Category: Pick ’em

So here’s the deal. Unlike previous years’ pick ems, I’m totally unorganized, busy, and a general mess. Personal and professional life are totally chaotic, and the last thing I have is free time for posting stuff on this site (I’d rather spend the free time I have with family — sue me). So I haven’t been able to organize prizes or anything fun like in years past. My apologies.

So this year, bragging rights are on the line. Join up here (password, if it asks, is utterlyboring20). Your brackets need to be filled out by Thursday morning. Scoring remains the same as in years past. Since there are not prizes, the rules regarding prizes don’t apply.

I won’t be posted scoring updates like I did in the past. See lack of free time warning above.

Good luck! And hopefully sometime this week I’ll put out my quarterly-ish link dump.

The Dren, the dude that lost our last Pick ‘Em (third time he’s done so — see here and here) sent me a picture of the special shirt I made for him:

If you can’t read the text:

Thanks Dren for playing and sucking so bad!

First off, a big thank you to all of the prize providers for this year’s pick ’em:

• Mug Revolution
• Paizano’s Pizza
• Jake’s Diner
• Brother Jon’s Ale House
• Home Improvement Services
• Bend Oregon Restaurants Blog

There’d be no point in having a pick ’em like this if it weren’t for the wonderful folks who throw in prizes, so please support them all, click through to their sites, buy something, eat something, etc…

I was one of a few people that picked Kansas to win the tournament while most of the people in the 2012 UtterlyBoring NCAA Pick ’em picked Kentucky. I thought I was going to look like a genius. Not so much after Kentucky smacked the Jayhawks around, causing me to drop from first on Saturday to fourth today. As you can see, quite a few folks picked Kentucky, and I barely held on to fourth place.

But that matters not, as the following folks are in the money, so to speak:

• First Place goes to BBall Magic (Erock): A $25 Gift Certificate for a handmade mug from Mug Revolution Plus a $25 Amazon Gift card (provided by my parents, who run Home Improvement Services) Plus A totally un-used Starter Pack for Arduino Plus two lift tickets to Ski Anthony Lakes, courtesy of Baker City’s Best Pizza Place.
• Second Place goes to Zen-ish (David): He’ll take home a meal (breakfast, lunch, or dinner) for two at Jake’s Diner Plus an Alehouse T-Shirt from Brother Jon’s Ale House Plus $25 gift certificate to Paizano’s in Baker City.
• Third Place goes to Larry Legend (LarryK): Larry will take home a copy of Mario Super Sluggers for the Wii Plus a luxurious fuzzy Paizano’s Pizza embroidered full-length robe.
• Second-to-Last Place goes to GoHogs! (Kyle): He runs off with the fully punched Taco Del Mar punch card for a free burrito, courtesy of Bend Oregon Restaurants Blog.
• Last Place goes to Drentastic!: Dren is a three-time loser and gets a t-shirt from the UtterlyBoring.com shop. I’ll have to add a few design elements to the shirt to make it extra special

I’ll be getting in touch with all the winners later this week once I get all the prizes rounded up. Per the rules, you have two weeks to get back to me from when I send the email, otherwise the prizes go to the next person on the list. Make sure your email address it visible on the tournament member page otherwise I have no idea how to verify you are who you say you are (or contact me at utterlyboring {at} gmail {dot} com and I’ll give you another way to verify, involving the tournament member page).

Thanks again for playing!

The Final Four is over, and I’m actually winning the 2012 UtterlyBoring.com Pick ’em, but it’s still going to come down to the final game. If Kansas wins, I’m the bragging-rights champ (since I’m not claiming any prizes), but if Kentucky wins, I’m going to drop down to fourth, as several folks are really close to me, and have Kentucky winning the final game. The final game is worth a bunch of points (13 to be exact) so things could really get interesting. The updated scores for the day are here.

In all the years I’ve been running the pick ’em on this site, never have I been in contention to win the thing this late in the game. As it stands right now, I manage to pick 3 of the 4 Final Four teams and stand in second place behind “Zen-ish,”, who has been close to the lead for more of the tournament. If Kansas and Kentucky win next weekend, it would come down to me and “BBall Magic” for the championship, as he picked Kentucky to win, I picked Kansas.

That being said, it doesn’t really matter, other than for bragging rights. I’ve said all along, I’m not eligible for any prizes, so should I manage to win, the prizes will be given away starting with the second place person. But you dang-well better believe that that I’m going to make sure everybody knows that I picked it right.

Of course, knowing my luck, all this might be for naught as Louisville and Ohio State might win and I won’t get any more points anyway, so it might end up being a moot point.

The last few games of the Sweet 16 have been played, and we have a new leader in the 2012 Pick ’em. “Zen-ish” regained the lead he had last week with several folks right on his taile (scores are here). I managed to pick six of the eight teams that are still left standing, so I’m sitting tied for ninth (which is the highest place I think I’ve ever sat in this late in the tournament).

Scores for the next round will be posted after the Final Four is set on Sunday. Good luck everybody!

The second weekend of the 2012 Pick ’em kicked off today with four of the elite eight teams being decided tonight. Which naturally means two of the four teams I had picked lost, pretty much killing my bracket.

“MGoBlue” still has a single-point lead over “Zen-ish” heading into the second day of the Sweet 16, if you see the scores. “Zen-ish” still has more points sitting out there to score, so the tournament is far from over.

The first weekend in the pick ’em is over, and we have our losers. By a single point, “Drentastic!” will be getting the loser t-shirt (again) and “GoHogs!” will be getting the burrito. Neither one of them have teams left to score points with, so the bottom two shall remain the same. Congrats, gentlemen! I’ll contact you later this week to arrange for prize delivery. Dren’s managed to lose this thing a few times now, so I’ll have to make his t-shirt extra special this time around.

As for those of us who are actually trying to win something by picking winners, “MGoBlue” took the lead today, scoring 10 points and holding onto a slim, single-point lead going into next week (where the games are worth more points). Spreadsheet and pretty graphs are posted here for your viewing pleasure.

Things went mostly as predicted today in the 2012 Pick ’em, with the top seeds winning and folks who picked them getting two points each for their trouble. Things will get interesting tomorrow as the low-seeded teams that won yesterday will get a shot at further screwing up everybody’s brackets.

After half of the Sweet 16 has been set, we have a tie on top with “Bodacious Bracket” and “Zen-ish” tied for first with five brackets only a single point behind. The day’s scores have been posted with “Go Hogs!” and “Drentastic” bringing up the rear. Tomorrow’s games will probably solidify which person with get the burrito and which person will get the shirt. We’ll see how things turn out. I’m currently tied for 21st place with the like’s of Jack and my brother, but I still have more potential points to score than all of them (and even “Canadian Invaders” could make a serious run from 28th place, as that bracket still has 115 potential points sitting out there).

With two different #2 seeds losing to #15 seeds and a #11, #12 and #13 seed all winning today, there are a load of screwed up brackets after the first round of the 2012 pick ’em. Perpetual loser Dren scored more points than I think he has in a while, and has some competition for last place. Thankfully, after it was all said and done, my Elite Eight teams are still alive, so I still have a lot of potential points, but I’m still near the end of the group, tied for 35th place.

Scoring sheet has been updated. Good luck this weekend, everybody!