Run a Weekly Football Pool
Much of the enjoyment of football revolves around the competitions and contests surrounding it – the games within the game. A football pool is one of those games that’s always easy and fun to play. Best of all, Football Weblog has created the football pool forms for you, in PDF format, ready to download and print. You’ll find the link to the forms at the end of this post.
Running a football pool is easy. Contestants (your family, friends, and co-workers) fill out a copy of the current week’s form by circling the team they think will win each game. They also pencil in a guess of how many points they believe will be scored in the Monday night game (for tiebreaking purposes). They submit the form to you prior to kickoff of that week’s first matchup. After all the games have been played, you review the forms. The person that finishes the week with the most correct games is deemed that week’s winner.
In case of a tie, the tiebreaker system is used. Example: Let’s say that after all of the week’s games have been played, Emmy and Stanley are knotted in a first place tie. The Raiders played the Bears in the Monday night contest and won 27 to 22. That’s a combined score of 49. If Emmy’s tiebreaker guess is 47 and Stanley’s is 52, Emmy is declared the weekly winner since her guess is closer to 49. (Emmy misses the actual amount by two points; Stanley by three.) If Emmy had guessed 47 and Stanley 51, both are proclaimed co-winners since each of their guesses misses the actual amount by exactly two points.
Winning a football pool is a great head-trip, and the bragging rights are rewarding, but sweetening the concoction with money makes the game that much more enjoyable. I suggest a weekly entry fee of either one or two bucks. The weekly winner, of course, wins the pot, and since most everyone pays with dollar bills, the resulting payout will be a dopamine-releasing, satisfyingly fat wad of bills. If two or more participants remain tied after the tiebreaker is applied, the purse is divided equally.
That’s the extent of the rules. Now it’s just a matter of getting your kinfolk, comrades, and colleagues involved. The more the merrier. Enjoy!