A1E: What's the dill?

First note, it seems that this blog has inspired at least two other folks from EWN to start ones of their own. More power to them, I says. But I'm also feeling a good feeling of flattery, seeing that imitation is its sincerest form and all.

Anyway, to the point of the post...

When I first got into A1E back in Y2K, I thought the vote system was the only way to go when it came to fantasy wrestling. Seeing that A1E and MBE both used it, and they were the only feds I was used to, I thought it was what worked best.

Then I joined the CWA (I think that's what it was called), Josh Weiner's fed over at FW, and I saw that a booked fed did work too. That was reinforced by Dave Brunk's Empire Pro, Sean Edmunds' New ERA, and all the other feds I've since joined.

There was also a growing discontent with the vote system, which started with Mike Stanton's vote-rigging to get him the Cyber Championship. Then there was Duchess beating Dan Ryan, among other screwy results. There was a growing voice within the A1E rank and file to change things. And I'd have to say, it was all justified. The vote system was keeping FW talent from jumping and mixing up the A1 talent pool. It cause grumbling to me in IM from certain folks. It was a mess.

Even I started to become disillusioned with the pure-vote system. I honestly thougth that there could have been bloc voting still happening, and I also thought that there wasn't a sufficient quorum for voting in the A1E roster. Results were being skewed.

So they decided on a compromise, a new system. They'd still count the public vote, but in case of a really out-of-whack result from the voters, the BC would have power of overturn.

At least that's how it was explained.

As the cards under this new system progressed, we were getting some results that were whackier than normal. The most egregious of these was Prisoner 187 going over Big Dog in the tournament. THe BC overturned that because they thought 187 was better than usual, but they never said if he was better than Big Dog that week or not. I'm guessing they let the results do the talking there.

But it turned out that the new system is really a BC vote thing, where each member's vote is weighted as one, while the public vote on the whole is weighted as two votes. Nevermind if you squashed in the public vote... that would be worth two votes in the new system, the same as if you won only by a single vote.

Now, I don't know if they're doing this in every match or not, but the fact remains that if it remains a possibility in any match, then it renders singular public voting worthless. Seriously, why should I vote if my vote may not have any bearing on the match? Out of seven counting votes, my vote would only make up *part* of the 2/7 that is counted from the public, and that's only if the guy I voted for won the public vote.

It's very troubling to say the least.

So, while it's admirable that the A1E Booking Committee tried to overhaul the system, it didn't work. It needs another overhaul. It needs as few people deciding the matches as possible. Honestly, I think the task of deciding matches should go on one person alone, three people at most. If anything, Roger (the noted head of the A1E BC) should be the only one deciding matches, and if that means that he can't run Housefly, Haven and whoever else he runs in the fed, then in the words of Housefly, "So be it." If he does want to run the characters, then they should go to the NFW system. Three votes, and in the case of matches by oen of the voters, do a Gregg Gethard Rule... have someone else vote in the guy's place. It's not that hard.

And it would certainly make things a lot simpler for all parties involved.

Besides, the vote system is clunky anyway. It puts the vote in hands of irresponsible people for the most part. I mean, I know that I don't read all the matches every week, so I don't vote every week. And there are people who don't read matches who do vote.

So why make the entire fed do a job that's suited for one to three people?