Platoon Scoring Idea (1 Viewer)

[jmills]

In most fantasy leagues, owners are required to set players as either starters or reserves each week. Players on the bench contribute nothing to the team. But this isn't necessarily what happens for real football teams. Sure, there are players who will be in on every play, but for the most part players are spelled by their backups, making the starters more productive. I've been thinking of applying this logic to fantasy football teams.

What if instead of designating 2 starters at RB, you platoon 3 players. Have RB1 and RB2 play 75% each and then have RB 3 play 50%, adding up to 2 positions distributed to 3 players. You would receive 75% of your RB1 and RB2 scores, and half of your RB3 score. You could even go to 4 players if you have a very deep stable of runningbacks. To factor in players being more productive while sharing the load, you could adjust these factors. Say you play a RB 100%, you get 100% of his score. If you play him 75%, you get 80% of his score. You could extend this to 60% scoring for 50% play, and 40% scoring for 25% play.

This scoring factor could be applied to WR or TE as well, though I don't think it should be applied to QB. What do you guys think? This would give owners a reason to keep depth on their roster and not be forced to trade it away to upgrade at other positions.

 

[jmills]

Well, for one, this would reward teams with depth without necessarily hurting teams without it. With this system being able to platoon players would make your RB scoring higher overall. Plus it promotes different strategies. Do you draft RB early and play your studs 100% each, or do you wait until later, draft 3-4 middle-tier backs and platoon them? Suppose you 3 RBs and 1 has a great matchup that week while the other 2 have tough matchups. You could play your good matchup 100% and play the other 2 50% each. It seems to me that this scoring wrinkle would add a lot more strategic options. Plus it somewhat mirrors what real NFL teams do.

 

[Righetti]

I thought this was a new scoring system designed by famed footballguy Patoons

 

[renesauz]

I thought of doing something like this before, and still like the concept. It's a NIGHTMARE for a commish though, as it would require a lot more work on a weekly basis.

 

[Velcro]

Sorry, but it doesn't make any sense to me. I don't see how you're rewarding someone with depth. If I have 2 RB's that will each have 100 yards and a TD and my opponent has 3 RB's that will each have 100 yds and a TD, we'll both get exactly the same score. All this idea would do is change (not necessarily for better or worse) his decision of who to start and in what role, i.e. go with 2 or diversify across 3.

In short, I don't see this as a better option than a flex position.

 

[DocNiner52]

Ever have the wrong guys in your starting lineup only to find your bench guys woulda got you the win? I'm sure we've all made that mistake of leaving guys on the bench and they go off that week.It's agonizing sometimes deciding who to start. Of course we all start our studs every week , right I hear guys say you put them in your lineup so live with it. I seem to draft good players but I'm lacking somewhat when picking the right guys to start each week. I go over matchups, off. & def. rankings, past performances and a slew of other categories trying to determine the right guy to insert in my lineup. I'd like to see and am looking for a league where every player on your team has his stats added to your weekly score. Doing it this way kinda eliminates head-to-head battles so the league champion would have to be determined by total points. So it wouldn't matter if you had 6 players on bye the same week. I commished a small league back in the 80's like this. It was only 5 teams. We had 2 qb's 4rb's and 4wr's on each team. I tabulated all the results by hand as MFL.com was started yet. I used the USAToday paper for stats. It was kinda fun. No worry about having to hang around home the weekend waiting to see who guys were gonna start and such. Still., I'd like to find a league along these lines. If anyone knows of such league/leagues I 'd like to get some info to contact them. I had thought about setting up this kind of league myself but my company is making overtime mandatory to the tune of 55 hrs. per week and I just don't have the time right now. We'll probably be working this kind of overtime every week until Spetember or longer. I'd greatly appreciate any info anyone has on this type of league where every player starts each week. 16 players per team would seem like an ideal amount. Thanks for your help

 

[jmills]

In most fantasy leagues, owners are required to set players as either starters or reserves each week. Players on the bench contribute nothing to the team. But this isn't necessarily what happens for real football teams. Sure, there are players who will be in on every play, but for the most part players are spelled by their backups, making the starters more productive. I've been thinking of applying this logic to fantasy football teams.

What if instead of designating 2 starters at RB, you platoon 3 players. Have RB1 and RB2 play 75% each and then have RB 3 play 50%, adding up to 2 positions distributed to 3 players. You would receive 75% of your RB1 and RB2 scores, and half of your RB3 score. You could even go to 4 players if you have a very deep stable of runningbacks. To factor in players being more productive while sharing the load, you could adjust these factors. Say you play a RB 100%, you get 100% of his score. If you play him 75%, you get 80% of his score. You could extend this to 60% scoring for 50% play, and 40% scoring for 25% play.

