Warrior General Games

For the third week in a row, no one in Alpha changes positions, but Zeta continues to sort itself out at the 3-8 spots: http://spreadsheets.google.com/pub?key=pOUigrsS32wKMzIC-k1LxCQ

The Rankings Summary for the ALPHA conference:

Rank Team - Rating (Change from last week)
1 Hattgenstein Volunteers - 15.183 (--)
2 Black Country Knights - 14.520 (--)
3 Italian Stallions - 13.820 (--)
4 Dublin Anarchists - 13.255 (--)
5 London Aces - 13.197 (--)
6 Flying Monkeeh Armada - 12.845 (--)
7 Maranello Enzos - 10.971 (--)
8 Minot Defenders - 10.747 (--)
9 Belfast Defiance - 9.556 (--)
10 Irish Car-Bombers - 8.031 (--)
11 Davenport Tigers - 7.734 (--)
12 Sinsheim MC Airs - 7.142 (--)
13 Messina Blazers - 6.588 (--)
14 Reykjavik Vikings - 6.050 (--)
15 Jellystone Park Bruins - 5.366 (--)
16 Soft Fluffy Pancake Bunnies - 3.823 (--)


The Rankings Summary for the ZETA conference:

Rank Team - Rating (Change from last week)
1 Polk High Panthers - 14.943 (--)
2 Rome Poison - 14.765 (--)
3 Tilburg Lightning - 12.738 (+1)
4 Dublin Shamrocks - 12.513 (+3)
5 Helsinki Crabs - 12.400 (+1)
6 Eastwick Savages - 12.205 (-3)
7 Denmark Destruction - 11.962 (+1)
8 Mannheim Jaguars - 11.798 (-3)
9 London Pounds - 11.093 (--)
10 Chernobyl Neutrons - 9.498 (--)
11 Portuguese Men-of-War - 8.194 (--)
12 Siena IL PALIO - 7.263 (--)
13 Monte Carlo Maniacs - 6.832 (--)
14 Milano Xela - 5.710 (--)
15 Brasilia Rockets - 5.706 (--)
16 Trojan Magnums - 3.781 (--)


UPCOMING GAMES OF THE WEEK

Alpha Conference
Black Country vs. Dublin - After weeks of waiting, we at least have a somewhat compelling Game of the Week in Alpha. The Anarchists and Knights are both 8-1, with each having their singular loss come from the Vols (by margins of 28 and 27, respectively). I'd have to give the edge to the Knights as I wasn't too impressed with Dublin's 28 point victory over the Enzos in Week 9, and the Knights are the only team so far to reach the endzone against the Vols, but either team could win this one.

Zeta Conference
Dublin vs. Tilburg - In Zeta, no team outside of Rome or Polk High is hotter than the Lightning, who have won their last 7 after dropping their first two contests (unsurprisingly, to Rome and Polk). The Shamrocks have only lost three games (two to the Rome/Polk duo and a one point loss to the Crabs), and could potentially get a leg up on Tilburg for home field in the first round of the post-season if they can pull out a win here. Dublin's last two games were close affairs (6 and 4 points, respectively), and I expect the same for this one.

Snoozer of the Week
London vs. Soft Fluffy Pancake Bunnies - I was going to select the Jellystone vs. Sinshiem game as the one that no one cares about, but I decided to go to the reader mailbag instead. After my rankings following week 8, I received the following in PM from an interested reader (name removed to protect the guilty - and yes, I really did receive this message):

Originally posted by Mr. Anonymous Aces Hater
In your next rankings, could you find a way to point out that the Aces are complete posers right now? With by far the most favorable schedule I've ever seen, they have a legit shot at being 10-1 going into their last 4 conference games where they could easily finish with straight loses to Italian, Dublin, Flying Monkeeh, and Hattgenstein, before playing the Trojans (the Zeta version of the Soft Fluffy Pancake Bunnies).
So, with that prompting, I'd like to point out that even if the Aces:
(1) are posers right now with their 8-1 record;
(2) have only played 2 teams with winning records (and who incidentally account for exactly half of the 26 total wins the Aces' opponents have this season); and
(3) have played 8 of the 9 teams with the worst current records in Alpha (the other of those 9 coming up this week);

London should still waltz all over the Bisquick Bunnies.

Good to see, I just wanted to throw this out there. I don't think strength of schedule matters that much in the rankings does it? We've played 6 of the top 7 teams already. Now to the bottom half of the schedule for Mannheim (we need it )

The SOS does matter and is a fairly important aspect of the rankings, but it's hard for me to express how much it really matters without quantifying it. Looking at the data, here is what I do know:

Theoretically, a team's winning percentage has the greatest single impact (~38.9%) on the score, and the total SOS calculation (i.e. Opponent and Opponents' Opponents wins and GLB ratings) collectively accounts for ~37.6% of the score. A team's GLB rating accounts for ~11.7%, the margin of victory accounts for 10.4%, and the remaining ~1.3% is for a value that factors in quality wins (i.e., wins against teams with equal or better records).

Now that's theoretical, and the practical aspect is that there aren't huge differences between most teams in some of the categories, so the real value is in the differences between the teams. Measured relative to the top power ranking in the league (15.183), the difference between the statistically hardest and weakest schedule strengths (1.73) represents only about 11% of the total score, while the difference between the top and bottom teams in wins is about 49% of the score. To put that in perspective, a difference of 2 games (e.g., 8-1 vs. 6-3) at this point in the season would also have about an 11% effect and compensate for the lower strength of schedule. (NOTE: Because the margin of victory can be negative, the difference from the best to worst in that category represents about 22% of the score, so it can factor in far more than the strength of schedule).

