Does anyone allow the total points scored make the playoffs?

[jtztdm 2]

We have been thinking about adding this to our playoff system next year. One of the teams in our league is the highest scoring team but they are 4-8. They will miss out on the playoffs.   What we are proposing to do is have 7 teams make the playoffs with one team getting the 1st round bye and that 7th playoff team will be the team with the highest point scored and be this number 7 seed.  Just looking for thoughts and opinions on this and if you do this in your league.

[polecatt 485]

Sounds like it would be an extremely rare occurrence and most seasons wouldn't be a factor.

Crazy things happen from time to time. It sucks for the person who has the most point but a losing record, but it's an exception.

What happens if next season it's back close to normal and the person with the best record also has the most points?

Who gets that last playoff spot then designed for the top points scorer?

The 7th place team?

I don't see a need to do this, what happens, happens

[Sean Mooney 2,055]

Yeah I agree with polecatt. I think it is a rare occurrence and I'm not certain I would change the playoff format because of it. 

[jrokh 615]

In my BML we award a decent chunk of Prize skrilla to the season long points leader, and nothing based on record. That way it doesn’t mess with playoffs, but the points leader is both recognized and compensated if bad luck strikes…

[weepaws 3,372]

In my leagues we have HTH, and reward total points.  So at the end of the season both the winner of HTH , and that team that produced the most points earn the most reward.  

[rilett 15]

We use victory point scoring in all my leagues and that will never happen. 

[AxeElf 787]

Take the 4 best records and the next 2 highest point scorers to the playoffs; 2 best records get byes.  And yes, a token prize for most points is good too.

[Bert 1,128]

The top 2 teams in each division make the playoff.  The team with the most points scored, that is not in the top 2 in each division, gets the 5th playoff spot.  

[Byrdman5 112]

7 teams is too many teams to make the playoffs unless 14+ IMO. 

Top 2 records get bye. 3-4 spots are based on record and 5-6 wild cards are total points for. Also most point  for season gets money so it doesn’t feel as bad when they lose first round of playoffs instead of getting a bye.

My league has been doing this for only about 5 years and it’s the first time the most points scored is not in the top 6 either. Usually a top 3-4 scorer falls outside the top 6 every year. So I think this is the best system for playoffs. 

[Serenity Now 63]

My favorite form of play is a two win a week system. One for head to head one for being in the top half of scorers. It pretty much eliminates this from happening.

[weepaws 3,372]

Four teams should be the amount of playoff teams period.  

[Sean Mooney 2,055]

3 minutes ago, weepaws said:

Four teams should be the amount of playoff teams period.  

In an 8 team league maybe (if anyone is masochistic enough to play in one of them)

In a 10 and up league there should be at least 6 teams that make the playoffs. There should be some sort of competitive advantage for at least the #1 team in the regular season where they only need to win once to get their money back potentially. 

[RedzoneMonster 110]

I’m in a 12 man league, 3 divisions. We historically had 3 Div winners and one WC make the playoffs. A few years ago we switched to 6 teams make the playoffs - 3 Div winners, 1 true WC, and the 2 remaining teams with highest total points.  We extended the playoffs from 2 to 3 weeks as well, and now the 2 Div winners with best record get first rd bye.  Everyone seems to prefer it this way. 

[rowdystylz1 6]

The league i run has a ‘high point wildcard’ that enables a team to advance if there are no ties for the last playoff spot. 12 teams total and 6 make it in. If the first 5 teams are cut and dry (no ties) then the final spot goes to the team with the highest points regardless of record.

It definitely keeps teams competitive to the very last game. It usually comes into play once every 3 years or so. Its a great rule altho maddening to any bubble teams that get bumped for a team with a worse record but theres a ‘Price is Right’ feel when the wildcard hits. It works and makes sense. Big $ league and weekly point prizes so all teams have a ‘chance’ til the end. 

[weepaws 3,372]

I’m in three 14 team leagues and one 12 team league, only four teams make the playoffs, also we don’t have divisions, the top four records make the playoffs.  You have to earn the right to make it to the playoffs. 

Plus in all four leagues we play a full season total points also , the pay out for the HTH championship winner and the total points winner is the same.  

Thanks. 

[Sean Mooney 2,055]

4 hours ago, weepaws said:

I’m in three 14 team leagues and one 12 team league, only four teams make the playoffs, also we don’t have divisions, the top four records make the playoffs.  You have to earn the right to make it to the playoffs. 

