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Light Heavyweight rankings

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Thu, 14 Jun 2007 01:10:00 +0000

Here are my current linear rankings for the UFC Light Heavyweight division, and the latest community rankings via Unspun. My personal linear top Light Heavyweight fighters currently active in the UFC:

Mauricio "Shogun" Rua
- Welcome to the UFC Mr. Shogun sir. Despite the fact that he's likely 1-2 fights away from a rematch with Jackson, I don't see anything in the transition from PRIDE to the UFC that makes me think the results are any different the second go round.
Quinton Jackson
- One of the few divisions where I feel the current title holder deserves to be up at the top of the list... if it wasn't for Shogun moving over Rampage would stand alone here...
Rashad Evans
- Despite being a fan of Tito Ortiz in the past and a big fan of Team Punishment, I think Evans handily defeats Tito Ortiz at UFC 73.
Lyoto Machida
- the dark secret of the UFC's Light Heavyweight division. His highly technical counter-based style won't win him a lot of fans or get him a lot of TV time, but I think he stands a lot farther up this list than most give him credit for...
Chuck Liddell
- too early to say if age or partying has finally caught up to Chuck since he simply made a mistake and got caught at UFC 71 and prevented us from seeing the fight we wanted. However, I do feel everyone above beats Chuck most of the time. Machida is a big assumption but I think Machida is smart enough to force Liddell to come after him and not vice-versa.
Dan Henderson
- I'm a big fan of Henderson but I really think he belongs at Middleweight. I don't think he can hang at 205 for long despite the win over Wandy. But I'd love to be proven wrong...
Michael Bisping
- Despite trouble with Sinosic, Bisping still ranks here with me
Houston Alexander
- welcome to the UFC, Houston Alexander.
Thiago Silva
- Chute Boxe. 'Nuff said.
Tito Ortiz
- its been WAAAAAY too long since Tito has beaten anyone of substance to rank him any higher.
Forrest Griffin
- one of the few divisions with the depth to need to go past a top ten. Hopefully Forrest rebounds nicely this weekend but I think he's going to be in a tougher fight than many expect against Ramirez.
Renato Sobral
- Tough to not be a fan of Babalu, but he clearly came back too quickly from the Liddell fight and its hard to consider him a favorite over anyone above him on this list...

Here are the latest community rankings via Unspun:

Technorati Profile

Introducing Unspun and my UFC rankings - Heavyweight

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 20:13:00 +0000

Cujofan pointed me towards a new software feature from Amazon.com called Unspun. What is Unspun you ask? From their FAQ:

Existing methods for community collaboration on the Web aren't good at developing consensus rankings. If you do a web search for "sexiest movies," you might find websites that have lists of "sexiest movies," but each will be the opinion of the individual who authored that website.

Wikis (as prominently and beautifully exemplified by Wikipedia) are an excellent mechanism for community collaboration, but they don't support consensus rankings. Imagine a large group of people editing and re-editing a wiki page that purported to have a ranked list of "sexiest movies." It wouldn't work -- they'd step on each other.

So that's the niche that UnSpun endeavors to fill.

If you want to see the community consensus on what's the best or the worst, the scariest or the funniest, the tastiest or the dumbest, UnSpun provides the right amount of structure to make that possible.

So Cujofan and I immediately put together rankings for the UFC weight classes.

These are designed to be only fighters currently under UFC contract. So Fedor isn't at #1 in heavyweight because he's not under UFC contract and thus not eligible to be ranked.

Here are the current UFC heavyweight rankings via the Unspun community:

Here are my personal rankings which I've submitted on Unspun, with a bit of explanation. First off, these are meant to be linear rankings. That is to say, this is not a list of "this guy is holding the belt, and here are the other nine guys in relative order who should get to fight for it." Instead, this is designed to rank from top to bottom who the relative best fighters are in the UFC. #1 should usually beat #2-#9. #2 should usually beat #3-#9 but not #1. etc. That's not to say that #1 beats #2 four times out of five, but instead at least six out of ten times.

Antonio Rodrigo Nogueira
- I think "Big Nog" is the best of the current crop of UFC heavyweights.
Mirko Cro Cop
- despite the viscous KO at the hands of Gonzaga, I think Mirko would defeat Gonzaga in a rematch. Cro Cop will now train in a cage and train to better defend elbows on the ground.
Gabriel Gonzaga
- yes, I think Gonzaga defeats Couture at UFC 74.
Randy Couture
- I think was fantastic that Couture took the belt from Timmy... but I don't believe he's at the top of the UFC heavyweight division except in title only...
Brandon Vera
- I feel we haven't seen enough out of "The Truth" lately to rank him any higher at this point. Especially after the long layoff. He could rocket up the chart quickly though...
Tim Sylvia
- I am not a Tim Sylvia fan in the slightest, but I've got to acknowledge that he belongs about here on this list. Definitely ahead of AA after beating him twice.
Andrei Arlovski
- Having dropped two of three to Tim Sylvia, AA ends up at #7.
Fabricio Werdum
- Despite the poor showing against Arlovski, still makes #8.
Heath Herring
- More of a statement on the lack of depth at heavyweight.
Cheick Kongo
- If he were five years younger he'd be a force to be reckoned with. As is, his pitiful ground game makes him an entertaining striker but a poor mixed martial artist.

So vote for your favorites in the poll, and feel free to comment here on what you think.

I'll be back soon with posts for each of the rest of the UFC weight classes. If you want to find those polls in the meantime just search for "UFC" on Unspun...

-P

Back from long hiatus

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Thu, 07 Jun 2007 20:09:00 +0000

I'll be back posting on Performify.com now. I had moved where the blog was hosted a couple times (following along with several server moves at UFCjunkie.com) and wasn't previously able to get Blogger's limited publishing configuration ability to work with my server configurations.

However, with the last UFCjunkie.com server move, I've gotten things playing nicely with Blogger and will be back posting on here again.

Thanks for hanging with me in the hiatus.

-P

UFC 69 coverage

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Sat, 07 Apr 2007 23:40:00 +0000

as usual we're doing full coverage of tonight's UFC 69 over on UFCjunkie.com.

You can head over there to check out my usual round of picks for the fight, or for our live play by play from inside UFC 69 including full coverage of the undercard.

Should be a really good card - the headlining match between St. Pierre and Serra really isn't competitive but the rest of the card could be one of the most competitive we've seen in a while.

Performify's Picks: UFC 68

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Sat, 03 Mar 2007 16:20:00 +0000

My picks for UFC 68 are posted over on UFCjunkie.com: Performify's Picks: UFC 68. I'm in Columbus for the fights and as usual we'll be live blogging the event over at UFCjunkie.com.

Here's a quick breakdown of my picks. Click through to the full article for the usual writeup:

Matt Hughes -650: 6.5 units to win 1 unit

Renato Sobral -445: 4.45 units to win 1 unit

Rex Holman +245: .205 units to win .5 units

Gleison Tibau -240: 4.8 units to win 2 units

Jason Gilliam +325: .2 units to win .65 units

My turn in The Well

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Sat, 03 Feb 2007 00:21:00 +0000

A stranger is being shown around a village that he has just become part of. He is shown a well and his guide says "On any day except Wednesday, you can shout any question down that well, and you'll be told the answer".

The stranger shouts down several questions, and all are answered. The stranger is impressed, and after thinking a minute he shouts down: "Why not on Wednesday?" and the voice from in the well shouts back "Because on Wednesday, it’s your day in the well".

For those who might be interested to know a little more about me, both as a poker player, as a handicapper, and as a person, I'm taking a turn in The Well on the 2+2 Sports Betting forum.

So you can head over there and ask me any sort of question at all... or just see what everyone else wanted to know: The Well: Performify.

Performify's Picks: UFC 67

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Fri, 02 Feb 2007 05:35:00 +0000

My usual round of full card predictions are up on UFCjunkie.com for this weekend's UFC 67, specifically here: Performify's Picks on UFCjunkie.com. Here's a quick rundown of my predictions from a gambling perspective, but again click through to Performify's Picks on UFCjunkie.com to see all the details:
	Anderson Silva -450: 4.5 units to win 1 unit John Halverson +600: 0.1 units to win .6 units Mirko Cro Cop -1200: 12 units to win 1 unit Scott Smith +140: 0.36 units to win 0.5 units Terry Martin +205: 1 unit to win 2.05 units * Diego Saraiva +190: 0.26 units to win 0.5 unit

Ultimate Fight Night 8 (1-25-07) full card predictions

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Wed, 24 Jan 2007 22:50:00 +0000

My usual round of full card predictions are up on UFCjunkie.com, specifically here: Performify's Picks on UFCjunkie.com.

I also put together a detailed recommendation on where I think you should be betting now, with Pinnacle gone. The short answer is BetCRIS. You can see my detailed guide on why you should be at BetCRIS, and how to best fund an account now, here: Where and How to Bet MMA Now. The title of the article references MMA, but its equally accurate for all the sports, including a little upcoming NFL game between the Colts and Bears.

