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Wrote this a few days back. Posting here for your enjoyment. Since I wrote this, there have been some additional changes. Robinhood is limiting many retail stocks to one share purchases to be continued with the market open tomorrow. The Redditors also targeted the gag crypto Dogecoin and sent it through the roof. The next target for this Monday appears to be silver (Which I own 210 ounces of in my IRA). We will see where this goes. My letter starts below.
I will explain this in the quickest most efficient way possible. For all of you who have known me for years, these past two years which have been awful from a personal perspective have been really good from a financial perspective. I have gotten very involved with crypto, precious metals and ETFs (If you need an explanation for these, let me know). I have always thrived in chaos. It is my one superpower. The markets have made more sense to me as the chaos continues to build. Going back, I was an early adopter of the Robinhood application. It made buying mutual funds, stocks, ETFs and a limited supply of crypto extremely easy. They have informative articles. It was a great tool. One of the few things that made the internet better. The purpose of the Robinhood app was to bring investing to the common man and educate them. It absolutely accomplished this. This is also what led to the events of this past week. Starting with a Reddit thread with over two million users called #WallStreetBets where the investors are led by Gen-X millionaire Barstool Sports founder Dave Portnoy and his followers who are mostly young and use Robinhood, the users decided to start buying Gamestop stock en masse after it became public knowledge that Wall Street hedge funds shorted the stock severely to basically bankrupt it. Bankrupt retail stocks have done well on Robinhood. I made money on American Airlines and Nokia after people on this Reddit thread started buying them. Both companies are on their last legs. One year ago today, one Gamestop stock was $3.93. After today, it is $325.00.Gamestop is basically bankrupt due to these COVID lockdowns. This short squeeze involved many other companies that are in trouble like Bed, Bath and Beyond. So far, this short squeeze has cost these evil, piece of shit hedge funds over 70 billion dollars. Like its namesake app, Robinhood users are literally taking from the rich and giving back to the middle class. As long as they hold these stocks, these hedge funds will lose big time. Watching the smart investors whine and cry on CNBC all week has been my early 2021 Christmas present. Are these stocks all overvalued? Hell yes. But if you think a bunch of idiots bought these due to their lack of knowledge, that would be a mistake. These Reddit investors knew exactly what they were doing and who it would impact. Plus with the elevated stock price, banks now have to loan to Gamestop at the elevated price. These banks know that these stocks are garbage. So not only does the Reddit army make money but it is screwing over two of the most corrupt entities in this country, our banks and hedge funds. So because regular idiots are making money, it is time for "regulation" and "rules" to be instituted. Robinhood's primary investor, Melvin Capital, was one of the hedge funds that got hit the hardest. Robinhood needed one billion dollars to stay functional this week. Now, they are limiting stock purchases. #WallStreetBets got suspended on Reddit and Discord.They have decided to move the people back into their proper "place" as passive investors slowly getting screwed by the self reinforcing system that is rigged against them. Expect more of these actions soon. Two of my favorite leftists on this topic. Matt Taibbi The Hill's Krystal Ball Dave Portnoy (The instigator of much of this) has a scathing interview about this on Tucker. This is a must watch. Enjoy the chaos!
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Last week, the big tech triumvirate of Apple, Amazon, and Google colluded to take the number one app on the Play Store down citing that the network “did not adequately police content that promoted violence” despite the fact, as Glenn Greenwald states here, that not one person arrested at the Capitol riot was a user of Parler. As Greenwald explains about the people who actually initiated the protests on January 6th, “The Capitol breach was planned far more on Facebook and YouTube. As Recode reported, while some protesters participated in both Parler and Gab, many of the calls to attend the Capitol were from YouTube videos, while many of the key planners “have continued to use mainstream platforms like Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube.”
