Many of you are familiar with this from my days of posting on Fan Posts, which is now The Feed. I’ve been given to opportunity to present the contest here on the main site, so this may be the first time that some of you have heard of this. For those of you who have played, you may not need to read further, unless you are a former winner and want to see your name in “lights”. All you need to know is that I’ll provide the post for picking on Wednesday afternoon or evening. If you haven’t played, let me explain a bit of the history and how to play.

This will be the 5th year for the contest. I’ll be honest, some have been quite a bit better at this than I expected. Maybe they have just been better than me? Going into year one, I expected a few people to get a couple right, so I was surprised to see multiple people get three right. It took 3 picks, Pierce, Woods, and Raimann and a good tie-breaker guess for Zheyerbyonki (I still have to look that up each time I go to write it) to claim the inaugural crown by besting the field of 31.

Year 2 saw our winner connect on 4 guesses! I guess you can’t call them guesses when you are forecasting that well. 69coltsfan took home the hardware (yeah, right) by submitting AR, Brents, Rush, and Freeland, making the tie-breaker a non factor. Four correct picks could be the highwater mark for quite some time?

Year 3 produced the kind of struggles that I expected when I dreamed this thing up. 22 of the 25 entries produced either zero or one correct pick. However, Bum65 still turned in Latu, Mitchell and Bortolini to distance the field.

Last year was the closest the competition to date. We struggled to the point that two correct picks, sent you to the tie-breaker. This is based on guessing what percentage of the total entries, would not have any correct picks on their card. The percentage came in at 34.6 and two entries were nearly perfect. oldecoltsfan turned it on late and closed with Leonard and Wohler, while predicting 33% to take the schneid. Only 1.6% from perfection, but that fell just short this year to our resident conspiracy theorist and in-depth writer Chris Shepherd. Operating under the handle cq.noble, Shepherd predicted Warren and Travis, while summoning 35% as a tie-breaker guess. His .4% difference from the actual number, was necessary to nudge Olde and to take the Draft Contest Year Four title.

So, for those scoring at home, it has taken three, four, three, and two correct picks to win the contest in the four years of it’s existence. To all of our winners’ credit, they have been modest about their victories and have done a better job of not reminding the rest of us how superior they were, than I likely would be. All hail Zheyerbyonki, 69coltsfan, Bum65, and cq.noble as each attempt to be the first 2-time winner.

The rules are pretty simple. Submit 10 names that you believe will be acquired by the Colts, during the draft process. ****The draft process WILL NOT include UDFAs this year.**** No entries will count that come in after the draft has been declared open by the commissioner at or around 8:00 pm on April 23rd. Just getting your picks in before the Colts pick will not count, as you have had the luxury of seeing names go off the board.

No need to put the round that you expect your player to be taken, as all correct names count the same. You are not limited to drafted players. If you have a belief that the Colts might use a pick to obtain a player from another team, you can put that player’s name down. I.e. Greenard, Sweat, Thibideaux? I don’t expect many to go that route, but it would be allowed if the trade happens within the time frame of the draft.

I understand many will want to explain their rationale for each pick, but let’s keep that to a minimum. No need to post a guy’s entire scouting report, or add a link to his name so that everyone can see his highlight reel. (if someone asks for it, sure, hook them up) Do not do comparisons! It is just another name that I have to interpret whether it is a pick or not. You are not being graded on your insight, just your results. Put the player’s name, position and school, just in case there are players with the same name out there.

If your player description runs on to the next line, it is too much. If you want to detail your picks, do it at the end, where we can all blow off reading it and I don’t have to sort through it trying to find out how many you guessed correctly.

*Tie-breaker* At the bottom of your selections, guess what percent of the entries will list 0 (zero) correct names. Closest wins, you may go over. For example, If there are 30 entries, and 6 of them do not pick a single player correctly, that would mean 20% got 0 correct.

Since I am a school teacher and I have seen how horribly wrong my instructions can be interpreted, here is an old example:

1. Bryce Young QB Alabama (trade up)

2. Zay Flowers WR Boston College (too good to pass at 35)

3. Julius Brents CB Kansas St. (it is perfectly fine not to say a thing)

Name Positions School

Name Positions School

Name Positions School

Name Positions School

Name Positions School

Name Positions School

10. Name Positions School

37% of the entries will have 0 correct names.

Those are the rules and they have worked out well enough that I see no reason for changes. Don’t forget that tie-breaker. If I see that you have omitted it, I will try to remind you, but if it is not adjusted before the draft starts, you would lose the tie-breaker to any other entry that did include one. I’ll post again later on Wednesday, so that our West Coast readers can get them in if the draft is starting while they are still at work.

Good clean fun for all to enjoy. Olde, if you are out there just observing, I hope this gets your legal pad up to date and gives you a reason to be heard again. Same for my buddy Bob2006. I haven’t heard from you in a while either. I hope all is well for both of you.