UPS and DOWNS for Tuesday, the first week of November!

As the college football playoff committee puts out its rankings tonight, and Following Football has done the same over the last two days for all 285 pro and college teams we cover, it's a great time to look at which teams have had a surprisingly UP season, and which ones have been startlingly DOWN...

WHO'S UP? Well, what about the Cincinnati Bengals and the Carolina Panthers? Everyone who saw both of them at 7-0 starting November raise your hands. OK, we've identified the liars in the room...

WHO'S DOWN? It's not hard to find struggling teams in the NFL, but a couple we saw in the playoffs last year are the Baltimore Ravens and the Detroit Lions. Tough schedule, sure - close games, yes - but somewhere in there, you've got to stand up and win a couple of those games.

WHO'S UP? Three "usual suspects": the Green Bay Packers, the Denver Broncos, and the New England Patriots. Remarkable to watch Peyton be Peyton again, but Rodgers and Brady have left no doubt that they're still at the top of their games. And all three have defenses to get them the ball.

WHO'S DOWN? Again, who do you expect? The Tennessee Titans, of course, who just fired another coach...the Cleveland Browns, who continue to put up with Manziel for some odd reason...the Chicago Bears weren't expected to do much, and still haven't lived up to expectations... and even with their shiny new QB, the Tampa Bay Bucs are barely better than they were at this point last year.

WHO'S UP? There are signs of life in Oakland...in Minnesota...in Atlanta...in St. Louis. Parity is always the stated goal of the NFL admin, but what you really want is the feeling as a fan base that any year could be THE YEAR!

WHO'S DOWN? When you've got a fan base like the Sasktachewan RoughRiders do, arguably the best in the Canadian Football League, and you were expecting to be contending for the Grey Cup, when you were right on the heels of the eventual champion Calgary Stampeders all season...and you go a miserable two and fifteen heading into the final week of the season...yeah, the green is blue this year. The Riders were actually eliminated from playoff contention six weeks ago...in a league where 2/3 of the teams make the playoffs. THAT'S impressive in its badness.

WHO'S UP? When you went 2-16 last year in your first campaign as an expansion franchise, you can be forgiven if a successful second season in your mind was, say, six wins. Looking at the two expansion clubs in the AFL (Gold Coast and GWS), they went through about that - two bad years, then two mediocre years. But instead, the Ottawa RedBlacks are one win away from an Eastern Division championship in their second year - already guaranteed a winning record at 11-6, all they need to do is win OR not lose by more than five points at home on Saturday to the Hamilton Ti-Cats...not the first choice of opponents in this situation, especially since it's the Ti-Cats who will earn the title if you fail. But just to have this opportunity in your sophomore campaign! CONGRATULATIONS, OTTAWA!

WHO'S DOWN? My attention span for Canadian football once the American season hit full steam in late September. It was frustrating, because I knew I didn't have the time or energy to stay abreast of every single thing in the NFL, NCAA, and the CFL - and as the footy season was reaching its climax down under, it was the mid-to-late weeks of the Canadian season that got the short shrift. To our readers, I apologize. But of course, all we can do is our best, and we'll continue to do that for you.

WHO'S UP? At the moment, we have our top four "theoretically playoff bound" FBS teams (in the humble opinion of Following Football ACNC!) - LSU, Clemson, Alabama, Notre Dame. To most observers we've heard, the first two names are almost indisputable at the moment (things change quickly in college football, though!), and the other two could be replaced by any of close to a dozen teams: TCU, Baylor, Oklahoma, Oklahoma St, Michigan St, Ohio St, Florida, Stanford, Iowa, Utah, even Memphis or Toledo. (Probably not Idaho, though.)

WHO'S DOWN? Which teams thought they'd be in the mix at this point and aren't? There are some obvious candidates: Georgia, Auburn, Oregon, USC, Tennessee, There are some others whose fan bases might have thought it feasible - but that's another story.

