Poke holes in this please:

Swiss format, so every week is a position round.  Handicap is ? (undecided, likely 80-90%) of the difference between the two teams averages.  Payout is based on points, team points as well as personal points, not position.  Team average is tie breaker, higher team average is higher position.  One point per player game and series, 3 points per team win and series total, also *series total ranking points*.  Lower seed picks lineup last.  300 max score.  Prior season book average used for first 9 games.  King of the Hill bonus, the top 3 teams and individuals based on season point total get extra money every week they stay in qualifying spots. 

*Series total ranking points are a way for a team that had one of the highest series' in the league but got whooped to still stay above water or not dip too far just because they got a bad draw one week, kinda like a bad beat jackpot at a casino.  So say there are 10 teams, the team that had the highest handicap team series that week would get 10 bonus points, next team would get 9, so on and so forth.  If the team that had the highest series wiped the team that had the second highest series, but that second team would have beaten anyone else in the league that week, they would still get some points.  Still working on point logistics, not sure if it would actually factor in or just be extra points for no reason. 

Players would go head to head with the bowler across from them using the same format as the team, handicap based on the difference between the two bowlers averages for scoring purposes, regular 90% of 220 would be the basis for scoring for individual awards. 

Pros: Works for every average level.  Every week has importance, keeps you more invested from week to week.  Promotes improvement. 

Cons: Complicated AF.  Could possibly bowl same team several weeks in a row.  Weekly series ranking points may not be fair if pair to pair scoring consistency is questionable.  The bowlers most interested in this type of format are likely the ones who oppose handicap the most, and the possibility for a 235 avg to lose to a 230 avg because of handicap exists. 

Coming up with ideas is hard because I support an opinion I don't share.  I want a super competitive league that's difficult and makes me care about showing up, and that's usually when things start to go downhill.  I start with stuff that would be fine and then by the end of it I come up with stuff no handicap bowler would want anything to do with.  Other problems you can see?

You are combining a handicap format and a scratch format with your tiebreaker being higher average.

Series ranking points carry too much weight and how are you figuring handicap series if you are using the difference in the team averages.

Do away with individual awards to eliminate confusion using 2 different handicap systems.  Or if you are making it a handicap league make it fair, using 220 as a base isn't fair if there will be individuals averaging over that.

First yes, the idea is to provide participation to handicap bowlers, but also with incentives to improve.  Inevitably though, my preferences take over.  Another idea I'd had is to make handicap based on 90% of the highest average in the league.  Would fluctuate every week, but if there are no individual awards, nothing to worry about and would be simple to execute. 

Series ranking is proving to be problematic at best, but looking to try to eliminate or at least alleviate what I'd consider to be a serious format flaw.   Of course it's a flaw with virtually every league or tournament, and at least the Swiss format I believe allows for "getting back into it," despite getting an unfortunate draw here or there. 

I'm not a fan of individual awards anyway, rather just dump all the money into a few places so it's not so diluted. 

I'd REALLY like to do a draft league here, but people here I don't think would be into that.  They want to bowl with who they want to bowl with, and even if we HAD a draft, they'd all just pick all their buddies and then whine about how unbalanced the teams are. 

What was the biggest league in the city at 20ish teams a few years ago just died this past year, our scratch league is likely done this year, and a "classic" league someone else is trying to start doesn't look like it will get off the ground because of some very odd rules.  (Handicap is 90% of 220, but with a max of 10 per person per game . . the heck?)  If it's scratch, no one wants to bowl, if it's handicap, the scratch bowlers won't bowl, if it's too relaxed people just show up to hang out and ultimately lose interest or don't care whether they're there, if it's too competitive, nobody wants to show up and go to war for 3 hours after a long day at work.  Difficult to find a happy medium that most can accept or be happy with. 

You are combining a handicap format and a scratch format with your tiebreaker being higher average.

Series ranking points carry too much weight and how are you figuring handicap series if you are using the difference in the team averages.

Do away with individual awards to eliminate confusion using 2 different handicap systems.  Or if you are making it a handicap league make it fair, using 220 as a base isn't fair if there will be individuals averaging over that.

If the league is a position round every week then the "bad beats" work themselves out and the standings will be close enough without the bonus points.  If you did a schedule the bonus points would work better.

Yeah I definitely get that.  Bowled a swiss format tournament a couple years ago where my team and another good team caught some really rough breaks the first couple games and ended up bowling each other for last place the next 4 games despite outscoring the majority of the field each of those 4 games.  It got old really quickly.  Making it handicap I would hope would shuffle it up better, but again, the higher average teams will rise to the top, and the lower averages will settle at the bottom.  Even if it's broken up one week, it will return right back to where it was the following week. 

But with a traditional schedule, in our scratch league there's really only a couple of weeks every third that matter.  Have to take it to the top 2 or 3 teams, and then the rest you can kind of cruise against.  We could have picked who was going to finish in what place at the beginning of the season and not had to bowl the next 33 weeks because we already knew.  Competition will usually end like that, but if you make it TOO casual, no reason to show up. 

Just can't come up with anything that doesn't have some massive dealbreaking hole in it. 

Having every week as a position round truly sucks. I bowled a summer league several years that did this and left the league because of the every-week-is-a-position-round-format.

Here is what happens; within a few weeks, everyone settles into small groups that continue to bowl each other, there becomes very little movement up or down the rankings. So consider having to bowl with someone you would rather not be on the same pair with, EVERY WEEK for a couple of months. It happens at the top, middle and bottom.

True.  I bowl a draft league where they rank you by individual points as well, so if you're a good performing member on a lousy team, you still get paid by the number of points you won for your team too. 

Here is an idea that I have kicked around for a few years now, but have not tried. The thing is, once a team is too far behind in a season, then we tend to lose interest. One way to help with that issue would be to have a "Singles" league running concurrent with your Team league. Each night/day your team is bowling another team, but you as an individual are bowling a singles match as well.

The person your are bowling against for the singles league may or may not be(odds are they won't) on the team your team is bowling against. Add a couple of dollars to the weekly dues and it all goes to the singles league prize fund except for the small fee to the league secretary.


Kinda like having a fantasy baseball, football, basketball etc team when your favorite team sucks that season.