2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

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2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by Crazy Khan Tech »

Inspired by the Canadian and general player polls, I’m pleased to announce the 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll.
Eligibility is gained by fulfilling either of the following criteria:

1. Playing 2019 ACF Regionals at UCF and/or 2019 SCT at UF
2. Playing any two of NASAT at Valencia, Cambridge Open at UCF, Penn Bowl at Auburn, AL, ACF Regionals at UCF, D1 SCT at UF, Sun God at NCF, Spartan Housewrite at UF, or PIANO at GTech

Note that these eligibility criteria do NOT exclude players from non-Florida institutions who otherwise fulfill the requirements. Open players are not eligible.
You are welcome to consider all tournaments from the past year, and public posting and commentary of ballots are welcome, but not required. Open players are not eligible. Your ballot should include 20 players.

Ballots may be publicly posted in this thread or sent to me privately at [email protected] or by Facebook Messenger. Ballots are due by May 27.

The following is a list of tournaments that were either hosted in Florida or attended by eligible Florida players:

SUMO (SSNCT) at UCF: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5109/
CamO at UCF: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5127/
Chicago Open: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5380/
NASAT at Valencia: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5172/
Collegiate Novice at UF: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5225/
EFT at UCF: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5254/
Penn Bowl at Auburn: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5253/
Delta Burke at Valencia: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5402/
ACF Fall at UF: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5381/
Sun God at NCF: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5362/
ACF Regionals at UCF: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5582/
SCT at UF: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5616/
Spartan Housewrite at UF: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5570/
HFT at Santa Fe: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5267/
CCCT at Valencia: https://www.naqt.com/stats/tournament/s ... nt_id=9503
Terrapin at Auburn, AL: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5667/
ILLIAC at UF: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5713/
FST at UF: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5630/
PIANO at Georgia Tech: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5533/
ICT: https://www.naqt.com/stats/tournament/s ... nt_id=9501
ACF Nationals: http://hsquizbowl.org/db/tournaments/5750/
Last edited by Crazy Khan Tech on Thu May 02, 2019 10:28 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by bradleykirksey »

Edit: I saw "played two of these tournaments" instead of "Open players are not eligible" and then listed a bunch of ineligible open players.

Then I, even more stupidly, included Jesse Gingold, who is most definitely enrolled at Valencia, because I am a moron, which is my primary motivation for most of the stuff I do.
Last edited by bradleykirksey on Thu May 02, 2019 1:05 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by Crazy Khan Tech »

Although Bradley is correct that all of the players he listed are excellent, some of them are not eligible for this poll due to being open players. My intent for this poll is to determine who the community views as the top 20 active Florida collegiate players, and although these open players are excellent and many would undoubtedly be ranked in an overall poll, they are unfortunately not eligible in this one.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by jonah »

bradleykirksey wrote: Wed May 01, 2019 5:08 pm It might be worth noting that the above criteria would include several people who are not currently going to school, like…Jesse Gingold
I sure hope he's enrolled, because he's been playing stuff.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by DanacondaGolisch »

jonah wrote: Wed May 01, 2019 6:34 pm
bradleykirksey wrote: Wed May 01, 2019 5:08 pm It might be worth noting that the above criteria would include several people who are not currently going to school, like…Jesse Gingold
I sure hope he's enrolled, because he's been playing stuff.
Yeah, Brad made a boo-boo there. Jesse has been enrolled at Valencia this past year and is starting at UCF this summer.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by TaylorH »

In hopes of starting a bit of a discussion, I am posting my preliminary ballot and a few comments on each player here. This is subject to change and is largely based on 6 years of observation while playing in this circuit and some cursory stats browsing. All the players here are very worthy of praise and attention for their skills and pleasantness.

1. Taylor Harvey
“Taylor is one of the two players in Florida who really garner any national attention (the other being our teammate Tracy "the Gherkin" Mirkin"), and deservedly so. He has anchored our team this year and every previous year due to his very strong lit knowledge--he has indeed read more than 15 books--and increasingly wide and deep knowledge in other categories, even science! I can also attest that he is good at situating our team on many bonuses, e.g. time period, author, etc, that provides a substantial bump to our PPB that is not noticeable when just looking at stats. While Tracy "the Murkin'" Mirkin is hot on his heels, his ability to buzz on 16-18 different categories even at the hardest difficulty levels edges him out at #1 in this poll, and if you aren't putting him as the #1 player in Florida, you haven't been paying attention.” -- Jonathen Settle

2. Tracy Mirkin
Tracy is the second best player in the region-- and the country-- with a unisex 'T' name and glasses. Jokes aside, Tracy is The Real Deal: generalist chops with deep specialties in history and arts, quick recall and buzzer speed, great at lateral thinking, excellent study habits and a real drive to constantly improve. Tracy means to make his mark in quiz bowl history and I am sure that he will just seeing his improvement in the two years I've known him.

