Monday, April 07, 2008

Was Jorge Sammour-Hasbun the USCL's rookie of the year?

A few days ago in this blog entry, using the USCL rating system I developed, whether Todd Andrews should have won the USCL's Most Improved Player award. Today, I examine whether Jorge Sammour-Hasbun of the Boston Blitz should have won the Rookie of the Year award.

Sammour-Hasbun had a fantastic year in the USCL. He won six and drew two, without a loss. (Indeed his results in other tournaments have been similarly great; he just repeated as champion of the Dos Hermanas tournament - which was an incredible feat, given the competition he knocked out on the way there.)

But was he really the USCL's rookie of the year? How should that even be defined?

Let's start with the USCL rating system. One measure of whether a player is the rookie of the year is comparing the player's initial assigned rating and the player's rating at the end of the year, on the final 2007 list, and looking for the greatest difference. Remember that initial ratings are assigned by the board on which the player first competed.

Given that criterion, the rookie of the year would be the New York Knights' Irina Zenyuk (also spelled Iryna - I don't know what she prefers). She gained 136 points from her initial rating, while Sammour-Hasbun gained 125. Zenyuk also had an excellent year, with four wins, three draws, and a single loss.

Here are the top five rookies of 2007. They must have played a minimum of three games in 2007 to be included on this list.

1. Irina Zenyuk 2386 (+136, started at 2250, board 4)
2. Jorge Sammour-Hasbun 2575 (+125, started at 2450, board 2)
3. Eric Rodriguez 2370 (+120, started at 2250, board 4)
4. Chris Williams 2363 (+113, started at 2250, board 4)
5. Francisco Guadalupe 2352 (+102, started at 2250, board 4)

What rookie will take the award this year?

6 comments:

Ilya said...

I believe he only drew one game, so maybe your math is off because of it.

Bionic Lime said...

In the USCL rating system, all games are counted in the ratings, including the 5+5 blitz playoff games. That's where the second draw came from.

Rihel said...

I disagree that the difference in ratings from the start to the end should define rookie of the year. Going without a single loss, and taking your team to the final should be considered a big part of this.

vishank said...

Same here, i agree with rihel. The rookie is the year should not only depend on the change of rankings, it should also depend on how they affect their team.

UTDdad said...

Humm...check your ratings again. According to the final USCL list provided at the link, Francisco's final rating was 2388, not 2352, giving him a +138. Did I miss something?

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