WHO'S UP? There are some remarkable positive stories this fall of teams who weren't expected to fare as successfully as they have, as there are every year. That doesn't make them any less worth applauding: Florida (new head coach Jim McElwain has them sitting at #7 on the Following Football ranking at the moment; finished the 2014 season at #34), Michigan (Harbaugh took a team who finished at #67 last year, bottom half of the FBS, and has them at #14 right now), Houston (up from #69 last year to an undefeated 8-0 at #21 and looking at a possible New Year's bowl); and Temple (similar story arc, moving from #79 to current #22, having just taken Notre Dame to the brink). There are lower eschelon stories as well: Southern Miss moved from tier S up to its current tier L; Tulsa has bounded from tier T up to tier N this year. Vanderbilt from tier R up to its present place in tier I; and Northwestern, who beat Stanford to start the year, Duke for its only legitimate defeat (ahem, Miami), and moved from last year's tier M and #78 all the way into tier G and position #35.

WHO'S DOWN? And then... there are the sob stories. The ones you tsk tsk about behind their backs. The ones who (in your opinion) deserve a bad year every once in a while... How about Texas? Charlie Strong's first year looked promising! But with a blowout, embarrassing loss to Notre Dame (well, ok), embarrassing near-misses against California and OK State (hmmm...), a bad loss at TCU (eww...), a surprise win in the Shootout (hey! Maybe...) followed by definitive losses to two foes they used to pick their teeth with the last two weeks: K-State and Iowa State. Read that again. Iowa State! The Texas offense was not only shut out, they never got past the ISU 40 yard line.

But that pales next to Nebraska, who fired a coach who gave them nine wins a season every year - AGAIN. A decade ago, they fired Frank Solich because he wasn't Tom Osborne. The man they hired to replace him...was no Frank Solich. Disaster - they didn't even make .500! In desperation, they brought in NU guy Bo Pelini - colorful, successful, nine wins a season, just like Solich (who went on to be one of the most successful coaches in MAC history). Seven years of Pelini NOT being Tom Osborne was enough for the faithful, and they brought in Mike Riley, a very nice man with a mediocre program at Oregon State, who has produced a mediocre program at Nebraska, finding exciting ways to lose close games to good teams and sometimes to bad teams like Purdue last weekend.

South Carolina was doing badly enough that the Head Ball Coach simply walked away into retirement. Central Florida saw the same story with Head Resume Inflator in the lead walking role. Whether the story ends the same way at Virginia Tech in Frank Beamer's last year remains to be seen. It looks like Minnesota's going to be hanged if they allow Jerry Kill's epilepsy-induced retirement to end the same way, thankfully.

WHAT'S NEXT? Who knows? And isn't that the beauty of football? It's the best reality show there is - all the drama, the competition, the tension of the staged TV events, except it's actual reality! There IS no script! Maybe Texas turns it around! Maybe Florida nosedives the rest of the way! Maybe Jim Harbaugh takes Michigan to four miraculous victories against Ohio State, Iowa in the B1G title game, the semifinal and the NC game, and the Blue rule the nation! Or...just as unlikely...maybe they lose every game from here on out, including a 59-0 shutout by the Buckeyes. That's the point - we can't know ahead of time! So sit back, turn on the TV, go to a game if you're close enough, and enjoy the ride!

UPS and DOWNS for Tuesday, Sept 29th, 2015

UPS to the AFL for an amazing season under some difficult conditions - dealing with the specter of racism against the aboriginal superstar Adam Goodes, who chose to retire quietly, after his final game, so as not to go through the traditional plaudits at the end of his last game that he so richly deserved and therefore avoid the possibility of negative reaction to deal with. The league can't be expected to solve a centuries-old problem singlehandedly in a few weeks, but the footy community did everything they could reasonably do for Adam and against racism. More than that, the murder of Adelaide Crows head coach Phil Walsh was handled with more aplomb and grace than could have ever been asked for - some of the most touching and beautiful moments ever seen on a sporting field took place in the aftermath. The league dealt with the after-effects of the Essendon doping scandal, the possibility of "tanking" for draft choices, and the seemingly everpresent shadow of injuries to its star players, such as Gary Ablett Jr and Nat Fyfe, the 2015 Brownlow Medal winner last night as best player in the league. Finally, as its highest paid player, Lance Franklin, admitted as the playoffs began that his injury issues were more of a mental health case than physical, the AFL and its community made great efforts to both shield him from the prying eyes of the media and to put those mental health issues in the light of day, exposing them as serious and no more or less debilitating OR worthy of embarrassment than a broken arm or an ACL. (Now, if they can get their free agency set-up to work more reasonably...)