Here's a quick rundown of my predictions from a gambling perspective, but again click through to Performify's Picks on UFCjunkie.com to see all the details:

Sean Salmon (+500) by unanimous decision: .2 units to win 1 unit

Heath Herring (-330) by TKO, 2nd round: 3.3 units to win 1 unit

~~Spencer Fisher (+110) by TKO, 2nd round: .09 units to win .1 units~~

Dean Lister (+190) by submission, 1st round: .53 units to win 1 unit

Chad Reiner (+310) by submission, 2nd round: .16 units to win .5 units

Chris Price (+330) by KO, 1st round: .15 units to win .5 units

Clay Guida (-125) by TKO, 1st round: 1.25 units to win 1 unit

Rich Clementi (-410) by submission, 1st round: 4.1 units to win 1 unit

My Top Ten Albums of 2006

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Tue, 23 Jan 2007 08:05:00 +0000

I've had this post in draft format for a month and a half now, since December 7th. Its obviously was a busy holiday season for me, and has been a busy start to 2007 with my work helping to spin up UFCjunkie.com and a few other interesting projects as well. But a phone call from The BlogFather chiding me for my lack of posts lately has kicked me in to gear enough to get this up ASAP. I’ll be back at least twice more this week – once with my usual writeup and picks for the next UFC event (which is this Thursday, already) and with an update on a couple different personal topics.

So, while I don't have the extensive writeups on each of these that I would like, I'm still going to get this out there, before I have to fend off yet another email asking when my annual top ten list will come out.

In alphabetical order by artist, NOT in order of ranking. Note that most of these are available from Amazon for $10 or less, so if you're interested and happened to have missed some of these, I'd definitely recommend giving them a shot. You can just hover over the image for a cool preview of the current price via Amazon.com

	...And You Will Know Us by the Trail of Dead - So Divided This Austin-based band has been in my regular rotation with both of their last two major albums, 2002’s Source Tags and Codes and last year’s Worlds Apart which somehow barely missed my Top Ten of 2005 list. I'd label them as "Progressive Indie Rock" if you forced me to cram them in to a genre title. Trail of Dead is also taping friendly and freely allows sharing of their live music through The Internet Archive.
	The Decemberists - The Crane Wife This is an absolutely brilliant album that has received a lot of critical praise this year, including an 85 rating at Metacritc, eclipsing last year's 80 rating for universally-praised Picaresque. The Decemberists are perhaps the epitome of hipster bands, but I loved Picaresque and I also love The Crane Wife. Most know, I'm a sucker for progressive sounds that actually move a genre forward, and for concept albums that push the conceptual boundaries of music – if not the boundaries of pretentiousness itself. Hipster concept album based on a Japanese fable, crossed with thematic elements of Shakespeare's The Tempest? Ladies and Gentlemen, we have a top ten finisher. The Decemberists are also the only band to receive back-to-back honors on my Top Ten for last year and this year, although Beck came close.
	Ghostface Killah - Fishscale Ghostface Killah aka Tony Starks aka perhaps the most successful rapper to emerge from the rap collective of the Wu Tang Clan released two albums in 2006, the very well regarded Fishscale and a follow-up at the end of the year called simply "More Fish". As usual in this world of digital music I most frequently just pull my favorites from both albums in to my iPod, but Fishscale is definitely the more polished release and clearly earned its spot on my Top Ten. Fishscale featured several tracks produced by MF Doom, and the two are rumored to be working on a full collaborative project for release in 2007.
	Gnarls Barkley - St. Elsewhere I went "Crazy" over Gnarls Barkley like everyone else in America groan, but this musical collaboration between DJ and super-producer Danger Mouse (aka Brian Burton) and rapper/singer Cee-Lo Green – who mentored Outkast's Andre 3000, and you can definitely see the influence there - delivered much more than that first smash single. The whole album is an absolute favorite, and hasn't left my regular rotation since its release. The title track "St. Elsewhere" is definitely my favorite, but the whole album has fantastic listenability start to finish.. I've won over several fans to the work, even those who weren't typically fans of this type of music .
	The Killers - Sam's Town Burdened by heavy expectations and the fear of the dreaded sophomore slump, this album was highly anticipated and generally met with a universal "meh" from most of the critical music press. I for one really liked the album. Its definitely not "Hot Fuss", but it’s a great evolution of the previous work, and in some ways – at least on some songs – I think it’s even superior, a great step forward. While a couple tracks on the album trend more towards the forgettable, I think "Read My Mind" is the Killer's finest work yet, and tracks like "Bones", "When You Were Young", and "For Reasons Unknown" are every bit as good as my favorites from Hot Fuss.
	POS - Audition Stefon Alexander, aka P.O.S., started life as a punk musician and evolved in to a unique sound in hip-hop. Audition" features the work of two simultaneous DJs which gives it much more depth than his earlier work, Ipecac Neat (2004). Plus, you've got to like anyone who pays enough homage to Takashi Miike's to name an album after one of his masterpiece movies - and do all the cover art from said album in Miike theme as well. For those interested in more, I wrote a pretty extensive review of POS including this album in a post on 2+2's OOT forum (Other Other Topics) which of course turned in to a trainwreck of people arguing about the best in underground hip-hop, but hey that's the interweb for you.
	Raconteurs - Broken Boy Soldiers I've seen this labeled as "only the fourth best White Stripes album", but for me Broken Boy Soldiers warrants clear inclusion in my Best Of list for the year. Its worth it alone just to hear Jack White backed by a drummer with even moderate talent – sorry Meg. Intimate Secretary, Store Bought Bones, Level, and Steady As She Goes carry the album for sure, but its definitely one that I can listen to front to back.
	Snow Patrol - Eyes Open Northern Ireland's Snow Patrol opened for U2 during 2004, and the effect of being so close to their kinsmen for a year definitely shows on this more mature sophomore release. Snow Patrol crosses a bit of U2, a bit of Coldplay, a bit of The Shins, and puts their own unique voice forward along with what I'd consider some very strong lyrics. I also did an extended review of this album previously on my blog and in another 2+2 post
	Thom Yorke - The Eraser Radiohead frontman Yorke could put out an album of Danish Deathmetal-infused-Polka and it would probably be a strong candidate for my top ten list. I think the Eraser is good but not great, but still ranks among the top ten, although I’d probably rank it towards the bottom rather than the top if I were doing these in numeric order - which I’m not. I think the album has a noticeable peak in the middle with The Clock, Black Swan, and Skip Divided (#3, #4, #5). Those three songs are the only ones with a permanent spot on my iPod, but the fact that those three might as well be hardwired in, means this album succeeds where so many others failed to impress.
	Tool - 10,000 Days Without question my album of the year. I know a lot of old school Tool fans point to Aenima as their favorite, and some smaller group will point to Lateralus as the pinnacle of their fanaticism. However, I strongly feel that 10,000 Days continues one of my favorite trends about this band: Tool gets better and better with each album in my opinion, as the band continues to lead progressive rock in new and exciting directions. I’ve been a big fan since Undertow, their first major studio album, but I really think every album is better than the last, and 10,000 Days stands alone not only at the top of Tool’s catalog, but at the pinnacle of everything released this year. Every song on this album is fantastic. I can’t say enough good things about it.

Honorable mention (close but not quite):

	Joseph Arthur - Nuclear Daydream Ohio singer-songwriter Arthur has release six studio albums and seven EPs in a career spanning back to 1996. I’ve seen Arthur on tour twice, once a few years back when he was a one-man-band, and then on the tour supporting Nuclear Daydream where he’s added a full band "The Lonely Astronauts" to complement his unique live sounds. While this album features some standout tracks, overall there are few good tracks mixed among only "OK" songs to crack the top ten, but it was really close. "Black Lexus" would easily be in my top five singles of the year, however – its haunting lyrics and melodies make it one song I can't skip over anytime it comes up when I'm shuffling songs. If you're interested, you can stream the entire album from JosephArthur.com (bottom right of the page).
	Beck - The Information I had high hopes for The Information, mostly due to the presence of longtime Beck-collaborator Nigel Godrich, who also happens to be known as the sixth member of Radiohead due to his longtime collaboration with the Oxford band. Reportedly this album took a difficult three years for Beck to finish, and most of it was actually recorded prior to the Dust Brothers produced "Guerro". I think it shows – the finished product is definitely good and shows signs of the usual Beck brilliance, but its no Guerro, and its no Top Ten.
	Deftones – Saturday Night Wrist I'm a longstanding fan of the Deftones and of Deftones frontman Chino Moreno's unique vocal and lyrical stylings. However, there are two clear classes of Deftones albums: Adrenaline, White Pony, and Around the Fur, all amazing albums still in strong rotation for me to this day, and 2003's self-titled Deftones and now 2006's Saturday Night Wrist which are listenable and good, but definitely not great. In my opinion, "Beware" and "Kimdracula" are the only tracks on the album that make me think the Deftones are still capable of delivering the type of brilliance last consistently demonstrated on 2000's White Pony.
	AFI - Decemberunderground AFI's seventh album is not their best, nor is it their worst. A couple tracks clearly stand out, but the album is a little too "poppy", a little too glam, a little too emo to crack the top ten. However, its definitely a standout album and well worthy of mention as an album just outside my Top Ten.

