Yahoo's data provider response re: position eligibility

[horrorfan]

I've been in regular contact with a Yahoo staff member who has tried to help answer questions about the position eligibility process. I've gone into detail on several points, including what I (and many from previous discussions) feel about the current process, suggestions on what could work in the future, the lack of transparency to users, the mass removal of positions in the offseason, and the mass (re)additions during this season.

Finally, he's passed on the data provider's response regarding how they determine eligibility.

From data provider:

In talking with our Hockey guys, for offensive players they breakdown, game-by-game, the starting line combinations for each. They use multiple sources for these lines, whether through TV, NHL.com game previews, Twitter, dailyfaceoff.com, etc. They don’t do defensive players because they aren’t broken into several positions like offensive players are. They’re all just listed as D.
They update the line combinations as often as they can (they are currently updated through 11/30), and every one to two weeks, they will do an audit of every player to see whether anything needs to be changed based on recent trends. For example, if we have a guy listed as C, but notice he has been starting at LW for the past several games, or a good portion of the last several games, they will do a little more digging. They might take a look to see how many faceoffs he has been taking over those several games. If after this analysis it seems to warrant a change in how we list his positions, we will go ahead and make the change…in this case, we will change the C to a C/LW.
Keep in mind that his primary position has to be what NHL.com lists him as. There will be a decent number of players who, for example, might be listed as C/LW, but have played all of their games at LW. Since NHL.com lists him as a C, we have to keep him as C/LW instead of LW/C.

Additonally from Yahoo:

As mentioned earlier, we are working on a way to make the data that they are using to make these changes visible in our game but we don't have access at this time so it wouldn't be until next year.

Let me know if you have any additional questions.

I'm happy to go back with any questions you have for them, assuming I haven't covered it already. One thing I will ask is why there was a decision to remove a significant number of positions in the offseason for the first time in years, only to have loads added back this season? Was the offseason data just wrong on NHL.com?

I've tried to make it clear that relying on a data provider who makes these decisions, yet doesn't provide any transparency on how it's done can lead to a flawed system. A few messages earlier, I had made these suggestions so you can see where I'm coming from:

- Come up with a source that is agreed to be used to determine primary positions.
- Decide on a rule to determine how many games at a position (based on the above source) a player should be given multiple eligibility e.g. 10 games
- From the beginning of the season, announce to users that there will be changes to the process in one year
- Keep track of players' positions based on this source for the entire season.
- Based on these results, assign the players this/these position(s) at the beginning of the following season.
- Implement eligibility rule from this point and provide it to users like you do in baseball.
- If a player does not meet the eligibility rule of a specific position, it is removed in the following offseason.

Maybe, just maybe we can finally get somewhere where the system used will be transparent by all and lead to far fewer requests to add/remove positions and helps managers better use this information.

[hockeyrobot]

I have found Yahoo's support staff to be increasingly helpful on plenty of topics across the three sports I play fantasy wise.

Nice work man

[Rodgort]

Wow, awesome job.

May I suggest that when they change/add position eligibility they do it either at the quarter marks of the season, or the half point of the season, and let people know before the season starts. You may have covered that already, if so sorry to add this, it would just be simpler than "10 games'

[horrorfan]

I have found Yahoo's support staff to be increasingly helpful on plenty of topics across the three sports I play fantasy wise.

Nice work man

For me, it's hit or miss. Customer care often don't know much and often aren't very helpful. People like the one I'm in contact with are in the minority because we don't hear from them much, which is part of the problem. Often, though, when you can communicate with them, they are honest and will try to help if they have the information. In cases like this, they are relying on a third party. We'll see what happens.

Wow, awesome job.

May I suggest that when they change/add position eligibility they do it either at the quarter marks of the season, or the half point of the season, and let people know before the season starts. You may have covered that already, if so sorry to add this, it would just be simpler than "10 games'

I can mention that, but I'm not sure they are even at that stage yet where they will/can change the process. The 10 game example was just that, an example - I don't have any concrete suggestion there. The most important thing I wanted them to improve was transparency. Nobody knows really how they do it, and even with this response, it seems a bit all over the place without a fixed rule and plenty of judgement calls. But them providing this much is more than (I believe) we've received before, so hopefully it's a step forward.

[horrorfan]

Refreshing in case anyone else wants to comment and/or submit questions for me to pass on.

[2014olympicgold]

Ask for Powerplay/PK lines not be used in the assessment for position eligibility.

[Pengwin7]

Great work hf.

The solution is still... should be simple, IMO.
It starts in that some website, whether NHL.com or Yahoo, should have a counter of each players' opening position for each game.
Somebody is gonna do it - just don't know who or when.

1) Each NHL player opens Yahoo! at just one position.
2) Then, only after a starting opening game position at some other position runs to 10gp... only then does the play get the 2nd position.
3) And they cap the date when they'll give the 2nd at some point - say mid-Feb... before the "trading deadline" of each year.

Right now, its mostly a mess because people don't know when its coming.
If they had the same GP counter that they do for baseball, it wouldn't be an issue.

Meh.
FWIW - Fantrax is doing the same shit. (Fortunately, in my Fantrax league - we've locked the players down to one position with our Premium payment.)

[Jouko-Pouko]

Keep in mind that his primary position has to be what NHL.com lists him as. There will be a decent number of players who, for example, might be listed as C/LW, but have played all of their games at LW. Since NHL.com lists him as a C, we have to keep him as C/LW instead of LW/C.

I think this is the biggest issue they're facing. NHL.com is not a fantasy hockey site, they have no need to get their player positions correct. They usually put every young forward as 'C' probably because they're too lazy to figure out their correct position. After the player has been in the NHL for a year, they usually start getting them right... At least in most cases. In some cases, they're still weirdly completely wrong. Marko Dano is a great example; they still list him as 'C' even though he hasn't played that position for years. But that's fine, they don't care about that kind of stuff. But fantasy hockey sites should care about that stuff, so that's why they shouldn't be using NHL.com as their primary source.