Fan support bug - Page 2

Scott Vibert · 03-11-2003, 11:53 AM

Our early research found that a big source for that was not using promotional days. OOTP5 does export promotional days which should help this issue a bit.

We are continuing to track this.

Raven · 03-11-2003, 01:23 PM

Oh, and if this helps, the problems were most severe when fan interest was in the lower range ( ie 1-39). A team around 20 or 30 Fan Interest were losing points despite being in the Wild Card race, or leading it.

Scott, shouldn't fan interest increase independantly without the additional help of promo days though? If a team wins 90 games and goes to the playoffs as a Wild Card team, than that in-itself should draw larger crowds (as opposed to small decreases in fan interest as it's currently happening).

Promo days being exportable is a great step, but it's going to benefit large markets with poor fan interest more than it's going to benefit small markets with poor fan interest (because of less opportunity for cash reserves).

Scott Vibert · 03-11-2003, 02:12 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Raven
Scott, shouldn't fan interest increase independantly without the additional help of promo days though? If a team wins 90 games and goes to the playoffs as a Wild Card team, than that in-itself should draw larger crowds (as opposed to small decreases in fan interest as it's currently happening).

Promo days being exportable is a great step, but it's going to benefit large markets with poor fan interest more than it's going to benefit small markets with poor fan interest (because of less opportunity for cash reserves).

It should and does increase independantly. Without Promotional days we found the average team that improved to 2nd place gained between 7-10 points in fan interest. An occaisional team may have stayed flat or lost a point or two, but most improved their fan interest.

It will have to be a delicate balance for the Wild Card... because while it may have an impact, its not an overwhelming effect.

Anaheim's stadium seats 45.000. Last year during a weekend homestand in late July against Seattle they drew 43,000 a game, excepting the Sunday night game where they drew only 35,000. For the season ending weekend series against Seattle they again drew 43,000 a game. For a weekend series against Baltimore at the end of August they drew 30, 38, and 25 in the three games.

The Dodgers play in 56,000 seat Dodger Stadium and were in the wild card and divisional race until September. The Dodgers in May drew 54, 42, & 53 for a weekend set at home against Arizona, when they played each other on a weekend at Dodger Stadium after the All Star break they drew 46 (Thur), 43, 34, & 46. They played a weekend set at home against San Diego in April drawing 24, 47, 41 & 48. The series in Sept drew 30, 46, 34, and 49.

(I would have used SF as an NL example, but unfortunately (well fortunate for them) they sold out almost every game last year so its not a good comparison, unless you want me to show that they had good attendence in May and still had good attendence in August.)

What scenarios would you consider analogous to what you are expecting? Are there any Real World examples? (ESPN has schedules and attendences for each team back to 2000 on its website now)

Raven · 03-11-2003, 02:25 PM

This season, Oakland won 92 games and won the AL Wild Card. I started the season with fan interest at 28, gradually went up to 34 by mid season, and lowered ticket prices to $8, but still saw my fan interest drop back down by the end of the season.

May 27th 3rd in AL West, 9 games back, 3 GB in Wild Card.
June 24th 3rd in AL West, 13 games back, 4.5 GB in Wild Card.
July 29th 2nd in AL West, 9.5 games back, tied for Wild Card lead.
Aug 12th 2nd, 14 games back, 1 gb in wild card.
Sept 9th 2nd, 11.5 games back, 1 game UP in wild card.
Sept 23rd 2nd, 14 games back, 2 games UP in wild card.

Finished 92-70 as wild card champ. Finished 14 games back in division, won wild card by 2 game lead.

Detroit on the other hand finished 1 game behind their division leader, won 87 games and saw their attendance skyrocket from 31 at the beginning of the season to 51 at the end of the season.

Raven · 03-11-2003, 02:28 PM

While I get that image working......

Anaheim is probably a good real life example. But you should not only be comparing anaheim's july and august crowds, you should be comparing those numbers to their 2001 crowds at the same time. and their records at the time.

Scott Vibert · 03-11-2003, 02:39 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Raven
While I get that image working......

Anaheim is probably a good real life example. But you should not only be comparing anaheim's july and august crowds, you should be comparing those numbers to their 2001 crowds at the same time. and their records at the time.

I would figure if being in the Wild Card hunt was really a factor teams crowds would actually get bigger down the stretch against comparable opponents. In the above cases I didn't see a big improvement during the season as interest built for the teams stretch run.

