2019 COAS Pigskin Pick 'Em: Week 8

After accelerating things for the past couple weeks, the coalition is back on its normal schedule as we resume our quest to pick games against the spread!

Groupthink prevailed to an extent last week, and it ended up creating a deadlock: Adam took two of our three disputed games to move back into a tie for first as my uncontested lead lasted all of four days. He was happy to pull back into a tie for first, but wasn't happy with how the spread gods said no to what he thought were solid picks.

What I found funny was, after confirming that fact with Adam on Sunday afternoon, Joe texted that he would be right up there with us... if you consider ten games out "right up there." Now I refuse to count him out; I wasn't looking great going into Thanksgiving last year, then had the best week in contest history to get right back into contention. But leapfrogging four people and picking up ten games is a tall order, even with more than half the season still to go. It doesn't help that Joe generally... doesn't go hero; over the past 24 weeks of the contest, he has made exactly two hero picks. And it's those hero picks that have really helped Adam be in the tie for first, with an 8-4 record in those games, best in the group (technically tied with a 2-1 Geoffrey, but larger sample size wins). I'm riding a 10-2 mark in games where the group has split evenly on who we've picked to my spot at the top with Adam. You can view a full breakdown of how we've picked in relation to each other here.

You will also notice that, if you look at the record on here as well as on that spreadsheet, there's a major discrepancy with our ESPN standings. You may remember last week that Aiden forgot to pick every game other than the Thursday night contest in Week 6. In the interest of fair play combined with him not having any clue how those games played out, Adam got his picks for that week and found that he retroactively went 5-9. I've taken out the note about Aiden forgetting from last week's post and credited him the five points ESPN doesn't have logged for him.

I also got a little confused in prepping stuff for this week. Talking with Adam when he was in town last week, he's going to be on vacation one week in December where I'll need a backup for him. I mistook that for being this week and lined up Geoffrey Clark as a backup. Since I asked him to go through the effort I'll include his picks for this week as well, and hopefully he'll be able to join me again in December. Either way, I promise jabs about Jeff Blauser will be kept to a minimum.

This week Adam and I disagree on just five games out of 15; Geoffy and I only dispute three. Let's get to it!

2019 COAS Pigskin Pick 'Em: Week 7

We're well into October now as the coalition continues its quest to pick NFL games against the spread!

We saw a little bit of tier evolution in Week 6, as well as a changing of the guard. The big issue, and something that happened last year as well, was that Aiden missed the deadline for a bunch of picks and thus "officially" went 0-14 last week, but for the purposes of record keeping, it doesn't go down as the worst week ever.

Meanwhile, up in that upper tier, I swiped six of eight disputed games from Adam to take over the group lead. It's a tenuous one game advantage, and it may not last, but I will enjoy it while I can. Adam apparently turned into Matt Nagy, claiming he got too cute last week and saw it blow up in his face. You can view the full group standings here, and how the entire group has picked in relation to each other here.

This week, the disparities fall mostly by the wayside and groupthink prevails as Adam and I only disagree on three games out of 14. Let's get to it!

2019 COAS Pigskin Pick 'Em: Week 6

Now a little ways past the quarter pole, the coalition chugs along as we continue our quest to pick NFL games against the spread!

At this point, the group seems to be fully separated into tiers. It's your featured columnists... and everybody else a sizable chunk behind us. You can view how we've all picked in relation to each other here. Suffice it to say that, based on the tiers, looking at frequency and success of hero picks have been one of the reasons why Adam and I have found a little separation.

I buried the lede a little bit here from last week. Adam and I tied the record for number of disputed games with a dozen last week; the only other time that happened was back in 2016 (thanks to Adam for doing the research), but that was with a full 16 game slate. I'd argue disputing 12 out of 15 is the tiebreaker. Anyway, with that much disparity, I hinted that we may see a flip in the standings; go figure we split the disputed games evenly. That means Adam's three game lead over me holds, but to quote Lovie Smith, "We have a lot of football left to play."

This week, Adam and I disagree on eight games out of 14. Let's get to it!

2019 COAS Pigskin Pick 'Em: Week 5

With the conclusion of tonight's game, we will hit the quarter pole of the 2019 NFL season. And with that thought in mind, the coalition works its way into its fifth week of work!

The early slate was not kind to much of the group, but we all rebounded fairly well in the late afternoon slate and beyond. Adam and I, for our part, split our eight disputed games as he retains his three game column and group lead. We're starting to separate ourselves from the pack a little bit, though Week 4 saw a surge from Aiden to create a little bunch at the bottom of the group. You can view the full group standings here, and a comparison to how we've all picked compared to each other here.