3. Jonathen Settle
Jonathen possesses the deepest specialty in the South, but his generalist abilities are nothing to sneeze at either. His science skills-- particularly his mastery of physics, computer science, and math-- go a long way in making UF A as good as it is. He has excellent quiz sense and will Steal Your Buzz on almost any category given the right topic.

4. Alex Shaw
Yes, yes, maybe a bit egocentric to rank the members of UF A as the Top 4, but Alex certainly earns this spot. Normally a third or fourth scorer on a stacked team, Alex's generalist abilities were certainly on display in leading his team to win the D1 site of Florida SCT. Alex is excellent at lit, arts, computer science, philosophy and especially social science, where his psych knowledge is probably among the best in the game.

5. Daniel Golisch
As I told him after a tight game at Spartan, Daniel is the only player in the circuit that makes me a little nervous to play. His religion and history knowledge is formidable and his buzzer speed is to be feared. His position as a high level generalist anchor will be sorely missed at UCF.

6. Jesse Gingold
The best new face in the region, Jesse never ceases to surprise with his knowledge and quickness. Just look to his CCCT performances if you are in doubt: the Olds of the Florida circuit have a new rising star to contend with.

7. Tejas Santanam
While I have not seen him play quite as much as most of the other names on the list, Tejas has been causing waves in the region by leading GA Tech in scoring with a solid lit specialty. Tech is going to be a giant in the region very soon, and Tejas is a huge part of that.

8. Jacob Hujsa
UF A's sometimes fifth scorer and rock of UF B, Jacob has music specialty a mile wide. Many of the most delightful questions at 2019 FST were a result of Jacob's deep arts, poetry, mythology, and general knowledge. Jacob is truly the Player Most Likely to Outbuzz You in Your Category from Something He Learned in Uncle John's Bathroom Reader.

9. Leo Law
The glue of NCF, Leo's commitment to improving has led to his ability to buzz on nearly every category at regs difficulty. The only player in the region to make Jonathen sweat a bit on math and physics, Leo will likely keep improving into grad school at UF.

10. Zachary Knecht
Undoubtedly the best CE and American History player in the region, President Knecht is a presence to be feared when up against UF B. See his solo 90 ppg FST performance if there are any doubts to his skill.

11. Peter Torres
A monster on history, geography and trash, Peter has been a strong presence in the circuit longer than most people on this list. Every game Peter manages several impressive buzzes and instances of Figuring it Out despite being shadowed by some of his teammates with similar strengths.

12. David Honsinger
David never fails to impress me with his early buzzes, usually on extra-canonical topics that make me wonder "how did he know that?" David's specialty seems to be "stuff you've never heard of" and that stuff scales all the way to nats.

13. Katia Diamond
Like David and several other players at NCF, Katia is the type of player who is buzzing on questions when you have know idea what is going on. Very much a Real Knowledge player, Katia's consistent performance at nats for the past few years is not to be ignored.

14. Chandler West
Honorary Floridian Chandler has deep pockets of knowledge in visual arts, lit, American history, and trash, and always makes our games against Auburn interesting. Chandler's commitment to improving and general interest in the community are inspiring.

15. Hannah Sage
Hannah's level-headedness, ability to buzz on nearly every category, and nearly non-existent negging make her a Apollonian presence on otherwise chaotic UCF lineups. Hannah's consistency and generalism is much feared by the lower rungs of her UF B rivals like the below pair.

16. Khanh Nguyen
Khanh will own you on any History Thing every mentioned in Total War, Civ, Mount and Blade, European Power Metal or any Youtube channel focuses on battle diagrams. He will also blindside you on geography and probably neg before you have processed any information in the question. Despite his impulsive buzzing, Khanh is a strong specialist to watch going forward.

17. Henry Hill
The Vladamir to Khanh's Estragon on Florida B/C, Henry's very real knowledge in science, myth, lit and random occult historical things is to be admired. Henry's dedication to reading primary text on myth and thought and his general passion for learning might make him a great player one day if he keeps at it.

18. David Espinal
David's buzzer speedy, wide generalist knowledge and exuberant play style make him a memorable character that is constantly a scoring presence on rather stacked UCF A or B teams.

19. Dylan Higbie
Dylan consistently gets great buzzes on history and often contends with many of the other solid UCF players in scoring.

20. Jason Zappulla
Maybe the least known of UF's extremely deep bench, Jason has maybe the deepest history knowledge in the circuit in select areas. Though he has a very reserved play style, his ability to effortlessly 30 history bonuses on 19th century politician you've never heard of is awe inspiring.

Honorable Mentions (no order):

Nabeel Farooq
Nabeel is one of the best science players in the circuit and has deep pockets of religion and social science to boot.

