Gramps Braggin Rights Missouri Boys all schools/all class ratings - Alphabetical listing 3/15/2022

 Man, it's been an interesting week.  There always seems to be some chatter about the rankings and it isn't about the top ten teams in the state.  As one reader/follower messaged me, "it's always some small-town team in the middle of the rankings that has a bone to pick".  

I try to take these inquiries, as I call them, in stride.  I don't have a bone to pick with any team and my statistics are based on season performance, not just one game, but that is hard to get through to some people.  I was asked about West County LEADWOOD and Steelville's rankings and I spent an hour re-evaluating the two teams, something I typically only do for class four, five, and six, the top 10 teams or so.  I went through and explained the comparative statistics and was told they don't make sense.  We won by 10 and that's that.  Okay, so you don't buy season performance then?  One game does not make a season, does it?  If that was the case, we could just play and win the first game and call ourselves state champions, right?  Then on top of that, some yahoo from Leadwood called me a jackass and accused me of damaging the West County girl's psyche by not listing them as the fourth-best team in the state.  Sorry, bud, but I just post my analysis, I don't have any intention of castigating any team's performance or accomplishments.

Then another chap demanded that I remove point spreads.  Well, I have said this is not published so that you can go out and make some money in Vegas on Gramps line.  I doubt if you can even place a bet on a high school game in Festus.  The thing is, if you quantify a teams' performance over the season, you are measuring their capability vs. other teams.  It's no different than getting a grade in algebra, or a rating in the service, or a performance review at a job.  We get rated our entire lives, so what's the big deal about the difference between two teams' ratings (which becomes the game spread)?  Are we afraid someone might have hurt feelings if we give their team a rating?

I guess the best thing to do is to keep the system MSHSAA has and put all the best teams in one district and give the rest of the state a chance to be in the final four?  I mean the NCAA does that, right?  They put Arizona, Baylor, Gonzaga and Duke in the same bracket, don't they?  Oh, they don't?  I guess they use a comparative statistics model similar (but much, much better according to some of these respondents than mine).

I really do not care what MSHSAA uses to seed teams next year, as long as they consider actually seeding them instead of having the same great teams play each other early in the districts and have some horrible state finals.

I will post a final rating for all classes next week unless I get a lot more flack.  Heck, I might just retire.

Here's the alphabetical version of the boy's ratings:

ratings: