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Commish Corner - Revisiting the Bills-Bengals MNF situation and planning for the future (1 Viewer)

I really don't see how you can do anything other than these two options:

  1. Go with the NFL official scores (zero)
  2. Go with what happened in the game until it was cancelled
Allowing someone to choose another player, or the league average, or another week, creates a situation which advantages the person whose player didn't finish the game. If Higgins got knocked out on that play and the game continued, would you let Higgins' owner choose another player to sub in after the fact?

If not (and I really hope you wouldn't), you can't let them choose someone to sub in after the fact, here, either.

Our league had this discussion before the 2020 season when there was a lot of COVID uncertainty; what happens if your player is out with COVID, or a game gets cancelled because of COVID? The answer was clear: Nothing happens. You pays your money, you takes your chances.

There's plenty of debate on the main thread on this topic, so there's no need to go through the same points.

I do think zeroes are just fine if there was previous discussion (ideally documented) explaining that's exactly what would happen in this situation. Even if that discussion didn't take place, I can definitely see how that's going to be the right default decision for a number of leagues. Draftkings, yahoo public league, high stakes leagues with strangers run by a bookie, leagues composed entirely of contract lawyers, and many others. Zero, "thems the breaks" makes perfect sense for these and many other leagues.

In my personal experience within longstanding home leagues amongst mostly friends, NOBODY -- whether they were winning, losing, or had no dog in the fight, was advocating for "just take a zero".

If this situation went in a different way, do you think the average person would feel good about cashing in on an auto-championship with full payout because somebody died when they had a narrow lead in a fantasy contest that was up in the air? You don't think it's possible that both parties would rather have the fantasy season end with actual football, after reaching agreement on a fair replacement score, rather than accepting an asterisk championship?

I can't see how someone can't see more than those two solutions.

Big kudos to @Joe Bryant with some fantastic advice when this whole thing went down.
My league is a friends and family league, been running for 25+ years, and no one had a serious suggestion other than the two above. And as I said, we'd specifically discussed a similar scenario prior to the 2020 COVID season. To be relevant to this thread, which is about what to do in the future, I don't think there's any moral justification for giving someone points in the case of their player's game getting cancelled, if we don't give them points in any other scenario where their player gets a zero for situational reasons.

Sure, it doesn't feel great to win a game that way. I'm sure if you were playing in a playoff league and you beat the guy who started Purdy you don't feel great about it. But that's the game. If you're not going to give the Purdy owner a do-over I don't see why you'd give the Burrow owner a do-over.

That's fair. For me, the takeaway from all of this was that there were different leagues with different backgrounds, past precedent, previously established bylaws, and lack thereof. Within this rainbow of league dynamics, there was an endless array of scenarios of where exactly did the fantasy matchup stand at the point of the cancellation. Which offensive players, IDPs, and DSTs were affected? I just don't think there was any one size fits all solution for all leagues. If there absolutely had to be? Official NFL week 17 results say zero probably had to be it, but why?

Let's take these two options:

1) official NFL scoring for week 17 says zero
2) whatever stats were accumulated in the game prior to the cancellation

If Team A was trailing by 2 points at the start of the game and had Burrow playing, I would sincerely hope that Team B conceded the match (given the TD pass to Boyd) regardless of NFL official scoring for week 17. IF Team B doesn't concede and latched on to Rule 1, I would assume that your inclusion of Rule 2 indicates that you would rule in favor of Team A (favoring Rule 2) if you're the commish in this situation?

I would assume that you're going that way because it's the right, fair, and just ruling, in my very subjective opinion. Yet such a ruling is going to fly in the face of anyone "going by the book", which says that everyone in that game recorded a zero.

I am curious for anyone who holds firmly to Rule 1 as the universal truth, if Team A and Team B both agree that Team A is the rightful winner and Team B concedes, are you overruling that mutual agreement and proclaiming that Team B is the champion? After all, that's what the official NFL stats are saying, and Team B would technically prevail as the rightful champion in the court of law.

I do happen to be the commish of my league, and I was Team B (though, slightly different situation, we do a two-week Super Bowl and I was well ahead, not within 2 points). I put it out to the league with the suggestion that we do Rule 2 (count Burrow's partial score), which people were generally in agreement about, and which we did. It didn't change the outcome of the game, but some of the other suggestions, like substituting in a bench player, might have.

The way I think about it is, if Team B started Foles (who went out in the first half), we'd all expect to get his partial score. It's a little different for Team A because the NFL officially cancelled the score, but, Burrow did rack up his stats in a real NFL game and it seems appropriate to count them even if the NFL zeroes them. But if you deal with Team A's problem by promoting, say, Tom Brady from the bench (432 yards, 3 TD), what do you do for Team B who had Daniel Jones (177/2 passing, 91/2 rushing) on the bench? If Team B might feel bad about beating Team A because of the cancellation, for sure Team A should feel bad about beating Team B because he got credit for a player he chose to bench.

Not trying to nail you to a wall or anything, but I have to ask....

You, like several other posters in this thread were in a unique (and somewhat unfortunate) position of serving as the commissioner, while also having a dog in the middle of a championship fight.

Would you be willing to specify exactly where things stood at the moment of infamy in your matchup? I really feel like the details are everything in all of these cases. If you had a 98.8% chance of victory when it goes down, then it's all a big nothing. You make whatever ruling you have to make to put a stamp on things and move on with a well deserved championship.

