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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 pre-season 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, along with the results and standings so far:
Staff Member | Record | Wk01 | Wk02 | Wk03 | Wk04 | Wk05 | Wk06 | Wk07 | Wk08 | Wk09 | Wk10 | Wk11 | Wk12 | Wk13 | Wk14 | Wk15 | Wk16 | Wk17 |
Aaron Rudnicki | 4-1 | GB | NO | SEA | SD | NYG | DEN | |||||||||||
Alex Miglio | 4-1 | GB | NO | SEA | INDY | ATL | NYJ | |||||||||||
James Brimacombe | 4-1 | GB | INDY | NE | INDY | DEN | SEA | |||||||||||
Jason Wood | 4-1 | GB | NO | INDY | SD | NYG | NYJ | |||||||||||
Chris Feery | 4-1 | DEN | NO | INDY | SEA | NYG | NE | |||||||||||
Dave Larkin | 4-1 | DAL | NO | NE | ATL | GB | MIN | |||||||||||
Jeff Pasquino | 4-1 | DAL | INDY | NE | GB | ATL | SEA | |||||||||||
Steve Buzzard | 4-1 | DAL | MIA | NE | SEA | GB | NYJ | |||||||||||
Jeff Haseley | 4-1 | GB | NO | SEA | SD | ATL | NYJ | |||||||||||
Maurile Tremblay | 4-1 | SEA | NE | CAR | CIN | AZ | TEN | |||||||||||
Andrew Garda | 3-2 | MIA | AZ | CIN | BUF | BAL | HOU | |||||||||||
Dan Hindery | 3-2 | NE | BAL | HOU | SEA | KC | NYJ | |||||||||||
Ari Ingel | 3-2 | JAX | BAL | SEA | INDY | KC | DEN | |||||||||||
John Lee | 3-2 | NYJ | NO | CAR | INDY | BAL | GB | |||||||||||
Justin Howe | 3-2 | CIN | BAL | CAR | SD | KC | TEN | |||||||||||
Andy Hicks | 3-2 | DEN | INDY | NE | SEA | KC | GB | |||||||||||
William Grant | 3-2 | DAL | MIA | SEA | DEN | BAL | NYJ | |||||||||||
Justin Bonnema | 3-2 | NYJ | MIA | NYG | INDY | BAL | PHI | |||||||||||
Clayton Gray | 3-2 | GB | NO | NE | AZ | ATL | DET | |||||||||||
Mark Wimer | 3-2 | GB | TEN | NE | OAK | NYG | NYJ | |||||||||||
Steve Holloway | 3-2 | MIA | INDY | SEA | BUF | ATL | NE | |||||||||||
Matt Bitonti | 3-2 | NYJ | MIA | SEA | OAK | GB | CIN | |||||||||||
Bear Heiser | 3-2 | MIN | BAL | SEA | SD | GB | CIN |
DISCUSSION
After being the last undefeated staffer, Andrew Garda has stumbled two weeks in a row and thus made this quite the contest again. Everyone is either 4-1 or 3-2 on the season, and with eight more losses last week due to Kansas City (4) and Baltimore (4), it is really tight. Throw in the biggest mix of picks yet this year for Week 6 and we are sure to see a shakeup in the standings come Tuesday.
The picks this week are the longest list of teams yet with 11 different selections. Only one team (the New York Jets) received more than two votes this week, and even that one does not feel like a lock to me. Sure, New York is hosting Washington after the Jets had a bye week, but Washington forced Atlanta to go to overtime to get a home win. I do not think the Jets will get an easy win this week. The rest of the picks are scattered with Cincinnati, Denver, Green Bay, New England, Seattle and Tennessee all getting two votes while four more teams (Philadelphia, Minnesota, Houston and Detroit) all had unique choices for Week 6. With some of these teams on the road and some at 0-5 (Detroit) there is a lot of opportunity to get a big win or drop further behind this week.
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: Another somewhat tricky week but I am sticking with my preseason plan here and taking what feels like a sure win with Seattle at home against Carolina. Nothing is certain, but I like a home team with a good home field advantage where Las Vegas expects a touchdown victory, plus I do not see many future easier games for the Seahawks.
Will Grant: Ok - enough messing around. Once again the 'easy steal' turned into a loss for me. I'm going with the Jets this week after a bye. Washington offense is struggling and the Jets should be able to handle them at home. Still trying to save New England and Green Bay for later in the year, but getting cute has cost me twice now and it's time to just hunker down and make solid picks from week to week.
Clayton Gray: I have no idea what an easy win is anymore, so I'm going with the winless Lions. Are they bad enough to go 0-6? Hope not.
Good luck this weekend!
Questions, suggestions and comments are always welcome to pasquino@footballguys.com.