THE CHAMPIONSHIP
DOUBLE-ELIMINATION TOURNAMENT

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This year the NSYBA will use a double-elimination tournament to determine the championship. In a double-elimination tournament, you continue to play until your team has lost two games, at which point you're eliminated from the tournament. Needless to say, double-elimination tournaments are much more complicated than single-elimination tournaments. This web page explains how our double-elimination tournament will work.

The NSYBA regular season ends on Tuesday, June 18th. There will be no regular season games after Tuesday. 

SEEDING: On Tuesday night at 10:30 PM, which is the deadline for reporting all the scores, pitchers used and innings pitched, the scorekeeper determines the seeding of the tournament. If a score has not been reported by 10:30 PM Tuesday night, then the game is recorded as "not played." Your team receives two points for each win (either by completed games or winning forfeits), zero points for each loss, and one point for each tied game. 

The scorekeeper then ranks ("seeds") all the teams, irrespective of league. The top sixteen teams participate in the championship; the bottom two teams do not participate. In case of ties, here is the formula:

• If the tie is within the league, then the head-to-head records break the tie.

• If the tie is across the leagues, or the head-to-head records don't break the tie, then the NSYBA Commissioner (Joe Hasman) flips a coin on Tuesday night.

 Your team's seeding remains constant throughout the entire tournament. The higher seed in any game is the home team. The lower seed is the visiting team.

FIRST ROUND OF THE PLAYOFFS: The first round of the playoffs, eight games, will occur between Wednesday, June 19th, and Friday, June 21st. The highest seeded team (team 1) will play the lowest seeded team (team 16). Team 2 will play team 15, team 3 will play team 14, and so on. Wherever possible, we will try to schedule the game at the higher seed's home diamond, but we make no promises in this regard. Also, if your team played a game on Tuesday, June 18th, you will not play your first-round game on Wednesday, June 19th. 

DOUBLE-ELIMINATION MATRIX: Now it starts to get complicated. If you have Adobe Acrobat Reader, you can click on this website to view or print out the double-elimination matrix we will use. If you do not have Adobe Acrobat Reader, you can obtain it here. There is no charge for Adobe Acrobat Reader. This printout will give you the matrix on a single piece of paper. 

The only change we are making to this matrix is that the higher seed is always the home team. The matrix says, for instance, that "3 plays 14," implying that 3 is visitors and 14 is home. But we will reverse that order: 14 will be visitors and 3 will be home. (In foosball, at which website we found the downloadable matrix, it doesn't matter, since there's no home field advantage.)

Also, the webmaster will produce a four-page version of the matrix, post it on the website and update it as each bracket is completed. Return to The Championship Season page to select this option.

The eight losing teams in the first round of the playoffs go into what's called the "losers' bracket," while the eight winning teams go into what's called the "winners' bracket." In the matrix, whenever a higher-seeded winner's bracket team loses and moves to the losers' bracket, that team retains its seeding. If its seeding is higher than its opponent, it will be the home team in its losers' bracket games.

WINNERS' BRACKET: These eight teams then play their four games of round one (Saturday, June 22nd and Sunday, June 23rd). The four teams that lose then go to the losers' bracket. The four winners of round one then play their two round-two games (on Tuesday, June 25th and Wednesday, June 26th), with the two losing teams going into the losers' bracket. The two winners of the round-two games play each other in round three (Friday, June 28th or Saturday, June 29th), again with the loser going to the loser's bracket. 

After three winners' bracket rounds, you're left with a single team that has never lost a game. The winner of the winners' bracket round three game then waits for the losers' bracket games to catch up with it.

LOSERS' BRACKET: These eight teams play their four losers' bracket round-one games (Saturday, June 22nd and Sunday, June 23rd). Because the four losing teams in round one of the losers' bracket have already lost a game (in the first round, June 19th through the 21st), they are eliminated from the rest of the tournament. The round-one winners then play the winners' bracket round-one losing teams in round two of the losers' bracket (Monday, June 24th). 

And so it goes for the losers' bracket. (Third round: Wednesday, June 26th. Fourth round: Thursday, June 27th. Fifth round: Saturday, June 29th. Sixth round: Sunday, June 30th.) Any team that loses its first game drops out of the winners' bracket and plays in the losers' bracket. If that team then loses a game in the losers' bracket, it is eliminated from the rest of the tournament.

Finally, after six losers' bracket rounds, you're left with a single team that has lost a single game. 

THE WORLD SERIES: In the World Series, the winner of the losers' bracket plays the winner of the winners' bracket. If the winner of the winners' bracket wins the first World Series game (Monday, July 1st), then the tournament is over. But if the winner of the losers' bracket wins the first World Series game, then the two teams play a second game (Tuesday, July 2nd) to determine the championship. 

Needless to say, given how fickle the Weather Gods have been this spring, please regard all dates mentioned above as being tentative. 

NSYBA 2002 spring home page.

Championship season page.