TPS is Here to Solve All of Your PPR Woes

The Points Per Reception (PPR) scoring system has grown substantially since first being introduced as a way to put wide receivers on an equal footing with running backs, the dominant position in the fantasy landscape prior to roughly 2010. However, after 2010 the scales began to tip heavily in favor of wide receivers being the most valuable position in fantasy football. Below is a small chart which outlines how pronounced and dramatic the shift was:

As you can see, after the 2010 season the value of running backs plummeted while wide receivers held steady. This type of disparity seems to signal that how we view and implement PPR scoring might be due for some reevaluation. Whereas PPR was presented as a way to place wide receivers on an even footing with running backs, PPR scoring itself is now the source of the exact inequity that it was developed to prevent. How do we fix it? Can it even be fixed? Should it be fixed? These are all questions that are being asked by the fantasy community with ever growing frequency.

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Let’s begin with the first question, how do we fix PPR? What if we just scrapped the whole concept of PPR and went back to “Standard Scoring”? Well, it’s a reasonable place to start, perhaps wide receivers just don’t need that extra bump any longer and are able to stand on their own two feet. I updated the previous table and removed a point for each reception made by an individual, regardless of their position. Additionally, I removed the quarterback position from this point, going forward, as they unduly benefit from any changes and that conversation is one that might be best saved for another article. After updating each player’s fantasy point and tallying the top 25 running backs, wide receivers and tight ends, the results were as follows:

Well, it looked promising that this could fix the current imbalance in fantasy football scoring until you reach the year 2014. Come now, you didn’t think it was going to be that easy, did you? This article could have been conducted over a series of tweets if that were the case. What if we just remove the awarded PPR points for the position in issue, wide receivers? Perhaps that can get us back on track.

After some very intense turmoil from 2011-2013, this does appear to help in a significant manner. The bonus to this modification is that tight ends become a much more desirable asset than in the prior two results. Though what if the problem isn’t with rewarding receptions, and is more closely tied to how we value the yardage gained on any specific play? Is it possible we could be chasing the wrong solution to the problem? I decided to try something a little bit different and awarded .05 points per ten receiving yards for receivers but kept both running backs and tight ends at one point per ten receiving yards. It is certainly safe to argue that running backs, and even tight ends to a degree, have a tougher time gaining yardage than wide receivers do, perhaps a premium should be placed on the yards gained by these positions. The results were intriguing to say the least!

Finally! Some consistency! As it turns out maybe the issue is a bit more complex than simply tweaking the points awarded for receptions. It appears very likely that points awarded for yardage could be key in bringing some parity to positional scoring. For those leagues with a flex position and two to one starting requirements, this appears to be an excellent solution to address positional scoring discrepancies. Thank you for reading, you may exit the ride now. Be sure to watch your step and make sure you have any valuables that you may have brought on the ride with you. For anyone left, which I’m guessing is still a large majority of you, let’s see if we can work towards greater parity. Perhaps our solution lies in a hybrid approach, reducing both yardage and reception points for wide receivers. Let’s keep the .05 points per receiving yard gained by wide receivers, but let’s try reducing the points per reception to a half point per reception as well.

There we are, much better. Enough variability to make things interesting and forcing owners to pay attention, but not so much that fantasy football makes no sense year over year. Comparing the Post-2010 average to the actual 2010 baseline shows that minor tweaks to PPR scoring when made in conjunction with how we value points awarded per yard, can yield a new and surprisingly balanced scoring format I’ve called Tiered Positional Scoring (TPS).

TPS scoring recognizes the solid foundation that PPR has set while confronting the realities of today’s game that simply didn’t exist at the advent of PPR. Furthermore, TPS also recognizes that the yardage gained per wide receiver reception far outweighs the average yardage running backs or tight ends gain per reception. Additionally, the sheer effort and physicality that goes into gaining a rushing yard far outweighs the corresponding effort and physicality needed to gain that same yard via reception, a reality which is also prominently visible in TPS scoring.

I purposely withheld a small bit of information throughout this article, those of you paying close attention may have spotted it. That bit of information is the ranking for each change when applied to the 2016 season. My reasoning for doing this was to avoid some recency bias when laying out my argument. Now that my argument has been made, let’s look back at each of the proposals and see how each would have impacted the top 25 players by position

As you can see, even in the 2016 season TPS keeps the positions firmly in balance. Here is the TPS table with the 2016 figures added

As you can clearly see, TPS has held up remarkably well over the past seven years, dramatically outperforming not PPR scoring but standard scoring as well, in terms of the even dispersal of points across the top players, regardless of position. TPS is built around the undeniable fact that both the NFL and fantasy game have changed dramatically in favor of the passing game since the creating of PPR scoring. Ignoring these changes only serves to introduce confusion and pure luck into a game that has always prided itself on rewarding research and a clear understanding of the game at its core. TPS, meanwhile, realigns the way fantasy football should be played, where owners seek out the best players at each position, finding value across the board, not just in one position and through sheer hoarding of that position.

Welcome back to fantasy football’s roots.

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