Nemmers Scrum

Happy New Year Footballers!

Week 16 wrapped up with a lot of people having solid performances. Special shoutout to Charlie N for his strategy of telling everyone his plan, and then getting 5 points out of 5. I daresay that maybe some of you boldly copied him. Either way, it was a fun week with lots of 4 and 5 point winners. Speaking for myself, I was heading into the Sunday night game with 4 points and really hoping that Tennessee would beat Green Bay to crush all the folks who had picked the Packers, but as soon as I saw the snow in pre-game, I knew I was in trouble.  Dang it – I coulda been a contender!

Going into our final week, Margie is in the lead by one point, and Bill and Jim are right on her tail.  Knowing it was so close, for this week I went with close games where each team had something on the line.  And….that means both NFC East games are on the list.

The week 17 Games are:

Dolphins v. Bills
Cowboys v. Giants
Football Team v. Eagles (feels funny typing that).

Also, this seems like a good place to layout what happens here at the end as far as determining a winner so here are the steps:

• If one person is alone atop the leader board with the most points, that person will be declared the winner.
• If there is a tie of two or more people atop the leader board, we will continue picking into the playoffs, but only the people who are tied for the lead.
• We will still use the “pick 3 games with one as your power pick” style of picking.  I will send out the games early in the week. The first week there is one contestant with more points than the others, that person will be declared the winner.
• On this week’s standings, I have made  gray everyone who is mathematically ineligible to win the pool.

We sure hope that everyone had a Merry Christmas. Ours was tiny, but we ate like kings and definitely got to relax a little. Let’s all say a cheer for 2021, may it be full of family visits and lots of joy.

And, even though Pittsburgh is gonna sit Big Ben, I still say GO STEELERS!!!!

Merry Christmas Footballers,

I hope you got something good in your stocking and maybe even a surprise under the tree.  I am betting that no one else got a super comfy couch blanket that looks like a tortilla.  Try not to be jealous.

This week, even Charlie N picking the Packers couldn’t dissuade most of the Scrum from going with Green Bay to be Tennessee on Sunday night. All but 3 people picked them, and all but 8 choosing it as their power pick. (Or, as Bill called it – “the big Cahooza”.  Whatever a Cahooza is, I’m not quite sure.  But, as one of the 3 people who went with Tennessee, I’m hoping that it means disaster.

I can’t believe we’re down to just this week and next. So exciting here at the end. Let’s see how the games shake out.  Good luck to everyone and GO STEELERS!!!!

This week’s picture is of me as a burrito in said tortilla blanket.

Merry Christmas Footballers!

In another crazy week that proves the prognosticators don’t know anything…we had a shuffle at the top of the scrum.  Props to Kevin and Jim for their perfect scores, and especially to Kevin who moved into second place.  Lots of other strong performances this week too. Nice work everyone!

With the extra distractions of the holiday week, please take a second and get your picks out of the way early. Just because it is Christmas does not mean I went easy on ya. We are down to the wire and the top of the pack is dense – just 6 points separate the top 12 players – so we gotta shake it up. The picks for Week 16 are as follows:

Eagles v. Cowboys
Rams v. Seahawks
Titans v. Packers

Good luck and Merry Christmas! (oh, and GO STEELERS!!!!)

This week’s picture is a tree that we went to go see last night.  It is about 50 feet tall and covered all the way up.  So pretty!

Hello Footballers,

I hope that everyone is smiling and singing, caring and sharing, rejoicing in life itself.  Also, I hope you are ready for a day of good football.  I am pretty sure nothing will compare to last Monday’s game, but we still should have some nice match ups.

The pool doesn’t have a lot of variation, but one thing we all agreed – Cleveland is gonna win on Sunday night.  Maybe Dad didn’t pick them, but as the guy at the bottom, that’s more strategic than cheering for the Giants.

This week’s picture is from the Nemmers kids family Christmas Zoom call.  Look closely, that white bearded man isn’t Santa, its Uncle Bart.

Good luck to everyone and GO STEELERS!!!!

Hello Footballers,

It was for sure a crazy week for the pool.  Whew-boy, those night games were something. Did you see it, with all the twists and turns? Were you excited? Of course I am talking about the fact that the Sunday Night Game (Steelers v. Bills) featured two head coaches that were teammates at William and Mary about the same time as some other great human you all know. Go Tribe!

Oh, and there was also that edge-of-your-seat craziness in Cleveland. So many twists and turns, and even a potty break. You can’t make this stuff up. But, I bet a lot of people who had money on the game wished that the Browns would have made up something other than a safety on the last play to leave Baltimore covering the spread. 2 seconds on the game clock were never so expensive.

