This has been a great season in the VGCC, with the majority of participants finishing above .500. And now, it all comes down to this: one game to decide the champion.
The top two participants advance to the Grey Cup Championship. They are:
Herschel456
Fooks
As always, you can still view a more complete list of all the rules here, but here is a brief .
Anyone may still make picks, but only those who qualify will have their picks count.
You must make your picks by FRIDAY NIGHT AT MIDNIGHT, or they will not be accepted.
On Saturday, I will post who gets which team. Priority will be given to the higher-ranked participant. However, regardless of your ranking, PICK THE TEAM YOU THINK WILL WIN, and allow me to make any necessary changes.
Make your picks as normal. All the same rules apply re: clarity, elaboration, and changes (though the deadline is Friday at Midnight.)
Though I may CHANGE your picks, I will not ASSIGN picks. So no matter what your ranking, you must make picks or you will have no picks entered. Unlike the regular season, a person who goes 0-1 will be ranked higher than someone who goes 0-0.
The participant whose team wins the Grey Cup is the winner of the Virtual Grey Cup Challenge.
And now, for anyone who didn't know, the Grey Cup game will be:
Montreal vs Saskatchewan
(at Calgary)
I'd like to take this opportunity to say thank you to everyone who took part in the VGCC this year. I hope you had as much fun participating as I had administering it. And congratulations to Herschel456 and Fooks; good luck in the Grey Cup on Sunday!
Like my team I'm now out of the running, and will be watching the Virtual Grey Cup from the sidelines. But also like my team, I have no reason to be disappointed with my third-place finish, and vow to try to do better next year.
Though it doesn't matter, and though no one cares about my picks anymore, I've never missed a week, and I don't intend to start now.
Montreal over Saskatchewan: Don't get me wrong: the Riders are a really good team, and deserve to be in the Grey Cup. The second best record in the CFL regular season, first place in the Western Division, the Western Final played at home in front of a very big, very green, very insane crowd, defeating the "defending champions" to earn a berth in the championship game. Those Rider fans who like to think of their team as perennial underdogs, underrated and underappreciated, but overachieving, need to face the fact: their team is there, one of the top-tier teams in the league. As a Ticat fan, I can remember that feeling; it feels good, but also feels kind of weird when you're used to thinking of yourself as the little guy. Enjoy that feeling, because it may last two or three years, or maybe more, but as a Ticat fan I know that it doesn't last forever. Unless you're the Montreal Alouettes. How is it that this team just seems to get better and better, year after year? Fifteen wins, perfect in their own park, and a record on the road better than most teams did at home, winning the season series against every team but the one they faced in the Eastern Final, where they won by a score that must have embarrassed even them. They can't possibly get better than they are right now, and that's good news for teams like mine looking ahead to the long-term future, but bad news for the Roughriders looking ahead to Sunday. They play the game for a reason, and the Alouettes have a history of coming up short in the big game, but as it stands right now I don't see any team beating them. While the Riders are head-and-shoulders above the Lions, and should therefore make a reasonably close game, there's really only one pick I can make. Als by 8.
Why would you do that? If you take Montreal, odds are you will become the VGCC winner for this year, and the bragging rights that go along with it. I know you want the Riders to win, I do too, but you can still take the Als and cheer for the Riders.
Picks for the Grey Cup. Again it's not like my picks matter anyway.
Montreal @ Saskatchewan going with my heart on this one.
I also wanted to convey my thanks to you Big Dave for putting on the Virtual Grey Cup Challenge every year. The time and effort you put into this every year must be tremendous. I am sure all of us on the forum who put in picks appreciate all the hard work you do every season.
I think you had mentioned that you keep track of all of this on a spreadsheet and I was just thinking it's too bad you could not do this in a database. Well you probably could do it but then we would not get to read everyones reasons for their pics which to me is part of the fun participating in this every year.
With the Grey Cup on the line in Calgary on Sunday, November 29, 2009, I'm still going to make my selection even though it doesn't count in the standings for anything.
Montreal vs Saskatchewan- Although I think the Riders are a much better team than I’ve given them credit for this season, and they could win the Grey cup game this year, I just don’t think they will stop Montreal from being the Grey Cup Champions. If we go position by position, Montreal would have the edge in more positions than the Riders, they have the best recod in the league at 15-3 this year, and finished 6-2 versus the Western Division, which is the overall stronger Division in the CFL this year. They have Anthony Calvillo, motivation from their loss of last year’s Grey Cup, and the strongest defense in the league. Montreal swept Saskatchewan in the two head-to-head games, and even though it is very difficult to beat teams three times in a year, I’m confident Montreal will accomplish this with a Grey Cup victory. Having said all that, I think the game will be closer than everyone may think, mainly due to the Riders strong defense and their group of underated receivers. I’m taking Montreal by 7 points.
Thank you Big Dave for the time you put in to make this work all year and run so smoothly. Even though I finished 11th, I had alot of fun, some frustration over picks that I thought were really good and didn’t pan out, and learning even more about the CFL and things that I didn’t know. I’m already looking forward to playing again next year.
I'll choose Montreal, even though I'll be cheering for the Riders. I just think it's Montreal's year. Watch out for Sask the next few years, though!
By the way, last week I would have chosen Saskatchewan and Montreal, just to officially get all my picks in for the year. Didn't expect Montreal to destroy BC like they did, but I did think they would win.
Thank you, Fooks. I'll feel a lot better about my third-place finish knowing that both those ahead of me made picks this week.
I understand that you'll be cheering for Saskatchewan, just as I cheered for the Alouettes last week against the Lions, even though my pick was changed to B.C. (I really didn't want an all-west Grey Cup game.) As a Rider fan, of course you don't want the Als to win, and you'll be disappointed if they do, we all know that. But after the great season we had in the VGCC this year, to have the Grey Cup game be so anticlimactic and meaningless would make me feel like this was one big waste of my time.
Anyway, no big surprises. Here are the teams for the remaining participants (changed picks are in red):
Herschel456: SASK
Fooks: MTL