Tie Breaker for Fantasy Playoffs (1 Viewer)

[ShockTheMonkey]

H2H just makes no sense to me in Fantasy Football. If your players literally played against my players it would be fine. But they don't. Using H2H as a tiebreaker is using how your roster did in week 2 (or whenever our h2h matchup was) vs. how my roster did in week 2...but our rosters might be completely different in week 13! If I was missing Gronk and Josh Gordon when we played in week 2, how is it fair to use that match as a tiebreaker? My strategy going in was that I might lose a couple of games early, but would dominate later on.

Total points just seems to give a more accurate reflection of who the better team manager was for the regular season.

 

[ShockTheMonkey]

Why set up the possibility of the way bye-weeks fall determining a playoff seed?

I'd be for total points (or -- even better -- all play) regardless, but this is the clincher.

***Unless your league has come up with a way to play defense in a head-to-head matchup. In that case, H2H is the way to go.

It would be interesting if the DST you selected would reduce your opponent's total score by the same percentage of fantasy points they scored that week. I.E. score 23 fantasy points, your opponent goes from 100 points to 77...

That percentage would obviously have to be tweeked because DSTs would be the major factor in determining a win or loss!

 

[kutta]

Well thanks for the feedback so far. I was the head-to-head guy. I have always had a fundamental problem with someone being seeded higher with the same record if I have beaten them in the regular season. I do agree that total points is a better indicator of who the better team is. But so what. Point differential is probably a pretty good indicator of who the better team is in the NFL but we don't care about that at all.

That said, I am really not super hard over either way. It is just a discussion we are having and I thought I would throw it to the group here for feedback.

In another league I'm in we don't use total points for any type of seeding, but at the end of the year, the total points champ gets all the waiver money (each wavier is $1). That works our very well.

 

[Max Power]

Question for the head to head crowd... What is your tie breaker when H2H doesn't solve anything? Move to division records? I can just think of too many scenarios where a league would be moving to the 2nd or 3rd tiebreaker to decide who gets what spot. It overly complicates things. Total points rarely has ties.

 

[Pickle Rody]

My league's playoff entry/seeding tiebreakers:

1. Win/Loss Record

2. Head-to-Head for season

3. Division Wins (if in same division)

4. Total Points for season

5. Head-to-Head Total Points (combine total points of both games)

6. Coin Toss

Have never gotten past #4, but have used #4 to determine a playoff team and seeding.

 

[Road Warriors]

Question for the head to head crowd... What is your tie breaker when H2H doesn't solve anything? Move to division records? I can just think of too many scenarios where a league would be moving to the 2nd or 3rd tiebreaker to decide who gets what spot. It overly complicates things. Total points rarely has ties.

We use two tiebreak systems in a 12 team league - 3 divisions 6 make the playoffs.

To determine division winners:

1. Record

2. H2H

3. Division record

4. Total points.

5. Coin flip

To determine the remaining wildcard teams ( next 3 )

1. Record

2. Total Points

3. H2H

4. Coin flip

We play an unbalanced schedule with 2 games against division opponents, so the division tiebreak focuses on those 6 games. Recognizing that generally the best teams are the highest scoring, we went to a total points for 1st tiebreak across divisions ( for simplicity, also ). It's worked out pretty well.

 

[blake]

Question for the head to head crowd... What is your tie breaker when H2H doesn't solve anything? Move to division records? I can just think of too many scenarios where a league would be moving to the 2nd or 3rd tiebreaker to decide who gets what spot. It overly complicates things. Total points rarely has ties.

Couldn't agree more. My league's first tie breaker is total points scored as it is a good indicator of how a team performed through the year and like you say, it doesn't complicate things. Also, it pretty much solves a tie right away and there is no need to go to a 2nd or 3rd tiebreaker.

 

[Don Quixote]

Their record against Team Z isn't a better measure of relative team strength than their record against each other. Their combined record against all their common opponents, on the other hand, is a better measure.

