SLB Open Forum: 2011 Schedules

Now that the divisions have been officially announced, the newest point of contention for the 2011 season is scheduling.

In an effort to make things as balanced as possible, I’ve set it up so that everyone plays the six teams in their division twice apiece. The other remaining ten games are split among the seven teams in the other division.

Obviously, this leaves a disparity in the number of games each team will have against non-division squads. Each team currently plays three non-division clubs twice and the other four non-division teams once apiece.

The move to fourteen teams no longer allows us to play an even number of games against every team, there’s nothing we can do about that. There does, however, seem to be some rumblings about which teams people have to play twice.

The non-division half of everyone’s schedule is currently randomized. I could make some changes, but in doing so, we’re effectively stacking the deck—on purpose—against certain teams if we try to balance out the perceived inequities of an unbalanced schedule.

There is no perfect way to set this schedule up.

The only two real options are as follows:

1) Leave the schedule as it is, wherein the interdivisional teams play each other twice and the non-divisional portion is randomized.

2) Randomize the entire schedule, thus not-ensuring an even number of games against interdivisional clubs, but ensuring a completely random and unbiased scheduling result.

I’m only offering this up because it seems some people suspect that I may have stacked the schedule in my favor. I’m not going to lie, that’s a bit of a kick in the balls given my fairly solid record as a fair commissioner over the years, but I understand why people might think what they think, so I’m leaving it up to y’all.

Here is the current Regular Season Matchup Matrix.

This chart shows the number of times each team faces off against the other in the regular season.

If you think that the schedule is wholly unbalanced in one (or many) team’s favor(s), let me know. I can make some adjustments, but ensuring that a perceived “bad team” gets two matchups against all of the perceived “good teams” from a different division is really only stacking the deck against them and that seems equally unfair.

Personally, I’m down with the randomized non-division portion of the schedule. One might say it is because I have a seemingly favorable non-divisional slate of games.

Well for a quick recap, I went 4-9-1 against the entire Pacific Division in the regular season last year.

That includes getting swept in the regular season series by Morgan (one of the teams I’m slated to play twice) and splitting the season series with John and Adam (the other two teams I’m slated to matchup with twice).

So if anyone thinks I’d be fattening up my win totals, recent history proves otherwise.

If you want to take a peek at your tentative schedules, you can do so by going to the league home on Yahoo! and clicking the schedule link.

If someone can give me a legitimate grievance that warrants changing the schedule—and not just nitpicking about the perceived strength of your schedule—I’ll consider making the change to a completely randomized schedule

Speak now or (hopefully) forever hold your peace.