ONFL2k9

[Zaxxon]

How do the tie-breaker questions work? Are they taken in succession -- i.e., the first question is used to resolve the tie, and if that doesn't work, you move to the second question and then the third? Or are the answers taken and measured in the aggregate in some way?

The first tie-breaker is your regular-season score. If you tie with someone both in the playoffs and in reg season, then the questions are used in succession.

[GuidoTKP]

And it's not like Arizona is coached by someone more familiar with Pittsburgh's offensive player tendencies than anyone on Pittsburgh's staff.

Not like that at all.

Arizona could certainly get beaten, but anyone who thinks they're a huge underdog isn't paying attention.

Especially when one considers the guy for the Eagles that was killing Arizona was a TE no one really has any film on because he was barely used this season - and add in how well the Cardinals D prepped for everything else the past 3 weeks - this isn't the gimme Super Bowl for the Steelers so many seem to think it will be.

The Steelers don't have a "surprise" player on offense AFAIK.

Mr. Lem, listen to these guys. They know way, way more than I do about football. Please listen to them!

[Jiffy]

Here we go...!

[Kurth]

So close . . .

Ouch.

[Zaxxon]

That was a hell of a finish. Not reviewing the obvious forward-pass-called-as-a-fumble at the end was criminal, though. Winners, please send me your address information so I can get payment out!

Thanks to all of you for another fun season. Enjoy the off-season. Use the time wisely to hone your pigskin prognostication skills to a fine edge.

Player Ttl Playoff Pts
Mr. Lem 21 - 1st place, 40% of pool
GuidoTKP 19 - 2nd place, 30% of pool
$iljanus 15 - 3rd place, 15% of pool
Soulbringer 15
Kurth 14 - EoS Surge winner, 5% of pool
Captain Caveman 13 - Reg-season winner, 10% of pool
Jeff V 13
Jiffy 11
Bensley 11
The Meal 9
Mitma 9
Moghedian 9
Miss Taken 9
Ralph Wiggum 7
Zaxxon 7
Quipp 7
Hell's Taco 7
pr0ner 5
Remus West 4

[Remus West]

They said they did review it and it looked to me like it was out of his hand before he started forward. Woodley had his hand on the ball and had pinned it against Warner's arm which is why it went forward. Can't forward pass with your elbow. I did disagree with the holding in the endzone call though as I thought the guy just got ran over and did not think he had grabbed on. The guy behind the rusher making the call was in a horrible position to make that one, should have been left to the back judge.

Anyway, thanks for running this once again.

[$iljanus]

After my first few losses in the post season I thought I was done. How much was in the pot again? I sure am hankering for another wireless guitar for Rock Band...

[The Meal]

Congrats to all the winners, and especially %iljanus (nice typo! I'm keeping it) for his amazing jump by picking the right team for the SB! And thanks go out to Zack for running the show for all of us again. I know these things aren't easy.

Recommendations:
1. Don't wink at someone shortly after making a command decision to not give them money. Especially if you awkwardly interject yourself into a side conversation to do so. Let the combatants take care of that sort of ribbing. (Imagine a ref coming back from under the hood after making a replay decision, announcing that team A was going to benefit from his decision, then winking at the dejected players on team B.)
2. Be up front about expectations out of participants, including methodologies (when and how to submit picks) and corrections (including cut-off dates).
3. Be up front about how you make your own picks, especially in the playoffs. I have no doubts regarding your integrity, but it's always good to spell out for everyone that you'll be making your picks independently of seeing the picks submitted by other participants. As a demonstration of your integrity, I noticed that Mitma could have had a shot at pulling third-place money by picking the Steelers in the Super Bowl this year, but like many of us, assumed her only shot at finishing in the cash involved going with the underdog (Kurth, what were you thinking!?!).

Note, the above is all in the spirit of making things better in future seasons — no interest in dredging up past events.

[$iljanus]

Congrats to all the winners, and especially %iljanus (nice typo! I'm keeping it) for his amazing jump by picking the right team for the SB! And thanks go out to Zack for running the show for all of us again. I know these things aren't easy.

I can't take the credit. I was leaning toward Arizona, under the impression that more folks might go for the Steelers. But when I said to my daughter, "Cardinals or Steelers" she said with a clear voice, "Steelers!" She's gonna do all my picks next season! Fear the two year old!

[Zaxxon]

Recommendations:
1. Don't wink at someone shortly after making a command decision to not give them money. Especially if you awkwardly interject yourself into a side conversation to do so. Let the combatants take care of that sort of ribbing. (Imagine a ref coming back from under the hood after making a replay decision, announcing that team A was going to benefit from his decision, then winking at the dejected players on team B.)