DOWNS to the TEAMS WHO WERE EXPECTED TO DO SO WELL THIS SEASON! And yet, here we are, not even out of September, and some teams are so deep in a hole they probably can't dig themselves out of it before the season ends...

> Baltimore Ravens, 0-3, looking up at a hot Bengals team three games up and a tiebreaker, with improved wild card possibilities throughout the AFC... Is another Harbaugh going to the colleges next year?
> Saskatchewan RoughRiders, 2-11 and presumably out of the playoff picture completely, despite the ridiculously generous CFL playoff system which invites 2/3 of the league into the post-season. In theory, they are still just 3 1/2 games behind 5-7 Montreal for that last spot, but with six games remaining, the Mean Green has correctly started playing for next year already. The Riders, Grey Cup winners just three years ago, were expected to contend for the West division title this year with Edmonton and Calgary...instead, they're on coach number 2, quarterback number 3, and on to 2016...
> Oregon Ducks, 2-2 and 0-1 in conference. Still a very viable possibility of a Pac-12 North title, but that's not the OU goal - the college football playoffs are their goal, and while the 31-28 loss at Michigan State would have been survivable, the spanking they got at home last Saturday night from Utah, 62-20 (including a late gift TD by the third-teamers) was so comprehensive and so vivid that no voter will forget it. Ever.
> Many other teams who shot themselves in the foot, like Louisville (1-3), Nebraska (2-2), Texas (1-3), Texas' kicking game (0-2), Tennessee, Auburn, and South Carolina (all 2-2) and Arkansas (1-3...but hey, someone's got to lose in the SEC!); Marshall (3 bad wins and one BAD loss); the entire Mountain West (15-24 outside of conference, 11 of the wins coming against FCS schools); U Mass (1-3 and expected to contend for a MAC East title); Cal Poly SLO, Idaho State, and Montana of the Big Sky, 3-8 between them; Eastern Illinois (0-3); Stephen F Austin (0-4); the entire SWAC (3-12 outside of conference); and our #1 Bottom Team, Davidson of the Pioneer League, who plays almost equally-fruitless Valparaiso at home Saturday, in a meeting of the two last place teams in the Sagarin Ratings for the 253 Division 1 schools. Valpo is down to an amazing 6.67 rating, and yet is favored on the road at Davidson, who has set a record with their current rating of 3.08! It's conceivable that a bad Davidson loss this weekend could create a situation Sagarin's never had in D1: a negative rating.

Here is the Canadian Football season in a nutshell so far:

Our selections in the AFL have been spot on all year; we've gotten 84 out of 116 correct this season, (75%) and sit in the top third of 1% in every grouping we're part of in the official AFL "tipping" contest (that's what they call predicting down under). So we know how to pick games. 

In the CFL, we're 3 out of 8 so far. (Which is better than the odds makers at BoDog, the official CFL gambling site, who have only gotten two games right so far.) Despite what actually passes as worse than "flip a coin" prognostication, we're in the top half of the pool already, and moving up. Go figure.

Last weekend, in Round 2, the Eastern Division somehow went 4-0 against the "vastly superior" West, with Hamilton annihilating 1-0 Winnipeg 52-26 - and that was the LEAST of the four results! - "quarterbackless Montreal crushing defending champion Calgary 29-11 behind first-time starter Raheem Cato (of Marshall U fame); Ottawa matched its 2014 win total sixteen games early by upending the British Columbia Lions 27-16; and in the game of the young season so far, two incredibly proficient teams went toe-to-toe, slugging it out as long as theoretically possible - more on that in a moment - before Toronto upset Saskatchewan in the Mosaic in Regina 42-40 in double overtime. Two great writers to follow on Canadian football are Don Landry and Pat Steinberg on cfl.ca; here are their wrap-ups.