Congrats to Mary and Whoosie, whose dedication to the Bears made them the two perfect pickers for week 14.  Well Done!  The pool also saw some major shake ups at the top, with 2 of the leaders going into the week both got goose eggs. After the dust had settled, we’ve got Bill, Margie and Adam in the 1 to and 3 spots respectively. And, a tight pack of about 7 or 8 more right on their tails. It’s gonna come down to the wire!

Here’s the picks for Week 15:

49ers v. Cowboys (got bumped from the Sunday night game)
Bears v. Vikings (tied records, division on the line)
Browns v. Giants (the Sunday Night game that the ‘boys got flexed for).

This week’s picture is meant to calm your frantic brains after all the football chaos we’ve seen this week – it’s the view from Whoosie’s window during the weather last weekend.

Good luck to everyone. Go Steelers!

Hello Footballers,

With only 4 weeks to go, we might view this week’s Monday Night Game as a watershed moment in the 2020 season.  With all but 7 people putting their “bonus pick” powers on the Monday night game, it already was set to have a lopsided impact on the pool.  But…even better – we have lots of people on both sides of the victory.

And, as far as split deciding goes….the Steelers / Bills game also has power picks on both sides.  Boom!

All this to say that it will for sure shake things up in the pool as someones big 3 point win will be 3 point deficit of a competitor.  I do love it when it gets exciting.

Good luck to everyone all the same, but especially to those of you who picked Pittsburgh on Sunday night.

GO STEELERS!

Hello Footballers,

I hope that everyone is having a good week.  Even though the Steelers let us down (against “Football Team” no less!) we are having a nice week here in Dallas enjoying some sunshine, trying to figure out what to get everyone for Christmas (for your children we have picked out puppies and drum kits), and looking forward to basketball season (only 2 more weeks until we see Luka!)

Congrats to the many many people who did great this past week. For all the belly aching about how hard it was in week 13, most of the pool got either greater than 4 points. With all that success, I was encouraged and selected games with small spreads again. If you didn’t do so good, maybe pull a George Castanza this week and go with the complete opposite of your instinct. Who knows? Each week is its own little mystery.

As you can see from the overall standings, the top of the leaderboard is still pretty tight. Only 5 points separating the top 5 players.  Is there time for anyone to make a surge? I guess we’ll see soon enough.  But, congrats to Paul for staying out in front.

The picks for Week 14 are:

Texans v. Bears
Steelers v. Bills (Sunday Night)
Ravens v Browns (Monday Night)

With each week getting more wobbly, I am keeping my fingers crossed that all these games get played.  Please make sure to get your picks in by the end of the day on Friday.  Really, that’s just tomorrow, so just do the picking now and get it crossed off you’re weekend to-do list.

I didn’t get any fresh photos this week, so here’s one of a Christmas lights display near our house that we took Mom and Dad to when they were here in December a few years back.  If you come see us in December, we will probably try to take you as well.

Hello Footballers,

Did you know today is St. Nicholas Day? When we were kids, St. Nick would leave us a tiny present in our shoes sometimes on this day. I definitely left several pairs of shoes out last night….all over the house…and I got nothing. I was hoping for some prognosticating skills so I could get the hard games right the next few weeks. Anyway, I hope you got something good hiding in your shoes this morning.

Tough picks this week, and we have 5 of the 6 teams used as a power pick.  Heavy on Buffalo – but I think only one player made this pick because they think the team is named after them.  Ahem.

Good luck to all.  I think I am really pulling for the Chargers, as that’s the only way I am gonna make any strides toward the top.  Also: GO STEELERS!!!

Hello Footballers,

I realize that it is Thursday and that is very late in the week for getting the picks out.

Let’s start by recognizing this week’s big movers and shakers:  While Paul’s perfect picking solidified his spot at the top, Dan, Heidi and Molly made big moves with their 5 out of 5 victories as well.  Nice work, players!  We are certainly going to keep this thing exciting until the end. (Also, nice work Paul on keeping the state of Illinois safe, this article was GREAT!)

For the coming week, I am changing a rule.  I’m not using the Sunday Night game for our picks. It’s the Broncos, and in light of the whole qb mess, it just doesn’t seem like the right thing to do. I’m gonna go with the Monday night game instead.

So…..the Week 13 Games are:

Rams v. Cardinals
Patriots v. Chargers
Bills v. 45ers

All close spreads, so hopefully this will keep us all on our toes.

I also want to mention how the season will wrap up. Our season will end at the end of the regular season, and the person with the most total points will be the winner. They will be awarded the prize purse of $210. That is all assuming that we make it to the end of the season, and that there is not a tie.  If there is a tie, I’m not sure what we will do, especially if it is between more than 2 people. If things get dicey between now and then, I’ll assess at the time and see if we can’t come up with something that seems fair. If there was ever a year for “let’s be flexible and just wait and see” this would be it.

Hang in there Footballers, we’re almost to the end now.  And also:  GO STEELERS!!!