World Cup Office Pool Idea #7 – Fantasy Player Draft

Every Wednesday is World Cup Wednesday, where I focus my attention on different office pool ideas for the 2010 World Cup. So far I have concentrated my efforts on basic draft ideas such as team brackets, confidence scores and group winners. All these ideas can be played by people with a wide range of World Cup knowledge.

In this post I want to focus on an office pool that requires a little more skill and World Cup knowledge.

Here is how I would put together a:  WORLD CUP FANTASY PLAYER pool

Group Size: Any number up to about 10-12

Objective: To draft the best scoring players in the  2010 World Cup

1) Determine a draft order for the participants. (Use a snake draft…1-10 then reverse 10-1 and so on)

2) Each participant will draft 5-10  offensive players and 1 goalie depending on the number of participants you have.

• Players can draft any player at any position but you will get points for goals scored only
• For the goalie you may just use a “team goalie” (eg..USA goalie or France’s goalie etc.)

3) Scoring:

• Goal = 1 point
• Hat trick = 5 points
• Goals against goalie = minus 1 point
• Optional : Yellow card = minus 1 point, Red card = minus 2 points

4) The participant whose team scores the most points at the end of the World Cup wins

5) Optional Rules

• Have an “Auction Draft“
• Re-draft after the group round.
• Allow teams to pick up free players after the group round.
• Give an extra point if the player’s team wins.

PROs:

• Easy to put together
• More rooting interest in the game as now you can root for individual players
• Takes more knowledge than most pools
• Many optional scoring and draft ideas

CONs:

• Must have some knowledge of World Cup teams
• More difficult to track as you must track individual players
• Limited number of participants

Here is a  list of the TOP 50 WORLD CUP PLAYERS

5 World Cup Tips To Help You Win Your Office Pool

Want to win your Office Pool?… then take these 5 simple tips from The Office Pool Guy.

1) If in doubt pick teams from Europe or South America

These teams are very consistent and have dominated past World Cups.

2) Brazil, Italy and Argentina…Oh my

Only 7 times has someone other than these three teams won the World Cup. You have to go all the way back to 1974 to find a championship match that didn’t have one of these teams. Stick with the big three and you will be okay.

3) Every host country has made it to the round of 16…not this year

Host countries do very well in the World Cup except for this year. South Africa has a tough draw and is not very good, so don’t expect them to move into the round of 16 even with the home town crowd roaring.

4) Look at good offensive teams for your upsets

A team that can score always has a chance to pull the upset. Look at teams with high “goal for average” and they may provide a needed upset for you. Teams like the USA, Cote d`Ivoire, Serbia or Slovakia might pull an upset or two.

5) Look for teams with an easy draw in the group round

Teams like England, Germany and Argentina should be given an extra look because they should not be tested in the early games. Soccer is a game of stamina and having to fight tooth and nail just to get to the round of 16 can be very tiring. Tired teams don’t do well in the World Cup. Look for fresh teams that are on a roll going into the round of 16.

PREDICTIONS

Office Guy World Cup Champion 2010:

Argentina

Sleepers:

Denmark, Chile and Portugal

Most likely to play to a draw:

France, Slovenia and Brazil

If you want more rankings and predictions, including a breakdown of every group check out these sites:

World Cup Preview

World Cup Predictions

World Cup Rankings

For more previews and predictions check out “Guide To The 2010 World Cup”

World Cup Office Pool Review – $10 HWCI Tournament Pool

Weekend Office Pool Review

Every weekend I would like to review an office pool, website or tool from around the web. I will be giving an in-depth review of the quality, simplicity and creativity of the pool, tool or website so that we make informed decisions when starting out.

4th HWCI World Cup Tournament Pool

Description: There are not many World Cup pools out there but I did find this one based out of California. For only $10 you can enter this very interesting pool that allows you to pick all the World Cup games at the beginning of the tournament. The pool which has been going on for the last 3 World Cups, has a very simple scoring system in which you get points for each correct pick. It pays out 4 places and says that it is open to anyone with $10.

