'04 FBR Rankings - 11-30-12

No arguments here. Some teams have dropped a few. No Sting team in the top 10.

Brilliant deduction, sf!

Tx Spirit North..building something special..to all those that have strayed, come back home to the Mound!

you guys aren't texans yet

I guess I'm slow on the take because I'm not sure what that means..but thank goodness..I think

bwgophers wrote:Current Rankings include game results from 8/24/12 through PRESENT



Current Inter-Tier Records

Number 5 LP Keegan is gone, I think most of them went to FC Dallas and Number 25 Paisley is done as well, neither are on the LP website.

Huh, it must be that I'm new to the site because I don't understand how teams that are 1-9-1, 1-2, 1-1-1 are ranked higher than teams with better records. I understand some divisions are tougher, but if you're 1 an something maybe you should be playing down a bit? Also it looks like some teams are ranked below those the just beat in head to head games in the fall ( same division )

Sorry, just trying to see the logic behind the formula.

db10 wrote:Huh, it must be that I'm new to the site because I don't understand how teams that are 1-9-1, 1-2, 1-1-1 are ranked higher than teams with better records. I understand some divisions are tougher, but if you're 1 an something maybe you should be playing down a bit? Also it looks like some teams are ranked below those the just beat in head to head games in the fall ( same division )

Sorry, just trying to see the logic behind the formula.

Don't apologize. You aren't the first person to ask these questions, and you certainly won't be the last. I have to go through this explanation every so often as new people join the board and aren't familiar with the background of the FBR Rankings.

First, for a detailed explanation of the ranking system, please go here: http://www.ntxsoccer.net/rankings.aspx

(The website was created by another forum user - bobmac15 - and he was kind enough to post the details behind FBR for me, but he has either lost the time and/or desire to keep the website updated).

FBR is a mathematical based "computer" ranking. It provides a reasonably accurate assessment of the relative strength of teams to one another, based on their average performance over a period of time. Generally, I try to keep the time period equal to roughly the past 4 months of game results. The FBR software currently does not have the ability to apply a "sliding weight" scale that would give more recent results a higher weight than older results, so a game result from Sept 1 carries the same weight in the calculation as a game played on Dec. 1. That is one reason why you may see Team B, who just beat Team A, still ranked below team A. It's based on the overall body of work for a team in the past 4 months, not just what happened last weekend. I have plenty of historical data that I won't bore the general forum with, that shows that FBR does a pretty good job of generating an accurate relative ranking of poor W/L teams playing in stronger leagues against good W/L teams playing in weaker leagues. If you want the historical details, feel free to PM me. Also, whether people like it or not, or are willing to admit it or not, the top academy leagues in NTX are highly stratified. We're not talking about the difference between the SEC and Pac-12 in football, we're talking about the difference between the SEC and the Ivy League in football.

Different ranking systems have different strengths and weaknesses. A strength of human opinion polls, is that they can apply the head-to-head logic that you are looking for. They can also take into account "intangible" factors (i.e. was a team missing players due to conflict/illness/injury, was a team using guest players, etc.) On the other hand, opinion polls have a much higher level of subjectivity/bias/homerism. They can get caught up in "groupthink", and can tend to be knee-jerk, giving too much weight to a single recent good or bad game result. Computer based rankings (if done correctly) are generally much less subjective. However, they can't account for intangibles, can't apply head-to-head logic, and may be slower to identify a particularly "hot" or "cold" team (although they will always catch up in the long run).

FBR is NOT perfect, and I have never claimed as such. It's just pretty darn good. Again, plenty of historical data that I won't bore the general forum with, but please feel free to PM me if you want the details. Also, I have never claimed, and never will claim, that FBR is inherently better than other ranking systems people have used on this forum (Power Rankings, Statistical Rankings, consolidated opinion polls, etc.). If any of these methods are done correctly, they will all produce results with similar accuracy.

People will always get caught up in "How can you have Team Y ranked 3 spots ahead of Team Z..." Unfortunately, those people are really missing the point of these rankings, but it is a natural by-product of producing any kind of ranking, list, etc. The real value of these rankings is to give a general idea of the relative strength of teams, so that coaches/managers can choose leagues/tournaments/divisions that will provide them with the appropriate level of competition to accomplish their development goals for their team. Same goes for league/tournament directors, who can use them as a resource for setting up divisions/brackets to provide appropriate competition (some do, some don't, c'est la vie).

General rule of thumb...

Games between teams ranked within 5 spots of one another will usually be very competitive with one another. Most games will be decided by 2 goals or less margin, and it's not surprising to see the lower ranked team win.

Games between teams ranked within 5-10 spots of one another will still usually be competitive, with many games decided by 2 goals or less margin. However, the higher ranked team will come out with a W in a large majority of those games (70-80% or greater).

Games between teams ranked greater than 10 spots apart are usually not very competitive. They are often decided by more than 2 goal margin, and it's rare (<10% of the time) that the lower ranked team even manages a draw, let alone a W.

Hope that helps, and again, feel free to PM me if you want to get into the gory details.