The problem with doing the 2001 analysis is that the comparable teams were scheduled during the 9/11 incident, making a direct comparison very difficult between these years, especially when you are trying to make sure the opponents are comparable, not to mention the Angels were actually in the Divisional race down the stretch last year.

I decided to go with the 2001 A's... since they actually did win the Wild Card finishing 14 games in back of Seattle that season.

So here goes:

Weekend Series with Tampa Bay Early Sept. 2000-> 12, 31, 19
Weekend Series with Tampa Bay Early Sept. 2001-> 15, 33, 19

Slight improvement from season to season, not sure that its really a Wild Card rush to enthusiasm for the race.

Mid Week Series with Anaheim late Sept 2000 ->22, 23, 13
Mid Week Series with Anaheim late Sept (not the 9/11 make ups) 2001 -> 14, 28, 17

Again fairly comparable numbers, especially if you consider 9/11 to have impacted the 2001 attendence.

I'm just not seeing a huge rush to the stands in the case of wild card teams who are 14 games back of the divisional leader from year to year...

How about Wild Card rush during the season:

Mid Week series with Anaheim late Sept (not the 9/11 make up) 2001 -> 14, 28, 17
Mid Week series with Anaheim early July -> 11, 52, 29, 13

You see some small bump if you throw out the 52 which was attracted with a Fire Works show (hey Promotional Day

) and adjust for 9/11, but not a huge Wild Card push, IMO.

Raven · 03-11-2003, 02:51 PM

But the dates here are in july and august, not september.

And Anaheims record and attendance in late august of 2002 are going to be much higher than in 2001 because they were competing and stirring excitement amongst the fans. You can make that assumption without even looking at their attendance figures, so when you look at the attendance, I am sure that will verify that assumptions.

Raven · 03-11-2003, 02:55 PM

You can also see by the attendance graphs that Oakland remained level pretty much all season (with the end of year increase balancing out with the dip in August) whereas Detroit just kept increasing.

Dont ask me whats up with that dip in August, because the Wild Card figures shows I was competing for a playoff spot there. That dip is more inline with teams who have been eliminated from playoff contention in August.

Scott Vibert · 03-11-2003, 03:18 PM

Quote:

Originally posted by Raven
But the dates here are in july and august, not september.

And Anaheims record and attendance in late august of 2002 are going to be much higher than in 2001 because they were competing and stirring excitement amongst the fans. You can make that assumption without even looking at their attendance figures, so when you look at the attendance, I am sure that will verify that assumptions.

My recently posted stuff is for September... for a team that finished 14 games back of the divisional leader while winning the wild card.

Does that dip correspond with your raising of ticket prices... I notice the prices you dropped to 8 dollars were 10 by the end of the season.

I also notice that you omitted Detroits Ticket Price... from doing a quick calculation I can see that most of the season Detroit charged only 8 dollars a ticket (average price for them was $8.08). You're average ticket price was 9.50 so I get the impression that much of the season (excepting a short while at $8) you were at $10 which would also play a role on your attendence.

Detroit also has a better Fan Loyalty then your's which impacts how quickly Fan Interest will increase.

As I mentioned before we are looking into this, and it is quite possible that it will be tweaked. I'm not trying to say there isn't a problem... because there may be (that's the reason to look into it)..... I just think its important to make sure we don't overdo any adjustment.

Edit -

(Obviously I need to be senstitive of the needs of the low Fan Interest Teams since Kobe is rapidly becoming one

)

Raven · 03-11-2003, 04:13 PM

I omitted Detroit's ticket prices to save space. At end of season they were $10, not sure what they were during the season (though Schmidty can confirm).

Here is the problem with your Oakland 2000/2001 comparison....

In 2000 Oakland and Seattle both won 91 games, taking the Wild Card and DIvision title (I forget who got what, but it doesn't really matter because it came down to the last day or so). In 2001 Seattle won 116 while Oakland won 102. Oakland didn't compete for the Division, but outright won the Wild Card (20 wins more than Boston).

Weekend Series with Tampa Bay Early Sept. 2000-> 12, 31, 19
Weekend Series with Tampa Bay Early Sept. 2001-> 15, 33, 19

2000 Oakland was competing for the Division Title and the Wild Card, in 2001 they were only competing for the Wild Card (though they wrapped it up early). Basically the fans came out equally because the team was potentially post-season bound. It isn't showing a wild card "push", but it certainly is showing there isn't a huge decline in attendance if you are only competing for the wildcard but playing exceptionally well.

