I am so glad to see a discussion being taken seriously by uCoolon this matter. Thank you dave

1. Why is it now that the idea of brackets is thought of as interesting when the dozens upon dozens of threads in the past were overlooked or ignored?

2. I am not for bracketing in general, because I have yet to see a suggestion on how to make the brackets that can't be manipulated and would leave some people at teh lower end of the bracket through no fault of their own.

For example the idea of using POWER.
We all know that number is meaningless
It can be manipulated even on the rankings page
But irregardless no matter where you set the braking point form one bracket to the next, you will have people complain a bit. Say you make a bracket for 200m power and up. Well the people who are just 200m power may not be too happy because someone with 190mish power iwll win the bracket just below them and they have no shot against someone 750m power.

So bracketing may sound like a good idea to many - but it has its drawbacks.

One thing to keep in mind if a bracket system were put in place. Would each bracket have it own distinctive set of rewards that are meaningful for the people in the bracket.

I think one of the key issues to address in this is timing.
going to 12am in the USA East time zone is a killer. Plus having it overlap other events is bad.

ANd addressing this issue could involve some significant changes that could help CWF out.

I for one have thought that the USA championship should be 3 separate events - 1 per time zone.

This would allow CWF time to be set between other events for everyone, granted we may need to move an event to accomplish that

But a schedule of
rag 5pm server
CWF 6-8pm Server
GWF 8pm Server - BACK TO ITS ORIGINAL TIME
Lady 9pm

Then this would also create 2 new sets of winners which could spur some interest and spending.

This small step could give light to showing if creating even more sets of winners - either by extending the prize pool down to lower rounds or adding brackets or some other method - spurs both interest and spending. before any massive changes are made to the current system

Just my 2 cents