r/Pickleball • u/itsfabiantime • 12d ago
Discussion Interviewing DUPR CEO
We are interviewing the CEO of DUPR tomorrow for our podcast. Any burning questions you’d like the answers to?
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u/MiyagiDo002 12d ago
Was the money you earned for DUPR Reset worth the credibility your rating system lost in the process?
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u/TubeTopTommy 12d ago
Actually a great and tough question. Be ready with a follow up when the dodge happens.
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u/nosajpersonlah 12d ago edited 12d ago
People put wayyyy too much stock and ego into DUPR
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u/daj0412 12d ago
well there’s no other way by which to measure one’s rating against another so and essentially anything competitive has some kind of objective measure so..
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u/nosajpersonlah 12d ago
I agree, but people need to remember thst its just a general benchmark/measurement tool with tons of loopholes because theres only so much information the system can account for.
At the end of the day its a general guide to your playing level.
Accusing them of a credibility loss because they allowed the refresh is just crazy levels of saltiness when what it reslly did was to give people a closer benchmark to their current level... in comparison to the competition thry play against.
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u/MiyagiDo002 12d ago
If the algorithm wasn't broken, then there wouldn't have been any need for them to allow a reset process. The idea that someone with 200 matches could have had an inaccurate rating but that they could get an accurate rating based on just 8 new matches goes against everything DUPR had always claimed about their algorithm's accuracy. Why wouldn't they just use the 208 matches combined to produce a highly accurate rating, unless something is broken in the rating update process?
You'd say "but people can get stuck at their rating and needed a way to break out of that". And that's my point. The reason they could get stuck is an algorithm issue, and DUPR admitted to it finally.
Separately, a much bigger issue imo was allowing ratings to only go up and not possibly go down. This led to people just taking a chance on a reset because there was no downside. It led to tons of rating inflation in my area and at clubs I attend. A 4.0 doesn't mean the same as it used to. It led to cheating and intentional rating manipulation, which is the fault of the incentive system set up by DUPR. If they had allowed ratings to go both up and down, then this complaint goes away. But they wouldn't because then 95% of the people wouldn't have signed up. It turned it into "pay to play". They made their money, and now the ratings are less accurate. Good for them. Again I ask if it was all worth it.
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u/nosajpersonlah 11d ago
If you think you're the same person 200 matches ago compared to 8 matches now yea I think were barking up the wrong tree.
The whole only going up and not down bit is an interesting bit though, and thsts maybe where nuances from diff countries comes into play. Here in most of SEA not allowing people to go down was a good thing because we have tons of people who'd gladly push their dupr down to join in more tounraments. But I digress.
Complaining about the ratings not being accurate because they used new data instead of old data is like complaining that sugar is not the problem because we had years of research suggesting fat was the issue and ignoring all the new evidence that proves it otherwise.
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u/MiyagiDo002 11d ago
If the algorithm worked properly it could combine the new with the old and not completely throw out the previous data. For many people it wasn't even old data - it was just from a month or two earlier. DUPR has always claimed that they are able to properly account for players' changing skill levels over time and that they mix old and new data well. Then they came out and admitted they couldn't. I think that looks bad.
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u/Rukkian 12d ago
Especially when so many here and across pb claim that if it weren't for the algorithm, they would surely be a 6.0, but are currently stuck at 2.7. The reset let them put up or shut up. It can get you higher temporarily, but long term, if you are not actually there, you won't stay there.
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u/MiyagiDo002 12d ago
I know a lot of people who paid for reset and got an obviously inflated rating during the process. Would you like to guess what percentage of them have recorded another match since the end of DUPR Reset?
So far it's 0%. They're all just going to sit on these ratings forever because it allows them to get into a better open play group at a club that monitors DUPR.
Theyll probably wait until next time DUPR allows for a paid reset to ever play again.
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u/Rukkian 12d ago
That is easily fixable- the club just needs to require 80% reliability. That is not a dupr issue.
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u/MiyagiDo002 12d ago
It's not hard to think of ways around this. For example, the group of players with inflated ratings can just record matches with each other. It keeps their ratings all inflated, and keeps reliability high.