I can tolerate many negative aspects of human behavior. This includes the often corrupt or collusive behavior of many large corporations. As human beings, any institution, organization, charity, corporation, or group that we create is always done with the best intentions and will be flawed in some respect. But there are two violations of morality I have never been able to look beyond. I refuse to work or associate with any company involved in war. This means corporations who profit off making weapons and influence governmental policy decisions to satisfy their bottom lines. This is evil behavior no matter what happens to your stock price. The other condition is the violation of any First or Second Amendment Rights based on the laws established in our Constitution. I also protest violations of privacy, the foundation of the 4th Amendment. But I also understand that in certain circumstances, privacy can be used as a tool to protect criminal behavior. But violating an individual’s right to speech, their right to practice religion, the right of anyone to publish, the right to protest and the right to address the government for grievances as well as the importance of bearing arms should never be taken away by any business or government. The violation of these rights in the form of censorship is my Maginot Line. Once this line is crossed, you have declared war on me. So like promised last week, I am going to provide you with some options outside of the Big Tech monopolies. For clarification, I will not be attacking the “circus” aspect of the internet in the form of telecommunication companies and streaming services. Even though these companies have their own flaws, I can choose at any moment to eliminate my relationship with them by terminating my subscription. I did this with the AT&T owned HBO Max this past month. These options will be fundamentally based on social media and platforms that aggregate news. The impact these services have via information sharing and discovery as well as the ability to censor news that the website does not agree with can have a huge propagandistic effect on people’s knowledge and personal opinions. This behavior is inexcusable for any corporation or government in the 21st Century. Here is my list! AMAZON: I had an account with Amazon since 2012 and was an active participant with this company on Prime Video including movie rentals, Amazon Music, Amazon Kindle for my books, Online shopping, and Magazine Subscriptions. After my daughter got a reduced membership price in 2019 after starting her university, I started moving much of my entertainment content off Amazon. Only my movies and e-books remained. But after Amazon used their ability to drop a website from hosting on AWS for controversial reasons and colluded with Apple and Google, I decided that my time with the company had expired. As of January 19th, 2021, the last day of Donald Trump’s mediocre presidency, I moved my movies and books to open-source solutions and deleted my Amazon account. As an added bonus, I also deleted my Twitch Account, a game streaming company that Amazon purchased back in 2014. APPLE: Stopped using Apple programs and applications many years ago. But I still had an ITunes account with dozens of albums and podcasts. After their actions, I went back and moved my music to a local drive, deleted my podcasts and downloaded them onto an open-source alternative and said goodbye to Apple forever. The ghost of Steve Jobs will never make another penny off of me. FACEBOOK: Only used it on three occasions. I had an account in 2013 and deleted it a few months later in the early part of 2014. I tried Facebook because of my adoration for MySpace, the social media company that Facebook destroyed during its rise in the late 2000s. I did not like having to use my real name, so I deleted the account. I came back in 2017 with an alias and was suspended after Facebook discovered it in 2018. I also used my father’s account for a few months after his death in 2019 before closing it permanently. There is something about Mark Zuckerberg and the nature of Facebook that has always irritated me. Just observing his actions and often robotic speeches, he comes across as an individual that lacks a moral center. This is why I always felt uncomfortable using Facebook. Thankfully, Facebook’s actions before the election in 2020 proved my hesitation correct. I will never use any of their services again. GOOGLE: Been using this service for an awfully long time dating back to the mid-2000s. I bought into their “Do No Evil” motto that was part of every Google commercial on television in the 2000s. I bought my first Google owned Android OS phone in 2014. I often have dozens of their apps on my phone even though I do not partake in their entertainment applications like Google Play Music, Play Books, Play Movies, their spy applications like Google Photos, and their three alternate versions of YouTube. After the events of January 6th, I moved my Contacts off Google, closed my Google Play Games and YouTube accounts, and closed my alternate Google account, [email protected], that is primarily used for this blog. The only thing that remains with Google is my Gmail and Project Fi accounts which need to remain open so my phone can be used. All Gmail is now diverted to my Protonmail accounts. Once I decide to purchase a new phone, I am