OLC PLAYOFF TEAMS.

[Tom Kessenich]

I couldnt agree more with anything in the world than what you said Greg - "always make sure the best teams win the most money." Thats why I spend 100% of my fantasy football money here. Plain and simple. If I wanted to crush my league and risk being one and done due to bad luck I could go else where.

Thanks Jared.

I think Greg has done an excellent job of explaining why you can't compare individual leagues with the high stakes payouts (and I would consider "high stakes" in this instance as being a league with a national championship component) from a game operator perspective and why the prize payouts are different and need to be different. I think Ronny has nailed it from a player's perspective. We do believe our format awards the best teams within the league over the course of 13 weeks. That's especially true in the high-stakes leagues where we want the best teams advancing for a chance to win the national prizes. Once you get in those playoffs anything can happen as we've seen many times. But we want the premier teams from each league having that opportunity and we believe our format as currently constructed provides the best opportunity for that to occur.

That doesn't mean it's flawless; no format is. There are always going to be teams which are good but for one reason or another don't move advance and don't receive the opportunity to compete for the grand prizes. But with the high-stakes leagues the reality is we can't pay every team that was good in the league but wasn't quite great. So the emphasis there is on providing high payouts for the league champ and then having the national prizes be as enticing as possible. If we've learned anything over the years it's that the latter is what is driving this market at the present time. If you have an enticing national prize, especially with the $350 entry fee, now you have something which can grow in significant fashion every year. We've obviously seen that with the Online Championship which we first introduced to the fantasy industry in both the NFFC and NFBC. FFPC has clearly seen even more growth since it began its similar event with the same entry fee.

That's why we offer a variety of choices. If you want the big carrot, you can play in the Primetime, Classic or Online Championship. If you prefer deeper league prizes you can compete in our satellite or other "private" leagues. Or ideally you play some combination of both and make Greg and I very happy game operators every year.

Bottom line is there is enough variety in my opinion with what we offer for fantasy players to find something they like. Does that mean we have everything down perfectly? Of course not. That's why we'll be sending our a survey soon asking all of your for your input on some things we may look to change or adjust in the future. But I do believe the current setup is the best in the industry and ultimately we do what we hope - reward the best teams for their success each season.

[Erok]

Another option may be to give the top two regular season point leaders who do not make the playoffs, their entry fee back. $350 for each place.

Then you don't have to bother with a playoff of any kind, and the Top two teams move on for the big prize.

Just frustrating finishing within a few points of the #1 or #2 spot and not getting a ROI at all.

[Erok]

It would be nice to have more teams compete for the league title, only two is very tough and eliminates a lot of competition.

Do the standard top 15% for the big playoffs, and then have the top two points/top two W/L like the guy was saying compete for the league title over the course of the next three weeks.

$500 for regular season top points
$500 for regular season top W/L
$1100 battle between four teams, not two, for weeks 14-16

I'd be more inclined to buy three online teams if it meant I had a 33% chance in each league to make the playoffs and compete for the money. Two spots is too tight.

Good option.

[CALI CARTEL]

I think the biggest misconception about the whole thing is there isn't a League Playoff for the most part in the Online game. Those of you fighting to "expand" the Online League Playoff need to realize that there isn't a Playoff at all right now, aside from the H2H vs Pts playoff if they are different teams.

I just don't get where you think all this money is gonna come from -- there's only 50% of entry fees going to league prizes, that' means that only 6 sets of $350 are available to pay out to the league winners -- how can you possibly split 6 entry fees between 4 "playoff" teams and make it a reasonably decent reward for the top teams? You can't, it's just trying to squeeze blood from a stone. No amount below the entry fee ($350) should be designated as a prize, so giving $100 or $200 to 3rd & 4th doesn't work for me either.

Add the playoff for fun or a small consolation prize, that's fine, but there's no way most serious players are going to be up for lowering the top prizes in league just so that the 3rd and 4th place teams can get some -- this league is about breaking even in league and freerolling for the big overall prize, it's not about grinding out small profits in league, anyone who's looking for a 4th place "blanket" so they can try to break even might need to look for a different format.

[Marauders]

I personally like the way it's setup now. If anything I wouldn't mind seeing $700 for total points winner, $700 for H2H winner and playing for the other $700 in the playoffs (unless one person was the H2H and points champion then they would get $1400 and 2nd in points would get $700). This way you can at least double your money for a great regular season or possibly quadruple it for an excellent season.

P.S. This could of already been suggested, I didn't read all the posts.

[Erok]

Sorry, I stand corrected here.

