Parts Unknown (DP--Disassociated Press): The difficult task of anointing the participant whose handicapping season will be deemed as this year's "feel-good" story became that much more difficult to predict after 7mick7 got off to an amazing start to this year's first round of the postseason. The Irish Hustler, like a bolt from the blue, came out of nowhere to take an early lead in this year's playoff point standings after pounding out a flawless best-bet tally of 5-0-0, which was an outing that was good for a perfect 1.000 winning percentage. In the process, 7mick7 negated the opening round scoring advantages of this year's surprising regular-season champion, Vikings17, after he concluded the first round of the postseason with a one-point lead over the rookie phenom (10 pts vs 9 pts). As it turned out, all four of this year's divisional champions from the regular season made good on their respective scoring advantages by culminating the first round in the top-four slots of the playoff point standings--7mick7 (10pts), Vikings17 (9pts), the Biased Nihilist (8pts), and Driveline (6pts). Another handicapper who got off to a fabulous start to this year's playoffs was Blitzkrieg, who entered this year's postseason as just one of two at-large participants, but who through some clutch and suspenseful handicapping went 4-1-0 with his respective five best bets and finished the weekend in 5th place overall in the point standings after he accrued four total points for the opening round. And rounding out the rest of the point standings and in order of finish after tiebreakers were implemented were DawgPound (3pts), jcvike28 (3pts), Theopholis (3pts), TCU (3pts), moemonie (2pt), and the Hall-of-Fame City Kid (1pt). But it was 7mick7, this past weekend's top scorer, who stole the show after he notched a 10-point outing and ultimately got credited for the week-won.

As a result of his magnificent start, the Irish Hustler became only the second handicapper in the history of the Bookie Challenge to open a playoff round with a spotless 5-0-0 best-bet record, with the other handicapper being dbucc, who in Challenge year #11 also scored 10 points as a divisional champion qualifier after he also went 5-0-0 with his best bets to open that season's playoffs. Additionally, a third handicapper who also started a past postseason with a perfect best-bet tally was Bomber7, who in Challenge year #2 reeled off a best-bet tally of 4-0-0 to begin that year's postseason, and pulled off the feat as that year's regular-season champion. What's truly note worthy was that the 10 points 7mick7 accrued this past weekend was his best-ever start to a postseason. Previous to the start of this postseason, Mick Balls' best-ever start to a playoffs came back in Challenge year #7, when as a divisional-champion qualifier he produced seven total points after winning two of his best bets and knocking down a 3-point parlay hit. But this season marked the first and only time 7mick7 has ever registered an outright lead in a playoff point standings after an opening round of a postseason, which is a handicapping feat that most certainly has the Irish Hustler feeling as if he were walking on air. And why wouldn't he be feeling that way, especially when considering that from this point on in this year's postseason no handicapper will have a scoring advantage over him for the rest of the playoffs? Better yet, 7mick7 and the rest of this year's divisional champs from the regular season will all still have scoring advantages over the rest of the Challenge field in the upcoming playoff round for one last time in this year's postseason, which will be the final round they will hold scoring advantages before every participant goes under the same scoring format for the last-two rounds of this year's playoffs. What's more, in what can be seen as another slight edge for the Irish Hustler, he emerged from this year's opening round as just one of four handicappers who have all of their respective preseason Super Bowl selections still fully intact, with 7mick7's picks being KC to defeat SF in this year's Super Bowl. But after just one round of this year's playoffs, 7mick7's slight advantage, that of having his full complement of preseason Super Bowl selections still in play, might not seem like a big deal, or at least not for the time being. However, the aforementioned edge could manifest into some highly sought after bonus points if Mick Balls gets lucky enough in the last-two rounds of this year's postseason. Regardless, the handicapper who was most detrimentally affected by 7mick7's brilliant opening round was Vikings17, who learned a sobering lesson after he quickly found out that entering this year's postseason with the prime scoring advantages of a regular-season championship was not all it was hyped up to be, and how everything that glitters doesn't neccesarily mean it's gold. Furthermore, in something that's awkwardly interesting, Vikings17's pumped-up hopes to possibly win an overall Bookie Challenge champion may be the fault of the Biased Nihilist's weekly reviews.

