Welp, that's Game Over. If you are the sort of picker who has been following my picks to the letter for the course of the season, it gives me no pleasure to report that you are certainly out of the running for whatever season prizes your pool is offering after yet another 61-point catastrophe. In … Continue reading Week 12 Confidence Pool

Well, I finally hit on double-digit picks again last week, but at what price? Success in quantity cannot make up for failures in quality; I am therefore tempted to offer up a couple of my lesser wins from Week 10 up as a sacrifice, that I may still be able to claim the 13 points … Continue reading Week 11 Confidence Pool

I make my picks as early in the week as possible, and as a consequence I have a curious and unfortunate tendency to forget what picks I actually made in about one third of that week's games, give or take. This is for the best when it comes time to sit down and actually watch … Continue reading Week 10 Confidence Pool

Well, that was miserable. For the second time this season, I've failed utterly, putting up a truly pathetic 64 points out of a possible 105, with only 8 of 14 picks landing. And, for the second time this season, my thought process turns towards justifying my terrible whiffs even with the benefit of hindsight, rather … Continue reading Week 9 Confidence Pool

I was all set to open this week's column with an entirely reasonable, interesting, and not at all smug and infuriating bit about how great it was to bounce back so majestically after taking an awful beating in Week 6. While it's true enough that my Week 7 picks were considerably more successful, as I … Continue reading Week 8 Confidence Pool

I would like to personally apologize to anyone who make their picks last week based primarily on my advice. I don't know how I let this happen. Hitting on 8 out of 14 picks doesn't seem ghastly on paper, but Kirk Cousins' passing stats don't look ghastly on paper, either. My performance in Week 6 … Continue reading Week 7 Confidence Pool

(Correction 10/14/20 12:25 PM EDT: I don't know how I managed this, but for some reason the original article had the Jets playing the Chargers, who have their bye week. The Jets instead play the Dolphins. This has had a ripple effect on point value assignment - I'm not putting 11 on the Dolphins - … Continue reading Week 6 Confidence Pool

Here I was, several weeks into this column, thinking that I was going to be all done with housekeeping and rules clarification. And then, the Titans outbreak of the 'rona necessitated postponing their game with the Steelers. Since I had already published my picks when the announcement to postpone the game was made, and since … Continue reading NFL Week 5 Confidence Pool

(Programming Note: Starting this week, the Confidence Pool column is being bumped up to Wednesday. That there even is a GBBS season this year caught me by surprise, but since it exists I'm clearing out Thursday to make room for the GBBS Power Rankings.) (Update 10/2/20 1:17 PM EDT: This column was written prior to … Continue reading NFL Week 4 Confidence Pool