Week 10 2023 Season
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Return to Main Page This week certainly thinned out the competition in the race for the streak prize quite a bit. Twenty five franchises are not out of the running. Anybody who misses their top pick now will be out and every time Polecat adds to his streak (currently 10) it is likely that some will be mathematically eliminated.
After last week's results Beau The Dope wrote to me, "Insanity: repeatedly picking losing teams and expecting a different result." Maybe if you cannot change the results Kneel you should alter your expectations.
After I sent out the email that I had updated the HOF page to include The Jetpickers crash landing Beau wrote to me again, "It may be harder to lose that much as it is to win the weak. Be proud, be Very Proud." When you ponder the idea I think he is correct. Throwing darts or flipping a coin should, in theory give you 50% correct.
Thinking on the previous paragraph I begin to wonder if it is possible to miss all your picks. On rare occassions over the years we have had people pick a perfect week, but I wonder if it would be tougher to picks an imperfect week, or a perfectly wrong week. Think on it, there is always some dumb NFL team that plays above their head for one week and overpowers the team that they are supposed to lose to. As Beau says, losing that much is not easy.
After his great week last week Assfault sent me a note on Wednesday (I think). Scott wrote, "Assault is back with such clever picks. It's been quite a while. I pick odd weeks and Jacky does even, when she remembers to enter them. She said she couldn't believe it was Thursday already, I mentioned it happens every week right after Wednesday. Tomorrow I will remind her today was definitely Wednesday, I think." No need for sarcasm Scott... you have won back your entry fee so you are playing with house money now.
I noticed that Athletes Foot stubbed his toe in Germany this week, then he tripped in Baltimore. I just had to get that line in somewhere.
The Rotters Report
Just in Time for Gift Buying Season
There are some of you out there that may know Mrs. Rotter and I owned a couple of retail game stores in the early 80’s. Quite often I get asked the question, “What is the best board game to play?” In my humble opinion, it is “Carcassonne”. It is a German invented game but the inventor named the game after the French city that is the best preserved medieval walled city in the world. It is a UNESCO World Heritage Site.
“Carcassonne” is not a dice rolling game but rather a tile-laying game. The luck comes into play by which tile you blindly pick out of the pile but the skill is where you place the tile to your advantage. The tile you place must match the features of any previously laid adjacent tile, ie, road to road, field to field and city to city. The marker you place takes on the attributes of the feature it was placed on; thief on a road, farmer on a field, knight in a city and monk in a cloister. Points are scored when the feature is completed.
The basic game comes with 72 tiles and takes anywhere from 20 to 30 minutes to play. It is what is called in the business “a beer and pretzel game”. However, there are many expansions to the game which add to the playing time, complexity and strategy. The game and expansions can be bought on Amazon. If you like the game, my advice would be to buy a boxed set which includes the basic game and usually four expansions. “Carcassonne” is a very good 2 player game (can play with more players) where as its competitor game “The Settlers of Catan” is better with 3 or more players.
To see a picture of Mrs. Rotter playing the game while camping at Harrison Lake click here. . The grey board you see in the picture is of my invention. I made it of plasti-core and will hold 25 by 25 tiles. A square is drawn in the middle of the board which is where the starter tile is placed. There is a raised lip around the outside of the board which keeps the tiles from falling off and also acts as the score board. The board folds in half to take up less space while travelling and is hinged with, you guessed it, duct tape. In the picture, you can see the reflected image on the side of “Black Jack”, the FJ Cruiser, of Harrison Lake and the snow covered mountains of the Brackenridge range.
The Email of Hope
TTTMan continues to have the lead in the Email of Hope standings with 10 EoH. Shawn the Blanc has moved into 2nd place with 8 Emails. There are 3 Franchises tied for 3rd with 7 EofH each. They are the Rotters, Jet Picker and Watt’s Up. For those of you who wish to see the complete Email of Hope standings, please click here.
Note: the winning dollar amounts are a week behind as the winners are not known at time of writing.
The Monica Award Polecat now slides into the stink hole -
two points from the prizes. Ponder on that if you think rating the lower point games is unimportant.
The POW Award - Two games received consideration for this week's much coveted POW award. BadGasBrown was the only competitor in the pool who picked the Browns (of course he picked them - he wouldn't pick the Greens or the Reds would he) and Bruce made a lot of points vs the rest of the pool with this choice. Sarge made as many points by backing the Texans but The JetPicker gained a lot more by picking the Texans and rating them for 150 points. This earned him this weeks award! Of course, that is all Andrew earned this week because... well, he lived up to his franchise name and picked the Jets... for 200 points and when they skidded off the runway his week went down in flames.
The Celler Dweller - The worst finisher this week was Genomania who only earned 224 points on a week when the winner surpassed 600. Nicholas got 7 picks correct so obviously it is the rating that needs improvement.
Without further ado, this weeks winners, and we honour and congratulate them are....
1st - Muttley - Sandra sent in, "Woof woof woof. Kibble please." There is a difference between the needy and the greedy Sandra. I hope that you intend to spend your winnings on a wonderful Christmas gift for Beau The Dope Kneel seems nice and he qualifies as "needy"
2nd - Friendly Manitoban - Did not respond to EofH
3rd - Squash Brothers - Erik wrote in for the Bros, "That was a squeaker!! Thanks to my beloved Broncos we finally have some jingling in our pockets. " Well, we have all had a squeaker or two Erik but most of us just try to blame it on the dog.
4th (T) - New Orleans Taints - Did not respond to EofH
4th (T) - Show Us Your TD's - What a pleasant surprize to find that I had made a mistake and did better than I thought. I spent the entire MNF game hoping (not very hopefully) for a tie.
This week's quote is from the author Terry Pratchett who wrote, "Give a man a fire and he's warm for the day. But set fire to him and he's warm for the rest of his life." Well, that is true, now isn't it.
'Til next week then...
The Rhino
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