FINAL Power Rankings

Gentlemen,

There's a lot to get to here, so let's not waste time...

Total Points Scored

Total Points Against

Above are your full-season Total Points Scored & Against. There may be a few discrepancies with these numbers and Yahoo as I have not included the scoring changes from the past few weeks. As a reminder, these numbers are just the data used to build the analysis.

Also before we get to the Rankings, below are the current Payouts-to-Date for this season.

Payouts-to-Date

There is still $700 to be won via 1st, 2nd, and 3rd Place. The bottom 4 are highlighted because their final place in the standings is locked, regardless of what happens in the consolation.

Alright, let's get to the rankings:

Power Ranking

The best team from the 2014 regular season was Dick Dallus. I know not everyone looks at these numbers every week like me, but Gow was in the #1 spot for quite a while, and only finally relinquished it in the last week.

I can also say that the group at the top tightened up quite a bit in the last month. There was a time when Dallus/Gow were both running away from the pack, but that is no longer the case.

All-Play Record

The All-Play record is the same rankings in a different format, showing what records would be if every team played all opponents every week. You can see that we actually had two ties: 3rd Place (Bill and me) and 6th Place (Kenni and Ned).

What's fairly remarkable about these numbers this year is their general consistency with the final standings. Bill and me are actually a little better than where we ended and Andy/Kenni are a little worse, but we all made the playoffs.

There really isn't anyone that should have been in that isn't, and vice versa. Ned could have an argument, but he was tied for 6th which puts him squarely on the bubble... and that's where he found himself in the last week.

The bottom 3 teams were all much worse than the rest of the league, and each was on their own level. To provide some context, the worse team in our league last year was Ned, who scored a 6.23 on the Power Rankings.

So Crabs had a below average year at 6.46, which would have made him the worst team last year - this year he was 8th.

Whitebread had just a terrible year: 7.15 ties what had previously been the worst team since I started tracking these numbers. Coincidentally, that was Whitey's own record back in 2012.

But Coconuts... my oh my. EIGHT POINT ONE FIVE. That means that on average, he was WORSE than the 3rd worst weekly scorer. Coconuts only had one week when he was in the top half of weekly scorers, which happened to be Week 1. Since then he's always been in the bottom half, and 10 of those weeks he's been in the bottom 3. We really have not given the proper credit to him for how historically bad his team was. We will likely never see a team this bad ever again.

Now... I'm having fun, but context certainly needs to be considered here. Both Whitey and Coconuts mortgaged most of their core players with three weeks left and that plays a role in these numbers. But just a small one...

Strength of Schedule

Lastly, your strength of schedule. Again, a late change at the top as Coconuts overtook me (when I had lead this basically all season) in the final week.

Nothing too notable here, other than (to no one's surprise) Kenni finds good fortune with easy schedule once again. He no doubt is grinning from ear to jewish ear reading this.

One more thing...
I did one more special thing for the year-end: I made dot plots for each team based on their Power Rankings.

They're fairly simple, but here's how to read them: the x-axis is Weekly Rank, and the dots represent the number of times you finished in that spot. For example, if you were Top Point Scorer twice, you should have 2 dots over the 1. So good teams will have dots on the left, and bad teams on the right.

Enjoy.

Power Rankings: Week 6

Gents,

Whitebread's post about the Gophers mentioned/linked to a bunch of advanced stats, which is so Cracker. "Hey look I read all these advanced stats stuff because I'm smart. I probably can explain only a fraction of these numbers to you, but... HEY LOOK they say the Gophers are good!"

I keed, Whitey. I'm sure you're a regular reader of this stuff and jerk off to IsoPPP in your spare time.

But his post was a good reminder for me to post our own league stats. A brief review, even though everyone should know the drill:

I began doing these about 7-8 years ago - a rough season when I felt like every team I played had their best week against me - to determine when the luck of scheduling was removed, who was the best team.

I started tracking the scores each week to determine how we all fared in comparison with each other. Points Scored and Points Against can give you some idea of this info, but can be skewed by outlier weeks.

TOTAL POINTS SCORED

TOTAL POINTS AGAINST

There should be nothing surprising about those two tables - they are simply the data. Points Scored and Points Against for each team by week, summed and sorted. That's it.