So if this is the case, then it confirms our argument because OOTP shows a significant dropoff in attendance when you are in the division lead as opposed to the wild card.

Raven · 03-11-2003, 04:31 PM

BTW, here is an excellent source for
attendance figures.

Click on any team, then attendance and it not only shows attendance figures but also record and where they finished in their division.

What we are looking for is three years where teams are a) out of the race to compare with b) competing for Wild Cards and c) competing for division title.

Some of these teams are skewed because of new ballparks and outside factors though. (ie Houston, Minnesotta, Montreal)

Twins 2000 69-93 drew 1 million fans. Twins 2001 85-77 1.7 million fans.

Also, since you brought up Fan Loyalty, that also seems to be an issue. It seems to be very easy to decrease fan loyalty (2 years of .450 can see two drops) whereas increasing it requires many more years of work. I'd think these two factors would be roughly equal to each other and that's not the case.

Since Fan Loyalty definitely plays a part in attracting crowds in OOTP (as in real life), then maybe that is just as important. Or maybe make fan loyalties more stable and that could help fix this issue.

Operation Shutdown · 03-11-2003, 09:10 PM

I was just about to make a post on this myself and found this thread. This season, I've taken my fictional team from being .500 last year (81-81), and right now at the end of August, my record is 75-58. I've kept my ticket prices at $7 all year, and at the beginning of the year, I saw my fan interest increase from somewhere around 40, up to 49 right around the end of July. I'm currently tied for the wild card spot, but am 17 games back in my division, because there's a very good team in my division that at one point at the end of July/beginning of August won some 15 games in a row and pulled away from me in the division race. In the meantime, my fan interest has dropped from the 49 I was at at the end of July, to now 42 at the end of August. My fan loyalty is good. To me, this says there is a problem with how fan interest is calculated. I think if a team went from finishing .500 to competing for a playoff spot a year later, there'd still be a rising fan interest come August and September, not dwindling interest. JMO

Chief Rum · 03-11-2003, 10:35 PM

All right, time for an Angel fan to chime in here...

Scott, could you check the Angels' attendance figures in April against September? I'm pretty darn sure you'll see a significant difference.

Trust me, as an Angels fan, we already knew our team was legit by July, so there doesn't figure to be much attendance change from July to September. Heck, we knew our team was legit in May. It just took the rest of the world five months to figure it out.

Chief Rum

David Yellope · 03-12-2003, 07:12 PM

bump

Steve Kuffrey · 03-12-2003, 07:19 PM

This is an issue that we have posted that we are looking into. Patience.

TwinsFan · 03-12-2003, 10:17 PM

Just wanted to say that i've seen this bug in OOTP4 also. If your in 2nd and more than 8 or 9 games back, your fan interest will actually decrease. You could win 110 games, leading the WC, but if the team in 1st wins 120 your out of luck.

I really hope this is fixed in OOTP5.

Maple Leafs · 03-13-2003, 10:33 AM

Thanks again to everyone who replied, and to Scott/Steve for looking into the issue.

As I said before, I'm convinced this is a bug/flaw in the game, but I'll accept whatever decision they make. At the veyr least, though, if the game is working as designed then the manual should be updated to change the reference to "post-season" races.

Raven · 03-16-2003, 02:00 PM

bump.

Raven · 03-16-2003, 06:43 PM

It's not bumping so YOU notice. I know you guys are looking in to the issue. I was bumping so it wouldn't end up on page 3 (or page 21 or whatever) and be lost in the wind.

Perhaps there are other people who have noticed this bug but haven't read this thread yet, and maybe they might have something to add to it. If it ends up on one of the back pages, those people may never see it. Besides, we have 30 owners in our online league who are interesting in seeing what (if any) action is going to be taken to correct it because it is SERIOUSLY effecting the financials (and competitive balance) of our online league. If you guys aren't going to fix the bug, then we need to implement our own changes manually, and we need to do so ASAP because our current season is just reaching the playoffs and we want a viable system ready for next season. Now, I get the impression we won't know what (if any) fix is going to be implemented, so instead of having an open line of communication, we will probably be forced to wait for a patch to be released.

