Special Teams

[Kingswood]

I've noticed in my Bengals1 league that for two straight weeks I've had a street free agent kicking for me. I have two kickers, both healthy these past two weeks, and a punter. Week 1 I lost by 2 points, not that it was the kicker's fault, but I can't help but believe that having either of my kickers would've been better. Could someone please look into this?

[Kevin]

What's your team and who are your kickers?

[Kingswood]

My team is the Fergus Falls Commanders in Bengals1. My kickers are Nick Folk and Rodrigo Blankenship.

[cdcox]

For FG attempts and extra points, the simulation is using Nick Folk as your kicker. You can see a FG attempt by Folk in your week 2 game.

It is different for KOs. Nick Folk only had 10 KO in 2021. Blankenship did not have any. These number of kickoff attempts are 1) too few to establish a significant data set to predict KO performance in the game and 2) so few it indicates that neither Folk or Blankenship are truly up to NFL kickoff standards. So in the case where the kickers on your roster do not have the minimum number of kickoff attempts, we use a free agent.

Sam Koch is being used as your punter in the simulations. He too, had zero kickoff attempts in 2021, so he is also not an option for kicking off for your team.

Hope this explains what is going on.

[Kingswood]

I suppose it does, except Nick Folk has played more than just in 2021. So does this mean your simulations are only based off the previous year without accumulating data for their career performances?

[Kingswood]

Ah I get it now, so essentially since Folk didn't handle KO's the simulation assumes that a Street FA would be just as good, if not better. Thanks for the help!

[cdcox]

Yep. The idea is to replicate the decisions faced by NFL GMs. If a player can lean on their past history, it takes all of the risk away from the GM in thinking about long term contracts, player’s age, when to move on, etc. A big motivation for this game was the arm chair GMs that populate every fan base. This game gives you a chance to prove your mettle.

[cdcox]

Ah I get it now, so essentially since Folk didn't handle KO's the simulation assumes that a Street FA would be just as good, if not better. Thanks for the help!

Yep! I can’t tell you how much thought went into the game design on just these kinds of questions.