Backup QB Trevor Harris drove the Argonauts down for the tying score late in the fourth, and the teams traded touchdowns (and missed mandatory 2-pt conversions) in the first overtime together. In the CFL, OTs are run in the same basic Kansas City format the NCAA uses, except each possession starts from the 35 (the extra ten yards account for the goal posts being ten yards closer, on the goal line itself). They only allow two overtimes at most in a regular season game, and 2-pt conversions are required on all TDs. The Roughriders made their second TD to come within two of Toronto in the second OT, and then on the by-definition last play of the game, the Argos stopped Saskatchewan from converting to win the game by two. 

So right now, Toronto and Ottawa are 2-0 in the East (Toronto has a 17 point higher rating at the moment), with Hamilton and Montreal a game back at 1-1. Calgary still leads the West, tied with Winnipeg at 1-1; BC and Edmonton each sit at 0-1, and the Roughriders have looked good two straight weeks and are 0-2 to show for it. 

Next week, we see these likelihoods:
Edmonton over Ottawa 19-13 at home...Winnipeg at home over Montreal 28-23...Saskatchewan over BC 30-24 in Vancouver...Calgary edging Toronto 24-23 at home. The Hamilton Ti-Cats have the week off.

The weekend in CFL and AFL action

Starting with the CFL, thanks to the quarterback MASH unit overflowing, we went 1-3 predicting winners and 0-4 betting on the line. Great start, FF! But we're honest when we screw up...and it was under mitigating circumstances! Check out the review of the four weekend games here - you'll see that if it wasn't for Montreal losing BOTH quarterbacks, they probably win against Ottawa...and if Edmonton doesn't lose Mike Reilly for the year, then Toronto may not win (y'know, we take that back. Trevor Harris made his second professional start for the Argos and went 24-27. They would've won regardless...)...and if Saskatchewan doesn't lose star QB Darian Durant in the game, they hold on to beat archrival Winnipeg. So, losing those games stings less than it might otherwise. GREAT Monday morning reviews of the weekend's action from Don Landry and Pat Steinberg for CFL.ca - LOTS of insight in a short read!

Regardless, there were four exciting games up north!

Week 1
Ottawa d. Montreal 20-16 (Game winning drive AND time draining drive by Ottawa!)
Calgary d. Hamilton 24-23 (Rene Paradis kicks winning FG with no time left)
Toronto d. Edmonton 26-11 (Harris dominates Reilly's replacement...)
Winnipeg d. Saskatchewan 30-26 (another game winning drive, this time Winnipeg's)

In the Australian footy league, the biggest story in Round 13 was Richmond's upset at Sydney, pulling away to win by 18 Friday night. Not only did it move the Tigers into the top 8 for the first time in a month, but it allows reigning premier Hawthorn to use their distinctive second half domination over rival Essendon (with some bad blood thrown in from the Hawks' Sam Mitchell!) to jump into the top four for the first time in two months! As those top four get the "double chance" in the playoffs, that's a critical distinction for any team. (Can we please wait to cover the details of the double chance until we reach August?)

The other four games went more or less to form: Fremantle def. Collingwood (but barely, by seven points); Adelaide waited until the fourth quarter to show their dominance over the Brisbane Lions, pulling away by 13 after trailing most of the game; the Western Bulldogs got revenge for the St. Kilda 55-point comeback on May 9, winning by 13; and Carlton proved they're starting to rise from the dead, beating still-deceased Gold Coast 103-69. (Oh, and we got five out of six right last week, missing on Richmond's upset.)

If you can throw a football, and you have a Canadian passport, please call...

What a disasterous start to the Canadian Football season! 

First of all, huge favorite Montreal loses a close game to Ottawa after losing both quarterbacks, leaving the game to a raw rookie who hadn't ever played with the offense in a game (he ran the scout team offense).

Next, the Edmonton Eskimos lost 26-11 to Toronto today in another upset when starting QB Mike Reilly left for the day, carted off the field with a leg injury.