Biggest surprise:

Between the Buried and Me – The Anatomy Of
Between the Buried and Me, from Raleigh, North Carolina, are one of the more technical bands out there, crossing numerous genres in their music from classical to metalcore to alt-rock to electronica, sometimes all in one song. While I'm not always the biggest fans of their albums, I usually enjoy a couple tracks very much (such as "Selkies: The Endless Obsession" from their 2005 release Alaska) I can always appreciate their highly technical songs and their progressive sounds which push the genre. When I heard they were releasing an album of cover songs I was intrigued, and The Anatomy Of did not disappoint in the slightest. The concept was that the band would cover songs from some of their strongest influences, which ranged from metal standards Metallica, Pantera, even Motley Crue, to alt-rockers Soundgarden, Faith No More, Depeche Mode, and Smashing Pumpkins, to more esoteric influences such as underappreciated hardcore band Earth Crisis, progressive rock pioneers King Crimson (a major Tool influence), even one of the godfathers of progressive rock in Queen. And then they cross to cover two great songs outside what many would see as their normal genre, but to a true fan the line of influence is clear: the fantastic song "Change" by Blind Mellon, and "Colorblind" from the Counting Crows. I very much enjoyed this album and its covers continue to delight anytime they spring up in a random shuffle. I'd very much recommend this album to anyone who is a fan of any of the covered bands.

Biggest disappointment: (tie)

Jaz-Z - Kingdom Come
Universally panned by critics and bloggers alike, I can't really say much good about Kingdom Come. After the great commercial and critical success of The Black Album, I was looking forward to the fruits of Jay-Z's decision to step out of retirement for Kingdom Come, at least until I got my hands on the album. Unfortunately, it is nowhere near as good as the Black Album, and really needed help from a stronger production team. With collaborations from a couple standout names, I at least expected greatness from the track with Pharrell, and that turned out to be one of the worst on the CD. A big disappointment…

Pharrell – In My Mind
Pharrell's new album was actually one of my top anticipated albums of 2006. I am a big fan of Pharrell's work as a "super producer", especially his work with Chad Hugo under the name "The Neptunes" and work fronting the funk-rock band N*E*R*D with Hugo and Shay Haley. However, his first solo album really didn't deliver what I was looking for at all. While the album certainly isn't terrible, its definitely a huge disappointment. Pharrell couldn't seemingly bring his own signature sounds as a producer – or the infamous "Neptunes Sound" – to his own album for whatever reason.

Best Album I Overlooked from 2005:

Andrew Bird - Andrew Bird & the Mysterious Production of Eggs
This album appeared on last year's Top Ten list of a friend who generally exposes me to a lot of music, with whom I generally overlap quite a bit in taste but not always. I picked up a copy of this album on his recommendation, but never really seemed to get in to it last year enough to bubble it up to my own Top Ten. However, fastforward to the start of 2007, and "the Mysterious Production of Eggs" is in heavy rotation on my iPod, and is one of the few albums I never consider removing when I sync up with my iTunes library to pull in some different music. If you like Sufjan Stevens, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah, or even Elliott Smith, I'd strongly recommend checking out this album, and I'm sad to say I overlooked it previously.

If you're interested, you can find my previous two lists still online: 2005 | 2004.

UFC 66 full card predictions

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Thu, 28 Dec 2006 23:55:00 +0000

My usual round of full card predictions for this weekend's UFC 66 are posted in their new home, at UFCjunkie.com, specifically filed under UFC 66 : Performify's Picks.

I’m exceedingly excited about the UFC 66 card this weekend. We’ve got a couple decent matchups to bet in my opinion – no significantly “off” lines that justify wagering a significant amount, but we should be able to edge out some value in betting most fights on the card and playing the small percentage edges. Clink on through to UFCjunkie.com to read the full writeup and predictions.

Performify's Pigskin Picks - Week Sixteen

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Sun, 24 Dec 2006 02:53:00 +0000

Season Record Summary:

Game of the Week: 6 - 5 - 4 : +5.04 units
non GotW picks: 17 - 26 - 1 : (7.75) units
All Straight Picks: 23 - 31 - 5 : (2.71) units
Tease of the Week: 6 - 4 - 0 : +3.80 units

All Public Picks: 29 - 35 - 5 : +1.09 units

Straight Weighted: 68 - 70 : 49.35%
All Weighted: 85 - 82 : 50.96%
GotW Weighted: 32 - 27 : 54.24%

St. Louis -1 (-101) over Washington
The Redskins are being overvalued here by the public for their spoiler win over the Saints last week. While St. Louis has pushed the run game much more this year, they still have a potent passing attack with one of the game's best active wide receivers in Torry "Big Game" Holt. Look for St. Louis to stay run-first, but still put the ball up in the air to Holt and Bruce to exploit the overmatched Redskins secondary. Rams 24, Redskins 17. Game of the Week.

San Francisco -4 (-105) over Arizona
San Fran still amazing have their playoff hopes alive, and will be playing for pride at home. San Fran's powerful offensive line will manhandle Arizona's underpowered defensive line. Standout SF left guard Larry Allen gets to line up against rookie defensive tackle Gabe Watson, who will be overwhelmed by Allen all day, presenting a ton of running room for standout SF RB Frank Gore. The Cardinals' run defense is ranked in the middle of the NFL, giving up 119 yards per game, and has been battling injuries throughout the season. While Arizona would usually try to line up eight men in the box to try to stuff the run game, they can't really afford to do that with their porous secondary. Arizona ranks third to last in the NFL in pass defense and is giving up almost 236 yards passing per game. If they try to stuff the line against Gore, you'll see the renewed 49ers passing attack led by Alex Smith and the surging standout rookie tight end Vernon Davis. 49ers 24, Arizona 17.

Atlanta -6.5 (+102) vs Carolina
The Atlanta Falcons are playing here for their coach's job and for a playoff berth (if they win out they are still alive in the wildcard hunt). The Panthers are reeling, getting demolished last week by the Pittsburgh Steelers. The Panthers have suffered a lot of injuries on the offensive line and will be without their best offensive lineman, LG Mike Wahle, who missed last week's game with a shoulder injury. Look for the Falcons defense to put seven and eight men on the line of scrimmage, including walking up strong safety Lawyer Milloy much of the day. Panthers QB Chris Weinke, who has replaced the injured Jake Delhomme, starts his third consecutive game. Weinke is now 1-16 as an NFL starter and he'll move to 1-17 after Sunday's game. The Falcons dominated the Panthers in Week 1, and I predict a closer game here but still a touchdown win for the Falcons. 24-17 Atlanta.

Tease of the Week: Jets +2.5, Colts -9
Teasing 6.5 points to Jets +9, Colts -2.5. The Colts need to win this game to cruise in to the playoffs, and are still playing for home field advantage in the second round. The Jets game should be a close, hard-fought game and crossing both +3 and +7 there is huge.

Summary of Picks for Week 16:

Rams -1 (-101) : 6.06u to win 6u

49ers -4 (-105) : 3.15u to win 3u

Falcons -6.5 (+102) : 2u to win 2.02u

Teaser: Jets +9, Colts -2.5 (2-team, 6.5 point teaser @ -120) : 4.8u to win 4u

Performify's Pigskin Picks: Week 15

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Sun, 17 Dec 2006 17:34:00 +0000

Sorry, a busy week due to holiday partys / etc kept this from going up sooner / being more in depth in the writeup department. Not many games my system likes, anyways...

2006 Year to Date: Public Picks record:
Game of the Week: 6 - 4 - 4 +11.70
non GotW picks: 17 - 25 - 1 (4.62)
All Straight Picks: 23 - 29 - 5 +7.08
Tease of the Week: 6 - 3 - 0 +6.20
All Public Picks: 29 - 32 - 5 +13.28

Weighted Record ala Fezzik:
Straight Weighted: 68 - 60 53.20%
All Weighted: 85 - 70 54.90%
GotW Weighted: 32 - 20 61.54%

Cincy +3.5 (-112) at Indy: Game of the Week, 5.6u to win 5u. I have this game nearly equal, so getting 3.5 is huge here. I'd wait to place, keeping an eye on the line because Indy is a strong public favorite here so late money will likely move in on them, getting an even better line.

KC +9 (-106): 2.12u to win 2u. As strong as the Chargers are, they can coast a little here, the Chiefs are in a must-win. I don't expect the Chiefs will, but I have this game being decided by a single score.

Teaser: Chicago -6.5, Chargers -2.5: I have Chicago covering outright but I see moving them inside the 7 a very strong play here. Chargers likewise inside the three. 2.4u to win 2u.

