IMG Grading System (Many Merged Threads)

[LeeF]

21 minutes ago, Griff said:

That would never happen in Rugby League.

No they would also get the correction wrong 

Edited April 22 by LeeF

[sam4731]

I know people are probably sick of others giving their view on the IMG Grading but I don't care so settle in.

- Attendance Thresholds- The thresholds for attendance are not very ambitious and are quite wide apart. A team that gets an average attendance of 3,000 gets the same point value as a team that gets 7,499.

- Preaching to the converted- I hate that digital engagement is used as a metric for success. Unlike traditional marketing, social media only reaches people that already know about the content.

- Pass/Fail- A lot of criteria seems to be based on a pass/Fail concept. If a team meets all the facilities score criteria but have a capacity of 4,999 instead of 5,000 they are docked a whole point.

- Turnover is vanity, Profit is sanity- Teams are more heavily rewarded for turnover than they are profit. This seems ridiculously counter intuitive for sustainability. A team can spend ludicrous amounts of money to generate high turnover but not enough to get themselves a profit but be rewarded for high levels of turnover.

The non SL on field performance cap- A non SL team can only attain a certain amount of points for their on field performance, and by the same token SL teams have a floor that they can't dip below. We have a very real situation this year where Wakefield could go all season unbeaten and only earn 2.9167 and London could lose every game but earn 2.778. I know that some will say that SL is a tougher competition but how can a non SL team ever be expected to reach SL if can't attain enough points to get there.

I hope you don't hate my analysis but give me your take on my take.

[Harry Stottle]

9 minutes ago, sam4731 said:

I know people are probably sick of others giving their view on the IMG Grading but I don't care so settle in.

- Attendance Thresholds- The thresholds for attendance are not very ambitious and are quite wide apart. A team that gets an average attendance of 3,000 gets the same point value as a team that gets 7,499.

- Preaching to the converted- I hate that digital engagement is used as a metric for success. Unlike traditional marketing, social media only reaches people that already know about the content.

- Pass/Fail- A lot of criteria seems to be based on a pass/Fail concept. If a team meets all the facilities score criteria but have a capacity of 4,999 instead of 5,000 they are docked a whole point.

- Turnover is vanity, Profit is sanity- Teams are more heavily rewarded for turnover than they are profit. This seems ridiculously counter intuitive for sustainability. A team can spend ludicrous amounts of money to generate high turnover but not enough to get themselves a profit but be rewarded for high levels of turnover.

The non SL on field performance cap- A non SL team can only attain a certain amount of points for their on field performance, and by the same token SL teams have a floor that they can't dip below. We have a very real situation this year where Wakefield could go all season unbeaten and only earn 2.9167 and London could lose every game but earn 2.778. I know that some will say that SL is a tougher competition but how can a non SL team ever be expected to reach SL if can't attain enough points to get there.

I hope you don't hate my analysis but give me your take on my take.

Honest question Sam,

You are a fan of a SL club, a successful SL club who is sitting pretty and will not be affected at all by a number of the very stark inadaquencies of the IMG system, why unlike many fans of SL clubs do you care for the game as a whole not just what happens for the top 12 clubs?

[sam4731]

10 minutes ago, Harry Stottle said:

Honest question Sam,

You are a fan of a SL club, a successful SL club who is sitting pretty and will not be affected at all by a number of the very stark inadaquencies of the IMG system, why unlike many fans of SL clubs do you care for the game as a whole not just what happens for the top 12 clubs?

I appreciate that other clubs struggle to make ends meet, a problem that my club doesn't. I also appreciate that without lower league teams, we have no game.

Don't get me wrong, winning 4 in a row was amazing but after maybe 5 it would have started to get boring. Sport needs diversity to maintain the health of the sport.

[bobbruce]

24 minutes ago, sam4731 said:

I know people are probably sick of others giving their view on the IMG Grading but I don't care so settle in.