Plus in all four leagues we play a full season total points also , the pay out for the HTH championship winner and the total points winner is the same.  

Thanks. 

Here's the problem with this:

There should be some form of competitive advantage to a team that finishes 1st at least. Take a traditional payout structure of 1st, 2nd, and 3rd where the 3rd place team gets their buy in back. That means a team that finishes 1st or 2nd only needs to win once to get their money back at least. It also gives them some advantage for winning the regular season.

 

[weepaws 3,372]

No there is no problem, the playoff teams will each win money, those four teams where the best four , that’s why they made the playoffs. 

The top four teams in total points also win money. 

Total points is the most important of the two , I think total points tells the true story of how good ones ff team was.  

Thanks  

 

[rotisserieking 75]

IMO this is the randomness of fantasy football. I'm the 3rd highest scoring team in my 10 teamer but sitting in 8th at 5-7 because I had a stretch of 4 games where the weekly high was scored against me. Such is life. It sucks but points should be nothing more than a tie-breaker (after H2H).

[TBayXXXVII 2,676]

On 11/30/2022 at 8:54 AM, jtztdm said:

We have been thinking about adding this to our playoff system next year. One of the teams in our league is the highest scoring team but they are 4-8. They will miss out on the playoffs.   What we are proposing to do is have 7 teams make the playoffs with one team getting the 1st round bye and that 7th playoff team will be the team with the highest point scored and be this number 7 seed.  Just looking for thoughts and opinions on this and if you do this in your league.

Not worth the headache, in my opinion.  It's not often where the top scoring team misses the playoffs.  It's been my experience that when the top scoring team has a losing record, it's because there were a few massive weeks boosted their total number.  For example, I believe it was the 2017 or 2018 season where in my big money league, the leading scorer was 2-5 at the midpoint.  In that league, to win, you need to hit 140... he scored 200+ points in those 2 wins and was between 100 and 120 the other 5, so he was below league average in 70% of the weeks.  He finished 1st overall in points that year with a 6-7 record while scoring 200+ points 3 times.  He complained that he was "unlucky and got screwed", but that wasn't the case... he just had 3 monster weeks and the rest of the season he was below average.  If you put his weekly score up against our league average that year (138.7), his record would've been 5-8.  He had the total points lead by only 3.2 points by seasons end, so it wasn't like he was far and away better than everyone else.  Also, the number 5 scoring teams was only 30 points below him as well, so the next 4 scoring teams were right on his heels.  All of them had winning records.

We've been doing this league since 1998 and that year was the only year where the top scoring team missed the playoffs.  I think if you add an extra spot to the playoffs to be designated only for the top scoring team, I think you'll find that you'll almost never use that spot, and when you do, it's likely to be a team that probably doesn't belong in the playoffs anyway.

[Sean Mooney 2,055]

58 minutes ago, weepaws said:

No there is no problem, the playoff teams will each win money, those four teams where the best four , that’s why they made the playoffs. 

The top four teams in total points also win money. 

Total points is the most important of the two , I think total points tells the true story of how good ones ff team was.  

Thanks  

 

What's the competitive advantage?

Would you advocate the NFL doing away with byes? You went 15-2 Eagles this season...well you got to play the 8-9 division winning Bucs opening weekend. Pound sand.

Also, who pays out to 4th place? 

At least the 1st seed should always get a bye in fantasy football playoffs. Thems the breaks. 

Thanks

[plasma george 63]

48 minutes ago, rotisserieking said:

IMO this is the randomness of fantasy football. I'm the 3rd highest scoring team in my 10 teamer but sitting in 8th at 5-7 because I had a stretch of 4 games where the weekly high was scored against me. Such is life. It sucks but points should be nothing more than a tie-breaker (after H2H).

Total Points Champion is the real champion of any FF league.  It's a game of statistics, not actually playing H2H on a field.  Huge difference from real football.

We split our pot 50/50.  Around $3,000.  50% goes to Total Points, 1st, 2nd, 3rd.  50% goes to H2H, SB winner and SB runnerup.

Any Tiebreakers is also total points, not H2H record.

League loves it. 

[weepaws 3,372]

1 hour ago, Sean Mooney said:

What's the competitive advantage?

Would you advocate the NFL doing away with byes? You went 15-2 Eagles this season...well you got to play the 8-9 division winning Bucs opening weekend. Pound sand.

Also, who pays out to 4th place? 

At least the 1st seed should always get a bye in fantasy football playoffs. Thems the breaks. 

