Last Week's Question: How does your
league handle anonymous accusations?
In last week's column, I described the situation of a commissioner
who wanted to protect the identity of one wronged McCoy in a league
full of Hatfields.
In attempting to keep McCoy's identity secret, the commissioner
exposed himself to accusations by the Hatfields that he (the commissioner)
had fabricated McCoy's complaint out of thin air.
Even though I took pains to describe the ways that the Hatfields
might engage in coordinated retaliation against McCoy, no one wrote
in to advocate keeping McCoy's identity a secret.
Everyone who responded shared the opinion that any FFer who wants
to file a complaint with his league commissioner should be willing
to take ownership of the complaint. T.G.'s league has made this
a point of policy:
I tell the managers in my league to post a message
on our message board with whatever complaint they may have. I have
managers publicly vote on trades as well. This year we had 5 trades
go through with no issues.
I have it that way because it's unfair for a commissioner to endure
all the animosity that arises when something doesn't go a manager's
way. People need to step up instead of hiding behind their commissioner.
I also heard from a reader named Chris, who reported that he witnessed
something similar to the Hatfield-McCoy scenario in his own league
this year:
I had nearly the EXACT scenario happen. The
only difference was that one son had hacked into the other son's
account and approved trades between the two. Pa Hatfield was not
willing to do anything about it because, as he said, “This
is one of the only fun things I am able to do with my boys, so that’s
just the way it is.”
I am sure you will get this a lot, but I made the choice to leave
the league the following year, thus preserving friendships.
Actually found a league where the morals are high.
We can take a few lessons away from Chris' comment.
First, wherever there is competition (as in fantasy football), there
will always be room for what some people would call cheating and
what others (such as a reader named Ray) might characterize as "overly
aggressive interpretations of the rules."
Second, there's no reason to jeopardize real life relationships
in the name of fantasy football. If the behavior of the other folks
in your league seems dishonest, you don't have to choose between
1) hiding anonymously behind the commissioner; or 2) publicly accusing
a co-worker or old friend of cheating. You can always just find
a new league, as Chris did.
Third, please note that Chris didn't report having any trouble finding
a league "where the morals are high." It's true that for
some people, the main reason to play fantasy football is to win
money. For others, there's simply a compulsion to win. But most
of us play fantasy football to have fun.
If you're spending your time wondering whether the other players
in your league are behaving ethically (whether they are doing anything
objectionable or not), then you probably aren't having a lot of
fun. There's presumably something about the culture of the league
that gets your hackles up.
Trying to police the league through anonymous complaints to the
commissioner might address one or two things that bug you, but it's
unlikely that any amount of policing will make FF fun for you if
you fundamentally distrust the people you're playing with. If you
aren't having fun in your league, by all means find another one.
If you don't know how to start looking, I suggest posting on the
bulletin boards at FFToday. There's a whole discussion forum called
"Find
a League, Fill a League" that can help steer you in the
right direction.
Thanks to everyone who weighed in on this question, and if anyone
wants to make a belated case FOR anonymous complaints, I will do
my best to squeeze in your commentary before the end of the season.
This Week's Question: What do you
want to ask Matthew Schiff about Survivor Pools?
For week 16, we'll depart from our usual fantasy discussion so that
the real star of this column (the one and only Matthew Schiff) can
field questions about the structure and organization of survival
pools.
Matthew has received some questions this season about administrative
fees that he would like to address in Week 16.
If you have additional questions for him, you can email
him directly or ask me to pass them along. Either way, I look
forward to featuring his Survivor Pool commentary (in addition to
his picks, of course!) in Week 16.
Week 17 Teaser:
A Taste of Hybridity
As I mentioned a couple of weeks ago, I've received a number of
very interesting (and surprisingly disparate) models for incorporating
an element of "total points" scoring into traditional
H2H leagues. I'll be featuring a number of such models in the final
week of the regular season. Check out this minor tweak from Bill
to get a sense of the kind of thing we'll be discussing:
We play a standard HTH format with a minor twist.
