Mostly for Stogie and Smuttley:
First off I'd suggest you make the prizes "based on 100 entries". Do you really want to dish out all that cash if the same same 30 people compete?
Office pools are one of the few things that I really understand, sad but true. So 2 potential problem areas are:
1) Were the picks in on time? Especially when missing one week disqualifies one from the prizes. If you don't allow a late pick the guy screams. If you do everyone else gets pissed off especially if there were early touchdowns in a picked game.
2) Picking last is a significant advantage. This has little to do with late injuries and line changes since picking almost all favorites is the way to go if you're shooting for first instead of last. Rather it's the boner game and points that gives the last player an advantage.
Let's say we have a boner game where the Patriots are a two touchdown favorite. Most people will pick the Pats (though if you're the only guy on the underdog you're getting good pot odds to borrow a poker phrase).
Let's assume there are just 3 people in the pool. Player A has the Pats 28-14 and Player B 28-13. So if you're last to pick then you might pick the Pats 28-15 or 28-12 giving you about a 50% chance not 33% in the boner game.
So since picks can be changed the guy squeezed in the middle will change his picks at the last minute. This will prompt the new guy squeezed in to change till eventually someone's picks are late causing a dispute.
To make matters worse the most problematic bloke in the pool has a history of last minute picks even when there were no prizes and people were picking underdogs for the fuck of it.
In office pools most people who work for the company will be good sports because their work reputations are more important than the prizes. Problems would arise when outside friends entered pools. The biggest problems being in suicide pools when one of the few contestants left gets booted out for not having their picks in on time.
There are no easy solutions but these are two problem areas that are likely to be encountered. One thing that would help a bit is that if one wants to edit their picks they must quote the original post and make the edits in a new post. Then you have a time stamp on the picks.
First off I'd suggest you make the prizes "based on 100 entries". Do you really want to dish out all that cash if the same same 30 people compete?
Office pools are one of the few things that I really understand, sad but true. So 2 potential problem areas are:
1) Were the picks in on time? Especially when missing one week disqualifies one from the prizes. If you don't allow a late pick the guy screams. If you do everyone else gets pissed off especially if there were early touchdowns in a picked game.
2) Picking last is a significant advantage. This has little to do with late injuries and line changes since picking almost all favorites is the way to go if you're shooting for first instead of last. Rather it's the boner game and points that gives the last player an advantage.
Let's say we have a boner game where the Patriots are a two touchdown favorite. Most people will pick the Pats (though if you're the only guy on the underdog you're getting good pot odds to borrow a poker phrase).
Let's assume there are just 3 people in the pool. Player A has the Pats 28-14 and Player B 28-13. So if you're last to pick then you might pick the Pats 28-15 or 28-12 giving you about a 50% chance not 33% in the boner game.
So since picks can be changed the guy squeezed in the middle will change his picks at the last minute. This will prompt the new guy squeezed in to change till eventually someone's picks are late causing a dispute.
To make matters worse the most problematic bloke in the pool has a history of last minute picks even when there were no prizes and people were picking underdogs for the fuck of it.
In office pools most people who work for the company will be good sports because their work reputations are more important than the prizes. Problems would arise when outside friends entered pools. The biggest problems being in suicide pools when one of the few contestants left gets booted out for not having their picks in on time.
There are no easy solutions but these are two problem areas that are likely to be encountered. One thing that would help a bit is that if one wants to edit their picks they must quote the original post and make the edits in a new post. Then you have a time stamp on the picks.
Comment