Features:

• Pick all the games before the World Cup starts
• Many entry fee options including PayPal
• Many resources for participants including rankings, a discussion forum, a World Cup pool tracker and a Facebook page

PROs:

• The website provides many great resources
• Rules are easy to understand
• Simple scoring system
• Only $10
• One of the only World Cup pools out there
• Solves the “no day off problem”

CONs:

• Must pick all the games BEFORE the tournament
• Don’t know any of the participants so less trash talkin’ and enjoyment
• Not a well-known office pool site
• No bonus points – lose your World Cup finalists and your done
• Allows multiple entries (I don’t care for this idea)

Overall: If you don’t have a World Cup pool at your office you may want to consider this one. The Office Pool Guy will be throwing his $10 into this pool just to see what happens. Let me know how it goes.

World Cup Streak Survivor Pool – Simple, challenging and nerve-racking

Nothing will test your nerves more than having a streak of 20 games going in a Streak Survivor Pool and having to decide between two evenly matched teams. In a streak survivor pool, participants will pick one or more games a week in hopes of getting a winning streak going. Once you miss, your streak starts over. A streak survivor pool takes a lot of knowledge and a lot of guts to pull off. Some sites will even offer up to $100,000 to those that get a LONG winning streak going. This style of pool works well for sports that play games daily, such as baseball, basketball and of course the World Cup. A streak survivor pool would be a great addition to your World Cup experience and doesn’t take too much effort to put together.

How to put on a WORLD CUP STREAK SURVIVOR pool:

Group Size: Any

1) Each participant will need a calendar of the games that will be played during the World Cup.

2) Each participant must pick ONE team to win every day (If that is too much committment you may want to have them pick every other day).

3) Participants can email their picks to the Commish or you go to an online site to keep track of your streaks.

4) If the participant’s team loses or plays to a draw, the streak will start over (A draw could instead count as a push and the streak stays where it was).

5) Scoring:

• A participant will earn points only when their streak reaches 3 wins in a row.
• 3 wins in a row = 3 points
• 4 wins in a row = 4 points
• 5 wins in a row = 5 points
• 6 wins in a row = 6 points
• ETC….

6) Person who earns the most points at the end of World Cup wins

7) Payouts:

• Most total points
• Longest win streak

Optional Rules:

• Participants get one FREE pass a week in which they don’t have to pick a game (in other words they can pass on the day and keep their streak at the point where it is)
• Participants can’t pick the same team twice (difficult to do when you get to the elimination round)
• Give extra points for reaching a certain streak  (ie…such as 5 bonus points for reaching a streak of 5 games)
• Give an extra point for picking the underdog
• Each person gets a LOCK pick of the week or tournament and give extra points for getting it right and subtract points for getting it wrong.

I personally love this style of pool. It is easy to track, challenging and can be very nerve-racking. Let me know what you think by leaving a comment.

World Cup pools can get complicated

There are many ways to put on a good office pool, some more complicated than others. I prefer to keep it simple with some of the more basic pools, like a Group Winners pool or a Confidence pool, but if you like to challenge your math skills and really get in-depth in your office pools then take a look at this forum which discusses some of the more intricate World Cup scoring systems.

World Cup forum

For more basic World Cup pools check out these links:

Confidence Counts

Basic Pool

Bracket Pool

If you run a World Cup office pool then check out my blog on Wednesdays for World Cup Wednesday, where I will be discussing scoring systems, office pool sites, giving tips and more.

World Cup Office Pool Idea- Group winners will solve your problems

One problem that you may run into when organizing your World Cup office pool is that there is no day off between the last game of the group round and the first game of the elimination round. This can make filling out and turning in brackets very difficult if you are using the basic method I discussed earlier.

So here is another option you can use that would solve this problem: Pick THE GROUP WINNERS pool

Group Size: Any

1) Each participant will pick the winners and 2nd place teams of each of the World Cup’s 8 groups (A-H).

2) They will also pick the WORLD CUP winner and RUNNER UP.

3) They will also pick the CONSOLATION game winner and RUNNER UP.

4) Scoring:

• 1st place group finisher = 2 points
• 2nd place group finisher = 1 point
• Consolation game runner up = 3 points
• Consolation game winner = 4 points
• World Cup runner up = 6 points
• World Cup winner = 10 points

Tie Breaker = Total goals scored in World Cup championship

PROS: Easy to do and easy to score, can be done before the games start, no trouble going from group to elimination rounds.

CONS: Not a lot of strategy, not a lot of points to separate contenders

Here is a link to all the group round teams.