going to likely eliminate Google from my life once and for all. TWITTER: I was ahead of the crowd on this one. I opened a Twitter account in 2010 and used it less and less until deleting my account in 2015. I was not impressed with the platform. I felt the platform gave too much power and influence to individuals with the most followers. I found the people with less “follows” to be significantly more interesting. So Twitter has been outside my orbit for a half a dozen years despite the tremendous amount of fame that a certain ex-president gave it during his one term. Other corporations I terminated my relationship with because of bad behavior. CBS (CBS News and CBS Sports) and Yahoo for their censorship and propaganda, Adobe due to discovering better open-source solutions which made their membership ridiculously overrated and pricey, and Oracle, and Salesforce because of the creepy, Orwellian announcement about being the government funded platforms that will track vaccinations. I also cut ties with the popular millennial investment app Robinhood due to some questionable business practices and the constant instability of their application. The only mega-national, trillion-dollar technology company that still does business with me is Microsoft due to three factors: my Acer Nitro PC using Windows 10, my yearly Xbox Live subscription which has been active since 2005, and my yearly Office 365 subscription which is necessary for my family. Until I can find a way to unwrap myself from Bill Gates cold, heartless hands, I will be stuck with Microsoft for a little while longer. SOLUTIONS: USE LINUX BASED OPERATING SYSTEMS AND OPEN-SOURCE APPLICATIONS WHEN APPLICABLE. The problem with this solution is that you need the knowledge of an IT worker to understand how these programs and applications work. Especially with Linux Distributions, there is a learning curve to use it properly. Here are the best Linux distributions for beginners as a replacement for Windows 10:
List of Open-Source Applications That Can Be Substituted for Corporate Proprietary Products and Are Easy to Use for Beginners: -2FA Apps (Authenticator) – Time Based Log-In Authorization Aegis Authenticator or andOTP instead of any of the large company options owned by Microsoft, Google, LastPass, or Salesforce. -Podcast App Open-source AntennaPod or Podcast Addict created by an independent developer instead of Google or Apple’s offering. -Map App OsmAnd instead of Apple, Bing, or Google Maps. The only downside is that all maps need to be downloaded onto your device. -Ad Blocking App Open Source Blokada -Internet Search App Use DuckDuckGo instead of Bing or Google. -YouTube Substitution App NewPipe instead of YouTube. Plus, you will not get bombarded with advertisements. -Messaging App QKSMS instead of any of the dozens of proprietary options. Do not use WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger especially. More on this later. -Email App Protonmail instead of any of the large proprietary applications like Gmail, Yahoo Mail or Microsoft Outlook. -Internet Browsers More on this later. Firefox and Chromium are the best options for privacy and security over Google Chrome, Apple Safari, Microsoft Edge, and others. -Password Manager App Open-Source SSE (Secret Space Encryptor) instead of proprietary applications like FastPass, Dashlane or Norton. Alternative Proprietary/Corporate Applications Outside of the Big Tech Companies If the idea of tinkering with Linux is an oppressive thought (Even though the applications listed above are easy to use), then downloading proprietary/corporate/developer applications separated from Big Tech should be your choice. Here are a few more options. -E-Book App Use Scribd or Kobo Books instead of Google Play Books, Amazon Kindle, Audible, or Walmart Books. I do not recommend Barnes & Noble’s Nook App as it has had issues with ‘disappearing’ books over the years of its existence. -Music App Even though some of these have become large tech companies, it is always better to use Spotify, Pandora or Tidal over Apple, Amazon, or Google applications. -Messenger Apps If Open Source does not work for you (Simple SMS Messenger is another option), I recommend using small developers like Delicious with their Chomp or Textra apps or privacy messengers like Signal or Telegram. Using anything from Apple, Google, or Facebook here is a danger to your privacy. -Internet Browsers There are dozens of them online from small developers. Opera, Dolphin, Vivaldi, and Puffin along with my personal favorite, Brave as well as privacy focused ones like Mozilla, InBrowser, and Tor. There is never a reason to use a browser from Amazon, Apple, Google or Microsoft on your phone or PC. -Social Media Apps Time to check out of using Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Pinterest, Snapchat, TikTok, Twitch and YouTube or any other online social media company that has decided to censor someone’s content. For social media, use MeWe and Minds. If it ever comes back, use Parler. For a Twitter substitute, use Gab. For a YouTube substitute, use Rumble. Juxtapost is just as good as Pinterest. If you love open source, use Mastodon even though it is complicated to set up. The communities on these alternative websites are not as populated as the big tech platforms but they are growing exponentially by the day. I have found multiple