**************************
THE EMPIRE STRIKES BACK!
Emerton Perfectleeeee ends pink streak, captures yellow jersey
**************************
Dylan "Money" Retsek has monopolized the headlines over the past few weeks,
but that all ended in Week 13. Eric Emerton skipped over Money's house on
Park Place and bought Boardwalk, claiming the first-ever perfect 16-game
week. In the process, Emerton broke his personal 94-week winless streak,
and took the overall lead from his father. Now it once again looks like a
two-horse race between Eric and his father, who is currently just four
points back. Diane Emerton also finished in the money this week, and
represents The Family in 5th place overall.
Retsek was 31 points out of first place after Week 6. Since then,
he's put on an impressive second-trimester run that has included two weekly
wins and a thought-impossible perfect week. Now Retsek is 36 points out.
Dylan Oliver continued his own personal streak of fire, finishing in
the Top 2 for the third straight week. Robert Hassanali also screamed out
"LET'S GO STREAKING" and finished in the money for the 5th time in 6 weeks.
Rounding out the money, Scott Wyatt finished 4th, and "Steady Eddie" Jen
Retsek grinded out another couple bucks.
But the real story is Eric Emerton, who is now the frontrunner in a
race to win an unprecedented 4th Slate. And with the weight of the
second-longest winless streak in FunkyPool history off his shoulders, who
knows how fast he can run now? Though Money's "perfect week jackpot"
was
almost a two hundred dollars more than what Emerton won this week ($28.80),
Emerton's perfect week seemed to be worth even a few more bucks: Eric
actually had a couple upsets on his clipboard; he had a 250-dot game
(Arizona); and most importantly, this one was 16 games, the most maximum and
most perfect you can get until LA and LV get football teams.
If Only....
--------------
- If the Steelers had won, Scott Wyatt would've won the week, and Emerton
would be looking at 95 weeks without a win.
- If the Falcons or Niners had won, Hassanali would've won the week.
- If the Jets, Browns, or Broncos had won, DOliver would've won for his
second time in three weeks.
- If the Rams had won, Sully would've taken his 13th weekly win.
Stats!
----------
- Emerton's weekly win is the 15th he's had in 11 years in the pool, placing
him second only to Godsey on the all-time list. It is the 48th time he has
finished in the money, placing him 6th on the all-time list, right alongside
Money Retsek.
- It is the 15th time that Eric Franzen has finished in last place, placing
him 2nd on the all-time
list, even though he's only been in the pool for 5 years. He is just one
basement jack away from being "atop" the all-time list, even though
co-losers Adam Jennings and Mike Godsey have been in the league for 10 and
12 years respectively. Money has still never finished in last.
- We think this is the 200th week for the FMNFLP. We tried to work that
into the main article, but it didn't quite fit. Emerton is bigger than the
bicentennial.
- It has now been 76 weeks since Bill Ellis, current holder of The Slate,
has won the week. Adam Jennings is at 71, and Scott Farnsworth is at 70.
- Jason Sullivan is 12-0 in Bears games.
- Ken Vis and Jen Retsek finally missed with the Bengals.
- Eric Emerton went 6-0 in "swing games" this week, becoming the first
one
to go undefeated with that many swing games since Money did the same thing
in Week 1.
- Chris Sabbe is 9-25 games involving the Broncos, Jaguars, and Redskins.
- Nobody has yet to win a single point by picking San Francisco to win.
- Of all the points our pool has won on Denver games, Kathy has 10% of them.
- Wego is 5-17 on games involiving Dallas or St. Louis.
- Robert Emerton is 2-11 with his 1-pick.
- Diane Emerton is 2-11 with her 1-pick.
- Mike Schussel, in last place by 42 points, is 10-3 with his 3-pick.
Stat of the Week:
- If Kevin Sabbe had picked the last *five weeks* perfectly (gone
74-for-74), he'd still be in third place (for more on the plight of the
underdog in 2005, see article below). If Farnsworth had picked the last 74
games correctly, he'd be in 7th place overall. If Money had gotten the last
two weeks completely perfect (meaning 3 perfect weeks out of 5), he'd be in
3rd place overall -- just like he is right now.
Quote of the Week
----------------------------
"Yeah, I went to the Raider game [against Miami], and not only did the
Raiders suck, the Black Hole sucked. The Raiders still had a chance in the
fourth quarter, and everyone had gone home. There were like three guys with
make-up just standing all alone. I mean, I know part of it is because their
team is so bad -- but maybe it goes both ways."
- Random Bears fan, who was forced to watch a Raider/Dolphin game and
lived to tell about it.
Picks of the Week
-------------------------
With his desperate 13 on the Chiefs, Sabbe made a run at his first-ever POW,
but Emerton's perfection was too much for him, too. Emerton's dozen on the
Road Cardinals got three votes compared with Sabbe's two. Emerton is third
on the all-time list with 8 picks o' the week.
Four different picks were nominated for COW, but Farnsworth's 11 on SF
was villified as much as the other three picks combined. Send the wig his
way. Don't worry, it fits. This is the 12th time Farnsworth has been
clowned, taking the all-time lead back from Sullivan.