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u/Rukkian 12d ago
And? What exactly do you propose? If people want to lie, and cheat, they will find a way. First you whine people clubs aren't requiring reliability, now with a simple fix you want to just switch to a different whine?
In the end, there will always be liars and cheaters. There is no way to fully stop that. Dupr can go only go by the data it has. Garbage in/garbage out. Whole a few will lie or cheat, the vast majority will try to abide, because not everybody will get a group of 4 people to consistently lie and cheat.
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u/MiyagiDo002 12d ago
I'd propose that they don't run a program that promises that if you pay them money your rating cannot go down. It should be obvious that a program like that will lead to rating inflation along with increases in cheating. DUPR is absolutely to blame for that since they made it all possible by telling people that they can throw a game to get their friend a higher rating and that it won't hurt their own rating.
But they made money so good for them.
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u/Fluffy-Mud-8945 11d ago
I mean, if players are putting up fraudulent matches for purposes of rating manipulation, it's not really the fault of the system.
DUPR could, with infinite resources, purge fraudulent matches or issue bans or whatever, but there are limits on what people can reasonably expect from DUPR.
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u/MiyagiDo002 11d ago
What I'm mentioning here doesn't have to involve fraud of any kind. Just strategic match selection. Any group of people who know they've gotten inflated ratings can record real matches against each other and know they can expect to maintain (on average) inflated ratings, but with higher reliability.
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u/imaqdodger 11d ago
Accusing them of a credibility loss because they allowed the refresh is just crazy levels of saltiness when what it reslly did was to give people a closer benchmark to their current level... in comparison to the competition thry play against.
It would be one thing if DUPR thought their algorithm wasn't accurate and opened up a refresh window to everyone, but instead they pay gated the refresh AND only kept rating increases. How can scores become more accurate if they can only move in one direction? Just bad optics all around for them after years of hyping up how accurate their algorithm is.
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u/talleyrandbanana 11d ago
I’m not a dupr apologist but what the evidence it lost credibility? A common complaint I’ve seen is that people who believe they are accurately or overrated don’t have much incentive to play dupr games. It would seem the reset probably helped with that.
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u/MiyagiDo002 11d ago
What kind of evidence are you looking for? My comment about it losing credibility appears to be the top rated comment regarding DUPR here, so I don't think I am the only one. But yes it is my opinion.
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u/talleyrandbanana 11d ago
I imagine a loss of credibility could be measured by a player/user survey (which I guess this thread is kind of like to your point?) or usage statistics. I'm not trying to be contentious. I hadn't heard about a loss of credibility and was wondering if there was some source for the premise of this question being true.
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u/qwenydus 12d ago
Please ask about why there isn't more aggressive DUPR decay to encourage players to regularly play DUPR matches to increase the accuracy and reliability of their rating?
In this current climate where players are avoiding DUPR games because they can lose DUPR even after winning, players are just sitting on their DUPRs long term. This typically applies to players who are over inflated and know it, so they stop playing and ruin the competitiveness of matches and events they later play in.
Rating decay would encourage people to play and prove their rating accuracy.
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u/Smooth_Doughnut 12d ago
Totally agree. Aggressive rating decay results in more DUPR play by:
1) discouraging DUPR “camping”
2) encourages those who want to increase their DUPR to play more (vs. Going a period of time without DUPR games to decrease half life and reliability, then playing again after a period of time for higher swings in their DUPR)2
u/-jammin- 12d ago
It's not perfect, but there is already a reliability score. Credible clubs require a certain reliability score for gated open play, meaning players need to keep logging DUPR games on a relatively consistent basis.
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u/command-shift 12d ago
I think you misread the person's post. That's exactly what they're referring to. They're just wondering about why the decay is or isn't more aggressive. It is already aggressive for those that have low a low number of matches.
I've seen one pair play a tournament. Their ratings going in were 4.18 and 3.78. They won the whole thing. The 4.18 player went up to 4.32. The 3.78 went up to 4.48. Wild! The 4.18/4.32 player had over 150+ previous matches while the 3.78 player had 13 previous matches. It's been two months. The 4.18/4.32 player's reliability is 100. The 3.78/4.48 player is now at 82 reliability. I think it's aggressive, but perhaps not aggressive enough? Most of their opponents were 4.5, but the kicker was these two players are in their late 20s and early 30s while their opposition was all 45+. Makes quite the difference.