We have another bye this week, so of the 15 tilts on the slate, Adam and I disagree on a record 12 of them. Needless to say... some major changes in the standings could be forthcoming. Let's get to the picks!

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Championship

128 teams entered. Over six thousand games later, we're down to just two teams as we renew our quest to find the greatest MLB team of all time as part of the 2019 MLB Tournament of Champions. Every World Series champion got an invitation to the fun, and every franchise without a title got at least one iteration from their history into the festivities. They then went through a grueling 90 game double round robin to build up a significant sample size.

That accounted for 5,760 of the 6000-plus games, but that was just the beginning as I began a single elimination tournament from the top eight teams from each of the groups I'd built out for this tournament. Five rounds later, we have our top two teams left standing. And the fun part for this: we get an old rematch.

On one side was arguably the favorite coming into this whole thing. They were the best team in the 2017 Tournament of Champions, but proceeded to need every possible game to win the Championship of Champions. For a title defense, the 2016 Cubs seemed poised to be a dominant force once again, but ran into some slight hiccups. Despite losing their final four series in group play, the Cubs went 54-36, good for second place in Group H. They swept the 1919 Cincinnati Reds in the opening round of the postseason before needing winner-take-all games at home to finish off the 1972 Oakland Athletics and 1938 New York Yankees. A quarterfinal sweep over the 1944 St. Louis Cardinals, winners of their own group, and a six game victory of the legendary 1927 New York Yankees, have the Cubs back to within four wins of further immortality.

On the other side was a team that, in 2017, tied for the third-best record among my National League representatives, but was relegated to Wild Card status for the postseason. They won the Wild Card series that year before dropping a heartbreaking fifth game on a walk-off homer to... the 2016 Cubs. The 1975 Cincinnati Reds came back two years later placed in a different group, and worked to a 57-33 record... which unfortunately for them was only good for third in their group as they finished just one game behind the co-leaders. But the Reds won their first two series in four games apiece over the 2004 Boston Red Sox and 1912 Boston Red Sox, respectively, before punching their ticket to the quarterfinals with a sweep of the group champion 1924 Washington Senators. Cincinnati followed that up with a six game victory over the 1984 Detroit Tigers to remove the DH from the rest of the tournament, then won a hard-fought seven game series over the 1953 New York Yankees to get one more crack at the team that knocked them off two years ago.

This time around, the Reds will get home field advantage by virtue of their better Group Play record. It's a best of seven series played in a 2-3-2 format, so the Reds will get a little more leeway than the best-of-five they had to play in two years ago. In prior rounds of this postseason I've just gone with results and records. This time, I'm going to do brief writeups of each game in this series. You can view the bracket to date, as well as scores and standings from as far back as group play, here. All simulations for the entire Tournament of Champions are provided by WhatIfSports.com. And so, one final time this year... let's play ball!

2019 COAS Pigskin Pick 'Em: Week 4

It wasn't the greatest week on the whole for the coalition, but we nonetheless chug along into the fourth week of the NFL season!

All but one of us finished below .500 for the week last week, and while I don't necessarily want to say that we're seeing some separation... we kind of are. Adam took five of our eight disputed games from last week to extend his lead over me, but I remain in second place with a slight cushion. You can view the full standings here, and how we've all picked in relation to each other here.

We have our first set of byes this week to cut the slate down to 15 games.  Adam calls this week:

"The great reversal for about the next 3-4 weeks... where the oddsmakers over-correct and therefore cause many people to pick the wrong side of a game. While I am tempted to do an opposite week, with my [three] game lead I am going to just be more thoughtful about the picks."

As part of "The Great Reversal," Adam and I disagree on eight games. Onward to the picks!

2019 MLB Tournament of Champions: Semifinals

And then there were four.

I started this project all the way back in April with 128 teams, including every World Series champion dating back to 1903. After 90 games for each team, that got narrowed down to 64. And after four grueling rounds, we've finally advanced to the semifinals, and there are some big names here. Murderer's Row is here, along with another Yankee iteration a generation later, the Big Red Machine has advanced after having to settle for a Wild Card and getting bounced in the NLDS two years ago, and our defending Champion of Champions in the 2016 Cubs round out what's left.

To narrow the field down to just two teams, we will play a pair of best-of-seven series in a 2-3-2 format, with home field advantage going to the team with the better group play record (and as luck would have it, seedings match that as well). With all of our 1973-onward American League teams gone, so is the designated hitter for the remainder of the tournament.

You can view the bracket to date as well as how group play went here. All simulations are provided by WhatIfSports.com. Let's get to it!