On the other hand, if we're talking more of a 70-30, 80-20, even an 85-15.... I have to say that in that situation, I wouldn't love the fact that you're the one floating Rule 2 as the solution to the predicament, even if the league was "generally in agreement" with it. Was the opponent generally in agreement with the solution that extinguishes his title hopes? It seems kind of convenient to be in a position of power and suggesting / promoting any solution that most definitely ends with you as the champion. If the opponent had Burrow or whatever else in his lineup and had a decent possibility of chasing you down, letting him keep his 9 minutes of accumulated stats in an unofficial game isn't showing a lot of grace imo.

In this most undesirable circumstance, I think that the commish ideally recuses himself from the situation due to the clear conflict of interest. If the league has an official deputy commish that also doesn't have a conflict of interest, you would let them make the call. Otherwise, assuming there's no #2, you let whoever wants to participate in the debate forms a committee and you let them put forth a solution away from any of your influence. Heck, that recommendation doesn't even have to be final. I don't like the idea of them coming up with a bench replacement score either if that isn't in your league's by-laws. You would have every right to refute the logic of that suggestion. I would suggest that if it ends up being a true stalemate after vigorous debate, then the ultimate outcome might be the one where there isn't a pre-determined champ, using some form of a replacement score for the affected player(s) in a future week.

The other way to go is to be @Hot Sauce Guy and show a whole lot of grace in the role of commissioner and prospective champion. He had 40% odds of victory. He presented an option to his opponent that probably scaled his chances down to 20% by his own estimation. I don't love seeing a commish taking it in the teeth like that, but it's commendable and he probably strengthened his league as a result of it.
 
To flip the tables on me....

Even though I wasn't the commish in the league where I was battling for the championship, and even though I deferred to the commish and my opponent for how we should handle it.

The fact that I was trailing in both the actual score and win probability (52% to 48%), makes me feel a little bit icky about claiming a co-championship. Even though I actually had the slightest of leads in the projected score, I still kind of feel like the "2nd place" co-champ. The production of Tee Higgins in week 18 and the first week of the playoffs didn't help, even though he did get over the magical 14-point mark at Buffalo.

Part of me would have liked Cincy in the Super Bowl just so I could circle back with my opponent and make sure he wasn't interested in letting it all fly in the Super Bowl for all of the glory.


Did my standing in this league affect my judgement in the league that I am a commissioner and was otherwise impartial? I would like to say no, but I'm sure it probably did to some extent.
 

Not trying to nail you to a wall or anything, but I have to ask....

You, like several other posters in this thread were in a unique (and somewhat unfortunate) position of serving as the commissioner, while also having a dog in the middle of a championship fight.

Would you be willing to specify exactly where things stood at the moment of infamy in your matchup? I really feel like the details are everything in all of these cases. If you had a 98.8% chance of victory when it goes down, then it's all a big nothing. You make whatever ruling you have to make to put a stamp on things and move on with a well deserved championship.

On the other hand, if we're talking more of a 70-30, 80-20, even an 85-15.... I have to say that in that situation, I wouldn't love the fact that you're the one floating Rule 2 as the solution to the predicament, even if the league was "generally in agreement" with it. Was the opponent generally in agreement with the solution that extinguishes his title hopes? It seems kind of convenient to be in a position of power and suggesting / promoting any solution that most definitely ends with you as the champion. If the opponent had Burrow or whatever else in his lineup and had a decent possibility of chasing you down, letting him keep his 9 minutes of accumulated stats in an unofficial game isn't showing a lot of grace imo.

In this most undesirable circumstance, I think that the commish ideally recuses himself from the situation due to the clear conflict of interest. If the league has an official deputy commish that also doesn't have a conflict of interest, you would let them make the call. Otherwise, assuming there's no #2, you let whoever wants to participate in the debate forms a committee and you let them put forth a solution away from any of your influence. Heck, that recommendation doesn't even have to be final. I don't like the idea of them coming up with a bench replacement score either if that isn't in your league's by-laws. You would have every right to refute the logic of that suggestion. I would suggest that if it ends up being a true stalemate after vigorous debate, then the ultimate outcome might be the one where there isn't a pre-determined champ, using some form of a replacement score for the affected player(s) in a future week.

The other way to go is to be @Hot Sauce Guy and show a whole lot of grace in the role of commissioner and prospective champion. He had 40% odds of victory. He presented an option to his opponent that probably scaled his chances down to 20% by his own estimation. I don't love seeing a commish taking it in the teeth like that, but it's commendable and he probably strengthened his league as a result of it.

Note that this thread is about what to do in the future, and I'm trying to tie back my responses to philosophical principles about how to run a league. So my personal situation in week 17 isn't really relevant.

But the situation was, our friends-and-family league that I've been commishing for 20+ years uses week 17+18 combined scores for the Super Bowl, so the outcome of the game was not at all clear. I was up by 40+ points in week 17, with him starting Burrow. In our league Burrow averaged something like 27 points. So I was ahead but not a slam-dunk winner.

I am 100% certain that, whether or not I was Team A or Team B, I would think that assigning Burrow's average score to the week 17 matchup would be unfair to Team B. And I was clear in my message to the league that I was an interested party and I was interested in suggestions. We do have an assistant commish and he agreed with me.
 

Note that this thread is about what to do in the future, and I'm trying to tie back my responses to philosophical principles about how to run a league. So my personal situation in week 17 isn't really relevant.