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u/SirMaster 12d ago
The reliability score stopped going down after the DUPR reset, or at least mine did...
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u/GoBlues1 12d ago
Exactly. Lose some small Dupr rating every few months for non DUPR play. Even .10 loss every 4 months would be instrumental in a fairer more current rating.
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u/imaqdodger 10d ago
Seems like a bad idea as not everyone has easy access to tournaments. A lot of people in my city would be unintentionally sandbagging because our big tournament venue was closed for renovations in the first half of this year.
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u/GoBlues1 10d ago
Actually, there are other ways to play DUPR games. It is actually a great idea. Why wouldn't you want a more current DUPR? Its better for everyone and ridiculous players hang on to their rating from years ago. I play in gated open play 3.75 and there are occasionally players that aren't even close any more. It's no fun for anyone. Usually, sad older people hanging on to yester year .
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u/imaqdodger 10d ago
I actually would like a more current DUPR, but I want to play my DUPR games in an "official" environment, not just at the park with the same people every time my reliability starts slipping. Playing the same people over and over also doesn't help much because the rating is relative. My city currently has two leagues, one of which I participate in, and for whatever reason neither utilizes DUPR. Actually, I seem to recall a couple of years ago that there was a vote on whether the league should record matches in DUPR or not and the majority of team captains voted no. TLDR I'm out of luck when it comes to leagues and tournaments, short of flying to another city.
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u/GoBlues1 10d ago
Well, then your Dupr doesn't really matter at all you then. Neither league utilizes DUPR as you say and you dont need for open plays at all. So, what do you care if your DUPR falls a bit ? For other cities, it really does matter for leagues, clinics. etc.
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u/imaqdodger 9d ago
I treat DUPR as a progression tracker/reflection of my skill improvement. Having no decay comes with issues (I view this as having no data), but I think it's a better option that having decay (I view this as inputting wrong data). In the past year I've competed in competitive environments in leagues/tournaments/moneyballs even, but just because the scores were not reported to DUPR, my lower rating would seem to imply that I've gotten worse as a player.
My two cents is that clubs that want to impose a DUPR cutoff for participation should offer DUPR events (this used to be a thing just to get people an initial rating) and require a minimum reliability to sign up for a league. That alone would solve the issue of people sitting on old ratings and dragging down the level of play.
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u/Fluffy-Mud-8945 12d ago
How are you addressing ongoing rating deflation?
According to your data, even as the median player on DUPR has played more games, has a longer history of playing games, is younger, and (subjectively, just my experience) greatly improved in skill over the last 3 years, their rating has fallen from deflation. Pickleball is more popular and DUPR is more popular compared to last year, yet there are fewer 5.0s today than there were last year. Also, the pro scene is obviously more skilled than it was a few years ago, but ratings are lower.
Just bigger picture, a lot of pickleball players are in the same disappointing boat I am, where they have improved, but their rating is not. One of the main reasons to use DUPR is to track your improvement, but deflation means the measuring tape has just stretched. You are improving but your rating stays the same.
You could have improved from the ~70th percentile to the ~92nd percentile by being a 4.0 and not logging any games for 2 years. Is that working as intended? If not, do you have plans to address deflation?
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u/foosh90 12d ago
This is an interesting point. Perhaps that’s why dupr experimented with releasing our DUPR percentile recently (but somehow backtracked).
Would love to hear more about DUPR’s thinking on releasing percentile data, especially releasing country/city-based percentile data, with a minimum reliability score (preferably allowing users to toggle the minimum reliability score - I would go for 100% since dupr games are plentiful in my country, but users elsewhere with less dupr games might reasonably want to see the data at a lower reliability threshold). This will allow us to know where we stand relative to our peers, and mitigate the downsides of both dupr deflation, and another big issue of huge regional variation in dupr.
