Have you ever wondered where and when SuperCoach originated? Once of the lynchpins behind SuperCoach's lifespan is Peter Jankulovski from VaporMedia, and he shares his experiences, thoughts of the future and his SuperCoach team with SuperCoach HQ right here!
SC co-creator Peter Jankulovski
Firstly, which AFL club to you support?
A die-hard, one-eyed (is there any other type?) Pies supporter/member. Going just a bit ordinary at the moment which is a little disappointing, but it's hard not to have high expectations after the last couple of seasons.
Do you play both SuperCoach and DreamTeam? Which do you prefer?
Yep, and I love them both equally ;). Each have their unique qualities and advantages.
Tell us about VaporMedia.
We've been around since mid-2000, launching our first games in 2001 - interestingly enough with 3 AFL products including what is now Dream Team, a week-by-week game and funnily enough, the country's very first draft style competition (later retired temporarily for several years due to lack of interest). We followed up with the official AFL Dream Team competition in 2002, launched across multiple sports in 2003 and started SuperCoach with News Ltd in 2006. There is a team of 7 who look after all of our competitions, plus a small number of content providers who have come out of the community built around our games!
How many fantasy sports do they power?
We design, create and manage up to approx. 40-50 games each year, including a large number of tipping games. These include 12 sports and cover multiple leagues and all major global sporting events, particularly with football (soccer) and cricket. In addition to AFL and NRL SuperCoach and various others, we power the official games for just about all of the official sports bodies in Aus, including obviously the AFL and NRL (DT), NBL, Football Australia (A-League) and Cricket Australia. These are across a range of game types (salary cap, draft style, regular/eliminator/odds-based tipping), and across multiple platforms (online, mobile, iOS, Android, devices such as T-Hub etc). Vapormedia's games power approx. 90% of fantasy sports games in Australia, with around 1.3 million registrations/users.
Which is the most bizarre? In my opinion, fantasy V8s.
V8s actually goes quite well, has a very dedicated and loyal following similar to F1 and MotoGP. One of the more quirky and bizarre ones if you like, was a Greyhound racing fantasy game that we ran a couple of times around 2009. Kennel of Dreams! Quite funny at the time.
What do you see on the horizon for fantasy footy?
It's quite an exciting time in the fantasy sports space, with the products and acceptance maturing very well! It's incredible to see how much more serious and involving its become - you could be averaging 1900-2000 and barely be able to get into the top 100k this season - in past years that would have been good for a ranking in the top 20k! Our core games continue to evolve and innovate - we introduced the SuperCoach Gold and Assistant Coach services last year and they have been immensely successful with some massive growth in 2012.
Plus some great new features around dual player/DPP trading and social media leagues, which have been welcomed and accepted well beyond our expectations. We make about 60-80 changes and improvements to the games every season, 3-5 of which are very new and significant - and that trend will continue for 2013 and beyond.
Expect to see much more innovation in the mobile/app space, some new game concepts and significant changes and new additions in draft style games (which are getting there, if a bit slowly). We also hope to have at least a couple of other new concepts and games running in 2013. We are incredibly excited about a very new and unique game we are currently working on for international markets and to launch our international brand - but will no doubt make its way to AFL and NRL sooner rather than later. It combines more traditional team management with fantasy and is unlike anything else out there - and will be, initially at least, exclusive to iOS devices.
And of course we are incredibly proud of the brilliant fan sites and the community that has spawned around our products - the dedication is fantastic and we love to interact and work with them and support them where possible!
If the A-League is televised on free-to-air next season, could we see a complicated scoring formula for Fantasy A-League as well?
Highly unlikely. One big issue is the availability of such stats. The other is the actual sport itself. AFL (and to a large degree NRL) is quite unique in many respects - obviously the end match result is of the highest importance, but it is quite common for both fans and the media to come away from each game and actually caring about and discussing individual player performances - how many possessions, disposals, effectiveness are very commonly talked about on an individual player level. There are very few sports around the world that can claim such interest in deep player statistics from their fans actually, and footy in particular is very unique in that respect - which makes for great fantasy sports games.
Soccer on the other hand is essentially all about the team, the end result, who scored the goal/s, whether the team kept a clean sheet, etc - and this is all the fans care about. To a very large degree, neither the fans nor the media discuss how many defensive/offensive tackles a player may have made in a match, how many passes they made, how many times they possessed/kicked the ball, how many metres they ran etc and how relevant they may be - all that matters is who won and who scored the goals.
