Scumleague Fantasy Football 2014 (Voodoo Dynasty)

[Xalxe]

We cannot exist in the same universe.

One of us must be eliminated.

[T-Bone]

Our eyes have locked.

You know what this means.

[reinoe]

I have no hope of moving on anyway. I took a pass on Robert Morris and kept Eddie royal way past his exp date. I had holes in my team but didn't fix them until it was too late.

[LlamaFluff]

Bleh total points as tiebreakers over head to head record.

At least made a run at it with 4-2 to finish season until Julio Jones had his best game ever. 0-4 in games decided by 10 or less hurt.

Record of always finishing top or bottom four intact still though

[gamsimbre]

If it were possible, I would do division leaders as top 3 seeds plus the next person who has won the most EPE games as the wildcard to eliminate some of the luck of the schedule. But I guess that's part of the charm with fantasy football, just like with kickers.

[Locke Lamora]

I think if you want to have head-to-head matchups that actually mean something, you have to accept that there are going to be luck-based fluctuations in results that don't always reflect the overall quality of teams in terms of scoring at the end of the season. I expect if we went all the way to the other end of the extreme and just did an EPE league then most people would not like it as much (but perhaps some would prefer that). Somewhere along that spectrum are approaches like the EPE wildcard, which can balance out bad luck effectively but still only for one person, and once you introduce the mechanism you have to ask why you're only taking it so far. I see it like a lot of games or competitions that involves an element of luck, like a dice roll or cards: the better players will have better results over a long period of time, but within any individual season there's the potential for much bigger fluctuations.

[zoraster]

I think if you want to have head-to-head matchups that actually mean something, you have to accept that there are going to be luck-based fluctuations in results that don't always reflect the overall quality of teams in terms of scoring at the end of the season.

This.

Fantasy football is great because it's a series of weekly battles between you and an opponent. Using EPE or some other method (and I don't really think EPE is superior to total points for and TPF is way easier to calculate) may reduce bad and good luck slightly, but it does so by damaging what makes fantasy football fun.

Frankly, if you want to play a fantasy sport that isn't subject to these forces, play fantasy baseball roto.

[mith]

I wouldn't say EPE is superior to total points - they just measure different things. If you were doing a league without head-to-head, either would be a solid choice, just depending on your preferences.

I do think EPE is a better indication of how a team has performed with respect to a head-to-head weekly system; total points doesn't take into account when the points were earned. That's not the whole story of team strength - after all, someone with lots of points but a poor EPE is suffering from a different kind of luck (how their players' good and bad weeks happened to line up) - but it does matter in a head-to-head league.

That said, I wouldn't want to use EPE for determining playoff spots or relegation either...

[Jahudo]

Hey PokerFace, we've got a consolation game to play so I'll start Manziel. I'm finally going to live up to my team name.

[Debonair Danny DiPietro]

The main reason we do divisions is not rivalry, but for a symmetrical schedule. Teams in different divisions may play radically different schedules, but at least you are playing the same schedule as the teams in your division, and you are getting two shots at each of those teams. There is no such thing as a fair system with fantasy head-to-head... Someone is getting screwed by the schedule, divisions or no.

Yeah, but even the symmetrical schedule is completely arbitrary; in this case Tally lucked into an easier schedule than IS by being randomly placed into a weaker division. IS still manages to grind out an equal record and accrues more points but gets left out for her because he was in the hard division? That's a double screw and eliminating divisions would at least prevent that sort of situation because divisions don't eliminate easier/harder schedules, someone is going to have better luck and someone is going to have worse in that regard, we shouldn't compound that by breaking things up allowing for weird variance quirks to win the day. I'll admit this year's cases aren't "that bad" but why wait for an NFC South type scenario to happen before sensibly changing things?

[zoraster]

I wouldn't say EPE is superior to total points - they just measure different things. If you were doing a league without head-to-head, either would be a solid choice, just depending on your preferences.

I do think EPE is a better indication of how a team has performed with respect to a head-to-head weekly system; total points doesn't take into account when the points were earned. That's not the whole story of team strength - after all, someone with lots of points but a poor EPE is suffering from a different kind of luck (how their players' good and bad weeks happened to line up) - but it does matter in a head-to-head league.

That said, I wouldn't want to use EPE for determining playoff spots or relegation either...

i mostly agree with that. EPE is very interesting and I love to see the results of it --- at the very least and captures head-to-head better than total points, but it's not perfect. I've certainly played different people than I would if I were competing against all people because I'm in a unique situation in my individual game. Just one example: I didn't start a Defense in one week because all our players had played except my Defense and I was up by 1 point.