You guys are being closed lipped about this anyway, like it is some top-secret project. Since our league has seasons of documentation to verify and check results, I'd think you'd actually be asking us (and others) some questions to help you get to a solution. But instead I guess you'd rather have a couple beta guys fast sim a solo league for a few years to test results. But how "realistic" are those results going to be? Are those results really testing the engine, or are they simply number crunching?

A few guys in our league, myself included, have spent many hours over the course of 8 months seeing the results of this, yet you haven't asked any of us one question about it. That's probably where the impatience stems from, Steve.

I could also tell you other problems with the financial engine, but I won't waste my time unless you are actually interested. It looks like OOTP'ers (in general) are more interested in seeing their managers sons getting drafted than they are in seeing a good financial engine anyway.

So maybe guys like us are a minority and should shut the hell up.

mking55 · 03-16-2003, 09:20 PM

Raven,

Love your post. Sometimes it seems like these things we post just fall into a deep hole, never to be seen again. The key word in the previous sentence is "seems".

If I might make a suggestion, it might be that some sort of list be posted on the board, updates only being allowed to be made by the ootp team, that states what they are looking at and what conclusions they reached.

As for this particular bug, I am in total agreement. I too had a wildcard contending team in my online league for several seasons and each year my fan support just died. I was a ton of games behind the division leader, but actually had the 2nd best record in the whole league. It didn't matter. No one wanted to support us.

Yes, this is a bug that should be in the fixing stage. Is it? Who knows?

03-11-2003, 02:25 PM	#24
Raven Minors (Single A) Join Date: Dec 2001 Posts: 94	This season, Oakland won 92 games and won the AL Wild Card. I started the season with fan interest at 28, gradually went up to 34 by mid season, and lowered ticket prices to $8, but still saw my fan interest drop back down by the end of the season. May 27th 3rd in AL West, 9 games back, 3 GB in Wild Card. June 24th 3rd in AL West, 13 games back, 4.5 GB in Wild Card. July 29th 2nd in AL West, 9.5 games back, tied for Wild Card lead. Aug 12th 2nd, 14 games back, 1 gb in wild card. Sept 9th 2nd, 11.5 games back, 1 game UP in wild card. Sept 23rd 2nd, 14 games back, 2 games UP in wild card. Finished 92-70 as wild card champ. Finished 14 games back in division, won wild card by 2 game lead. Detroit on the other hand finished 1 game behind their division leader, won 87 games and saw their attendance skyrocket from 31 at the beginning of the season to 51 at the end of the season. Last edited by Raven; 03-11-2003 at 02:45 PM.

03-11-2003, 04:31 PM	#31
Raven Minors (Single A) Join Date: Dec 2001 Posts: 94	BTW, here is an excellent source for attendance figures. Click on any team, then attendance and it not only shows attendance figures but also record and where they finished in their division. What we are looking for is three years where teams are a) out of the race to compare with b) competing for Wild Cards and c) competing for division title. Some of these teams are skewed because of new ballparks and outside factors though. (ie Houston, Minnesotta, Montreal) Twins 2000 69-93 drew 1 million fans. Twins 2001 85-77 1.7 million fans. Also, since you brought up Fan Loyalty, that also seems to be an issue. It seems to be very easy to decrease fan loyalty (2 years of .450 can see two drops) whereas increasing it requires many more years of work. I'd think these two factors would be roughly equal to each other and that's not the case. Since Fan Loyalty definitely plays a part in attracting crowds in OOTP (as in real life), then maybe that is just as important. Or maybe make fan loyalties more stable and that could help fix this issue. Last edited by Raven; 03-11-2003 at 04:42 PM.

03-11-2003, 09:10 PM	#32
Operation Shutdown All Star Reserve Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: Pittsburgh PA Posts: 912	I was just about to make a post on this myself and found this thread. This season, I've taken my fictional team from being .500 last year (81-81), and right now at the end of August, my record is 75-58. I've kept my ticket prices at $7 all year, and at the beginning of the year, I saw my fan interest increase from somewhere around 40, up to 49 right around the end of July. I'm currently tied for the wild card spot, but am 17 games back in my division, because there's a very good team in my division that at one point at the end of July/beginning of August won some 15 games in a row and pulled away from me in the division race. In the meantime, my fan interest has dropped from the 49 I was at at the end of July, to now 42 at the end of August. My fan loyalty is good. To me, this says there is a problem with how fan interest is calculated. I think if a team went from finishing .500 to competing for a playoff spot a year later, there'd still be a rising fan interest come August and September, not dwindling interest. JMO __________________ "And Shepherds we shall be, For thee, my Lord, for thee. Power hath descended forth from Thy hand, Our feet may swiftly carry out Thy commands. So we shall flow a river forth to Thee, And teeming with souls shall it ever be. In Nomeni Patri Et Fili Spiritus Sancti."