And this is largely reflected in fantasy soccer games and their stats/scoring systems around the world -including ours.
Having said that, you never know - would be quite interesting to have a play with stats on a deeper level!
What is your SuperCoach team name and who have been your best players in 2012?
Pete's SuperPies is doing as well as it ever has been! Currently averaging 2121 - not spectacular, but it's sitting just outside the top 10k and I'm by no means an expert! My squad is what you would call a bit... generic :) - but in a good way. 20 trades left at the end of Rd 6. Not sure that I can single out any number of players, but some really poor captain choices have been costly (Pendles in Rd 3, Murphy in Rd 6, not hitting up the little master with the big C often enough) , the usual dilemmas with inconsistent GWS youngsters, Morris or Ellis (just about always the wrong one!) etc.
Except for one round, been relatively lucky with this year's injury carnage. I traded out Shaw and Fyfe at the right time, bought in Roughead - regretted it at the time, but he's coming good! Had to trade Ablett one week late, bought in Kennedy and saved a bit of cash. I also started with Goodes, which perhaps wasn't the smartest choice given that he's traditionally a slow starter - but at least consistent... up until this week! So if Gaz comes back this week, it causes some major thought and hitting of that Reverse Changes button. Otherwise I'm going from Goodes to Sidebottom and doing a straight swap from Clay Smith to Horsley. This leaves enough in the bank to bring in Gazza next week by upgrading a Magner or a Shiel (for a total of 5 premium mids). Might be good without him this week regardless - SC Gold is projecting 2305 - will take that!
I'm ineligible for the major prize (because I'm good enough for it.. hah!), so purely playing for leagues, and making changes, taking it one week at a time (! :-)) depending on the quality of my opposition.
Here it is: http://supercoach.heraldsun.com.au/?p=other_teams&tid=2
Were you involved in the production of the SuperCoach scoring system? Do you know the formula?
No we weren't - the SuperCoach scoring system (or player rankings as was previously known :)) had existed for several years before SuperCoach came along actually, and is the work of the very clever stats gurus at Champion Data.
They had been published in the Herald Sun exclusively for a number of years, before they were married to a fantasy comp between News Ltd and ourselves. And no, we don't know anything more about the formula than anyone else playing in the general public!
Thanks for your time, best of luck for the season.
Cheers.
Follow Peter on Twitter - @petejank
A die-hard, one-eyed (is there any other type?) Pies supporter/member. Going just a bit ordinary at the moment which is a little disappointing, but it's hard not to have high expectations after the last couple of seasons.
Do you play both SuperCoach and DreamTeam? Which do you prefer?
Yep, and I love them both equally ;). Each have their unique qualities and advantages.
Tell us about VaporMedia.
We've been around since mid-2000, launching our first games in 2001 - interestingly enough with 3 AFL products including what is now Dream Team, a week-by-week game and funnily enough, the country's very first draft style competition (later retired temporarily for several years due to lack of interest). We followed up with the official AFL Dream Team competition in 2002, launched across multiple sports in 2003 and started SuperCoach with News Ltd in 2006. There is a team of 7 who look after all of our competitions, plus a small number of content providers who have come out of the community built around our games!
How many fantasy sports do they power?
We design, create and manage up to approx. 40-50 games each year, including a large number of tipping games. These include 12 sports and cover multiple leagues and all major global sporting events, particularly with football (soccer) and cricket. In addition to AFL and NRL SuperCoach and various others, we power the official games for just about all of the official sports bodies in Aus, including obviously the AFL and NRL (DT), NBL, Football Australia (A-League) and Cricket Australia. These are across a range of game types (salary cap, draft style, regular/eliminator/odds-based tipping), and across multiple platforms (online, mobile, iOS, Android, devices such as T-Hub etc). Vapormedia's games power approx. 90% of fantasy sports games in Australia, with around 1.3 million registrations/users.
Which is the most bizarre? In my opinion, fantasy V8s.
V8s actually goes quite well, has a very dedicated and loyal following similar to F1 and MotoGP. One of the more quirky and bizarre ones if you like, was a Greyhound racing fantasy game that we ran a couple of times around 2009. Kennel of Dreams! Quite funny at the time.
What do you see on the horizon for fantasy footy?