groups to chat with on MeWe and find the platform satisfactory. I am going to stop the list here or this blog will be 10,000 words long. The most important thing to remember is that whatever tool you use on your phone, try to use an alternative to the ones provided by the Big Tech companies. Use TrueCaller instead of the Google Phone app for instance. You can separate yourself from these oppressive privacy invading mega-corporations that have no interest in your individual opinions. They only see you as a digital number that they can exploit with their insidious AI algorithms and tracking software. AFTERWORD: I went looking for a good alternative “News” site on the Apple and Google Stores. There are none that I can really recommend. Even Flipboard, which I used religiously for five years, mainly posts news articles from the mainstream. The best solution to resolve this is to use an RSS reader like the open source Flym or the proprietary Feedly where you can set up the diverse type of information with varying opinions that I hope everyone reads online (Right?) Until next time! UPDATE: Add Reddit, Stripe, PayPal and Visa to the list of companies that are violating people's right of choice and free association. I cancelled my Reddit account in 2018 and my Paypal in 2019. I cancelled my Stripe account today (A new tool for donation to this website will be created over the next few weeks). I do have one Visa card through Chase. Will have to find a way to resolve this problem over the next few weeks also. These riots are good.  These riots are bad.  Remember, this is what the media tells you is true. So it has to be, right?
No matter how you feel about one of the most controversial, divisive, and politicized president in United States history, the four years of the Donald Trump administration brought about one change that the American people should be thankful. Trump gave us clarity on the state of our Union. The hypocrisy of our corporations, politicians, and the media have been on full display over the past four years. Our government no longer serves the public. The supposedly “stupid” American people who have recognized this fact for the last dozen years have been trying to change this reality through mostly peaceful means via their own political systems. But after Trump got inaugurated back in January 2017, conspiracy theories that existed among many controversial outliers in our society ended up being factual in many cases. Are conspiracies still a conspiracy if they are proven true? Personally, I have never had issues with individuals, organizations or businesses pursuing their own self-interest. It is an important tool of self-preservation necessary for our survival as a species. Where self-interest crosses over into selfishness and other dark behavior is when the individual or organization use it to harm other people or collude in a monopolistic way to prevent competition or to silence the opposition. Because government is a public institution, it also has its own self-interest. Governments throughout the world are interested in two things: money and power. Anything that an individual, business or organization can do that increases money and power will become an ally of this institution. This is why countries run by democracies, monarchies and religious leaders have fought wars for centuries against one another. Politicians and government workers with authoritarian instincts and corporations with bottomless pockets are the two main groups that are supported by the United States government. Every other citizen and business is ignored and needs to be monitored or controlled by these superior individuals and organizations aligned with the government. These ‘chosen’ people and corporations are smarter, better, and more evolved than you. So keeping this in mind, let’s look at the awful year that just passed us by, 2020, as one example. The media likes to focus the American public on popular conspiracy theories believed by millions of people in some cases that brings about a collective disdain amongst the intelligentsia. Conspiracies like Obama being foreign born or many Democrats are secret child rapists (QANON) even though in the latter case, the existence of Jeffrey Epstein brought an aura of truth around the conspiracy. But what is not analyzed is how destructive the conspiracy theories have been amongst the people with wealth and power. Just a few examples in the 21st Century. Saddam Hussein has weapons of mass destruction. He did in the past during the Iran/Iraq War but during the time he was being accused, he absolutely DID NOT. This only led to hundreds of thousands of deaths, mostly Iraqi. Trump is a Russian puppet. Using the same standards that the Democrats used when Trump sued over election fraud, if you cannot prove it, then it must NOT BE TRUE. This fabrication circulated through the media for a three-year timeframe and could never be definitively proven and hindered politically important things like legislation or Trump’s personal wish to get us removed from our foreign entanglements. The government is only spying on foreign regimes. Edward Snowden proved this accusation false seven years ago. Say goodnight to your 4th Amendment rights and hello to the government technocratic complex. The lies and deceit told to us by our government every day is far more damaging and destructive than