Good at Pickem, Bad at Wager Points

When I created College Football Pickem last year I wanted something more than just one point per game. Confidence points were a little too much. I came up with the idea of Wager Points. Each person has the option each week to wager points on one game or split it up any way they wish. The risk being that if that pick is wrong, those points are subtracted from your total. For my group I went with 10 points.

I still think its a great idea, except for the fact that I’m terrible at it. For college football, through Week 4, which was this weekend, I have been wrong on every pick I’ve put wager points on. That’s -40 points. My total score for the season stands at -4. You might think I’m terrible at making picks in general, not so. My group has 9 members. The most correct picks in the group (just picks, not counting wagers) is 37. Two people have that total. Their scores counting wager points: 41 (1st Place) and 29 (5th Place). Me? I have 36 correct picks. I just have no idea which ones of them are going to be right beforehand. So while I’m only 1 pick behind the most in the group, I’m 45 points behind. If I would be even on my wager points so far, or just decided not to ever use them, I’d be in 2nd place.

I should either stay away from Vegas or go and bet every game. I think betting every game is the wiser idea. My win percentage is just over 50% and it would be more fun than not doing anything.

My method for using my wager points is to pick the two games I’m most confident in and then wager 5 points on each. I’d rather give myself a chance to come out even in the week than wind up losing 10 points off of one game. People in my groups seem to have come up with their own method. Some do the all in on one game, others wager 2-3 points at a time. I haven’t seen anyone go 1 point on 10 different games yet. Actually, that might not be a terrible idea for me.

For NFL Pickem I have the same setup. For some reason I’m a little better at that. Through Week 3, the games I put wager points on were both early games and I got those correct. That puts me at +10 for the season.