And now, the Saskatchewan RoughRiders are trying to hang on as we speak against the lowly Winnipeg Blue Bombers after their star quarterback Darian Durant left at the end of the first half with an ankle injury he couldn't put an ounce of weight on. Fortunately for them, second stringer Kevin Glenn is a former starter himself, and that depth may allow them to end the weekend as the top Western Division team, the big survivor of Death To Quarterbacks weekend! (Tied at 23 at the moment, though...)

And if they're long term injuries - and early reports are that at least one of Montreal's is season-ending - then Calgary's Bo Levi Mitchell is the MVP in waiting as the only surviving star QB!

By the way, before the weekend, here were the Grey Cup championship odds...

Calgary - 13 to 4             (3.25 - 1)
Saskatchewan - 5 to 1    (5 - 1)
Edmonton - 11 to 2         (5.5 - 1)
British Columbia - 6 to 1 (6 - 1)
Hamilton - 13 to 1           (6.5 - 1)
Montreal/Toronto - 8 to 1 each (8 - 1)
Winnipeg - 17 to 2           (8.5 - 1)
Ottawa - 20 to 1              (20 - 1)

It'll be interesting to see how they change next weekend! 

As the pre-season ends up north...

...and the end of a few CFL careers come with the final cutdown tomorrow, we take a look at the final exhibition games and the starting Following Football ratings for the CFL:

- Troubled Toronto handles rival Montreal 30-10, to my surprise (the Argonauts don't play in their Rogers Centre home until August, including having to play a "home game" in Ft. McMurray next weekend. Their ownership is changing and the current owner's not likely to spend another dime on the Argos this year...)
-Hamilton over Winnipeg 26-15, posting a 2-0 preseason after two easy games against the two weakest teams after playing Grey Cup last November.
-Edmonton traveled to Vancouver and beat the BC Lions 18-13. They also went 2-0, but defeated two good teams in Saskatchewan and the Lions.
-Speaking of Saskatchewan, their broadcast went live on line tonight, so we watched them compete marvelously against the defenders from Calgary, who showed their class by coming back from being down all game to score the last two TDs and win 37-29.

Calgary certainly deserves the highest rating going into the 2015 season, which starts on Thursday night. Here's our picks for week one, with the FF Elo-style ratings in parentheses...

Thursday, Montreal (29.6) at Ottawa (10.1) - M should win 33-7.
Friday, Hamilton (29.9) at Calgary (48.9) - C should win, 34-21.
Saturday, Edmonton (38.1) "at" Toronto (29.9) - E in a close one, 31-28.
Saturday, Winnipeg (20.1) at Saskatchewan (30.0) - we see S big, 35-17.
(And in an odd-team league, it's the BC Lions (32.9) with the bye to start the season.)

If you're interested in joining me in the CFL Pick'em contest, go to cfl.ca and register before Thursday night! It's free, it's quick (only four games to pick each week), and it'll give you some insight into the Canadian game! Twelve men flying in all directions, three downs, big field - it's a blast!

Canadian update...

A great place to look for quick hitters on each of the teams in the CFL is the "Checking Down" column that runs on the cfl.ca page every week...This week, it includes some interesting pieces on the Michael Sam situation: Sam has left the Montreal Alouette camp amidst speculation that he's getting harassed - ironically, not about his homosexuality but for appearing on Dancing With The Stars over the off-season (especially instead of training to make a roster). 

Also of interest last week was the Edmonton/Saskatchewan game held up in Fort McMurray, Alberta, opening the brand new stadium there, Shell Place (and it's gorgeous! Take a look!) To give you Yankees some perspective on life in Canada (or "Canadia", as my son keeps mistakenly referring to it), this is a thing there: The game was the most northerly CFL game ever played. Remember, in Canada, you're already pretty far north - everything is above the northern borders of the US, which means north of Minnesota, North Dakota, Maine, Ohio, etc... which means it can get COLD there. (Hockey. Remember?) And the farther north you go... Yeah, you got the picture now. Fort McMurray isn't ridiculously far, but it is 250 miles north of Edmonton, already above Canada's backbone Highway 1 by several hundred miles itself. They'll be playing a regular season game there in July, and Aerosmith hits the stage in July as well. The design of the stadium is brilliant: the stage sits at one end of the football field, waiting for seating to go in when they need it!