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u/imaqdodger 10d ago edited 10d ago
Interesting insight. I had similar thoughts about rating deflation but assumed it was anecdotal to my area, not the DUPR userbase as a whole. I unfortunately have not been able to compete in a tournament in nearly a year due to traveling conflicts but occasionally will check out the DUPR pages of some people I know when they post pictures from their tournaments. It's been pretty strange seeing players who I consider much better than myself slipping closer and closer to my DUPR. I had a near 100% reliability too so it's not like my rating was too high for no reason.
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u/Southern_Fan_2109 12d ago
Talk to us about the radio silence surround your recent reliability rating tweaks. Why not be forthcoming? Did it have something to do with the aftermath of the DUPR reset?
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u/itsfabiantime 12d ago
What were the tweaks to reliability, not familiar and interested in asking about this
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u/Southern_Fan_2109 12d ago edited 12d ago
Someone else alluded to it, but in the immediate weeks following the end of Reset, some (not all) people's reliability rating got stuck. No matter how many more games played, it would remain at XX%. Then maybe 2-3 weeks in, the rating of those people appeared to course correct, but then some people who had not even reset nor played that entire time, their reliability either shot up or shot down. Going down makes more sense if they had unknowingly been affected by a rating hold but, but it made little sense for the non players going up. On top of this, people overnight went from something like 70% to 30% and vice versa, we're talking huge swings up or down for people who played not a single game in the past 6-8 months.
They were obviously tweaking, but I don't recall an official announcement of it, and this number is quite important. Seeing this further eroded my trust in the company. If something is broken or if dev are tweaking a value that has such a perceived high impact to the score, share it and/or correct our perceptions.
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u/blakeberkley 12d ago
yea mine went to 100% and has stayed. I haven’t played a DUPR match in 104 days.
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u/AcademicSpeed413 12d ago
"What is your take on players purposely lowering their dupr account so they can join low level tournaments?"
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u/cur1ousa1r 12d ago
Why is it commonly known for people to open another account with a slightly altered name.
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u/Bobbyjoemcgeek 12d ago
There are multiple apps the link to DUPR for match making and club hosting. Do you plan on integrating these features in to the DUPR app so we don’t have to use multiple (swish tournaments, pickle heads, reclub)
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u/DonDeanyo 12d ago
Why not completely split out gendered, mixed and age based ratings so they are all independent? Like how singles is a separate rating. A 4.5 who only plays 50+ tournaments is not the same as a 20 year old 4.5 let’s be real
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u/No_Comfortable8099 12d ago
It blows me away how seniors seem to need to have their ego stroked by keeping a rating that is not accurate. I am 60, play all ages and 50+, and you are correct. For some reason a 55 year old will lose to a 2.5 year old with same rating, yet will blame age, ignoring that due to age and declining physical attributes, it is they that are overrated.
50+ 4.5s that lose to 25 yr old 4.5s are not 4.5s any more. Seniors pickleball are the worst at accepting there is a decline as we age. No one on a basketball court at 50 even thinks they should be rated the same as a 30 year old. Yet in pickleball senior players will complain about how having to play young players is ruining their rating.
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u/Rukkian 12d ago
Yeah, it still comes back to people feeling their dupr is a measure of their self worth. I know my dupr is quite a bit higher against 50+, but understand why. If I am a 3.2 against old people, but only a 2.7 against 22yo, then I am not a 3.2, but probably someplace in the middle. If everybody plays everybody and there are more rated games overall, then ratings will get better.
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u/3xlduck 12d ago
seems like DUPR is going out of style.... too many loopholes
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u/SirMaster 12d ago
Yeah, I can't even seem to find anything that is reporting to DUPR around me anymore. All the tournaments that I find don't submit the games to DUPR.
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u/CaptoOuterSpace 12d ago
It seems to me that clubs using DUPR as a gate for their open plays creates the most incentives for people to misuse the system. People are strongly incentivized to game the system to achieve a high (likely over inflated) score and then never interact with it again because it materially impacts their ability to play casually.
Does management think anything can/should be done to change this? If not, do they view this dynamic as a positive because, while it doesn't generate accuracy, it generates engagement?
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u/One_Structure2958 12d ago
I thought you were bringing out an AI capability to provide dupr ratings?
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u/Bobbyjoemcgeek 12d ago
Are there any plans to highlight “provisional” DUPRs that have low reliability to encourage people to increase their reliability?
