Congratulations to Grant Ingersoll who wins Week 12 with a score of 112.
Grant’s rant:
“Who would have thought my football pool returns (currently at break-even) would be the envy of almost every hedge fund manager in the country? This now clears the path for me to go after my picks with total wreckless abandon (ala Brandon Morris) in a hope to dethrone Austin. How in the world does Austin do it? This is a guy who uses a Mac to brush his teeth, proposed to his wife via IM, and spent every waking moment this fall either playing original nintendo games on his watch or programming traffic signals to turn green as any Archibald approaches. Does he actually watch the games or just hack into Jordan’s computer on Mondays? This being an era when Volkswagen is the most valuable company in the world for a day and Utah is going to another BCS bowl, I say anything is possible…so maybe Austin is an all-world pick-em genius. Two things I know for sure:
1) if Utah play USC (my other alma mater) in a bowl, I will take all bets
2) my commute home is going to have a lot more red lights”
This was a long time coming for Grant. After bailing on the pool a couple of years ago, we welcomed him back with open arms. Hopefully this win will keep him with us for another year.
Our second place finisher for the week was fan favorite Craig Bench with a score of 108. One point behind Craig was Dave Christiansen and then Ryan Baughman after him with a 105. Other top scores for Week 12 were Olivier Quinn and Mark Blake, both at 103 points.
Grant’s win moved him all the way up to 5th place in our overall standings, positioning himself nicely for a push into out top 3 by the end of the season. Ryan also slid up the standings and is now in a tie for second place with Rawley. Looks to be a pretty tight race to the finish. Doing his best impression of Ryan Curtis, Justin Alanis continued his free fall and has now dropped to 20th.
I wanted to take this opportunity to acknowledge Lance who celebrated his Birthday this past weekend. Since a few of the people in the pool happened to be at his party, I thought I would include a picture from the festivities. I really don’t know how these guys look themselves in the mirror every day:
Speaking of parties, there were some who questioned whether Ryan Andrus really did make contact with the blog mascot at the big Halloween bash a couple of weeks ago. Well, I now have documentation to validate the encounter. Our good friend Johnny Jackson was kind enough to pass this along. My only question for you Johnny: what are you doing with your hand in this picture?
On a totally related note, somebody from the pool sent me this great clip of a Denver Nuggets broadcast. Notice how the announcers go speechless for some reason. (I am warning you, watch at your own risk):
My favorite part has to be after the moment of silence there seems to be some sort of snicker while they try to regain their composure, and then say “A festive atmosphere here at the Pepsi Center.” The slow-mo isn’t bad either. Good stuff.
Lastly, I am sure some of you are waiting to hear some commentary on the big game from this past weekend. All right, here goes. I was really impressed with Harvard’s defense but I just wish Yale would have at least shown up to make it a decent game. Both offenses struggled big time to get anything going but I think the elements paid a big part in that. It was absolutely freezing and I am still trying to dethaw now, three days later. Either way, congrats to the Crimson, Ivy League Champs. (What, was there another game you thought I was going to talk about?)
So there are three games on Thursday, starting at 12:30 Eastern time. That means there will have to be quick turnaround on these picks. Please get them in on time. With Turkey Bowls and other Thanksgiving-related activities going on Thursday morning, you might just want to send them in either today or tomorrow.
Hope everyone has a great Thanksgiving!
so I am gonna propose that our blog mascot get a cut of the profits at year end. Heaven knows she has earned it.
Two things I’m thankful for today:
1) Sue letting Grant back on the wagering wagon & the pool rewarding him with a win
2) Max Hall
I need to clarify ‘total wreckless abandon.’ Grant should know better than anyone how it takes a while for my models to have enough data to pick my Seahawks and Scott Mitchell’s Lions accurately. Further, since this pool seems to be filled with BCS lovers, I assumed there’d be cash for teams finishing strong regardless of how embarrassing their early season performance.
Admit it, Cougar fans, you were silently cheering that tank job. After the low-hanging fruit was plucked (my sources say $7M in an hour at one point (aka 140 Sids or Pughs)), some of the swimmers in this pool were probably up next. With the BCS money safe, though, we can probably tilt against the east coast windmills without calling in many more $50K favors.