Summary of Picks for Week 15:

Cincy +3.5 -112 : 5.6u to win 5u

KC +9 (-106) : 2.12u to win 2u

6.5pt teaser: Chicago -6.5, Chargers -2.5: 2.4u to win 2u

UFN:7 Full Card Predictions

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Wed, 13 Dec 2006 04:01:00 +0000

My full card predictions for tomorrow's Ultimate Fight Night #7 are posted. But now, and going forward, they'll be posted exclusively on UFCJunkie.com. So click on through to UFC Fight Night 7: Performify’s Picks for all the details. You can also

There's one specific line that I think is pretty strongly "off", very surprisingly so in fact. I'm not sure how long it will stick around, I've hit it pretty hard myself and moved it already...

Performify's Pigskin Picks: Week Fourteen

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Sun, 10 Dec 2006 00:02:00 +0000

Last week: 2-1 +4.91 units with a push on Game of the Week.

2006 YTD - Season Record Summary:
Game of the Week: 5 - 4 - 4 +5.70u
non GotW picks: 16 - 24 - 1 -5.71u
All Straight Picks: 21 - 28 - 5 -0.01
Tease of the Week: 6 - 2 - 0 +10.60
All Public Picks: 27 - 30 - 5 +10.59

Weighted Record for my public picks( ala Fezzik):
Game of the Week weighted record: 26-20 (56.52%) +5.70 units
All straight picks(no teasers) weighted record: 59-58 (50.43%) -0.01 units
All Public Picks (inc. teasers) weighted record: 76-64 (54.29%) +10.59 units

As always, these lines are the WA lines as of the time of this post, and the units are graduated units so if you're playing 1% - 2% of your bankroll units, cut mine in half...

Jaguars -1 (-103) over Colts
Last week, i had some people over watching the Big 12 Championship game on my theater, and I was working on my NFL picks from my laptop while keeping an eye on the game. I had just finished crunching my numbers for the week, and my system spit out its plays for the week. A couple 2p2'ers were over, and wanted to get an early look at the week's plays. We all shook our heads when the Game of the Week was Titans beating the Colts - not Titans +7.5 which was the line at the time, but Titans moneyline. I talked through it, and figured I had to have made a mistake somewhere. I'd never seen my system spit out a moneyline play on an underdog > -3 let alone -7. So I tweaked and tweaked my inputs, and eventually downgraded the play to Titans +7.5 and downgraded it from the Game of the Week to a standard play. Well, once the Titans put through that 60 yard field goal for the win, you can imagine I got a phone call from one of the people there that night, chiding me for my lack of testicular fortitude, as he had played the Titans ML on my system's original recommendation. Long story short: my system has the Colts losing again this week, and I'm not asking any questions this time.

The Colts are well-documented at having the NFL's worst rush defense. This week they face a team who put up 150 yards on the ground last week against the NFL's 7th ranked rush defense (the 'Fins) on the road. At home, against the porous Colts rush d, we should see at least 150 from the Jags and maybe more. In addition to woes on rush defense, the Colts feature undersized defensive backs, especially corners, who will struggle greatly against a 6-foot-6 Matt Jones who is already on a hot streak, finally developing strong chemistry with QB David Gerrard. The Jags also have 6-foot-4 Reggie Williams opposite Matt Jones, which provides very significant height difference to the two Colts corners, the 5-8 Jason David or the 5-10 Nick Harper. Assuming Harper covers Jones, that's eight inches of height difference in both matchups.

On defense, the Jags are giving up just 91 yards a game on the ground. This staunch rush defense should let them play base defense at worst and possibly move to nickel most of the time to help try to limit the Colts aerial attack. The Jags giving up under 190 yards per game through the air, which is significantly below the Colts average of 270 per game. Also troubling for the Colts, Jags corner Rashean Mathis leads the league in interceptions with seven and would certainly like to add one from Manning this week.

While both teams need this win, Jacksonville needs it more - the Colts have secured a playoff spot but are playing for home field advantage. However, Jacksonville is fighting for a wild card spot and has to have this win at home. This game is also 72% to 28% in favor of the Colts on Wagerline, making it a fade-the-public play as well. Moving the line from Jags +1 to -1 in favor of better ROI here. 24-21 Jacksonville, Game of the Week.

Titans -1 (+107) at Houston
While a lot of people see this as an important game for the Texans to win to somehow justify passing over Vince Young, I see this going the other way. There are already questions about Carr's future in Houston, and I think the first sign of weakness from the Texans their homefield crowd is going to chorus up the boos, and you're going to see a typical homefield advantage turn in to extra pressure and an actual disadvantage. Vince Young should have additional motivation knowing that the Texans are looking to show he was over-rated.

The Titans are running strong, with five wins in their last seven games. On the other hand, the Texans are greatly struggling with offensive line troubles and now looks like they'll be brining in a new QB next year. If you didn't see the Texans / Raiders game last week, don't let the box score fool you. While the Texans did come away with a road win there, the Texans were clearly outplayed for most of the game.

The Texans are giving up 116 yards per game on the ground, and face a Titans rushing attack that is fifth best in the NFL. Look for big days out of both the Titans running backs Travis Henry and the occasional carry to Lendale White, as well has Vince Young's 6-yard-per-carry rushing average from under center. In addition to the strong ground attack, the Titans should be able to exploit the Texans through the air as well: Houston is ranked 27th in pass defense, giving up 227 yards a game. As a team the Texans have only 24 sacks, which puts them in the bottom third, and nine interceptions, which puts them at 26th.

On the other side of the ball, Tennessee is most vulnerable to a strong rushing attack, and the Texans don't have that, still searching for a primary ball carrier and still dealing with offensive line woes. The Texans can't rush first, they really do not have linemen with the size or strength needed to create run lanes, or to hold the holes open for any reasonable length of time.

Look for this to be a quick game, with both teams trying to run the ball quite a bit. However, The Titans have a far-superior rushing attack, and should ride Travis Henry and Vince Young to an easy victory. 24-14 Tennessee.

Jets -3.5 (-106) over Bills
My system has liked the Jets all year, they are my most frequently selected team, and coincidentally my most profitable team. They like this game at home against a banged-up Bills team as well. The Bills are missing linebacker Angelo Crowell (broken leg) and backup Keith Ellison is also being banged up (knee). If Ellison can't go, or struggles, The Bills' third option is to play backup safety Coy Wire at weakside linebacker, a pretty decent mismatch. Look for the Jets to exploit this matchup for sure.

Besides being banged up on defense, the Bills have their #1 and #2 running backs (McGahee and the A-Train Anthony Thomas) playing at less than 100%. Look for the Jets to load the line and force the game on to the shoulders of the always-shaky J.P. Losman, who is averaging only 160 yards per game through the air. On offense, the Jets face a Bill defense that is the third worst in the AFC vs. the run, giving up an average of 140 yards per game. Look for the newly-successful Jets backfield tandem of Cedric Houston and Leon Washington to have a good outing. The Jets also have a pretty decent size advantage with both Cotchery and Coles over Bills corner Terrence McGee to exploit.

I have this game being decided by four, five or six points most of the time, so the 3.5 doesn't hurt bad enough to warrant paying the extra vig to move the line to -3, but if you're really worried about it, feel free to pay to move the game to -3. Jets 24, Bills 17.

Tease of the Week: Chargers -7.5, Cowboys -7 (6-point, 2-team -110 at Bodog)
I have the Chargers blowing out the Broncos anyways, but love the opportunity to tease this game down inside the three anyways. The Cowboys are not a true Wong teaser here, but I see this game being a close affair and really like the value of moving the favorite down inside the 3 here as well. The Cowboys and Saints both are in a need-to-win scenario, and I think the home team's edge here is too large to pass up. Note that Pinnacle is screwing with their lines trying to make it less easy to place teasers there, so you'd have to do a 6.5 point teaser with the Chargers to get that line down inside the 3, if you want to use Pinnacle. Worth a four-unit play in my system (2u if you're playing 1%-2% units).

Summary of Picks for Week 14

Jaguars -1 (-103) : 6.18u to win 6u

Titans -1 (+107) : 3u to win 3.21u

Jets -3.5 (-106) : 2.12u to win 2u

Chargers -1.5, Cowboys -1: 4.4u to win 4u

Preliminary thoughts on Ortiz / Liddell II

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Thu, 07 Dec 2006 04:06:00 +0000

I've been asked a couple times already for my thoughts on the upcoming Ortiz vs. Liddell rematch at UFC 66. Here goes: There's no question that Liddell (remember everyone: two d's, two l's) has been amazing and is one of the best kickboxer/strikers in the world. What amazes me the most about Chuck isn't his striking per se, but his seemingly unfailable ability to get his opponents to abandon their gameplans the second they step foot in the ring with him. Well, that and he's one of the best counter-punchers to ever lace up the gloves. Its waaaay to early for me to release a formal pick in this fight, as we'll have the usual inside information from Big Bear as well as the Liddell training camp to look at, plus watch for any training injuries or anything else that comes up in the next three weeks. But the line for this fight is currently set at Liddell winning about 70% of the time, and I think.... If you're interested in reading the rest of my prelminary thoughts on Ortiz / Liddell II, please head over to UFCjunkie.com for the rest. As you'll see announced on UFCjunkie.com, i've joined the UFCjunkie.com team and will be contributing content for them going forward. If you're a regular reader of my blog, or have been following my UFC picks, i'd certainly appreciate if you headed over and had anything positive to comment in this thread I'll certainly still update my blog with just as much regularity, if not more, going forward. But expect to see a lot from me on UFCjunkie.com from here... and a lot of new exciting developments for the site, as well.

