Nsb pick em 2019 discussion thread

NSB PICK EM 2019 DISCUSSION THREAD Okay gentlemen, I put this damn thing off just about as long as I could, so it's probably a little overdue.. but hey, better late than never. Firstly I just want to wish everyone a happy New Year and here's hoping we get another bunch of great fights in 2019... the PICK EM CREW spent a lot of hours keeping this shit going last year, but speaking for myself at least I found the effort well worth it and hope all the players had as much fun as I did. For anyone who didn't know the 2018 winner was otrocubiche with 2017 winner RockyB a close runner up. Congratualtions to you both gentlemen. Despite a bit of a snafu in my scoring of the last fight of the year there wasn't any significant changes as a result, so I decided to get the ball rolling for 2019 before going back to make the corrections for completions sake. OK... Before we get this thing going for 2019 there were a few ideas I wanted to run past any players and perspective players based on your experiences of the last two years' games. Whilst none of these will change the essence of the game they could change (is some cases quite significantly) the way fights are scored, and other details, hopefully for the better. Those of you who had to read through some of my long winded posts in the past will know I can be a bit wordy at times, but please try to bear with me, cos I genuinely want to get as much input as possible so I can try to give you the game you all want. Firstly I've mentioned a few times over the year the idea of re-balancing the scoring system to put more emphasis on the method and detail of victory and less on the result itself - this would hopefully help differentiate the players more and reward deeper knowledge, especially given that in the vast majority of cases the favourite wins anyway. Ideas range from simply keeping the current 20/5/5 scoring system (result/method/detail), keeping the same system but rewarding perfect picks with a bonus 10pts (effectively making it 20/5/15), changing it to 20/10/10, 10/10/10 or even reducing the significance of the W greatly to 10/20/20. A second idea revolves around finding room for an extra DEC pick -currently the DEC results are CLOSE (<12 pts) and WIDE (12+ pts) with technically a DRAW counting as a separate type of pick. My proposal is to have a SPLIT (or some similar name) result to indicate a very close fight (though it doesn't necessarily have to be a split decision) with a winning margin of <6 pts, a CLEAR (or somesuch) pick of < 18 pts and a WIDE or DOMINANT result of 18+ points separating the fighters. Not only does this broaden the range of possibilities, again differentiating between the players more it also opens up the possibility of removing the somewhat random 'DRAW' pick we currently have and incorporating DRAW results into the SPLIT pick for either fighter. ie whichever winner you pick for a SPLIT win, a draw will also grant you the points (or possibly just the points for predicting a DEC result). A third issue is one that may suit some more than others and regards the multiplier for underdog picks. I know that some of the players dislike this in principle anyway, thinking it should always just be about picking the guy most likely to win, but others may like the gamesmanship and risk weighing that getting a bonus for picking the underdog brings to the game. Please tell me if you'd either like to see the 'Dog multiplier removed altogether or changed in some way. Currently the multiplier is calculated by taking the average bookies odds on a win and dividing it by 4 if it is 5/1 or greater. A suggested increase might be odds divided by 3 on odds of 4/1 or greater or even more (though I feel that going too far like say odds/2 might start to unbalance the game in really wide fights) Finally I would like any input on which fights players would like to see and how many. Did we get the balance about right last year? Were there too many fights? Too few? Would you have preferred lower ranked fights if it meant having a less clear and obvious favourite? Any suggestions and recommendations will help us to decide what fights to include over the course of the year. One last idea I'm toying with is setting up a social group for the players, with the hope of being able to more easily send out reminders and canvass opinion, but I ain't got a clue how the damn things work or if it's even a workable proposition so I'd welcome any help or advice from someone with the relevant knowledge. Dunno how successful it'd be but I reckon it could be a big help especially when we got fights on Fridays or Sundays and in different time zones. Finally (a hopefully final finally) an appeal for help... already making up the new PICK EM CREW for 2019 we got (unless there are any objections) NC Uppercut, and 2018 winner otrocubiche alongside myself Koba-Grozny, but I'd ideally like to add one or two more CREW guys - firstly because I want to make this thing as robust as possible cos I don't want it going down if one or even two of us should have to drop out for whatever reason, but also cos I want the PICK EM CREWs decision making to reflect a broad range of opinions... ideally this would mean getting one or two posters from countries that ain't either the UK or US (where the 3 current CREW hail from), but honestly it ain't that important - any extra hands on deck would be greatly appreciated. OK. Well, if any of you actually stayed with me through all that, thanks for your patience and please don't hesitate to make your feelings known. Good luck with your picks for 2019. MULTIPLE CHOICE POLL ADDED Regards Koba Sticky me please -MEGA-, BostonGuy, TBear, jaded