03-12-2003, 07:19 PM	#35
Steve Kuffrey Administrator Join Date: Jul 1999 Location: S.E. TN - Georgia born and raised Posts: 17,022	This is an issue that we have posted that we are looking into. Patience. __________________ Steve Kuffrey DABS Atlanta Braves - 2008 Eastern Division Champ *DBLC Atlanta Braves - 2011, 2014 East Division Champ, 2012, 2013 NL Wildcard Baseball Maelstrom-Montreal Expos-2013 Tourney winner, 2014 WC Team Sparky's League - Tampa Bay D'Rays Epicenter Baseball League - Astros 2014 The CBL Rewind - Phillies '95

03-12-2003, 10:17 PM	#36
TwinsFan Minors (Double A) Join Date: Apr 2002 Location: Some planet in outer space Posts: 196	Just wanted to say that i've seen this bug in OOTP4 also. If your in 2nd and more than 8 or 9 games back, your fan interest will actually decrease. You could win 110 games, leading the WC, but if the team in 1st wins 120 your out of luck. I really hope this is fixed in OOTP5. __________________ OOTP 22 OOTP 21 OOTP 20

03-11-2003, 11:53 AM	#21
Scott Vibert Hall Of Famer Join Date: Dec 2001 Location: My Computer Posts: 8,182	Our early research found that a big source for that was not using promotional days. OOTP5 does export promotional days which should help this issue a bit. We are continuing to track this.

03-11-2003, 01:23 PM	#22
Raven Minors (Single A) Join Date: Dec 2001 Posts: 94	Oh, and if this helps, the problems were most severe when fan interest was in the lower range ( ie 1-39). A team around 20 or 30 Fan Interest were losing points despite being in the Wild Card race, or leading it. Scott, shouldn't fan interest increase independantly without the additional help of promo days though? If a team wins 90 games and goes to the playoffs as a Wild Card team, than that in-itself should draw larger crowds (as opposed to small decreases in fan interest as it's currently happening). Promo days being exportable is a great step, but it's going to benefit large markets with poor fan interest more than it's going to benefit small markets with poor fan interest (because of less opportunity for cash reserves).

03-11-2003, 02:28 PM	#25
Raven Minors (Single A) Join Date: Dec 2001 Posts: 94	While I get that image working...... Anaheim is probably a good real life example. But you should not only be comparing anaheim's july and august crowds, you should be comparing those numbers to their 2001 crowds at the same time. and their records at the time.

03-11-2003, 02:51 PM	#27
Raven Minors (Single A) Join Date: Dec 2001 Posts: 94	But the dates here are in july and august, not september. And Anaheims record and attendance in late august of 2002 are going to be much higher than in 2001 because they were competing and stirring excitement amongst the fans. You can make that assumption without even looking at their attendance figures, so when you look at the attendance, I am sure that will verify that assumptions.

03-11-2003, 02:55 PM	#28
Raven Minors (Single A) Join Date: Dec 2001 Posts: 94	You can also see by the attendance graphs that Oakland remained level pretty much all season (with the end of year increase balancing out with the dip in August) whereas Detroit just kept increasing. Dont ask me whats up with that dip in August, because the Wild Card figures shows I was competing for a playoff spot there. That dip is more inline with teams who have been eliminated from playoff contention in August.

