I just spent the worst week of deer gun hunting season of my life. Weather was fine, property was fine, the people I was with were more than fine, but there were simply very few animals moving around. When you sit in a tree for a week and don’t even bring the gun to your shoulder it gets tiring, frustrating and physically and emotionally painful. That said, even the worst week of deer hunting beats a good week of work…. Or watching the Cavs and Browns play and the Indians ‘build’ toward their 2013 season.
The first public week of picking via the new ranking system went sufficiently, giving birth to an 8.5-4.5 record (the Atlanta-Tampa game was halved). But, like John Henry, my machine was outdone by a human, in this case BT, who managed his best week of the year at 9.5-3.5. DJC, after taking a convincing lead, sputtered a bit at 6.5-6.5.
Fresh off their win against the Pittsburgh Steelers, the Cleveland Browns head west to take on the Oakland Raiders.
There has been an outpouring of hundreds - nay, tens - of requests to begin posting the weekly results of my NFL ranking system, HERO (Hutchison Enigmatic Ranking Output), and it would be a fool thing for me to disoblige. So, here they are.
In a way, it’s not fair. When one reviews the career of a sports icon who helped break the color barrier in American society, the temptation is to focus on his race, and the life and times in which he lived. This is natural; that was the tense and dangerous crucible in which he displayed honor and dignity.