The only thing above that might be interesting is where the Points/Loser Bonus $ has been allocated thus far. Bill and I collectively have earned 2/3 of the Bonus $ thus far. Surprisingly, Gow hasn't earned any while having one of the stronger teams.

Let's talk Power Rankings...

These are RANKINGS - they RANK us in comparison with each other for each week. It doesn't matter if the top point scorer got 200 points one week, and the following week's top points scorer only got 100 - for the purposes of ranking against the other teams, they both earn a 1 for their respective weeks.

POWER RANKINGS

Don't act like you're not impressed! I narrowly own the top spot, just barely ahead of both Dallus and Gow. The three of us are all very close, and the two of them have probably been more consistent than my team.

Those last 3 teams all look pretty bad by these numbers. Whitebread has only had one week where he was higher than 7th (and he lost that week thanks to Russell Wilson's MNF heroics). Crabs started off about as bad as you can, and has played ok enough to win 3 in a row while not looking overly impressive. Juan's team is just plain bad, but as we all are aware, it's 100% injury-driven.

The biggest loser when looking at this is Mr. Fredricks. A pretty darn good team but is currently 1-5. Poor Bill.

As you look at these there is a distinct gap between the Top 5 and Bottom 5. And that becomes even more apparent when you look at the All-Play Records:

ALL PLAY RECORD

There isn't even anyone that close to being .500 -- there are 5 good teams and 5 not-so good teams. But Kenni (surprise surprise) and Crabs have lucked their way into a better records, and Bill has just had some of the worst luck.

Let's look at schedules...

STRENGTH OF SCHEDULE

Most probably assumed to see Bill at the top, and he's very close (he also has a 2.6pt edge in Total Points Against). But the owner of the hardest schedule-to-date is yours truly. Aside from the first game, I've played a top half team each week including four Top-3 finishers.

Bill has had a tough schedule, but some of his misfortune is just bad timing and dumb luck. When his team has done well, he's played someone slightly better. When he's had easier competition, he's had down weeks.

Whitebread, you may remember, had one of the most difficult schedules ever last year - thus far, the fantasy gods have not shown him the proper regression.

Gow/Dallus both have very good teams this year, but their records are certainly buttressed by playing mediocre-at-best competion thus far.

If you've read everything to this point, it should be no surprise that Kenni and Crabs have had the easiest schedules.

Who have I not mentioned at all yet? Crapswell and Titwarmer. There isn't that much to say about each... This article focuses more on outliers and regression candidates - both of them are more just middle players.  Ned's got an above-average team and should probably have a better record, but his schedule has been a little tougher. Andy probably deserves his 2-4 record.

So there you go. First batch of Power Rankings for 2014. What else did you find interesting? Care to refute anything I've said? Let me hear it in the comments.

Tuesday Update: Power Ranks!

Gentlemen,

A brief explanation about the Power Rankings, since we've not been reviewed them yet this season...

I began doing these about 6-7 years ago - when I felt like every team I played had their best week against me - to determine when the luck of scheduling was removed, who was the best team.

I started tracking the scores each week to determine how we all fared in comparison with each other. Points Scored and Points Against can give you some idea of this info, but can be skewed by outlier weeks.

These are RANKINGS - they RANK us in comparison with each other. It doesn't matter if the top point scorer got 170 points one week, and the next top points scorer only got 100 - for the purposes of ranking against the other teams, they both earn a 1 for their respective weeks.

TOTAL POINTS SCORED

TOTAL POINTS AGAINST

The two grids above are simply Points Scored and Points Against by week for the whole season. This is simply the data used to determine the Power Rankings and also Strength of Schedule.

The Points Scored grid also denotes who has won the Points Bonus (Green) and Loser Bonus (Red) for each week. Totals for the season so far are:

Bill Fredricks	$45.00
Marcus Whitebread	$25.00
Rod Jerks	$20.00
Juan Coconuts	$20.00
Ike Crabs	$20.00
NooShoo Gow	$20.00
Andy Crapswell	$15.00
Kenni Hana	$15.00
Dick Dallus	$15.00
Ned Titwarmer	$5.00

Ok, let's get to the analysis...