But the situation was, our friends-and-family league that I've been commishing for 20+ years uses week 17+18 combined scores for the Super Bowl, so the outcome of the game was not at all clear. I was up by 40+ points in week 17, with him starting Burrow. In our league Burrow averaged something like 27 points. So I was ahead but not a slam-dunk winner.

I am 100% certain that, whether or not I was Team A or Team B, I would think that assigning Burrow's average score to the week 17 matchup would be unfair to Team B. And I was clear in my message to the league that I was an interested party and I was interested in suggestions. We do have an assistant commish and he agreed with me.

It's relevant as far as what's the right thing to do when we're running into these situations as the commish that also has a dog in the fight. It sounds like you had a co-commish, and they would be the one to rule in a situation like this. If that's the framework of the league, then he made the ruling and that's what it is.

For mine, we really don't have an official #2 or any official chain of command for making unilateral decisions. At least not for a situation like this. Hence, for me it was really more about coming to a reasonable resolution that all affected parties could agree to. Personally, I viewed maintaining the win-loss probability on any proposed replacement score as a high priority. Basically, no big "winners" or "losers" in our league as a result of a guy nearly dying on the field and the game getting cancelled.

I guess I would be curious if the loser was satisfied with the outcome in your league? It sounds like you might have pretty typical QB scoring, but with 6 point passing TDs. Basically, entering the game you win the championship as long as Burrow doesn't score 1.5X (maybe 1.8X?) what he normally averages. So even with the early success, I'm guessing that you were probably forecasted as the winner by 85-90%, maybe more? If that's the case, it's a very grey area imo. If I'm in your opponent's shoes, conceding my 10% win probability is probably the right thing to do, even though I probably feel less than stellar about feeling obligated to do so. On the other side, if I'm the one with a 90% lead, I probably feel very confident in prevailing even if I offer my opponent the opportunity to replace his score with any Burrow game in week 18 or the playoffs that he chooses. I'd probably prefer to win outright rather than allowing anything weird to hang over my rightful championship.
 

Note that this thread is about what to do in the future, and I'm trying to tie back my responses to philosophical principles about how to run a league. So my personal situation in week 17 isn't really relevant.

But the situation was, our friends-and-family league that I've been commishing for 20+ years uses week 17+18 combined scores for the Super Bowl, so the outcome of the game was not at all clear. I was up by 40+ points in week 17, with him starting Burrow. In our league Burrow averaged something like 27 points. So I was ahead but not a slam-dunk winner.

I am 100% certain that, whether or not I was Team A or Team B, I would think that assigning Burrow's average score to the week 17 matchup would be unfair to Team B. And I was clear in my message to the league that I was an interested party and I was interested in suggestions. We do have an assistant commish and he agreed with me.

It's relevant as far as what's the right thing to do when we're running into these situations as the commish that also has a dog in the fight. It sounds like you had a co-commish, and they would be the one to rule in a situation like this. If that's the framework of the league, then he made the ruling and that's what it is.

For mine, we really don't have an official #2 or any official chain of command for making unilateral decisions. At least not for a situation like this. Hence, for me it was really more about coming to a reasonable resolution that all affected parties could agree to. Personally, I viewed maintaining the win-loss probability on any proposed replacement score as a high priority. Basically, no big "winners" or "losers" in our league as a result of a guy nearly dying on the field and the game getting cancelled.

I guess I would be curious if the loser was satisfied with the outcome in your league? It sounds like you might have pretty typical QB scoring, but with 6 point passing TDs. Basically, entering the game you win the championship as long as Burrow doesn't score 1.5X (maybe 1.8X?) what he normally averages. So even with the early success, I'm guessing that you were probably forecasted as the winner by 85-90%, maybe more? If that's the case, it's a very grey area imo. If I'm in your opponent's shoes, conceding my 10% win probability is probably the right thing to do, even though I probably feel less than stellar about feeling obligated to do so. On the other side, if I'm the one with a 90% lead, I probably feel very confident in prevailing even if I offer my opponent the opportunity to replace his score with any Burrow game in week 18 or the playoffs that he chooses. I'd probably prefer to win outright rather than allowing anything weird to hang over my rightful championship.
Again, we use combined week 17+18 scores for our Super Bowl, so while yes, I might have been an 80% favorite to be leading after week 17, that doesn't mean I was an 80% favorite to win the Super Bowl. As it so happened, he outscored me by about 20 in week 18, so combined I won by 25 if you count Burrow as zero, or by 15 if you give him the first quarter scores from the cancelled game. If you slotted in Burrow's average, or Team A's best-scoring backup in week 17 (Mac Jones), Team A would have won. But if you slotted in his second or third-best scoring backup, Mike White, or Baker Mayfield, Team B still would have won.

I don't think it's ever a reasonable thing for a commish to do to select someone's backup player for them after all the games are complete. Regardless of circumstance.
 
Again, we use combined week 17+18 scores for our Super Bowl, so while yes, I might have been an 80% favorite to be leading after week 17, that doesn't mean I was an 80% favorite to win the Super Bowl. As it so happened, he outscored me by about 20 in week 18, so combined I won by 25 if you count Burrow as zero, or by 15 if you give him the first quarter scores from the cancelled game. If you slotted in Burrow's average, or Team A's best-scoring backup in week 17 (Mac Jones), Team A would have won. But if you slotted in his second or third-best scoring backup, Mike White, or Baker Mayfield, Team B still would have won.

