Head-to-Head scoring coming to Ottoneu Fantasy Baseball in 2018

Ottoneu Updates
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I am pleased to announce that there will be some new head-to-head scoring options for Ottoneu Fantasy Baseball for the 2018 season. Scoring and scheduling will be more traditional in the first year, and more advanced options will be rolled out for seasons beyond 2018.

Switching to Head-to-head

Before the regular season starts, any league can change their scoring system. This is true today about switching from 4x4 to a points league, and will soon be true about being able to switch to either of these H2H scoring systems.

Scoring

There will be two scoring options, FanGraphs Points and SABR Points. There will not be category-based (roto) Head-to-Head in 2018.

Scheduling

There will be a single matchup per week in 2018. Since scoring is a point system, youā€™ll get a single win/loss/tie based on who scores the most points in the week (Starting Monday, ending Sunday).

Playoffs

Playoffs will be optional.

There will be options for 2 or 3 divisions, and a wild-card round or no wild-card round. Without a wild-card round, the top 4 teams will make the playoffs, and with a wild-card round, the top 6 teams will make the playoffs. Each division winner will make the playoffs, and from there the best records, with points scored acting as a tiebreaker. Playoffs will start on the first week of September.

These playoff options will be made available to all leagues, not just head-to-head leagues and have to be made before the regular season begins.

Head-to-head leagues that choose not to have the playoffs will not have divisions and the league champion will be established by record after the regular season is over.

See a more detailed explanation of playoff options here

Leagues that do not have head-to-head scoring but do want to have playoffs to determine their league champion will not have divisions, but instead will be seeded by finish the day before their playoffs begin.

Other Gameplay

Head-to-head leagues will not have a weekly lineup option. Head-to-head leagues will also only have 2 SP slots and 1 C slot, instead of the 5 SP slots and the 2 C slots of the existing Ottoneu Fantasy Baseball games.

There will be no inning maximums or minimums, though the season-long 162 game limit at each position will remain in place.

Everything else will remain the same - 24h waivers, 48h auctions, budget, roster sizes, etc.

I know there was some interest in having multiple matchups per week to reduce variance, but I ended up agreeing with @sakiehlā€™s thoughts about the luck factor. Multiple matchups might be introduced down the road.

I hope that this new game mode will attract new players to Ottoneu Fantasy Baseball and introduce some new elements to those of you who have been playing for a while. Let me know if you have any questions or thoughts - Iā€™m spending most of my time building this stuff now, so nowā€™s the best time to get your feedback in. Iā€™m especially interested in thinking about the following questions:

  1. The trade deadline: should it be moved to August 15?
  2. Playoff timing: does anyone have good advice on this?
  3. Inning limits: will slimming down to 2SP/5RP help limit streaming, or should there also be a per-matchup innings limit?

Thanks as always for supporting me and Ottoneu, and I hope youā€™re all having a nice holiday season.

UPDATE (9:32am): Great questions below asking a lot of stuff that was in my head but not written out. Iā€™ll update this post with answers.

UPDATE (1:12pm): Iā€™ve updated this post with some clarity and answers in the thread below, but I still highly recommend reading the whole thread. Thanks everyone for the great questions and feedback, and keep it coming!

UPDATE (3/16/18 8:37am): Iā€™ve updated this post with the latest rules and cleaned it up so it can be referred to in the future.

UPDATE (8/20/18 9:19a): Updated to reflect when the playoffs actually start.

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Crap, that means Iā€™ll be playing in at least one more league than I intended this year. Donā€™t tell my wife!

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Can you elaborate on what this might mean/look like for existing points leagues? We can adopt a playoff system?

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Will we have the option to convert existing points leagues to H2H, or will all H2H leagues need to be new for 2018?

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I was just about to ask the exact same thing

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If there is a single matchup per week, but no H2H leagues are weekly lineups (all are daily), why reduce the number of number of SP slots to just two instead of five? Will that mean teams will only get to throw two SP per week? Wonā€™t this also have a major impact on the prices of starting pitchers compared to traditional (non-H2H) points leagues?

Likewise, will RP slots also be reduced to two?

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Is there any chance for an option to assign wildcards based on total points? For example, with 4 playoff teams Iā€™d love to have 2 division winners, 1 record wildcard, 1 points wildcard. Helps to keep very high scoring but unlucky teams in the playoff hunt.

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I imagine itā€™s a way to functionally limit GS/IP for the week without actually having a hard limit, since you can only have 14 GS from SP during the week.

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I would say #1 depends on what the date of the playoffs would be. Whatever decision is made, Iā€™d like to see a consistent trade deadline for all leagues (no just H2H) so that there arenā€™t multiple dates to keep track of.

I would rather have a per matchup (one per week) IP limit than a reduction to 2 SP, but Iā€™ll wait to understand more about why the reduction from five to two in the first place.

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In the off-season, any league can change scoring systems. This is true currently, and H2H will just be two more scoring systems to pick from. Once the regular season starts, leagues can no longer change scoring systems.

So, you can convert an existing league to H2H or start a new one!

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Right, I was thinking it was a weekly lock of lineups when I posted earlier but I guess with two SP and seven daily lineup changes you could throw 14 GS for SP. I assume this means weā€™ll still have 40 man rosters?

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Yeah! So every league will have the opportunity (before the season starts) to enable the playoffs. However, the playoffs will be a head-to-head points matchup following the rules of head-to-head here - you can pick between FanGraphs Points or SABR Points for your playoffs, and there will be 2 SP slots and 1 C, etc.

All leagues will have the option of playing a season-long roto or points league and have the playoffs kick in in September. Kind of a final sprint after the summer marathon.

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Yep! Same roster rules, etc.

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Similar to the multiple matchup question, I think ā€˜luckā€™ in this case is a feature. Itā€™s not just a feature, it is the defining feature. So for 2018, records will still be the defining criteria for playoff teams.

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This is a big, big deal. Major (positive) change to existing points leagues. I think this is similar to what @DSpracale requested long ago if I understand it correctly.

So per your earlier post, if we wanted to implement playoffs in an existing, non-H2H league, we would:

  • Need to select playoffs prior to the start of the season
  • Need to select either 2 or 3 division setup
  • Need to select either wild card or no wild card (is this dependent on which divisional setup is selected?)

All playoffs begin September 1st? What happens to the rest of the season if the four team playoff is selected? By my count the playoffs would be over at the end of the second week of September, correct?

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Once the options are live (and Iā€™ll make sure to announce that loudly!), youā€™ll be able to enable playoffs and some default options will be created. Youā€™ll have the ability to change divisions around, enable or disable a wild-card.

ā€œWild cardā€ means 6 teams make the playoffs, regardless of the number of divisions in the league.

If there isnā€™t a wild-card round, only 4 teams make the playoffs, and I think starting the second week of September makes sense in this case. I have the impression avoiding the last week of September for meaningful fantasy baseball matchups is a good idea, but Iā€™m happy to get more feedback on this.

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I strongly agree: there will be one global trade deadline. Maybe we can see how the first year goes and based on feedback, it can globally be moved in 2019 if necessary.

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Other than facing the #1 or #2 seeded teams in the 2nd round, will there be any other ā€œpenaltyā€ for Wild Card teams when they face off in the first round of playoffs?

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I think having a GS or innings cap each week would limit streaming more than having just 2SP slots. People are going to try to make sure they have someone to start each of those 7 days instead of playing the best pitchers they have available to them.

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That makes sense, and a 60IP limit seems like the right number.

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