Volleyball Coaching Life-"Sandbagging"

 sand bagging

To deliberately perform at a lower level than you are capable of

A lot of discussions have been started and proposals made on how we can stop “Sandbagging” in the large tournaments. This seems to crop up every year around the same time when teams are trying to qualify for Junior National Championships. The accusations are that teams are maliciously playing below their potential, in an attempt to qualify for Nationals by hook or by crook. Their playing in a lower competitive level indicates that they are:

1.     Depriving a more worthy team who is playing in the correct level of competition of that chance at the bid.

2.     These teams are maliciously and deliberately cheating to get into the Nationals.

The first point smacks of entitlement while the second point is based on subjective and biased judgements.

Those who accuse teams of sandbagging often act as if they are the aggrieved team; more often than not, they are the team that gets knocked out of contention by a stronger team through competition, other times they are on the sideline looking thinking that if it wasn’t for that team, or all the other teams who are sandbagging we would be qualifying for nationals. That belief is false.

Remember, the divisions are structural not factual: The divisions are a convenience not a definition. It is a means of giving the USAV a means of organizing the large numbers of team participating. It is NOT a definition to be assigned to teams. Using the division definition is the tail wagging the dog. The teams play into the division definition by the body of their work AFTER having played the season, not before the season, not during the season. The determination can be made a posteriori, even that assignment to a division is dodgy.

The intent of dividing the field into divisions is both logistical and practical.

·       An unlimited division would entail many more matches in pool play to so that the field can be winnowed down to manageable brackets.

·       Bracket play would be untenable and last well beyond a weekend, and detrimental to the health of the players.

The tacit assumption is made by those who cry sandbagging that each team, as they are formed each season, have an identity ascribed to them. They are an Open team, we are a USA team. How can you tell?

To follow the logic of the complainants about “sandbagging”,  a clear definition of what each division means, and most important to them, a way of identifying these teams. These arguments are usually made to determine the definition in their minds.

·       The Eye Test. They look good: they are big and athletic.  What is meant: They are at least bigger and more athletic than my team, therefore they are “sandbagging” when they play in my division.

·       Competition Test. They have won matches in the higher division, they are therefore playing below their level now. Which is to discount the following:

o   The players they have available: There may be players on the roster that are missing from the tournament on the weekend that they play in a lower division.

o   The level of competition at each tournament is not homogeneous: The tournament on the weekend where the team played at a higher division is composed of generally weaker teams, ergo, they played better.

o   The path to bracket play is different for each tournament, subject to chance. Even though the tournaments are structured identically and all the rules are the same, each tournament is an independent event. The teams may find that they match up better against the opponents along their path in one tournament than the other tournaments. The components: teams, pools, and brackets change with each tournament. It is anything but predictable.

One proposed solution is the sliding qualification argument: if your team performed “well” playing at a higher division, you should stay in that division and not be allowed to move down.

Which leads to the idea that those teams who did well in a preceding qualifying tournament at a higher division will dominate in in a lower division for the next qualifying tournament This deploys a well-known fallacy: post hoc, er·​go propter hoc: after this, therefore because of this: because an event occurred first, it must have caused this later event—used to describe a fallacious argument. Each tournament is an independent event, if that team performed well at a higher division previously, it does not automatically mean they will dominate the following tournament at a lower division, all the arguments stated previously still holds. One would expect them to, but it is not guaranteed.

Examining the reason for “Sandbagging”, and I know there are teams that try to qualify at a lower division after having played and not succeeding to qualify at a higher division.

·       Maybe they aren’t good enough to compete at that level?

·       Maybe their coach and club misjudged their potential at the formation of the team?

·       Maybe they were better off playing in the lower division in the first place? A bitter dose of reality.

Now examining the reason for those who are upset at “sandbaggers”.

·       Maybe the adults making the decisions are not aware of the quality or the numbers of teams that play in their chosen division. They didn’t know what they didn’t know.

·       Maybe their coach and club misjudged their potential at the formation of the team?

·       Maybe those teams who are upset just aren’t good enough to compete with those teams at their self-identified division? A case of the Dunning Kruger effect.

·       Maybe they were better off playing in the lower division in the first place? Again not knowing what they didn’t know.

·       A bitter dose of reality, which turned into bitterness which turned into an exercise in the  sunken cost fallacy: we have committed the season to a selected division, but because we misjudged, our solution is to ignore our initial error and instead blame the “sandbaggers” for our team not being able to qualify.

The purpose of club sports is to have an opportunity to compete against all kinds of teams. You learn more from losing than from winning. I do agree that getting thumped mercilessly is not enjoyable, but that is part of the lessons of competition. Coaches pontificate brilliantly about resilience and grit. They are consulting with experts, reading books, and listening to podcasts to look for the magic potion that will make our players grittier and more resilient; yet, when our teams face any kind of headwinds, like a strong opponent in a competition, we balk and accuse others of malice. It can’t never be because our team are not performing or that we, the coaches, are mistaken.

Sometimes we coaches need to learn how to do what we constantly teach: suck it up Buttercup and play ball. As my friend always tells his teams before playing a tough match, strap on your crash helmets, this is a rough ride.

Although there is always the Patriot division if you want to go to nationals that badly.