I don't think it's ever a reasonable thing for a commish to do to select someone's backup player for them after all the games are complete. Regardless of circumstance.

100% with you on slotting in bench players in week 17 unless there were bylaws for that.

I got the two-week part but was thinking you were on championship week 2-of-2 (week 16/17) when you were actually on 1-of-2 (week 17/18). That's definitely a unique consideration for your league, since it was already going to score the final regular season week 18 per usual. Hence, week 18 not really an option for replacement scores like it was for most other leagues. Though, the following options were still open:

a) count Burrow's week 17 as zero, give Burrow double-points on his week 18 start
b) count Burrow's week 17 as zero, let him start an extra QB off his bench in week 18 as the replacement score
c) count Burrow's week 17 as zero, give him a replacement score in the playoffs

Of those options, (B) would have made the most sense for me. In many ways, a more natural fit for a replacement score than the vast majority of leagues that opted for a week 18 replacement despite the fact that their regularly scheduled championship would have concluded week 17. But purely subjective.

Your league punts on the replacement score, makes the ruling before week 18 that you will count what Burrow scored in week 17, but there's no other relief beyond that. The championship is still up in the air at that point with you favored, but no championship has been sealed as a result of the ruling. The other guy still has a fighting chance to score enough in week 18 to overtake you.

Was your opponent accepting of the ruling prior to the start of the final week 18? My guess is that it was probably easier to swallow since he still had a chance. After his strong week 18, was there any blowback on the ruling after the fact? If he agreed to it before, he would definitely be in the wrong to dispute it after the fact.

With all of that said, it does ultimately leave the champion in a slightly regrettable position that the runner-up will always be able to say that they would have likely won had this event in Cincy not occurred, or even if it was resumed at a later date. 27 average with 10 points in the bank that quick means that he's probably a 70% favorite to get the 25 points that would have ultimately changed the outcome. The comeback is that this might have also changed the strategy on the week 18 lineup (more ceiling, less floor). That, along with the obvious fact that the event did happen, and there was apparently enough precedent in a 20+ year league history to rule in this direction.
 
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For next year I'm recommending we add a rule around postponed / rescheduled / cancelled games.

If the situation is foreseeable (weather, COVID etc.) you'll be allowed to submit a list of alternates prior to kick-off of the alternate's game. If the affected game isn't played within the "fantasy week", I'll retroactively plug in the alternates.

If the situation is unforeseeable, I will retroactively plug in the next highest projected bench player eligible for the position. If you don't have an eligible player on your bench, you take the zero.
I like the first idea but not the second. It's natural to have a preference for games that got played over games that didn't. But retroactively bailing out an owner by putting in a bench player basically gives him the chance of playing best ball against someone who had to make a starting decision.
For what it's worth, in one of my leagues we have a "conditional lineup" rule. You set your starters and name preferred backups at each position. If any of your starters is a gameday inactive, you get your previously-named backup's score instead.

That rule wasn't designed for Covid or game cancellations, but it is very flexible and allowed our league to navigate both without any issues. The only suspense was waiting for the NFL to confirm that the Bills/Bengals game was officially canceled (meaning they counted no stats instead of partial stats), at which point all players from that game were officially inactive and the conditional requests triggered. Everyone got their previously-named backups, and everyone was content that the outcome was resolved within the existing rules with no alterations or exceptions required. (Other than we did extend the deadline for claiming a conditional request, but only because the NFL took so long to rule the game a no-contest.)

It's not "fair" (presumably your backup is worse than the guy you started-- though in this case one of the backups was Mike Evans!) but it's a lot better than just eating the zeroes, and it doesn't involve making up anything. Everyone's scores were 100% reflective of the lineups they named and the official NFL stats for the week per Elias. And we all agreed that it leaves a workable precedent should this ever happen again in the future.

More on the rule here: https://www.footballguys.com/article/HarstadDiP31
 
For next year I'm recommending we add a rule around postponed / rescheduled / cancelled games.

If the situation is foreseeable (weather, COVID etc.) you'll be allowed to submit a list of alternates prior to kick-off of the alternate's game. If the affected game isn't played within the "fantasy week", I'll retroactively plug in the alternates.

If the situation is unforeseeable, I will retroactively plug in the next highest projected bench player eligible for the position. If you don't have an eligible player on your bench, you take the zero.
I like the first idea but not the second. It's natural to have a preference for games that got played over games that didn't. But retroactively bailing out an owner by putting in a bench player basically gives him the chance of playing best ball against someone who had to make a starting decision.
For what it's worth, in one of my leagues we have a "conditional lineup" rule. You set your starters and name preferred backups at each position. If any of your starters is a gameday inactive, you get your previously-named backup's score instead.

That rule wasn't designed for Covid or game cancellations, but it is very flexible and allowed our league to navigate both without any issues. The only suspense was waiting for the NFL to confirm that the Bills/Bengals game was officially canceled (meaning they counted no stats instead of partial stats), at which point all players from that game were officially inactive and the conditional requests triggered. Everyone got their previously-named backups, and everyone was content that the outcome was resolved within the existing rules with no alterations or exceptions required. (Other than we did extend the deadline for claiming a conditional request, but only because the NFL took so long to rule the game a no-contest.)