Jared Stinson and Garrett Johnston
I have not played Auburn enough to really know what Jared and Garrett are good at, but they both frequently give Chandler good support in scoring and seem to be improving each time I see them.

Kayla Kalhor
She second scored the Florida D2 SCT, largely a result of her solid lit and science dual wielding. Kayla is a promising new face in the circuit.

Jenna Callison
Like Kayla, Jenna only played a few tournaments this year, but when she did she often impressed with a solid handle on the history cannon.

Donny Lisle
Donny's lit and art knowledge is often impressive, especially on more contemporary topics. His specialties have served various UCF teams well over the last well years.

Max Murphy
Yet another UCF player with a solid history and general knowledge foundation, Max has impressed me several times this year with some excellent bonus gets, especially at SCT.

Will Grossman
Will has consistently been a strong player on a very strong Florida B/C team. He has a strong lit foundation and is starting to develop a deep specialty in social science as well. On top of this, he is very dedicated to improving and studies like a madman.

Anthony Delgado
Almost certainly the best film player you;ve never heard of, Anthony's knowledge base is diverse and hard to describe, but I've heard him get great buzzes on everything from lit to religion to painting.

Harrison Andrews
Almost certainly the best trash player in the circuit, Harrison's generalist ability and diverse knowledge base has added some firepower to a variety of NCF lineups.

Griffin Thompson
Griffin strikes me as a generalist in the making who seems to take after his forefathers Peter and Daniel in play style. One to look out for moving forward.

People that are maybe not quite eligible but deserve a shout:

Bhanodai Pippala
Though UGA only clashed with the Florida teams a few times this year, Bhanodai and his teammates made those clashes memorable. His history skills are no joke, and were a large part in dealing UF A our only lose to a closed team in the regular season.

David Galban
UGA's secret weapon, David consistently fires off excellent buzzes across many categories. His buzz on Anna Bach at PIANO was among the sickest I heard all year.

Rosa Brown
I've played her once or twice, but Rosa has very much impressed me with some strong lit buzzes. And she went 48/0 at (Georgia) Regs!

Maddie Hendrick
FSU's pillar of scoring over the last few years, Maddie's generalist knowledge base and ability to lead a relatively small team is to be admired.

Did I miss anyone? Let me know.
Last edited by TaylorH on Thu May 02, 2019 3:35 pm, edited 3 times in total.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by bradleykirksey »

jonah wrote: Wed May 01, 2019 6:34 pm
bradleykirksey wrote: Wed May 01, 2019 5:08 pm It might be worth noting that the above criteria would include several people who are not currently going to school, like…Jesse Gingold
I sure hope he's enrolled, because he's been playing stuff.
Yeah. My post initially said "at a 4 year University" and included Jesse because he normally played CC tournaments instead of SCT, Nats, or ICT. I changed it because I didn't know how to classify myself, which is dumb, because I'm bad at quiz bowl. The moral of this story is that I don't know how to read. Not anything about Jessie.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by wjg »

First off, I'd like to thank Zach for making this poll. It's a fantastic idea to generate some recognition for the efforts of players in a circuit that is to some extent geographically isolated from the rest of quizbowl for much of the year.

I believe the way that Zach has designed the eligibility for this, though, only Florida players are eligible. So, Taylor, while Bhanodai, David Galban, Tejas, Chandler, Garrett, Jared, and Rosa are all excellent players worthy of recognition, I don't think they'd be eligible for this poll since they didn't all play two of the tournaments Zach listed. But correct me if I'm wrong, Zach.

In regards to your poll, though, I'd like to echo many of your sentiments, and add some of my own, primarily in regards to my own teammates this year. This circuit has many great players worthy of recognition, many of whom Taylor has included in his poll, but I am able to speak to the knowledge and work ethic of the people who I practice with three nights a week in the most detail. I completely agree with your top 6, and beyond that, I'd like to emphasize how right you are about Zach Knecht, Jacob Hujsa, Khanh, and Henry. Zach has excellent knowledge on his categories, and is a stellar in game decision maker. I sat next to him at ACF Nats while he led our team in scoring during prelims without negging once throughout the entire tournament, which is definitely an impressive feat. Jacob has great knowledge on a wide range of categories, but music, lit, myth and fine arts definitely stand out. He scales quite well on all of those, which led to him getting many early buzzes at ACF Nats, especially some very impressive music buzzes there. Khanh and Henry have been my teammates at the majority of tournaments this year, so I can attest to how extremely deep and real their knowledge is on their respective categories. They also both have surprising range, with Khanh possessing a good amount of bio and chem knowledge to complement his deep history/geo ability and Henry regularly surprising me with how many categories he can buzz on.

