Will 20 Wins be Enough for Playoffs? (28/05/2008 21:48)

OK managers, this is probably an easy question for you, would you be happy if someone came and said that they knew that your team would win 20 games exactly this season? Except for the few active managers who have fallen into a league where their team just overpowers inferior competition or were able to get key pieces at the end of last season to greatly improve, the answer is probably yes. However, for teams in this blogger's good old International 5/62, not only might this number not be good enough for top 3, it might put them in 5th.

Here is the current form at the halfway point in International 5/62
                                              W   D   L         Pts
Fenix                                    13   2   0         41
Pool Man                             12   2   1         38
Of Per Zia                            11   1   3         34 (+26 goal differential)
IFK LIverpool                       11  1   3         34 (+22 goal differential)
Dorchester FC                    11  0   4         33
Espantas                               8  2   5         26
Liverpool Niggaz                  7  2   6         23
Wermacht                             5   3   7         18 (-1 goal differential)
huse mitt                               6   0   9         18 (-5 goal differential)
Forex                                      5   1   9         16
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Amsterdam FC                    3   5    7        14 (-8 goal differential)
youneverwalkbjksiz             4   2    9        14 (-26 goal differential)
-------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
Niebieskie Orlatka              3   2    10       11 (-8 goal differential)
traeff fc                                   3   2    10       11 (-23 goal differential)
GPs Team                            2   4      9        10
Dinamo Ploiesti                   1   1    13         4

Yes, if the top teams even run a little bit worse then the pace they set in the first half of the season, there will be 5 20-win teams at the end of the season. There would definitely be some upset managers considering shows that in some leagues, a 7 or 8 win team currently holds 3rd place. While none of the 5th division International International League  Divisions have 5 11-win teams or more, a decent amount have 5 10-win teams including 22, 38 (where the 5th 10-win team has 6th place), 39, 64, 71 (Top 4 have 12 wins or more), 73, 94, 109 (Top 6 teams have 10 wins or more), 127, 147, 161, 170, 179, 206, 220 (Top 6 teams have 10 wins or more), 232, and 238. Department 29 holds the only noteworthy honorable mention has they have 4 teams with 12 wins or more

What this means is simple, a pretty good amount of great teams will not be getting promotions from this division this year if forms hold. So next time someone, like yours truly, feels that if only they were in a different division they would be in a playoff, remember that there are others out there in your same position. Final word of wisdom, better to be a 20-win team two years in a row in a lower division then a 16-win team who gets promoted and then posts a 0-4-26 record the next season.

NOTE: (If any of my 100-200 readers are in a similar standing league either post it in comments or send me a PM and I will mention it in my next blog which will probably be late Saturday- early Sunday ML time)