- Attendance Thresholds- The thresholds for attendance are not very ambitious and are quite wide apart. A team that gets an average attendance of 3,000 gets the same point value as a team that gets 7,499.

- Preaching to the converted- I hate that digital engagement is used as a metric for success. Unlike traditional marketing, social media only reaches people that already know about the content.

- Pass/Fail- A lot of criteria seems to be based on a pass/Fail concept. If a team meets all the facilities score criteria but have a capacity of 4,999 instead of 5,000 they are docked a whole point.

- Turnover is vanity, Profit is sanity- Teams are more heavily rewarded for turnover than they are profit. This seems ridiculously counter intuitive for sustainability. A team can spend ludicrous amounts of money to generate high turnover but not enough to get themselves a profit but be rewarded for high levels of turnover.

The non SL on field performance cap- A non SL team can only attain a certain amount of points for their on field performance, and by the same token SL teams have a floor that they can't dip below. We have a very real situation this year where Wakefield could go all season unbeaten and only earn 2.9167 and London could lose every game but earn 2.778. I know that some will say that SL is a tougher competition but how can a non SL team ever be expected to reach SL if can't attain enough points to get there.

I hope you don't hate my analysis but give me your take on my take.

Agree on point one attendances should be given points on a sliding scale rather than three set points. would also like to see some weighting given to lower league attendances. Maybe averaging 4k gives them top marks. 
 

don’t know enough about point two but I understand this is in IMGs area of expertise so will go with it. 
 

As I said earlier a lot of this could be done on a sliding scale for points. 
 

If we judged it on profits wouldn’t we be forcing our clubs into paying tax where they don’t need to.

 

Aren’t we expecting possibly two non SL teams to come into SL next year so it is possible. 
 

 

[Daft old hooker]

41 minutes ago, sam4731 said:

I appreciate that other clubs struggle to make ends meet, a problem that my club doesn't. I also appreciate that without lower league teams, we have no game.

Don't get me wrong, winning 4 in a row was amazing but after maybe 5 it would have started to get boring. Sport needs diversity to maintain the health of the sport.

But IMG is designed to keep lower level clubs down within a couple of years you will have 12 Clubs in SL maybe a couple of other scraping around trying to get there and the rest trying to stay in business on ever decreasing revenue, but unfortunately that’s what the game wants.

[Click]

2 hours ago, sam4731 said:

I know people are probably sick of others giving their view on the IMG Grading but I don't care so settle in.

- Attendance Thresholds- The thresholds for attendance are not very ambitious and are quite wide apart. A team that gets an average attendance of 3,000 gets the same point value as a team that gets 7,499.

- Preaching to the converted- I hate that digital engagement is used as a metric for success. Unlike traditional marketing, social media only reaches people that already know about the content.

- Pass/Fail- A lot of criteria seems to be based on a pass/Fail concept. If a team meets all the facilities score criteria but have a capacity of 4,999 instead of 5,000 they are docked a whole point.

- Turnover is vanity, Profit is sanity- Teams are more heavily rewarded for turnover than they are profit. This seems ridiculously counter intuitive for sustainability. A team can spend ludicrous amounts of money to generate high turnover but not enough to get themselves a profit but be rewarded for high levels of turnover.

The non SL on field performance cap- A non SL team can only attain a certain amount of points for their on field performance, and by the same token SL teams have a floor that they can't dip below. We have a very real situation this year where Wakefield could go all season unbeaten and only earn 2.9167 and London could lose every game but earn 2.778. I know that some will say that SL is a tougher competition but how can a non SL team ever be expected to reach SL if can't attain enough points to get there.

I hope you don't hate my analysis but give me your take on my take.

Really? You think digital marketing only goes to the converted?

[Click]

2 hours ago, Harry Stottle said:

Honest question Sam,

You are a fan of a SL club, a successful SL club who is sitting pretty and will not be affected at all by a number of the very stark inadaquencies of the IMG system, why unlike many fans of SL clubs do you care for the game as a whole not just what happens for the top 12 clubs?