I'd also like to go into some detail on some UF players who were honorable mentions in Taylor's preliminary poll that I plan on ranking a bit higher. I can't bring up Anthony Delgado without mentioning his incredibly deep film knowledge (he scored 710 points at our SHAWARMA II mirror with many strong players, including Taylor, who is an excellent film player. Anthony's quiz bowl ability goes far beyond film, though. He has been a true swiss army knife for our team this year, constantly helping us with his ability to consistently buzz on an extremely wide range of categories and his penchant for converting hard bonus parts as much as anyone on Florida B/C. He's regularly a threat on lit, history, visual art, social sciences, religion, and thought. To be honest, I think his stats (which are quite good freshman stats in a vacuum anyway) don't even do him justice, being that he most often plays on a team where he has some significant overlap with almost everyone on the team (Khanh on History, Henry on thought and SS, and myself on lit and SS). The same could be said for everyone on Florida B/C, but I think this affects Anthony the most given his breadth of knowledge. I would strongly encourage voters to rank Anthony on your poll.

Jason Zappulla has consistently deep and wide real history knowledge, and regularly impresses us with his ability to convert hard answerlines and 30 countless history bonuses. He also has some degree of generalism (which makes the fact that he seldom negs even more impressive) in other humanities oriented categories that should not be ignored, and has helped play a key role in some upset victories for his Florida D (sometimes C or E) teams throughout the year. Jason's constantly relaxed and happy demeanor while playing quizbowl coupled with his extremely real and impressive knowledge make him a memorable figure on the Florida circuit who will only get better next year, and I'd strongly encourage voters to rank him.

Nabeel Farooq is a very strong science specialist with some good secondary categories at well. Nabeel does neg often, but a big factor in that is that he is often the only science player on his team. He more than makes up for that with many early buzzes though, and his knowledge scales well. He has had a lot of success this year (top 10 at Regionals and many other tournaments and a solid Nats performance), and his quiet excellence should be recognized.

Kayla Kalhor and Jenna Callison have a relatively smaller sample size of tournaments relative to the others mentioned, but they both have very good lit knowledge, and Kayla is quite a strong science player, whereas Jenna has a good history specialist base. They both have the ability to beat many players who will be ranked high on this poll to their respective categories, and neither of them should be overlooked.

Lastly, while I'm the last person to build myself up, I do think I've improved fair amount over the course of the year, especially in terms of deepening my lit knowledge and expanding some subcategories, like social science and US geo, and I think my stats decidedly improved over the course of the year. My ACF Nats stats were nothing eye-popping, but I scaled a bit better than I expected, and I was able to get several good lit buzzes off of eventual top bracket teams in prelims, for what that's worth, and I'd like to think my newfound ability to not neg often adds some value.

I'd love to hear input from more people and really generate a discussion. Thanks again Zach for making this poll, and Taylor for your input so far. I'm glad to see the Florida circuit getting recognition!
Last edited by wjg on Thu May 02, 2019 10:32 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by wjg »

A correction to my last post. Based on Zach's eligibility requirements, I believe that Chandler, Zach, and Jared of Auburn players are eligible for this poll by virtue of of playing Penn Bowl and Spartan Housewrite, but I do not think GT and UGA meet the two tournament requirement (but again, correct me if I'm wrong). Would there be interest in simply expanding this to an overall southeast poll to include them? That could certainly be a separate poll if not.

Edit: Several of the GA Tech players are indeed eligible in light of PIANO being added to the list of tournaments for meeting the criteria.
Last edited by wjg on Thu May 02, 2019 11:52 am, edited 2 times in total.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by LeoLaw »

TaylorH wrote: Thu May 02, 2019 12:33 am 13. David Honsinger
David never fails to impress me with his early buzzes, usually on extra-canonical topics that make me wonder "how did he know that?" David's specialty seems to be "stuff you've never heard of" and that stuff scales all the way to nats.

14. Katia Diamond
Like David and several other players at NCF, Katia is the type of player who is buzzing on questions when you have know idea what is going on. Very much a Real Knowledge player, Katia's consistent performance at nats for the past few years is not to be ignored.
I am going to do the customary "shout out to my teammates" kind of thing. I feel incredibly blessed to have David and Katia as my teammates for the last couple years. David and Katia don't usually put up big numbers at tournaments, but that's because they don't study clues from packets that much, most things they know are real knowledge, which means more early buzzes (though they are both usually conservative at buzzing early) and 30s on bonuses and less ppgs. And it shows, as they both outscored me at Nats. I am going to miss both David and Katia as teammates as they are also just really good people.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by Jewish Pugilist »

TaylorH wrote: Thu May 02, 2019 12:33 am I did not rank Maddie Hendrick or Peter Torres-- who are both excellent players--
since I am not sure if they were enrolled all of this year, and each only
played 1-2 tournaments.

