My two cents worth

2:09 PM   I kept my winning streak alive in my college picks but it was the first week where I got less than two thirds of the picks correct. I still haven't had a losing week all season.
Records- NCAA: 13-7, NFL:3-4-2, Combined 16-11-2

I was a little out of place at the wedding last night. The ceremony and reception were all in Korean. It followed the pattern of an American wedding so I knew what was taking place but I didn't understand a word.

11:02 AM   The weather has started to turn a bit chilly hear in Chicago. Some leaves are starting to show a hint of yellow. Autumn and football, I love it.

My NCAA PerformanZ Ratings look a little different this week because I stripped away all past data and started basing them only on games from this season. So I would expect their predictive performance to drop a little this week. I generally like to do this after all teams have played 4 games. It is just an arbitrary decision and I thought the time was close enough. I really should just not publish my ratings until mid season like the BCS but where is the fun in that? My NFL ratings are near the bottom so far because I never added any past data and have kept them based on this season only from the start.

This weekend I am going to the wedding of a coworker. Congradulations Woojeong.
It is a Korean wedding so I am not exactly sure what to expect.


Here are some NFL picks for this week
Buffalo -3 over Philadelphia
Indanapolis -1.5 over New Orleans

10:42 AM   I'm going with 5 college games this week. I may add an NFL game or two later.
Utah +6.5 at Colorado St.
Iowa +6.5 at Michigan St.
Texas Tech +2 at Mississippi
LSU -13.5 at Mississippi St.
Toledo +3.5 at Syracuse.
Picking 5 road teams is dangerous, I hope it works out.

10:21 AM   It appears my main site is down. It looks like the whole system is down.

I had mixed results with my picks this week. It was the 4th week in a row to get 2 out of 3 for college games but the NFL is not going as well. The system was actually 2-0 in college with the extra game I added being the one that was wrong.

Records: ncaa 10-5, nfl 2-3-2, overall 12-8-2

This weekend I rode the Des Plaines River trail again. It was probably my last Saturday to have both time and good weather so I wanted to get it out of my system. My odometer showed I went 102 miles but that was obviously wrong, I think it was somewhere between 30 to 35 miles.

On Sunday downtown Oak Park was having a festival so I went to a concert by a Beatles tribute band. It was fun, obviously not as good as the real deal but still worth it.

2:54 PM   Looking forward to watching Texas A&M/Virginia Tech play tonight. Maybe the hurricane could help keep it close but I think VT should win comfortably.

I feel reasonably comfortable with my picks this week as they are home team favorites to cover.
Gerogia Tech -4 over clemson
Iowa -9 over Arizona St.
Boise St. +6 over Oregon St.
Indianapolis -7.5 over Jacksonville
Buffalo +3 over Miami
Seattle -3 over St. Louis

2:59 PM   Back on August 1st I gave a link to a story in the Dallas Morning News about how Bill Parcells was spending time everyday practicing certain situations. I made a comment that this was why it would eventually be fun being a cowboy fan again. As it turns out Dallas had prepared exactly for the situation they found themselve in Monday night. They completed the 25 yard pass with 11 seconds left and kicked the field goal. Just as Parcells had drilled it into them.

2:28 PM   Aoccdrnig to a rscheearch at Cmabrigde Uinervtisy, it deosn't mttaer in waht oredr the ltteers in a wrod are, the olny iprmoetnt tihng is taht the frist and lsat ltteer be at the rghit pclae. The rset can be a tatol mses and you can sitll raed it wouthit porbelm.

Tihs is bcuseae the huamn mnid deos not raed ervey lteter by istlef, but the wrod as a wlohe.

Pttery amzanig huh?

9:33 AM   My picks last week were 2-2-1 overall but I did have another good day for college games.
Overall: 9-5-2
College: 8-4
Pro: 1-1-2

None of my systems did exceeding well this past weekend but that was expected. It was one of those weeks where just looking at the predictions I knew some would be wrong. But there is nothing that you can do about it. I knew my NFL ratings were going to have a rough week because I chose to keep them based soley on information from week 1.

Not much happened this weekend. The highlight, or lowlight depending on how you look ait it, was a farewell bbq for Mackenzie, who is leaving this week for a job as a CSI in Naples, Florida.

This week is a rare treat for a Texan living in Chicago. The Dallas Cowboys play on Monday Night Football and my college, Texas A&M, plays Virginia Tech on ESPN Thursday night. I usually get to watch both teams on tv during the Thanksgiving weekend but see very little of them otherwise.