Nice passive aggressive post directed at everyone with a differing viewpoint as people who don't care for the game as a whole

[Click]

1 hour ago, Daft old hooker said:

But IMG is designed to keep lower level clubs down within a couple of years you will have 12 Clubs in SL maybe a couple of other scraping around trying to get there and the rest trying to stay in business on ever decreasing revenue, but unfortunately that’s what the game wants.

So... Exactly the same thing that we have right now then?

[phiggins]

2 minutes ago, Click said:

Really? You think digital marketing only goes to the converted?

Regardless of views on digital marketing in general, the scoring system used to measure a club's digital footprint is pretty primitive. Not all engagements are good and not all website visits or social media followers are useful, or even real.

In fact, I'm disappointed that clubs haven't started to see replies to their X posts that just says "IMG points in bio"

[phiggins]

3 minutes ago, Click said:

So... Exactly the same thing that we have right now then?

So if nothing is changing, what is the point?

[Click]

9 minutes ago, phiggins said:

Regardless of views on digital marketing in general, the scoring system used to measure a club's digital footprint is pretty primitive. Not all engagements are good and not all website visits or social media followers are useful, or even real.

In fact, I'm disappointed that clubs haven't started to see replies to their X posts that just says "IMG points in bio"

I think it is quite easy to audit digital followings to see if a team had paid for followers, etc. Judging on how RL clubs in this country have embraced SM over the last 10 + years, I doubt any of them would even know how to go about doing it in the first place.

7 minutes ago, phiggins said:

So if nothing is changing, what is the point?

Well, that is kind of the point of the system, to try and enact change. It is only your opinion that IMG will suppress clubs below SL, that isn't a fact. You've just described a system that IMG is apparently creating, which just happens to be identical to what the current system results in.

[phiggins]

1 minute ago, Click said:

It is only your opinion that IMG will suppress clubs below SL, that isn't a fact. You've just described a system that IMG is apparently creating, which just happens to be identical to what the current system results in.

I didn't describe anything, your comment about things being exactly the same as it is now was in response to somebody else. I only ask, if things are going to be exactly the same, then why bother?

[Click]

22 minutes ago, phiggins said:

I didn't describe anything, your comment about things being exactly the same as it is now was in response to somebody else. I only ask, if things are going to be exactly the same, then why bother?

Apologies on that, but your question is telling me your opinion already. I don't believe that things are going to be exactly the same as before, someone else has described the IMG system as a system that will result in: "you will have 12 Clubs in SL maybe a couple of other scraping around trying to get there and the rest trying to stay in business on ever decreasing revenue"

He has just described what we have now, and said that is what IMG is going to bring about.

[Dave T]

3 hours ago, sam4731 said:

- Turnover is vanity, Profit is sanity- Teams are more heavily rewarded for turnover than they are profit. This seems ridiculously counter intuitive for sustainability. A team can spend ludicrous amounts of money to generate high turnover but not enough to get themselves a profit but be rewarded for high levels of turnover.

 

I think there are plenty of issues with how the Grading has been introduced, but I don't have an issue with this one (apart from maybe the actual numbers and %). Turnover is really important here - it's all well and good giving points for a club making a profit - but that isn't necessarily going to grow the game. A tiny club making £1k profit shouldn't be rewarded more than a club turning over £10m and posting a loss of £100k for example.

It feels sensible that the three things they look for here is (1) pure turnover number - they want bigger clubs that are driving loads of income. (2) % of non-centralised - no over-reliance on central funding - clubs need to drive their own income (3) profit - this addresses your concerns that clubs aren't just recklessly driving hollow turnover. Broadly it feels like it can work.

I also don't have too much of an issue with the on-field performance tbh, having one giant ladder feels ok, and in the circumstance you describe, Wakey have the opportunity to be ranked 9th on performance if they won the GF and the 1895 cup. That doesn't feel too odd.