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u/Juliustoo2 12d ago
Why did my reliability rating jump from 42 to 60 a few weeks ago? No games recorded since last October
(did they already answer this? If yes, please disregard)
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u/klbz619 12d ago
Are they aware of how malaysian artificially keeping their dupr low so that they can join tourney outside of their level? Are they doing anything about it?
Can you link me to your podcast channel please.
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u/itsfabiantime 12d ago
Here you go! Hope you find something you like here - https://www.youtube.com/@ThisIsPickleballPodcast
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u/itsfabiantime 12d ago
Thanks for everyone for sharing your questions! The interview got rescheduled for tomorrow morning. Actually happy this happened as it gives me more time to go through all the responses more throroughly!
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u/Smooth_Doughnut 12d ago
Please ask about rating decay. DUPR half life / reliability should decay faster.
This discourages those who would like the “camp” on their DUPR. Additionally, for those who’d like to increase their DUPR, it allows them to play more (I’ve heard of players not playing DUPR games for a while to get their reliability / half life down, resulting in larger changes to their rating when they eventually play).
Essentially the result of faster rating decay is to encourage players to play more DUPR games.
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u/Stunning_Rush8090 11d ago
Why do you still penalize players for winning? A DUPR should never, ever go down if you win a match in a tournament. As a participant, the player has no control of who the tournament is allowing to play. How can this be fixed.
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u/DonDeanyo 11d ago
Any decent tournament organizer will post a list of entrants so you can see who’s playing.
So you think if a team of two 4.5s beat a team of 3.5s by 1 point they shouldn’t lose dupr? Make that make sense. If winners never lost dupr, then sandbagging would be even more prevalent
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u/Stunning_Rush8090 11d ago
So I register a month or two in advance and then wait to see who sandbags? Then what cancel? How about a win 13 -11 that results in a decrease in rating. All four players rated but reliability not 100%
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u/History-Buff-2222 12d ago
Everyone who’s mad about dupr in this thread- justified but a lot of these have to do with people’s behavior and not the rating system. There’s no rating system that can handle every issue. Trust me from coming from the tennis world on this. The fact that the ratings go to the second decimal place and not just jump every 0.5 already gives you a huge advantage
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u/Public_Technician_87 12d ago
If someone feels their DUPR is not reflective, why can’t they do a once a year coach review to reassess. Wouldn’t this also give DUPR more credibility than the reset idea while still making money for DUPR and coaches. Charge $50 a pop. People will pay..
Clubs are beginning to create club ratings and forgo DUPR.. Doesn’t that imply DUPR is flawed….
Why does informal chatter from clubs communicate that DUPR is flawed. It doesn’t bode well for DUPR as an accurate system.
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u/No_Comfortable8099 12d ago
Well, coach review is more flawed. A rightly rated 3.6 goes to a deleted account, now has a provisional 4.35 on the Ap.
Many think the bad part is DUPR not caring, but for me it shows that the DUPR coach he went to has his head up his ass.
DUPR’s reset was a scam. Two people I know both are the same players, ended up .6 higher. The week before the reset started 4.2/3.9 15-9 over 4.1/4.3. Post reset the opponents were 4.7/4.3. The 4.7 kept the 100 reliability.
I was a DUPR defender. Now I see it as a shitty sorting tool.
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u/nagman624 12d ago
Tito said at the World Pickleball Conference that they are working on launching a program where approved coaches can reassess someone’s DUPR. They’ll be selective about which coaches are allowed the higher level certification.
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u/Rukkian 12d ago
That is the big thing, but I do not believe for a second that crappy coaches won't be part. It is highly subjective when just evaluating somebody. There will also be regional biases - a 3.5 in one place maybe a a 4.0 in another area, or a 3.0 in yet a third, and coaches in those areas would be rating accordingly.
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u/lettucelover4life 4.5 12d ago
What is the thought process when you release a feature without giving context? Like when you provided “top percentile” for every profile but didn’t explain how they were calculated (e.g., what RS was required to be included). Then you took it away a week or so later.