Why I handicap sports

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Wed, 06 Dec 2006 15:39:00 +0000

I received an interesting question from a reader and though I'd take the time to post a response publicly:

...Im just confused about how realistic getting into handicapping really is, looking at it now it seems like it would take a huge amount of time each day/week to stay ahead of things. Hearing that professional handicappers can lose money after a full year of betting seems disheartening. would it be wiser to invest my time into other areas ( Ecommerce, Affliate, stock market, poker etc etc etc. from here atleast it seems that these are better and more secure ROI

My $0.02:

You should do what you love, everywhere in life.

I'd say 90% of serious sports bettors love sports and love sports betting. The fact that some of us can make money doing this is just a great benefit. There's nothing better for me than a weekend that includes a UFC or Pride card on Saturday and a full lineup of NFL games on Sunday, as I can usually expect to profit 50% - 100% of my income from the work week on those two weekend days, and its something I enjoy as a fan to boot. For UFC cards I've got a house full of people watching the fight, most following my picks so we're all cheering or jeering at the same fighters, screaming, drinking, having a blast. And getting paid for it.

I don't get to have that much fun on the other projects I work on... eCommerce, affiliate programs, stock market are all for the most part going to be easier and more reliable income than sports betting. Even poker is generally more rewarding and easier. But none will have the adrenaline rush you get when your side scores a late come-from-behind TD to cover the spread - including poker in my opinion, with the exception of some of my largest MTT final tables - and none of those bring out the same passion in me when I handicap sports. Even - no, especially - poker. Poker is work. I sit at the tables, I grind out a small edge, I don't really enjoy it. I enjoy the income and its better than a lot of other "jobs", but its not something I'm passionate about doing: I enjoy playing live occasionally and I enjoy discussing poker and such, (i'm on twoplustwo.com after all) but I'm not excited and energized every time I sit down to multitable my nightly batch of tournaments. But I am excited every time i get to sit down and watch one of my picks... or research them... or write about them, for that matter.

Its all about passion and enjoying what you do, and being good at what you do. If those stars align for you in the arena of sports betting, then you too are fortunate.

There's a reason I use the term "passionate pursuit" in my tagline, and its not just the alliteration...

Performify's Pigskin Picks - Week Thirteen

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Sun, 03 Dec 2006 03:24:00 +0000

2006 YTD - Season Record Summary:
Game of the Week: 5 - 4 - 3 : +5.70 units
non GotW picks: 14 - 23 - 1 : -10.62 units
All Straight Picks: 19 - 27 - 4 : -4.92 units
Tease of the Week: 6 - 2 - 0 : +10.60 units
All Public NFL Picks: 25 - 29 - 4 : +5.68 total units

Dallas -3 (-113) at NY Giants
I look for the Giants slide to continue here, in what should be a great game of football. First, injury status. The Cowboys are 100% healthy with no one even "probable" on their injury report. On the opposite side, the Giants have eight players on their injury report, most of them injuries on the defensive side of the ball: Michael Strahan the standout DE will miss the game. Starting corner Corey Webster will miss the game. Three other key defensive players are banged up, listed questionable but should play but will likely be limited by their injuries: linebacker Brandon Short (knee), DE Osi Umenyiora (hip) and probably most importantly the other cornerback Sam Madison (hamstring).

Second, while both teams need this game, the Cowboys aren't just looking playoffs they're looking towards postseason success while the Giants are heading the wrong direction, spiraling down with infighting on the team while they're in the middle of a three game slide including last week's biggest ever fourth quarter collapse in the Giants loss to the Titans.

On offense, look for Dallas to come out with three receiver sets to spread the field and force matchup problems for the banged up Giants secondary. Look for Romo to have a big day against the struggling Giants corners, expecting 300 yards and 2 TDs. On defense the Giants are in a no-win situation. Since Dallas can spread the field and attack downfield it will force the Giants to shift out of their base defense (going nickel or dime) which will expose them to the dangerous Dallas rushing attack. But when they try to stop the run, they're exposed to the pass.

On defense, Dallas brings a very strong defense to the field, the fourth ranked defense overall and #4 against the run. The Giants need to run first to be successful on offense, and with the strong Dallas rush defense look for Eli Manning to be forced to throw early, and frustrated as a result. The Giants are good running off tackle but struggle running in the middle. Look for the Cowboys to play Roy Williams in the box all day supporting the run outside, forcing the Giants to run inside where they average less than three yards per carry.

The Giants are struggling on and off the field and while they definitely "need" this game, we should see the Dallas defense stuff the rush and force Manning to throw - and when - not if - Eli makes his first mistake, the whole house will come down on him. The fans will boo this team, the team will self-destruct, and Dallas will roll. The final score will likely be closer than the game will look - I expect Dallas to build an early lead and have the game well in hand, perhaps a late garbage TD for the Giants to bring things closer. 28-21 Dallas, Game of the Week.

Titans +7.5 (-110) vs Colts
In Week 5 the Titans lost to the Colts by only by one point, 14-13. Since then the Titans are 4-2 in their last seven games. In one of those losses, the Titans lost by only 1 point to the Ravens as well. The Titans have a strong rushing attack, Indy has the well-publicized worst rush defense in the league. Additionally, Indy is cruising with little motivation to try to win out. 21-14 Colts for the cover.

NY Jets -1 +102 at Packers
Another case of must-win versus who cares. While the Pack are certainly always more motivated to win at home, this season is already a writeoff and the Jets are fighting for a playoff spot. The Jets need this win to stay in the wild card race, and stay in fighting distance of the Pats for the division in case New England drops a couple. Recommend moving the line to -1 +102 rather than the Jets ML at -102.

Summary of Picks for Week 13

Dallas -3 (-113) : 5.65u to win 5u

Titans +7.5 (-110) : 2.2u to win 2u

NY Jets -1 (+102) : 2u to win 2.02u

A couple lines have crept my way slightly in the past 12 hours and if they move again before the games I may be back in the morning with another play and possibly a teaser depending on line movement.

An update on my 2006 NFL record, and a free bet tracking spreadsheet

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Wed, 29 Nov 2006 23:04:00 +0000

And a somewhat significant update at that:

I was doing some data analysis on my record for public NFL picks as posted here (and in a couple other places) and noticed some things didn't add up.

I keep a detailed set of electronic records for all my bets. However, I did not previously track my "public picks" as separate, i just extrapolated them separately and tracked them here.

Somewhere, I think in Week Seven, I had apparently mis-reported some public results and then I carried that mistake forward all the way to today.

So I did two things: I went back through each week of posted picks and gathered all the data on my picks. Then I made a stripped down version of my personal recordkeeping system and built it in excel, and used it to track my public record.

So without further ado, here are the changes to my record:

Game of the Week results were off +.05 units

Tease of the Week record was off, showed three losses when I have two.

Tease of the Week results were off -1.0 units

Year to Date combined record was off significantly: listed as -0.34 when the total was +5.68

here is the updated record in the new format I'll be reporting:

2006 YTD - Season Record Summary:

Game of the Week: 5 - 4 - 3 : +5.70 UNITS
non GotW picks: 14 - 23 - 1 : -(10.62) UNITS
All Straight Picks: 19 - 27 - 4 : (4.92) UNITS
Tease of the Week: 6 - 2 - 0 : +10.60 UNITS
All Public NFL Picks: 25 - 29 - 4 +5.68 TOTAL UNITS

If you want to back-test this publicly available data for yourself, you can search my site via Google or you can hit the Sports Betting Forum on twoplustwo.com, hit the forum Search button, look for posts in the last year by username:performify with the subject "Pigskin Picks" (make sure to put Pigskin Picks in quotes) and you can verify the entered amounts yourself if you care to do so.

...But that's not all. Since I took the time to pull together the spreadsheet, i thought I'd go ahead and make it public. For those interested, here is the spreadsheet with my public season data: Performify's 2006 NFL public picks to date.

And since I decided it was worth making a stripped down version of my recordkeeping system and building it in excel, and since I've fielded several requests in the past to share a spreadsheet or a tool for tracking bets. So here it is: a blank version of my NFL bet tracking spreadsheet .

This doesn't have all my features and analysis I use in my own record keeping, but if you're new to handicapping or find you're not keeping the best records, this might be a helpful start.

Here are some tips for its use:

you might find comparing the blank to my version with data (linked above) to be helpful.