[Dave T]

50 minutes ago, phiggins said:

Regardless of views on digital marketing in general, the scoring system used to measure a club's digital footprint is pretty primitive. Not all engagements are good and not all website visits or social media followers are useful, or even real.

In fact, I'm disappointed that clubs haven't started to see replies to their X posts that just says "IMG points in bio"

None of this is perfect, and i do think there needs to be an element of accepting that the holistic approach will tease out the better teams, and broadly speaking, I don't think there were too many anomalies in that first round - although time will tell on that. I do think people are guilty of looking at the minute detail too much, but that is always going to happen under a system like this, which is a flaw for me.

On your point about digital engagement - one thing I did see was London recently pleading for people to engage with their social media so they could get IMG points. We also hear the likes of Cas talk about putting seats in to get IMG points. I think this speaks volumes about those clubs, and explains why they are ranked where they are. Instead of just saying "click here to give us points" maybe London could actually focus on the spirit of this and actually create content that people want to engage with.

And maybe instead of Cas talking about improving facilities to get points, they should change their mindset that they are improving facilities for the comfort of their fans to improve their viewing experience, allowing them to drive more money and retain more fans.

I think it speaks volumes about the mindsets of people in the sport. And that includes fans - people are talking about Castleford finally making improvements to their ground after decades of criticising the ground as a negative. It's a really strange mindset.

[Daft old hooker]

1 hour ago, Click said:

So... Exactly the same thing that we have right now then?

No because supporters always have hope IMG removes that

[phiggins]

2 hours ago, Dave T said:

None of this is perfect, and i do think there needs to be an element of accepting that the holistic approach will tease out the better teams, and broadly speaking, I don't think there were too many anomalies in that first round - although time will tell on that. I do think people are guilty of looking at the minute detail too much, but that is always going to happen under a system like this, which is a flaw for me.

On your point about digital engagement - one thing I did see was London recently pleading for people to engage with their social media so they could get IMG points. We also hear the likes of Cas talk about putting seats in to get IMG points. I think this speaks volumes about those clubs, and explains why they are ranked where they are. Instead of just saying "click here to give us points" maybe London could actually focus on the spirit of this and actually create content that people want to engage with.

And maybe instead of Cas talking about improving facilities to get points, they should change their mindset that they are improving facilities for the comfort of their fans to improve their viewing experience, allowing them to drive more money and retain more fans.

I think it speaks volumes about the mindsets of people in the sport. And that includes fans - people are talking about Castleford finally making improvements to their ground after decades of criticising the ground as a negative. It's a really strange mindset.

I think the flaw that you point out is a pretty fundamental one, given that it could be the minute detail that sees a team relegated from, or refused a place in Super League. If the gap between 12th and 13th is marginal, and the 13th placed team have finished in either the top 11, or won the Championship, is it right to deny them a place? Is the sport better for it?

I dislike this system on pretty much every level. But I don't dislike the idea of grading teams. The system itself has too many flaws in my opinion. You give examples of the scoring system leading to poor behaviours with digital content. This is because the system is using data without context, which is a poor practice. There are other issues I have, such as the wide bands, lack of recognition of year on year growth vs decline, no recognition of different challenges faced outside of Super League, and of course, the catchment area metric.

But ultimately, as a sport, we have decided to continue with having clubs move up and down the leagues. Whether that is correct is a whole other debate. But with that in place, I find it peculiar to use a scoring system like this to dictate who wins the place in the top tier. Particularly a scoring system with the flaws this one have.

Once it is decided to keep P&R, then I think that should be won and lost on the field, with grading used to enforce minimum standards, rendering a club ineligible unless they meet those standards.

