Another suggestion - Making players play every game

[Johnahl]

Use part of their take-home winnings in a separate pool to determine actual take-home winnings. The method I'll describe takes a little computer work, but since the computers are already in place it wouldn't be too hard to implement.

I will use as an example the Round 4 Group 73 players that went home. Each player qualified for a $17,000 win. I suggest taking $2,000 from each player so they will still go home with at least $15,000. The other $2,000 from each player or $6,000 is paid back by their % of wins with all players in that group only. This will insure that no matter who they are playing, they will be compensated for every win.

Here are the results from Group 73. The 3 player's going home were Strickland, Adkins and Nick Van Den Berg. Total wins for these players were 33, 36 and 27 respectively. Total wins being 96 and their %'s 34.38, 37.5 and 28.13 respectively.

Final prize money for these players:

Earl $17,060
Adkins $17,250
Nick $16,690

If Nick VDB had won one additional game:

Earl $17,040
Adkins $17,230
Nick $16,730

Of course you could use larger portions of their prize money, but I don't think you should go too far. I don't think it would be fair to take away a large portion of their winnings if they had a really bad round.

Anyway JMHO.

 

[ineedaspot]

Actually, I would be in favor of substantially changing the payout structure so that each match you win would be worth say $1000, and then on top of that you get prize money for however far you make it in the tournament. You'd have to reduce the prize money paid out at the end of each round in order to pay the $1000 per match won, but if you calibrate it correctly, you could set the numbers in such a way that everyone basically ends up with the same amount of money as the way it is new (give or take a couple thousand).

But the incentive to win each match would definitely be there in that case. Also, in terms of the yearly money rankings, you would definitely want to play hard each match because every match you win affects your overall money ranking in a direct way. As it is now, your win % will only matter at the end of the year if there is a tie in the money ranking.

 

[Johnahl]

Actually, I would be in favor of substantially changing the payout structure so that each match you win would be worth say $1000, and then on top of that you get prize money for however far you make it in the tournament. You'd have to reduce the prize money paid out at the end of each round in order to pay the $1000 per match won, but if you calibrate it correctly, you could set the numbers in such a way that everyone basically ends up with the same amount of money as the way it is new (give or take a couple thousand).

But the incentive to win each match would definitely be there in that case. Also, in terms of the yearly money rankings, you would definitely want to play hard each match because every match you win affects your overall money ranking in a direct way. As it is now, your win % will only matter at the end of the year if there is a tie in the money ranking.

My suggestion is to make sure players play out a round even if they know that can't possibly win.