URGENT FF RULING (today only)
 

12 team league

top 6 make playoffs with top 2 teams getting byes

Playoffs determined by winning %. One of these teams is the
last to get in, the other is the first out of the playoffs

Team A = 7 wins 6 losses

Team B = 6 wins 5 losses 2 ties


Which team makes the playoffs>

Team B

Aren't those percentages the same? NFL treats a tie as half a win for Win PCT purposes, so that would go to the next tiebreaker wouldn't it?

6wins 5 losses 2 ties = .545
7wins 6 losses - .538

How do you get that?

That's if you count ties as games that never happened. (6 wins in 11 games, disregarding ties).

Which is a reasonable way to do it. But the NFL does count ties as 0.5 wins. So Team B would also be .538. 6 wins + 2 ties is the equivalent of 7 wins in the NFL system.

If the rules don't specificy exactly what to do, I think the best thing you can do is go by NFL rules and move on to the next tiebreaker.

Equal winning % if you use the same rule as the NFL where ties count as half a win and half a loss. Hmmm...I'd probably go with who had the most points.

6 divided by 11
7 divided by 13


In the NFL a tie does count as a half win and half loss however winning percentage isnt a tiebreaker.

dola: I see. If you throw out the ties, then 6-5 is better than 7-6.

But I don't think that you throw out the ties. You count them as .5 win and .5 loss. Which, IMO, makes these two teams identical. I would go to next tiebreaker.

I would agree that according to NFL rules it should go to the next tie breaker. However, if in the rules it clearly states that playoffs are determined by winning percentage the 6 win team has a better winning percentage mathematically.

That seems to get to the core of the question--how do you compute winning percentage? Specifically, do ties count as .5win and .5loss or do you throw them out?

Either interpretation is reasonable. My gut says to go the .5/.5 route. But I think that reasonable minds can differ.

To me, a team that is 1-2-7 is different than a team that is 1-2-0. The first team is closer to a .500 team than the second team. That's why I think that keeping in ties makes more sense.

dola:

To take a more extreme example, a team that is 1-2-10 after 12 games seems like it should have a better winning percentage than a team that is 4-8-0 after 12 games. But if you throw out ties, then they have the same winning percentage.

Yes I suppose we could look at it this way also being WINNING PERCENTAGE is the key word(s). Since you won 7 out of 13 games rather than 6 out of 13. Maybe the 7 win team should get it. It really is a tough call for the league and commissioner at this point. Should probably fix that rule and clarify it going forward.

Did they not play head to head?

Not really. Those two games happened so that team won six of thirteen games so it has a worse winning percentage if you go that route.

If a tie counts as .5 win and .5 loss, aren't they both 7-6 in this case?

I don't know how you decide this, but I would remove this as a tie breaker next year. Make it head to head record then points scored.

Yeah I'm not sure why you would throw out the ties if you're not going the .5/.5 route. I would think the most basic definition of winning percentage, if you were to ask someone who isn't a football fan, would be "wins as a percent of games played".

7/13 > 6/13 in that case.

This is one reason I like fractional scoring in my FFL leagues. I like ties in real sports, but they can only lead to complications and annoyed people in fantasy sports.

Ties count as .5 win and .5 loss. They have identical records.

This is one of those situations in fantasy sports where both sides are going to want you to decide the way that benefits them. Once you make a decision, they person who got the short end will still be bitching about it in 2025.

:D

Good luck.

In the NFL they do. And it is written in the rules.

As far as this league, how do we know this? This is what we have to decide from

Playoffs determined by winning %. One of these teams is the
last to get in, the other is the first out of the playoffs

My ESPN league shows winning percentage in its standings but I don't think it's any part of a tiebreaker. I don't know how they calculate it in respect to ties, but if your league rules definitively state that this is the tiebreaker, and your site calculates it in one way or another and displays it, whatever that result is (throwing out the ties, including the ties, wins divided by all games played) should be what rules, even if everyone in your league has logic issues with it.

If you use a site that doesn't calculate winning percentage, and you guys always had this in mind as a tiebreaker but you never actually defined it in your league rules, that's a problem and frankly there isn't really an answer for who is right.

Go to total points.

If playoffs are truly decided by winning % in the rules, then the 7 win team gets it. Winning % is wins against games played. Its pretty cut and dry if the rules state winning % decides it, right or wrong.

You can get ties in fractional scoring leagues as well. Seen it more times than I ever expected to.

This discussion point makes me like the way soccer gives points for wins and ties. Though, admittedly, there are FAR more ties then what happens in football or fantasy football.

