i aint yao ming but i can put in a layup

I’m serious, I think this would be really fun. Bietz, you can be the GM…I hope you do a better job than mchale :)

b

neil conrad/me = ray allen/KG

[that's pretty generous for me, but i actually have drawn comparisons to matt bonner, brian scalabrine and kurt thomas]

The only way to end this. Whats your lineup?

Thats all for now but im sure I can find something to complain about later.

I ordinarily agree 100%. I love the idea of including a variety of different schools. I also like the idea of geographic diversity. Initially (early Fall), I’d actually hoped to only invite one per school. But a few programs made that very difficult to justify. The idea of schools having an “A debater” and a “B debater” is ordinarily a sensible model, but I wouldn’t want to try and figure our which one is which with the schools we invited. This year certainly isn’t the only one with schools like that, but it does seem exceptionally pronounced this year.

Good point from Alex, though.

b

but congrats to everyone who was invited; the field is impressive.

i agree with kamil (grudgingly) and julian that camp isn’t important, but i find the whole VBI-NSD war delightful to engage in from time to time because people become so irrational when defending their camp. Honestly though, it’s winter break; we should be relaxing, not making multi-paragraph posts on vbd to discuss debate camp and its role on people getting into round robins.

http://youlose.ytmnd.com/

and good luck to all the competitors, I’m sure they’ll have loads of fun dealing with edina’s violence AC that dominated the blake edie tourne.

…and i picked now to unleash the idea of the ultra-camp, and the one camp to rule them all. and the oh-so literal camp wars: angsty teenagers beating each other down with stacks of evidence, expandos, and old flowing pens turned into shanks.

WEAK, NO FUN

congrats again to everyone invited, and make sure to take full advantage of buca di beppo.

plus one to this… i was only pointing out earlier that MBA had quite a lot of ppl from NSD. oh well, that was a dumb idea.

i mean, does it matter what camp a debater goes to? we tend to put a lot of importance on where a debater went to camp and its really kinda dumb. i mean, its more about who coaches them and how hard they’re willing to work. i guess this is propagated by both VBI and NSD posting all the ppl that cleared at every tournament and taking claim to victory at a certain tournament. i think a lot of the camp wars would go down if those were no longer posted. the ppl going to a camp are kinda important but what’s more important is the staff. so why not argue over how good the hires are instead of flaming RR threads?

i mean, NSD and VBI both have some of the greatest minds in the activity spread fairly equally between them, so why not stop hating and start loving? but julien isn’t entirely wrong either. but its just kinda non-unique really… like, everyone knows that debate is incredibly political… that’s just the nature of the event. besides, you get to chose who you invite to your party. i just don’t think the emphasis should be placed on which camp you went…

P.S. Congratulations to the Edina Squadron for garnering two invitations to the Archer Round Robin.

P.P.$. Rebar, even though I only judged you in one round, I believe you are qualified for many Round Robinz. Unfortunately, not everyone is able to see your skillz.

good luck to ben, mckneel, wholegoon, trin-prep, etc.

THE ONE CAMP TO RULE THEM ALL!

Quick, grab your expandos! Grab your pens! Grab your ties! MARCH TO THE BATTLEFIELD!

Hey, buddy, how do you know who was invited and who was not? Perhaps some people rejected the invite because they couldn’t make it out to LA a day earlier.

Btw, congrats to everyone.

Right, sorta like “do you still beat your wife?”

I never felt the need to defend myself or my camp.

I do, however, still find it odd that many deserving kids who went to NSD were not invited (who are also going to the tournament). Even if there isn’t exact cross-over b/t the tab rooms of both competitions, the RR is being run (it seems) by VBI staff members (Babb and Anderson). I’m sure Babb was not the sole person who decided who got the invites.

Camp antagonism does suck, so let’s put the issue to rest. However, I’m sure that I am vocalizing the concerns of many NSD staff/students who were surprised to see the final list, and the issue needed to be raised.

Congrats to those who were invited.

Babb is the director of the RR. I had zero say into who had invitations. In fact, I didn’t know the final field until I saw it on VBD. I still don’t know the field of the sophomore rr.

Josh Anderson is directing tab. I guess that means, in a pre-set round robin, is that he is doing the numbers and judge assignments.

