Parts Unknown (DP--Disassociated Press): It's called DOOMSDAY SUNDAY. It's the layman's term for the last week of the Bookie Challenge's regular season. It's the weekend where the rubber meets the road. It's do-or-die, sink or swim. In the history of the Bookie Challenge's annual competitions, DOOMSDAY SUNDAYS are almost always the most suspenseful weekends of a Bookie Challenge season, the weekend's intesity could rival the high-stakes drama of the competition's most thrilling Super Bowl rounds. One thing is assured, the finality of the weekend can bring either an extreme jubilation to a Challenge participant or a shattering heartbreak. Either way, it's a weekend in which the league's best postseason qualifications are up for grabs, are there for the taking, and and in most cases the qualifications won or lost can practically serve as harbingers of what's to come in the postseason. Win the regular-season championship and a lucky handicapper will have all the best scoring advantages for the first-two rounds of the playoffs. Complement that playoff qualification with two preseason Super Bowl selections that are still in play heading into the NFL Championship rounds and a fortunate participant can practically start spending either the 1st-place prize of the Latinum jackpot ($400) or the 2nd-place prize of the Latinum jackpot ($100), and not to forget that one of those two payouts will come on the heels of pocketing $100 for just getting into the postseason as the regular-season champion. But if the postseason qualification of being the regular-season champion doesn't pan out, then win one of the four divisional championships and you still have a serious and realistic shot at possibly overtaking the postseason's regular-season-champion qualifier, especially if you have your two preseason Super Bowl selections still in tow. However, if you don't qualify for the upcoming playoffs as either the competition's regular-season champion or one of the four divisional titlists--and well--good luck. So in a nutshell, that's what DOOMSDAY SUNDAY is really all about, to see who makes it inside of the arena and gets ringside seats to the big show or to see who are left out in the cold to scalp tickets to sit in the peanut gallery, you know, the area of seats that is located in the nose-bleed section. But guess what? Unlike many previous DOOMSDAY SUNDAYS, this year's most favorable postseason qualifications, meaning those of the regular-season champion and those of the divisional champions, are already spoken for, with the lone exception being the divisional titlist of the Run-&-Shoot division, where Vikings17 is clinging on to a 7-point divisional lead over two-time Bookie Challenge champion Driveline. Oh, and that's not a misprint, because apart from the dramatic finish to this year's divisional title in the Run-&-Shoot division between Vikings17 and Driveline, the best must-see conclusions to this year's divisional races will be the battles for the divisional wild-card slots in the Hail Mary divisional race and the Red Zone divisional race. But before taking a look into those two separate battles for divisional wild cards, let's take a quick glance at this year's most prominent races, the ones in which the league's heavy hitters lock horns to see who is going to corral the competition's top playoff qualifications.

Of course, there is no better place to start when it comes to ginning up the exploits of this year's top handicapper than to start with the Biased Nihilist. Right now the "Corozal Kid" is the league's proverbial "Belle of the Ball", or the present superstar handicapper who is sucking up all the oxygen in the league. Deservedly, the Biased Nihilist merits all the superlatives and accolades becoming of the league's best overall handicapper because the season he's piecing together has so far been downright spectacular. This past weekend, the Nihilist became the first participant to clinch a divisional title after he finished this past weekend with an 18-point divisional lead over his only divisional counterpart in this year's Corozal divisional race, of whom coincidentally is his son jcvike28. Theoretically speaking, the most points a handicapper can accrue on a regular weekend of the Bookie Challenge's regular season is 18 overall points (hits PERFECTA weekend and connects on two 5-pt exact-score predictions). With that in mind, the best jcvike can do this upcoming DOOMSDAY SUNDAY weekend is to tie the Nihilist at 48 points, but even that miraculous feat will not be enough to stop the Nihilist, for the Nihilist presently and easily owns the first tiebreaker edge over his son, which is more best-bet wins (the Nihilist 21 BB wins vs jcvike28's 13 BB wins). Interestingly, jcvike28 is the only other participant who has clinched a playoff spot before this DOOMSDAY SUNDAY, of which he clinched the divisional wild-card slot of the Corozal divisional race. But