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Date: 17 Oct 2006 20:14:13
From: Zero
Subject: What *exactly* is a USCF rating floor?
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I went to my chess club today and a really strong player in our club
told me that he was USCF rated 1723 and then he told me with a big grin
that the USCF gave him a rating floor of 1600. Does that mean that his
rating cannot go below that level? If so, why not?
Also, what is the whole purpose behind letting someone have a rating
floor? Can't someone just keep his rating at his floor and win lots of
tournaments? I think rating floors are bad because what if you are no
longer playing at that level. It seems to be rewarding people who
still can handle the level of the rating floor. Especially, old people
should not have rating floors.
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Date: 18 Oct 2006 20:48:03
From: Mike Nolan
Subject: Re: What *exactly* is a USCF rating floor?
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"Zero" <[email protected] > writes:
>I went to my chess club today and a really strong player in our club
>told me that he was USCF rated 1723 and then he told me with a big grin
>that the USCF gave him a rating floor of 1600. Does that mean that his
>rating cannot go below that level? If so, why not?
Yes, someone's rating cannot fall below his floor, though a player
can request to have his floor lowered. (There needs to be evidence
that the player has been at or near his floor for an extended period
or this request will not be granted.) Also, a player who participates
in a match (ie, 2 or more games between two players) while at his
floor is now considered to have made a request to have his floor
lowered by 100 points.
Over the years various floor policies have been in effect.
There are actually three kinds of floors currently in effect:
1. A player who achieves a rating of 1600 or higher will have a floor
based on his peak rating less 200, rounded down to the next
100 point interval. That means a player who achieves a rating of
1600 through 1699 has a floor of 1400 and one who gets to 1700 has
a floor of 1500, etc. The highest rating floor that can be earned
in this fashion is 2100.
2. A player who wins $2000 or more as a class prize (under 2000 prize
or section), is assigned a floor high enough for that person to
be no longer eligible for that section, up to a floor of 2000. So,
a player who wins $2000 in an Under 1800 section would be assigned a
floor of 1800. (The dollar amount was recently raised from $1000 to
$2000.) This is considered an anti-sandbagging measure, thought it
isn't clear how effective it is at preventing sandbagging.
3. A player who has played 300 or more games in events where that player
had a rating of 2200 or higher at the beginning of the event is
considered an 'Original Life Master' and has a floor of 2200.
The 'original' part refers to the fact that there have been a few other
ways of being named a life master over the years, most of which have
since been dropped.
The Executive Board has discussed but has not yet implemented a policy
whereby foreign players with international titles (eg, IM, GM) would be
assigned an appropriate floor. (There apparently used to be a policy about
this, I don't know exactly when it was dropped, or why.)
Floors are considered to be mildly inflationary, but the the Ratings
Committee has been under orders for the past several years to reinflate
ratings a bit anyway to compensate for deflation in the 1990's, so floors
may be playing a small role in that process.
I think k Glickman explained that goal fairly well in his interview
in the October Chess Life.
--
MIke Nolan
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Date: 18 Oct 2006 12:27:40
From: Duncan Oxley
Subject: Re: What *exactly* is a USCF rating floor?
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The current Chess Life has in interview with Glickman
where he gives an honest opinion of rating floors I found
amusing.
I highly recommend everyone participating in this thread
read it.
--Duncan
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Date: 19 Oct 2006 12:22:09
From: David Richerby
Subject: Re: What *exactly* is a USCF rating floor?
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Duncan Oxley <No@Thanks > wrote:
> The current Chess Life has in interview with Glickman
> where he gives an honest opinion of rating floors I found
> amusing.
>
> I highly recommend everyone participating in this thread
> read it.
Could somebody perhaps sumize the main points for those of us who
aren't USCF members?
Cheers,
Dave.
--
David Richerby Zen Wine (TM): it's like a vintage
www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~davidr/ Beaujolais that puts you in touch with
the universe!
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Date: 18 Oct 2006 11:13:30
From: Chess One
Subject: Re: What *exactly* is a USCF rating floor?
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"Zero" <[email protected] > wrote in message
news:[email protected]...
>I went to my chess club today and a really strong player in our club
> told me that he was USCF rated 1723 and then he told me with a big grin
> that the USCF gave him a rating floor of 1600. Does that mean that his
> rating cannot go below that level? If so, why not?
>
> Also, what is the whole purpose behind letting someone have a rating
> floor? Can't someone just keep his rating at his floor and win lots of
> tournaments? I think rating floors are bad because what if you are no
> longer playing at that level. It seems to be rewarding people who
> still can handle the level of the rating floor. Especially, old people
> should not have rating floors.
I agree. I don't know why they exist at all, since they seem deliberately
designed to represent a false rating, something not indicative of current
strength. Phil Innes
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Date: 18 Oct 2006 09:49:11
From: David Richerby
Subject: Re: What *exactly* is a USCF rating floor?
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[ Followup-To: rec.games.chess.misc ]
Zero <[email protected] > wrote:
> I went to my chess club today and a really strong player in our club
> told me that he was USCF rated 1723 and then he told me with a big
> grin that the USCF gave him a rating floor of 1600. Does that mean
> that his rating cannot go below that level?
Yes. And everyone has a rating floor: there's nothing special about
this guy.
> If so, why not?
The idea is to prevent `sandbagging', i.e., deliberately losing games
to lower your rating and then win prizes in lower-rated sections.
> Can't someone just keep his rating at his floor and win lots of
> tournaments?
No. Winning lots of tournaments will increase your rating above the
floor.
> I think rating floors are bad because what if you are no longer
> playing at that level.
Exactly. The correct way for the USCF to have dealt with the problem
of sandbagging would be to say that nobody can win prizes in a class
below their `rating floor', not that nobody's rating can fall below
their rating floor. In this system, the rating of the person at your
club could fall below 1600 if he lost lots of games but he'd not be
able to win prizes in an U1600 tournament.
Rating floors corrupt the rating system by keeping the ratings of
deteriorating players artificially high. I guess the USCF decidede
that the effect wasn't great but I still don't see why they did it.
The system I propose has exactly the same administrative overhead but
doesn't corrupt the rating system.
> It seems to be rewarding people who still can handle the level of
> the rating floor.
No, it's rewarding people who *can't* handle the level of their
floor. The guy at your club will have a 1600+ rating for the rest of
his life, even if he keeps playing in tournaments after he forgets how
the pieces move.
Dave.
--
David Richerby Revolting Cheese Ghost (TM): it's
www.chiark.greenend.org.uk/~davidr/ like a haunting spirit that's made of
cheese but it'll turn your stomach!
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Date: 17 Oct 2006 21:08:10
From: bobby
Subject: Re: What *exactly* is a USCF rating floor?
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Zero wrote:
> I went to my chess club today and a really strong player in our club
> told me that he was USCF rated 1723 and then he told me with a big grin
> that the USCF gave him a rating floor of 1600. Does that mean that his
> rating cannot go below that level? If so, why not?
>
> Also, what is the whole purpose behind letting someone have a rating
> floor? Can't someone just keep his rating at his floor and win lots of
> tournaments? I think rating floors are bad because what if you are no
> longer playing at that level. It seems to be rewarding people who
> still can handle the level of the rating floor. Especially, old people
> should not have rating floors.
well tell him that you should be respected as a not so good player and
it will be fine, the nerve that guy had right?
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