This scoring factor could be applied to WR or TE as well, though I don't think it should be applied to QB. What do you guys think? This would give owners a reason to keep depth on their roster and not be forced to trade it away to upgrade at other positions.

Sorry, but it doesn't make any sense to me. I don't see how you're rewarding someone with depth. If I have 2 RB's that will each have 100 yards and a TD and my opponent has 3 RB's that will each have 100 yds and a TD, we'll both get exactly the same score. All this idea would do is change (not necessarily for better or worse) his decision of who to start and in what role, i.e. go with 2 or diversify across 3.

In short, I don't see this as a better option than a flex position.

The bolded part above was my answer to your point, Velcro. The idea being the less a RB, WR, etc plays, the fresher he is and the more productive he will be. Under your scenario, you would score 32 points and your opponent, assuming he played his RBs 75/75/50, would get 35.2 points. Add to that any advantage that would result by diversification (covering for injuries and/or poor games) and you see the basis of my idea. I admit that this would be extremely hard to pull off without modifications in league management software, but I thought it would be an interesting scoring wrinkle.

 

[radballs]

This seems interesting and I like the concept of rewarding team depth. But, it does appear that it would be difficult to implement and would create a lot of work for the commish.

Why not just go with a "best ball" format? Depth is rewarded and you don't have to worry about setting your lineups.

 

[JayMan]

This seems interesting and I like the concept of rewarding team depth. But, it does appear that it would be difficult to implement and would create a lot of work for the commish.

Why not just go with a "best ball" format? Depth is rewarded and you don't have to worry about setting your lineups.

Isn't that the most enjoyable weekly part of FF though? (other than regular trading obvisouly)... to try and not to outsmart yourself in putting your stud on the bench because he's going against the best run defense in the league? to go back and forth while trying to figure out which teams will be leading 24-0 at halftime and won't throw a pass for the entire second half?... only to see yourself throwing a beer bottle at your LCD widescreen because none of your 'prediction skills' worked that week? (where did that come from?)

 

[Velcro]

The bolded part above was my answer to your point, Velcro. The idea being the less a RB, WR, etc plays, the fresher he is and the more productive he will be. Under your scenario, you would score 32 points and your opponent, assuming he played his RBs 75/75/50, would get 35.2 points. Add to that any advantage that would result by diversification (covering for injuries and/or poor games) and you see the basis of my idea. I admit that this would be extremely hard to pull off without modifications in league management software, but I thought it would be an interesting scoring wrinkle.

Ahh. I guess I skipped over that sentence since it contradicts the 1st sentence (that 3 RBs add up to 200%). But even in the example you give above, the total yardage for either team would be 200 yards and the total TDs would be 2, so I'm not sure how you came up with different scores. I think a better alternative (within what you're talking about) is a "best ball" approach where 1 player is defined as the possible alternate. This suggestion is a bit different since it removes some of the risk of "who to start" wheras your suggestion leaves it in play.Ultimately, I don't think your suggestion would work. I do appreciate your creativity though.

 

[Couch Potato]

I actually think that it's kind of a cool concept.

Instead of starting 1QB, 2RB, 2WR, 2flex, 1PK and 1DT, it would be...

100%QB, 200%RB, 200%WR, 200%flex, 100%PK and 100%DT, allocated among your roster prior to the weekend in any way you choose. That's not the same as best ball or full roster scoring. It's still decision making, in fact it's more strategic decision making than a regular lineup submission. Do you spread risk and therefore reward or do you go 100% with a guy and take the chance he does nothing?

I wouldn't do it if I were in just one league, but a cool thing about FF is the myriad rule possibilities, and this one could be a fun twist.

 

[SSOG]

Platooning makes no fantasy sense to me.

Let's say I have an RB who I project to 20 points, an RB I project to 15 points, and an RB I project to 10 points. Obviously I'm going to play 100% of the first two RBs, and 0% of the third RB. If I thought the third RB was going to do better than my two starters, I would have started him instead.

I think a much better method would be best ball, or perhaps "big day exceptions" where after the games are over, you can retroactively bench any of your starters for 50% of the points of someone on your bench (so if your starting RB goes for 5 points and a bench RB goes for 20, you can move the starter to the bench and in exchange get half of the bench RB's 20 points, giving you a +5 point gain). That rewards players for savvy start/sit decisions (giving you full points for someone you choose to start), but also rewarding depth if you have someone on your bench go nuts (albeit at a penalty to punish you for not starting him in the first place).