jcvike's clinching of the Corozal divisional wild card came by default after the Hall-of-Fame City Kid quit this year's Corozal divisional race before it even got underway. As a result, jcvike28 is the only handicapper in the league who doesn't have to worry about what happens on DOOMSDAY SUNDAY, nor does he have to worry about violating the league's PUSILLANIMOUS RULE. But that's not the case with the Biased Nihilist, as he still has to clinch this year's regular-season championship over both Vikings17 (leader of the Run-&-Shoot div.) and Kr@tos (leader of the Hail Mary div). But if the truth be told, the Nihilist will enter DOOMSDAY SUNDAY with a 7-point lead over Vikings17 and an 9-point lead over Kr@tos. But even though the Nihilist has not yet mathematically clinched the regular-season championship, both Vikings17 and Kr@tos will be hard pressed to upstage the Biased Nihilist from capturing this year's regular-season title, especially when considering that the Nihilist holds key tiebreaker edges over everybody in the league, never mind having them against Vikings17 and his son Kr@tos. With that being said, after adding extra points to the Nihilist's leads over Vikings17 and Kr@tos because of tiebreaker scenarios, the Nihilist will actually enter DOOMSDAY SUNDAY with an 8-point lead over Vikings17 and a 10-point lead over Kr@tos, and let's not forget that the Nihilist is the only handicapper this season who has not registered a scoreless outing in this year's competition (no goose eggs and no golden goose eggs). In other words, the Biased Nihilist is the heavy favorite to capture this year's regular-season championship and enter the postseason with every conceivable scoring advantage under the sun for the first-two rounds of this year's Bookie Challenge playoffs.

However, whereas the Nihilist is guaranteed to enter this year's postseason as a divisional champion, and more than likely he'll also qualify for this year's postseason as this year's regular-season champion, that's not the case for Vikings17 as he gets ready to handicap DOOMSDAY SUNDAY, meaning that the playoff-qualification scenarios that await Vikings17 on DOOMSDAY SUNDAY are not as propitious as those of the Biased Nihilist's playoff hopes. First and foremost, Vikings17 had better not forget the number-one pressing matter he'll need to take care of on DOOMSDAY SUNDAY, of which is to forget trying to win the regular-season championship over the Nihilist and instead stave off Driveline and win this year's Run-&-Shoot divisional championship. Now granted, a 7-point divisional lead with just one last week to handicap in this year's regular season sound like it's going to be a cakewalk for Vikings17, but let's not forget that all Driveline has to do is end the regular season deadlocked in total points with Vikings17, because if he does tie the "Purple People Eater" he will win the first tiebreaker over Vikings17, of which is more best-bet wins (Driveline presently has a 19-16 edge and cannot mathematically lose the best-bet tiebreaker to Vikings17 after this upcoming weekend). All things considered, Vikings17 can't go to sleep on Driveline, because Driveline (aka the Fisher of Winners) has a knack for stealthily getting the job done when it counts the most--as he gets it done in crunch time! In a strange coincidence, Vikings17's son Kr@tos also has a 7-point divisional lead, but his is in the Hail Mary division and over second-place dbucc (Kr@tos 39pts vs dbucc's 32 pts). But unlike his father's 7-point divisional lead over Driveline in the Run-&-Shoot division, in which Driveline owns the first tiebreaker edge over Vikings17, the opposite is true as it concerns Kr@tos' 7-point divisional lead in the Hail Mary division over second-place dbucc. More specifically, since Kr@tos is the one who easily has the tiebreaker edge over dbucc (presently Kr@tos has 20 BB wins vs dbucc's 15 BB wins), it means that dbucc will have to outscore Kr@tos in total points to win this year's Hail Mary divisional championship, so by extension dbucc will have to produce at least a PERFECTA outing on DOOMSDAY SUNDAY to have a legit shat at winning the Hail Mary divisional championship. But just like Vikings17 needs to first worry about Driveline before thinking about the Biased Nihilist, so does dbucc needs to worry about both Jets69 and Kennypie86 before setting his sights on Kr@tos, and that's because dbucc will be in a dog-eat-dog handicapping rumble among himself (dbucc presently has 32 pts), third-place Jets69 (31 pts), and last-place rookie Kennypie86 (31 pts) to see who among them will snag the division's wild-card qualification and this year's Special-Wild-Card qualification. Please note that this year's Special-Wild-Card playoff qualification is almost assuredly going to be won by a handicapper from this year's Hail Mary divisional race (more specifically, among dbucc, Jets69, and Kennypie86).