POWER RANKINGS

I'm not particularly fond of my team, so this is a little bit surprising. If you want to rip me in the comments, feel free. The fact that I sit atop these rankings, to me, speaks more to how balanced the whole league is this season. The records bear that out.

It's worth noting that Teams 2-9 (which is actually a 3-way tie for 7th) are only separated by 0.5 - what that means is that those teams have all been very, very close.

To be honest, I did not expect to see Kenni sitting there tied for 2... I think the general belief with Kenni is that he is lucky and has no business being 7-3, but based on these metrics, he's performed well enough to have earn the record he has.

I was also surprised to see Crapswell as low as he is... I've personally thought he had one of the stronger teams this season, but much of my belief may have been based on his depth, not necessarily his starting lineup.

Gow's team has been pretty darn bad this year. He's been the lowest point scorer 4 times in just 10 weeks.

If you're interested in looking at these metrics in another way, here are hypothetical records of all teams, if we played every team each week:

Rod Jerks	54-36
Kenni Hana	47-43
Bill Fredricks	47-43
Ned Titwarmer	47-43
Juan Coconuts	46-44
Marcus Whitebread	45-45
Ike Crabs	42-48
Andy Crapswell	42-48
Dick Dallus	42-48
NooShoo Gow	38-52

STRENGTH OF SCHEDULE

These are the same numbers as Power Rankings, but with how your Points Scored Against ranked amongst the other teams.

As you can see, no one has had it tougher this year than Whitebread. I like to give him grief about complaining, but the reality is he really has had it rough. Five times he's had to face the top point scorer in the league. FIVE. Out of TEN. He's currently on the bottom of our standings, but his team is definitely not the worst.

After Whitey, Dallus and Coconuts both have faced stiffer competition as well. Neither to the degree that Cracker has, but it's a big reason why both sit at 4-6 rather than 6-4.

Ned has had just about the easiest rode as we've ever seen. He's faced a team a bottom-four scorer 8 times out of 10 weeks. That's just insanely unfair.

Fun fact: Whitebread would be 7-2 if he had Ned's schedule (removing the week he played against himself).


Let me know if you guys still like this info. What else would you like to see? Is this pointless? Did I miss anything notable in my analysis?

Monday Update: A Whole New Ballgame

Gentlemen,

Week 8 is basically in the books. There's a game tonight, but every game is basically over.

How do you feel about your team at this point? 

Before you answer that, let's look at this in another way... At the beginning of this season, before anything ever happened including the draft, we all wagered $100. Essentially, you were betting on yourself.

Wednesday SUPER MEGA UPDATE: Back to Reality

Editors Note: First off, sorry the Monday Update is coming out on Wednesday. As I mentioned, it's getting much harder to keep these up each week, but I'm trying to stay committed to you guys.

Second, this is really long. There are lots of different sections and topics to get to here - this is a whole lot more than the standard weekly update. I want lots and lots of comments on this one because, as you will find, I spent a whole lot of time on it. I began work on Sunday night, and literally am finishing here on Wednesday afternoon, while working continuously both Monday and Tuesday nights. 

May I suggest this approach: comment as you read. Don't read everything all at once, and comment on one thing at the end. Read, form an opinion or response, comment, continue on. Repeat. 

I would love to shatter any previous commenting record we had because this is sort of a culmination for the entire season. I likely won't do another one like this for the rest of the year, possibly ever again. This took a lot of time. 

So please... sit back, read, comment, and above all else, enjoy.

Stats & Stuff: Week 4

Dudes,

Per usual, here's the regular stats through 4 weeks of the season. First up is Total Points Scored, and also the $ accumulated through Points/Loser Bonuses thus far:

Points Scored

This shouldn't be too much of a surprise since Y! posts it on the front of our league page. It's probably fair to say that through 4 weeks, this is the best FF team Juan has ever had. Interesting to see Crabs all the way down at the bottom...that's Gow's favorite team right now. #KissOfDeath

The reason I started tracking this stuff a couple years ago was because I thought Total Points were only telling part of the story. Each week was a competition unto itself and points could cover that up. For example, in Week 3, 100+ points was a really good score as only 2 teams crossed that threshold (and only 4 exceeded 90). But it Week 4, over half the league was over 100 and all but 1 team was over 90. Basically a good score one week could be a bad score the next...