Did I miss anyone? Let me know.
I was enrolled in fall and graduated. Idk if that makes me eligible or not
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by LeoLaw »

Also, just for funsy, I have some opinions about Florida players awards partially inspired by NBA that my insomniac brain came up with:

MVP(Most valuable player): Taylor Harvey
Taylor is the Steph Curry of Florida quizbowl, enough said. Taylor is the kind of player who powers a tossup on your favorite novels against you and you can't do anything about it.

Fourth score of the year: Alex Shaw
You can't really go wrong with this one either. While Alex was the fourth score on UF A most of the time, pretty sure that any team in the southeast would be more than happy to add him on the team and trust me, he won't be the fourth or third score on any of them. He is good at Social science and Computer Science, but honestly the scariest thing about him was that sometime, it feels like he has never dropped a tossup in his entire life.

Defensive player of the year: Hannah Sage
Well, I can't come up with a good name for it but the analog of DPOY in quizbowl to me, is the kind of player who just gets a lot of points and never negs. Pretty sure no one does that better than Hannah in the southeast. Hannah knows a lot of chem and a lot of art, and can buzz on almost every other categories as well.

Most improved player: ?
I don't know who to pick for this one, since an important criterion for MIP in the NBA is that the player wasn't getting much of any attention the year before, and all of a sudden exploded into the big-scene. No one really fits this one to me.

Rookie of the year: Khanh Nguyen or Henry Hill
UF peps can decide this one for me (if you want). Henry knows a lot of science and has a decent generalist game, but Khanh gets a lot of powers, it's a tossup to me.

Coach of the year: Chris Borglum
Shout out to the other CC coaches, but we all know that CB is the Gregg Popovich of CC quizbowl. It's no coincident that Valencia is more than often contenting for the CCCT championship.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by Zealots of Stockholm »

Since most of Auburn A is eligible for this poll (Me/Jared/Zach all played PB + Spartan), I'd like to take a second to shout out my teammates.

Garrett is excellent at history but is ineligible for this poll. He basically only buzzes on history + Geo/CE and Astro/geology, and usually clears 20 PPG (25/1 at Regs with me also going 5/2 on history).

Jared and Zach are both science players, and are both pretty good. They're both best at Bio and Chem, with Jared better at Bio and Zach better at Chem (I think). Usually Zach gets physics for us but we're much better at Bio and Chem. Jared tends to have a lot of breadth and helps us pull bonus parts all over the place and gets an occasional sick buzz outside of science. He's also been learning philosophy this year. Zach was strictly a science specialist coming into the year, and has been improving a lot this year and seems committed to continuing to improve, and has started picking up religion and myth recently. He went from 8.5 ppg at PB in October to 16.67 at Spartan in January.

Jared and Zach both have very good visual arts knowledge but are shadowed by me on this category. They will each usually get 1-2 TU per tournament in this category.

I'm best at lit, visual arts, and some American history. In tournaments outside of FL, I think I was the top scorer on lit at all tournaments with advanced stats. I also get occasional buzzes elsewhere (except in science) from osmosis. I think my ranking could vary pretty widely depending on what difficulty you value skill at most, as I don't scale super well but I think I do best at regs. I think my best two tournaments this year were ACF regs and the prelims of Spartan Housewrite, and my worst two were PIANO and ICT (I'm baaaad at NAQT), and I thought I did decently at my first ACF nats. If the UGA/GT folks were eligible (they aren't by Zach's guidelines), I would place myself somewhere similar to Tejas/Bhanodai as we generally have comparable PPGs on teams which are competitive with each other.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by Crazy Khan Tech »

Just wanted to clarify-most of the Auburn players are eligible, while the UGA people to my knowledge are not.

I recognize that this distinction may be somewhat arbitrary. I used the Canadian eligibility criterion of playing two regular difficulty tournaments or harder that were attended by Florida people. If there is significant interest in including the UGA people, I am willing to amend the eligibility slightly.

However, I am not interested in expanding this poll to a broader southeast poll. The main intention is still to determine the best players in the Florida circuit, and Auburn certainly has enough interaction with the Florida circuit to warrant their inclusion.
Last edited by Crazy Khan Tech on Thu May 02, 2019 12:02 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by TaylorH »

Crazy Khan Tech wrote: Thu May 02, 2019 10:30 am Just wanted to clarify-most of the Auburn players are eligible, while the Georgia people to my knowledge are not.

I recognize that this distinction may be somewhat arbitrary. I used the Canadian eligibility criterion of playing two regular difficulty tournaments or harder that were attended by Florida people. If there is significant interest in including the Georgia people, I am willing to amend the eligibility slightly.