To better explain it, for the longest now, for years and years, the Biased Nihilist has purposefully over hyped former regular-season champions in previous weekly reviews that have been written over the years, to include himself, but has done as much without any deceptive ulterior motives. For example, he didn't intend to embarrass any regular-season champion in the case he didn't convert his regular-season championship into an overall Bookie Challenge championship, but instead, he put those regular-season champions on high pedestals for the sole purposes to boost their confidence, to have them believing they could go all the way and capture overall Bookie Challenge championships. So if anything, Vikings17 shouldn't be blamed for taking the excessive accolades to possibly take his first-round scoring advantages for being this year's regular-season championship and going on to stun the rest of of the Challenge field by hauling in this year's overall Bookie Challenge title. Again, don't anybody blame him for taking the hyped-up bait, and taking it hook, line, and sinker, because if the truth be told, anybody would buy into a wave of superlatives that drenched him as the heavy favorite to win an overall Bookie Challenge championship. But here's the kicker, and it's something that all handicappers in the competition, with the exception of the Biased Nihilist, had no idea that a weird statistical anomaly existed as it concerns regular-season champions, and it's one that can be considered as the second-worst "handicapping curse" of the competition behind the number-one curse--or better known as the "Curse of the Number-one Top Seed". For those with seriously bad memories, the "Curse of the Number-One Top Seed" is a curse that has seen all previous number-one top seeds from all previous divisional seedings fail to ever win an overall Bookie Challenge championship. But let's get back to the hidden curse that has inflicted every past regular-season champion, with the lone exception of Bomber7. To start off with, only four previous regular-season champions have ever gone on to win overall Bookie Challenge championship, of whom were the Biased Nihilist (Challenge yr #1), Bomber7 (yr #2), Tony Soprano (yr #8), and Driveline (yr #12). But as it concerns that aforementioned "statistical anomaly" that nobody but the Nihilist is privy to, it will come to the amazement of the rest of the Challenge field to find out the following: With the exception of Bomber7, who as the regular-season champion for Challenge year #2 took an opening-round lead in the playoff point standings after he went 4-0-0 with his best bets and finished the round with eight total points and the outright lead of the competition, no other regular-season champion has ever concluded the first round of a postseason with an outright playoff lead of a Bookie Challenge competition, and that includes this year's regular-season champion, Vikings17.

To be more specific, what follows is a list of all regular-season champions and where they finished in the point standings after handicapping their respective first rounds of a postseason: This year (yr #13)--Vikings17 2nd place; yr #12--Driveline last place after goose egging 1st round; yr #11--T. Soprano 3rd place; yr #10--moemonie in lower tier after scoring just 2 pts; yr #9--Blitzkrieg middle of the pack; yr #8--T.Soprano 2nd place; yr #7--redsoxdon lower tier with just 4 pts scored; yr #6 moemonie middle of the pack with just 4 pts scored; yr #5--Smokey McPot 4th place; yr #4--rexkramer 4th place; yr #3--xjoeyx last place after goose egging the 1st rd; yr #2--Bomber7 1st place with 8pts scored; and lastly, yr #1--the Biased Nihilist 2nd-to-last place after scoring just 1 pt. So, when looking ahead to the remaining three rounds of this year's postseason, it's going to be fascinating to see which of the four present front-runners who occupy the top tier of this year's playoff point standings, or to see which handicappers from the rest of the Challenge field, are going to take their respective handicapping games to the next level and possibly snatch this year's overall Bookie Challenge championship, not to forget it will be just as thrilling to see which handicapper will finish in second place and as the runner-up to this year's overall champion. Surely, there's no freaking way that any handicapper still in the competition has forgotten what's at stake, as in the $410 that awaits to be awarded to this year's overall Bookie Challenge champion and the $100 that will doled out to this year's runner-up to the eventual Bookie Challenge champion. Right now, only four points separate this year's four divisional-champion qualifiers who are on top tier of the playoff point standings, meaning 7mick7's first-place lead of 10 points over Driveline's fourth-place total of six points. With the exception of second-place Vikings17, the rest of the front-runners are all battled-tested handicappers, and let's also keep it in mind that the Nihilist and Driveline have already won multiple Bookie Challenge championships. Regardless, every handicapper in the Challenge field is still not officially out of contention for an overall championship heading into the second round of this year's postseason, and it's because the scoring format for a second round of a postseason was revised over this past off-season and incorporated into this year's competition, so even at-large participants, for the first time ever in a postseason, will be eligible to submit 6-point parlay combinations. In other words, any handicapper in the upcoming round can elevate his hopes to win this year's overall title if he rattles off a 6-point parlay hit. But it's not going to be a cake walk, that's for sure. To find out why, keep on reading.