So I wanted to see who was performing the best as compared to the other teams, week-by-week. And that's where the Power Rankings came in:

Power Rankings

I'm currently on top, despite a bad Week 4, but check out #2: Kenny Hana. After the draft, Y! projected Kenny's team of backup RB's to finish 1-12. Obviously that was a little extreme, but it's very unexpected to see him this high, especially on this list. 

The only other notable call-out here is Whitebread, who sits alone at 8th on this list. He entered Week 4 as the only undefeated team, which means we'll probably see him near the bottom of Strength of Schedule (further down).

Y! started doing these automated recaps each week, after each match is finished. If you haven't checked them out, I recommend doing so. It's sort of like what I do with The Games segment of the Monday Updates, but with more stats and less insults. 

One of the things they list in each recap is the All-Play record, which records what your record would be if you played every team every week (if you're the top point scorer,  you would earn a record of 9-0 that week). This is another way of forming the same list as the Power Rankings I calculate, but it is interesting to see what everyone's record would be at this point.

All-Play Records

1. Rod Jerks: 25-11

2. Kenny Hana: 23-13

3. Juan Coconuts: 22-14

4. William Fredericks: 21-14-1

5. Dick Dallus: 18-18

5. NooShoo Gow: 18-18

7. Ned Titwarmer: 15-20-1

8. Marcus Whitebread: 15-21

9. Ike Crabs: 11-25

9. Andy Crapswell: 11-25

Moving along, also on our league's front page...

Points Against

Nothing too notable here. Let's do the same exercise as above and rank each person's weekly opponents to get a true Strength of Schedule:

Strength of Schedule

Ned currently sits in last place in our league standings, and given his shoddy performance (listed above) combined with the league's hardest schedule so far, and it's not too difficult to see why he's still yet to win a matchup.

You'll notice that Gow & Whitebread, two of the three 3-1 teams have had the leagues easiest schedules so far. Despite the mediocre-to-subpar performances of their own teams, they're tied for 1st place, mostly because luck has been on their side. Whitebread, in particular, has only played Bottom 3 teams through 4 weeks so far.

Bonus Updates
I noted in the Points Scored section who had already won money through the Points & Loser Bonuses, but let's not forget there is an extra $40 up for grabs as well... $20 each for the Winner of the Biggest Blowout of the Year, and for the Loser of the Narrowest Loss of the Year. Here's where both of those stand through 4 weeks:

Biggest  Blowout: 37.16 points - Gow over Crabs (Week 4)

Narrowest Loss: 4.02 points - Fredricks over Crapswell (Week 4)

Housekeeping
I just wanted to note a couple changes/updates that Y! has made that I think are awesome.

The first I already mentioned earlier, but the weekly recaps of each matchup. Great, great info. All kinds of statistical analysis based on Y! projections as well as what/if scenarios with records & stuff. I can't really explain it all, but I recommend you check them out. They can be found on the right hand side of the page, once the matches are complete each week.

The second thing is the League Pickem. You know how we've been able to vote on which team we think will win each matchup (vote for me over NooShoo this week!), well now Y! is tracking the pickem records. It looks like there are about 5 of us that have been doing this so far, although I know a couple of us have missed a week here or there... Nothing is on the line, but it's sort of a fun game-within-the-game that we all can play. Gow currently leads with 12 points, meaning he's average 3 right per week. It's not too late to jump in the game.

Last, but not least, is the FAAB bid recaps. We are now able to see what EVERYONE bid on free agents, not just those that won. If you click on "View All" (on the front page by the recent transaction log), then click on the FAAB Bids. I believe they only show players that have received more than 1 bid, which we only have 6 of through 4 weeks. That's actually crazy... we should be more active and bidding more as a league. Guys are going way to cheap.

That's it for this edition of Stats & Stuff. If there are other things that you'd like to see here, let me know. Not sure if I'll be able to swing this post each week, but I'll try as long as I know you're reading and you're enjoying it.

Now back to this boring-ass football game...