Hobey Baker Fan Voting

The fan voting portion for the Hobey Baker Award is now available. Murray, Bâby and LeNeveu are all eligible.

You can register to vote at

[www.hobeybaker.com]

Get out the vote!!

North Dakota's fans are stuffing the box.

Holy Smokes!
3 NoDak Patsies in the top three spots.
and 3 more on the list further down.

I know that Sue fans are biased, but they're getting a little ahead of themselves here.

Let them vote early. After all 9 NoDak residents cast their ballets, their players will run out of steam. Cows aren't allowed to vote, so they don't stand a chance.

All 9 of them can vote every day.

Didn't realize that. I still like NY's odds over ND, given those rules.

Well they are ahead and based on the standings on the Hobey Baker site, our fans aren't voting at all. Nine people voting everyday beats nobody voting never.

So, are we going to concentrate votes on a single player or distribute as we see fit. We can have a huge impact on one person should we so choose. The question is, who.....

-J

If we are going to focus on one player I think it should be Bâby.

If this was last year I'd say Murray and although he's having a good year - Bâby is having better.

Lenny is also a possibility but given the fact that he's a sophomore - I tend to favor Bâby.

I also think Bâby is gonna turn things up a notch here going into his final string of games at Lynah. The guy wants to go out with a bang.

I think we all focus on Bâby and get him in the Top 5.

Holy crap. I actually agree with Mo.

See Age - its not so hard to get along.

Alright then lets start voting for Bâby early and often.

Mo

Just vote for someone today. . . and tomorrow and. . . .

I'm not sure I agree. I don't see Bâby having any chance of winning the Hobey. Even though he is having a very good year by Cornell or ECAC standards, he is not even on the map amongst forwards nationally. Whatever we could do for him in the fan voting is not likely to make much difference in the outcome. Lenny, on the other hand, is arguably the best goaltender in the nation this year. If any player on our team has a shot at winning, it would be him. Pushing him up in the fan voting is more likely to have a meaningful impact.

That said, voting for any of our guys, in any order, is better than not voting at all.

Note the following disclaimer on the site:
[Q]
Attempts will be made to stop ballot-box stuffing. If it is obvious the same person is voting multiple times, and circumventing the rules, votes may be discounted, and users may be removed - at our discretion.
[/Q]
In fact, this whole exercise shows why fan voting is silly. When I was in grad school, my officemate and I toyed with the idea of trying to start an underground movement to get a bunch of goons onto the NHL All-Star team, so we could see penalties other than too many men on the ice. (This was years before Hank, the Angry Drunken Dwarf won People's on-line sex object vote.)

I'm voting LeNeveu, Bâby, and Murray - in that order - if anyone cares. I think if Lenny keeps his numbers near where they are now it makes him the best goalie in the country which will distinguish him from a pack of offensive players - especially should Cornell take the ECAC regular season and tournament crowns.

I'm with you Bill. . .I just voted in that order before checking your post.

I knew the day would come Age. I also agree with Mo here. Lenny is one hell of a goaltender, but after all his time here I think he deserves it the most. He is really starting to trun it up afte the last few weekends. First place votes to Bâby and second to Lenny. EVERYDAY!

Best,
Ogie

I'm with Bill and Graham on this. Lenny got my #1 vote. He's the best goalie in the nation, playing for "Goaltending U." While Bâby and Murray are good, they aren't as good as Lenny relative to the competition at their respective positions.

Each of us voting once per day is within the rules even if we all discuss a preferred order. I think they are talking about stopping people from registering a dozen email addresses and voting a dozen times a day, every day.

That said, I think fan input in the Hobey Baker vote is useful as far as nominating players and paring down the resulting list. I think the site explains that the fan influence diminishes in value through the various rounds - although they don't quantify how little influence it has.

This isn't going to be like that baseball All Star game in the 1950s when the city of Cincinnati got seven Reds voted as starters.

So wait, if you vote every day, that's not stuffing the ballot box? What is? Multiple votes on one day? If everyone can recast their vote every day, why not just have the polls open for one day only? The Hobey Baker Committee: Worldwide Proponents of Scientific Polling.

Well, yesterday I voted for Lenny, Bâby and Murray. And now I'm off to vote for Lenny, Bâby and Murray.

"So wait, if you vote every day, that's not stuffing the ballot box? What is? Multiple votes on one day?"

Yes. Of course this isn't scientific but voting once per day, everyday is playing within the rules as established by people without common sense.

"If everyone can recast their vote every day, why not just have the polls open for one day only?"

I guess it's so that you don't miss the polls being open. Obviously it would make more sense to have the polls open for multiple days but only allow you to vote once. But if everyone votes the same way everyday then there should be no change in the result - just higher numbers. I guess letting you vote everyday gives more impact to the truly dedicated who remember to vote every day. Judging from the number of people who regularly contribute to this site I was really surprised our guys didn't have a few more votes.

Want to start a fight about the voting in Florida? Please don't. I don't think there is enough room on the servers.

[Q]So wait, if you vote every day, that's not stuffing the ballot box? What is? Multiple votes on one day?[/Q]
To agree with Bill, multiple votes on one day is because those are the rules they've established. Perhaps "ballot stuffing" isn't the right phrasing for the 'crime' here, cheating is. The rules are each person can vote once per day, so they take measure to ensure no one gaoes beyond that.

[Q][Q]If everyone can recast their vote every day, why not just have the polls open for one day only?"[/Q]
I guess it's so that you don't miss the polls being open. Obviously it would make more sense to have the polls open for multiple days but only allow you to vote once.[/Q]
It would it you only wanted a scientific vote on pure numbers, but perhaps that's not what they wanted. Perhaps they want the most passionate voters to be able to have a larger say by voting more times, instead of everyone getting equal say, while still prevening you from setting up a script and voting millions of times.