If you look at my version with data, you'll notice that the columns for "who" (team picked) "sprd" (spread) and "vig" (price paid) are meant to be hidden for normal use. You enter the data in those fields each week, and then once you're done hide the fields so that the report at the bottom looks nice

Notice some of the fields have comments. In my version of excel, those are designated by small red triangles in the upper right of the fields with comments. mouse over those cells for my notes, which are meant to help explain abbreviations and etc.

to the far right of the spreadsheet, you'll notice abbreviations for each NFL team. If you use those abbreviations exactly when recording your picks in the "who" column, this area will break out the number of times you've chosen one of those teams and your record (in terms of units won/lost) on those picks of that team. This currently doesn't work for Teasers, just for the straight picks section. If you find this section helpful/interesting you can thank Lori for the impetus. If you don't, blame me.

This is obviously built for my format of publicly posted NFL picks: a Game of the Week, up to five other straight picks, and a single tease of the week. It shouldn't be hard for you to customize it to your own needs, other sports, etc. All the forumulas should be absolute references where they need to be, so when you move things around (adding, deleting rows) you should be able to fill in or strip out and have everything still work. If someone wants to make a generic version not for my specific format and send it back to me, i'll host it as well. If I have some time in the upcoming weeks I'll try to do it myself.

If you have any questions, post them here rather than PM me, to share the Q&A with the forum.

Performify's Pigskin Picks - Week Twelve

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Sun, 26 Nov 2006 06:41:00 +0000

Not a lot of plays this week, my system liked Kansas City this week but I didn't get a chance to post it due to Thanksgiving commitments. Anyways, on to the picks...

Last week: 3-1, +5.02u on straight picks. Win on Game of the Week. Win on Tease of the Week +5u. Total for the week: +10.02u

YTD RESULTS:
17-25-4 on posted picks, -6.72 units (excludes teasers)
4-4-3 on Game of the Week, +0.75 units.
6-3 on Tease of the Week, +9.6 units
Year to date combined on all posted NFL picks (includes teasers): -2.14 units

Remember, as always these are graduated units, so cut them in half if you're playing "1%-2% of your bankroll" sized units.

Jets -4.5 (-104) vs Texans
This is a must-win for the Jets to keep playoff hopes alive, while the Texans are playing for pride at this point with a 3-7 record and a 1-4 record on the road. The Texans are improving but still don't have everything they need on both sides of the ball to mount a serious run at the postseason. The Jets are coming off two strong games against the Pats and Bears, and yet Jets QB Chad Pennington is playing for his job as his arm has started to fade coming off his two shoulder surgeries in the offseason.

Houston has good quickness on their offensive line and with the surprising performance of speedster Leon Washington. The Texans have a bigger, slower defensive line (especially at the ends) which should allow the Jets, especially Washington, to run outside. The Jets have gotten their running game on track in the past few weeks and will build on that success here against a Texans team that gives up an average of 125 yards per game on the ground. The Texans also have troubles in the secondary, the Texans' defense is tied for last in the AFC with seven interceptions and is third-worst with only 18 sacks. Pennington should have plenty of time to throw, and shouldn't have to worry about turnovers much. Expect a solid outing for Chad Pennington and the NY Jets passing attack.

The Texans still have several gaps on both sides of the ball. Its especially a bad year to be a Texans tackle - on the offensive line the Texans are starting two backups at tackle after losing their top two offensive tackles, and they lost their top two defensive tackles as well. In short, the injuries to the Texans are much more significant than the casual observer realizes if you're not watching closely. 24-17 NY Jets, Game of the Week.

Chargers -13 (-110) vs Raiders
Oakland's defense has been playing better than expected, especially at home, but their offense is absolutely terrible. The Raiders offense took another blow last week losing Lamont Jordan for the rest of the season (ACL). The Raiders won't be able to run against the Chargers' top rush defense and with their problems at offensive line will struggle to protect their QB, whether its Brooks or Walter who might get time in the second half. The last time these two teams met, in week one, the Raiders gave up nine sacks on route to getting skunked 27-0. The Raiders should actually score this week, probably a late meaningless touchdown, but won't keep this inside two TDs. With KC beating Denver, San Diego can't overlook this game with a tight three-way race in the AFC West. LT has 22 touchdowns on the year. The Oakland offense has eight. I expect that ratio to stay about the same, LT finding the endzone three times and Oakland only once. San Diego 24, Oakland 10.

Carolina -4 (-101) at Washington
Redskins are struggling with the loss of their marquee running back Clinton Portis for the season, and are starting an inexperienced quarterback in Jason Campbell who gets his second NFL start. The Redskins' secondary is next to last in the league in pass defense, and definitely doesn't have anyone who can match up with Steve Smith. They'll have to double him all day, which will lead to big things for the rest of the offense, helping to open up the running game and the rest of the receiving options. The Carolina offensive line has gelled the last few weeks, producing their best rushing game of the year last week with 242 yards on the ground. The Panthers are tied for first in the NFC South (tied with the Saints, who have a tough game with the Falcons) so this is an important game for Carolina.

Colts -9.5 (+102) vs Eagles
The Colts are playing for home field advantage here, the Eagles season is shot with the loss of McNabb. While Westbrook should have a big day against the mediocre Colts rush defense, the Colts can stack the box and force the Eagles to the air, which is no longer such a threat without McNabb behind center. Garcia has no arm strength which takes away the deep ball. Look for a lot of three-and-out from the Eagles offense, and with the Eagles defense stuck on the field against the deadly Indy offensive attack they're going to give up a lot of points. 35-17 Colts, I wouldn't be surprised to see a three touchdown margin at halftime.

Summary of Picks for Week 12

Jets -4.5 (-104) : 5.2u to win 5u

Chargers -13 (-110) : 2.2u to win 2u

Panthers -4 (-101) : 2.02u to win 2u

Colts -9.5 (+102) : 1u to win 1.02u

Performify's Pigskin Picks - Week Eleven

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 22:28:00 +0000

Sorry these are really late... busy week on the road a couple days and then the big UFC last night. Won't have time for detailed writeups here, but picks posted for the record:

Last week:
1-2, +1.89u on straight picks. Win on Game of the Week.
Win on Tease of the Week, +3u.
Total for the week: +4.89u

YTD RESULTS:
14-24-4 on posted picks, -11.74 units (excludes teasers)
3-4-3 on Game of the Week, -4.25 units.
5-3 on Tease of the Week, +4.6 units
Year to date combined on all posted NFL picks (includes teasers): -7.14 units

Dallas -1 -109 over Indy
Not the best line that was available on this game, by far, but that's the current so thats what I track against. Indy a huge favorite of the public, my system has Dallas winning this by a fieldgoal. My team is strongly built on the "need to win" factor and this is the definition of a disparity in need to win: Dallas has to have this game, Indy could care less. 27-24 Dallas. Game of the Week

Philly -13 +101 over Tennessee Titans
Philly is a game behind the Giants for the East, this is a must-win for them. Titans pass defense is struggling. Big day for McNabb, looking to put this game away early. Backdoor cover always a possibility but I have this as a big Eagles win. 28-13 Philly. Three unit play.

Chicago Bears -6 +101 over NY Jets
I have Chicago winning this by a touchdown, 24-17. Two unit play.

Panthers -6.5 +101 over St. Louis Rams
St. Louis is banged up on both sides of the ball. The Panthers are rolling and need this game. Panthers 24, St. Louis 17.

Tease of the Week: San Diego +2.5, Kansas City -9 (2-team, 6.5 point)
Teasing to San Diego +9, Kansas City -2.5. Really hoped the Dallas line was going to move enough to be a tease, but didn't quite get there. KC should take Oakland but might not cover with Oak's renewed defensive prowess, and I really like the Chargers to keep the Denver game close if not win outright. Five units.

Summary of Posted Picks

Dallas -1 -109 : 5.45u to win 5u

Philly -13 +101 : 3u to win 3.03u

Bears -6 +101 : 2u to win 2.02u

Carolina -6.5 -101 : 1.01u to win 1u

Teaser: San Diego +9, Kansas City -2.5 : 6u to win 5u (2-team, 6.5 point tease at -120)

UFC 65: Full card predictions

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Fri, 17 Nov 2006 18:51:00 +0000

Taking the current odds from Pinnacle at the time of this post.

Brandon Vera vs Frank Mir
Brandon Vera -312
Frank Mir +282
Brandon "The Truth" Vera is now 7-0 in MMA with wins at UFC 57 over Justin Eilers and at UFC 60 over a then well-regarded Assuerio Silva. Mir has heavy hands and great ground skills, but has had terrible conditioning ever since coming back from a motorcycle accident which left him with a severely broken femur and a crushed pelvis. While there's always a very very very longshot that the "old" Frank Mir comes back and slips in a submission on Vera, the reality is that Vera is significantly better on his feet, is no slouch on the ground, and is significantly quicker, more explosive, and just overall a much better athlete. Vera has been very vocal about his plans to use a significant number of leg kicks to wear down Mir, and there’s no reason to think that strategy won’t work here. A pretty safe bet on Vera with a finish by strikes in the second round.