What I was trying to say was that it would be nice to adopt a format similar to FFPC somehow. You would still only have the Best Record/ high points regular season winners make the big playoff, but it would be nice to try to have 4 league teams (2 points +2 record) compete over two weeks for the league prize, prior to the start of the big playoffs.

Erok, since you started this same thread on the FFPC boards last night asking them to change their playoff format, it's obvious that you're not happy with either format. They have an 11 week regular season (8 teams are eliminated before Thanksgiving), 4 playoff teams going H2H in Weeks 12 and 13 and 2 teams in the Championship Round. I saw that you had a Top 2 team in your league and lost a high-scoring H2H matchup in Week 12. Your request for total points over 2 weeks has been well received by other owners, but the old WCOFF format of H2H over 2 weeks has been standard for that contest for years. That's a tough change.

Now here you like the 13 week regular season, or don't you? You want an 11-week regular season and 4 playoff teams going for total points in Weeks 12 and 13, the same request you're asking the FFPC to make?? To me, that would be eliminating 8 teams before Thanksgiving, which seems less of a season for most paying customers. And I'm not sure we're even rewarding the top 2 teams after Week 13 then, are we? What were the first 11 weeks for in that format, just playoff qualifying? Seems like less of an enjoyable contest.

Hey, I understand the year-end frustration and this happens every year where folks ask for more playoff teams and format changes. We've added a third Championship Round qualifying team in the Primetime and I think that has helped that contest. But the Online Championship is so big already that we'll have 300+ teams in the Championship Round the way it is. Adding 156 more teams to the Championship Round would take us closer to 500 total teams. Paying out only the Top 2 teams in each league is tough, but the goal is to reward the two best teams with as much money as possible, not the hottest teams in Weeks 12 and 13.

We'll watch the comments on both threads that you started because good ideas usually come from the customers. But we went from 780 teams to 1,872 in one season and the FFPC grew to over 4,000 teams, so we both must be doing something right in this format. The allure here is the $1,600 league prize and the chance to win $100,000 on a $350 entry. Can we make it an even better contest? I think we can and we'll continue to take your input, but I have to say that going down to 11 weeks for our regular season isn't an option we'll ever consider. Thanks and continued good luck the rest of the way.

Greg--- My post at FFPC was directed at the head to head post season matchups in the FGPC, which I absolutely hate!
It is too random and unfair. The best teams do not get rewarded in that scenario and that should be changed (I'd like to see the four playoff teams compile two weeks worth of points in weeks 12/13 and reward 1st and 2nd from that.)

That is a whole different issue than what I posted here. (Now, I played the FFPC VP Leagues for the first time this year and absolutely love them. They have many of the same NFFC guidelines in place too for that.)
Anyways, I am not upset nor am I trying to cause any problems here. I was just simply making a suggestion to you guys here to see what everyone's thought process was on this. I just thought it would be nice if the 3/4 teams could at least get their entry fee back somehow or compete for some sort of small cash payout.

I spend a lot of money on fantasy football each year for multiple leagues and look for a ROI from each of them. Paying out only two spots makes it difficult to do that. It is frustrating to be within a few points of the TP Leader and not make it.

I guess I am different from a few others here in that my goal is to grind out as much profit as possible from each league. Sure the big payout would be super, but realistically, it isn't happening for all but one of us.
As I have said in the past, the NFFC scoring/3 week playoff/KDS, etc.....is second to none. It is the best out there. Do not change anything there. Even the #13 week season is fine. All I was suggesting was somehow getting the 3/4 entry fee back for those teams not moving on in the OLC. I am not concerned with a league playoff at all. I was just looking for a way for the 3rd/4th place teams (point leaders)to at least get their entry fee back. Maybe a redistribution of the way the league prizes are paid out? Sorry if this was misinterpreted or I did not come across clearly.

[CALI CARTEL]

I personally like the way it's setup now. If anything I wouldn't mind seeing $700 for total points winner, $700 for H2H winner and playing for the other $700 in the playoffs (unless one person was the H2H and points champion then they would get $1400 and 2nd in points would get $700). This way you can at least double your money for a great regular season or possibly quadruple it for an excellent season.

P.S. This could of already been suggested, I didn't read all the posts.

I do agree with this, rather than adding 3rd/4th place money, the split between 1st & 2nd could be a little flatter. $1600 to $500 is a huge hit in terms of the buyin amount; I think the 700/700/700 suggestion is decent, but maybe a 600/600/900 setup would be best for Greg/Tom, as they'd still be awarding $1500 (a juicy number that actually looks better in print than $1600 or $1400) to the league winner, while the runner up could get $600 (a 20% boost).