It's not "fair" (presumably your backup is worse than the guy you started-- though in this case one of the backups was Mike Evans!) but it's a lot better than just eating the zeroes, and it doesn't involve making up anything. Everyone's scores were 100% reflective of the lineups they named and the official NFL stats for the week per Elias. And we all agreed that it leaves a workable precedent should this ever happen again in the future.

More on the rule here: https://www.footballguys.com/article/HarstadDiP31

We sort of adopted something like this for COVID purposes, but gave it no staying power to affect week 17 of this year.

Something to the effect of, if the game is known to be at-risk leading in to the week, we would make that declaration by a certain time and you would be expected to declare alternates from your bench. If a game was cancelled unexpectedly, some sort of bench replacement would automatically be triggered. For a minute, I had to gulp to make sure that none of our special COVID considerations had precedent to affect the week 17 outcomes.

I'm guessing with something like this, every team sets their depth chart of alternates at the start of the season, maybe updates throughout depending on roster turnover, but otherwise isn't obligated to list out alternates for each and every week to account for the 0.02% chance that something like this is going to happen?
 
For next year I'm recommending we add a rule around postponed / rescheduled / cancelled games.

If the situation is foreseeable (weather, COVID etc.) you'll be allowed to submit a list of alternates prior to kick-off of the alternate's game. If the affected game isn't played within the "fantasy week", I'll retroactively plug in the alternates.

If the situation is unforeseeable, I will retroactively plug in the next highest projected bench player eligible for the position. If you don't have an eligible player on your bench, you take the zero.
I like the first idea but not the second. It's natural to have a preference for games that got played over games that didn't. But retroactively bailing out an owner by putting in a bench player basically gives him the chance of playing best ball against someone who had to make a starting decision.
For what it's worth, in one of my leagues we have a "conditional lineup" rule. You set your starters and name preferred backups at each position. If any of your starters is a gameday inactive, you get your previously-named backup's score instead.

That rule wasn't designed for Covid or game cancellations, but it is very flexible and allowed our league to navigate both without any issues. The only suspense was waiting for the NFL to confirm that the Bills/Bengals game was officially canceled (meaning they counted no stats instead of partial stats), at which point all players from that game were officially inactive and the conditional requests triggered. Everyone got their previously-named backups, and everyone was content that the outcome was resolved within the existing rules with no alterations or exceptions required. (Other than we did extend the deadline for claiming a conditional request, but only because the NFL took so long to rule the game a no-contest.)

It's not "fair" (presumably your backup is worse than the guy you started-- though in this case one of the backups was Mike Evans!) but it's a lot better than just eating the zeroes, and it doesn't involve making up anything. Everyone's scores were 100% reflective of the lineups they named and the official NFL stats for the week per Elias. And we all agreed that it leaves a workable precedent should this ever happen again in the future.

More on the rule here: https://www.footballguys.com/article/HarstadDiP31
I think a conditional lineup rule like that is reasonable because both teams have access to it and it's agreed-to in advance. With the Cinci situation, only the team that happened to get hosed by the cancellation of the game would have access to any remedy.
 
For next year I'm recommending we add a rule around postponed / rescheduled / cancelled games.

If the situation is foreseeable (weather, COVID etc.) you'll be allowed to submit a list of alternates prior to kick-off of the alternate's game. If the affected game isn't played within the "fantasy week", I'll retroactively plug in the alternates.

If the situation is unforeseeable, I will retroactively plug in the next highest projected bench player eligible for the position. If you don't have an eligible player on your bench, you take the zero.
I like the first idea but not the second. It's natural to have a preference for games that got played over games that didn't. But retroactively bailing out an owner by putting in a bench player basically gives him the chance of playing best ball against someone who had to make a starting decision.
For what it's worth, in one of my leagues we have a "conditional lineup" rule. You set your starters and name preferred backups at each position. If any of your starters is a gameday inactive, you get your previously-named backup's score instead.

That rule wasn't designed for Covid or game cancellations, but it is very flexible and allowed our league to navigate both without any issues. The only suspense was waiting for the NFL to confirm that the Bills/Bengals game was officially canceled (meaning they counted no stats instead of partial stats), at which point all players from that game were officially inactive and the conditional requests triggered. Everyone got their previously-named backups, and everyone was content that the outcome was resolved within the existing rules with no alterations or exceptions required. (Other than we did extend the deadline for claiming a conditional request, but only because the NFL took so long to rule the game a no-contest.)

It's not "fair" (presumably your backup is worse than the guy you started-- though in this case one of the backups was Mike Evans!) but it's a lot better than just eating the zeroes, and it doesn't involve making up anything. Everyone's scores were 100% reflective of the lineups they named and the official NFL stats for the week per Elias. And we all agreed that it leaves a workable precedent should this ever happen again in the future.

More on the rule here: https://www.footballguys.com/article/HarstadDiP31
This is a comprehensive / robust solution and if your managers are agreeable to this (manual) process week in and week out, that's great. For our league, I'm trying to find the "delta" between work effort and the likelihood these substitute players will ever actually get inserted. From a work effort perspective I don't think I would invoke this for a GTD player who doesn't play. To me that risk should be apparent to the manager leading up to the game and should be baked into their sit/start decision.

A few games each year are "at risk" of being affected by something so it makes sense to pull out the contingency player option for those. Then you have the "freak occurrence" Bill-Bengals game. Rather than treat every game like it could be that game, I'd like to have an easier fallback plan. I think next highest projected player is reasonable. As the commissioner, I'm not choosing who those players are, the site host's projections are. I'm just following a process in a situation that has extremely long odds of ever happening again.
 