It's quite an exciting time in the fantasy sports space, with the products and acceptance maturing very well! It's incredible to see how much more serious and involving its become - you could be averaging 1900-2000 and barely be able to get into the top 100k this season - in past years that would have been good for a ranking in the top 20k! Our core games continue to evolve and innovate - we introduced the SuperCoach Gold and Assistant Coach services last year and they have been immensely successful with some massive growth in 2012.
Plus some great new features around dual player/DPP trading and social media leagues, which have been welcomed and accepted well beyond our expectations. We make about 60-80 changes and improvements to the games every season, 3-5 of which are very new and significant - and that trend will continue for 2013 and beyond.
Expect to see much more innovation in the mobile/app space, some new game concepts and significant changes and new additions in draft style games (which are getting there, if a bit slowly). We also hope to have at least a couple of other new concepts and games running in 2013. We are incredibly excited about a very new and unique game we are currently working on for international markets and to launch our international brand - but will no doubt make its way to AFL and NRL sooner rather than later. It combines more traditional team management with fantasy and is unlike anything else out there - and will be, initially at least, exclusive to iOS devices.
And of course we are incredibly proud of the brilliant fan sites and the community that has spawned around our products - the dedication is fantastic and we love to interact and work with them and support them where possible!
If the A-League is televised on free-to-air next season, could we see a complicated scoring formula for Fantasy A-League as well?
Highly unlikely. One big issue is the availability of such stats. The other is the actual sport itself. AFL (and to a large degree NRL) is quite unique in many respects - obviously the end match result is of the highest importance, but it is quite common for both fans and the media to come away from each game and actually caring about and discussing individual player performances - how many possessions, disposals, effectiveness are very commonly talked about on an individual player level. There are very few sports around the world that can claim such interest in deep player statistics from their fans actually, and footy in particular is very unique in that respect - which makes for great fantasy sports games.
Soccer on the other hand is essentially all about the team, the end result, who scored the goal/s, whether the team kept a clean sheet, etc - and this is all the fans care about. To a very large degree, neither the fans nor the media discuss how many defensive/offensive tackles a player may have made in a match, how many passes they made, how many times they possessed/kicked the ball, how many metres they ran etc and how relevant they may be - all that matters is who won and who scored the goals.
And this is largely reflected in fantasy soccer games and their stats/scoring systems around the world -including ours.
Having said that, you never know - would be quite interesting to have a play with stats on a deeper level!
What is your SuperCoach team name and who have been your best players in 2012?
Pete's SuperPies is doing as well as it ever has been! Currently averaging 2121 - not spectacular, but it's sitting just outside the top 10k and I'm by no means an expert! My squad is what you would call a bit... generic :) - but in a good way. 20 trades left at the end of Rd 6. Not sure that I can single out any number of players, but some really poor captain choices have been costly (Pendles in Rd 3, Murphy in Rd 6, not hitting up the little master with the big C often enough) , the usual dilemmas with inconsistent GWS youngsters, Morris or Ellis (just about always the wrong one!) etc.
Except for one round, been relatively lucky with this year's injury carnage. I traded out Shaw and Fyfe at the right time, bought in Roughead - regretted it at the time, but he's coming good! Had to trade Ablett one week late, bought in Kennedy and saved a bit of cash. I also started with Goodes, which perhaps wasn't the smartest choice given that he's traditionally a slow starter - but at least consistent... up until this week! So if Gaz comes back this week, it causes some major thought and hitting of that Reverse Changes button. Otherwise I'm going from Goodes to Sidebottom and doing a straight swap from Clay Smith to Horsley. This leaves enough in the bank to bring in Gazza next week by upgrading a Magner or a Shiel (for a total of 5 premium mids). Might be good without him this week regardless - SC Gold is projecting 2305 - will take that!
I'm ineligible for the major prize (because I'm good enough for it.. hah!), so purely playing for leagues, and making changes, taking it one week at a time (! :-)) depending on the quality of my opposition.
Here it is: http://supercoach.heraldsun.com.au/?p=other_teams&tid=2
Were you involved in the production of the SuperCoach scoring system? Do you know the formula?
No we weren't - the SuperCoach scoring system (or player rankings as was previously known :)) had existed for several years before SuperCoach came along actually, and is the work of the very clever stats gurus at Champion Data.
They had been published in the Herald Sun exclusively for a number of years, before they were married to a fantasy comp between News Ltd and ourselves. And no, we don't know anything more about the formula than anyone else playing in the general public!
Thanks for your time, best of luck for the season.
Cheers.
Follow Peter on Twitter - @petejank