Scores? You want pre-season scores? Well, besides Edmonton defeating Saskatchewan 31-24 up north, Montreal knocked off Ottawa 26-9, defending champ Calgary easily handled British Columbia 20-6, and Winnipeg upset Toronto by a touchdown, 34-27. This Thursday and Friday hold the last four pre-season games before the final roster cuts and the start of the season next Thursday night, on the 25th of June. Following Football has its ELO-style rating system in place and will finalize ratings and be providing you with the opportunity for predictions leading into each week of the Canadian Football League season this year!

Along the lines of the FF rating system for the AFL...

...comes the Following Football CFL rating system! (Yeah...we're bored. What's your point?)

This was formulated using the numbers from the last three CFL seasons (except for Ottawa, who was an expansion franchise in 2014), with each season being worth half of the one that followed it. The ratings have been normalized with 30 as a median, so that the sum of all the ratings should always equal 30*9 teams=270:

Calgary Stampeders           48.5
Edmonton Eskimos            37.7
British Columbia Lions     32.5
Saskatchewan R.Riders    29.6
Hamilton Tiger-Cats          29.5
Toronto Argonauts             29.5
Montreal Alouettes             29.2
Winnipeg Blue Bombers   20.2
Ottawa REDBLACKS           13.3

A few interesting notes about this rating system as it's played out...
--- Calgary seems really high, but that's what you get when you're as dominant as they were last year, plus very solid seasons the two previous years. It remains to be seen if that rating accurately predicts scores, however - my guess is that it's too high for that purpose.
---Given an average score of 30, it's funny to see only three of nine teams above thirty. Of course, having four teams in the 29s makes up for it! That's about how close those teams have been the last couple of years!
---What will home field advantage be worth? Traditionally, three points, but whether that works with this rating system is still anyone's guess. 
---Like Calgary, Ottawa is so far off the norm that it's anyone's guess whether that number will be accurate or useful in predicting outcomes and scores for the REDBLACKS, the only fully-capitalized team in professional sports! The great thing about these rating systems, though, is that they self-normalize over time - if they're not accurate yet, they will be soon!

So, we'll have to wait and see how this plays out over the course of the 22-game CFL season. We'll track the games here, right alongside the AFL in the early season and the NFL in the fall and winter. As need be, we may adjust the numbers slightly in the pre-season as we "tweak" the set-up for its initial use.

Play ball!

Montreal and Edmonton move on to the conference finals!

The Montreal Alouettes held up their end of the bargain, walloping the crossover BC Lions by a score of 50-17 (and it wasn't that close - early in the fourth, it was actually 50-3!) to move on to the Eastern Conference finals next week against their rival, the Hamilton Ti-Cats.

Meanwhile, as expected, the Edmonton Eskimos held on to a halftime lead to defeat the defending champions Saskatchewan Roughriders by a count of 18-10. They will travel to Calgary next week to play the team with the best regular-season record, the Stampeders, for the Western Conference title next weekend, with the winner advancing to the 102nd Grey Cup in Vancouver on November 30th.

Here are the links to the recaps for the two games - enjoy!

Montreal routs British Columbia to prevent a home-team-Grey Cup, 50-17.

Edmonton's 18-10 win over the Roughriders sends them to Calgary next week.

Here are our professional games forecast for Week 11 (and CFL playoff week one!)

NFL Week 11 games

            Having spread our 32 teams out into eight tiers now, tier 1 being championship material and tier 8 being first-pick-in-the-draft material, we can start using these tiers for setting point spreads as well, always remembering that nobody has a clue how to predict NFL games! Got that? All right, then – here we go!

Buffalo @ Miami (Thur 6:30 pm)

            5-4 tier 5 @ 5-4 tier 4. Miami by 5. Vegas says by 5 ½. Dolphins won 22-9.

Minnesota @ Chicago (Sun 11 am)

            4-5 tier 6 @ 3-6 tier 7. Bears by 1. Vegas says by 3 ½. Bears won 21-13.