Unlike the opening round of a postseason, in which pointspreads are released for six games and their corresponding over/under totals that are scheduled for an NFL wild-card round, of which allows every playoff qualifier with the exception of at-large participants to choose five best bets and a 3-team parlay combination from 12 overall pointspread selections, the second round of a postseason will be harder to select five different best bets and 6-point parlay combinations that cannot include any best bets. To put it differently, there are only four games that will be played in the upcoming divisional round, which means there will be a total of just EIGHT overall pointspread picks to choose from. With that in mind, if a handicapper wants to submit a parlay combination that will be worth six points in the upcoming second round, he will have to utilize every one of the eight pointspreads that will be available to choose from, meaning he has to utilize five different selections for his five best bets, and then utilize the three remaining pointspread selections for his 3-team parlay combo. One has to remember that a 6-point parlay combination can never include one or more best bets in a weekly set of picks from a handicapper. Of course, if a handicapper can't figure out how to submit eight different selections and can't devise a 6-point parlay hit in the upcoming round, he can always decide to go with a parlay combo that's worth only three points by simply including one or two of his five best bets into his 3-team parlay combo. Whichever way the handicappers still remaining in this year's playoff competition decide to go when it comes to Selecting this upcoming weekend's handicapping strategies, one thing is guaranteed to happen--the second round of this year's playoffs is going to be rife with plenty of nail-biting handicapping drama and heart-pounding suspense.

• BELIEVE IT! THIS YEAR'S CHALLENGE FIELD KEEPS ON ROLLING, REGISTERS BEST-EVER OUTING FOR AN OPENING ROUND OF A POSTSEASON: For some unknown reason, the previous opening rounds of the postseasons have not been kind to the past Challenge fields. In fact, entering this postseason, the competition's 13th overall, the past Challenge fields have posted losing best-bet records in the first rounds of the last-seven straight postseasons, and overall they've registered losing best-bet marks in the first rounds in nine of the previous 12 postseasons. Moreover, the three postseasons in which the past Challenge fields have posted winning best-bet records in the opening rounds of past postseasons, the fields have barely been able to eke out those winning best-bet records, as can obviously be seen by the following records of those three respective seasons: Yr#5--46-43-0 for .517 win%, yr#3--34-32-13 for .515 win%, and yr#2--27-25-0 for .519 win%. But this past weekend's opening round of the playoffs was a totally different animal, when this year's field exploded for a highly impressive 35-21-0 best-bet tally, which factored out to a meritorious .625 winning percentage. After the best-bet outburst, this year's Challenge has increased its best-bet numbers on the year to a season-high best of 284-258-14 (.524 win%), and as a result, it's almost likely that it will end this overall season with a best-bet record very much in the black.

