Parts Unknown (DP--Disassociated Press): The 16th annual Bookie Challenge competition came sprinting out of the gates in its season-opening outing of week #1. Four handicappers--the Biased Nihilist, Driveline, Kr@tos, and Matty_Ice--all connected on their respective 6-point parlay combinations and each handicapper ended their respective season openers with 7-point outings apiece for the weekend. Impressively, the four 6-point parlay winners from this past weekend tied the all-time record for a Bookie Challenge field to open up a handicapping season. Back in Challenge year #5, rexkramer (7pts), 1947Lifer (PF-PERFECTA), Smokey McPot (PF), and redsoxdon (PF) initially established the combined handicapping feat, and in the process, the four handicappers back in Challenge year #5 were also instrumental in setting the all-time scoring record (48 pts) by a Bookie Challenge field to open up a handicapping season. This past weekend, this year's Challenge field scored 41 combined points to start off its new season, of which the 41 points scored rank third all-time behind the aforementioned 48 points in Challenge year #5 and the combined 47 points tallied in Challenge year #8. But despite the very decent start by this year's Challenge field, this past weekend's season opener for the 16th annual Bookie Challenge competition was not all peaches and cream. On the contrary, the Challenge field could have improved on its 41 points it scored in this year's opener if only a handful of handicappers would have knocked down some points for their exact-score predictions. Incredibly, however, even though this year's Challenge field started this season with its highest number of members (19) since Challenge year #9 (also 19 members), not one handicapper within the Challenge field connected on any exact-score points, and that egregious failure included both of the exact-score games for the opening weekend (UPDATE! after Thursday night's first exact-score selections for week #2, this year's Challenge field has yet to record an exact-score point). For the record, the last time a Challenge field missed its exact-scores for an entire weekend occurred in week #15 of last year's competition. In addition to the exact-score misses in week #1, five handicappers--dbucc, Blitzkrieg, TCU, Hall-of-Fame City Kid, and rookie Brooklyn211--all goose egged their respective handicapping starts to this year's competition.

As it concerned the four 6-point parlay winners from this past weekend, the Biased Nihilist continued his dominance of connecting on the most all-time 6-point parlay winners in the history of the Bookie Challenge competition after he became the first handicapper this season to knock down a 6-point parlay winner. The Nihilist rebounded from losing his first best-bet of the season, of which was the Thursday-night game in week #1 that was played in Australia between San Francisco and the LA Rams (the Nihilist had chosen the Rams -3½, his favorite NFL team). But on the ensuing Sunday, the self-proclaimed Greatest Handicapper of All Time blasted out the year's first 6-point parlay hit after the first slate of early games became finals on the first Sunday of this NFL season. The 6-point parlay winner by the Nihilist was his 40th all-time regular-season 6-point parlay hit, and when including 6-point parlay hits for the postseason, the Nihilist has now pounded out 46 all-time career parlay winners for the regular season and postseason combined. Just to get an idea as to why the Nihilist is the King of 6-point parlay hits, the next all-time totals of 6-point parlay hits by active handicappers who qualify for all-time records is 27 6-point parlay winners, of which the 27 all-time parlay winners have been produced by three separate handicappers (7mick7, jcvike28, and Blitzkrieg). The Nihilist produced his winning 3-team parlay combination by choosing all favorites--Buffalo (-2) over Houston, Pittsburgh (-3) over Atlanta, and Cincinnati (-3) over Tampa Bay.

Also hitting a 6-point parlay on the opening Sunday of the season was 2nd-year veteran Matty_Ice, who completed his parlay trifecta at the end of the second slate of games on Sunday. But more importantly, Matty_Ice finally got off the schneid and drilled his first-career 6-point parlay winner. Also known by his Bookie Challenge moniker as the "Handicapping Hurricane" because he loves the Miami Hurricanes in college football, Matty_Ice was able to knock down his first-ever 6-point parlay winner thanks in large part to three superb selections. In the first slate of games on this past Sunday, Matty_Ice chose the game between Tampa Bay and Cincinnati to go over the pointspread total of 51 total points. Subsequently, the game went easily over the total after the Bengals beat the Buccaneers by a final of 33-27 (60 total pts scored). The winning parlay pick in the early slate of Sunday's games enabled Matty_Ice to enter the second slate of Sunday's games needing the Las Vegas Raiders (-3) to cover over the Miami Dolphins, and also for the same game to stay under the scoring total of 42 combined points in order for Matty_Ice to hit parlay paydirt for the first time ever. As it turned out, and much to the delight of the "Handicapping Hurricane", he indeed was able to secure his first all-time 6-point parlay hit after the Kirk Cousins-led Raiders covered the -3 pointspread over the Dolphins by defeating the "Fish" 27-13. However, Matty_Ice got really lucky that the game stayed under the 42-point total (27-to-13=40pts). In fact, just to show how a Bookie Challenge handicapper sometimes needs a little luck to connect on a big parlay winner, the Miami Dolphins' place kicker Riley Patterson missed a chip-shot 41-yard field goal after a critical Dolphins' drive had stalled at the Raiders' 23-yard line with just 11 seconds left to play in the 3rd quarter. If Patterson connects on his 41-yard FG attempt, Matty_Ice would have suffered an excruciating loss of his parlay combination, but instead the two-year Challenge veteran ended his opening weekend with a big-time outing, his best ever in his nascent Bookie Challenge career.