[Greg Ambrosius]

I personally like the way it's setup now. If anything I wouldn't mind seeing $700 for total points winner, $700 for H2H winner and playing for the other $700 in the playoffs (unless one person was the H2H and points champion then they would get $1400 and 2nd in points would get $700). This way you can at least double your money for a great regular season or possibly quadruple it for an excellent season.

P.S. This could of already been suggested, I didn't read all the posts.

I do agree with this, rather than adding 3rd/4th place money, the split between 1st & 2nd could be a little flatter. $1600 to $500 is a huge hit in terms of the buyin amount; I think the 700/700/700 suggestion is decent, but maybe a 600/600/900 setup would be best for Greg/Tom, as they'd still be awarding $1500 (a juicy number that actually looks better in print than $1600 or $1400) to the league winner, while the runner up could get $600 (a 20% boost).

And I agree, this is the type of suggestion that gets the ball rolling on changes that could benefit the players. How can we set this up so that TWO teams make a good enough ROI within the league to make the NFFC Online Championship even more desirable? As we grow this contest to 2,000 teams and more, maybe it makes more sense to add to the league prizes. Last year we had $700 for first place and $1,400 for second place. We changed it this year to $1,600 to really create a solid league prize and $500 for 2nd place. Maybe it's time to go $700 & $700 for the H2H and Total Points champions and raise the bar on the league prizes to $2,200 total and $800 for first. That would be $1,500 and $700 for 1st and 2nd.

Erok, I know your suggestion means well and I hear you about 3rd place getting something back. But once you dip too much into the league prize numbers, then it's tough to have that big carrot out there. And as we have seen at this price point, folks LOVE a shot at $100,000 for a $350 buy-in. It's tough to add $700 more per league -- which would be $109,200 for the 156 leagues we had this year -- in prizes and take that much out of the overall prize pool. There would be little left for a grand prize to make sure 3rd and 4th place get their entry fees back.

But great suggestion here and I will look at the league payouts for 2013 and see what we can do to make this contest even better than it is this year without really hurting the top league prize. I like the fact that someone can make more than 4x entry for winning a league title, but you are right 2x for 2nd place is better than a little more than your entry back.

[Greg Ambrosius]

Greg--- My post at FFPC was directed at the head to head post season matchups in the FGPC, which I absolutely hate!
It is too random and unfair. The best teams do not get rewarded in that scenario and that should be changed (I'd like to see the four playoff teams compile two weeks worth of points in weeks 12/13 and reward 1st and 2nd from that.)

That is a whole different issue than what I posted here. (Now, I played the FFPC VP Leagues for the first time this year and absolutely love them. They have many of the same NFFC guidelines in place too for that.)
Anyways, I am not upset nor am I trying to cause any problems here. I was just simply making a suggestion to you guys here to see what everyone's thought process was on this. I just thought it would be nice if the 3/4 teams could at least get their entry fee back somehow or compete for some sort of small cash payout.

I spend a lot of money on fantasy football each year for multiple leagues and look for a ROI from each of them. Paying out only two spots makes it difficult to do that. It is frustrating to be within a few points of the TP Leader and not make it.

I guess I am different from a few others here in that my goal is to grind out as much profit as possible from each league. Sure the big payout would be super, but realistically, it isn't happening for all but one of us.
As I have said in the past, the NFFC scoring/3 week playoff/KDS, etc.....is second to none. It is the best out there. Do not change anything there. Even the #13 week season is fine. All I was suggesting was somehow getting the 3/4 entry fee back for those teams not moving on in the OLC. I am not concerned with a league playoff at all. I was just looking for a way for the 3rd/4th place teams (point leaders)to at least get their entry fee back. Maybe a redistribution of the way the league prizes are paid out? Sorry if this was misinterpreted or I did not come across clearly.

Erok, again, no offense taken. I totally understand your comments here and on the FFPC boards. There are a lot of owners who play in both contests and love both dearly. At times, they almost seem like they want the formats combined into one perfect contest. But there are aspects of our contest that we love here, and obviously Dave and Alex love certain formats in their contest. Asking us each to make changes that make us look more like our competitor is interesting.

For instance, we've always had a 13-week regular season and total points over 3 weeks for the league playoffs. They are 11 weeks and H2H with four teams. Now owners -- many who have been with the NFFC for a long time -- are asking them to change to 13 weeks and total points. We honor only two teams in this format; they have 4 teams in a 2-week playoff, while 8 teams have their regular seasons over before Thanksgiving. But because 4th place can sneak out a league title there, people want us to change to their format and have 4 playoff teams here.

