@CoastalRat,
Congratulations, Coastal Rat! The Pick-um game is fun for a bunch of reasons - some of it is the camaraderie of despair with others who made the same poor choices, the joys of guessing right, the dread of getting most games completely wrong, the sometimes circumstance of being sure of your choice and then right about it.
US style football is in many ways an ugly game, but I've followed it for a long time, starting with our grammar school team at St. Nick's. It's one of the good things about Autumn, for me anyway.