What's different from the usual "a player could get hurt and get you a zero in any game, so just take the L" argument is two things... First, it's exponentially rare for multiple players get hurt before recording any stats, so if you had a Burrow/Chase stack and just needed two points, the odds both would be hurt in-game before scoring anything is remote, and, second, in no other injury case have the points that were scored erased. If you had the Burrow/Chase stack, needed two points, you watched the game, you saw them connect for a game-winning, seal-the-deal touchdown, and then 40 minutes later those stats suddenly never happened, that's blatantly unfair.
 
What's different from the usual "a player could get hurt and get you a zero in any game, so just take the L" argument is two things... First, it's exponentially rare for multiple players get hurt before recording any stats, so if you had a Burrow/Chase stack and just needed two points, the odds both would be hurt in-game before scoring anything is remote, and, second, in no other injury case have the points that were scored erased. If you had the Burrow/Chase stack, needed two points, you watched the game, you saw them connect for a game-winning, seal-the-deal touchdown, and then 40 minutes later those stats suddenly never happened, that's blatantly unfair.
I understand that's frustrating, but I'm pretty sure the owner of the Purdy/Aiyuk stack wasn't too happy with the result of the NFC Championship Game either.

Shizzle happens.
 
What's different from the usual "a player could get hurt and get you a zero in any game, so just take the L" argument is two things... First, it's exponentially rare for multiple players get hurt before recording any stats, so if you had a Burrow/Chase stack and just needed two points, the odds both would be hurt in-game before scoring anything is remote, and, second, in no other injury case have the points that were scored erased. If you had the Burrow/Chase stack, needed two points, you watched the game, you saw them connect for a game-winning, seal-the-deal touchdown, and then 40 minutes later those stats suddenly never happened, that's blatantly unfair.
I understand that's frustrating, but I'm pretty sure the owner of the Purdy/Aiyuk stack wasn't too happy with the result of the NFC Championship Game either.

Shizzle happens.
Two scenarios that most definitely are not the same. One is normal football stuff. The other, with the game being suspended and ultimately cancelled in the middle of play, is not. Both are the result of varying degrees of player injury, but when one of those injuries is so traumatic that the entire game is cancelled with all stats erased, that situation probably has more in common with a terrorist event at the stadium than just another player injury in a violent game that was completed per usual.

I think the "take a zero" argument begins and ends with those are the official NFL stats for week 17 play.

Let's put it this way. Zac Taylor, despite leading 7-3 with his offense on the march agreed to suspend the game with no conditions. I'm pretty sure Sirianni isn't agreeing to suspend the NFC Conference Championship Game when Shanny tells him that Purdy got banged up real bad and the team is traumatized that all their QBs are injured.

Anyone that intentionally took advantage of the Hamlin incident to help their fantasy team, I think would be on par with Zac Taylor telling McDermott, you and your players can take the forfeit and go to the hospital to be with your teammate, the Cincinnati Bengals got a football game to win.
 
What's different from the usual "a player could get hurt and get you a zero in any game, so just take the L" argument is two things... First, it's exponentially rare for multiple players get hurt before recording any stats, so if you had a Burrow/Chase stack and just needed two points, the odds both would be hurt in-game before scoring anything is remote, and, second, in no other injury case have the points that were scored erased. If you had the Burrow/Chase stack, needed two points, you watched the game, you saw them connect for a game-winning, seal-the-deal touchdown, and then 40 minutes later those stats suddenly never happened, that's blatantly unfair.
I understand that's frustrating, but I'm pretty sure the owner of the Purdy/Aiyuk stack wasn't too happy with the result of the NFC Championship Game either.

Shizzle happens.
Two scenarios that most definitely are not the same. One is normal football stuff. The other, with the game being suspended and ultimately cancelled in the middle of play, is not. Both are the result of varying degrees of player injury, but when one of those injuries is so traumatic that the entire game is cancelled with all stats erased, that situation probably has more in common with a terrorist event at the stadium than just another player injury in a violent game that was completed per usual.

I think the "take a zero" argument begins and ends with those are the official NFL stats for week 17 play.

Let's put it this way. Zac Taylor, despite leading 7-3 with his offense on the march agreed to suspend the game with no conditions. I'm pretty sure Sirianni isn't agreeing to suspend the NFC Conference Championship Game when Shanny tells him that Purdy got banged up real bad and the team is traumatized that all their QBs are injured.

Anyone that intentionally took advantage of the Hamlin incident to help their fantasy team, I think would be on par with Zac Taylor telling McDermott, you and your players can take the forfeit and go to the hospital to be with your teammate, the Cincinnati Bengals got a football game to win.

"Anyone who intentionally took advantage": You mean, like, asking that we invent new rules so we could add points to their team for a game that didn't happen?
 
I am reopening this thread to see what all commishs are doing to add cancellation language as a rule.......

I want to address potential game cancellations or even postponements starting this year, but really have limited good ideas at this point.

I want my weekly games to start Thursday and end the following Wednesday, closing that week. So, if a game is postponed, suspended, cancelled, I don't think a zero is fair if the game isn't played.
I am thinking average of the top 3 scores for that player (helps eliminate missed weeks), but then i need to address weeks 1-3. So, I was thinking Week 1 you are SOL. Week 2 and Week 3 you get the prior week's scores. It sounds complicated, but at least it's a rule.