Winning percentage - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Totally depends on how you define your winning % calculation.

If I were commish, we would go with ties are worth .5/.5, both teams would be 7-6 for the purpose of the win % calculation and then you would go to the 2nd tie-breaker. If you don't have a 2nd tie-breaker, then I would have to flip a coin.

This is a tie, you go to the next tiebreaker. That's the reasonable interpretation of "winning percentage" in my view.

Here's the thought experiment that makes it clear to me. What if one team ended up with 1 win, 0 losses, and 12 ties? Would that team get your league's bye week by having a 100% winning percentage? Of course not, they're a middling team by anyone's reckoning.

It's been decades and decades since anyone (like the NFL) just set aside ties for these purposes, and you shouldn't either. 7-6 and 6-5-2 are the same record.

And go to fractional scoring next season.

Are you really in a non-yahoo/espn/cbs/nfl.com league that this is going down by hand?

Hopefully this league's rules allow going to a second tie-breaker!

By that logic, a 7-6-0 team is the same as a 7-0-6 team. Seems off.

Yeah, the ties have to count.

Logically you are right on. But when trying to decide this like in the court of law. Logic doesnt always win out. However the rules/laws are written IS the logic. Lawyers will looks for loopholes just like I am sure these 2 are in trying to make their claim they should be in the playoffs. LOL!

I remember 15+ years ago before Yahoo/ESPN did all this fantasy stuff. It was around week 14 or 15. I had the Bears specials teams/defense. They scored on TD on a fake field goal attempt running it in. I was able to convince the commissioner that this should count as a special teams TD and I needed this to advance in the playoffs. Do I feel petty about it now? Sure. Point is that there was no rule in place for that situation and the commissioner had no idea how to rule that.

I completely agree that its not right, I just meant to point out that if Winning % is used, it needs to be clearly defined. You can't really use winning % if you can have ties, I just think we use the term winning % to mean your place in the standings. Just saying Winning % leaves too much open to interpretation, especially for nuts like me that would take it literal.

Agree with fractional scoring next year.

Tend to think the team with the most wins should get a slight preference. However since it's truly a conundrum you should go to the next tiebreaker. If you don't have tiebreakers then you need to. And maybe a coin flip


Off the wall idea.

Have both 7-6 and 6-5-2 set lineups next week vs the team they'd face in the playoffs and have a fatal 3 way match to advance.

It wasn't fair when then WWF did that to Yokozuna after the 1992 Royal Rumble ended in a tie, and it wouldn't be fair here.

now you're opening up some old wounds

Fractional scoring certainly helps, but ties definitely do still happen.

Regardless, I agree that they should be considered tied and go to the next tie-breaker (which should be H2H, then points scored)

Random Number Generator, 1-12, take result and compile score of each teams entire roster for that week.

I am, if nothing else, out of the box.

I imagine B&B has been spending the last 3 hours overseeing a war between the two parties at a level of brutality not seen since "Anchorman", just waiting to declare a winner.

Yea, this is key. Hopefully the league has a second tie-breaker such as points in the rules, because ultimately both owners will have an argument by saying the rules don't specify what a tie counts as.

My guess was B&B has one of the teams and didn't make the playoffs as he was expecting.

FWIW IMO they have the same winning percentage record, and if they hadn't played head to head, as the next tie breaker I would go with the 7-6 team as they had won more matches.

My assessment as well

This seems to be the most reasonable way to handle this. Either way, someone is going to be pissed.

Does you league have a rulebook?

How about they're both out, and the team they would have played gets a first-round bye.

My league has been around 29 years. When we've run into this kind of thing, and we have, we go to the NFL rules on tie breakers. It really is the best you can do to resolve disputes that your rules didnt cover explicitly.

I'd say that winning percentage is a tie, and you move onto the next tie breaker.

Whatever second and/or third tiebreakers you decide on, have an emergency vote among all other league members (not involved in the dispute) to go that route.

Once you agreed on such tiebreaker(s), put it in the rulebook for future reference.

No, disagree. Ties in any football context, and almost any American sports context, count as half a win and half a loss. So unless something in the rules specifically defines winning % otherwise 7-6-0 and 6-5-2 are both equal and we go to the tiebreaker (presumably H2H or Total Points). Unless B&B is in a league with a bunch of Euro soccer fans who are used to a 3-point win, 1-point draw system I don't even understand why this is a debate.

I'm in a fractional scoring league and have had ties two years running.