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Over the past few years, we have given the subscribers of Footballguys.com some help in playing office pools, one of the most popular methods to follow the NFL aside from fantasy football leagues. For the past few seasons, the staff members have done the Staff Confidence Pool Challenge, where numerous staffers try and pick the winners each week with a confidence ranking, and Jeff Pasquino’s “For The Win” column where Jeff attempts to pick each and every NFL game against the Las Vegas spread. Both of these have been very popular features, so this year Footballguys is adding a combination of the two called the “Against the Spread” Challenge and also the Eliminator Challenge, where staffers have to pick a team to win each week. Just one? That sounds easy, but here is the catch – you can only pick the team you choose in a given week once all season long. Many contests and pools out there get pretty big, so an Eliminator (or Survivor) Pool can go 16 or 17 weeks.
Jeff Pasquino has provided some insight into this kind of contest with two pre-season articles, first one that describes this kind of contest along with some advice on how to pick a team each week:
The second article is rather interesting, which describes Jeff’s preseason plan to get all the way through 17 weeks. Will it work? We are about to find out.
This pool will run all season long, but to keep participation up, the pool will crown the staffer with the best W-L record for the season (which means that everyone in the pool will continue to make picks every week).
THIS WEEK'S PICK SUMMARY
Here are the picks for this week.
Staff Member | Record | Wk01 | Wk02 | Wk03 | Wk04 | Wk05 | Wk06 | Wk07 | Wk08 | Wk09 | Wk10 | Wk11 | Wk12 | Wk13 | Wk14 | Wk15 | Wk16 | Wk17 |
Andy Hicks | 12-0 | SEA | NE | GB | CIN | MIN | TEN | KC | DAL | SD | BAL | PIT | BUF | DEN | ||||
Matt Bitonti | 12-0 | KC | BAL | MIA | CIN | PIT | NE | GB | NYJ | DAL | AZ | NYG | BUF | OAK | ||||
William Grant | 12-0 | SEA | CAR | MIA | WASH | GB | BUF | DEN | NE | KC | AZ | NYG | TEN | NO | ||||
Clayton Gray | 11-1 | SEA | DEN | MIA | CIN | MIN | NE | ATL | NYJ | DAL | BAL | NYG | TEN | OAK | ||||
Mark Wimer | 11-1 | KC | BAL | MIA | MIN | NE | PIT | CIN | NYJ | DAL | AZ | OAK | NYG | DEN | ||||
Aaron Rudnicki | 11-1 | HOU | CAR | MIA | AZ | GB | BUF | CIN | DEN | KC | AZ | DET | NO | NE | ||||
Bear Heiser | 10-2 | GB | CAR | SEA | CIN | PIT | BUF | ATL | NYJ | DAL | AZ | KC | NYG | NE | ||||
Jeff Pasquino | 10-2 | HOU | CAR | MIA | AZ | NE | BUF | CIN | MIN | KC | BAL | OAK | NYG | DEN | ||||
Andrew Garda | 10-2 | PHI | BAL | NYG | HOU | OAK | BUF | DEN | MIN | KC | AZ | PIT | TEN | SEA | ||||
Jeff Haseley | 10-2 | KC | SEA | DAL | CIN | MIN | AZ | DEN | NE | GB | BAL | NYG | BUF | NO | ||||
James Brimacombe | 10-2 | INDY | CAR | MIA | WASH | NE | BUF | CIN | MIN | DAL | AZ | PIT | NO | GB | ||||
John Mamula | 9-3 | SEA | CAR | MIA | HOU | NE | PIT | CIN | MIN | GB | AZ | OAK | NYG | DEN | ||||
Alex Miglio | 9-3 | SEA | CAR | MIA | DET | GB | AZ | ATL | MIN | DAL | BAL | NE | BUF | DEN | ||||
Chris Kuczynski | 9-3 | KC | BAL | MIA | DET | PHI | AZ | CIN | OAK | DAL | GB | PIT | NYG | DEN | ||||
Ari Ingel | 9-3 | SEA | TEN | AZ | CIN | NE | DET | GB | MIN | SD | BAL | KC | NO | DEN | ||||
Justin Bonnema | 9-3 | HOU | JAX | MIA | CIN | MIN | BUF | TB | DET | DAL | BAL | KC | NYG | ATL | ||||
Justin Howe | 9-3 | BAL | DET | MIA | HOU | PHI | BUF | NE | MIN | KC | AZ | NYG | NO | X | ||||
Devin Knotts | 9-3 | HOU | DET | MIA | CAR | NE | GB | CIN | NYJ | ATL | BAL | PIT | NO | DEN | ||||
Jason Wood | 8-4 | HOU | NYJ | TB | AZ | NE | CAR | OAK | MIN | NO | AZ | NYG | BUF | DEN | ||||
Chris Feery | 8-4 | SEA | OAK | CAR | AZ | NE | PIT | DEN | DAL | KC | NYG | DET | BUF | GB | ||||
Dave Larkin | 7-5 | HOU | CAR | SEA | NE | PIT | GB | BUF | MIN | NO | AZ | KC | DAL | OAK |
DISCUSSION
Last week was a stellar week for the staff, as all 21 selections were successful. That's a pretty good achievement in September, but even better on Thanksgiving weekend. That leaves just five weeks in the regular season and we still have three undefeated staff members (Will Grant, Matt Bitonti and Andy Hicks). Can they keep their perfect records?
With the picks in for the week, we have a clear top choice - Denver. The Broncos were chosen nine times, which really stands out as five members of the staff had already used Denver. That means over half of the staff that still had Denver chose to use the Broncos this week, including Andy Hicks who has a 12-0 record. Oakland came in as a distant second with three picks, including one from one of our leaders (Matt Bitonti). Only the Packers (hosting Houston) and the Patriots (big favorites at home against Los Angeles) had more than one selection, but both teams had been used extensively already. Only five of the staff still had the Patriots left at their disposal (which does beg the question as to why the other three did not pick them as 13-14 point favorites this week). Three unique picks round out the group with single selections of Atlanta, Seattle and New Orleans. The Saints were chosen by our third co-leader, Will Grant, who clearly had some tough choices to make with New England and Denver no longer available. This is going to be quite the week to watch the results.
Note - a late pick came in that added the Saints by Jeff Haseley, so that makes two for New Orleans.
Please note a few things: We will be doing these picks every week, win or lose, to keep it entertaining all season long. Normally a Survivor / Eliminator pool would end once all but one player lost once, but to provide our subscribers with more perspectives, everyone will pick every week even if they lose. That said, we will still try and honor the spirit of an Eliminator / Survivor Pool, trying to win every week and not re-use any teams during the year.
COMMENTARY
Each week, contestants are invited to submit any comments that they might have about their picks. If they submit them early enough, we post them with the article. If not, the comments will be within the section below.
Jeff Pasquino: I decided to go away from the script of my preseason plan, where I picked Chicago hosting San Francisco, partially because the Bears are a mess and partially due to the 49ers playing some competitive football of late. The point spread in that game is too close to call (under three points), which means there have to be better options. I chose to use my preseason Week 14 pick in Denver, which went with the consensus this week as the Broncos travel to Jacksonville for a must win game. The Broncos cannot afford to drop any more games that they should win after the heartbreaking overtime loss at home last Sunday to Kansas City. I believe that Denver gets it done this week, and that I can also find a reasonable option for Week 14 to replace Denver.
The Pick: Broncos
Good luck this weekend!
Questions, suggestions and comments are always welcome to pasquino@footballguys.com.