for the uninitiated or absent-minded
Posted 8/29/01 (Updated 9/14/08)
1. 100 bananas a season.
2. Payable to the head chimp, Josh. (note: this changes from year to year so make sure before sending.)
2a. You must send your yellow fruit in or suffer serious consequences. He will be posting details soon - or watch this space for full disclosure.
2b. What I'm saying is, you have to pay. No futzing around here. We mean it.
3. Everyone is in it for the whole season (17 weeks).
4. 75 bananas to each weekly winner.
4a. Overall season winner gets 250 Bs, runner-up 100, third place 50.
4b. New in 2005 -- the last place finisher gets the final 10 bananas. He has to trade them in for a bag of honest-to-goodness fishsticks!
4c. We now have a winner's cup, to be sent from the previous winner to his/her successor. Don't take Josh's lead on this and let it sit in your cupboard for two years.
5. The spread for each week is determined by a website that's called something like footballlocks-dot-com (offhand, I can't recall). I post the lines on the "Make Picks" page, and make it really easy for y'all to select. I try to do this by Tuesday night, give or take a day.
6. You have to pick a winner. That is the team that beats the spread. In the case of a tie (i.e., team A is supposed to beat team B by 6 points and does exactly), the favored team wins. So, to put it another way, the underdog has to beat the spread.
7. Picks have to be in by Friday midnight (east coast time).
7a. If there is a Thursday game, at least that game has to be in by Wed. midnight
7b. Late season Saturday games won't affect this. It'll still be Fri. midnight
7c. UNLESS YOU ARE REQUESTED TO GET THEM IN EARLY - like, say, I'm going away on Friday and need to post them for everyone's benefit.
8. Please don't be late.
8a. Good excuse or not, if you are chronically late, you will be penalized. Don't ask me how; I might show up in the dead of night with a hockey mask, or make annoying crank calls. Try me. If you get your picks in by Sunday noon, your picks count toward your overall record but you cannot compete for the week.
8b. If you completely fuck up and don't get them in, you receive the worst record minus one for the week.
9. Everyone is encouraged to trash talk on the chat page and (new in 2007!) blog. C'mon, chumps.
10. There is no #10. Bert long ago left the building.
11. The Grand Poobah designation is a controversial one. Mostly, it's an informal coalition of Mike, Josh, Todd, and Doug, who have been in this from the start (well, Todd wasn't in it the first year, but he's so damn persistent, we let him have a say). I guess we're the ones who make final rulings on tricky issues.
12. I would do this for free. Oh yeah, I do already.
12a. I don't say that so you can throw me a pity party or bless me with accolades (but don't be shy). What I mean is that you need to cut me some slack sometimes.
12b. But you should absolutely call bullshit on me when I deserve it. And I often do.
13. The winner of the whole thing is supposed to throw a Superbowl party, or at the very least buys beer for the largest one which includes people from this pool.
14. I am allowed to forget stuff.
15. Tell me if I did.
-Mike