However, I am not interested in expanding this poll to a broader southeast poll. The main intention is still to determine the best players in the Florida circuit, and Auburn certainly has enough interaction with the Florida circuit to warrant their inclusion.
At the risk of this devolving into Canada II: Is Georgia a Part of Florida, I admit I failed to read the rules carefully. It seems the UGA people largely ineligible, but Tejas and some of the rest of GA Tech are, having played Penn Bowl and PIANO. I will adjust my original post soon accordingly.
Last edited by TaylorH on Thu May 02, 2019 3:40 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by VSCOelasticity »

TaylorH wrote: Thu May 02, 2019 11:28 am
Crazy Khan Tech wrote: Thu May 02, 2019 10:30 am Just wanted to clarify-most of the Auburn players are eligible, while the Georgia people to my knowledge are not.

I recognize that this distinction may be somewhat arbitrary. I used the Canadian eligibility criterion of playing two regular difficulty tournaments or harder that were attended by Florida people. If there is significant interest in including the Georgia people, I am willing to amend the eligibility slightly.

However, I am not interested in expanding this poll to a broader southeast poll. The main intention is still to determine the best players in the Florida circuit, and Auburn certainly has enough interaction with the Florida circuit to warrant their inclusion.
At the risk of this devolving into Canada II: Is Georgia a Part of Florida, I admit failed to read the rules carefully. It seems the UGA people largely ineligible, but Tejas and some of the rest of GA Tech are, having played Penn Bowl and PIANO. I will adjust my original post soon accordingly.
Some UGA people have played both Spartan @ UF and Terrapin @ Auburn, so they should be eligible
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by wjg »

LeoLaw wrote: Thu May 02, 2019 2:40 am Also, just for funsy, I have some opinions about Florida players awards partially inspired by NBA that my insomniac brain came up with:

MVP(Most valuable player): Taylor Harvey
Taylor is the Steph Curry of Florida quizbowl, enough said. Taylor is the kind of player who powers a tossup on your favorite novels against you and you can't do anything about it.

Fourth score of the year: Alex Shaw
You can't really go wrong with this one either. While Alex was the fourth score on UF A most of the time, pretty sure that any team in the southeast would be more than happy to add him on the team and trust me, he won't be the fourth or third score on any of them. He is good at Social science and Computer Science, but honestly the scariest thing about him was that sometime, it feels like he has never dropped a tossup in his entire life.

Defensive player of the year: Hannah Sage
Well, I can't come up with a good name for it but the analog of DPOY in quizbowl to me, is the kind of player who just gets a lot of points and never negs. Pretty sure no one does that better than Hannah in the southeast. Hannah knows a lot of chem and a lot of art, and can buzz on almost every other categories as well.

Most improved player: ?
I don't know who to pick for this one, since an important criterion for MIP in the NBA is that the player wasn't getting much of any attention the year before, and all of a sudden exploded into the big-scene. No one really fits this one to me.

Rookie of the year: Khanh Nguyen or Henry Hill
UF peps can decide this one for me (if you want). Henry knows a lot of science and has a decent generalist game, but Khanh gets a lot of powers, it's a tossup to me.

Coach of the year: Chris Borglum
Shout out to the other CC coaches, but we all know that CB is the Gregg Popovich of CC quizbowl. It's no coincident that Valencia is more than often contenting for the CCCT championship.
This is a fun idea. I think a strong case can be made for Jesse Gingold for most improved player. He was no doubt a good quizbowl player last year, but if you compare his 2018 CCCT/ICT stats to those he put up in 2019 at the same tournaments, the improvement is great, and it shows you how much work he puts in. I fully expect him to be a force in this region and beyond for years to come.

If you count high school to college improvement, Tejas Santanam has done a great job of going from being a good high school generalist to being well on his way to very strong college generalism. He impresses me at every tournament I see him at, and I believe he and his teammates will bring GA Tech to prominence on a broad quiz bowl level in the years to come.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by VSCOelasticity »

I will provide some commentary with my votes; apologies if the commentaries are longer on the UF people, but I see them like five times a week so I have more to blabber about.

1. Taylor Harvey
You already heard what I had to say about Taylor. He's number one on this poll.

2. Tracy Mirkin
Tracy's definitely earned his spot at number two in Florida. This year he has substantially added to his existing history and generalist knowledge to start stealing points from Taylor and Alex in Fine Arts and Lit. He's got great buzzer speed (the perks of being young) and even better game sense. Perhaps his best performance of the season was ICT, where he led Florida A in powers. He is extremely motivated to study, so watch out Taylor!

3. Alex Shaw
Despite getting shadowed by Taylor and Tracy, Alex continues to display strong generalist ability by leading his team to victory at the Florida site of SCT. He lacks a bit of depth, but he consistently gets clutch middle buzzes while playing on the A team

4. Daniel Golisch
During his time at UCF he has grown into a great first scorer for them, specializing in history and religion (mostly bible I believe) with the ability to buzz across the distribution.

