Like Steve McQueen Underneath Your Radar Screen...

Fuck all the head-shot injuries this week, this was the week of the dreaded half-a-point screwing! 3 games this week were determined by a 1/2 a point. Houston won by 4, they were giving 4.5; Baltimore lost by 3, they were getting 2.5; Indy won by 3, they were giving 3.5;  If you were on the losing end of any of those games, man it sucks, if you were on the losing end off all three of those it really, really sucks. Trust me on this, I know, I lost all three of those games and the vinegar in the wound for me is I finished tied for first with 10 wins for the week, meaning I came within a combined 1.5 points of a 13-1 record. God dammit!  Lets just move on.

This week 6 players finished with 10-4 records including me and yes I am bitter about those two Jacksonville turnovers deep in Tenn territory last night, if those two possessions were converted into 10 points, not an unreasonably expectation I would have won the week based on my tie breaker score so fuck you Jack Del Rio. But more about me later.   "MCQ" beat out "MuffinTops" after having to use the third tiebreaker, they both tied for wins and had identical tiebreaker scores so we have to dust off the rules and use rule 2.0-2a to get our winner.  I was hoping "MuffinTops" would win a week this season just so I could use that picture but because it was a tie I figured I'd use it anyway.  Congrats to "MCQ', the win moved him up 27 spots into 28th place. The biggest mover of the week was "MuffinTops", up 37 spots into 61st place.   We still have one poor sap that is winless on Monday Night Football, "Bean Pie Specials" is 0-6, I have a radical idea for you, next week who ever you think you want to pick, take the opposite, just try it.   The 5 hottest players over the past 3 weeks are JoeF, Krs10, crkob, WATERBOY and Zeus and I think at least 2 of them are chicks which shows that even though chicks can't drive a car for shit some can hang with the boys when it comes to picking NFL winners. Again this week a few teams that saw limited action covered the spread, Seattle who was picked by just 20% (25) players beat Chicago outright leaving Pete Carroll pumped and jacked and Washington picked by 31% (38) players covered vs. Indy.

Week 6 in the books and the separation in the standings is slowly happening.  Last week 10 games separated the #1 and #56th spot in the season standings, this week that number is at 50.  Overall the NFL is getting what they designed their system to do, create parity.  There are no undefeated teams, only 3 of the 32 teams have one loss and every single team in the NFC has 2 losses or more. In back to back weeks a team that has zero wins picked up their first win (DET & SF) and despite being 1-5 SF is just 2 games out of first place.

Over to my baby, the Survivor Pool 48 remain, 18 have 0 losses. In the history of the Survivor Pool has there ever been an easier pick than Pit over Clev?  Pit had zero chance of losing that game so it wasn't a shock to see 23 players take the easy road and pick Pitt.  14 other players hitched their pick to the Giants over Detroit, I thought that was a fools gold pick going in and it almost was, Detroit hung around in that game for a longtime and could have easily won but in the end those 14 players gutted out a win.   After my lecture last week I was disappointed to see so many players take the easy road with Pit and the NYG but happy to see a handful of others listen to me and started to really play, 8 took the win-less SF 49ers over Oak, a risk pick for sure esp. considering  Oak just beat down SD the week prior and SF was an unusually high 7 point favorite (one of those if it is too good to be true it probably is things but the points don't matter here but it was odd to see Vegas think they were that much better than Oakland) but the risk/reward was there and for those 8 players the risk paid off.  Of course I was one of those 8 players and along with "daveydfla" we both took Det last week and SF this week.  But "daveydfla" has to be the stud so far in this pool, he already has a loss from week 2 so the last 2 weeks he has pinned his survival hopes on two teams who had 0 wins going into the game. I did the same thing but I have the safety net of no losses, he does not have that luxury.  4 of the other players that took SF this week also had one loss coming into this weekend.  Be proud!

I could get into anther sermon how the 37 players that took PIT and NYG are pussies and just thinking of the week at hand and not long term but why bother, next week I am sure the board will be full of those same players taking Bal and NO in week 7 so I'll save my fingers from more typing abuse.  But please everyone, for your own safety stop picking SD, they knocked out 3 more players this week and have been an absolute disaster pick all season. When I say take a risk pick once in a while I don't mean a team like SD, that is not a risk that is suicide. 

To my fellow students of this pool who now must wonder if week 7 should be a spot where you take another risk or play it safe.... tough call. My rule is I only take a risk on a team playing at home, that team has to have a poor record but have played well and lost games because a few bad plays or calls (i.e. Det and SF the last two weeks) and they have to be playing a team that is not as good as they look on paper.  This coming week looking quick there is one game that falls into that category, KC @ home vs. Jax who may have lost their starting QB and could have to go with Trent Edwards who was cut by the win-less Bills after week 2. KC is one of those "are they as good as their record says?" teams, they have a decent record but .....Hmmmm..... I am not sure if I'll go with them or play it safe, KC could be one of those teams to pick now while they are playing well, to me they remind me allot of last year's Denver team that started off well then tanked the 2nd half so buying high now may be a wise pick in week 7.  That is the luxury a handful of us and I have, we took some chances so in the weeks when it is iffy we can take the safe road if we want and go with Bal or NO.   Finally while looking for shit to put in here of random facts for the season I stumbled upon this regarding my favorite topic, myself.  Through 6 weeks in the Survivor pool I have picked all NFC teams including every team in the NFC North! 

Until Next Week, Stay Thirsty My Friends!

Random Nomar Fact of the Week

"On September 1, 1996 Nomar hit his first major league home run in Oakland off John Wasdin"
(yes, that John "WAY BACK-WAY BACK" Wasdin!)