Antoni Hardonk vs Sherman Pendergarst
Antoni Hardonk -267
Sherman Pendergarst +247
Antoni Hardonk is a Dutch kickboxer trained under K1’s Ernesto Hoost, but has been training jiu-jitsu under Rickson Gracie jiu-jitsu in LA for the past couple years, and he has achieved the rank of blue belt. Hardonk doesn’t really have any significant opponents to date, and holds a 4-2 MMA record. His last three fights were in K1 in mid-2004 which he lost by UD, and a victory over Hammer House’s Wes Sims in November 2004, and then a win at Bushido Europe in late 2005. Sherman "The Tank" Pendergarst comes from WFL and cage fighting, with a 7-3 MMA record and no significant opponents except a loss to Justin Eilers at “Combat in the Cage 2” back in May of this year. Sherman has a background in college wrestling and trains with Militech. Hardonk was supposed to fight Brad Imes here, and Pendergarst is taking the fight on two week’s notice – he was already training for a fight in December, so he’s not coming in untrained entirely though. These are two pretty unknowns here so this isn’t a fight to load up on. If this fight was in December, with Pendergarst having full time to prepare, he’d be a strong pick. As it is, I think I’ll take the guy with the wrestling background and Miletich in his corner, despite my clear love of the Gracie camp. Pendergarst by first round TKO, ground and pound baby. Risky bet though, Hardonk could catch The Tank shooting, The Tank could decide he’s going to stand and trade and lose there, or Hardonk’s BJJ could result in a first round sub. But despite all those ways of winning its hard to bet on an unknown named LOL_Hardonkaments.

Alessio Sakara vs Drew McFedries
Alessio Sakara -483
Drew McFedries +433
“Legionarius” Sakara has a 10-4 MMA record, 2-1 in the UFC. We’ve seen him at UFC 55 were he got kicked in the junk (and the fight was stopped, No Contest), at UFC 57 where he took Elvis Sinosic to a win by UD, beating him up pretty bad along the way, and then last saw him get first round triangle’d by Dean Lister at UFC 60 on the undercard of Hughes/Gracie. Sakara is a strong boxer, with a pro boxing record of 6-2. McFedries is a Miletich fighter with a 4-1 MMA record: he opened his career with a loss to Nate Quarry way back in 2001, won a fight in 2002 and two in 2003, and then took a three year break to return at Extreme Challenge 71 with a win. McFedries normally fights at 185 and is fighting here at 205, and took the fight on roughly two week’s notice. Sakara is a big favorite here for a very good reason. McFedries will certainly have a puncher’s chance, but not much of one. Both of these two should stand and trade on the feet in what should be an exciting bout. Sakara will open with his dangerous leg kicks to set up his boxing ability, and we should see a first round KO here.

Hector Ramirez vs James Irvin
Hector Ramirez -153
James Irvin +143
James Irvin will always be remembered as the man with the infamous flying knee KO of Terry Martin at the beginning of the second round of their match at UFC 54. This will be Irvin’s sixth fight in 2006: he’s 11-3 overall, but 2-2 in 2006 (one match was a no contest) with a first round loss to Stephan Bonnar at Ultimate Fight Night 3 in January, and a follow-up loss to at WEC 19 to Lodune Sincaid. Irvin has trained in Gracie BJJ and in Muay Thai, and is fighting on his home turf as he’s from Sacramento. Ramirez is no slouch, ranked third in King of the Cage at light heavyweight and holding a 6-1-1 MMA record. Ramirez is a solid wrestler with heavy hands and trains with Quinton “Rampage” Jackson. Ramirez will likely look to take this fight to the ground and impose his will, but probably won’t be able to finish Irvin, certainly not with submission. Irvin should have the edge in conditioning and if he can survive the first round I look for Irvin to win with a late TKO, say third round after Ramirez gasses.

Joe Stevenson vs Dokonjonosuke Mishima
Joe Stevenson -228
Dokonjonosuke Mishima +208
Mishima is 17-4-2 in MMA with a win over Marcus Aurelio in late 2004 and big losses to Yves Edwards at Bushido 7 in mid 2005 and a loss to Ralph Gracie back in 2003. Joe “Daddy” Stevenson is 25-7 in MMA, we last saw him with a win over Yves Edwards at UFC 61 in July in that ridiculously bloody bout. Mishima is a grappler primarily from Shooto with good ground skills, but outside of a recent submission win over the barely-.500 fighter “Crazy Horse” Bennett at Bushido 9 in September 2005, Mishima hasn’t won a fight by stoppage since July 2003. On first glance these odds looked somewhat attractive, but on deeper reflection I don’t expect Mishima will have anything deal with Joe Stevenson’s strength and quickness. Stevenson is obviously a very strong wrestler but has submission skills himself, and Mishima is going to have trouble putting something on Stevenson that Joe won’t be able to defend or power through. We know “MMAth” doesn’t always work, but Mishima losing to The Crow in 2005 and Joe Daddy dropping him in 2006, I do expect the edge to Stevenson. Mishima is on the downside of his career here and I don’t expect him to prevail. I think this is a fight handpicked to build up Stevenson. Joe Daddy by second round TKO, ground and pound.

Tim Sylvia vs Jeff Monson
Tim Sylvia -253
Jeff Monson +233
Let me start by saying: Man, I hate Timmy. Sylvia is 22-2 with his only two losses to the in-shape Frank Mir (the infamous arm breakage) and the first fight with Andrei Arlovski. Sylvia has won his last five fights. Monson has a 22-5 MMA record and is 4-2 in the UFC, but is coming in riding a very impressive 16 win streak, with his last loss back in 2002 to Forrest Griffin in the first WEFC (World Extreme Fighting Championships). Most recently we’ve seen Monson choke out Branden Lee Hinkle at UFC 57, defeat Marcio Cruz by split decision at UFC 59, and first round TKO Anthony Perosh at UFC 61.

Much has been made of the height difference here, so I’m not going to go in to it in depth, except to say a couple things. Monson looked like crap against Marcio Cruz, letting Cruz keep him at arms length with really weak jabs and leg kicks. If he does the same thing against Sylvia he’s obviously a dead man. But my opinion is that Monson stayed standing with Cruz because Cruz is such a strong jiu-jitsu fighter (he and Monson had fought several times in grappling contests) so he figured he’d keep it standing and look to win on the feet where he had an edge albeit a very slim one. Hopefully Monson is smart enough to know he can’t let Sylvia do the same. So hopefully we see Monson close the gap with Sylvia and use his height as an advantage: its really hard to punch down at a close opponent with this type of height disparity: since you can’t use downwards elbows, and Sylvia probably won’t want to throw knees from close as it gives Monson an opportunity to throw off his balance and/or grab a leg. Ultimately, I think if Monson can manage to take this to the ground, he can snap Timmy in half. Here’s hoping we get to see that happen… man I hate Timmy.

Matt Hughes vs Georges St. Pierre
Matt Hughes -127
Georges St. Pierre +117
GSP is a monster, no question. In his last fight with Hughes he was very tough for Matt to control. Both of these fighters are well rounded for sure, and if you stacked up all of their opponents together, they both beat both of their opponents list most all of the time. But when they match up together, its about the edges. I see Hughes as an edge in wrestling and control once it hits the ground. Not a major advantage, based on the elusiveness GSP showed in their last match, but still when this fight goes to the ground, Hughes gets an advantage. If GSP can keep the fight standing, if he can force Hughes to trade, then he can certainly win this fight. So I’m certainly not saying Hughes is a mortal lock or anything else. But I think Hughes wins this fight around 67% of the time (2/3 fights) which goes to a -200 line and means I see tremendous value in the current line of Hughes around -135 (which translates to Hughes wins 57% of the time). Its obvious that the line has moved the opposite direction of what I expected it to do, though. I recommended grabbing a big handful of Hughes around -145 where it opened, and obviously quite a bit of money has moved in on GSP. Mine is on Hughes. Despite how bad BJ Penn made Hughes look for the first two rounds, I think Hughes is at the pinnacle of his career here. This should be a great matchup and heavily anticipated by yours truly. I think Hughes wins a close decision fight, probably three round to two.

Nick Diaz vs Gleison Tibau
Nick Diaz -478
Gleison Tibau +428
Diaz, a black-belt student of Cesar Gracie Jiu-Jitsu, now sports a 13-6 MMA record with a spread of three UFC losses (Ultimate Fighter 2 finale vs Diego Sanchez in late 2005, UD loss to Joe Riggs at UFC 57 in February 2006, UD loss to Sean Sherk at UFC 59 two months later. Diaz then returned to UFC 62 defeating Josh Neer in August. Tibau is a BJJ practitioner fighting with American Top Team coming to the US from Brazil, holding an 11-3 pro MMA record. Tibau is largely an unknown here, and given Diaz’s recent struggles I think there’s always a possibility that the two guys take the fight to the ground and Tibau pulls out a submission. I’m not willing to lay close to 5:1 on a fighter who is struggling versus a complete unknown with a BJJ background and a solid record. So I’m going to recommend a tiny play here against Diaz.

