Cancelled Games

Definitions

Cancelled Game - A game is considered "cancelled" if it is not played within the week that it was scheduled. Whether it is cancelled, postponed to a future week, or one of the teams had to forfeit, (for whatever reason... weather, covid-19, air quality, etc.) we will treat it as a "cancelled game" and this page describes what that means for pickem pools.

Forfeit Games - New in 2021 in the NFL, a team that can not take the field due to a covid outbreak may have to forfeit and take a loss if the NFL is not able to reschedule the game to a later week. In this case, the website will still treat that game as a cancelled game, NOT as a "win" for the non-forfeiting team. Any picks remaining on that game will not be scored (basically treated as a "No Pick").

Games Postponed Within the Same Week - For a game that is postponed to a later time in the same week, we will simply update the game time and will NOT treat the game as cancelled. The picks will be retained and scored as usual at the game's conclusion. Note that this may also apply to games that are postponed to the Tuesday or Wednesday after we have already switched to the subsequent week. For example, in 2020 NFL Week 12, the game between Baltimore and Pittsburgh was postponed from Thursday night to the following Wednesday. The game was not marked "cancelled" and the results were still counted in Week 12 even though the game was technically played in Week 13.

The Process

We will keep a close eye on the news each week and will display warnings on the picksheet when games have the potential to be cancelled or postponed. Once we confirm that game has been cancelled we will:

• Officially designate the game as cancelled, preventing anyone from making a pick on that game.
• Assign backup picks to any pools that are eligible to use them (see below for more info on backup picks).
• Send an email notification to anyone who had a pick on that game.
• Send an email notification to any pool manager who has a pool member affected by the cancelled game, including additional instructions depending on their specific settings.

Pool Member Response

If you receive a notification that a game for one of your picks has been cancelled, Contact your pool manager to see what additional changes might be made to the picksheet to compensate for the cancelled game, and then return to the picksheet as soon as you can to adjust your picks as necessary.

Pool Manager Response

Depending on the type of pool you are running, there are a number of options available as described below. The important thing is that you decide on how you want to handle it and send a poolwide email to your pool members so they know what to expect ahead of time. Here are some options based on your pool type:

Pick'em Pools where you pick all the games on the picksheet

Standard Pick'em In a standard pick'em pool where there are no key picks or confidence ranks, there really is no action necessary. The game, if cancelled or postponed to a future week, will simply not be scored, and it will be like the game was never on your schedule to begin with. It's safe to delete the game from your picksheet if you want to. If, as in a college pickem pool, you would like to add a replacement game, you can do that (POOL ADMIN>Set Picksheet), but only if you are confident there is enough time to get the word out and for people to return to the picksheet to pick the added game.

Key Picks With a key pick pool, there is the possibility that a few people had a key pick on that game. In this case, they will end up with one fewer key pick opportunity than everyone else. They should try to return to the pick sheet and add a new key pick. If the pick deadline has passed but there are still some games remaining to be played (e.g. the late Sunday afternoon games or the Monday Night game) then you can move your pick deadline back to open up the picksheet. You can also use the POOL ADMIN>Manager Picks page to assign them a different key pick and in that case, if you don't have another rule in place, we recommend you designate their last pick on the sheet as a Key Pick.

Confidence Ranks Not everyone will have the same confidence rank on the game that is cancelled, so to make it fair, we have a Bump Confidence Ranks Tool the pool manager can use to bump the ranks up or down so that everyone has the same ranks in play. A link to the tool will be displayed for the pool manager on the Poolwide Picks page.

The Bump Confidence Ranks Tool will adjust the ranks properly, so if the ranks should be 16-2 after the cancelled game (like most NFL pools), it will bump the ranks UP to put everyone on par. If the new ranks should be 1-15 instead of 1-16, then the ranks would be bumped down. It all depends on the type of pool you're doing and your specific settings. There are too many options to go over every possible scenario so please trust that the ranks would get adjusted properly. (Of course if the tool doesn't work properly, contact us at that time and we'll make sure to get it sorted out.)

Pick'em Pools where you are only picking your "Best X" number of games.

Regardless of your pick'em variation, in a Best Bets pool, if there are still some games to be played (e.g. the late Sunday afternoon games or the Monday Night game) then the best option is to move your pick deadline back to open up the picksheet again so that people can make a replacement pick. If no games are available, the pool manager can use the POOL ADMIN>Manager Picks page to do it manually. We recommend adding a pick for the home team on the last game on the sheet that wasn't already picked.

Backup Picks - New in 2021, we have enabled a backup pick option for pools that are not picking all of the games on the picksheet. After you have made your primary picks for the week, you make a single backup pick that can be substituted for a primary pick on a game that gets cancelled. That substitution will automatically be made when we "cancel" the game in the system. Note that a backup pick can only be chosen from a game that starts at the pick deadline or later. You can't choose a backup pick from a game that starts before your deadline. So if, for example, you use the "Last game time each week" option for your deadline, you will only have that last game to choose from. If you have a Sunday 10AM Pacific deadline in an NFL Pool, you won't be able to choose a backup pick from the Thursday Night Game. You can enable the Backup pick option on the POOL SETTINGS>Format page.

Survivor Pools

We hope this helps

The above is not an exhaustive list of options and there are many ways to handle the situation. Remember that you always have the Manager Pick page to make any adjustments you deem necessary, according to your rules.