sporcle blog

Another year has passed, and at the beginning of each year, those of us who are football fans know that one of the more entertaining times of the NFL season is upon us. The playoffs. Some of the best games happen at this time of year, and the first week of the playoffs is one of the best sports weekends on TV, up there with the first week of March Madness.

Perhaps this year’s winner is a forgone conclusion, or perhaps a complete afterthought will make it to the ‘Big Game’. As they like to say in the marketing spiel…any given Sunday (or Saturday as the case may be). Don’t delay. You’ve got until this Saturday to put your stake in the sand.

Make your 2007-2008 NFL playoff picks.

And also, to see who’s picking what, check out the constantly updating NFL playoff pool statistics.

With the NBA season starting in a couple weeks, we figured it was time to put up the prediction site for you to put your picks in black and white. That way, when the season ends sometime in April or May, you can see just how right you were.

You can make your picks here.

As picks are made, you can see the statistics for who’s picking what. Currently, the wildcard statistics aren’t working, but we’re investigating a fix for that. You’ve got until the 30th of October to make your picks, as that’s when the season kicks off.

With the NFL season fast approaching, all the experts are getting their predictions in before thursday’s Indy/Saints game. Since you still have another day to make or change your picks, here’s a roundup of some of the predictions we could find around the web. We’ll combine these and put them into a pundit group over on sporcle.

Salon: King Kaufman’s AFC preview, shockingly not picking the Dolphins to win anything.

ESPN: Experts roundup.
ESPN Page 2: Greg Easterbrook picks the division winners, and comes up with some seriously whacked expected w/l records.

CBS Sportsline: Going through each division, one day at a time:
AFC East, AFC North, AFC South, AFC West(TBD)
NFC East, NFC North, NFC South, NFC West(TBD)

Sports Illustrated: Who needs online content? Apparently you should be buying the magazine if you want their NFL preview information.

And remember, make your own predictions here, the only place that puts the power of predicting into the hands of the common man or woman.

The NFL season is only a few days away (thursday night starting game? really? football is for sundays. done.), and here’s a little update on what people are predicting.

Sporcle user’s NFL 2007 Predictions

Four teams currently don’t have anyone picking them to win their division. These perennial winners are Buffalo, Cleveland, Washington and Atlanta. I’ll admit, I didn’t pick Atlanta either, but I think Joey Harrington is underrated. I think he’s got a good chance for a rebound year. All those years in Detroit, he was blessed with well…nothing. Pretty much everything around him was awful, from the other players all the way to the owner. I’ll be rooting for him to do well this year, though it’s possible that the curse of being a Lions QB will never rub off.

Looking over the division winners, almost every division has a run away team: (over 60% of users picking them to win)
AFC: New England, Indianapolis, San Diego
NFC: Philadelphia, Chicago, New Orleans, Seattle

Only the AFC North is fairly evenly split amongst Baltimore and Cincinnati. It will be interesting to see if these predicted teams hold up through the season. Another interesting observation, besides the current division leaders having won their division last year, the order of the teams in each division from top to bottom almost exactly mimic the 2006 final standings. Apparently the majority of people don’t believe the notion of parity in the NFL.

New England is currently picked to win the Super Bowl by almost 1 in 4 predictors. They certainly have a great coach, QB and what looks like a good supporting cast. As is usual with all predictions in the NFL though, it really comes down to injuries. If a team can stay healthy and keep most of their starting players through the year, they have a really good chance to win it all.

The statistics will continue to update between now and thursday’s starting game.

This evening, the 2007 NBA Draft gets underway. All the mock drafts and arguing and preparation finally comes to a close, and it’s time to actually make the picks. We’ll wrap up some of the biggest pre-draft questions, rumors and predictions.

#1 Already wrapped up? ESPN The Magazine (and many many others) are reporting that Portland has notified Greg Oden that they will be selecting him with the first pick. Perhaps this is true, perhaps it isn’t. What I don’t understand it is…why would you do that? What possible gain can there be by telling all the other teams (especially Seattle) what you’re going to do? Was all the secrecy of the past couple months for nothing? Wierd.