Just Saying!
----------------
Just in case Godsey here wasn't already hospitalized with boredom after a
year that included the most predictable NCAA tournament ever, a baseball
offseason where all the rich teams get richer, a football season where we
would gain 19 whole points with two straight perfect weeks, and a hockey
season that didn't exist...Cal Poly's football team reaches the second round
of the National Tournament, gets televised on ESPN2 and -- down 14-0 in the
fourth quarter -- punts from the opponent's 40-yard line. Are you fucking
kidding me? With 8 minutes left, on 4th and 6, they punt it into the end
zone (shocking!), knocking Texas State a whole 20 yards back. What, there's
always next time we'll be on ESPN2 and Firestone is packed with Mustang
fans? It was just like looking a big-screen picture of a big flaccid penis
with no testicles. Absolutely lacking stimulation or inspiration,
embarrassing, and obscene.
And now...
An Inside Look: What if Steady Eddie really entered the FunkyPool?
--------------------------------------------------------------------
Jen Retsek made a claim that while "Steady Eddie" does well in the long-term
race for the Slate, he/she doesn't make a whole lot of money. Godsey has,
in his own way, alluded to the opinion that the Vegas Line cannot be beaten
in the long-term, and anyone who wants to stick with the Vegas Line
(intentionally or not) will automatically (and without merit) find
him/herself at the top of the standings -- conversely claiming that Steady
Eddie has little chance at the Weekly Win, where the winner needs more
"creativity" and "style." Eric Emerton has, on the other hand,
argued that
"the middle road" is the way to the Slate -- he is now at the top of the
yearly standings *and* just won the week.
What gives? With two perfect weeks, is 2005 really as boring as Godsey
whines it is? Does the "creative" underdog really have a chance? Are
the
Emertons actually beating the spread? A month and a half ago, Patrick
Godsey angrily announced that he was giving up trying to argue with the
conservatives and just was going to pick the spread every week -- if he had
followed through, he'd have had a perfect week and a near-miss, and would be
right up on the playoff line. Is this what we're supposed to do? With the
conservatives winning the Weeklys as well as the yearly race, it seems so.
Weekly Recap takes a closer look.
Since we didn't have the statistical capability to look back on the Vegas
Spread for the past 13 weeks, we did something different, similar, and in a
way more interesting. We looked back at the what the FunkyPool consensus
picked each week, and assigned the proper point value to a fictional "Steady
Eddie" to see how he'd fare. For example, in this past week, we put a total
of 366 points on the Colts -- that would be Eddie's 16-pick; we put only 3
more points on the Bengals than we put on the Steelers -- this would be
Eddie's 1-pick.
Well, Jen was right in a way: Eddie would be at $34 right now, which is
$20 behind the best "loose cannon" of the year, DOliver. But Eddie is
outprofitting every other "loose cannon" in the pool, and only has less
money than a few other conservative grinders.
Godsey was also right in a way: Eddie hasn't won the week in 2005, but
he has finished in 2nd twice, and "the spread" had a perfect week in Week
9.
He's also finished 4th twice, and finished in the money a total of five
times -- compared to Godsey's two. Eddie actually has as many money
finishes as Sullivan and Godsey combined, and more money finishes than any
of us but six.
How about overall? Turns out Godsey was wrong: It is possible to beat
the spread. Sort of. If you just picked as boringly as possible, right
down the middle road, you wouldn't be in first place. But you'd be real
close. Steady Eddie would be at 1158 points right now, placing him in 3rd,
but only 7 points behind Eric Emerton. In other words, the Emertons are
beating the spread, but at a very insignificant level. More significantly
for most of us, if we had just made extremely boring picks all season long
(especially after Week 2), we'd be richer *and* in a prime spot for a run at
the Slate. But we'd still be trailing the Emertons....
-----------
Steady Eddie, by week:
1: 65/136 12th
2: 79/136 9th
3: 87/105 4th
4: 82/105 9th
5: 63/105 10th
6: 94/105 4th
7: 82/105 4th
8: 73/105 18th
9: 101/105 5th
10: 89/105 2nd
11: 94/136 10th
12: 116/136 6th
13: 133/136 2nd
--------------
Questions still exist:
Is the spread that much different than the consensus? We're guessing
not significantly at all. Normally we'd think the spread would make a
little less weekly money than Eddie, but the spread would have won Week 9
this year, and split the jackpot with Money.
And is Steady Eddie this good every year, or is the NFL in 2005 a
little more conservative than usual? With the names Jason Sullivan and Mike
Godsey engraved on the Slate, we're guessing some years have been more
eccentric than this one. On the other hand, Mr. McKean infamously won the
Slate holding hands with the spread. But we don't have the energy to
research every past year, at least not right now.
Next week:
---------------
Godsey's Bucs at Emerton's Panthers.
Jennings' Browns at Godsey's Bengals.
Scott Wyatt's Giants at Godsey's hate pick.
Sully's Pats at Diane's Bills.
And Wyatt's Dolphins at Patrick's Chargers.
See ya then...
|