[Wraith]

MY DESKTOP LIIIIIIIVES!!!!!!

AT LAST, I CAN POST HERE REGULARLY AGAIN!

[Bert]

I think if you want to have head-to-head matchups that actually mean something, you have to accept that there are going to be luck-based fluctuations in results that don't always reflect the overall quality of teams in terms of scoring at the end of the season. I expect if we went all the way to the other end of the extreme and just did an EPE league then most people would not like it as much (but perhaps some would prefer that). Somewhere along that spectrum are approaches like the EPE wildcard, which can balance out bad luck effectively but still only for one person, and once you introduce the mechanism you have to ask why you're only taking it so far. I see it like a lot of games or competitions that involves an element of luck, like a dice roll or cards: the better players will have better results over a long period of time, but within any individual season there's the potential for much bigger fluctuations.

Agree!!

[PokerFace]

Hey PokerFace, we've got a consolation game to play so I'll start Manziel. I'm finally going to live up to my team name.

yay its fitting I have run into you in the consolation. I probably will get Juls next week

If you want to start Johnny then you are welcome to. But if I were you I'd use stafford

[PokerFace]

Ok Yahoo fantasy projections say Manziel should outscore Stafford. I'd like to revisit my earlier argument that Yahoo's projections are the worst fantasy projections and state this as further evidence

[mith]

The main reason we do divisions is not rivalry, but for a symmetrical schedule. Teams in different divisions may play radically different schedules, but at least you are playing the same schedule as the teams in your division, and you are getting two shots at each of those teams. There is no such thing as a fair system with fantasy head-to-head... Someone is getting screwed by the schedule, divisions or no.

Yeah, but even the symmetrical schedule is completely arbitrary; in this case Tally lucked into an easier schedule than IS by being randomly placed into a weaker division. IS still manages to grind out an equal record and accrues more points but gets left out for her because he was in the hard division? That's a double screw and eliminating divisions would at least prevent that sort of situation because divisions don't eliminate easier/harder schedules, someone is going to have better luck and someone is going to have worse in that regard, we shouldn't compound that by breaking things up allowing for weird variance quirks to win the day. I'll admit this year's cases aren't "that bad" but why wait for an NFC South type scenario to happen before sensibly changing things?

It's not arbitrary - the goal is that, since we can't have identical schedules for the whole 12 team league, we can at least make groups of four teams have the same schedules amongst themselves, and in this case it makes some sense to reward the winner of each grouping, since they have done best amongst teams with the same schedule, who they have also played twice. In some cases, that means one of the teams left out of the playoffs has a better case than someone who got in - IS v. Tally is your example, though Tally was a deserving playoff team by EPE standards, it's hasdgfas that is the outlier - but in other cases a better team can finish with a worse record as a division winner than the fifth place team (Yiley v. Panzer in League 2).

For me, having divisions is more fun, and also is more elegant. I do think ignoring divisions would give "better results" in some fraction of cases, but that fraction is small - much of the time, the division winners were all among the four best teams by any measure, and occasionally one would get bumped in favor of an inferior team if we did away with divisions because of scheduling quirks. I don't think making a change is worthwhile, but if there is strong support for getting rid of divisions I will consider it.

One option I've been toying with, which would be a radical change but would preserve symmetrical scheduling while also balancing the schedules and getting rid of the weak division problem is to decide in the schedule for the final three weeks (the second set of divisional games currently) *after* the first 11 weeks have been played. We then group the teams into pseudo-divisions (for scheduling purposes only; no "division" winners. The simplest grouping is: 1-6-7-12; 2-5-8-11; 3-4-9-10; and the "seeding" of teams for this could be done by actual record, total points, EPE, or some combination of the three. This ensures that every "division" is equal, or at least very close to it. We could also have other groupings to emphasize important break points while retaining balance: 2-7-8-9 (emphasizing the relegation battle), 4-5-6-11 (emphasizing the battle for the last playoff spot), and 1-3-10-12 (the leftovers, relevant on both extremes).

[zoraster]

i agree with mith. i like divisions. we don't have enough weeks to play everyone twice, so it makes sense to add some order to the process of who you do play twice. yes, that's going to mean there are easier and harder divisions, but that's okay with me.

