Correction, November 8: An earlier version of this piece said no one had been announced for guard. Crossmen's October 19 choreography team names a main equipment choreographer and a weapon choreographer, which is guard work; we covered it on November 6. What has not been announced is a color guard caption head. The headline, summary and two sections below were corrected, along with two rounded scores.

Crossmen announced their 2027 design team on October 16 [1]. Three people are new: Chris Carrasco as production manager, Grant Underwood as aesthetic production designer and Michael Raiford as design consultant.

Four return. Wes Pendergrass moves into a new role as program coordinator and visual designer. Rachel Montañez is aesthetic production specialist, Mike Huestis percussion arranger and composer, and John Meehan music coordinator, composer and arranger [1].

Read against the 2026 sheet, the list answers one weak caption more clearly than the other.

Two captions trailed

Crossmen finished 15th at Prelims with 84.363, 0.388 ahead of Music City at 83.975. They placed 15th again at Semifinals with 83.425.

Color Guard trailed that placement all week. It read 16.3, 18th, at Prelims, and 16.2, 17th, at Semifinals.

Percussion was the lower number at Semifinals. It read 15.65, the lowest score on Crossmen's sheet that night. Music City's line read 16.9 and The Academy's 15.95.

The rest of the sheet sat near the finish. General Effect Visual read 16.75 (16th) at Prelims and 16.675 (15th) at Semifinals. Brass, at 17.4 on the Semifinal night, was the corps' best caption.

What the fall has addressed

Percussion has had attention. Huestis returns as percussion arranger and composer on the design team [1], and on October 4 the corps announced a 2027 percussion and audio leadership team [4].

Production has had more. Three of the design team's new names hold production or aesthetic titles, and Montañez's return was announced separately [5]. Those roles shape how a show looks and flows, which touches every visual caption.

Visual got a leader early. Reid Griffin was introduced on September 17 as visual caption head [6], and the corps introduced its 2027 choreographers on October 19 [3].

What it has not named

The design team is not a guard hire. A production manager and an aesthetic designer are not a guard caption head, and the design team release names no guard designer [1]. The guard-facing announcement is the October 19 choreography team: Danny Page as main equipment choreographer and Xavier Yankey as weapon choreographer, with Andre Williams as movement specialist and equipment choreographer [3].

So guard has choreographers. What the corps has not yet said is who runs the caption: no color guard caption head has been announced, and corps often name guard staff later in the fall.

Keep the stakes in proportion too. Madison Scouts, one place above Crossmen at Semifinals, scored 86.25, about 2.8 more. Guard's 0.8 gap to the Scouts' 17.0 is worth 0.4 on the total, because guard is a performance caption and counts half. No single caption closes that distance. Two weak ones make it longer.

What to watch

Watch for a guard caption head. If Crossmen name one, the second weak caption has an owner as well as a book, and the fall plan covers both.

If they do not, the 2027 build-out answers a different question than the one the guard numbers asked. The first scored nights will show which it was.

Sources

1. Introducing the 2027 Crossmen Design Team! · 2026-10-16
2. https://www.dci.org/news/corps-news-and-announcements-20261023/ · 2026-10-23
3. Introducing the 2027 crossmen choreographers · 2026-10-19
4. We’re excited to announce the crossmen’s 2027 percussion and audio leadership team · 2026-10-04
5. The crossmen are thrilled to welcome back rachel montañez and connor vaughan · 2026-09-22
6. We’re excited to welcome reid griffin to the 2027 crossmen staff as our visual caption head · 2026-09-17