BuzzerBeater Forums

i LOVE Scotland. Oh wait, i'm from Scotland, no wonder I love it. I miss you....

You are so beautiful, i miss your streams and trees, I miss your NEDS and clowns. I will return.

What is a NED?

NED is a derogatory term applied in Scotland to youths who wear casual sports clothes,[1] with the stereotypical implication that they engage in hooliganism or petty criminality.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ned_(Scottish)

Yup, it stands for Non Educated Delinquent, but it applies much more broadly than that. I don't think they consider it derogatory though, :D.

I dunno, I just searched it up on Wikipedia. :-)

Game's on: http://www.buzzerbeater.com/match/15722/reportmatch.aspx

And it ain't pretty.

Hello, I have few cents about whole tournament and our matches.
First of all: Congratulations for Your NT Manager - Jfarb, Your staff and Your community. After 8 seasons USA came back to top-4 and won medal in World Cup. It was good cadency for You, two tournaments and two medals. It was great job. Congratulations.
You have strong team. But we had our dreams and they are different than Yours.
I think You have the best perimeter on whole BB-World. And without HCA it will be of course harder for Poland, I know it. But please remember, in 6th season USA had HCA in WC so sometimes we must play with HCA and sometimes against HCA ;-)
After our match in semifinal I was really confused. I have lot of respect for Your team and I had many concerns before this match. You have strong guards, and... Grubbs ;-) He is playing in club which owner is BB-Charles ;-) So he is dangerous for every team ;-)
Our first match resolved in last minute.
And therefore I decided to play CT in semifinal. Result exceeded my expectations. And after match I scared that I won silver but lost gold in semifinal. But fortunatelly final match was happy for us.
Good information for You is that Your team is close to Chile. If I compare our matches in group phase I think match with USA was the hardest for us (Chile defeated us but please note that Chile used more effort). Semifinals and final aren't good examples because every team had different enthusiasm.
I know You like statistics (USA teached all Europa count assist, blocks, steals, etc, etc, etc). I made statistics of all WC, You can find them here:
http://bbtools.x10.mx/files/BB-Stats-WC-NT-s16.ods
Congratulation for Bronson - the best assistant and the best stealer in tournament.

Regards from Poland
May the Force be with You ;-)

Thank you for the kind words BB King and congratulations on winning the gold! I loved your guys previews with the whole Star Wars/Star Trek themes haha!

I don't blame Poland for being given HCA or anything, and yes we did have HCA in S6. I'd like to point out that S6 was a very different time for us and BB as a whole than S16. In S6 HCA was not enough to close the large talent gap between everyone inlcuding ourselves and Italy/Spain. If we had HCA in S16 I can confidently say that we would've won the Gold as well.

I just think that the BBs need to think harder in the future about who they give HCA to. Its not your fault they gave it to you, you did exactly what you were supposed to do and it resulted in a gold medal. HCA allowed you to TIE every single game so you had an overwhelming enthusiasm advantage against us and Chile. I give you credit, you made the correct decision to TIE everything. No offense, but I think it goes beyond just saying that it would be "harder", I think it would be fair to say that it would've been nearly an impossible task for you to win Worlds Gold without HCA.

You guys have a great team and I hope you don't take that as criticism. I just think that looking at the final scores of the semifinal and the final, it appears to me that the entire season was pointless and that this whole season was over before it began. Considering this is my only Worlds as the manager, I'm kind of annoyed that I walked into a Worlds season with practically 0% chance of winning it, and everyone was just playing for second. Beating us by 45 in the semifinal, and then beating the best team in the world by 25 in the final...I just hope those scores opens the BBs eyes to the advantage they are giving away with HCA.

Don't even get me started on Joe Bronson's statistics, I can show you some more of his stats that will make you think twice. Thank you though for that link it is interesting stuff to look at!

Again, I don't mean anything I say as any offense to you or Poland, you guys are the champions! I understand that in real life, just like in the World Cup, someone gets to host the tournament and has an advantage. Problem is that in real life soccer, HCA might be worth one goal a game or might not result in anything in a game. In BB HCA gives you a 10 point advantage, and allows you to choose "Take It Easy" which adds to that advantage as the weeks go on. Can't "take it easy" in real life.

EDIT: I see that in the suggestions thread, you claim that HCA is not as big of an advantage as one might think. I agree. With = enthusiasm, HCA is not a 45 point advantage or a 22 point advantage. You know what is a significant advantage? 14 enthusiasm vs 7 enthusiasm + HCA. Thats a huge advantage.

While you were just cruising along doing PTB/m2m/TIE with a blank lineup every game, the rest of us had to fight desperately, normal games, and be creative tactically to even reach the semifinal. You think Wisnewski typically pulls 23.5 player ratings? He's an amazing big man and I'd love to have him, but at this point in BB, no player should be pulling a 23.5 rating.

I would like to reiterate the fact that you guys have one of the best teams in the World and I very much respect that!!! Hopefully some good will come of this season and HCA in the Worlds will be rethought.



Last edited by jfarb at 7/28/2011 5:53:37 PM

I'm sure in next tournaments Poland will have to play without HCA ;-) So it's challenge for us.

I know it's hard to play if You are underdog. But we had similar situation in European Championships, for many season we had no chance to fight with Spain, Italy and Germany or France. Because Poland joined to BB in 3rd season and in few first tournaments we had players one or two years younger than our opponents and therefore of course worse ;-) And we were frustrated we had no chance not only to win gold, but even bronze.

In season 15 I went to semifinals in EC with enthusiasm (afaik) by 7 levels less than Italia and Italia had HCA ;-) So we have 0% chance too. But we was happy because it was our first medal in history.

What would be if Poland had no HCA in this Championships? We would fight ;-) I think we could play different tactic than PtB in groups and we should have chance too ;-) Impossible is nothing ;-)

In my opinion HCA gives us +5 points (if compared to neutral ground). It's +10 points if we compare home game with away game.

Last edited by B.B.King at 7/28/2011 5:49:54 PM

Tell you what, if Poland wins the Gold in S18 I will gladly eat crow and apologize. I think you missed my point about it being more than just HCA. Its the fact that you could TIE every game and still easily reach the semifinal, no one else could do that. Its HCA+the enthusiasm you build from having HCA.

Different tactics? You mean LI? Even though you PTBd every single game this season everyone knew, including us, that you would LI in the semifinal and the final.

Problem is that without HCA and an enthusiasm advantage, your bigs become = to Chile's, Uruguays, Italys etc etc. Still better than ours tho ;). But also without HCA and enthusiasm advantage, and your guards become a liability. You face the same problems you face week in and week out in S15 and every European Championship. Your tactics become predictable, just like ours were vs everyone except Italy. You really think on a neutral court, with equal enthusiasm, you could beat us by anywhere near 45 points? I'd venture to say that if we played 10 times under those circumstances, both teams would win 5.

Again, none of this is your fault, and you didn't mess up and now you have a Gold Trophy to show for it. And if the roles were reversed for sure I would not complain one bit ;) I just think for the future of BB, HCA should not go to a top 10 Worlds team, because otherwise the season is totally pointless.