Agreed. However FWIW, the winkie was more than a week later. And while I also hate to dredge up this event, I have to once again reiterate that I made a point each and every week this season to remind everyone to check their picks. The awkward interjection was more to address what I viewed as a cheap shot at our resident cave-dweller, made all the cheaper since the error was not his fault. As I'll mention again below your next point, I'll make sure to write specific deadlines in stone next year (though I'm loathe to need to do so, as it will take the pool one step further away from being an informal, friendly affair). However, I think it's safe to say that disallowing changes after the season had ended was the right decision.

I know you're upset that you lost out on a small pile of money due to [my typos in your entries | your failure to check your picks during the season]. And I know that as the commish of the pool, it's unbecoming of me to comment on the situation any further than making a ruling. But this is not the NFL--it's a small pool of my family and friends that I run to increase our enjoyment of the season. If I need to treat it like it's the NFL, I'll cease deriving any enjoyment from it, and will stop running it.

2. Be up front about expectations out of participants, including methodologies (when and how to submit picks) and corrections (including cut-off dates).

This is something that will be taken into consideration next year. It's never been a highly-requested change in our annual suggestions thread, but after this year's incident some form of regulation will unfortunately be required.

3. Be up front about how you make your own picks, especially in the playoffs. I have no doubts regarding your integrity, but it's always good to spell out for everyone that you'll be making your picks independently of seeing the picks submitted by other participants. As a demonstration of your integrity, I noticed that Mitma could have had a shot at pulling third-place money by picking the Steelers in the Super Bowl this year, but like many of us, assumed her only shot at finishing in the cash involved going with the underdog (Kurth, what were you thinking!?!).

I thought I was up front about this, and I certainly don't think this needs a rules change to explain (see end of point 1).

I make my picks before I enter anyone else's. In fact, I have GMail filters set so that I don't even see your emails until I go into my pool filter in order to enter picks. I do allow myself to make last-minute changes (to the same extent that I allow others to make last-minute changes), but I only allow myself to do so if I've learned of some significant event that impacts the game (Peyton Manning spraining earlobe, for example). I don't let myself make 'gut feeling' changes at the end, since I recognize that I could be subconsciously changing my pick because I've seen the entry trends.

Mitma and the rest of the folks I actually know IRL never see the spreadsheet except for the edition published on my site and occasionally if they happen to be there while I'm entering a score and re-tabulating results. Never midweek.

And one last note, concerning how these typos crop up in the first place. A significant minority of picks are entered via a remote connection to the machine housing the spreadsheet. Depending on the speed of my connection to this machine, there can be a delay in keystrokes showing up, and in some cases keystrokes are lost. I suspect that most of the time, this is the cause of the errors. I do make an effort to give each week's entries a once-over--and FWIW I catch most of the errors this way. However it's often a struggle to find the time to enter/update/recap each week, and spending a ton more time quintuple-checking everything is just not something I'm interested in. If folks are invested in wringing every possible point out of their entry, they should be verifying their scores each week.

[pr0ner]

Personally, I would think that the weekly reminder Zaxxon provided to check the spreadsheet to make sure your picks were entered correctly is plenty of warning, and that anyone who fails to heed this warning by waiting until the last minute does so at their own peril.

[Kurth]

Congrats to all the winners, and especially %iljanus (nice typo! I'm keeping it) for his amazing jump by picking the right team for the SB! . . . I noticed that Mitma could have had a shot at pulling third-place money by picking the Steelers in the Super Bowl this year, but like many of us, assumed her only shot at finishing in the cash involved going with the underdog (Kurth, what were you thinking!?!).

I was thinking that 40% sounds much better than 15%, and I was certain the only way I had a shot at jumping ahead of Lem and Guido was by picking Arizona. I also thought it likely that all players not in the top three would also feel compelled to pick the underdog, resulting in everyone under me picking Arizona too. If those assumptions were right, it meant that picking (but not locking) Arizona gave me a shot at 1st place with very little risk.

And with 37 seconds left to go, it looked like a good decision. Or not.

[Zaxxon]

How much was in the pot again? I sure am hankering for another wireless guitar for Rock Band...

$690--36 participants, 3 of which were $10 Ironman entries.

Mr Lem - 40% = $276
GuidoTKP - 30% = $207
$iljanus - 15% = $103.50
Cap'n Caveman - 10% = $69
Kurth - 5% = $34.50

Payments will be sent out this week. Congrats to all five of you; I hope to see everyone else back next year!

[Zaxxon]

Just a quick update--all prizes should have gone out by now. If you don't receive them in the next couple of days, please let me know.

Catch you all (I hope) next season!

[Jiffy]

Thanks for running the pool Zaxxon, I had a great time in it. I'll be back next season!