I'm just curious how many people we have here who have participated in the Predictions game in the past. Also let me know where you participated (ESPN, BBB, Both). Thanks. Gramps...
FYI We can host custom programs here and integrate them with user information and sending out PMs and that kind of thing. We have access to live stats, even daily ones (e.g. what players did on one day) if that can help automate the game. I never played the game, but I'm very interested in seeing it.
Hi, Gramps. As you know, I'm a longtime prediction game player and loser on both ESPN and BBF. Glad to see you made it over here and I hope you'll run the game here this season.
I really shouldn't pump up this game because it decreases my odds of winning, but I thought it was one of the more fun aspects on BBF. Somehow gramps got adidas to sponsor the game. From the game, I have a large amount of adidas gear, Blazer shoes signed by Travis Outlaw in my size, and a magazine with Zbo on it and signed by him (OK forget that one). I know I'm not the only one into the game because many posters play and when gramps doesn't post the results for a while, posters start asking. Also, some posters will give their predictions for the week before they go on vacation. I think Gramps game gave a real unique aspect to the board as it brought posters from other teams into the board . . . heck we are all sports fans so competitve to some degree and gramps fed our testosterone. Really if this board has a lot of traffic by season start, gramps game will bring in even more posters. But as I stated, if the traffic is at the BBF, I have a feeling we will be finding ourselves there. But I digress . . . two thumbs up for gramps game. In fact gramps, limit the game to here to draw in others . . . and to give me a better chance of winning prizes.
I'll be posting details on how the game is played in a couple weeks. Essentially, you predict the final score of a game prior to game start and then I calculate winners for each game and keep track of overall winners (who has the best average rank, etc.). The past few years I've had a sponsor so there have been prizes awarded to monthly winners, half-season winners, and full-season winners. A typical monthly prize the past couple years has been a $50 gift certificate for use at ShopAdidas.com (Adidas has been the sponsor the past couple years). The application is written using a business intelligence tool and hence, it is not something that is "hostable" without spending a large chunk of money to get a license for the software. However, it may be something that would be worthwhile considering rewriting in a Java app or something similar that could be hosted and made functional for all teams. Something to consider. Gramps... Gramps...
Take a look at this link: http://sportstwo.com/NBASalaries.php It's custom PHP programming; I'd suggest we do up your game in that language... Same thing Drupal and vB3 are written in. Last year we ran weekly NFL and NCAA Football pick em games that were entirely automated. The software looked at odds/lines to generate the entry form and then as final scores came in it updated everyone's results page and the leaderboard. Weekly first prize for each was $100 cash plus $250 in a BetUS.com account. We don't have a big enough sponsor this year to do it again, tho. We also had a real-time sportsbook simulation and a rotisserie basketball game. We'd like to add new games to this vB3 setup...
So, that's what all the predictions threads were in BBF.com? Hell, that sounds like a good time. I look forward to coming in last!
I did it for one year at BBB, but I don't think I did it enough to qualify. I would love it if you did it here, it was fun when I had the time to participate
