The 2017 field trial season is now “officially” over with the announcement of a 2017 World Cup champion on Saturday. Congratulations to Paul West on winning the World Cup with Lakehill’s Haywire.
To keep in touch with the hunters and continue to make the Masters leaderboard as competitive and interesting as possible, the leaderboard committee would like to welcome suggestions for 2018 that may be viewed as fair to all competitors across the country. If anyone has any suggestions they want the committee and Masters BOD’s to review and consider for 2018, please submit them, in writing, below this post, before DECEMBER 31st and we will collect and discuss them.

Thanks,

2017 Leaderboard Committee

Clif Parker
Kelly Parker
Chris Graham
Shane Painter
Larry Bird Saucier
Brandon Whisenant
David Futch
Mike Carr
Terry Walker

A rule that needs to be put in is ! Before your points count for any leaderboard you should have to judge at least one 2or 3 day hunt within a 2 year period. That will help with judges also. We are always needing more judges so that will help. But I know this will never happen because there is a lot of people that run in a lot of hunts that NEVER judge. And also you think enough of a person to ask the to judge ? Why does it take two people to scratch for somethings ? These are just some of my opinions!

I think that in order for leader board points to count you should judge no less than one 3 day points hunt within that year .
I also think ( if it’s a pen hunt ) that if you or a kennel partner have hounds in a points hunt you shouldn’t be allowed in the pen for any reason other than an emergency Or designated area for viewing .
It’s sad that this great sport our forefathers once started has come to making all the rules we are making to try and keep it a level and fair as possible playing field . Whether there’s wrong doing or not. Some things just look bad even when in reality it may not be and probably isn’t .
Just my opinion
God Bless and Happy Hunting

Heath and Ronnie,
I personally agree with each of you and sure wouldn't object to the idea of some sort of requirement to judge a minimum of at least one 2 or 3 day affiliated event throughout the year by at least 1 member of a kennel before any award would be presented at year end for KOY. I fully understand the difficulty in getting people to volunteer their time to judge trials because of the number of trials I assist with throughout the year. The issue here would be the over site and policing of it. It would be a manual process, and I'd probably have to take it on as a personal task, but it could be done. I just looked, and if my calculations are correct, out of the current Top 20 kennels in KOY, ~ 50% had a member judge at least 1 affiliated trial this year. Thanks and this will be acknowledged.

If there are 5 kennel partners in together, all 5 should be required to judge at least one complete 3 day hunt. Not just one of the 5

It would also cut down on the same ones griping about honest judges doing their job. It’s a lot different on the other side of the scoresheet.

First, I suggest eliminating the franchise program. In 2016, the Leaderboard had 178 affiliated trials, including franchise agreements, and sponsors, the Leaderboard paid out the equivalent to a little over $12,000 among the top 20 of the 4 different OY categories. With a large percentage of this coming from franchise hunts and sponsors. $12,000 distributed, is merely a small drop in the bucket in comparison to the money spent by hunters chasing to be in the top 20 of any of the OYs. It's also not fair that some association pay several hundred dollars to participate while others only pay $30. I suggest replacing it with a flat $100 for all associations and any trial that meets the requirement of 150 all age dogs gets the same step up in points as being a franchise hunt. With equal participation, the Leaderboard payout should nearly double as well.

Second, a hound worthy of winning HOY, ought to be encouraged to travel and compete among fields both big and small. Currently, the Leaderboard dictates that a hound can only earn HOY points from four trials in a single pen. However, the leaderboard gives an exemption to hunts grade 1 & 2. I recommend that the Leaderboard limit the amount of times a given hound can earn HOY points in a particular pen to three trials, instead of four, regardless of grade. In addition, I suggest that travel bonus be increased from 50 to 75 points and possibly be awarded per pen as apposed to, currently, per state.

In addition, the current entry factor is inconsistent. The first 99 hounds include 3 different entry factor brackets and the second 100 hounds is inclusive into one bracket. Then the third 100 hounds is broken again into two brackets and anything above that is in a final bracket. The overwhelming majority of trials do not attract over 200 hounds in a single class. It would seem that a trial with 100 hounds compared to a trial with 199 hounds would be more appropriately rewarded to better reflect the varying degree of competitiveness. Also, currently, some hunts are given preferential treatment regarding Leaderboard grade, several of these being Masters Corp. trials. The primary requisite for receiving such preferential treatment should be amount of entries followed by history and tradition. For example, most "state" hunts have longstanding traditions with a lot of history that attract greater competition. Allowing state hunts to be a higher grade will also allow each region to more easily participate in higher stakes hunts.

As for requiring hunters to judge at least one trial in order to be Leaderboard eligible, Clif's right. This would be incredibly hard to police. However, the Leaderboard may be able to incentivize hunters to judge at least one trial by awarding KOY points for doing so. For example, if a hunter judges at least one trial, his kennel will receive 100 bonus KOY points. (This bonus will have to be limited to one bonus per kennel, however.)

I agree with Todd and like bonus points per pen.

:+1: :+1:

I look at the top 20 in KOY and some of them have never judged a masters hunt since the masters was started. That I know of ? Out our way anyways! If you have to keep up with it to give them points? How can that be easier than keeping up with if they have judged or not? Just asking? I don't think it should be every year . Because if a working person has a good hound and wants to try and win HOY it will take a hunt from them!

Just to piggyback off of what Todd said I believe that if you lower HOY to a maximum of 3 placings from one single pen you should lower KOY, SOY, and DOY to 3 maximum from one single pen. At the moment those 3 categories have a maximum of 8 from one single pen. I just personally think it would be best to have an equal number of placings from one single pen amongst all categories.