Ha! It's Back! RealJohnBoy's A2K NFL "Pick-Um" Game!

They know nothing about football. To select their coaches, NFL team owners usually head down to the local hardware store or pizzeria and promote one of the managers into a coaching position without any formal training or experience.

WEEK #10:

Atlanta
Tennessee
Cleveland
Indianapolis
Minnesota
Buffalo
Tampa Bay
Houston
Kansas City
Giants
St Louis
'Zona
Pittsburgh
Philadelphia, 31 - 20

I didn't know that Tico. But they are not the ones I meant.

Tell me--in the standings there is a column for ties. How do you get a tie?

Also- if a match is played between teams not in the same division is it classed as a "friendly"? Are top players rested? Is effort and concentration allowed to relax?

a tie occurs when the teams are still tied at the end of the 15-minute overtime session.
for the playoffs, they play as many overtime sessions as it takes to determine a winner...
no...
the resting of players usually occurs late in the season, and has to do with playoff standings, not opponent...
no.
football coaches tend to demand 110% from their players at all times...

I've been a football coach RP and what I demanded I didn't necessarily get and my teams weren't multi-millionaires.

Ask Donovan McNabb ...

NFL'ers tend to follow instruction because they realize they have a small window to make their moolah...

There's a difference RP between 100% and 99%. They are dealing with small fractions of a second and the only way to get an athlete at 100% in a "friendly" is to get him angry. It's psychological and there's nothing an athlete can do about it. He is, in the parlance, not in the "zone". And the zone is extremely tiring.

A cricket batsman has about 0.5 secs from the ball leaving the bowler's hand at 90 mph to it arriving. If it pitches 5 yards in front of him and has swung in through the air and then goes away off the pitch he has about 0.12 secs to adjust his stroke. The close fielders are chattering among themselves about what hot stuff his wife is, that's called sledging, the crowd are roaring and and millions of viewers are watching. If he isn't in the zone he won't last long.

It's a form of torture really. There's nowhere to hide. The crease is a very lonely place. Baseball batters can't get in the zone because they are not there long enough.



He was trying to force a draw (tie). England were dead. And he succeeded. The innings will never be forgotten whilever the English language is spoken.

It was FANTASTIC. He broke the South African bowler's hearts.

In a word, bullshit.

WEEK #9-
We seem to be getting smarter! As a group we finished with a record of 194-105 (.649). That is our best week this season. Had the Patriots and the Colts won, we would be at .769 for the week.
Spendius came in at 12-1, missing on just the NE-Cleveland game. EhBeth had a fine week, going 12-2 with miscues on the same game plus Indy's loss to Philly.
Lmur, LiontamerX, AndyClubber, Ragman, JPB and Osso finished at 10-3 followed by Panzade, Fbaezer, Cowdoc, McGentrix and Tico at 9-4. CoastalRat, Ms Cowdoc and Johnboy went 8-5 while Edgar and Region could only manage to go 7-6.
In negative territory for the week were Rhys, George and Mysteryman at 6-7 while Alex (last week's winner) and Jespah stumbled in at 5-8.
The best expert on ESPN was 10-2 while the worst was 8-5.

Standings After 9 Weeks-

And the rich get richer while the poor.... I am working on a tax on the people at the top.
1) Spendius (83-47 .638) claims sole possession of 1st and has a 2 game lead over...
2) JPB (81-49 .623) who slips out of a tie for 1st
3) LiontamerX (80-50 .615) stays in 3rd but is now 3 games back
4) Ragman (79-51 .608) holds 4th and is 4 games behind
5) Panzade (75-55 .577) remains in 5th but now has company
5) Ehbeth moves up 4 slots from 9th
5) AndyClubber climbs from 8th
8) McGentrix (74-55 .574) slips from 7th
9) Ms Cowdoc (74-56 .569) slumps from 5th
10) Cowdoc (73-57 .562) gives up a notch from 9th
11) Tico (71-59 .546) stays in 11th
11) Osso moves up from 14th
13) Edgar (69-60 .535) drops from 11th
14) CoastalRat (69-61 .531) remains in 14th
15) JohnBoy (68-62 .523) climbs from 19th
16) Rhys (67-63 .519) slips from 14th
17) George (59-55 .518) slumps from 13th
18) Mysteryman (67-63 .515) is down from 14th
19) Jespah (66-64 .508) spirals down from 14th
20) Region (65-65 .500) breaks even, holding 20th
21) Lmur (63-67 .485) moves up from 22nd
22) Fbaezer (61-69 .469) gets out of the cellar so that
23) Alex (60-69 .465) can move back in

The best ESPN expert (.638) would now be in a tie for 1st after being ahead of us all last week. The least successful expert (.492) remains in 21st.
Drive on!

(ps. I am pleased to welcome a new player for the rest of the season. He is a George Washington quarter with the Wright Brothers airplane on the back.
The North Carolina coin in our mint's state quarter series. He goes by the name CoinToss50/50).

I don't wish to seem ungallant and curmudgeonly Johnnie but surely Beth is on 11-2.

Did you know that Jets, Chargers,Bears,Vikes,Eagles and Raiders games were all knife edge affairs. 3 went to OT.

I had performed my devotions to the Great Goddess of Fortune.

You are right re Ehbeth: 11-2 not 12-2 in a week that had 13 games. The standings are correct. The typo was in the narrative. Thanks for the noting the error.

Cricket batters can't get in the zone right away. And only a few can maintain it for any length of time. Baseball batters are not there long enough. And they only do hit or miss. It's obviously very skilful. The hand/eye co-ordination combined with strength I assume is the best 300 million can find. I wasn't criticising baseball batters. That would be a silly thing to do. They have to make do with the rules they are given. Which probably evolved from a game first played in schools.

They have no time, or no need, to get in the zone.

By the way, great win this week on a tough Sunday spendius.

I discovered that I can't flip a coin as well as I once did. My thumb doesn't work like it used to. Anyway, CT50/50 goes for Atl, Tn. Cle, Cin, Chi,
Det, TB, Jac, Den, NYG, SL, Sea, NE and Wash.
I am looking forward to Week #10, where we might end up with more spicious standings.

On NPR today was a brief story claiming that, in the English language, 90% of what we say or write consists of only 7,000 words. New words (like blog or tweet) get added each year to the dictionary while other perfectly good words get dropped.
A movement is afoot (savethewords.org) that urges us to adopt a word. We pledge to try to use the word we get once a day. I, of course, signed up. I was assigned the word "spicious" which is an adjective meaning "of a thick consistency."
You can go to that site, get a word and not have to register.
I am thinking I can use the word here to describe the state of mind when some players make their picks.

my word was "obstinate" which describes my picking Dallas week after week.

Your continuing picks of Dallas does seem to evidence spicious logic on your part.

well done