Hawks looking to dump #11 pick? All week there have been rumors that Atlanta is looking to trade the #11 pick for a player-actually-playing-in-the-nba. There was the Luke Ridnour for #11 with Seattle rumor, and more recently, the Garnett/Stoudamire 3-way blockbuster trade. Neither rumor has so far had much legs, but they both make clear Atlanta’s intentions to trade one of their numerous 2007 Draft picks for a proven NBA player.

‘Mock’ Mock Draft. There are an insufferable amount of Mock Drafts coming out leading up to the final day of guessing. We found this Bill Simmons - Chad Ford argue-fest quite an entertaining read however. Maybe it won’t give you the right answers, but at least it should make you smile.

And remember, with the draft starting at 7:30 EST tonight, you have until about 7ish to fill out your own mock draft. Will anybody get the first 20 picks right? Will it be you?

Well, we’re less than a week away from the 2007 NBA Draft. The players have visited many of the teams they might be going to, doing workouts and the like. There haven’t been any major trades yet for pick jockeying, but there’s a good chance there will be some movement on draft day.

Over at sporcle, you can track the relative draft pick positions of the first 20 picks, tracking live based on what sporcle.com users are picking.

Here’s a list of some various Mock Drafts, if you’re still in need of some inspiration.

Chad Ford, ESPN: Mock Draft, version 5.0
Bill Simmons, ESPN Page 2: The obvious guy’s lottery predictions
CBS Sportsline: Three mock drafts from their experts
Chris Ekstrand, CNN SI: Mocking the entire 60 picks

Well, the NBA draft is about 3 weeks away, which will give you plenty of time to make your predictions for the draft order for this year’s class, and then change it 20 times before Portland’s first pick on June 28th. Go make your picks now.

When picking, be wary of mock drafts you see out on the internet, as one can never quite comprehend the actions of an NBA GM when they’re on the clock. You’d think with all the time they have to prepare, scout, plan, they wouldn’t make such consistently boneheaded choices. Remember, Atlanta and Philadelphia have picks in the top 20, so, expect something crazy there. Check out Docsports for the 10 potential 2007 draft busts. Yes Noah, we’re looking at you.

Good luck to all.

Here are some early playoff predictions from the pundits, if you’re looking for some help in making your picks.

Salon: King Kaufman maps out the first round. He points out, rather correctly that the first round in the NBA is a fairly predictable affair, with the higher seeds winning an fairly substantial proportion of the time. Final winner? San Antonio Spurs, which was the same as his preseason choice.

ESPN: No predictions yet (they’ll probably come out sometime friday), but a Power Rankings…not that there are terribly helpful at predicting who wins, but it’s fun to make lists anyhow!

CBS Sportsline: Tony Mejia does a rundown on the Eastern Half of the first round brackets. He’s got New Jersey and Chicago pulling the upsets. Though can you call anybody an upset in the East?

The NBA season has finished, and between now and Saturday afternoon (April 21, 2007), you can come and make your NBA Playoff predictions. Will the Mavericks complete their dominant season with a NBA Championship, or will one of those other teams from the East win it all? You make the call, then invite your friends to show them you’re right.

Make your picks today!

Also, you can see what the prevailing opinion of all sporcle users is on the NBA playoff page.

As always, if you any comments or suggestions, please either post them here or use the feedback page.

NBC Sports: I guess cause they show some of the later playoff games, they’ve gotten in to the picking game. Check out a few of their picks on a nice team icon based table. They even pick the studs of each round, if you’re into that kind of thing.

TSN ca: Maggie the Monkey makes her first round picks, and compares them to the TSN hockey crew. Other than Minnesota, it appears Maggie likes the favorites in round one.

ESPN: First round predictions from their hockey crew. Couple of them have the Flames winning the first round. Without trying to be too partial…should have been the Avalanche here instead of Calgary.

SI: Their NHL experts pick them all the way through. Have to navigate down a little to see all their results. A clean sweep for Buffalo in the east.