Freestyle Footbag World Ranking System with Zeb Jackson

Not long ago a savvy young freestyler name Zeb Jackson brought to fruition the brilliant idea of creating a World Ranking List for the freestyle footbag community. This has been something that has been needed for some time to further legitimize our great sport. We recently got a moment to pick Zeb's brain on the details of the Ranking System. Below is a short interview with Mr. Jackson himself.

-First, how long have you been in the sport?

I have been in the sport for 4ish awesome years

-Where did you get the idea for the Ranking List?

There was a thread on modified (I think Jeremy Mirken started it), and it was asking why footbag still didnt have a world ranking system, and there was lots of talk on how to do it, and who should do it, but there wasnt much being done about ACTUALLY doing it.So i took the initiative.

-What do you hope gets accomplished with it?

There are a couple of things.

1) to help legitimize the sport:

I want people to want to get their events IFPA sanctioned, it helps everyone follow rules that everyone else abides by, as well as gives the governing body of footbag a little more power. Plus it also shows outsiders how serious we are about what we are doing, and that were not just a bunch of hippies that "hack". We're athletes!

2) to have physical evidence of the top players in the world, instead of just hearsay and opinions. To be able to say, "Vasek Klouda is the best in the world he did the best in the rankings this year." Would show people that this system works (Also i went back and used this system on most of the events Vasek competed in from 02-06 and he was DEFINITELY the best at the time...by far.)

-How often will it be updated?

Right now I am updating it about once a month, usually around the 15th or so when the results from the previous months have been posted.

-What duration of time does it cover during the year?

The ranking list covers all the IFPA sanctioned events from the day after the previous years worlds up until the next years world events. After that the list is cleared and the list starts over.

-Do you feel it is accurately in regards to skill level right now?

People say that Milan is probably one of the best in the world, and they also say that Poland is a dominating force in footbag, and if you look on the ranking list, you can clearly see that according to the ranking system that it follows everyones beliefs. I think that it is fairly accurate in following competitive skill. Obviously Vasek dominated for many years and to see him ranked 26th currently on my list seems really low, but in order to get the rank you want you need to compete, and Vasek hasn't competed in many events this year.

-What will help the list along?

Organizers accurately placing individuals as to how they were ranked in the event they competed in will greatly help, also ranking EVERY competitor, even the ones that got 15th 16th. Another is updating footbag.org with the event result information is very helpful to me when im updating the list. As for helping it along to become more accepted in the community, I think action will have to speak louder than words and no matter how many people nay say the system, or who don't believe in it, just ignore them. I know the system is not perfect. I didnt intend it to be, but i have created it in a way that it can change. To the demands of a growing sport. The rules of changing events, and to also peoples opinions and views on what they want to see in the system. If anyone has an idea or wants to input their ideas to the system please feel free to post in the official thread and discuss it there :) http://modified.in/footbag/viewtopic.php?t=21354&start=0

Thanks for the hard work Zeb. To look up the current results of the World Ranking List, you can click below;

Freestyle Footbag World Ranking List

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