freak On" is 6 or 7 IIRC.

"Common People" was quite low, it won its poll with only 75% or so, and was around 50-60 in the rankings. That put it in the top pot for the groups, but not in the seeds.

The way the groups meeting seeds were worked out was that I added the rankings of all songs in a group together, and the sum of that group (representing its relative weakness or strength) determined which seed its winner met. So the group with the highest ranking total sent its winner up against "Into The Groove". "Common People" was in a fairly weak group, hence its strong draw.

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Of course, the seeding system throws up the occasional anomaly - being a strong track in a crappy P&J poll can inflate your percentage hugely. But I guess the tennis analogy holds (the Lex can help me out here): aren't there players who are only good on clay who end up seeded on grass events because of their world ranking, and then go out in the first round?

"Wannabe" is the lowest-ranked song still in the tournament, by the way. The Utah Saints are second-lowest.

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

Yes - Wimbledon actively tries to rearrange the seeds to prevent this but this is 'controversial' and it can hardly drop a top 10 player out of the top 30.

There are also players with artificially high rankings because they play lots of weak events and clean up in them, but whenever they face a true elite player tend to lose heavily. I see this analogy holds up - 'Common People' is the Anna Smashnova or Anabel Medina Garrigues of the pop world.

And 'Get Ur Freak On' is Serena Williams :)

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[alexmacpherson.livejournal.com]

Although this is still not that cut and dried - I guess this is a rusty, struggling Serena, but she's led all the way and hopefully when this is over I can say the result was never in doubt, as valiantly as her overmatched opponent fought.

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[koganbot]

So the group with the highest ranking total sent its winner up against "Into The Groove".

Wouldn't that be "lowest ranking total"? Or am I not understanding you?

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[justfanoe.livejournal.com]

I presume he means "highest ranking" in the sense of numerically highest. i.e. a group with a total ranking of 350 has less liked songs than a group with total ranking of 300, but has a "higher ranking". So that "highest ranking total" = worst group. That is how I interpreted it.

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

Yes, highest numerically = weakest group. Sorry for confusion!

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[koganbot]

I think I get it: something that's ranked 33 has more "strength" than something ranked 64, hence the lower number is the stronger. But the phrase "highest ranking total" is totally confusing, since 32 is higher ranking than 64. I presume, though, that Tom intends "highest ranking total" to mean "highest numerical total."

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

Given that CP is By Science the second best song on any of the NOWs, I imagine it could have gone a lot further if it hadn't been up against a song with such across-the-board support (EG it would clean Into The Groove's clock, I suspect).

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[freakytigger.livejournal.com]

I don't know - remember Madonna isn't on any Now albums: I think CP would have run into trouble against any of the really huge Madonna hits.

I'd agree that this result, if it holds, would suggest Missy could go all the way.

Re: Always happy to talk methodology!

[braisedbywolves.livejournal.com]

I had forgotten what I should have remembered :(