Thanks

Would love too see the nfl getting rid of byes.  I don’t think a 8-9 team should be allowed to make the nfl playoffs, I’m all for no divisions. Only the top four teams from each conference should make the playoffs, the only reason why you see a 8-9 team make the playoffs is because they play in a weak division, get rid of the division format you eliminate that from happening, only reason why all sports leagues let so many team in the playoffs is, ,,,, money. 

We pay out the top four in HTH, and in total points.  

No the first seed doesn’t need a bye week, we don’t play divisions, top four records in HTH make the playoffs, those four teams are not a,ways the top scoring teams.  

Thats why we also payout total points.  

Im less concern about HTH,  Total points is what’s the key, the best teams are the highest scoring teams.  

Thanks 

[TBayXXXVII 2,676]

1 hour ago, weepaws said:

Would love too see the nfl getting rid of byes.  I don’t think a 8-9 team should be allowed to make the nfl playoffs, I’m all for no divisions. Only the top four teams from each conference should make the playoffs, the only reason why you see a 8-9 team make the playoffs is because they play in a weak division, get rid of the division format you eliminate that from happening, only reason why all sports leagues let so many team in the playoffs is, ,,,, money. 

We pay out the top four in HTH, and in total points.  

No the first seed doesn’t need a bye week, we don’t play divisions, top four records in HTH make the playoffs, those four teams are not a,ways the top scoring teams.  

Thats why we also payout total points.  

Im less concern about HTH,  Total points is what’s the key, the best teams are the highest scoring teams.  

Thanks 

Imagine that, a business who's main focus is on making money.  That's new.

[AxeElf 787]

Back on AOL in the 90s, we used to run total points qualifier leagues to get into the Main league, because yeah, it seems like the best team would be the team that scores the most points.

Problem is--it's BORING!  Without the weekly chance of being a winner, there's more attrition once teams get 100 points out of first or so.

And in the end, while it may be a better measure of quality than a random H2H record, it's still not perfect, because total points can be skewed by one or two huge games.  Is one team really "better" because it had a guy who scored 6 TDs one week and posted a 60-burger?  I'm not sure that team is "better" than one that finished 20 points behind it.

A small sum for the total points champ is warranted, but it shouldn't be equal to the overall league Champions payout.  Consider total points in playoff seeding, but make it subsidiary to H2H record--like the top 3 or 4 teams get in by record, with 1 or 2 more "wildcard" teams getting in on the most points among the remaining teams.

It just makes the most common sense.

[weepaws 3,372]

No a business making money isn’t news.  

But as it pertains to the NFL, it sure does water down the product known as the playoffs.  

Why should there ever be teams with 9-8 or worst records in the playoffs, I don’t think that should happen. 

Go to a non division format, top four teams per conference make the playoffs, no bye weeks during the playoffs, and no bye weeks during the season. 

Also I’m all for protecting the players, I would like to see a 14 game nfl regular season at most.  

 

[weepaws 3,372]

I’m not for a total points leagues, I like having a combo of both HTH for that weekly competition, which does include when you actually play in leagues with people one knows, side bets, with a total point league. 

Either way I still say over the course of a entire nfl season the ff team with the most total points in a ff league is the best team.  

[Super Cubs 155]

In one of my leagues the team with highest total points gets a $100  bonus but does not guarantee playoffs. 

 

[easilyscan 1,029]

11 hours ago, plasma george said:

Total Points Champion is the real champion of any FF league.  It's a game of statistics, not actually playing H2H on a field.  Huge difference from real football.

GAME-SET-MATCH

[uwmalcolm 77]

On 11/30/2022 at 10:46 AM, AxeElf said:

Take the 4 best records and the next 2 highest point scorers to the playoffs; 2 best records get byes.  And yes, a token prize for most points is good too.

This is what my leagues have done for years. Best approach in my opinion. 

[DrG 103]

No but they get a cash prize end of season

[IMMensaMind 462]

On 11/30/2022 at 7:54 AM, jtztdm said:

We have been thinking about adding this to our playoff system next year. One of the teams in our league is the highest scoring team but they are 4-8. They will miss out on the playoffs.   What we are proposing to do is have 7 teams make the playoffs with one team getting the 1st round bye and that 7th playoff team will be the team with the highest point scored and be this number 7 seed.  Just looking for thoughts and opinions on this and if you do this in your league.

Instead, we went to a system that has each team playing two other teams every week.

[ric0 23]

Final playoff spot goes to the highest scoring team.