Many negative aspects of scoring systems trace back to the early days of fantasy football, when calculators and box scores were crucial to determining who won week-to-week. Standard scoring became popular, not because it's the best system, but because it was an easy way to score. One point per 10 yards rushing or receiving, six points for a rushing or receiving touchdown, and so on. Some leagues made it even easier by just awarding fantasy points for touchdowns, resulting in Bubba Franks winning fantasy MVP after fantasy MVP. Then there's the PPR movement, where points are awarded for receptions. These scoring systems aren't good for fantasy football; let's delve into why.

Standard Scoring

Standard Scoring is still by far the most popular way leagues do fantasy football scoring. It's easy to understand, but it's just flat out inaccurate. One yard rushing doesn't equal nine yards rushing. A one-yard pass play is terrible. A 24-yard pass play is significant. Standard scoring doesn't reflect that at all.

I assume most will just dismiss this and tell me "it averages out at the end." Please. Tell that to the guy who loses by one point even though his players accounted for more yards, but all of his players ended on 89 yards rushing and 224 yards passing! That's a travesty and my--er, that team shouldn't be penalized because of an antiquated scoring system!

Now that we've established that the system is broken, let's look at the reasons why people won't want to change. First, they will find it hard to calculate scores if every point counts the same. I guess that's true if you're using slide rules and abacuses. Last time I checked, just about everyone lets a computer calculate their scores automatically. In fact, most freaks (I use that term lovingly) I know follow along to live scoring every weekend. The computer doesn't care if your scoring is easy or requires quantum physics. It's just a formula and it spits out the scores all the same.

Besides, we need to keep these computers in check. Hal 9000 was a warning shot across our bow. Deep Blue proved that they are for real, and this soccer robot just scares the hell out of me. Anyway, the point is live scoring means we should maximize the accuracy of our scoring systems without worrying about how complicated the system is. Some don't like the idea of each yard counting. They will say "Look, losing by one fantasy point is rough enough, but now we're going to be losing by .1 point? That will make me want to sacrifice myself to the fantasy football gods."

To that, I counter with this: At least it's the right outcome. I can handle losing fairly by decimals but I can't take falling unfairly to whole numbers. Also, winning by a decimal is a lot more fun than winning by a whole point. I'm just saying.

PPR

Oh, PPR, how I loathe you. I equate the introduction of PPR to releasing snakes to take care of your rat infestation. Sure, you're taking care of the rats, but now you have a snake issue.

The thought behind PPR was that running backs are overpowered compared to wideouts. What better way to even the playing field than by awarding points for getting a reception? That way the wideouts will gain an extra 60-70 points over most running backs. Except, apparently some forgot that running backs are allowed to get receptions also. (Larry Centers, I'm looking right at you) And some actually get just about as many as wideouts. Not only was the problem not solved, but it pointlessly skews the value of running backs.

How does it do that? Let's say your running back gets a reception for negative four yards. This is a bad thing. In fact, it's a terrible play. He should have just batted the ball into the ground. In PPR, he gains a point! For doing something terrible!

Fantasy football isn't like the Chicago Bears quarterback position. You shouldn't be rewarded for doing something poorly! Look at these two stat lines. Both guys are running backs. Player A finishes with 8 catches for two yards and 20 carries for 60 yards. Player B finishes with 1 catch for 9 yards and 15 carries for 99 yards. Under standard PPR scoring, player A finishes with 14 points. Player B with 9. Which had the better game? Of course it's player B, who actually helped his NFL squad with a quality game. Player A is a bum and probably thinks the Sklar Brothers are funny.

Solution

What good would this column be without an offer of hope? (I'm really like the Barack Obama of fantasy football writing.) First of all, every scoring system should award points for each yard rushed, received, or passed for. Generally, rushing and receiving yards should be worth about twice as much as passing yards. Rushing and receiving scores should be 2-3 times as valuable as passing scores. You can use decimals, but whole numbers work if you don't mind ending with 1,000 points as opposed to 70. That's the easy part.

Here's a brilliant fix for PPR: don't add points for receptions. Take away points for receptions and rushes. Problem solved. Start subtracting points every time a running back or wideout touches the ball. This solves two problems. First, running backs get way more touches than wideouts, so it evens the two out, which is the whole reason why PPR was set up in the first place.

Second, it rewards efficiency, which is something real life NFL teams care about. When one player has 15 carries for 100 yards, that's a yards-per-carry average of more than 6.5! That's very good! If another player needs 50 carries to get to 100 yards, that's very bad! Those two players shouldn't receive the same number of points anyway.

So, make every yard count and make yards per carry (and yards per reception to a lesser extent) count. Then you'll finally exit the Mesozoic Era of fantasy football, where commissioners etched scores on tablets and cave walls, and enter the wondrous computer age of enlightenment, where I hear Deep Blue thinks Reggie Bush is overrated.

ANDY'S TOTALLY RELEVANT LINK OF THE WEEK

You want cheat sheets? How about customizable cheat sheets that are stuffed with enough info to let you mock others as you dominate? Sound good? Head over to Rotorob where fellow Creative Sports writer Derek Jones and I demonstrate just how awesome we are.

ANDY'S COMPLETELY IRRELEVANT LINK OF THE WEEK

Just one chess game linked this week? I think not. Check out Robert Fischer in what many call the Game of the Century. I don't care what anyone says, that game is crazy.