CR: Flagrant Fouls

[Milanproda1]

Officials of the Youth Hockey League and parents of players in the league have become concerned with the number of flagrant fouls occurring during league games. This past season, the number of flagrant fouls was double the number from the season before. League officials plan to reduce the number of such fouls during the coming season by implementing mandatory suspensions for players who commit flagrant fouls.

Which of the following statements, if true, provides the best evidence that the officials’ plan will be effective?


A-Most serious injuries occurring during league games are a direct result of flagrant fouls.

B-League referees have been trained to recognize flagrant fouls and to report incidents involving such fouls.

C-Parents of players in the league are in support of mandatory suspensions for flagrant fouls.

D-A similar league suspends players for committing flagrant fouls; this league has a relatively low incidence of flagrant fouls when compared with the Youth Hockey League.

E-Most players in the league strive to be selected for the All-Star team, and league rules state that no player with a record of suspension shall be selected for the All-Star team.








OA is E.


Question: Why not B?
The answer explaination states: While the referees’ effectiveness in recognizing and reporting flagrant fouls will surely aid in the implementation of the new policy, this has no bearing on whether the policy will deter players from committing flagrant fouls.

My thinking: If referees do not have the ability to discern what a flagrant foul is, there will be no way that the plan can be effective.

Furthermore: the explanation for answer choice E: If players want to make the All-Star team, and if a record of suspension precludes these players from being selected for the team, then players are less likely to commit fouls that will lead to suspensions.

This statement is dependent on whether referees can tell whether a flagrant foul was made. If they cannot, then the kids won't be punished if they commit flagrant fouls.

Please help me figure out where my thinking is wrong.

[messi10]

Hi Milanproda,

The argument does not talk about flagrant fouls not being reported correctly by the referees. The statistic is already there that there were twice as many fouls this year than the last.

While its true that League referees need to be trained to report the fouls but is that giving enough reasons to the players to not commit the fouls?

Choice B is not a bad one but in the presence of choice E, it is less favorable. Answer E is giving the players a good reason not to and thereby aiding the officials' plan

Regards

Sunil

[Milanproda1]

I see what you are saying, BUT if the referee cannot tell if a foul is flagrant, then there is no incentive for the players NOT to committ flagrant fouls. The rule that "you wont be on the all star team if you commit flagrant fouls" won't hold ANY weight if the judge (in this case the ref) cannot tell if the foul is flagrant or not.

Without the refs ability to judge, the arguement falls in the water.

Bear with my bad analogy:

A recently passed law requires that Company A stop spilling large amounts of acid into the nearby lake. Inspectors will routinely come by the lake and check for the chemical that Company used to spill. If the inspectors find a a high level of acid, Company A will pay a substantial fee.

What good is the threat if the inspectors cannot tell how much acid is in the lake?



This is a strengthen the argument question, so maybe underlying assumptions are not as important. But either way, the argument cannot work without the refs.

[messi10]

Hey,

I understand your point. But you are mixing an assumption type question with a strengthen type question. The flagrant fouls argument is a strengthen type question whereas your argument is an assumption type. I can rephrase the flagrant fouls question stem as:

Which of the following statements provides the strongest reason to expect that the officials' plan will succeed?

Strengthen the conclusion questions work slightly differently from assumption questions. If you read the CR guide, pg 113 (4th Edition) - its the 1st page of the Strengthen the Conclusion chapter. I will quote the book:

"Note that this is different from finding an assumption in that an assumption will be necessary for a conclusion to follow from the premises. A premise can strengthen or support a conclusion without being necessary for that conclusion."

If you read on there is more explanation.

Your analogy is based more on the assumption type.

Hope this helps

Regards

Sunil

[Milanproda1]

Thanks for the advice Sunil, that makes sense, and is definitely why I am wrong.

[jnelson0612]

Great advice Sunil! :-)

[kanhaiya.honrao]

Nice explanation sunil.. thnx!

[tim]

:)

[minnick6]

Hi Everyone,

I searched this problem and although my question is slightly different than the original poster, I thought it would be good to keep it all on one chain.

My concern is regarding how they determined that E is the BEST answer:

E-Most players in the league strive to be selected for the All-Star team, and league rules state that no player with a record of suspension shall be selected for the All-Star team.

When I read this, the typical CR red flags popped up in my head. How can they assume that the players committing the flagrant fouls are interested in joining the All-Star team? All of the fouls could very well be coming from the 49% (or less) players that have absolutely no interest in joining the All-Star team. If the answer excluded the word "Most" I would without a doubt agree that this is the best answer, but that is not the case. In fact, if you reference the solution notes for answer D, it reflects the same type of issue that I see in answer E.

(D) While we might conclude that the other, similar league has a low incidence of flagrant fouls because it suspends players who commit such fouls, we have no evidence to show that the suspensions actually deter players from committing fouls. It is entirely possible that the other league has a low incidence of flagrant fouls for other reasons. For example, maybe the players in the other league are just inherently less aggressive.

Look at E when I write the notes in the same fashion:

(D) While we might conclude that the players committing the flagrant fouls are interested in joining the All-Star team, we have no evidence to show that these players are committing the fouls. It is entirely possible that the fouls are being committed by the players that have no interest in joining the All-Star Team. For example, if there are 100 league players and 20 flagrant fouls occurring the past year were comitted by 15 players that are not interested in joining the All-Star Team.

Although, both of the answers are clearly less than ideal, I would argue that D is better than E. The reason being that E has an "internal" weakness (i.e. the players that are not interested in joining the All-Star team that break the answer), while although I was able to spot the weakness in D, I indentified it as an "external" weakness, that is, it is finding an exception to the rule by reaching externally from the answer (i.e. less aggressive players).

By including "Some All-Star candidates committed fouls" somewhere in the problem or by removing "Most" from the answer would address this and clearly make E the best answer, but that is not how it was written.

If anyone can let me know where I am going wrong on this, I would appreciate the help. I don't know how to go about dealing with this if it comes up again.

Thanks everyone!

[jlucero]

This is absolutely a scenario where there is more than one way to strengthen the argument, but only one can provide "the best" evidence.

Ultimately, our conclusion seeks "to reduce the number of such fouls during the coming season by implementing mandatory suspensions for players who commit flagrant fouls"

The biggest distinction I notice between D & E is this: D says that ONE similar league has a suspension policy and has low numbers of fragrant fouls (correlation). E says that MOST players in this league strive to be on the All-Star team and gives a reason why they will be trying to not get fouls (causation). You can almost always find scenarios that will make a conclusion not stand. Neither of these answer choices guarantees that the plan will work, but if you want this plan to work for the given reason, you'd be more interested in explaining how THIS policy will affect THIS league's players.

[minnick6]

That's a fair assessment. I missed the correlation vs causation and that definitely makes the difference. Time to brush up on my Freakonomics :)

Thanks!

[tim]

:)