Kind of like the way you can vote 30 times for the MLB All-Star games, or if you have a script... < whistles and walks away >.

-Fred

So does somebody have a perl script that can get it to automatically vote for Bâby from say 10 different email adresses every day?? Would that be considered "stuffing?"

Bill R '94 wrote:

Want to start a fight about the voting in Florida?

Well, it's not a butterfly ballot, but it's kind of a challenge to line up the radio buttons on the voting form with the candidates. (Tip: scroll down until the guy you want to vote for is on the last line on the page.)

I've been voting in this order for the past few days. Seems most accurate to me regarding CU players who get attention.

[Q]That said, voting for any of our guys, in any order, is better than not voting at all.[/Q]
Why, exactly? Just because I choose not to participate in what I feel is a silly exercise in homerism doesn't make me any less of a fan of Cornell or our hockey team. My policy is to cast the one vote I am allowed in the final round for the candidate I feel deserves to win the Hobey Baker award, regardless of my school, league, and geographic affiliations. I had this policy when this fan vote started, and there was a similar push for Golden Knight votes on the old Clarkson Roundtable.

I'm not saying that you shouldn't vote everyday if you want to, because it's obvious that this contest is fun and entertaining to many. I am saying that you shouldn't belittle or question the loyalty of those of us who don't vote to the max for every Cornell player possible.

I meant that if your goal is to get a Cornell player into the top 5 -- as most people who have posted here seem to want -- then you should vote regularly for our guys, in any order.

I'm not sure why you interpreted that sentence as belittling or questioning your loyalty; it certainly wasn't intended in that way. I advocated voting for Lenny, then tacked on this last sentence to reconcile with the Bâby camp -- "I'd rather pick Lenny, but it doesn't really matter what order you choose to vote in."

I actually tend to agree that the whole process is kind of stupid. Everyone is free to do with it what they will...

I am no longer free to do what I want....I have been hype-no-tized into voting for Cornell players. I cannot resist.

I can tell you that voting once per day, and teaming up to vote for whomever, is within the rules.

The "stuffing" they are referring to, is registering multiple e-mail addresses ... I've seen instances of dozens, simultaneously.

I can also tell you that whatever "stuffing" may have been done, has not been checked for yet - so if there is cheating going on, you could see vote totals change over the next week.

Wasn't American Idol won because a computer geek flooded the server with zillions of false IP addresses voting for the same chick, in the hopes that she'd be grateful and, um, "date" him? Or is that just an urban legend?

Seeing as it was a phone vote, its absolutely seems to be an urban legend.

Good. I'm relieved to know she won it on the basis of pure talent...

Lenny, Bâby, and Murray currently stand at numbers 8, 10, and 11, respectively. Not too bad, given the size of the field.

Looks like the Ferris State voters are coming out in force now.

There's a huge pissing contest about ballot stuffing on USCHO. I don't recall who,, but apparently one team's entire roster made this round.

You'll notice that a lot of schools (including Cornell) have one guy with a lot of first place votes, one guy with a lot of second place votes, and one guy with a lot of third place votes. At this point, it's clear the exercise is a farce, so I suppose everyone might as well stuff (within the rules) for their own school to get their best players more publicity.

The sad thing is that once upon a time, the Hobey consensus on HOCKEY-L was more or less right on (e.g. Holzinger in 1995).

I think it is worth reiterating that the fan voting does not even come close to being the deciding factor in who actually wins the award. That said it is not so much a pointless exercise in that it provides the fans with some entertainment.

I wonder how accurate a college sports award can be in that the teams do not play every other team and the voters do not get to see every player in action. I have more faith in the MVPs of the professional leagues.

Our boys are certainly holding their own against the cadre of western fans.

We count ourselves among the (if not THE) most rabid fans in College Hockey. How can we let Ferris State out score us in the voting. We should make our three nominees, 1,2, and 3 in the standings. Lets not get hung up on who deserves the top vote (among the Cornell players), lets just get them all up there. We were out done by Maine and UNH fans last year, lets not get slammed by Ferris State this year.

And yes, this is something of a game, the rules are set up to let the most vocal fans sway the count. Not unlike the baseball All Star voting. Good or bad, that is the way that it is.

So vote early, vote often (at least once a day)

Looks like the NoDak fans are doing just what I would like to see us do

Indeed...even if we're not voting for the same order of players (personally, I'm doing it as LeNeveu/Bâby/Murray), we should all be sure to vote each and every day to get our players up there. No, I take that back. We should vote for who we really think are the best players in the nation, regardless of the team. In my vote for LeNeveu at least, I know I can hold true to that notion since I really do think he's the best goalie in the nation (and the numbers have proven it throughout the year, with some competition from Jim Howard of Maine). So, yeah, Vote for Hobey and let's get the ball rolling some more.

I like that attitude Chris. I guess those Ferris State and N. Dakota fans have a lot of time on their hands, but who are we kidding, so do we! So, get out there and vote for Bâby.

Best,
Ogie

It doesn't appear the Ferris State fans had to debate long over what order they would vote for their guys:

Kunitz, Chris (LW, Ferris State) 433 60 39 2384
Brown, Mike (G, Ferris State) 28 347 43 1224
Legue, Jeff (C, Ferris State) 4 27 217 318

bump... don't forget to keep voting guys, Lenny is down to 10, Bâby to 12, and Murray a few below that.

Okay, I won't mention this again... last time...

ALL OUR GUYS ARE OUT OF THE TOP 10!!

Don't forget to vote (repeatedly!)

I have no doubt that Peter Senja of Colorado College will win the award this year.

How much relative importance is given to the fans' votes (as compared to the 60 coaches' votes)?

I think it counts as the 61st coach.