Houston @ Cleveland (Sun 11 am)

            4-5 tier 6 @ 6-3 tier 3. Browns by 9. Vegas says 3 ½. Houston upset the Browns, 23-7. Vegas' point, 1-0.

Seattle @ Kansas City (Sun 11 am)

            6-3 tier 4 v. 6-3 tier 4. Chiefs by 3. Vegas says Seahawks by 1. Chiefs won, 24-20. Our point: 1-1!

Atlanta @ Carolina (Sun 11 am)

            3-6 tier 7 @ 3-5-1 tier 5. Panthers by 7. Vegas says by 3. Atlanta blocked a field goal to win the game, 19-17.

Cincinnati @ New Orleans (Sun 11 am)

            5-3-1 tier 3 @ 4-5 tier 5. Saints by 1. Vegas says by 7. The Bengals pull the upset IN New Orleans, 27-10, so we win this "bet". FF up 2-1.

Tampa Bay @ Washington (Sun 11 am)

            1-8 tier 8 @ 3-6 tier 6. Redskins by 7. Vegas agrees. And we were both wrong...27-7, Bucs.

Denver @ St. Louis (Sun 11 am)

            7-2 tier 1 @ 3-6 tier 7. Broncos by 9. Vegas says by 10 ½. When you've got Shaun Hill going 20-29 w no interceptions, and "Greg The Leg" Zeurlein kicking five FGs, plus three injured receivers for the Broncos, you get a 22-7 Rams victory.

San Francisco @ New Jersey Giants (Sun 11 am)

            5-4 tier 5 @ 3-6 tier 6. Giants by 1. Vegas says the 49ers by 4 ½. And the Niners won by six, 16-10. Point, Vegas, score is 2-2. So we call the contest a tie this week.

Oakland @ San Diego (Sun 2:05 pm)

            0-9 tier 8 @ 5-4 tier 4. Chargers by 11. Vegas says by 10. The Raiders said seven. They may have lost 16 in a row, but they seem to always play close games!

Philadelphia @ Green Bay (Sun 2:25 pm)

            6-2 tier 2 @ 6-3 tier 1. Packers by 4. Vegas says by 7. On the other hand, the Packers are on a ROLL. 53 points without seeming to try hard against a division leader - ridiculous.

Detroit @ Arizona (Sun 2:25 pm)

            7-2 tier 2 @ 8-1 tier 1. AZ lost its QB. Arizona by (less than) 5. Vegas says by 1, which given the circumstances makes more sense. Great game! A superb defensive struggle in which AZ put up two quick TDs and made them hold up for 50 more minutes against Stafford, Megatron, and the Lions, 14-6.

New England @ Indianapolis (6:30 pm)

            7-2 tier 1 @ 6-3 tier 2. Colts by 1. Vegas says by 2 ½. And the Pats made it clear who the best in the AFC is: New England 42, Indy 20.

Pittsburgh @ Tennessee (Mon 6:20 pm)

            6-4 tier 3 @ 2-7 tier 8. Steelers by 7. Vegas says by 5 ½.

The thing about those picks, to us, is that our instincts say that the Vegas line makes perfect sense: Houston could very well stay close to the Browns; Seattle "should" be able to beat KC, the Saints at home are a juggernaut; and the 49ers "should" be the favorite as well. But we'll stick with the tiers and see what happens! (There's no money riding on it, after all - this is all fun and games!)

And the CFL PLAYOFFS start this weekend!

BC Lions @ Montreal Alouettes (Sun 1 pm) – West semifinal

            Both 9-9 teams; both looked poor last week. Home field advantage will be important… Montreal by 3.

Saskatchewan Roughriders @ Edmonton Eskimos (Sun 4:30 pm) – East semifinal

            Eskimos finished 12-6, the Roughriders 10-8. MMQB “leans towards the Eskimos”, and we do too. Edmonton by 5.

Reviewing our Week 10 predictions!

Well, if you've been with us this week, you know we've been firing on all cylinders in Week 10! Here's our results...