Everybody in the Bookie Challenge competition has to already know that 7mick7 is feeling it, truly feeling it, that he might finally win an overall Bookie Challenge championship for the first time in his Challenge career. That he can't let this "golden opportunity" slip away, because it's not too often a Bookie Challenge participant gets a realistic shot at winning an overall title. Just imagine what a waste it will be if 7mick7 doesn't close out the deal, especially after he registered his best-ever competition, one in which he reached career highs in this year's regular season for total points scored (48), nailing down the most 6-point parlay hits (5 in all), and setting a new all-time record for amassing the most parlay wins within one's combined parlay combinations on the season (37 parlay wins). Of course, there are a few envious handicappers who would rather not see the Irish Hustler finally corral his first-ever overall Bookie Challenge title, the likes of the three-time Bookie Challenge champion, the Biased Nihilist, and the likes of this year's defending Bookie Challenge champion, Driveline, who has already won two overall titles and can become only the second participant, apart from the Nihilist, in the history of the competition to win back-to-back Bookie Challenge championships, not to forget that Driveline can also become just the third participant in the history of the competition to rack up an overall third Bookie Challenge championship. With all the aforementioned in mind, 7mick7 controls his own destiny--but getting to the finish line will be easier said than done. So if 7mick7 wants to snatch his first-ever Bookie Challenge championship, he knows that he'll have to buckle down and produce his best-ever stretch of handicapping to close out a postseason. He also knows that anything less is not going to cut it. The bottom line? It's now or never for the Irish Hustler.

To say the least, the Hall-of-Fame City Kid's rookie season in the Bookie Challenge competition has so far turned out to be one of the strangest handicapping debuts by a rookie in the history of the Bookie Challenge, and when his rookie season is juxtaposed to that of the performance from this year's only other rookie entrant, meaning Viking17's greenhorn stint, it can easily be said that this year's two rookies have had the most bizarre rookie starts to a Bookie Challenge competition, the likes of which have never before been seen in previous Bookie Challenge seasons. As it pertains to the City Kid's overall regular season, he got off to the worst-ever rookie start to a Challenge competition, but to his credit, he rebounded to salvage his regular-season rookie debut on the strength of a 6-point parlay hit that he nailed down in week #3. Subsequently, at one point of this year's regular season, the HOF City Kid began to rival Vikings17's eventual turnaround to his rookie season, and in the long run, the City Kid, somehow and someway captured the Red Zone divisional wild card slot after the conclusion of this year's divisional races. But in a handicapping decision that took the league by surprise, the HOF City Kid adopted the league-wide and unpopular strategy of shooting for 3-point parlay hits instead of sticking with more 6-point parlay attempts, of which was a strategy that had the rest of the handicappers in the league scratching their heads. As it turned out, the City Kid would set an all-time record for attempting the most three-team parlay combinations for a single-season of regular-season handicapping after he submitted 16 overall 3-point parlay attempts. The bad news was that he became the first handicapper to not connect on a 3-point parlay attempt after leading the league with the most attempts of 3-point parlay combinations. All in all, after salvaging his regular season by seizing the division's wild card, the City Kid ended his regular season in a sour note after he only eked out one point for weeks' #15, #16, #17 and then capped off his regular season with a goose egg outing, of which his goose egg outing resulted in his 6th scoreless weekend of the season, not to mention that the outing tied him with two other handicappers--the Nihilist and 7mick7--for registering the most scoreless outings in this year's regular season. More glaring is that the HOF City Kid chose a bad time to go belly up with his handicapping game after he followed up his goose egg outing from this year's regular-season finale with a highly disappointing 1-4-0 best-bet tally to open up his first-ever postseason. Essentially, in what can be deemed as an unfortunate and coincidental twist to his rookie season, the Hall-of-Fame City Kid almost started his playoff debut as pathetically as he had started off his regular season, or by finishing in dead-last place of the competition's point standings after his starts to this year's regular season and postseason. Now, the following quote is not meant to be a personal low-blow to the HOF City Kid nor his overall handicapping game, but when a Bookie Challenge contestant stinks up the joint with an embarrassing spell of handicapping, whether he's a rookie or a veteran, there's just no place to hide in a Bookie Challenge weekly review. So, when keeping in mind all the aforementioned from above, there's no shadow of a doubt that inquiring minds from the Bookie Challenge competition want to know where the Hall-of-Fame City Kid was at when he submitted his fucked-up weekly set of picks for the opening round of this year's postseason. Of course, we'll never really know where he was when he posted his fucked-up picks, but if we had to hear it straight from the horse's mouth, it would probably go something like this: "I'm at the NFL Hall of Fame!...I'm at the football game!...I'm at the grocery store!"