How grading works

A claim about the future that can be checked later. Opinions (“the refs were awful”) don't count, and neither does anything posted after the game started. You can add a take we missed, but you can't hide one we found. If something isn't really a prediction, dispute it.

• Yes or no

  “Lions beat the Packers Sunday”

  Settled by what happened. Calling the underdog earns more.

• Head-to-head

  “Chase > Jefferson this year”

  Graded on the stat named when the take was logged (receiving yards here). Losing by a hair still earns a little.

• Number

  “Lions win 12 games”

  Graded on how close you got. Exact is full credit, and credit fades the further off you are.

• Ranking

  “Top 3 QBs: Allen, Lamar, Burrow”

  Credit for every spot you got right or nearly right.

• By a deadline

  “Caleb wins an MVP within 3 years”

  Stays open until the deadline. It can hit early, and only misses when time runs out.

• Vibe take

  “The Jets are cooked”

  No stat settles it, so your group votes when it comes due. It counts for group boards and awards, not public rankings.

Every take gets one stamp when it's graded.

Called it

You were right. The result matched your take, and the less likely it looked when you posted it, the more points a hit earns.

Close

You were at least 60% right, like calling 12 wins when the team won 11. Head-to-head takes that lose by less than 5% also count as close. A close call earns partial credit: it costs less than a miss, and on a long shot it can still come out ahead.

Missed

The result went the other way, or you were under 60% right. A miss costs a point, half a point for a hedge and 1.5 for a lock.

Push

A tie. A push doesn't move your score.

Doesn't count

Not a real call: it was posted after the game started, or it wasn't a prediction at all. It stays out of your score.

Points reward being right when it wasn't obvious. For every take, we work out how likely it looked when you posted it. Then a hit earns more the less likely it was: a safe call earns a little, a long shot earns a lot, up to 10 points. Conviction scales everything: hedges count 0.5× and locks count 1.5×, so a miss costs a point normally, half a point on a hedge and 1.5 on a lock.

How likely? For yes-or-no takes, prediction markets when they exist. For stats, head-to-heads and rankings, we replay the season 4,000 times from preseason projections and see how a take like yours would usually have done. Picking the favorite in a head-to-head (about 65% likely) earns about half a point. Nailing a top 3 in order (about 1 in 8) earns over six. When there's nothing to compare against, we judge how bold the claim was.

Close calls earn partial credit, but rankings and numbers reward nailing it far more than getting near it. Someone who only ever repeats the consensus ends up around zero.

Your points are averaged with 20 imaginary break-even takes, so a hot streak of five doesn't beat a long track record. That becomes a score from 0 to 100, where 50 is a coin flip. You need 25 graded takes in a board to be ranked on it.

• AProphet80 to 100
• BSharp65 to 79
• CCoin Flip45 to 64
• DProfessional Yapper30 to 44
• FCooked0 to 29

The letter is another way of writing your Yap Score: plus and minus split each tier's band into thirds (F has no plus or minus), and the math never changes.

Every take scores in its niche (like NFL), its category (Sports) and overall. To be eligible for King of the Castle you need 25 graded takes overall and at least 10 in 2 different niches.

Some takes can't be settled by a stat, like “the Jets are cooked.” In a group, those go to a vote when they come due: aged well, mixed, or aged badly. It takes at least 3 votes, and you can't vote on your own take. Group verdicts count on group boards and at Sentencing Night, but never on public leaderboards.

At the end of each season, every group gets its own awards, each one backed by the record.

Biggest yapper

Most messages sent.

Called it

The season's best single take.

Aged like milk

The season's worst single take.

Flip-flopper

Switched sides on the same take the most.

Greatest hit

The most-reacted message of the season.

No fear

Most bold calls that actually hit.

Most delusional

Voted by the group.

Biggest homer

Voted by the group.