03-11-2003, 04:13 PM	#30
Raven Minors (Single A) Join Date: Dec 2001 Posts: 94	I omitted Detroit's ticket prices to save space. At end of season they were $10, not sure what they were during the season (though Schmidty can confirm). Here is the problem with your Oakland 2000/2001 comparison.... In 2000 Oakland and Seattle both won 91 games, taking the Wild Card and DIvision title (I forget who got what, but it doesn't really matter because it came down to the last day or so). In 2001 Seattle won 116 while Oakland won 102. Oakland didn't compete for the Division, but outright won the Wild Card (20 wins more than Boston). Weekend Series with Tampa Bay Early Sept. 2000-> 12, 31, 19 Weekend Series with Tampa Bay Early Sept. 2001-> 15, 33, 19 2000 Oakland was competing for the Division Title and the Wild Card, in 2001 they were only competing for the Wild Card (though they wrapped it up early). Basically the fans came out equally because the team was potentially post-season bound. It isn't showing a wild card "push", but it certainly is showing there isn't a huge decline in attendance if you are only competing for the wildcard but playing exceptionally well. So if this is the case, then it confirms our argument because OOTP shows a significant dropoff in attendance when you are in the division lead as opposed to the wild card.

03-11-2003, 10:35 PM	#33
Chief Rum Minors (Rookie Ball) Join Date: Dec 2002 Posts: 41	All right, time for an Angel fan to chime in here... Scott, could you check the Angels' attendance figures in April against September? I'm pretty darn sure you'll see a significant difference. Trust me, as an Angels fan, we already knew our team was legit by July, so there doesn't figure to be much attendance change from July to September. Heck, we knew our team was legit in May. It just took the rest of the world five months to figure it out. Chief Rum

03-12-2003, 07:12 PM	#34
David Yellope Minors (Double A) Join Date: Apr 2002 Posts: 113	bump

03-13-2003, 10:33 AM	#37
Maple Leafs Minors (Triple A) Join Date: Mar 2002 Posts: 234	Thanks again to everyone who replied, and to Scott/Steve for looking into the issue. As I said before, I'm convinced this is a bug/flaw in the game, but I'll accept whatever decision they make. At the veyr least, though, if the game is working as designed then the manual should be updated to change the reference to "post-season" races.

03-16-2003, 02:00 PM	#38
Raven Minors (Single A) Join Date: Dec 2001 Posts: 94	bump.

03-16-2003, 06:43 PM	#39
Raven Minors (Single A) Join Date: Dec 2001 Posts: 94	It's not bumping so YOU notice. I know you guys are looking in to the issue. I was bumping so it wouldn't end up on page 3 (or page 21 or whatever) and be lost in the wind. Perhaps there are other people who have noticed this bug but haven't read this thread yet, and maybe they might have something to add to it. If it ends up on one of the back pages, those people may never see it. Besides, we have 30 owners in our online league who are interesting in seeing what (if any) action is going to be taken to correct it because it is SERIOUSLY effecting the financials (and competitive balance) of our online league. If you guys aren't going to fix the bug, then we need to implement our own changes manually, and we need to do so ASAP because our current season is just reaching the playoffs and we want a viable system ready for next season. Now, I get the impression we won't know what (if any) fix is going to be implemented, so instead of having an open line of communication, we will probably be forced to wait for a patch to be released. You guys are being closed lipped about this anyway, like it is some top-secret project. Since our league has seasons of documentation to verify and check results, I'd think you'd actually be asking us (and others) some questions to help you get to a solution. But instead I guess you'd rather have a couple beta guys fast sim a solo league for a few years to test results. But how "realistic" are those results going to be? Are those results really testing the engine, or are they simply number crunching? A few guys in our league, myself included, have spent many hours over the course of 8 months seeing the results of this, yet you haven't asked any of us one question about it. That's probably where the impatience stems from, Steve. I could also tell you other problems with the financial engine, but I won't waste my time unless you are actually interested. It looks like OOTP'ers (in general) are more interested in seeing their managers sons getting drafted than they are in seeing a good financial engine anyway. So maybe guys like us are a minority and should shut the hell up. Last edited by Raven; 03-16-2003 at 06:45 PM.

03-16-2003, 09:20 PM	#40
mking55 All Star Starter Join Date: Jun 2002 Location: Boading, China Posts: 1,249	Raven, Love your post. Sometimes it seems like these things we post just fall into a deep hole, never to be seen again. The key word in the previous sentence is "seems". If I might make a suggestion, it might be that some sort of list be posted on the board, updates only being allowed to be made by the ootp team, that states what they are looking at and what conclusions they reached. As for this particular bug, I am in total agreement. I too had a wildcard contending team in my online league for several seasons and each year my fan support just died. I was a ton of games behind the division leader, but actually had the 2nd best record in the whole league. It didn't matter. No one wanted to support us. Yes, this is a bug that should be in the fixing stage. Is it? Who knows?