Looking at it from a slightly different perspective (since SOS involves multiple factors), and just in terms of team wins vs. wins by opponents, it currently takes about 14 wins by a team's opponents to have the same impact on the power rankings as a single win by that team. This varies, however, from the start to end of the season, and by Week 16, 1 win is about equal to 8 opponent wins as to its impact on the power rankings. (Incidentally, this should help Mannheim as with each week, Mannheim's tough opening schedule should give it more of a boost in the power rankings, although other teams will obviously start catching up as well).

Probably no one cares for that detail, but there it is anyway...

Originally posted by iguazu_cn
The SOS does matter and is a fairly important aspect of the rankings, but it's hard for me to express how much it really matters without quantifying it. Looking at the data, here is what I do know:

Theoretically, a team's winning percentage has the greatest single impact (~38.9%) on the score, and the total SOS calculation (i.e. Opponent and Opponents' Opponents wins and GLB ratings) collectively accounts for ~37.6% of the score. A team's GLB rating accounts for ~11.7%, the margin of victory accounts for 10.4%, and the remaining ~1.3% is for a value that factors in quality wins (i.e., wins against teams with equal or better records).

Now that's theoretical, and the practical aspect is that there aren't huge differences between most teams in some of the categories, so the real value is in the differences between the teams. Measured relative to the top power ranking in the league (15.183), the difference between the statistically hardest and weakest schedule strengths (1.73) represents only about 11% of the total score, while the difference between the top and bottom teams in wins is about 49% of the score. To put that in perspective, a difference of 2 games (e.g., 8-1 vs. 6-3) at this point in the season would also have about an 11% effect and compensate for the lower strength of schedule. (NOTE: Because the margin of victory can be negative, the difference from the best to worst represents about 22% of the score, so it can factor in far more than the strength of schedule).

Looking at it from a slightly different perspective (since SOS involves multiple factors), and just in terms of team wins vs. wins by opponents, it currently takes about 14 wins by a team's opponents to have the same impact on the power rankings as a single win by that team. This varies, however, from the start to end of the season, and by Week 16, 1 win is about equal to 8 opponent wins as to its impact on the power rankings. (Incidentally, this should help Mannheim as with each week, Mannheim's tough opening schedule should give it more of a boost in the power rankings, although other teams will obviously start catching up as well).

Probably no one cares for that detail, but there it is anyway...


Wow, you got it figured out then. I always like reading these, so don't get me wrong. Was just trying to see if it was or wasn't.

Sad part is that after looking at the data, I can say that it is a factor, but I'm still not sure if I can say that SOS is or isn't a big factor.

Originally posted by iguazu_cn
Sad part is that after looking at the data, I can say that it is a factor, but I'm still not sure if I can say that SOS is or isn't a big factor.

Well for Mannheim's sake it should be the biggest factor . Nah its all good, I'm sure it all balances out during the course of the season. Fact is Mannheim has lost 3 of its last 4 games. They deserve that.

I think that's funny how someone actually PMd you about the Aces. As if we can help that we got an easy first half schedule.

This league is about 6 teams deep anyway. Everyone will be getting the same cupcakes that we have played.

Good luck to all teams.

Signed,

Mr. Doesn't disrespect any teams no matter what their schedule looks like

You know what the worst part of that PM was? The Soft Fluffy Pancake Bunnies are WAY better than the Magnums. I am offended, I really am.

I can say that the interested party was from Alpha (and apparently upset that London is ranked near his team), so maybe he just doesn't follow Zeta well enough to appreciate that Bunnies have scored multiple times this season, while I'm not even sure that Magnums have reached opposing territory.

UPDATE on the PM: I've received a follow-up message sarcastically thanking me for including the actual message in my forum post. Apparently I was just supposed to include the Aces attack as my own, personal opinion, without implicating the other party. Oops, my bad.

I predict Bunnies 101 - Aces 3 and there was much rejoicing..YAYYYY!!

Originally posted by iguazu_cn
I can say that the interested party was from Alpha (and apparently upset that London is ranked near his team), so maybe he just doesn't follow Zeta well enough to appreciate that Bunnies have scored multiple times this season, while I'm not even sure that Magnums have reached opposing territory.

UPDATE on the PM: I've received a follow-up message sarcastically thanking me for including the actual message in my forum post. Apparently I was just supposed to include the Aces attack as my own, personal opinion, without implicating the other party. Oops, my bad.


We have decided to forfeit all of our victories against the cupcakes in our league. We have decided it isn't fair to the rest of the league, who have to play the same teams.

Hopefully this makes up for the issue of our fake football squad playing a weak fake football schedule.

Quit yer beotching!

Yeah, I hate those London Aces!

Well, when i read the PM originally i kind of agreed that london has had an easy schedule so far, and that's why they were 8-1, but when i look at the rankings i am not displeased with them.

for starters, i know its largely based off winning percentage and until the final game has played out, the rankings are gonna be a little off since SoS doesn't count as high.

Second, we (BCK) beat the Aces and the two teams below them by about the same amount. so its not unlikely that the rankings are like that.

It's really the Vols at the top, with BCK and the Stallions doing everything they can to catch up (possibly Dublin too, we'll find out tomorrow morning). with the next 4-5 teams doing everything they can for 5th place (or 4th, again we'll see what happens in the BCK-Anarchists game)

We (London Aces) have had a pretty easy schedule so far but we haven't been going off on the boards proclaiming we are the best team or even 2nd best ..hell we haven't even said we're a top team. We've just played whatever has been given to us and yes we've had easy matchups so far but it's not like we choose them.

We hope to give everybody a good game and maybe suprise people if possible with an upset or two but whatever happens....happens.


I will have to say we could beat my favorite NFL team the Oakland raiders though =(