I direct the VBT. The tab room of the VBT are Jennie Savage and Jon Cruz. You will see Anderson and Babb judging rounds, at least on day 2. Josh is going to help out with the tournament on the first day because it is at UCLA and he will help direct traffic and stuff. Nonetheless at the “directors” level (tournament and tab room) there is no cross-over. So yah, amazing coincidence.

For the record, you are once again misinformed regarding the scholarships. Moerner got the scholarship for his performance at the VBT, not the RR. Dolan won the first scholarship. Moerner got the second. When he declined it moved to Traber. Neither Becca nor Lindsey were in the sophomore round robin, as they were Juniors last year.

Happy New Year! I’m glad it’s starting off with some awesome camp antagonism.

Love,
Bietz

For the record, I recall that Moerner got some sort of scholarship to VBI after winning the Sophomore RR, and I was wondering if that is still in place. My third “wrong” point was a question, not a statement of fact. And if there is a scholarship to VBI offered at the RR, then there’s no disputing that Babb’s 1st argument is false.

Wrong. Yes it did.

“This year it’s still being held directly after the Victory Briefs Tournament, and it is being run by the same people who are involved with the Victory Briefs Tournament”

Wrong.

“I know there was one for last year, and if that is still in place this year then there is no denying that this is in fact Victory Briefs’s Round Robin.”

Wrong.

This is just not true. If you search for the threads from past winners of the same round robin, in ‘06 it reads, “David Weeks wins the Victory Briefs Round Robin”, and in ‘07 it reads, “Nathan Abell wins the Victory Briefs Round Robin.” It’s not like the RR suddenly changed. This year it’s still being held directly after the Victory Briefs Tournament, and it is being run by the same people who are involved with the Victory Briefs Tournament and the people who work at VBI. Changing the name to the “Archer Round Robin” doesn’t do anything .

Here’s a question for Babb: Will there be a scholarship to VBI given to the winners of the RR? I know there was one for last year, and if that is still in place this year then there is no denying that this is in fact Victory Briefs’s Round Robin.

Also, as a final note, I agree with much of what Babb said, and I don’t think these threads are a good place to stimulate camp antagonism. However, I think to treat the issue as “well it’s just coincidental that this is Victory Briefs’s Round Robin and practically ever attendant went to VBI and none went to NSD, and my proof of this is that VBI and the RR (which has previously been called the Victory Briefs RR) are not inter-related!” is simply absurd.

We will have the Sophomore Round Robin announced shortly.

Babb

First of all, VBI has nothing to do with the round robin. I have worked and continue to work at programs other than VBI. The Archer Round Robin is not affiliated with a summer institute.

Secondly, it is not true that no students from NSD were invited. I suspect that some students preferred to attend the MBA Round Robin just as some students preferred to attend the Archer Round Robin. Invitations to each event were extended at roughly the same time. Some students received invitations to both. Some received invitations to one or the other. Reasons for attending one or the other are varied, and I don’t wish to speculate to much about why or how people made their decisions. I will only suggest that logistics (or team/coach preferences, recreation, where friends are going, etc etc.)may be as great of a concern for some as any speculative camp affiliation.

Third, the variables factored into who does and does not receive an invitation are numerous. I will recall the wisdom of Aaron Timmons with respect to his invitations to the Greenhill Round Robin: it is ultimately our party. There is no reason invitations should be purely a function of merit–I am not even sure if that’s possible: I don’t believe some debaters are objectively better than other debaters. Much obviously depends on the topic, the opponent, and the judge. And while I think our round robin does an exceptional job of including the most successful debaters from the last couple of years, we have no illusions of including the 14 most talented debaters, especially on the same weekend as another excellent round robin. I am also more familiar with the talents of some than the talents of others.

Fourth and finally, I believe this is an inappropriate forum to stimulate camp antagonism. If you have any specific questions about my camp sentiments, feel free to address them to me personally or to direct those concerns to forums about camps. I don’t think it best derail the celebration of an event with a fundamentally tangential concern about camp politics.

Thanks, and hope that helps!

Babb
Archer Debate

See everybody @ The Omaha Westside Warrior Invitational!

GO VIVIAN!! (g’luck to everyone else obviously, lol. but especially to david donnati and todd liipfert)

THE METZMANIACS WILL SEARCH AND DESTROY BABY

Shut ‘em down. Take it home.