Now that the season is over, it's time to whine. I don't have a lot to complain about, but there's always something.
I ended up winning FSWA Industry Insiders League 3 pretty handily. In fact, I finished with 96.5 points, while the second-place guy came in at 79. Overall, it was a good league: daily lineup changes, nine pitching slots, 14 hitter slots, plenty of bench spots, and a commish who posted entertaining blurbs. Initially, I had a beef with the use of OBP and SLG instead of AVG and HR, but that ended up making things interesting...as did the limit on games started for pitchers. In fact, I really capitalized on the latter by keeping my P slots filled with relievers and racking up Ws and Ks that didn't count against the limit.
But my one complaint had to do with the way they selected the overall champion across the four FSWA leagues. They did this by taking the stats from the top three teams in each league, putting them in one pool, and calculating the roto results from there. (I ended up finishing third. Michael Jones from Fantasy Sports Publications took the crown.) Sounds fair enough, but the problem is that you play to win your specific league, right? I had a sizable lead in SB, Ks, and Ws, so I traded away Ellsbury and Lester. I also left 21 starts on the table. Had I known we'd be calculating the overall champion the way we did, I obviously would have done things differently!
To me, the better way would have been to simply go by who finished with the highest total points. Of course, that sounds biased considering that it probably would have put me on top, but I firmly believe that's the fairest way. You could argue that those in stronger leagues would have a disadvantage, but so what? Isn't that the way it works in sports? Ask the Tampa Bay Rays!
I ended up winning FSWA Industry Insiders League 3 pretty handily. In fact, I finished with 96.5 points, while the second-place guy came in at 79. Overall, it was a good league: daily lineup changes, nine pitching slots, 14 hitter slots, plenty of bench spots, and a commish who posted entertaining blurbs. Initially, I had a beef with the use of OBP and SLG instead of AVG and HR, but that ended up making things interesting...as did the limit on games started for pitchers. In fact, I really capitalized on the latter by keeping my P slots filled with relievers and racking up Ws and Ks that didn't count against the limit.
But my one complaint had to do with the way they selected the overall champion across the four FSWA leagues. They did this by taking the stats from the top three teams in each league, putting them in one pool, and calculating the roto results from there. (I ended up finishing third. Michael Jones from Fantasy Sports Publications took the crown.) Sounds fair enough, but the problem is that you play to win your specific league, right? I had a sizable lead in SB, Ks, and Ws, so I traded away Ellsbury and Lester. I also left 21 starts on the table. Had I known we'd be calculating the overall champion the way we did, I obviously would have done things differently!
To me, the better way would have been to simply go by who finished with the highest total points. Of course, that sounds biased considering that it probably would have put me on top, but I firmly believe that's the fairest way. You could argue that those in stronger leagues would have a disadvantage, but so what? Isn't that the way it works in sports? Ask the Tampa Bay Rays!
I'd be interested in hearing what you all think about this...and what complaints you have from your leagues.
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5 comments:
Hi Jonathan,
I totally agree with you. In fact, I am not quite sure why there has to be one champion, especially when you weren't given the opportunity to play against the other top teams in other leagues (unlike football, which has its own problems because it is sometimes hard to tell who is your conference). I think our league had the best participation and was the toughest overall, so if there were votes on overall champion, you would have had mine.
Much appreciated, Perry. Not a huge deal, but it was curious. Still, the league was a lot of fun, and I'm looking forward to next year. Question is, do you play to win your league or the overall championship???
I think you have to play to win the league. What struck me as oddest about the system is that you could not win your league and win the overall championship. I think it needs more tweaks than the BCS system. I am not sure that league points would be more fair, but the current system made little sense because there was no communication between the leagues. (And, by the way, I don't think you would have won because I think there were some teams in the triple-digits. I can get you the links tonight.) In any case, Mike is a good guy and had a great team so it is hard to begrudge him his victory.
Wow, that's impressive that someone was in triple digits. Actually, in a way it's a relief to know I wouldn't have won either way!
Did all of the leagues have the same format? If not, then the "overall champion" is bogus.
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