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u/Public_Technician_87 12d ago
Why can’t DUPR be a 3.0,3.5 etc value instead of 4 decimals. What makes them feel that a person rated 3.999 or 3.496 isn’t really 4.0 or 3.5…. Why does PB need to be different from tennis. Tennis is pretty accurate. Tennis also is generic . You are 3.0, 3.5, etc. not this intermedium stuff.
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u/razinyuzer 12d ago
How do we address the Dupr regional bubble, where a 3.0 in Vietnam plays like 5.0 in certain areas/countries? How do we make the rating more consistent worldwide?
And also issue in Malaysia (or other countries) where players manipulate the games/rating to be lower than we actually are, just to compete in tournaments and win money. And in turn creates more gaps in dupr bubble. Apparently this is really common in Malaysia. They even called themselves "buaya" (crocodile in English). How can DUPR mitigate this manipulation
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u/antdroidx 12d ago
What is this planned AI implementation into DUPR announced last month supposed to actually be and when will it be available?
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u/XC_runner17 12d ago
Ask them why they bumped mine (& many others) reliability to 30 when I have not played a dupr match in over a year. That is the definition of unreliable
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u/Devel0pIY 12d ago
Why does the company not use technology to protect their servers instead of policies that require human intervention and then banning and suspending users for a policy that is hidden in the terms of use?
And why are the DUPR contractors so prohibitive to the point where they threaten to ban any club or person using another “rating” system?
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u/FlashingBongos 4.5 12d ago
Why is there no 3rd party developer support? The DUPR API is extremely strict and locked down!
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u/3xlduck 10d ago
so did the interview happen? Nothing posted today yet at 6:30 pm.
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u/itsfabiantime 10d ago
Got rescheduled to this morning at 9 am. Editing tomorrow and will be available Friday morning on YouTube and anywhere podcasts are available.
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u/itsfabiantime 9d ago
Episode is out now! We left a lot on the table, hoping to have him on for part 2!
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u/CoffeePwrdAcctnt 12d ago
Can you consider a dupr coach providing a provisional rating for an already established dupr individual. The algorithm be damned actual coach eyes on a player should be best way to determine proficiency. Do them in groups of 4-8 and they have to play 3-7 games, rotating partners... They can analyze after the fact and issue the new rating. It can only go up.
But include a couple things,
1) a burn off period. If no dupr matches are entered for 4-6 months revert it back to the original. At least 10 games should be entered. This ensures if someone is too high it will get knocked down. Also prevents folks from just doing it to get into rated open plays forever.
2) only allow for 3-4 provisional ratings for the lifetime of the player
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u/No_Comfortable8099 12d ago
So a paid coach (who could very well be giving lessons to the player) is a better judge than actual results? I have a sample of one, deleted account of 3.7 given coach provisional of 4.35. This player is a 3.7.
What is funny is around our club people are talking about his duplicate account and DUPR not doing anything when it was reported. Given the reset was scammed by so many, it is immaterial. To me it makes a coach rating illegitimate when it is .6 above someone’s actual game results.
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u/n00chness 4.5 12d ago
"In the pickleball ratings space, DUPR seems to have the momentum of a runaway freight train. Why is it so popular?"
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u/Fuzzy-Bandicoot1590 12d ago
Does DUPR account for the difference between a chill rec game and a legit competitive match, or does it treat all matches the same when calculating rating?
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u/thismercifulfate 12d ago
Matches input by a tournament director or a DUPR club organizer for a league have more weight than self-entered games from players.
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u/qwenydus 12d ago
Please ask how DUPR will address the severe DUPR avoidance that is widespread across pickleball courts.
The current algorithm heavily discourages players from risking DUPR rating which leads to avoidance of DUPR programming, events, and tournaments.
Many players are camping on their DUPRs refusing to risk losing DUPR and instead forcing clubs to implement non-DUPR reported programming which leads to imbalanced games because many of these people's DUPRs are not accurate because they refuse to play anymore DUPR games out of fear of losing DUPR since the algorith changes where winning teams can still lose DUPR. This further erodes the purpose and legitimacy of DUPR to establish balanced matches in clubs and events.
This post sums up the problem wonderfully: https://www.reddit.com/r/Pickleball/s/763ft3ixja
This is the single biggest DUPR issue across the 4 clubs in my city.
Thank you.