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+# StructuredJson judge protocol: reachable, and currently rejected
+
+**Status:** blocker specified, not fixed. **Date:** 2026-08-13.
+
+## Why the protocol matters
+
+AgentEval's free-text verdict parser *"vetoes a leading yes when the word no appears later in the
+response"*. A judge answering "yes — there is no discrepancy" is therefore scored as a failure. That
+is a **systematic** mis-scoring, not noise, and `JudgeVerdictProtocol.StructuredJson` is the fix.
+
+It was also unreachable: the parameter existed on `CreateOptions` and every call site took the
+default. It is now selectable via `--judge-protocol free-text|structured-json` (default unchanged),
+and the choice is emitted into the report's protocol block so a StructuredJson score can never sit
+beside a FreeText one without the difference being visible.
+
+## What the first run found
+
+`longmemeval-prepared-20260813T001444Z` — 2 questions, `--judge-protocol structured-json`. **Rejected.**
+
+The expected risk was *incomparability with a free-text base*. The actual blocker is different and
+more concrete: **our own run validator is FreeText-shaped and refuses a StructuredJson run outright**,
+on two independent counts.
+
+**1. Call accounting.** The validator observed 4 LLM calls, classified 2 of them as diagnostic judge
+retries, and was left with **0 base judge calls against an expected 2–6**. The StructuredJson judge's
+call pattern is not the arithmetic that guard encodes.
+
+```
+structured: Observed 2 judge calls (0 base after excluding 2 diagnostic retries)
+            for 2 questions; expected between 2 and 6 base judge calls.
+```
+
+**2. Correctness reconciliation.** Fired for *every* question in *both* arms:
+
+```
+structured: AgentEval judge verdict and recorded correctness disagree for question bc149d6b.
+hybrid:     AgentEval judge verdict and recorded correctness disagree for question 5831f84d.
+```
+
+That says our recorded correctness is still derived on the free-text path regardless of which
+protocol the judge actually ran under.
+
+## Why the guard was not loosened
+
+The obvious way to get a green run is to widen the call-count bounds and relax the reconciliation.
+**That guard exists to catch exactly this class of anomaly.** Adjusting it so that the run which
+provoked it passes produces a number that looks measured because the thing that would have objected
+was tuned away — which is the failure this evaluation track exists to prevent.
+
+## What is actually needed
+
+1. Teach the run validator the StructuredJson judge's call shape, rather than widening the bounds
+   until both shapes fit — bounds loose enough to admit both admit real anomalies too.
+2. Read recorded correctness from the **structured verdict** when that protocol is in force, instead
+   of from the free-text parse.
+3. Only then re-run, and report it as a protocol change on a fresh base — never by flipping the
+   default, because every sealed base here is free-text.
+
+Estimated S–M against AgentEval's contract. The run was worth its cost for turning a guessed-at
+comparability caveat into this list.