Comments (20)

Putting the fights up earlier would help with people missing picks. That is definitely the aim for this year, man. Mainly it's down to my lazy ass when stuff goes up late, but with the enthusiastic new team of NC Uppercut and otrocubiche we should hopefully get things moving a bit faster. We're trying to put a coupla other things in place to help make sure people don't miss out too, and we're also trying to think of ways of keeping people interested even when maybe they miss a few. We've already made a few moves to looking ahead a bit as well and we're intending to poll the players on potential upcoming fights to get a feel for which ones players want to see in the Pick Em. Hopefully we get up at least a partial schedule of likely Pick ams for Jan, Feb and March within the next week or so.

7y ago

Citizen_Koba

I like the 20-10-10 point system. It values picking the right winner and rewards perfect picks. 20-5-10(5 bonus point included in detail for the perfect pick) can also work. I think to solve the "missing pick problem" we can have a default choice of picking the favorite, but you only get the points for the winner and not the method or detail. You talking about when folk just miss the fight, cos they're away or get the date wrong or whatever? First thought was 'what the hell?' but on a second reflection it's maybe not such an awful idea... would help keep players in the mix even if they miss a couple through mistake or unavoidable circumstance. We're already looking at planning a lil further ahead this year, so it should be possible for guys who know they ain't gonna be around to make advance picks (as we did for 'Pandas last summer), but that's a slightly different situation. Be a balance though - firstly I ain't gonna be scoring every player every week even if they just made one pick at the start of the year - there'd have to be some kinda of rule about it being regular players only. Second I ain't sure the guys who make sure they turn in a pick every week are gonna be to happy about other guys getting credit for doing nothing. It's an idea that does warrant further thought though, cos like I said earlier you can't really blame the guys who just drop out after missing a few picks.

7y ago

Oluminati

7y ago

Citizen_Koba

Weird. I wrote another reply to this thread last night, went back and proof-read it after posting, and now it's gone.Was it a reply to my post? I ain't had any notifications of quotes from you. What you thinking to having quarterly winners and then an overall winner for the year? I ain't saying it'll happen this time round but I'm gonna keep raising the ideas I think should improve the game and see if I can get more people interested.

7y ago

Redd_Foxx

Weird. I wrote another reply to this thread last night, went back and proof-read it after posting, and now it's gone.

7y ago

Citizen_Koba

I wouldn't mess around with all the points crap - like 5 people know how to use them or give a crap about them. I do think the scoring system needs to be expanded a bit. DuckAdonis made a great example - current scoring only rewards you if you pick the correct winner. If you think it's gonna be a close fight but not sure who wins, it shouldn't all depend on you guessing correctly who judges will go with. Maybe something like: If you pick KO, picking correct fighter = 20 pts, method (1-4, 5-8, 9-12) 10 pts If you pick Wide, correct fighter = 20, method 10 pts If you pick close Close, correct fighter = 10, method 20. The points thing is gonna be voluntary participation only I think. Like you say some people use em a bit but most don't really care. Hell, I've been here 5 years and I musta used em twice (and once was last week). With the scoring system that kinda thing was roughly what I meant when I responded to Duck's post saying I wasn't quite sure what system we'd use. Honestly yours is about as good a system as you could get I think... changing the priority for close decisions to Method/ Detail / Result, but it still strikes me as kinda unwieldy and adds an additional chance of errors when we tot up the scores I get the point being made, and I'd like to figure some way of dealing with it, but I'm not sure that is it. I'll think on it some more though, see if there's maybe some other option that achieves a similar result.

