Join the Top Level Sports Bracket Challenge!

Welcome to the Top Level Sports bracket challenge!  Here’s your chance to prove yourself as an expert March Madness prognosticator by joining the official Top Level Sports tourney pool on Yahoo.

Here is the link: Join the Bracket Challenge!

There is one important thing to note, however.  I have decided this year to forego the traditional bracket scoring of 1-2-4-8-16-32 points per round.  Over the years, I have become increasingly dissatisfied with the imbalance in relative worth of games with this scoring system used by a large majority of bracket pools.  While this system looks nice on the surface, with 32 points being available in every round and the point values as an inverse function of the teams remaining in the tournament, in practice I find it very unappealing because I believe it puts far too much emphasis on picking the correct champion rather than having a better overall bracket.  I believe that the first round should be where the most points are won, considering that 32 of the 63 March Madness matchups occur there, and it is the only round where going in the two teams playing are known.  However, in a normal pool, these games which comprise half the tournament are only worth 1/6 of the points, the same as the championship pick.  Often times, picking the correct champion can win a pool no matter how bad the rest of the bracket is.  I don’t agree with that.

This isn’t to say I don’t value choosing a correct final four or champion, as this is obviously harder to do and should be rewarded with more points per game, but overall a lower total for the round.  The scoring system that best reflects my interest of a well-rounded system which places gradually lower weight on lower rounds without becoming too complicated is the Fibonacci scoring system, based off the Fibonacci sequence, with scoring of 2-3-5-8-13-21.  Here the ratio of a championship pick to first round pick is 10.5:1, much more even than 32:1, and a round is worth as much as the two rounds preceding it.

Now that I’ve explained my rationale for choosing the Fibonacci system, there’s only one thing left for you to do: join the pool!  Here is the link again: Join the Bracket Challenge!

Good luck!

Connor