This is an idea that I've thought about for a few weeks, but I have been unwilling to incorporate it into the leagues that I operate due to the budget requirements, the risk, and other factors.


What if a league ran a split schedule? For example, events would be held for the league in two separate locations (let’s say one in the east/one in the west, for example) on a day the league decides to hold events. As the season progresses, the tours move closer to the location of the league's championship, meeting there on Championship Tuesday.


This would be feasible for leagues with a large amount of active members, no less than 40. Groups could choose a tour for the season and stick with it, and all the members could participate in the unlimited-slot league championship.


The first league that came to mind was FAME for this, when FAME was at its height with over 60 active members. Every member could have run a full league tour without having to fight for slots over other members.


Downside to this: cost. The leagues I either operate or help operate, FLAG and PERC, both run a season schedule consisting of 10 regionals and 1 championship. The ten regionals, all tier 6 events, come out to a $168,000 investment (for drum corps and marching band leagues with identical season structures, the cost would be even higher--$210,000). Now, with a split tour, those costs would be doubled. Adding in the cost of the championship event, that is about $400,000 to invest. But if the league has enough members to warrant the need of a split tour, then 400 grand should be pocket change--most upper level leagues have values exceeding 3 million. Unless the league is not at all capable of maintaining somewhat to-capacity events (under 40% attendance) or balancing league finances, the worst loss would probably be close to $100,000--still nothing major to the top leagues.


I feel like this may be a subject no one has brought up before in the community, so I’d like to hear from you guys about it. What are your thoughts? Criticisms? Input? Modifications?

Good idea! Let me know if it works good cause I'm in the process of building my own league.

I have never tested this to be certain, however I think that a league can only host one event per day.

I know we have thought of doing things similar, but what we wanted for at one point was there to be a factor that changed results slightly from one show to the next so you couldn't so easily compare groups that aren't at the same event. Right now its pretty easy to look at the overall results and so long as everyone competed that day, you would know exactly where everyone actually lines up. This would cause me to push for separate league tours or groups because this would build that excitement of who really is beating who. Its a big ask considering we currently don't have a lot of input to game changes where your suggestion could be easily carried out. I think the league board would have to agree to it.

I like the idea. I could see it being very interesting. Unfortunately we haven't had 40+ active members per season for a long time (don't remember off the top of my head), but that's okay. Nowadays having 40 active members is a lot and usually unlikely. I'd say that it wouldn't work with less than 20 active members per season. Every event doesn't have to be full or a tier 6 (if you couldn't afford it). You work with what you have. I've always held 3 events per week in weeks 1-4, including an opening day. With over 23 million $$, FAME definitely has the funds to try it. I've thought about having league events every day, not that I would expect everyone to join every event but just to use up some of the money. The point is that it wouldn't hurt to try, and I can't see it really hurting a league that's got a few million stashed away.

The problem I imagine is getting everyone to cooperate. Is the idea to have half join the "west coast events (tour 1)" and the other half join the "east coast events (tour 2)" and then meet in the middle for championships? If yes, it will take much cooperation. If you're just randomly picking west coast on Tuesday, East coast on Thursday, etc, wouldn't that defeat the concept of having two separate tours? Members definitely would have to commit to one tour or the other for it to even make sense. Who decides which tour groups will take? How do you make it an even amount and ensure everyone sticks with just one tour? Again, it will take a lot of cooperation. Of course, I'm assuming that every active group will participate in league events. Am I over complicating your idea? (lol)

Nevertheless, all that directors must do to see how they stack up against other groups is to click on the statistics tab. Wouldn't it be more interesting if directors didn't look at the statistics tab but only focused on the events that they attended? That would create much more suspense leading up to the conclusion of championship day. It would be cool if we actually could award groups for winning league events. Other than bragging rights and helping to keep the league active and interesting, there's no incentive to winning league events.

Gary, just FYI, you CAN host more than one league event per day.

good to know! Thanks Aaron...I might see if CLASS wants to do like group competitions so like Group A goes to X Y Z competitions while Group B goes to A B C competitions. we have PLENTY of money as well LOL

im down with the west/ east thing