Calculation (1 Viewer)

[Tjaden]

than me...

okay, this will be a topic with an unspectacular question about scoring and standings.

I've the following problem(s): we are a 12team league with 30er roster (+2 IR)

I want that the weakest team in my football league gets the 1st pick in our rookie draft next season.

I play on ESPN and we've 4 divisions.

On ESPN Season Standings we've PF (points for?) and PA (points against?)

The "weakest" team has now 1074 PF and the "strongest" 1210 PF.

So my problem(s) is/are

a) if I add the fantasy-numbers of every player on someones team I have a different value than ESPN (e.g. 1872.5 instead of 1065.5 for the PF data)

b) how can I be sure that the weakest team is truly the weakest team (cause his bench could be empty or he has only 20players instead of 30, so his PF would be lower while owning 10'studs')

I tried to come up with some formula which is neglecting those differences (amount of players/PF) but I failed.

Any help would be appreciated

 

[Kool-Aid Larry]

points for includes bench?

can't you just do it in reverse order of finish like the nfl and many fantasy leagues?

ps

trying to define the 'weakest' team is a waste of time, simply because 'weakest' is not a clearly defined term.

usually leagues just use order of finish to approximate weak and strong teams, but you could use total points scored instead, I suppose, although this will still include things like injuries ---- if arian foster missed 14 games with an injury the team in question might actually be 'stronger' than their total points indicates, etc.

or, maybe some guy actually has a pretty strong team but continually makes bad decisions on who to start each week.

 

[Glatty]

My initial thought is to go back and determine the optimal lineup for each week for every team, then re-tally the PF. I would keep it only to starting lineup because if a team has two QBs on the bench, he'll likely have more points than teams with only 1 QB on the bench, as an example.

 

[Tjaden]

points for includes bench?

can't you just do it in reverse order of finish like the nfl and many fantasy leagues?

ps

trying to define the 'weakest' team is a waste of time, simply because 'weakest' is not a clearly defined term.

usually leagues just use order of finish to approximate weak and strong teams, but you could use total points scored instead, I suppose, although this will still include things like injuries ---- if arian foster missed 14 games with an injury the team in question might actually be 'stronger' than their total points indicates, etc.

or, maybe some guy actually has a pretty strong team but continually makes bad decisions on who to start each week.

thanks for the quick answer.Yeah, I thought of the standard reverse order at first but you've to face the problem of 'tanking' (or unlucky hand*) for the last place (and it's always hard to prove someone is tanking if he's doing it the smart way) and an unlucky schedule as well (players injured/spared or facing top ranked DFS at the end of schedule).

I guess you can make as many points for a system as against it.

However you're right with the injured-theme (A.Johnson, P.Hillis or P.Manning) who would all be left out for the PF-scoring.

And 'total points scored' would've the same issue as you pointed out above.

So, do you take the final regular season standings or the standings after the playoffs to determine the draft order? (team who finished last in the regular season could've some luck and win the consolation ladder)

*) I would say I've a decent/good roster but a pretty unlucky hand and my double-diggit players are always on the bench (or injured) so now I'm pretty low in the standings.

 

[Tjaden]

My initial thought is to go back and determine the optimal lineup for each week for every team, then re-tally the PF. I would keep it only to starting lineup because if a team has two QBs on the bench, he'll likely have more points than teams with only 1 QB on the bench, as an example.

So you would look at week 1, week 2,... and pick the players with the highest amount of fpoints for every team (in a hypothetical starting lineup) and re-tally the PF?

 

[Topes]

I want that the weakest team in my football league gets the 1st pick in our rookie draft next season.

Might be a whole lot simpler to change your goal than try to reach it, especially given that you purport to be unable to get there without assistance from the smarts.As stated above "weakest" is a subjective term. Trying to make math point to it is about as pointless as trying to project future statistics of NFL players.(If I didn't know any better, I'd wonder whether you don't already have a specific goal in mind, toward which you think this "weakest team" pursuit might point you, and are now trying to rationalize the logic/math around it.)

 

[sports_fan]

points for includes bench?

can't you just do it in reverse order of finish like the nfl and many fantasy leagues?

ps

trying to define the 'weakest' team is a waste of time, simply because 'weakest' is not a clearly defined term.

usually leagues just use order of finish to approximate weak and strong teams, but you could use total points scored instead, I suppose, although this will still include things like injuries ---- if arian foster missed 14 games with an injury the team in question might actually be 'stronger' than their total points indicates, etc.

or, maybe some guy actually has a pretty strong team but continually makes bad decisions on who to start each week.

thanks for the quick answer.Yeah, I thought of the standard reverse order at first but you've to face the problem of 'tanking' (or unlucky hand*) for the last place (and it's always hard to prove someone is tanking if he's doing it the smart way) and an unlucky schedule as well (players injured/spared or facing top ranked DFS at the end of schedule).

I guess you can make as many points for a system as against it.

However you're right with the injured-theme (A.Johnson, P.Hillis or P.Manning) who would all be left out for the PF-scoring.

And 'total points scored' would've the same issue as you pointed out above.

So, do you take the final regular season standings or the standings after the playoffs to determine the draft order? (team who finished last in the regular season could've some luck and win the consolation ladder)

*) I would say I've a decent/good roster but a pretty unlucky hand and my double-diggit players are always on the bench (or injured) so now I'm pretty low in the standings.