Any thoughts from other commissioners?
 
I understand your concern and wanting to have something set in stone. I see two differing scenarios that need to be looked at. The first is the Covid type where the game is cancelled before it even begins. It can be late in the week but generally there are rumblings of the possibility. In that case, we would allow subs to your lineup that the owner identifies ahead of time. If the entire game is cancelled then the subs points are utilized for that week. It worked well for the Covid games and don't see why it wouldn't work moving forward.

The second situation is a game getting cancelled after it already started. The Buf-Cincy situation. I see this as so unique that I would treat it the same as we treated the situation last year. We ended up using the following weeks game points for the cancelled game. We allowed you to substitute any player that wasn't already in your lineup the previous week if you wanted to. Essentially mass flexibility to allow owners to not be hurt with a zero or not having a player to use. It was such a unique situation we didn't have any problems and now that we have had a precedent set it should be easy to implement it again.

This is how I plan to handle it moving forward.
 
It ended up not affecting our league but it definitely could have. 3rd place payout was in play and the guy had Burrow. If 4th place ended up beating him, it would have been a discussion as what to do.

Definitely want to get something in place before this season.
 
I created a new rule that outstanding events such as Covid or a Damar Hamlin situation will be dealt with on an individual basis. For the most part, we will go with the host website rules. A conversation with league mates will also occur with a possible vote if we can’t all agree.

Also, I hate the idea of having avg points and such to cover the difference in the Hamlin situation.
 
I created a new rule that outstanding events such as Covid or a Damar Hamlin situation will be dealt with on an individual basis. For the most part, we will go with the host website rules. A conversation with league mates will also occur with a possible vote if we can’t all agree.

Also, I hate the idea of having avg points and such to cover the difference in the Hamlin situation.
i hate it too, but i hate not having something in place more. host websites just treated the game as a blank. it is a risk of magic sports, but we count on games being played in the NFL.
 
I created a new rule that outstanding events such as Covid or a Damar Hamlin situation will be dealt with on an individual basis. For the most part, we will go with the host website rules. A conversation with league mates will also occur with a possible vote if we can’t all agree.

Also, I hate the idea of having avg points and such to cover the difference in the Hamlin situation.
i hate it too, but i hate not having something in place more. host websites just treated the game as a blank. it is a risk of magic sports, but we count on games being played in the NFL.
Personally, doing something like that opens the door to having backups to your starters for every game due to the randomness of NFL games and injuries. That’s not where I want my league to go.

There is no perfect way here, if you ask me. But I really dislike the avg points remedy.
 
I am reopening this thread to see what all commishs are doing to add cancellation language as a rule.......

I want to address potential game cancellations or even postponements starting this year, but really have limited good ideas at this point.

I want my weekly games to start Thursday and end the following Wednesday, closing that week. So, if a game is postponed, suspended, cancelled, I don't think a zero is fair if the game isn't played.
I am thinking average of the top 3 scores for that player (helps eliminate missed weeks), but then i need to address weeks 1-3. So, I was thinking Week 1 you are SOL. Week 2 and Week 3 you get the prior week's scores. It sounds complicated, but at least it's a rule.

Any thoughts from other commissioners?
President was set last year.

My leagues will handle it that same way going forward.

It wasn’t the same solution for all 3 leagues, but it will be consistent for each league.
 
There is no perfect way here, if you ask me. But I really dislike the avg points remedy.
Totally.

My 3 leagues:
1. Used the week 18 points from effected players retroactively applied to the week 17 score.

2. No points? Too bad. It was like those players all got hurt & scored 0.

3. Used the week 18 points from effected players retroactively applied to the week 17 score.
 
There is no perfect way here, if you ask me. But I really dislike the avg points remedy.
Totally.

My 3 leagues:
1. Used the week 18 points from effected players retroactively applied to the week 17 score.

2. No points? Too bad. It was like those players all got hurt & scored 0.

3. Used the week 18 points from effected players retroactively applied to the week 17 score.
part of me likes #2 and not #1. in fact, i did that in my league, but the champ game was a blow out and effected players really couldn’t have scored enough. i mean, i can always treat a cancellation as a player injury and tough luck. i may still do that. maybe just have something in place for the championship game. i just don’t want to not have a rule going forward. league votes never end well.
 
There is no perfect way here, if you ask me. But I really dislike the avg points remedy.
Totally.

My 3 leagues:
1. Used the week 18 points from effected players retroactively applied to the week 17 score.

2. No points? Too bad. It was like those players all got hurt & scored 0.

3. Used the week 18 points from effected players retroactively applied to the week 17 score.
part of me likes #2 and not #1. in fact, i did that in my league, but the champ game was a blow out and effected players really couldn’t have scored enough. i mean, i can always treat a cancellation as a player injury and tough luck. i may still do that. maybe just have something in place for the championship game. i just don’t want to not have a rule going forward. league votes never end well.
There’s just no satisfying solution here.

See my OP in this topic - the game that was cancelled was looking like a shootout, and I had more offense than IDP

The week 18 games weren’t the same playoff vibe as that Bengals/Bills matchup under the lights. It might’ve been a coin flip, but my odds dropped with that week 18 solution.

That said, at least with that I had a shot. My opponent in that league had 4 fewer players, but had a good amount of points. Without the week 18 stats I woulda been blown out, so personally I prefer that method.
 
