How scoring works

Every roster in 20-0 turns into a projected record through a simple, transparent model. Understanding it is the difference between hoping for a perfect season and building one. Here's the whole chain, step by step.

Step 1 — Each player has one rating

Every player-season carries an era-normalized overall rating from 0 to 100. "Era-normalized" means production is judged against the league context of that exact season, then blended with era-proof signals of greatness — titles, major awards, all-time accolades — so a star from the 1970s and a star from today sit on the same scale. That single number is all the simulation reads from a player; the displayed stats are there for your judgment, not for the math.

Step 2 — Your roster becomes one strength number

The roster's position-weighted average of those ratings is its overall strength. A few positions carry a slight premium (the ones that swing games most), but every starter counts — which is why a single low rating drags the whole team down. There's no separate "weak-link penalty"; the weak link simply lowers the average, and that's enough to matter.

Step 3 — Strength maps to wins on a curve

This is the key idea. Wins don't scale in a straight line with strength. Up to an "easy floor," a competent roster racks up wins cheaply. Past that floor, the curve gets convex — each additional win toward a perfect record demands a steeper jump in strength than the one before it. The last few wins are by far the hardest, so the gap between a very good roster (say 16–17 wins) and a perfect one (20-0) is much larger than the raw rating difference looks.

The practical consequence: near the top, every point of average rating is worth more. Raising your roster from a 86 to an 88 average might be the difference between a heartbreaking 19-1 and a flawless 20-0, while the same two points lower down barely moves your record.

Step 4 — Points and record always agree

Your displayed score (points) and your projected record come from the same underlying number, so they can never disagree — a higher score is always a better team. This is also what the leaderboards rank you by, so two players with the same record are separated by the underlying quality of their rosters.

Why a perfect season is rare

The curve is deliberately calibrated against a difficulty harness that simulates thousands of drafts, so that even optimal play reaches 20-0 only a fraction of the time. That's the point: a perfect season should feel earned. If you want to turn the curve to your advantage, read how to build a 20-0 roster.