Need help setting division rankings and playoff schedule for

[aman74]

Hi all, 10 team league with AOL. 2 Divisions.

What do you think about this setup:

I think 6 is too many teams for the playoffs. So 4 teams with 2 wildcards decided by overall points.

Schedule will be through week 14 for the regular season with the schedule from Football guys that says:

Each team plays divisional opponents twice, one non-divisional opponent twice, and all other teams once.

I guess that's as balanced of a schedule as I can get without going to a 13 week season with 6 teams in the playoffs?

AOL's choices for division ranks and tiebreakers:

Overall Win
Division Win
Most Points
Points Last week
H2H Games Played (2 Teams Only)
H2H Total Points (2 Teams Only)
Points against

Since you can't have a 3 way H2H tiebreaker I assume it just skips over that tiebreaker if there's a 3-way?

How does H2H total points come into play?

Since it's a H2H league with the focusing being on record for better or worse. I'm thinking it should be:

Overall Win
Division Win
H2H Games Played
Points Against

You only pick 4 and then it does a coin toss.

So then the wildcard I assume I will have to rank the tiebreakers manually? I don't see an option.

Since I'm using points for the wildcard I was thinking:

Points
H2H
Overall win
Points against

Does this make sense? I'm trying to take away some of the luck you have where teams that aren't that good sneak into the playoffs and end up winning. I'm trying to introduce a reward for point leaders without diminishing the fun of H2H.

Thanks

[RCR]

Seems like an awful lot of work and an uneven schedule to get the 4 teams. In a 6 team playoff, the two top teams actually get a bye week and only have to win 2 games to win it all. Essentially it makes Week 14 the week that 4 teams duke it out for 2 spots against the division leaders (thus having to win 3 games in a row)-- much like the real NFL play-offs. The regular season is also more balanced (play division teams twice, non-division once).

[aman74]

Thanks for the reply.

10 teams with 4 going to the playoff seems popular around here so I was wondering how people usually do it.

In your scenario the 6th best team in the league could easily win it all, that's what I'm trying to avoid.

The schedule isn't too unbalanced. You play your division twice, all others once, just like u said, then u just play one more team again, giving you more statistical data.

I appreciate your comments, it is a good argument to go with 6.

What do you think about wildcards being the point leaders?

[RCR]

I did play in a league last year w/ 10 teams and 4 Play-off teams. It was set up to end week 13 (play division twice, non-division once) and each play-off game was then 2 weeks long for the 4 teams. Of course that meant playing the Championship on weeks 16 and 17.

Didn't much care for week 17 being involved, so I see your dilemma. But I also see in your scenario that the unbalanced scheduling may mean that one play-off contender may have to play the other Division leader twice while the second contender may play the other bottom-dweller twice. May not come into play this year, but eventually it would (kinda like the BCS controversy each year), especially when it may come down to tiebreakers but strength-of-schedule differs. Allowing 6 teams may let one slip in but at least no one feels left out. The leaders are rewarded with byes.

That's all I got. Anyone Else?

[aman74]

Thanks for the input!

We ended up just going with the 6 teams for simplicities sake. Next year when I have more time I will come up with something more clever, maybe trying to include total points in there, etc...