[mith]

Radical change 2: 11 week regular season. In week 12, the playoffs begin for teams 9-12, while 1-8 play amongst themselves for further seeding. In week 13, the winners from the first round join 5-8 (which may be different from the end of the regular season), while 1-4 play each other to battle for the 1 seed and 11-12 determines last place (so sorta double elimination for relegation purposes). In week 14, 2-4 join the week 13 winners, the week 13 losers and the double elimination winner continue the relegation battle, and 1 plays 12 in a totally meaningless match. Then in week 15, the 1 seed joins the semifinals; of the five teams not in the semis who haven't already taken two loses, the highest seed is relegation proof while the other four play in a consolation bracket where two losses means relegation.

Complicated, but pretty entertaining... (Inspired by Bill Simmons' "Entertaining As Hell" tournament idea for the NBA.)

Less radical idea: We expand to 14 and everyone plays everyone once, top 6 make the playoffs. I find 14 too many personally.

[Debonair Danny DiPietro]

Radical change 2: 11 week regular season. In week 12, the playoffs begin for teams 9-12, while 1-8 play amongst themselves for further seeding. In week 13, the winners from the first round join 5-8 (which may be different from the end of the regular season), while 1-4 play each other to battle for the 1 seed and 11-12 determines last place (so sorta double elimination for relegation purposes). In week 14, 2-4 join the week 13 winners, the week 13 losers and the double elimination winner continue the relegation battle, and 1 plays 12 in a totally meaningless match. Then in week 15, the 1 seed joins the semifinals; of the five teams not in the semis who haven't already taken two loses, the highest seed is relegation proof while the other four play in a consolation bracket where two losses means relegation.

Complicated, but pretty entertaining... (Inspired by Bill Simmons' "Entertaining As Hell" tournament idea for the NBA.)

Less radical idea: We expand to 14 and everyone plays everyone once, top 6 make the playoffs. I find 14 too many personally.

Yes, but where does the two-man sack race held on consecutive Sundays fit in as a tiebreaker?

[mith]

zoraster and I need to work that into the draft lottery next year.

[Debonair Danny DiPietro]

It's not arbitrary - the goal is that, since we can't have identical schedules for the whole 12 team league, we can at least make groups of four teams have the same schedules amongst themselves, and in this case it makes some sense to reward the winner of each grouping, since they have done best amongst teams with the same schedule, who they have also played twice. In some cases, that means one of the teams left out of the playoffs has a better case than someone who got in - IS v. Tally is your example, though Tally was a deserving playoff team by EPE standards, it's hasdgfas that is the outlier - but in other cases a better team can finish with a worse record as a division winner than the fifth place team (Yiley v. Panzer in League 2).

For me, having divisions is more fun, and also is more elegant. I do think ignoring divisions would give "better results" in some fraction of cases, but that fraction is small - much of the time, the division winners were all among the four best teams by any measure, and occasionally one would get bumped in favor of an inferior team if we did away with divisions because of scheduling quirks. I don't think making a change is worthwhile, but if there is strong support for getting rid of divisions I will consider it.

I guess my big problem with that logic (besides the unaddressed double jeopardy of being in a weak or strong division) is that I don't see the schedules being that different because of the league size. Divisions sort of (and not even that well, NFC South) work in the NFL because you don't face half the teams in the league. The Bengals and the 49ers share two common opponent this year; the Bengals and Raiders still share only four common opponents for five shared games. But in fantasy we literally play everyone at least once, so that's a minimum of eleven games of overlap with a random other team in a fourteen game schedule. As such schedule variance matters so very little compared to random weekly variance of individual teams.

[Rob14]

Save me, Kerwynn Williams! I need a boom out of this boom-or-bust. I easily can see Williams with a 15 point game, but I can just as easily see him with a 2 point game. Bah.

[Rob14]

Ok Yahoo fantasy projections say Manziel should outscore Stafford. I'd like to revisit my earlier argument that Yahoo's projections are the worst fantasy projections and state this as further evidence

I agree, absolutely. They rely way too much on past results as an indication of future success. Stafford did poorly the first half of the season with a hardish schedule, so he MUST do poorly against an easy schedule the rest of the way. Giovani Bernard has been awful lately and is clearly at the bottom of a two-man committee, but he did really great earlier in the season and was projected as an RB1, so he MUST get to at least 7-8 points.

Wrong and wrong.

[Wraith]

Ok Yahoo fantasy projections say Manziel should outscore Stafford. I'd like to revisit my earlier argument that Yahoo's projections are the worst fantasy projections and state this as further evidence

lol shows what you know manziel is the messiah

[zoraster]

14 is too much. your crazy idea is fun.