The beauty of fantasy football is that there is no PERFECT format. I think both contests are FANTASTIC and serve different purposes. I'd be surprised after they just reached 4,000 teams if they suddenly changed formats and went to 13 weeks. And it would be a huge departure for us to suddenly take from the overall prizes to reward 3rd and 4th place in each league. Our satellite leagues are set up to reward 3rd place in each league and 80 percent payouts to just the league. If folks really are looking for the best ROI within a league, the satellites or the Supers or the Ultimates are the leagues to turn to.

As Ronny so perfectly said again, the allure here is the chance to win $100,000 on a $350 entry, plus the chance to win $1,600 within your league for a $350 entry. It's unlikely that the Online Championship will ever pay too deep within the league, but who knows, as this contest grows and grows maybe we will decide to reward more and more money within the league rather than turn the grand prize well past $100,000. That's the decision we'll all make together if growth continues at the pace we saw last year. Fair enough?

[Erok]

Greg--- My post at FFPC was directed at the head to head post season matchups in the FGPC, which I absolutely hate!
It is too random and unfair. The best teams do not get rewarded in that scenario and that should be changed (I'd like to see the four playoff teams compile two weeks worth of points in weeks 12/13 and reward 1st and 2nd from that.)

That is a whole different issue than what I posted here. (Now, I played the FFPC VP Leagues for the first time this year and absolutely love them. They have many of the same NFFC guidelines in place too for that.)
Anyways, I am not upset nor am I trying to cause any problems here. I was just simply making a suggestion to you guys here to see what everyone's thought process was on this. I just thought it would be nice if the 3/4 teams could at least get their entry fee back somehow or compete for some sort of small cash payout.

I spend a lot of money on fantasy football each year for multiple leagues and look for a ROI from each of them. Paying out only two spots makes it difficult to do that. It is frustrating to be within a few points of the TP Leader and not make it.

I guess I am different from a few others here in that my goal is to grind out as much profit as possible from each league. Sure the big payout would be super, but realistically, it isn't happening for all but one of us.
As I have said in the past, the NFFC scoring/3 week playoff/KDS, etc.....is second to none. It is the best out there. Do not change anything there. Even the #13 week season is fine. All I was suggesting was somehow getting the 3/4 entry fee back for those teams not moving on in the OLC. I am not concerned with a league playoff at all. I was just looking for a way for the 3rd/4th place teams (point leaders)to at least get their entry fee back. Maybe a redistribution of the way the league prizes are paid out? Sorry if this was misinterpreted or I did not come across clearly.

Erok, again, no offense taken. I totally understand your comments here and on the FFPC boards. There are a lot of owners who play in both contests and love both dearly. At times, they almost seem like they want the formats combined into one perfect contest. But there are aspects of our contest that we love here, and obviously Dave and Alex love certain formats in their contest. Asking us each to make changes that make us look more like our competitor is interesting.

For instance, we've always had a 13-week regular season and total points over 3 weeks for the league playoffs. They are 11 weeks and H2H with four teams. Now owners -- many who have been with the NFFC for a long time -- are asking them to change to 13 weeks and total points. We honor only two teams in this format; they have 4 teams in a 2-week playoff, while 8 teams have their regular seasons over before Thanksgiving. But because 4th place can sneak out a league title there, people want us to change to their format and have 4 playoff teams here.

The beauty of fantasy football is that there is no PERFECT format. I think both contests are FANTASTIC and serve different purposes. I'd be surprised after they just reached 4,000 teams if they suddenly changed formats and went to 13 weeks. And it would be a huge departure for us to suddenly take from the overall prizes to reward 3rd and 4th place in each league. Our satellite leagues are set up to reward 3rd place in each league and 80 percent payouts to just the league. If folks really are looking for the best ROI within a league, the satellites or the Supers or the Ultimates are the leagues to turn to.

As Ronny so perfectly said again, the allure here is the chance to win $100,000 on a $350 entry, plus the chance to win $1,600 within your league for a $350 entry. It's unlikely that the Online Championship will ever pay too deep within the league, but who knows, as this contest grows and grows maybe we will decide to reward more and more money within the league rather than turn the grand prize well past $100,000. That's the decision we'll all make together if growth continues at the pace we saw last year. Fair enough?

Yes. Thank you for clarifying the thought process behind it, Greg. I certainly see your points now that you broke it down.

That was the main reason I have always stuck to the satellites prior to the past two seasons. Thought I'd try to branch out a little more into different formats though the last couple of seasons. Hasn't worked out to well for my bankroll though

Hopefully we can fill more 500/1000 satellite leagues next summer. It was a shame we couldnt fill any of the 14 team 500/1000 satellites this past summer too. Those were always super competitive.