Can Someone Explain This Tiebreaker Inconsistency To Me?

[chucksabr]

We have a 12-team single table league which has played for 11 seasons now. The top four teams make the playoffs with standard seeding.

We have had four seasons with ties that had playoff implications, which OOTP handled with tiebreaker games for the first three seasons, but handled with head-to-head record for the fourth. I don't understand why OOTP decided to make the change on its own, but let me describe the situations here, and maybe someone can explain the logic to me.

In 1970, two teams tied for second place. OOTP played a tiebreaker game for second and third seeding (basically, to determine home field advantage between the two).

In 1971, there was a three-way tie for first place. OOTP somehow determined tiebreaker seeding, played one tiebreaker game between the #2 and #3 tiebreaker seeds, and then played another tiebreaker game between the winner of that game and the #1 tiebreaker seed.

In 1975, there was a tie for fourth place, the final playoff spot. The game played a tiebreaker game to determine which team would play baseball in October and which team would play golf.

Then, in 1978, there was a tie for first place. This time, OOTP forewent the tiebreaker game and simply handed the #1 playoff seed to one of the two teams.

The gamerunner did not make any changes to the tiebreaker format prior to the 1978 season, and confirmed that the tiebreaker scenario is a discretionary decision made by the game, since he appears to have no checkbox to control it with:



My question is, what's the logic behind the game deciding to run a tiebreaker game for the first three scenarios, then simply handing the championship to one of the two tied teams in the fourth scenario? There are a lot of theories flying around, but in the end, we are all stumped.

[Matt Arnold]

The game will play tiebreakers to differentiate between "division" teams and "wildcard" teams. So if your setup has, say, the top 2 teams from each division making the playoffs and then a number of wildcards, then it will play a game to differentiate between those spots.

So if you have a 12-team single division league, I'm guessing you have it set up with the "top 2" from the division plus the next 2 "wildcards", since it seems to like to break ties between spot 2 and 3.

If you don't want any tiebreakers, can just set it as a straight top 4 make it.

[chucksabr]

Originally Posted by Matt Arnold

The game will play tiebreakers to differentiate between "division" teams and "wildcard" teams. So if your setup has, say, the top 2 teams from each division making the playoffs and then a number of wildcards, then it will play a game to differentiate between those spots.

So if you have a 12-team single division league, I'm guessing you have it set up with the "top 2" from the division plus the next 2 "wildcards", since it seems to like to break ties between spot 2 and 3.

If you don't want any tiebreakers, can just set it as a straight top 4 make it.

It's a 12-team single table league, no divisions at all, top four teams make the playoffs, no wild cards as they are traditionally known. We definitely want tiebreakers when appropriate.

When I look at the "wild card" standings for this single table league, this is how they are split out:



Would this grouping explain why there is a tiebreaker when there's a tie for second place, but no tiebreaker when there's a tie for first place?

If so, is this the default for every single table league that has multiple playoff spots, as we do? If we didn't want to do it this way—if we wanted only one team separated at the top with every other team in the wildcard grouping below it, so we could have tiebreakers for first place—what setting, if there is one, would we have to tweak?

[chucksabr]

Originally Posted by Matt Arnold

{snip}
If you don't want any tiebreakers, can just set it as a straight top 4 make it.

Re: this, if we have straight top four make it, which is what was intended, but then we choose no tiebreakers, what happens when there's a tie?

[Matt Arnold]

Can you post your custom playoff setup? Sounds like you want to make sure it's set to 1 division winner and 3 "wildcards" if you want a tiebreak for 1st place (and also if you had teams tied for 4th).

[chucksabr]

I’m not the gamerunner on this, somebody else is. What page should I tell him the settings are on?

[Matt Arnold]

Originally Posted by chucksabr

I’m not the gamerunner on this, somebody else is. What page should I tell him the settings are on?

You can't see it while the playoffs are on, but it's the same spot as that "edit playoff matchups" button shows up from the first screenshot. You can either use that to return to regular season mode and then open the playoff settings, or just grab them after the playoffs are done (assuming you don't want to make any changes in the current playoff year).

[chucksabr]

As it turns out we are in the playoffs right now. Should be through them in another day or two.

[chucksabr]

Originally Posted by Matt Arnold

Can you post your custom playoff setup? Sounds like you want to make sure it's set to 1 division winner and 3 "wildcards" if you want a tiebreak for 1st place (and also if you had teams tied for 4th).

If we did it this way, would there be a tiebreaker for 1-2 and 4-5, but not for 2-3 or 3-4? It would do it by record, then by head to head, etc.?

Or would there be a tiebreaker for 3-4 since it affects who the winner and loser plays in the first round?

[Matt Arnold]

Originally Posted by chucksabr

If we did it this way, would there be a tiebreaker for 1-2 and 4-5, but not for 2-3 or 3-4? It would do it by record, then by head to head, etc.?

Or would there be a tiebreaker for 3-4 since it affects who the winner and loser plays in the first round?

There would be a tiebreaker for 1-2 (because of division seeding) and for 4-5 (make it or not).

[Rain King]

It is pretty easy to go in and add an extra regular season game manually if you want the tie-breaker between 2/3, 1/2 or whatever....which I do in my leagues that have promotion/relegation.

[snarls200]

IIRC MLB does not do tiebreaker games between division winners. Only if a tie for a specific division or lowest wild card.

[chucksabr]

OK, I got the screenshot for the playoffs, and it is as I suspected: two "division winners", two "wildcards".



Again, this is a 12-team single table league.

If we would have selected 1st through 4th on the left side, and had no wild cards, would there be any tiebreaker games at all for teams tied within playoff positions? Meaning, 1 vs 2, 2 vs 3, 3 vs 4? Can I assume they would all default to head-to-head record? Even three- or four-way ties would default to round robin head-to-head?

Would the only tiebreaker game occur if there was a tie between 4 and 5, or more exactly, 4 and however many teams are tied with that record?

Am I making sense here?

[Matt Arnold]

Originally Posted by chucksabr

OK, I got the screenshot for the playoffs, and it is as I suspected: two "division winners", two "wildcards".



Attachment 810539



Again, this is a 12-team single table league.



If we would have selected 1st through 4th on the left side, and had no wild cards, would there be any tiebreaker games at all for teams tied within playoff positions? Meaning, 1 vs 2, 2 vs 3, 3 vs 4? Can I assume they would all default to head-to-head record? Even three- or four-way ties would default to round robin head-to-head?



Would the only tiebreaker game occur if there was a tie between 4 and 5, or more exactly, 4 and however many teams are tied with that record?



Am I making sense here?

Yes, pretty much