Pardon the BloggEruption

Circuit Expansion

Today's quizbowl commentary is largely a response to Dwight's October 27 post. Go ahead and read it first if you haven't already. I'll be right here.

OK. I think Dwight's working off a totally different premise from the legions of others who have made comments about the QB circuit's health and/or future. Most individual teams, etc., have no vested interest in circuit expansion on the collegiate level, whereas a company like NAQT does. The profit motive largely colors Dwight's comments, and so that's why I'm going to have to challenge him here. (No, there's absolutely nothing wrong with profit, being a company, etc. It's just that a vested interest in making money from the circuit is going to give one a different viewpoint. One I think is wrong.)

Let's start with Dwight's first premise:

There is an immense number of people not currently served by the circuit, who, if exposed to it, would like to be involved. This is true whether we are discussing the collegiate level, high school level, or even the post-college level.

OK, I will agree that there are a large (I won't say immense) number of people who would, theoretically, be interested in playing circuit-level (HS, College, or Masters) quizbowl. However, preliminary interest does not necessarily continue through time and exposure. Nor does it account for the all-important motivation factor. Furthermore, these theoretically interested people are probably monodispersed throughout the institutions and locations thorughout America. In order to create something approaching a viable team or program, you need a critical mass of interested folks, and you need to bring them together.

I considered inserting a reaction kinetics analogy here, but I figured that it would either be totally lost on my readership if I explained it fully, or quite redundant to those who will grasp the picture merely by alluding to chemical kinetics. I'll briefly just say that you have a complex reaction with multiple reactants here, and the rate limiting reagent is a person with interest and organizational skills. Team creation is largely a spontaneous reaction, though it probably requires some catalyst. Places where the critical mass and catalyst exist already have teams, or will have them soon.

The problem, as I see it, is what constitutes our "catalyst." (I'm speaking largely in terms of the college circuit, so keep that in mind.) For schools out in the east / midwest / mid-Atlantic region, exposure to the circuit at large seems to be enough. There's just not enough of a true "circuit" out west and down south to sufficiently impact a team into wanting to join it. The whole mess is complicated by the limited number of people with the organizational skills / know how / desire.

Yeah, I'm rambling, but so what? It's my blog. The bottom line, I think, is that there are so many barriers to entry (Economics! Run!) that we are never likely to see any significant growth in the circuit, with certain established programs continuing as the Big Dogs, and other schools popping up occasionally, rising and falling with changing numbers of interested, motivated people. I know people hate the Dreaded Sports Analogy, but it really is like Division IA college football. The big programs are going to stay big, with other schools rising and falling. Barring something major, we are unlikely to see a major expansion into the south and west. We will see the large state schools and the top-tier private institutions dominate, since they will likely always have the critical mass. And you know what? I'm OK with that. You should be, too.

Dwight also mentions that he hopes for "[a] reduction in tournament costs such that everyone is able to play as much as they want." Again, it comes back to economics. Tournament entry fees are hardly onerous (I'm unaware of any instances of schools shirking tournaments because they were too expensive, though Penn Bowl's fees have become, shall we say, aggrivatingly high.), though the situation may be a little different for high school stuff. The major costs ae going to be tied up in travel expenses -- gas, van rentals, hotels, food, etc., and those are pretty well fixed. Even if we had such a dense circuit that a team could have a totally full schedule without making an overnight trip, part of the lure of collegiate quizbowl is the travel. I have always enjoyed seeing other campuses, and I imagine I'm not alone. Were we to lose this, it would be a shame. So, basically, I'd like Dwight to elaborate on that point.

I might have some other stuff later, but that's it for now.