Bowl Pool - 22 Guys named "Army" edition.

 As you probably know by know, I’ve been pretty sick the last few days, so sitting around watching a football game I have marginal interest in is pretty appealing right now.  Turns out the Armed Forces Bowl was a pretty good one to watch.  For one, the way Army plays is quite enjoyable.  The clock is pretty much continuously moving, so the actual game time isn’t that long.  I think a lot of college games last 4.5+ hours because they throw it all over the field and the clock stops on every first down, incomplete pass or play out of bounds.  You don’t get much of that with Army.  That, plus no one really roots against Army.  You may root for your team if they are playing against Army, but you’re not really all that excited about an Army loss.  It just feels strange.

Anyway, it turns out that this may have been the best game of the whole season.  I was feeling pretty good about Army winning, until Missouri’s last drive.  When they took the lead with about 90 seconds to go, I didn’t think Army could move the ball down the field fast enough to get into field range.  I think they had thrown maybe 4 times all game up until the last drive.  Somehow they figured how to execute multiple forward passes on the last drive and hit FG as time ran out.  It really could have gone to either team.  It was pretty fantastic.  It didn’t hurt that I had 23 points on Army either.  One last thing: I thought it was kind of appropriate that none of the players had their names on their jerseys.  Seems totally in line with what I know of the Army.

Speaking of which, the standings are now updated.  Here they are:

1. Klei R.: 252 (-108)

2. Hutch H.: 242 (-111)

3. Josiah T. #1: 240 (-148)

4. Daniel E.: 226 (-127)

5. Scott H. #2: 220 (-172)

6. Larry G. #2: 213 (-155)

7. Ben S.: 203 (-84)

8. Michelle L. #1: 202 (-176)

9. Mike W.: 201 (-127)

10. Josiah T. #2: 197 (-162)

11. Chad L.: 196 (-162)

12. Pete J. #2: 196 (-168)

13. Jay H. #2: 195 (-160)

14. Jason S.: 192 (-77)

15. Matt N.: 191 (-118)

16. Mark A.: 183 (-164)

17. Pete J. #1: 180 (-184)

18. Stefan K.: 179 (-76)

19. Dylan B.: 178 (-145)

20. Adam E.: 175 (-145)

21. Michelle L. #2: 172 (-178)

22. Becky H.: 170 (-71)

23. Mike N.: 169 (-100)

24. Dylan L.: 168 (-155)

25. Adam O. #3: 167 (-119)

26. Adam O. #1: 166 (-144)

27. Damien R.: 165 (-169)

28. Marc R.: 162 (-94)

29. Cam L.: 161 (-118)

30. Adam O. #4: 158 (-144)

31. Adam O. #2: 151 (-144)

32. Creighton H.: 147 (-138)

33. Emily T.: 146 (-163)

33. Grant F.: 146 (-163)

35. Brad R.: 144 (-100)

36. Weston T. (Shane): 144 (-137)

37. Brian K.: 141 (-93)

38. Ryan W.: 137 (-99)

39. Scott H. #1: 134 (-178)

40. Dan D.: 131 (-67)

41. Brett W.: 128 (-117)

42. Dustin B.: 127 (-106)

43. Brent S.: 125 (-124)

44. Amy L.: 123 (-183)

45. Matt M.: 121 (-110)

46. Ally H.: 111 (-121)

47. Lee K.: 110 (-122)

48. Jay H. #1: 108 (-123)

49. Larry G. #1: 106 (-249)

50. Doug L.: 74 (-27)

51. Tom B.: 42 (-186)

…and the net points rankings:

1. Klei R.: 144

2. Hutch H.: 131

3. Ben S.: 119

4. Jason S.: 115

5. Stefan K.: 103

6. Daniel E.: 99

6. Becky H.: 99

8. Josiah T. #1: 92

9. Mike W.: 74

10. Matt N.: 73

11. Mike N.: 69

12. Marc R.: 68

13. Dan D.: 64

14. Larry G. #2: 58

15. Scott H. #2: 48

15. Adam O. #3: 48

15. Brian K.: 48

18. Doug L.: 47

19. Brad R.: 44

20. Cam L.: 43

21. Ryan W.: 38

22. Josiah T. #2: 35

22. Jay H. #2: 35

24. Chad L.: 34

25. Dylan B.: 33

26. Adam E.: 30

27. Pete J. #2: 28

28. Michelle L. #1: 26

29. Adam O. #1: 22

30. Dustin B.: 21

31. Mark A.: 19

32. Adam O. #4: 14

33. Dylan L.: 13

34. Brett W.: 11

34. Matt M.: 11

36. Creighton H.: 9

37. Adam O. #2: 7

37. Weston T. (Shane): 7

39. Brent S.: 1

40. Pete J. #1: -4

40. Damien R.: -4

42. Michelle L. #2: -6

43. Ally H.: -10

44. Lee K.: -12

45. Jay H. #1: -15

46. Emily T.: -17

46. Grant F.: -17

48. Scott H. #1: -44

49. Amy L.: -60

50. Larry G. #1: -143

51. Tom B.: -144

As an aside, I talked to Tom B. today about the pool.  He is having an epically bad run in this pool.  Despite that, he is pretty good spirits about the whole thing.  He was of the opinion that the cost only being $5 to get in, the updates and commentary was kind of worth it even if he’s probably going to be mathematically eliminated from all contention as soon as I can calculate the odds.  That’s always nice to hear.  I don’t want people to be disappointed.

Tomorrow is another day in mid-to late December, so that means we have 2 more games to navigate on this ongoing pilgrimage to low stakes gambling glory.

Frisco Football Classic (3:30 on ESPN)

Vegas Line: Miami(Ohio) -2.5

Median Pick: Miami(Ohio) for 5 points.

Picks for Miami(Ohio): 28 (15.39 points average, 431 total points, 45^th)

Picks for North Texas: 23 (16.17 points average, 372 total points, 51st)

Total points wagered: 803 (40^th)

Pick distribution:

Nothing screams “premier” football game than a unsponsored mid-week mid-day matchup between two 6-6 mid-major schools on the same field where they played another bowl game with virtually the same name literally two days before in what is primarily a soccer stadium.  My guess about how this game came together was that people looked around and realized that there were 2 more bowl eligible teams than there were slots for teams, so some decided to whip this bowl game out of nothing and viola!  I don’t think the actual story is too far off from that.

One thing I like about this game is that it’s totally in the Christmas spirit with the Redbirds going against the Mean Green.  They should lean into that.  It doesn’t have the fewest remaining points wagered on it, but it seems like it probably should.  Tip of the cap to the 2 people that picked this game in their top 10 for points (oddly both for North Texas).  Good luck to anyone whose sheet hinges on winning this game.  Watch it be a wildly entertaining game after all the bagging on it that I’ve done.

Union Home Mortgage Gasparilla Bowl (7:00 on ESPN)

Vegas Line: Florida -7

Median Pick: Florida for 25 points.

Picks for Florida: 37 (26.86 points average, 994 total points, 16^th)

Picks for Central Florida: 14 (14.57 points average, 204 total points, 67^th)

Total points wagered: 1198 (16^th)

Pick distribution:

So, I used to make the same joke about this bowl game every year.  That joke was something about now knowing with the heck a gasparilla was.  However, after making that same joke year after year, it seems kind of lazy since I could just look it up.  A gasparilla has something to do with pirates and maybe a boat parade.  Whatever it is, it’s something that “Florida Man” surely loves.  Speaking of which, does this game get any more “Florida”?  It has two Florida schools playing in Florida.  There’s probably a joke in there about the sponsor being a Mortgage company and Florida being the epicenter of the Subprime Mortgage collapse of 2008, but I’m not a good enough writer to come up with that one.  Honestly, I could go on and on bagging on the state of Florida, as a self-righteous Californian.  I will say this for Florida, they do produce a heckuva lot of good football players.

It looks like there’s a pretty good consensus on how this game is going to go.  Lots of people love Florida – and they should.  They are 7 point favorites and they play in the SEC, so people are probably more familiar with them.

On to the bad news on the day, and it’s a good transition from the most Florida of Bowls – What are to do about the Gator Bowl?  If you’ve been paying attention, you probably heard the news that Texas A&M has decided to pull out of the Gator Bowl.  Some mix of too many injuries and too much COVID made it untenable for them.  So, what do we do about it for the Bowl Pool?

First off, we’ve never had this happen before, so we are in a little uncharted territory here.  As of right now, even the Gator Bowl doesn’t know what they are going to do.  It looks like Rutgers is going to get a bid as the 5-7 team with the best academic record.  Wow.  That’s crazy.

With the way this pool is set up and with the rankings of the points, this change would undoubtedly change people’s picks and points if they knew it was going to happen.  Unfortunately, I can’t have everyone resubmit their picks as that would be chaotic.

What I am going to do is treat this is if a star player gets suspended from the game the day before the game.  That would also effect the points and picks, but we don’t allow people to resubmit picks and points as a result.  The best I can do is keep everything the same, but substitute Rutgers for Texas A&M.  That’s a terrible outcome for everyone, and one I would rather not have had to do.  I blame COVID, especially the Omicron variant.  I hope this is the last time something like this happens, but I fear it will not be with the way this new variant is spreading and how much time there is between now and when games are played.  Keep your fingers crossed that this is as bad as it gets.

Good luck to everyone!!!!