Contest Time! College Bowl Pick 'Em #12

 

It's back! Pick some mostly meaningless college football games for free and win some stuff! 

 

After taking a year off due to the horrible pandemic, the annual Bowl Pick 'Em contest is officially back!

Our past winners include Adam from Thoughts on Sox (2009-10), Mark from Stats on the Back (2010-11), AJ from The Lost Collector (2011-12), Royal Dan (2012-13), The Prowling Cat (2013-14), Jeff from One Man's Junk (Wax) (2014-15), Matt of Bubba's Bangin' Batch of Baseball Bits (2015-16), MrHaverkamp (2016-17), Anaconda37 (2017-18), Trevor of Bump and Run (2018-19), and GLM1 (2019-20). We've never had a repeat winner!

Because of the gap in contests, I no longer have a way to re-invite the previous season's participants. This will serve as the primary notification for anyone to participate. This means we will likely have fewer entrants than normal, which means that you theoretically have a better chance than ever to win! Why not give it a shot?

If you want to skip all the blah blah blah and just get to the free stuff, go to the bottom of the post for the sign-up link and make sure you submit picks for every game. There are now two separate sub-contests for the non-ESPN people (or whoever!) which should only require a modicum of thought.

• First place will receive: a 2022 Topps Series 1 blaster OR suitable equivalent (subject to availability)... as well as a small plastic pouch of cards from your favorite team/player(s)/etc.
• Second place will receive: a mystery unopened sports cards item and a bubble mailer full of cards from your favorite team/player(s)/etc. So mysterious!
• Third place will receive: a bubble mailer including cards from your favorite team/player(s)/etc. I will also probably toss in a few cards from whatever happens to be lying around on my desk.
• The Worst Place winner will receive: whatever I feel like sending you. This is probably also going to involve whatever happens to be lying around on my desk and hopefully nothing illegal.

Here are some rules you should really read (important stuff in bold):

• Participants must sign up through the official ESPN link. Unfortunately, this means that you must have an ESPN account. I know this is a deal breaker for some, but I am not fancy enough to figure out a good system on my own that wouldn't require more time than I allot to this project.
• Promote this contest! This is not an actual requirement for entry, nor does it mean that you'll gain any competitive advantage by posting about this contest. I just want to see a lot of people participate, as it will encourage me to hold more contests/free box breaks in the future if there are more participants.
• Points are scored according to the Confidence System. This basically means that while you are predicting which team wins which bowl game, you will also be responsible for ranking how confident you are in each pick. The higher you rank those games, the more points you'll get when they win and prove that you're totally right and deserve all the I-told-you-so's in the world.
• Email or DM me your contest information after you sign up. You can't assume that I will automatically recognize your contest entry name. [Blogger profile / Twitter profile]
• You can change your picks at any time, so long as your pick is made before the official start time (usually the TV broadcast time) of each game. This is what ESPN calls a "rolling lock" time.
• Don't be a jerk and lose on purpose just to try and claim a prize. There are many, many of us who are bad enough at picking these without extra help.

Click here to sign up, and click on the 'Join Group' link! It's free! First-timers are as welcome as tenth-timers! Password: quackquackquack

DEADLINE: There's a deadline of Friday, December 17th at 9:00 AM PST. That's the start time of the first bowl game.

But wait... there's more! Available to all entrants as well as non-entrants who don't want to use ESPN, there's a bonus contest:

Leave a comment here predicting the final score and winning team of the DUKE'S MAYO BOWL before the Mayonnaising officially begins (the game is on the 30th) and win a retail pack of 2022 Topps Series 1. Whoever is closest gets it. (R.I.P. Belk Bowl.)

Is that not enough for you? Tell me the name of the next weaselly college football coach to accept a head coaching position at another school, and you'll win a mystery prize! This contest will run as long as it needs to and starts as soon as this post is live. The "winning" coach must already be a head coach with another school who accepts the same position with another school and is officially confirmed as being hired by the new school.