The final playoff spot is awarded to the team with the best all-play
record. So the 5 non-qualifying teams' individual records are thrown
out and the all-play record is compared. The only additional rule
in comparing all-play records is that a HTH win is worth 4 wins.
Sounds complicated but it’s not so bad.
So Team A has 103 all-play wins and team B has 100. If Team B beat
Team A in their only HTH matchup they would get the spot; otherwise
Team A gets it.
This season we have a team whose all-play record is second in the
league but is mired at 6-6. They have, however, clinched a playoff
spot based on all-play record. It takes much of the sting from a
high-scoring team that has bad luck.
If your league does something to help out high-scoring teams that
simply run into bad luck from the scheduling gods, please consider
letting me know about it.
The most interesting models will be featured in this column in Week
17.
Survivor Picks - Week 15 (Courtesy of
Matthew Schiff)
#3: Tampa at Carolina (13-1: PIT, NO, CIN,
SF, CLE, SD, NE, KC, SEA, DEN, GB, PHL, STL, DET)
Upset Special. These teams are very similar in nature.
They both lack an identity and a sense of purpose, and both feature
rookie receivers who are trying to establish themselves as playmakers.
Kelvin Benjamin and Mike Evans will battle it out as to who is the
better receiver with a competition of “anything you can do,
I can do better” that should be very entertaining. But ultimately
this game will come down to who can run the ball better. Carolina
is looking to reestablish the two-headed running attack of Jonathan
Stewart and DeAngelo Williams, but the real story about the ground
attack in this game is that Doug Martin (who is finally healthy
again) is poised for a resurgence. To top it off, the Panthers will
be feeling the effects of the absence of Cam Newton, who will be
out because of injuries sustained from flipping his car earlier
this week.
#2: Indianapolis over Houston (9-5: CHI,
Sea, NO, TB, DET, Den, CLE, MIA, KC, BAL, SF, GB, HOU, MN)
If you had to rely on one potential playoff team that 1) wants to
win badly this week, and 2) has a suspect opponent to play against,
then look no further than the Colts hosting the Texans. Andrew Luck
is having a fantastic year, and he should continue to have success
through the air against a Texans team that yields the fifth most
yards per game. But as Colts fans know, yards don’t always
translate to points, and this one may be closer than the touchdown
spread indicates. Even so, with your options limited because you’ve
used the likes of Baltimore, Green Bay, New England, and other teams
with favorable matchups, the Colts may be your best option.
Image by Tilt Creative (Ty Schiff)
#1: NY Giants over Washington (11-3: PHI, DEN,
NE, SD, GB, SEA, BAL, DAL, CIN, AZ, WAS, IND, DET, NO)
What a difference a week makes. Don’t get me wrong. These
Giants are not a good football team--or even a consistent one.
But this week they play a Washington Redskins team that has to
start Robert Griffin III, a player that Coach Gruden has already
stated won’t be back next year, because Colt McCoy is unable
to play due to injury. So why are the Giants the lock of the week
this week? Well, there are two reasons. First off, Tom Coughlin
still has this locker room. Somehow, even though his team seems
out of it, he can still motivate his players. Secondly, Odell
Beckham has been the best addition to this roster, or maybe any
NFL roster, in a long time. His play is getting better every week,
and it’s just a matter of time before Eli passes the torch
to the kid as the new face of this team. This week though, Manning
and Beckham share the stage at home against a defense that has
given up the eighth most points (and tenth most yards) in the
entire league to opponents. While Perry Fewell’s defense
hasn’t been great, it has been better of late, and the G-Men
should be able to play well enough to pull out the victory.
Mike Davis has been writing about fantasy football since 1999.
As a landlocked Oklahoman who longs for the sound of ocean waves,
he also writes about ocean colonization under the pen name Studio
Dongo. The latest installment in his science fiction series can
be found here.
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