[Toby Chopra]

1 hour ago, phiggins said:

I think the flaw that you point out is a pretty fundamental one, given that it could be the minute detail that sees a team relegated from, or refused a place in Super League. If the gap between 12th and 13th is marginal, and the 13th placed team have finished in either the top 11, or won the Championship, is it right to deny them a place? Is the sport better for it?

I dislike this system on pretty much every level. But I don't dislike the idea of grading teams. The system itself has too many flaws in my opinion. You give examples of the scoring system leading to poor behaviours with digital content. This is because the system is using data without context, which is a poor practice. There are other issues I have, such as the wide bands, lack of recognition of year on year growth vs decline, no recognition of different challenges faced outside of Super League, and of course, the catchment area metric.

But ultimately, as a sport, we have decided to continue with having clubs move up and down the leagues. Whether that is correct is a whole other debate. But with that in place, I find it peculiar to use a scoring system like this to dictate who wins the place in the top tier. Particularly a scoring system with the flaws this one have.

Once it is decided to keep P&R, then I think that should be won and lost on the field, with grading used to enforce minimum standards, rendering a club ineligible unless they meet those standards.

We haven't decided to keep P&R.

This is a fundamental misreading of the IMG model which many have made, perhaps because it's so ingrained as an idea.

The model is specifically designed - in principle - to keep the same clubs in SL, to allow them to build sustainably, and also allow the competition as a whole to invest its brand and presentation without jettisoning 1/12 of that investment each year.

There are two reasons we didn't move explicitly move to fixed term licenses or a full NRL-style closed shop.

Firstly, it would be politically very difficult to get through, so we've fudged it so people still labour under the misapprehension that there's some sort of P&R in place. This is regrettable and I wish we'd been more honest.

Secondly, and more crucially, as things stand we simply don't have 12 or even 10 clubs strong enough to definitely know they'll still be strong in 5 years or so. So we've had to keep a door open for potential replacements.

But the idea, once we get through the transition year, is for the clubs to be pretty fixed, barring disasters.

If we ever get to 10 grade As I'd expect the door to be shut properly, and only be opened for properly funded expansion clubs, like the NRL do.

This is the reality of the IMG model - soft or dynamic licensing if you will, but not P&R.

I know why many would hate this. And I can't hand on heart tell you I know for sure it'll work, overall.

But it's important to see it for what it really is.

Edited April 30 by Toby Chopra

[Archie Gordon]

I probably do not need to state that I am not a fan of the RLC grading system. Nor will it change the make up of the top division, except to freeze its membership from 2025, and I don't see it driving up standards in any other way than cosmetically. The 12th strongest club in SL does not contribute 1/12 towards the brand - and never will. This focus on who gets that 12th spot for 2025 - and likely the medium-term - therefore seems barmy. 

It seems particularly barmy because this single-minded focus on the bottom end of the men's SL is also coming at a disastrous time for the game. It is international and women's sport that is growing and, on those topics, RLC is silent. Whether Castleford or TO or whoever grabs spot #12 in SL is really rather trivial.

[phiggins]

32 minutes ago, Toby Chopra said:

We haven't decided to keep P&R.

This is a fundamental misreading of the IMG model which many have made, perhaps because it's so ingrained as an idea.

The model is specifically designed - in principle - to keep the same clubs in SL, to allow them to build sustainably, and also allow the competition as a whole to invest its brand and presentation without jettisoning 1/12 of that investment each year.

There are two reasons we didn't move explicitly move to fixed term licenses or a full NRL-style closed shop.

Firstly, it would be politically very difficult to get through, so we've fudged it so people still labour under the misapprehension that there's some sort of P&R in place. This is regrettable and I wish we'd been more honest.

Secondly, and more crucially, as things stand we simply don't have 12 or even 10 clubs strong enough to definitely know they'll still be strong in 5 years or so. So we've had to keep a door open for potential replacements.

But the idea, once we get through the transition year, is for the clubs to be pretty fixed, barring disasters.

