2013 RULES: Injury Adjustments to Game Updates
Posted: Tue Mar 12, 2013 11:10 pm
In at least in one high profile championship example this playoff season, there was an injured sim player who rode solid averages and nice performance boosts with strong grades around him to a championship bowl win.
The issue of injured players and how we adjust their averaged games had come up in previous off-season polls, where I thought we were giving injured players way too high of updates. The most we currently reduce a player's stats is 75% for doubtful (85% for questionable, 99% for probable). If a player was out in the last regular season game (but not seriously out for the year) and bumped up one level to doubtful, then his playoff update is not too far off his normal game update with that 75% reduction.
It turns a normal game average of:
23-for-38, 268 yards, 1 TD / 1 INT
into 17-for-28, 201 yards, 1 TD / 1 INT
If the game situations call for more passes called, the QB essentially performs about like his usual self despite his low injury status. Add in a maximum offensive advantage if superior supporting cast grades around him and it takes that injured QB's completion percentage from 60 to 75% and performing at elite levels despite being pretty seriously hurt.
An elite back who was marked doubtful in the playoffs would have his averaged game go from:
22 rushes for 130 yards and 1 TD
to 16 rushes for 98 yards and 1 TD
With in-game situations calling for more rushes, he's somewhat his normal self also despite the doubtful injury health.
Part of the issue in not impacting injured players more is that their completion percentage and average per rush isn't really impacted by our current injury adjustments that just lower their attempts and totals mostly.
If we take 75% off a 65% elite passer, he'd go down to 49% game update when most injured but still playing. For a most injured RB, his 4.0 yards per carry x .75 would go down to 3.0 yards per carry. That's more the injury impact I think perhaps needs to be made to really scale back the production of very injured players. The problem with that, though, is that none of the attempts and totals are as easy to also adjust to fit the modified averages/percentages.
What I proposed in previous years was to double the injury reduction just for game averages (keeping the injury multiplier for grades just as it is). So instead of 'attempts x .75', it would be 'attempts x .75 x .75' making it more like a 56% larger reduction in the totals for the guys most seriously hurt as to be doubtful.
With less attempts in the update, once they get beyond that figure their additional attempts would be more at a default performance level (usually lower than averages for good players).
It's very difficult to manage injury situations and make personal subjective judgement calls on hundreds of players and not have people fall through the cracks. So we previously instituted the playoff injury practice of bumping every player (except those on IR) up one injury level at the start of the playoffs and one more level up before the bowl games. Doing so, though, allows guys who were really walking wounded at the end of the season look almost totally healthy because we don't impact their game updates so much arguably. I think that could be resolved and we wouldn't have to worry about injured players impacting the sim playoffs so much if we just chopped the injured players' stats down further than we currently do. We aim to do that now, but it just isn't as much of a reduction arguably as it should be.
Also, if a guy is at the lowest injury level I'm thinking he should also perhaps be marked for in-game injury to put a cap on his impact limited to his reduced averaged totals (and if a QB who surpassed his averaged attempts and marked for in-game injury would be replaced with backup once beyond those averaged attempts).
The issue of injured players and how we adjust their averaged games had come up in previous off-season polls, where I thought we were giving injured players way too high of updates. The most we currently reduce a player's stats is 75% for doubtful (85% for questionable, 99% for probable). If a player was out in the last regular season game (but not seriously out for the year) and bumped up one level to doubtful, then his playoff update is not too far off his normal game update with that 75% reduction.
It turns a normal game average of:
23-for-38, 268 yards, 1 TD / 1 INT
into 17-for-28, 201 yards, 1 TD / 1 INT
If the game situations call for more passes called, the QB essentially performs about like his usual self despite his low injury status. Add in a maximum offensive advantage if superior supporting cast grades around him and it takes that injured QB's completion percentage from 60 to 75% and performing at elite levels despite being pretty seriously hurt.
An elite back who was marked doubtful in the playoffs would have his averaged game go from:
22 rushes for 130 yards and 1 TD
to 16 rushes for 98 yards and 1 TD
With in-game situations calling for more rushes, he's somewhat his normal self also despite the doubtful injury health.
Part of the issue in not impacting injured players more is that their completion percentage and average per rush isn't really impacted by our current injury adjustments that just lower their attempts and totals mostly.
If we take 75% off a 65% elite passer, he'd go down to 49% game update when most injured but still playing. For a most injured RB, his 4.0 yards per carry x .75 would go down to 3.0 yards per carry. That's more the injury impact I think perhaps needs to be made to really scale back the production of very injured players. The problem with that, though, is that none of the attempts and totals are as easy to also adjust to fit the modified averages/percentages.
What I proposed in previous years was to double the injury reduction just for game averages (keeping the injury multiplier for grades just as it is). So instead of 'attempts x .75', it would be 'attempts x .75 x .75' making it more like a 56% larger reduction in the totals for the guys most seriously hurt as to be doubtful.
With less attempts in the update, once they get beyond that figure their additional attempts would be more at a default performance level (usually lower than averages for good players).
It's very difficult to manage injury situations and make personal subjective judgement calls on hundreds of players and not have people fall through the cracks. So we previously instituted the playoff injury practice of bumping every player (except those on IR) up one injury level at the start of the playoffs and one more level up before the bowl games. Doing so, though, allows guys who were really walking wounded at the end of the season look almost totally healthy because we don't impact their game updates so much arguably. I think that could be resolved and we wouldn't have to worry about injured players impacting the sim playoffs so much if we just chopped the injured players' stats down further than we currently do. We aim to do that now, but it just isn't as much of a reduction arguably as it should be.
Also, if a guy is at the lowest injury level I'm thinking he should also perhaps be marked for in-game injury to put a cap on his impact limited to his reduced averaged totals (and if a QB who surpassed his averaged attempts and marked for in-game injury would be replaced with backup once beyond those averaged attempts).