The only way I have seen to assure the worst team gets the first pick is by optimal lineup scoring instead of actual points scored. This eliminates the influence of manager start/sit decisions and, by extension, tanking. With optimum lineups, the team with the least points scored is the worst team, plain and simple.

 

[Lash]

use MFL and draft via "Possible Points" reverse order

are use ESPN and manually add up the "best possible" lineup for each owner each week if they had picked perfect lineup and draft in reverse order of total points

 

[Phil Elliott]

NBA addressed "tanking the season to get the first pick" by going the secret lottery route. You might be over thinking this. Its "just" fantasy football.

 

[King of the Wolfies]

i would use a potential points in a play all format. that way it takes out tanking, while also keeping the whole league in context. in my league, a team is 5-4, but has the top 3 scores of the season, but 4 of his other weeks were pretty week. i'd call him a strong team still tho because his playall record is near the top, but is total points is blowing everyone away because of the 3 games. likewise last season, one of the lowest scoring teams still ended up 6-8 simply because of the luckiest scheduling ever, whereas his playall rec, and total potential pts were both 2nd worst..

 

[Bad_Mo]

7

 

[Topes]

You might be over thinking this.

That's where I'm at.I'm still left wondering whether the formula the OP wishes to create is in response to folks tanking.

That is, whether he wishes to create a formula to mitigate folks gaming the system to get the top pick.

Because, if that's the case, that is the problem he should be asking smarter people to help resolve.

Creating an new abstruse formula to replace and old simple formula is not likely to prevent folks from trying to game the system to get the top pick. Some of the worst fantasy football rules in existence are made in reaction to perceived unfairness.

 

[GregR]

Repeating a bit what some of the others have said...

Points For is what the team actually scored with their weekly lineups. You should not expect that to equal what you get if you add up their bent.



Potential Points is something that a lot of leagues make available in a report somewhere. You can find it in MFL in the Power Rankings. It is what the team would have scored if he had submitted his perfect lineup every week. Some leagues actually do this instead of having to set a lineup, in which case it is often referred to as Best Ball. It is probably a better measure of team strength than is Points For, but it's not perfect either. If you use 2 roster spots to carry a backup kicker and defense, and I don't carry backups but use those for a 6th string RB and 7th string WR, your 2 roster spots will probably increase your potential points more than mine will since your backups will tend to outscore the kicker and/or D you started more than my 6th string RB will outscore the RB I started, etc. So roster composition has an effect on Potential Points.



All Play record is what you get if instead of playing 1 team each week, you play every team in your league every week. It gets rid of luck of scheduling. It also can distinguish between two teams who scored the same points, but one team was 4th best in the league every week and the other team had a phenomenally high score 1/3 of the time and was just barely low score the other 2/3 of the time.

If you can find (or build) an All Play record off of Potential Points, that might be the best single thing to go by. I don't know if any sites report All Play based on Potential Points, unless your league was set up to be Best Ball in the first place where your Potential Points actually is your weekly points.

It wouldn't be 100% perfect... an owner could leave roster spots empty to lower his potential points. Though that's easy to deal with (draft order penalty for not keeping a full roster), they could still fill their bench with bad players and with players at 1 or 2 positions. Not a lot you can do there except try to fill your league with quality owners who won't tank, and kick out those who do.

 

[GregR]

Oh, one other thing. One of my leagues we combine the end of season record and the consolation bracket playoff results to do the seeding for the bottom 6 teams.

So finishing last helps a team towards the #1 pick, but winning the consolation bracket also helps. In brief, we seed the consolation bracket and each team gets their seed number times 2 in "points" towards their draft position. So the last place team/6 seed gets 12 points, the #1 seed/7th place reg season team gets 2 points.

Then they get points for order of finish. 6 team bracket, winner gets 8, then 6, 4, 2, 1 and 0 for the team who came in last in the bracket.

Add the seeding and playoff result points together, and the team with the most points gets the pick, on down the list. Tiebreaker goes to the worse regular season team. With that method, the #1 pick can only go to the worst 4 regular season teams, and the worst regular season team can't pick worse than 4th.

Since teams have to do well in the consolation bracket, it would help keep them from filling their bench with lousy players leading up to the playoffs, since they might need them.

 

[Zoblefu]

My league is 14 teams. 8 Teams make the playoffs, but only 4 get paid.

Put simply, we divide people into 3 groups and you have incentive to win every single game. This however means the worst team may not get the first pick, but it seems the most fair (and the worst team will still get an early pick).

If you're in the bottom 6 (no playoffs)... your own playoff bracket where the worst 2 teams get a BYE week 14. (This ensures the worst two teams, at worst, get to pick in the top 4). The better you do in the bracket, the earlier draft spot you get...

If you're in the top 4 (playoffs and won week 14), you're in the money and have financial motivation to succeed. 1st place overall gets last pick (14th) to 4th place overall gets 11th pick.

If you make the playoffs and lose the first game, you have 4 teams and 2 weeks to order them... perfectly easy to do and those who win these consolation games move up a spot in the draft (in the 7th-10th spots).

All this keeps our playoffs exciting to a point even if you aren't in the money at the end. You still have motivation to win every game to improve your spot the next season, but the teams are in their own "groups" so you're at most fighting over a handful of spots and not them all. The 6 non-playoff teams will always get the first 6 picks, and the worst 2 teams always get in the top 4.... so it's still pretty balanced and keeps it fun at the end.

Hope this makes sense