If we ever get to 10 grade As I'd expect the door to be shut properly, and only be opened for properly funded expansion clubs, like the NRL do.

This is the reality of the IMG model - soft or dynamic licensing if you will, but not P&R.

I know why many would hate this. And I can't hand on heart tell you I know for sure it'll work, overall.

But it's important to see it for what it really is.

Whatever terminology you want to use, we have a model were clubs can drop down or climb up the divisions. London will most likely drop down a division. That's relegation, Wakefield will move from the Championship to Super League. That's a promotion.

My opinion is that as soon as it was decided to have a system that allowed for movement between leagues, then it needed to be on field P&R, subject to minimum standards. 

On your point on what the system was designed to do, I really doubt it will achieve that. It does not offer a greater level of certainty than P&R does, and could just as easily see a couple of teams yo-yo and replacing each other year on year. But what it does do is effectively shut the door on any team that finished outside the top 14 in the indicative grades for as long as this system is in place.

[Toby Chopra]

45 minutes ago, phiggins said:

Whatever terminology you want to use, we have a model were clubs can drop down or climb up the divisions. London will most likely drop down a division. That's relegation, Wakefield will move from the Championship to Super League. That's a promotion.

My opinion is that as soon as it was decided to have a system that allowed for movement between leagues, then it needed to be on field P&R, subject to minimum standards. 

On your point on what the system was designed to do, I really doubt it will achieve that. It does not offer a greater level of certainty than P&R does, and could just as easily see a couple of teams yo-yo and replacing each other year on year. But what it does do is effectively shut the door on any team that finished outside the top 14 in the indicative grades for as long as this system is in place.

The likely London/Wakefield swap is a quirk of the transition year, not indicative of the system as a whole. 

If there is lots of up and down in the following years it will be because weak SL clubs keep getting into major trouble despite the advantages of the new system and get replaced. But they'd have to be in serious decline for that to happen.

It's certainly possible - we know who the likely candidates are. But if those weaker 4 or 5 clubs find a level of stability and that helps them grow, then there will be very little change, and that is my expectation of what will happen.

As for whether this is good for the game overall, we will just have to see how it pans out. 

[LeeF]

9 hours ago, sam4731 said:

I know people are probably sick of others giving their view on the IMG Grading but I don't care so settle in.

- Attendance Thresholds- The thresholds for attendance are not very ambitious and are quite wide apart. A team that gets an average attendance of 3,000 gets the same point value as a team that gets 7,499.

- Preaching to the converted- I hate that digital engagement is used as a metric for success. Unlike traditional marketing, social media only reaches people that already know about the content.

- Pass/Fail- A lot of criteria seems to be based on a pass/Fail concept. If a team meets all the facilities score criteria but have a capacity of 4,999 instead of 5,000 they are docked a whole point.

- Turnover is vanity, Profit is sanity- Teams are more heavily rewarded for turnover than they are profit. This seems ridiculously counter intuitive for sustainability. A team can spend ludicrous amounts of money to generate high turnover but not enough to get themselves a profit but be rewarded for high levels of turnover.

The non SL on field performance cap- A non SL team can only attain a certain amount of points for their on field performance, and by the same token SL teams have a floor that they can't dip below. We have a very real situation this year where Wakefield could go all season unbeaten and only earn 2.9167 and London could lose every game but earn 2.778. I know that some will say that SL is a tougher competition but how can a non SL team ever be expected to reach SL if can't attain enough points to get there.

I hope you don't hate my analysis but give me your take on my take.

Please could you expand on what you mean by the bit in bold?

[Yorks Tim]

9 minutes ago, LeeF said:

Please could you expand on what you mean by the bit in bold?

Free beer for season ticket holders?

That kind of thing I expect.

[Griff]

On 22/04/2024 at 11:01, Harry Stottle said:

Pardon, no such thing, that insinuation is like saying Tommy Robinson should be the next Foreign Secratary !

Fella that played for Huyton in the 1990s ?