Summary of Picks

Brandon Vera -312 : 9.36u to win 3u

Sherman Pendergarst +247 : .5u to win 1.235u

Alessio Sakara -483 : 2.415u to win .5u

James Irvin +143 : 1u to win 1.43u

Joe Stevenson -228 : 2.28u to win 1u

Jeff Monson +233 : .5u to win 1.165u

Matt Hughes -127 : 2.54u to win 2u

Gleison Tibau : +428 : .25u to win 1.05u

The first four plays, Vera, Pendergarst, Sakara and Stevenson would be those that i'd see as strongly +EV. Monson is a longer shot underdog call. Hughes I see as a tremendous value but i'm surprised to see where the money has ended up. Tibau is a pure value play that you can probably stay away from unless you want the full card covered...

Performify's Pigskin Picks - Week Ten

noreply@blogger.com (Performify) — Thu, 09 Nov 2006 15:47:00 +0000

Gotta love yet another brilliant week last week. Chicago turns the ball over 7 times. Atlanta turns the ball over three times. Green Bay throws an INT in the endzone in the 4th quarter as they're ready to tie up the game, which leads to a Bills TD so 14 point swing. Chargers are covering and give up a garbage TD with a minute left. Yay, double digit losses on the year now. Didn't need the teaser points but nice to see that win without any real danger.

Despite all that, I still have confidence in my system of game selection and weighting. I'm getting burned by turnovers this year: my system is selecting teams which are good at forcing turnovers playing teams that are bad at turning the ball over, and instead in those games my picks are turning the ball over unusually. For example, Chicago was +11 in turnovers (meaning they had generated eleven more turnovers than they had turned the ball over themselves), tied for #1 in the league in that category on the year - at least prior to last week - and Miami was -5. So on average you wouldn't expect that Chicago would give the ball away 6 times for a -4 turnover differential. Likewise with Atlanta/Detroit, where Atlanta is one of the best teams in the league for turnovers playing one of the teams near the bottom in turning the ball over. And instead, Atlanta gives the ball away three times for a -2 turnover differential, and Detroit scores three of their touchdowns off the Atlanta giveaways.

Anyway, I still have all the confidence in my selection system and my capping ability. I really feel this is all short term variance, and I really do expect stronger showings going forward. But feel free to fade away, if you think otherwise :)

On to the picks and writeups, but first: up-to-date record:

Last week:
1-4, -7.24u on straight picks. Loss on Game of the Week.
Win on Tease of the Week, +3u
Total on the day: -4.24u

YTD RESULTS:
13-22-4 on posted picks, -13.63 units (excludes teasers)
2-3-3 on Game of the Week, -10.25 units.
4-3 on Tease of the Week, +1.6 units
Year to date combined on all posted NFL picks (includes teasers): -12.03 units

Jets +10.5 (-107) at Patriots
The Jets are coming off their bye week following a disappointing loss to Cleveland in Week 8. The Pats are coming off a crushing loss to Indy, a game which they gave away with turnovers and penalties.

I look at a lot of factors for these games, including a lot of statistics and breakdowns. With some of the tremendous new statistical sites available, there are a lot of very interesting bits of information available. For one, in 45 career starts at quarterback, Jets quarterback Chad Pennington is 6-2 after games in which he had a quarterback rating lower than 75. Most recently, Pennington had a 28.9 rating against Jacksonville in Week 5 and then torched Miami in Week 6. He had a 21.1 rating against Cleveland in their last game... and now I look for him to continue this trend with a rebound performance against the Patriots. No, before someone jumps on me, not just because of this trend. Its all about the statistics: the Pats give up 229 yards per game in the air on average, making them the #28 ranked pass defense in the NFL. They're coming off a game in which they gave up 326 passing yards in Week 9 vs. the Colts. Also the New England defense does not blitz often, instead preferring to stay in their base 3-4 formation and play the run stronger. And of course, Jets coach Eric Mangini, the Patriots' defensive coordinator last year, knows New England's personnel well and has had two weeks to prepare, so expect some new developments in the Jets' game plan. Patriots starting safety Rodney Harrison will also miss this game, out with a broken shoulder blade, which leaves a big hole in the already leaky New England secondary.

On offense, the Patriots like to run the ball (128 yards per game on the ground on average), and should have a big day against a weak Jets rush defense that allows 148 yards rushing per game. But this is actually a factor in why my system likes this game: The Jets have a high-powered passing attack playing a leaky pass defense, which should allow them to put up points quickly. On the other side of the ball, the Pats will likely pound the run much of the game, which should chew up the clock and serve to keep things closer than most people expect here. Bill Belichick is one of the best coaches in exploiting an opponent's weakness and he will draw up a run-first approach to grind out yards against an undersized Jets defensive line. Another bit of interesting statistical matchup from another of those aforementioned sources: In 11 career games against the Jets, New England QB Tom Brady averages just 196 yards and one touchdown. Worse, in his last three home games against the Jets, Brady has thrown just one touchdown pass.

This will be the second time these divisional rivals have met this year. In week two the Pats won 24-17 in New York. I predict this game will be pretty similar to that last meeting: a game in which the Pats ran for 157 yards, the Jets threw for over 300, and the Pats shut down a late Jets drive to win a close game. 21-14 New England for the Jets cover. Game of the Week.

Chiefs -1 (-103) at Miami
Road favorites can always be trouble, but the Chiefs are on an absolute tear, led by Larry Johnson who has 459 rushing yards out of his last three games. The Dolpins are coming off a big win and I believe there's a chance for an intangible "letdown" game after the big victory over Chicago.

The Dolphins are #14 in the NFL at defending the run, and with the Chiefs offensive line starting to gel and Chiefs backup QB Damon Huard really starting to open up the entire offense, the Chiefs should roll over the Dolphins here. The Chiefs do have a couple struggles at offensive line, with last week's injury to guard Brian Watters, but they have veteran Chris Bober to replace him and will still be able to run against Miami with Bober standing in for Waters.

Joey Harrington will face another Cover 2 defense with the Chiefs, and he's struggled against the Cover 2 throughout his career including last week against Chicago where despite throwing three touchdowns he threw two INTs and made numerous questionable throws. The Chiefs have built a very strong, very underrated defense, and CBs Ty Law and Patrick Surtain will probably each produce an interception against Harrington this game. The Chiefs have allowed just one running back to top 100 yards on the ground this year, and despite Ronnie Brown's turnaround against Chicago I expect him to have a less productive game here, with Miami falling behind early and being forced away from the run. Chicago turned the ball over six times last week, and the Chiefs will protect the ball better than that here. The Dolphins offensive line is slower than average, and the Chiefs defensive front is built around exceptional speed. Look for a big day from the KC defensive ends, especially speedster Jared Allen.

If the Chiefs can limit mistakes, they will win this game. 21-17 Kansas City.

Saints +4 (-102) at Steelers
This is a popular pick this week among some cappers I respect, and my system likes it a little as well. The Steelers are the worst team in the NFL at turning the ball over, at -11 on the year. The Saints aren't great in that category, sitting at -3 on the year, but still I expect the Steelers will not reverse themselves here and play mistake-free football. The Steelers have struggled protecting Roethlisburger all season, and the Saints match up well defensively with an aggressive pass rush. The Saints have allowed only one quarterback to top 250 yards this season, and I do not expect Big Ben to join that elusive club. The Saints defense has also only allowed two running back touchdowns all season, which should mean a rough day for Willie Parker.

On the other side of the ball, the Steelers have allowed some big games for opposing QBs this year, and the combination of Colston and Brees should be able to capitalize to keep things close. The Dynamic Denver Duo of Jake Plummer and Javon Walker tore up the Pittsburgh secondary last week, and you’ll see Brees making big throws between big target Marques Colston and speedster Devery Henderson. Unlike some others I don't think the Saints win here often enough to be worth a moneyline bet, but I do like taking the four points. 24-21 Pittsburgh for the Saints cover.

Tease of the Week: Denver -9.5, Carolina -9.5 2-team, 7-point teaser
I have both of these games being slightly closer than their large spreads, and as such have a tremendous value in moving both inside the three. Denver goes on the road to face an Oakland team that's been playing well lately. They won't play well enough to upset Denver's roll. Carolina faces Tampa Bay at home on Monday night. I think there is greater probability that Carolina doesn't need the points from the tease, but this should be high probability moved inside the three. This is worth a play to win three units in my system.

Summary of Picks for the Week

Jets +10.5 (-107) at Patriots : 6.42u to win 6u

Chiefs -1 (-103) at Dolphins : 3.09u to win 3u

Saints +4 (-102) at Pittsburgh : 1.02u to win 1u

Teaser: Denver -2.5, Carolina -2.5 : 3.9u to win 3u

I'll probably be back tomorrow with some more lower-level picks, my system spit out these two games and the tease as pretty strong plays and I'll take a closer look at my factors for the closer 1-unit games.