World Cup Pool Idea – Confidence Counts

In this post we will discuss the: CONFIDENCE SCORE Pool

Group Size: Any

1) Each participant will predict the winner of all 48 games in the group round.

2) For each of the 48 games, the participant will place a “confidence score” from 1-48 points (48 being VERY confident and 1 being NOT confident). The “confidence score” is a rating of how confident the player is that they will be correct in their prediction.

3) The participant may also predict if the game will end in a draw.

4) Scoring group round:

• If the participant predicts the WINNER they get the number of points equal to their confidence score. (ie..if player predicts the USA to win and is 48 points confident then they would get 48 points for that win).
• If the participant is INCORRECT they get no points.
• If the participant predicted a DRAW and is correct they get double the points. (ie..if the player predicts the USA and Slovenia to play to a draw for 48 points and they do, then the player would get 48 x 2 = 96 points)

5) When the teams reach the elimination round, players will rank each team from 1-16 (16 points being the team the player thinks will win it all and 1 point for the team they think has no chance to win it all).

6) Scoring for elimination round:

• Take the team that wins the World Cup and compare them to the place that each player had them on their confidence rankings.
• Players get the number of points that they put on the winning team.
• ie..if I think that Brazil is going to win it and USA is going to finish 2nd, I would put 16 points on Brazil and 15 points on the USA. If Brazil wins it all I get 16 points but if the USA wins i would get the points that I put on USA.

7) Total each players points for the group round and the elimination round and highest total would be the winner.

PROS: Any size group, strategy important, easy scoring system, get to participate in all games

CONS: Time consuming for participants, group play more important then elimination round (unless you double elimination points), difficult to know who is winning the pool.

I really like this style of pool as you do have to do some thinking before the games start. Many use the idea of a confidence score for the NCAA football bowl games.

World Cup Office Pool Idea – Bracket Madness

A very popular and simple office pool to host is the well-known Tournament Bracket Pool. This type of pool, which is commonly done for the NCAA basketball tournament, can easily be adapted to the World Cup because of the way the elimination tournament is set up. The main drawback of this pool is that it does not incorporate the group play matches.

In this post we will discuss how to put together: The BRACKET pool

Group Size: Any

1) After the group play matches are complete and the 16 teams have been determined for the elimination rounds, have each participant fill out a tournament bracket (you will be able to find brackets to print on this site), predicting each games winner.

2) Each round will be worth 40 points

2) Scoring:

• 1st round  (games 49-56) = 5 points for each  correct prediction
• 2nd round (games 57-60) = 10 points for each correct prediction
• 3rd round (games 61-62 )  = 20 points for each correct prediction
• Finals and Consolation game = 20 points for each correct prediction
• Tiebreaker is that the player must predict the total goals scored in the Finals (closest to the total without going over wins)

3) Payout to the 3 participants with the most points

PROS: Very simple with easy setup, most are familiar with the style, easy to score, no limit on the size of the group

CONS: Not much strategy, group play not used, no advantage to choosing an underdog

World Cup Office Pool Idea – The Basic Draft

With the World Cup 2010 just around the corner, the Office Pool Guy will focus a few posts on the different pools that can be put together for this special event.

In this post we will discuss the: BASIC DRAFT pool

Group Size: 4-8 works best

1) Depending on the number of participants, each person will draft 4 to 8 of the 32 World Cup teams.

2) Make sure you are familiar with the World Cup format of Group play followed by the Elimination rounds.

3) Scoring:

• 3 points for a win
• 1 point for a draw
• 0 points for a loss

4) Payouts

• Most Total Points (for all of a players teams)
• Player with the Championship Team
• Player with the 2nd Place Team
• Optional Payout: Biggest Upset (use this chart’s rankings to determine biggest upset)

5) Other Options

• Double the number of points awarded for a win each round of the elimination tournament (round of 16).
• Complete a bracket for the round of 16. (add the points for each the group round and the brackets)
• Don’t allow participants to pick teams from the same group.
• Award extra points for winning the group round.

PROS: Easy to track, not a lot of participants needed, numerous payout possibilities, basic knowledge of World Cup needed.

CONS: Must get everyone together to draft, not much strategy, may be knocked out of pool early, better if many upsets.