There is no perfect way here, if you ask me. But I really dislike the avg points remedy.
Totally.

My 3 leagues:
1. Used the week 18 points from effected players retroactively applied to the week 17 score.

2. No points? Too bad. It was like those players all got hurt & scored 0.

3. Used the week 18 points from effected players retroactively applied to the week 17 score.
part of me likes #2 and not #1. in fact, i did that in my league, but the champ game was a blow out and effected players really couldn’t have scored enough. i mean, i can always treat a cancellation as a player injury and tough luck. i may still do that. maybe just have something in place for the championship game. i just don’t want to not have a rule going forward. league votes never end well.
There’s just no satisfying solution here.

See my OP in this topic - the game that was cancelled was looking like a shootout, and I had more offense than IDP

The week 18 games weren’t the same playoff vibe as that Bengals/Bills matchup under the lights. It might’ve been a coin flip, but my odds dropped with that week 18 solution.

That said, at least with that I had a shot. My opponent in that league had 4 fewer players, but had a good amount of points. Without the week 18 stats I woulda been blown out, so personally I prefer that method.
yeah, but you are specifically talking about the championship game only. so, is this a season long rule or just something for the championship? i mean, if games are cancelled week 4, we can’t use week 18. just call them a loss and move on i guess? like an injury….
 
yeah, but you are specifically talking about the championship game only. so, is this a season long rule or just something for the championship? i mean, if games are cancelled week 4, we can’t use week 18. just call them a loss and move on i guess? like an injury….
If you use it for championship week you should also use it for a regular season game. You don't have to use week 18 as a hard week. We actually worded it so you use the following week's fantasy stats for the cancelled week's players.

This game is supposed to be entertainment and fun. Just giving people's players a zero because a game was cancelled in game by a fluke situation takes the fun out of it. Finding an equitable way to allow the affected players to accumulate stats (not use an average to date) seems like the best way to remedy the situation. That is what we did.
 
yeah, but you are specifically talking about the championship game only. so, is this a season long rule or just something for the championship? i mean, if games are cancelled week 4, we can’t use week 18. just call them a loss and move on i guess? like an injury….
It’s a good point, and one we discussed as a league.

Typically I believe a week 4 game would be replayed by the NFL.

That it was week 17 is why the NFL just cancelled it.
 
yeah, but you are specifically talking about the championship game only. so, is this a season long rule or just something for the championship? i mean, if games are cancelled week 4, we can’t use week 18. just call them a loss and move on i guess? like an injury….
If you use it for championship week you should also use it for a regular season game. You don't have to use week 18 as a hard week. We actually worded it so you use the following week's fantasy stats for the cancelled week's players.

This game is supposed to be entertainment and fun. Just giving people's players a zero because a game was cancelled in game by a fluke situation takes the fun out of it. Finding an equitable way to allow the affected players to accumulate stats (not use an average to date) seems like the best way to remedy the situation. That is what we did.
Exactly this.
 
there is no good answer……..if week 4 has cancelled games and say i started aaron rodgers and his game is cancelled, what happens if i cut him prior to week 5? do i need to say you have to have that player rostered the following week? i actually hate this…..so many effin variables.
 
Yea there's no fair way to do it. Say a guy has multiple players in a MNF game and then it's cancelled. Does he just forfeit that week due to poor timing?
 
so, i took this to an open league forum and it seems we will go with your highest scoring backup filling in for cancelled players…..trying to determine how this works positionally.

this is since qb is likely my highest backup scorer based on league rules. i don’t personally think you should get the backup qb stats. maybe highest scoring backup non qb.
 
and if week 4 is cancelled, what if your player has a week 5 bye? he still gets no points…..
Again, IIRC there is precedent for game cancellations/make-up games.

The NFL only took this approach because they deemed it wouldn't impact the playoff standings, so they cancelled with no make-up game.

Thus, it wasn't just fluke timing for fantasy football, it was fluke timing for actual NFL as well.
 
is highest scoring backup at that position a possibility? changes how people rooster players.
I don't like this approach because you get a huge benefit by getting a good scorer. I would rather have the team pick a player for the following week where the outcome isn't already decided.
 
there is no good answer……..if week 4 has cancelled games and say i started aaron rodgers and his game is cancelled, what happens if i cut him prior to week 5? do i need to say you have to have that player rostered the following week? i actually hate this…..so many effin variables.
Just because you cut him doesn't mean he isn't playing week 5. Just take his pts he scored in week 5. He doesn't have to be on your roster. If he is on bye then use week 6 pts.
 
Yea there's no fair way to do it. Say a guy has multiple players in a MNF game and then it's cancelled. Does he just forfeit that week due to poor timing?
Give him the next week's points for those players. How is that not fair?
 
It is. What if his opponent had a tough defense to go against this week but the following week it's a weak defense. Not fair to him.
That is completely random and not an issue of fairness. Schedule luck is just part of the game plus there is no guarantee a good defense holds the player to less points than a bad defense. Matchups is not an issue of fairness.
 
It is. What if his opponent had a tough defense to go against this week but the following week it's a weak defense. Not fair to him.
That is completely random and not an issue of fairness. Schedule luck is just part of the game plus there is no guarantee a good defense holds the player to less points than a bad defense. Matchups is not an issue of fairness.
I think that solution is just as arbitrary as saying the game doesn't count. Tough luck on playing guys for it.
 

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