5. Jonathen Settle
I'm decent at science and the 5 books I've read.

6. Jesse Gingold
His PIANO stats indicate he still has some work to do at the higher difficulties, but Jesse is a solid generalist. I'm looking forward to seeing how he improves at UCF next year. He and the rest of UCF at a great shot at doing some things in D2 SCT/ICT.

7. Tejas Santanam
Tejas led a young (I think?) GT team to a great year. I'm not really quite sure what he's good at, but he's definitely good. Like Jesse, I think his PIANO stats show he can't quite scale yet, but he's on his way to being a great player in the region.

8. Jacob Hujsa
Jacob consistently demonstrates his knowledge in fine arts (particularly music), mythology, and lit (particularly poetry he's read). His biggest enemy is himself, as he'll often neg himself out of things that he could have gotten before everyone else in the room; despite that, he's had great scoring performances throughout his final year in undergrad.

9. Peter Torres
Another history-knower in the FL circuit. His overlap with Daniel hurts his stats at a lot of tournaments, but Peter is a can play the quiz.

10. Zachary Knecht
This dude knows CE. I had the pleasure of playing with Zachary once this year, and it was a great comfort. He really knows the stuff he knows, and hardly ever negs (I wish I knew how to do that). At ACF Nats, Zachary helped Jacob lead Florida B to a not-too-shabby top of bottom bracket finish.

11. Leo Law
Always being a strong physics and math quizzer, Leo had to fill in some generalist gaps at NCF after Yonatan stepped back. His Nats performance was kind of surprising, but he has played well across many tournaments all year.

12. David Honsinger
David consistently proves that he knows things that no one else knows. Every time I've played NCF it feels like David buzzes on something I've never heard of before, mostly in history, but also in other things.

13. Katia Diamond
Ok all the NCF people ending up was not on purpose, I promise. Katia impresses me in a similar way to David. Katia's knowledge is very real, so it is hard to categorize her buzzes in a quizbowl-sense.

14. Hannah Sage
Hannah shares with Zachary the ability to put up a lot of points while hardly ever negging. She is probably the second best science player due to her chem and bio knowledge, and can buzz almost everywhere else.

15. Chandler West
An Alabamian that makes the drive with his teammates once or twice a year to come play at UF, Chandler knows his stuff in visual arts, literature, American history, and basketball. He provides a solid anchor to an Auburn team that is on the up and up.

16. Khanh Nguyen
Khanh has been a lovely addition to the quizbowl community in Florida. Sometimes he knows too much for his own good and gets tripped up, but most times he is pulling a 30 or powering a tossup on some history thing he has learned from some "degenerate" source. He is also very good at geography and has some ability to steal buzzes in other categories.

17. Henry Hill
Henry, like Khanh, posses real knowledge even if it is "degenerate". Henry has shown great ability in science, myth, religion, literature, and random things he's learned while studying to GM for Call of Cthulu. After powering up from the books bought at the Friend of the Library sale, he will be an even bigger force to be reckoned with next year.

18. David Espinal
David could help Jesse, Hannah, and (Donny? Max? Griffin? someone else? idk lol) fill in for Daniel's passing from the world of QB to the world of real life with his solid generalist knowledge. He played well throughout the season, and almost led his team to a victory in a disadvantage final vs Florida B at SCT. With another summer under his belt, he could shape into a great player.

19. Will Grossman
Will has consistently improved throughout this season, managing to lead Florida C to the D2 title at ACF Regionals. He lacks some of the specialization possessed by his teammates, but he provides a breadth of knowledge that has kept Florida B competitive throughout the year.

20. Dylan Higbie
Consistently got solid history buzzes while I read to his team at FST. Furthermore, he has displayed his abilities against Florida A several times this season getting points with real knowledge in a variety of categories.

Honorable Mentions (no order): Garrett Johnston (eligibility), Nabeel Farooq, Jared Stinson,
Kayla Kalhor, Jason Zappulla, Rosa Brown, Donny Lisle, Max Murphy,
Anthony Delgado, Harrison Andrews, Griffin Thompson, David Galban (eligibility reasons),
Yonatan Stone (eligibilty reasons), Bhanodai Pippala (eligibility)

Hopefully I did not forget anyone.

I would also like to say I am thankful for everyone on the Florida circuit for making each and every tournament fun to play :) I am looking forward to seeing y'all again next year!

