Xark!

Week 13 NFL Power Rankings

Life is intruding on my blogging these days, which is why you're getting this week's rankings on Wednesday instead of right after the MNF game. There were no huge shakeups this week, but the post-season picture really started coming into focus...

Week 12 NFL picks

Last week was my best of the year (I went 14-2, missing on Seattle-San Francisco and the Titans-Eagles), which can only mean one thing: This week I'll go 2-14.  Plus it's a short week, so I've got to pick these things early...

Week 12 NFL Power Rankings

The San Diego Chargers have been quietly rising up the charts all season, but it's time to make some noise about them: They're the best team in professional football.

Week 11 NFL picks

There hasn't been time this week for me to post, much less pick, but here goes...

Week 11 NFL Power Rankings

Week 10 NFL picks

After the jump: 16 games in order of confidence...

Week 10 NFL Power Rankings

The Indianapolis Colts and their league-worst rushing defense are back atop Xark's NFL Power Ranking, proving once again that Peyton Manning is the single most dominant player in the sport and perhaps the greatest quarterback I've ever seen.

Meanwhile, my beloved Chicago Bears -- the No. 1 team in this ranking since their win in Week 5 -- lost at home to the Miami Dolphins, the team I've mocked more than any other this year. Yep: my  No. 32 team beat my No. 1 team on the road, maiming them in the process and proving once again that the margin between greatness and mediocrity is thin.

Week 9 NFL picks

My two-week streak of poor picking continued, but at least I got back into the winning column thanks to New England's blowout on Monday night. Still, my 8-6 record brought down my season average to .684. I need a big week to boost it back over 70 percent, and I feel a lot better about this week's predictions...

OUTCOMES: Confident predictions, 3-1; Not-Betting-The-Farm predictions, 4-1; Just-Guessing, 2-3. Total for the week: 9-5.

Week 9 NFL Power Rankings

The Bears and the Colts hold their positions, but I add a third team to the "Elite Teams" list...

Week 8 NFL picks

Misery loves company, so I was loving me some Vegas last week. I had my first losing week of 2006, going 5-9 over a slate of 13 games that included -- you guessed it -- nine Vegas upsets. And we're not talking point-spread failures: Nine underdogs won.

I'm going to try grouping my picks by confidence, and to make it a little more interesting, I'm going to give a little characterization of how I expect the games to unfold. And, for the record, I'm picking before I look at the spreads and markets.