[elgringo79]

Thanks! That would certainly explain it. The 4th place team was in first at the half, and the 2nd place team was farther out of it than I was at the half.

Just found the setting. Sure enough. Cost me a promotion (maybe). It saved the playoff schedule already, so there's no going back. Wish I could go back just one day to change the setting and see if I could get in, but one of the nice/not nice features of the game is you can't just reload from a saved point.