The problem with head to head as a tiebreaker is that it arbitrarily picks 1 week out of the season to determine which team is better. Unlike the NFL there's no "defense" in fantasy football, so A's record against B is no more indicative of their relative strengths than A and B's record vs. Z. If you're going to use wins and losses as a tiebreaker, you should probably use the largest comparable sample possible.

The common opponents thing is just a corollary to the earlier point that using H2H as a tiebreaker double-weights that week. The fact that the teams are tied at the end of the year already accounts for A's win over B - there's no reason to use that game again as the tiebreaker. You may as well just make your league's tiebreaker, "Whichever team scored the most points in week 6."

In a standard league where everyone plays every other team, using "common opponents" will mean that whoever lost the H2H matchup wins the tiebreaker (you are just taking away the win from H2H winner, and the loss from the H2H loser). So, it may as well just be "whichever team scored the least points in week 6". It doesn't result in expanding the sample.

 

[John 14:6]

Question for the head to head crowd... What is your tie breaker when H2H doesn't solve anything? Move to division records? I can just think of too many scenarios where a league would be moving to the 2nd or 3rd tiebreaker to decide who gets what spot. It overly complicates things. Total points rarely has ties.

That's pretty much the order of tie breakers we use. Total points right away is definitely simpler, but I enjoy complicated leagues: idp, dynasty, salary cap, contacts with bonuses, sixteen teams, etc

 

[Yenrub]

Points is the way to go here.

I have the perfect example to back this up. In one of my "just for fun" 12 man leagues, I have the 2nd highest points, but I'm 5-8. I have the highest points against by a long shot. I have almost 400 more points (30 PPG) more than another guy that is 5-8, yet he is ranked better than me because he beat me in the one game we played against each other. On top of this, there are 5 total teams that are 5-8. I happened to lose to all of them. I beat all the good teams and all the bad teams got lucky and beat me. If it were total points, I'd be in 7th place. Due to H2H, I'm in 11th place. I have the 2nd highest points overall in the entire league.

Anybody that thinks a team with 2nd highest overall points should be ranked worse than a team with the least overall points with identical records is out of their mind. He beat me the one time we played by 3 points in his best game ever and it was one of my worst games ever.

You have the 2nd highest points scored in the league but would be in 7th place if the league were total points. How is that possible?

Also you lost to ALL 5 teams you are tied with in a head to head league but think you should make the playoffs ahead of ALL of them

 

[steveski]

Points is the way to go here.

I have the perfect example to back this up. In one of my "just for fun" 12 man leagues, I have the 2nd highest points, but I'm 5-8. I have the highest points against by a long shot. I have almost 400 more points (30 PPG) more than another guy that is 5-8, yet he is ranked better than me because he beat me in the one game we played against each other. On top of this, there are 5 total teams that are 5-8. I happened to lose to all of them. I beat all the good teams and all the bad teams got lucky and beat me. If it were total points, I'd be in 7th place. Due to H2H, I'm in 11th place. I have the 2nd highest points overall in the entire league.

Anybody that thinks a team with 2nd highest overall points should be ranked worse than a team with the least overall points with identical records is out of their mind. He beat me the one time we played by 3 points in his best game ever and it was one of my worst games ever.

You have the 2nd highest points scored in the league but would be in 7th place if the league were total points. How is that possible?

Also you lost to ALL 5 teams you are tied with in a head to head league but think you should make the playoffs ahead of ALL of them

I meant that I'd be in 7th place if the tie breaker was total points. I'd be in 2nd place if it was strictly a points league.

Yes, I lost to all 5 teams that were the same record as me, but I also beat all the teams that were better than them. I basically beat every single playoff team and lost to every single non-playoff team. Overall, I beat better teams than they did and put up more points. It just happened to be that I had injuries, byes, or my opponent just had personal bests the weeks that I played them. Why should the 1 week sample size be the tie breaker instead of the entire seasons output? I will never play in a league that works this way again and I'm blown away by people that support it. Maybe you just haven't been screwed by it like I have?

