How to run a backyard tournament

This is the single highest-value decision, and it rules out most of the catalogue for tournament purposes — not because those games are worse, but because there is nothing to point at when two people disagree.

Cornhole wins on all three counts: published rules, short rounds and a player count that brackets cleanly. The rules themselves are summarised in cornhole rules, and the court dimensions in regulation cornhole dimensions.

Four, eight or sixteen teams. Nothing else. A bracket that is not a power of two needs byes, and a bye is a free pass into the second round that somebody will resent by the third.

If you have an awkward number of players, the fix is to change the teams rather than the bracket. Six people is three teams of two, so make it four teams by putting the two strongest players in singles teams and pairing the rest — cornhole publishes 2 or 4 players and singles is a standard format, so this is not a house rule.

Single elimination, not double. An 8-team single-elimination bracket is 7 matches in 3 rounds. Double elimination roughly doubles that, and the losers' bracket is played by people who have already decided they are done. Run a second short bracket afterwards instead if there is appetite.

Thirty seconds, in front of everyone, covering exactly four things:

1. Which rulebook. “ACL rules.” That is the whole sentence.
2. What you have changed. Playing to 15 instead of 21 to keep matches short is the most common and most useful modification. Say it.
3. How ties are broken. In cornhole, cancellation scoring means an exact bust is possible; decide in advance whether you play on or reset.
4. Who adjudicates. One person, named. Not a committee, and not the host if the host is playing.

For bocce, add one more: use the measuring rope. Close ends are the entire dispute surface of bocce and the GoSports sets publish a rope in the box for exactly this reason.

• Certified bags, if it is cornhole. ACL COMP bags are published at 6 by 6 inches and 16 ounces with a certification for competitive play. A tournament where everyone throws the same bag removes an argument you did not know you were going to have. Comparison: cornhole bags.
• A second set of boards. The single biggest improvement to running time.
• A visible bracket. Written on something. A dry-erase board is genuinely useful and a giant yard dice set ships one.
• A measuring rope, for bocce or for any game where “closest wins” decides points.

If this is for a work event rather than friends, the social constraints change the game choice considerably — yard games for a company picnic covers why an individual-skill game is the wrong pick in front of colleagues.