Successes: Bowling Green over Akron...NIU over Ball St...Temple closer than a TD to Memphis...Baylor destroying Oklahoma...Duke big over Syracuse...Army over UConn...TCU over Kansas St...LSU took Alabama to overtime....Toronto over Ottawa late...Hamilton wins against Montreal (half-credit)..,Cardinals big over the Rams. We'd like to be able to claim Minnesota's win over Iowa, but we didn't, so we can't.

Missteps: We said UL-Monroe would win against Appalachian St; the Warhawks gave up a late FG to lose 31-29...We were surprised Old Dominion beat FIU 38-35, but they had to score ten points in the last 65 seconds to do it...Ohio St beat Michigan St, on the road...Arizona St sure impressed us, handling Notre Dame...Didn't think Saskatchewan still had it in them to beat Edmonton...and the half-credit Hamilton was because we did NOT think the Tiger-Cats would win by enough to win the division (8). They won by fifteen. (Yes, that's more than eight.)

(And there's still the chance that Chicago could stay close to the Packers tonight.) So, right now, we are 10.5 - 5.5, so we will take that!

Time for the playoffs, eh?

Well, Hamilton won the pivotal game with Montreal, 29-15, to secure not only a playoff spot but also the Eastern Division title at 9-9. (Hence, the three team round-robin went to all three home teams, as we expected!) With Saskatchewan's (surprise) win over Edmonton, 24-17, the Grey Cup playoffs are set:

Next Sunday, the BC Lions go to Montreal to play the Alouettes; the winner gets to play the East Division champion Hamilton Tiger-Cats. All three of these teams finished the season 9-9.

Meanwhile, in the West, there'll be a rematch of yesterday's last game of the regular CFL season, Saskatchewan @ Edmonton. Of course, the winner will travel to play the regular season champs, the Calgary Stampeders.

The winners of the conference title games in Calgary and Hamilton play on November 30th in BC Place for the 102nd Grey Cup. Incidentally, the Lions have a chance to become the fourth consecutive team to play in their home stadium for the title! 

Canadian Football update

With two weeks to go, here's what's going on north of the border...

This weekend's results: Montreal over Ottawa 23-17, Calgary beats Saskatchewan 40-27, the BC Lions edge Winnipeg 28-23, and in the most interesting game, Toronto holds serve at home in the first game of the East Conference round-robin, squeaking by Hamilton 26-24.

Toronto 26, Hamilton 24 - Saturday, October 25th, 2014

With BC's win, clinching a playoff spot for the Lions, there are four guaranteed spots going to Western teams, leaving only two for the three teams battling in the East: Montreal's at 8-8, with Hamilton and Toronto at 7-9.... BUT Montreal has to play both of the other two over the next two weeks, while the seven-win teams get "free" wins against Ottawa in the other weeks. 

IF (as happened this week) the home team holds serve in each of the other "round-robin" games (and Ottawa loses twice), then Montreal  and Hamilton will end up 9-9, and Toronto will be the odd one out at 8-10. Montreal will have the division record edge (they would have split their games against each other) and should win the bye week, while Hamilton would play either BC or Saskatchewan in the first round.

And now...let's dive into the Canadian Football League!

We're in week 15 of the CFL season, and it's all Calgary Stampeders, who at 12-2 lead the entire league by three full games, clinching their playoff spot seemingly years in advance. 

With their 31-24 victory over the Saskatchewan Roughriders Friday night, coupled with Edmonton's one point loss to Toronto Saturday, Calgary stretched their lead over those two clubs to three games with four to play before playoffs start in November.

Much like last year, the WIDE gap between the East and West divisions is what stands out when you  glance at the standings - before Hamilton's victory on Saturday and Winnipeg's surprise loss to bottom feeder Ottowa Redblacks 42-20, all five teams in the West had better records than all four teams in the East! Hamilton leads the East at 6-7 (you read that right), while Winnipeg fell to 6-8 with their loss, last in the West and a game behind the BC Lions.

Last year's champions, the Toronto Argonauts, host their division rivals, the Hamilton Tiger-Cats, for first place in the division Friday night with four weeks to go in the season! Saturday, Ottawa travels to Vancouver to play the BC Lions, and on Monday the 13th, there's a pair of games: Saskatchewan at Montreal, and then Winnipeg at Edmonton.