To: WSFAlist at WSFA.org
Date: Tue, 29 Mar 2005 05:12:16 -0500
Subject: [WSFA] sports seeding
From: ronkean at juno.com
Reply-To: WSFA members <WSFAlist at WSFA.org>

On Mon, 28 Mar 2005 22:31:45 -0500 "Mike B." <omni at omniphile.com> writes:

> And then there's the sports news "seed" thing.  I'm pretty sure it
> really
> is "seed", but it makes very little sense in context.  "Seat" would
> make
> more sense...as in "Buddy is currently fourth seat in the
> tournament," but
> I've been told in the past that it's really "Buddy is currently
> fourth seed
> in the tournament," which sounds goofy and I keep wondering at the
> origin
> of this term.  Some part of me keeps wanting it to have been "seat"
> in the
> past, until some jock-turned-talking-head misheard it, started using
> it,
> and the rest of the herd-beasts just trundled along toward the
> linguistic
> cliffs with him.  Anybody know?
>

I had wondered about that myself, so I asked around until I got an
answer.  'Seed' is the correct term, not a misuse.  'Seeding' is a
feature of tournament procedure in which individual players are initially
pitted against other individual players deemed to be of a similar ability
level, to give all players a more nearly fair chance in the early rounds
of play.  Without seeding, it is not unlikely that some new and promising
players, ones who might happen to be matched with very good established
players in early play, could be knocked out of the tournament early.
When that happens, it is discouraging to the new players, it does not
make for interesting play, and it cuts short the opportunity for new
players to become successful in that tournament.  So, for the overall
good of the sport, and to promote more interesting play, tournaments use
'seeding'.

During the Cold War, Soviet chess players in international tournaments
were sometimes suspected of collusion to pit their strongest players
early against Western players, to knock out the Westerners and assure
that most of the top prizes went to Soviet players.

Ron Kean

.