Divisions are pointless in leagues with 12 or less people, but if you have to do them, it should be the winner of each makes it and after that it goes by record and then total points. The H2H thing is stupid because the sample size is so small. The object of a good fantasy football league should be to keep it interesting while trying to minimize luck. Weekly H2H matchups is the norm because that keeps it fun on a weekly basis. Not sure why people feel the need to throw more luck into it than that with divisions and deciding rankings based on a single week rather than an entire season of output.

 

[SaintsInDome2006]

Question for the head to head crowd... What is your tie breaker when H2H doesn't solve anything? Move to division records? I can just think of too many scenarios where a league would be moving to the 2nd or 3rd tiebreaker to decide who gets what spot. It overly complicates things. Total points rarely has ties.

I'd say, go to head to head total points scored after h2h record.

I love that games earlier in the year can mean something more.

 

[Yenrub]

Points is the way to go here.

I have the perfect example to back this up. In one of my "just for fun" 12 man leagues, I have the 2nd highest points, but I'm 5-8. I have the highest points against by a long shot. I have almost 400 more points (30 PPG) more than another guy that is 5-8, yet he is ranked better than me because he beat me in the one game we played against each other. On top of this, there are 5 total teams that are 5-8. I happened to lose to all of them. I beat all the good teams and all the bad teams got lucky and beat me. If it were total points, I'd be in 7th place. Due to H2H, I'm in 11th place. I have the 2nd highest points overall in the entire league.

Anybody that thinks a team with 2nd highest overall points should be ranked worse than a team with the least overall points with identical records is out of their mind. He beat me the one time we played by 3 points in his best game ever and it was one of my worst games ever.

You have the 2nd highest points scored in the league but would be in 7th place if the league were total points. How is that possible?

Also you lost to ALL 5 teams you are tied with in a head to head league but think you should make the playoffs ahead of ALL of them

I meant that I'd be in 7th place if the tie breaker was total points. I'd be in 2nd place if it was strictly a points league.

Yes, I lost to all 5 teams that were the same record as me, but I also beat all the teams that were better than them. I basically beat every single playoff team and lost to every single non-playoff team. Overall, I beat better teams than they did and put up more points. It just happened to be that I had injuries, byes, or my opponent just had personal bests the weeks that I played them. Why should the 1 week sample size be the tie breaker instead of the entire seasons output? I will never play in a league that works this way again and I'm blown away by people that support it. Maybe you just haven't been screwed by it like I have?

Divisions are pointless in leagues with 12 or less people, but if you have to do them, it should be the winner of each makes it and after that it goes by record and then total points. The H2H thing is stupid because the sample size is so small. The object of a good fantasy football league should be to keep it interesting while trying to minimize luck. Weekly H2H matchups is the norm because that keeps it fun on a weekly basis. Not sure why people feel the need to throw more luck into it than that with divisions and deciding rankings based on a single week rather than an entire season of output.

Anyone that plays in H2H leagues will eventually get “screwed” like this eventually it’s just part of the game. Hell this year in my work league (16 teams) I was tied for 2nd in scoring for the year but didn’t make the playoffs. #### happens. I trust you knew the rules before the season started.

Did none of the 5 teams you lost to have players on byes or that were injured?

 

[GregR]

Week 1, I played Team #12 and scored 297 points.

If I'd played Team #11, I would have scored 297 points.

If I'd played Team #10, I would have scored 297 points.

If I'd played Team #9, I would have scored 297 points.

You get the picture. In real sports, you actually play a role in how much your opponent scores, and he plays a role in what you score. Head to head makes a bit of sense since scores are very much dependent on the opponent.

Fantasy scores are mostly independent of who your opponent is. Even if you try to "cover" your opponents WRs by starting the QB that throws to them, the dependence between your score and your opponent's play is still miniscule compared to that of real sports.

So I agree head to head has little place in fantasy sports tiebreakers. I'd even go so far as to say division record could be questioned if it should be used.

Total points for. All Play. Reverse of Total points against. All are pretty good options. All Play probably is best though it'll take time for it to catch on more.

 

[ebsteelers]

isnt in a way all play and total points the same?

i guess all play is more a reflection on consistency and total points could be someone who just had beyond monster week and just held on from there

^ just typing out loud