7y ago

Citizen_Koba

What if this ran every 6 months? That way, people who missed some aren't screwed for the whole year?We could use something like that. As things stand essentially the single biggest factor in getting to the top of the leaderboard is simply consistency... of the top 10 last year I don't think anyone missed more than 2 or 3 and most had only missed 1 or none. Dudes who miss more than 4 or 5 picks are effectively out of the running and quite a few simply drop out after a few missed picks so it'd be good if we could address that in some way. I've mentioned before I'm gonna figure out some notification system, whether it's signing everyone up to a Pick 'em Social group or something else I ain't figured yet, but that should help some with making sure as many people as possible get their picks in. Ummm. I think there's something special about having it a year long annual event, but maybe we have half-yearly or quarterly winners too... for those in the sweepstakes maybe smaller payouts at the same interval. Logisitically I'll have to give that some thought cos all quarters past the first would require additional bookeeping, but if I can find a way to do it without too much extra work I think it's a winner. Also I'll try to find some way of emphasising accurate picking over simple volume. The change to 20/10/10 should already go some way towards that of course, but I'm sure there's other things we could do. EDIT: Yeah. Course, we could do 4 seperate quarters and then total the points for the whole year at the end of the year to come up with an annual winner. That should be manageable. Definitely another solid idea to run past the players.. though we need to decide sooner rather than later cos we'd have to think about the impact it'd have on the use of multipliers and whether we need to rejig the numbers there. Cheers Redd - and while we're on the subject, I'm noticing you ain't got a pick in for Uzcategui - Plant yet! :lol1:

7y ago

Citizen_Koba

7y ago

Redd_Foxx

What if this ran every 6 months? That way, people who missed some aren't screwed for the whole year?

7y ago

BLASTER1

word i think you should definitely do points since they hit the reset button on it...... literal you have to pay points in order to "play" :D top 3 gets those points etc Definitely. And it would be more incentive to keep going in the piks or guys that do it once in a blue moon they won't join because it takes their points. It would help solve people picking each week plus it would be less work for the crew cause only the posters that play all year will want to pay.

7y ago

NC_Uppercut

I think participation was an issue last time. I don't have any ideas on how to fix it unless there's a way people can sign up for a group reminder and everyone gets their name tagged a couple days before the event. I believe that’s what the social group will help

7y ago

j0zef

7y ago

otrocubiche

I really can't see why try to complicate things more, it works.

7y ago

koolkc107

Been thinking a bit more about this idea and I reckon it's a good 'un so I'm figuring on incorporating it (unless too many players object) the single caveat I'd like to make is that you can only stake on a fight where there isn't a wide favourite - say 2/1 on the 'dog or less (maybe even 3/2) - just to make sure you don't get everyone piling 'em on a fight like Fielding - Canelo or GGG - Vanes. You gonna have to earn them points. Hell, I'm even tempted to make the same stipulation about using regular multipliers - like you can't play a x2 or a x3 on the favourite if there's a multiplier on the underdog or somesuch - I'll have to give that idea some more thought though. Agree. It aint about just tossing somebody 200 points. It's got to involve the skill of making that perfect pick to get the wagered points on a fight that is not a gimme. You should definitely screen the fights they can use the "Hail Mary" on.

7y ago

Citizen_Koba

im sure we can work around that so they can start scoring points........ or they can bet on fights and get points that way :dunno: OK I had a quick scout at some of the new users' points and the lowest I can find is a little over 5000 for a dude with about 12 posts, so I wouldn't want to go higher than that whatever way we jump, but I'm still not sure about the logistics or indeed making it a requirement... :thinking:... What I think I might do is make a list of all players that have contributed to the prize fund - have them donate say 5k points to the PICK EM CREW account and then distribute the points at the end of the year to the highest ranked players / other categories among those who have thrown in points. That shouldn't really be much extra work.