After the Biased Nihilist and Matty_Ice recorded the competition's first 6-point parlay winners of the season on the opening Sunday of the 16th annual Bookie Challenge competition, the Bookie Challenge had to wait until the conclusion of this year's first Monday night game between Denver and Kansas City to become a final before the competition could see if two more 6-point parlay hits were going to be won on the opening weekend. Specifically, both Driveline and Kr@tos had entered Monday night's game with each handicapper needing just one more parlay winner within their respective 3-team combos for each handicapper to keep pace with the Biased Nihilist (7 pts) and Matty_Ice (7 pts). In the case of Driveline, he needed the game between the Broncos and the Chiefs to stay under the pointspread total of 44 points, while Kr@tos needed the Chiefs to cover a -3 pointspread over the Broncos. Much to the relief of both handicappers, the Chiefs throttled the Broncos handedly 31-10, of which the huge victory by the Chiefs allowed Kr@tos to easily win his 6-point parlay combination. However, the two-time Bookie Challenge champion Driveline had to sweat out his parlay hopes as the combined 41 total points of the Monday night game just barely stayed under the pointspread total of 44 points. In any event, the 6-point parlay hit by Driveline was his all-time 23rd parlay winner for regular season handicapping, and it was his 25th overall 6-point parlay winner when including his two all-time 6-point parlay hits he has knocked down in his postseasons. As it pertains to Kr@tos, he notched his 5th all-time 6-point parlay in just his third year of handicapping the Bookie Challenge competition. By connecting on a 6-point parlay hit to open up this season, the "Handicapping God of War", as Kr@tos is popularly known by his main Bookie Challenge moniker, has now tallied a 6-point parlay hit in each of his first-three seasons (to include this season). Oddly, in last year's Bookie Challenge competition, Kr@tos belted out a rare 3-point parlay winner in the first week of last year's handicapping season. And although there have been many handicappers who have hit 6-point parlays on different opening days in the history of the competition, after connecting on his 6-point parlay hit in week #1 of this season, the "Handicapping God of War" became the first handicapper in the history of the Bookie Challenge competition to open consecutive seasons with a 3-point parlay hit and then a 6-point parlay hit. That all-time record is likely to never be broken because few handicappers ever attempt 3-point parlay hits during the Bookie Challenge's regular seasons. To be exact, in the previous 15 years of the Bookie Challenge competition, only eight 3-point parlay winners have ever been won in the history of the Bookie Challenge's regular seasons.

• A 4-WAY TIE FOR 1ST PLACE AFTER WEEK #1?...YEAH SO, GAME ON!: After the Biased Nihilist, Matty_Ice, Kr@tos, and Driveline each ended the opening week of the season in a 4-way tie for first place in the season's first point standings, the eight-week rat race to this year's divisional seeding has gotten off to an intriguing start. For starters, because 19 overall members are competing in this year's handicapping competition, all four prizes from this year's Gold-Pressed Latinum jackpot have increased, including the 4th-place prize to be awarded to whomever captures this season's overall top seed at the conclusion of week #8's handicapping action. The 4th-place prize was incorporated just two seasons ago and the payouts for the first-two seasons was $50 to the first-ever top-seed winners. Blitzkrieg had won the first-ever top-seed prize ($50) in Challenge year #14 and the Nihilist ($50) won the top-seed prize in last year's competition (yr #15). However, with a record-setting total jackpot of $950 being established for this year's competition, the 4th-place prize to be awarded for seizing this year's top seed will be a noteworthy sum of $100. With that being said, the Nihilist, Matty_Ice, Kr@tos, and Driveline are all licking their chops even though there is still a long ways to go before week #8's divisional seeding takes place. Still, though, the 4-way tie for first place in the point standings is a great start for the four aforementioned handicappers, and if anything, the tie almost assures that the competition is headed for its most exciting dog-eat-dog battle to ever be fought for an overall number-one top seed.




• WEEKLY TICKER ...........KEEP AN EYE ON KR@TOS: After Kr@tos opened up his 3rd Bookie Challenge competition with a 7-point outing, he is starting to build a reputation in the league for having the moxie and doggedness to become a top contender in the Bookie Challenge, especially in the regular season. Now granted, Kr@tos completely collapsed in his 1st postseason of his rookie season from two years ago, but in that first regular season he hit 3 6-pt parlay hits and also won the Red Zone divisional title. In his sophomore season of Challenge year #15, the "Handicapping God of War" produced a 2nd-consecutive winning best-bet record after going 21-16-1 (Win% .568) en route to winning a second divisional title (Hail Mary division).........THIS YEAR'S ROOKIE CROP GETS OFF TO A HO-HUM START: This year's rookie class that consists of KingDarsh, Jonnybucs, JamesGang, and Brooklyn211 went a combined 3-5-0 with their collective best-bets, with Brooklyn211 producing an opening-day goose egg.................