Edit: Removed Bhanodai since he was not eligible.
Last edited by VSCOelasticity on Fri May 03, 2019 1:49 pm, edited 1 time in total.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by ValenciaQBowl »

His PIANO stats indicate he still has some work to do at the higher difficulties, but Jesse is a solid generalist
This is fair, but keep in mind that at PIANO Jesse was on a team with me and Sean Platzer (history/classics) and Ian Mackenzie (art/art history), so the shadow was strongly in effect for him. His best areas (lit, history, art, music) are my best areas and partly those of his other (older) teammates there. Maybe a better illustration of his ability to scale up is that he had 21 powers in 13 games at CCCT and 22 powers in 13 games at ICT (on tougher questions versus better teams).

He spent a lot of last summer reading hard packets with me to make a big leap, and I expect he'll make a similar leap for UCF next year.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by VSCOelasticity »

ValenciaQBowl wrote: Fri May 03, 2019 10:28 am
His PIANO stats indicate he still has some work to do at the higher difficulties, but Jesse is a solid generalist
This is fair, but keep in mind that at PIANO Jesse was on a team with me and Sean Platzer (history/classics) and Ian Mackenzie (art/art history), so the shadow was strongly in effect for him. His best areas (lit, history, art, music) are my best areas and partly those of his other (older) teammates there. Maybe a better illustration of his ability to scale up is that he had 21 powers in 13 games at CCCT and 22 powers in 13 games at ICT (on tougher questions versus better teams).

He spent a lot of last summer reading hard packets with me to make a big leap, and I expect he'll make a similar leap for UCF next year.
This is fair. Y'all did shadow him quite a bit. I didn't mean to undersell his abilities in anyway: 22 powers in 13 games is impressive! I think it is still a mostly fair assessment considering the difficulty step between DII ICT and PIANO, though.

I too expect improvement from Jesse this summer (no pressure!) and look forward to playing him and UCF as a whole next season.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by ValenciaQBowl »

Nah, pressure is good. He's coming with me up to Chicago to read CO and then to play Scattergories with me and Tracy (and John Petrovich), which will be a good introduction to the crueler reaches of the game.
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by Crazy Khan Tech »

Ballots are due for this poll in one week. I have received several ballots already and would love to get even more!
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Re: 2019 Florida Circuit Player Poll

Post by Crazy Khan Tech »

Voting is completed. Thank you to everyone who voted and/or participated in the discussion around this poll. There were 9 total ballots received. The voters were Peter Torres, Tracy Mirkin, Bradley Kirksey, Leo Law, Jonathen Settle, Taylor Harvey, William Grossman, Daniel Golisch, and me. Here are the results:

#1: Taylor Harvey (UF): 180 (unanimous #1)
#2: Tracy Mirkin (UF): 171 (unanimous #2)
#3: Daniel Golisch (UCF): 156 (highest #3, lowest #5)
#4: Jonathen Settle (UF): 155 (highest #3, lowest #5)
#5: Alex Shaw (UF): 146 (highest #3, lowest #6)
#6: Jesse Gingold (Valencia): 129 (highest #5, lowest #9)
#7: Leo Law (NCF): 106 (highest #7, lowest #11)
#8: Jacob Hujsa (UF): 101 (highest #7, lowest #12)
#9: Peter Torres (UCF): 99 (highest #5, ranked by 8 ballots)
#10: Tejas Santanam (GTech): 97 (highest #6, ranked by 7 ballots)
#11: Zachary Knecht (UF): 93 (highest #10, lowest #12)
#12: Katia Diamond (NCF): 65 (highest #12, lowest #19)
#13: Hannah Sage (UCF): 64 (highest #9, lowest #19)
#14: David Honsinger (NCF): 58 (highest #10, lowest #20)
#15: Khanh Nguyen (UF): 45 (highest #13, ranked by 7 ballots)
#16: Chandler West (Auburn): 41 (highest #13, ranked by 6 ballots)
#17: David Espinal (UCF): 39 (highest #10, ranked by 8 ballots)
#18: Henry Hill (UF): 37 (highest #14, lowest #18)
#19: Nabeel Farooq (UF): 24 (highest #11, ranked by 5 ballots)
#20: Bradley Kirksey (RTS): 20 (highest #7, ranked by 2 ballots)

Also receiving votes:
#21: Donny Lisle (UCF): 15 (highest #16, ranked by 5 ballots)
#22: William Grossman (UF): 12 (highest #16, ranked by 4 ballots)
#23: Dylan Higbie (UCF): 11 (highest #13, ranked by 3 ballots)
#24: Anthony Delgado (UF): 10 (highest #15, ranked by 2 ballots)
#25: Griffin Thompson (UCF): 9 (highest #14, ranked by 2 ballots)
#26: Carlos Gonzalez (NCF): 3 (highest #18, ranked by 1 ballot)
#27: Harrison Andrew (NCF): 1 (highest #20, ranked by 1 ballot)
#27: Jason Zappulla (UF): 1 (highest #20, ranked by 1 ballot)
#27: Max Murphy (UCF): 1 (highest #20, ranked by 1 ballot)
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