7y ago

bigjavi973

Only thing is I don't want to exclude new posters who might not have many points. I know we'd be on much more of a level playing field than we used to be though... it wouldn't have made any sense at all before the reboot. How many points do new posters start with? im sure we can work around that so they can start scoring points........ or they can bet on fights and get points that way :dunno:

7y ago

Citizen_Koba

Again, if it is too much work, to hell with it. But, it would be absolutely brutal the last month of the year. Fun to watch even if you aren't directly in the running. Being able to wager 200 points would have had the whole top 10 in play the last few weeks. Been thinking a bit more about this idea and I reckon it's a good 'un so I'm figuring on incorporating it (unless too many players object) the single caveat I'd like to make is that you can only stake on a fight where there isn't a wide favourite - say 2/1 on the 'dog or less (maybe even 3/2) - just to make sure you don't get everyone piling 'em on a fight like Fielding - Canelo or GGG - Vanes. You gonna have to earn them points. Hell, I'm even tempted to make the same stipulation about using regular multipliers - like you can't play a x2 or a x3 on the favourite if there's a multiplier on the underdog or somesuch - I'll have to give that idea some more thought though.

7y ago

Citizen_Koba

word i think you should definitely do points since they hit the reset button on it...... literal you have to pay points in order to "play" :D top 3 gets those points etc Only thing is I don't want to exclude new posters who might not have many points. I know we'd be on much more of a level playing field than we used to be though... it wouldn't have made any sense at all before the reboot. How many points do new posters start with?

7y ago

bigjavi973

Definitely good ideas. I did actually tend to announce particular good scores or picks when they came up, to start off with often two or three of the standout players each week or two, or each time I updated the leaderboard, but it did get a bit more sporadic as the year went on. Having all players as part of a usergroup could help make this kind of notification easier too. In terms of prizes, definitely I'd encourage any players who want to participate in a sweepstake (for points) to do so, and I'm sure we can keep track according to whatever winning conditions are decided, but I'm unwilling to make a points ante obligatory if some players players don't want to. There was even some discussion of a real money stake last year for those who wanted to participate, but again that would have to be a private deal between any players who wanted to do it... though again I'd have no problem keeping scores (or hell even holding escrow if anyone was stupid enough to trust me :lol1:). Further to that I'm gonna to get in touch with one of the guys who run the site to see whether we can arrange for some kind of prize for the overall and possibly category winners - even if it's some fairly inexpensive tat like merchandise, it'd still add some extra buzz to the game. You any ideas who would be best to contact? I was thinking maybe Rold (cos his e-mail was easiest to find) but I'm not really sure that kind of thing would be managing editors job. That said. If a lot of the players really wanted to have have a points ante I've certainly no objection, though I wouldn't want players with few points to be excluded as a result. word i think you should definitely do points since they hit the reset button on it...... literal you have to pay points in order to "play" :D top 3 gets those points etc

7y ago

Citizen_Koba

^^^^^ also imo announce winners every week etc.... i think we should incorporate points somehow.... if we bet we gotta throw like 1k pts something like that and only the most correct pick wins it etc.... can make it out more like a competition. Definitely good ideas. I did actually tend to announce particular good scores or picks when they came up, to start off with often two or three of the standout players each week or two, or each time I updated the leaderboard, but it did get a bit more sporadic as the year went on. Having all players as part of a usergroup could help make this kind of notification easier too. In terms of prizes, definitely I'd encourage any players who want to participate in a sweepstake (for points) to do so, and I'm sure we can keep track according to whatever winning conditions are decided, but I'm unwilling to make a points ante obligatory if some players players don't want to. There was even some discussion of a real money stake last year for those who wanted to participate, but again that would have to be a private deal between any players who wanted to do it... though again I'd have no problem keeping scores (or hell even holding escrow if anyone was stupid enough to trust me :lol1:). Further to that I'm gonna to get in touch with one of the guys who run the site to see whether we can arrange for some kind of prize for the overall and possibly category winners - even if it's some fairly inexpensive tat like merchandise, it'd still add some extra buzz to the game. You any ideas who would be best to contact? I was thinking maybe Rold (cos his e-mail was easiest to find) but I'm not really sure that kind of thing would be managing editors job. That said. If a lot of the players really wanted to have have a points ante I've certainly no objection, though I wouldn't want players with few points to be excluded as a result.

7y ago