Speaking of dbucc and his upcoming throw down against Jets69 and Kennypie86 for the Hail Mary divisional wild card and the league's Special Wild Card, dbucc had entered this past weekend in fourth-place and with the possibility of heading into this year's postseason with the playoff qualification of an "at-large participant", but this past weekend dbucc was able to eke out the division's wild-card slot, if only for the time being, over second-place rookie Kennypie86 and third-place Jets69 after he finished his outing with three overall points. Additionally, the three points dbucc scored allowed him to get credited with a "week-won". Moreover, the only reason dbucc ended his outing in the position that he is presently in, is because he never quits--no matter how dire his situation might appear to be. Strangely, the crooked number dbucc put up this past weekend, meaning his 3-point outing, marked the third time this season that a handicapper scored three points for a weekend and got credited with a "week-won". The Nihilist was the first to do it back in week #2 and then rookie Kennypie86 pulled off the odd handicapping feat in week #6. Overall, the week-won by dbucc this past weekend was the second one he collected this season, and his 6th all-time for regular-season handicapping. But in an odd twist, this past weekend's week-won by dbucc marked the first time in his Bookie Challenge career that he registered two week-won's in a single regular season (out of 11 previous seasons).

And finally, the last remaining divisional race to analyze before DOOMSDAY SUNDAY is that of the Red Zone division, where its divisional leader 7mick7 presently enjoys a comfortable 9-point lead over second-place Blitzkrieg and an 11-point lead over third-place rookie Matty_Ice. Of course, as can readily be seen, the divisional championship in all likelihood is going to be won by 7mick7, and as a result, the real drama left for this DOOMSDAY SUNDAY as it concerns the Red Zone divisional race will be the battle for the division's wild card between Blitzkrieg and Matty_Ice. And although Blitzkrieg presently enjoys a 2-point edge in total points over Matty_Ice (Blitz with 24 pts vs Matty with 22 pts), the truth of the matter is that it's going to take a 6-point parlay hit this upcoming DOOMSDAY SUNDAY for the rookie to win out over Blitzkrieg, as the "Snowman" (aka Blitzkrieg) presently owns the best-bet tiebreaker over Matty_Ice by three best-bet winners (15 BB wins vs 12 BB wins). In other words, there's no way that Matty__"I'm-as-Cold-as"__Ice can surpass Blitzkrieg for the Red Zone divisional wild card without landing a 6-point parlay winner. Worst yet for the down-and-out rookie is that there are no "participation trophies" to be handed out after DOOMSDAY SUNDAY runs its course, to mean that the loser between Blitzkrieg and Matty_Ice will enter this year's postseason as a lowly "at-large participant". But when considering the breaking news from this past Thursday night, losing out to Blitzkrieg might not be the big disappointment for Matty_Ice that it's being made out to be, and that's because the Maimi Hurricanes, or Matty_Ice's favorite college football team, upset the hell out of Ohio State in this year's college football playoffs. If anything, the Hurricanes' surpising victory should at least ease the pain somewhat on DOOMSDAY SUNDAY for the rookie handicapper known in this year's Bookie Challenge competition as Matty__"I'm as cold as"__Ice.