2:14 PM   Suggested picks for this week.

Alabama -14 over Kentucky
Boston College -4.5 over Connecticut
Georgia Tech +24 over Florida St.

San Francisco +3 over St. Louis
NY Jets +3 over Miami

There are two others the system suggests but I would stay away from:
Tulane +3 over Mississippi St.
Houston +8.5 over New Orleans

3:39 PM   I made a minor revision to the ncaa retrodiction numbers today by going back and labeling a couple of the week 1 games as neutral site games.

Looks like I am going to lose my shirt and maybe even my shoes in the stock market today. The general market is going to end up falling 2% today which is a large one day loss.

3:26 PM   Who do I work for, the hospital or the university? That has been a question that I have often been asked. And I have never had an easy answer. Here is an excerpt from an email I received about our new name change.

I have great news to share with you that marks an exciting chapter in Rush’s history: today, our Board of Trustees has approved our name change from Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke’s Medical Center to Rush University Medical Center.

The university culture is an integral part of the fabric of our institution, and the name change is a natural and logical evolution in Rush’s history. Including the word, “university” in our name underscores our role and importance as an academic medical center. Last year, 1,221 students were enrolled in Rush University’s four colleges.

Rush’s last name change took place in 1969 when the name Rush-Presbyterian-St. Luke’s Medical Center was created. At that time, a preeminent teaching hospital – Presbyterian-St. Luke’s Hospital (itself the result of a 1956 merger) – joined the region’s oldest medical college, Rush Medical College. The college was chartered on March 2, 1847, two days before the city of Chicago received its charter.

12:09 PM   The conference presidents were here in Chicago yesterday to discuss the BCS.

9:24 PM   For the most part it has been a relaxing weekend of football. Saturday morning I did do something that I had wanted to do all summer but never got around to it. I biked part of the Des Plaines River trail. There is an off-road bike/walking trail that follows the Des Plaines river. One end of it is near me in River Forest and it goes north along the river for about 23 miles. There are a lot of twist and turns and side trails that go through the forest preserve.

My PerformanZ ratings had a very good week. They had the best won/loss record for the week. Something that does not happen very often.

Today was opening Sunday in the NFL and there were a lot of close games. Miami losing to Houston was a big shocker. My hometown Cowboys were on national tv today but I didn't get to see them. Here in Chicago of course we had to sit through the Bears blowout. Overall I think things went about how I expected them to.

My picks this week were 2-1 for college and 1-0-1 for pro.
Overall 7-3-1
NCAA 6-3
NFL 1-0-1

10:52 AM   For yesterdays Jets/Redskins game every single rating system picked the wrong team to win while the Vegas line got the correct team and the margin of victory exact as well. The Redskins looked better than I thought that they would.

10:25 AM   Here's a news story about the fairness of the BCS. Today there is going to be a hearing at congress as to whether the system is working or needs to be changed. Some schools are claiming the system amounts to a legalized monopoly.

1:26 PM   If you feel like getting dizzy visit This site

The prediction trackers are mostly done for the week. Tomorrow is opening night for the NFL, Woohoo!

I am going to make three college picks and 2 pro picks this week. All 5 are underdogs.
Tulsa +38 over Arkansas
Ohio +19 over Iowa St.
Marshall +19 over Tennessee
Atlanta +2 over Dallas
NY Jets +3 over Washington.
Record so far: NCAA 4-2, NFL 0-0

3:50 PM   Today is a dreary Labor Day in Chicago. I was going to go to a barbque today but there has been a constant drizzle all day yesterday and today so I didn't feel that it would be worth it.

The college season is now in full swing. This is easily my favorite time of the year. The weather generally begins to cool down and the football games begin. It actually took quite a bit of work to get the prediction trackers running this year. Maybe that was partly due to me being away and having to do everything for NCAA during the first week. I believe the NCAA page is all set. There are still a lot of pro systems that I am not sure about for this season. So that will be a work in progress this week.

I guess the upset of the week was Northern Illinois over Maryland. That actually doesn't surprise me much, NIU was very strong late in the season and they were ripe to upset a team that has always overperformed anyway.
I watched pieces of a lot of games over the weekend but did not sit down to watch any particular game. Most people into computer ratings seem to favor the college game but I am much more excited that this is the opening week of the NFL. I will definitely be watching some football next weekend.

The picks that I made below went 4-2.

The first pass of week 1 NFL prediction is now available. There is still another college game tonight so I will not begin working on week 2 until sometime tomorrow.