the false beliefs of a few hundred thousand people with no political power huddled into the darkest reaches of the internet. Having this basic perspective is incredibly important in understanding the distortion of power dynamics in these debates. Other destructive fabrications are still in the process of occurring. The “truth” will probably not be known for years or possibly, decades. Some examples are: The Origin of COVID-19, Do masks prevent COVID-19 spread or not?, Modern Monetary Theory or MMT, and Critical Race Theory, the new ideological theory destroying universities nationwide. Even though I only post one side of the argument in two of the links above, you can do your own research and try to understand the underlying arguments of both sides of these controversial topics. Sharyl Attkisson has done a wonderful job tracking all the fabricated news stories that revolved around Donald Trump during his presidency. Most of these “false” stories were redacted or removed for inaccuracies. This leads me to the events that occurred a week ago on Capitol Hill. The narrative is that “insurrectionists” and “domestic terrorists” invaded the Capitol which led to destruction inside the historic building as well as leaving five people dead. Even though Trump’s speech can be perceived as a form of incitement, looking at his speech more closely shows that he did not want these protestors to riot. Here is Trump’s entire speech from outside the Capitol. Go through it and look to see if he is encouraging violence amongst the protestors. You can ‘perceive’ that some of his language is brutal (Especially against the media, the Democrats, and the election). But is this really incitement based on the legal definition? The hardest part of reading any Trump speech is dealing with his narcissistic behavior. But if Trump is guilty, then why are none of these Democrats guilty for this behavior? Isn’t this also inciting domestic terrorism? Here are the five people who died in the Capitol Riot, four of them were Trump supporters. Here are the twenty-six people that we know of that were killed in the BLM riots over the summer. The same riots that the Democratic Party wholeheartedly supported. So did many corporations. These riots were the largest manmade disaster in history with insurance costs unknown. With this 1 to 2 billion dollar prediction, I would lean towards the higher end of that assumption. Years ago, the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan were supported mostly by conservatives and their neo-conservative globalist brethren which showed us the power of the military industrial complex. Trump’s presidency has shown us the power of the media and their propaganda. The COVID-19 outbreak has shown us the corporate and governmental collusion tied to the medical industrial complex. The events that have occurred since the Capitol Riot on January 6th is what the American people should be concerned about. Never willing to let an opportunity go to waste, the Democrats are embracing their authoritarian instincts. Now, the controversial events surrounding the November election has exposed the authoritarian technocratic impulses of our tech leaders. The upcoming social media site Parler which was started by libertarians to challenge Facebook. GONE! Apple, Amazon, and Google disappeared the social media site from the internet citing extremism. The same type of extremism promoted on their websites on a daily basis. Hundreds of thousands of mostly conservative social media users have had their accounts suspended. The acting president of the United States until January 20th had his account permanently suspended on seven websites. Giant multinational corporations, the biggest polluters and violators of personal rights around the world, are jumping over themselves to be the next one to ‘ban’ Trump from doing anything. The continued stoking of division and “white racism” by the liberals and these corporations is causing an irreversible separation among the political elements inside of the United States. Because if the people ever truly united against this government and the corporations enabling it, there would be a lot of bodies hanging dead outside the Capitol. As Glenn Greenwald points out in this wonderful article about the elimination of Parler, the 21st Century liberal is an “authoritarian” who has fully embraced the values promoted by the Silicon Valley elites. What are the most dangerous things about an “authoritarian?” They will use any means necessary (Including brutal violence) to achieve their goals. This is where we are heading if our citizens do not wake up and resist. Is this really the type of country that we want to become? I have always been clear about my personal beliefs and ideology. I am always willing to grow and change to accept different viewpoints and perspectives. But there are two things I have always stood for that are non-negotiable from an ethical standpoint. I am opposed to war in almost every circumstance except in situations where rebels are trying to overthrow a violent, autocratic leader or a country is fighting back against an invasion. Other than that, no form of war should ever be acceptable. My other belief revolves around my strong defense of personal rights especially the ones guaranteed by the United States’ Constitution. One of those rights revolves around the “Freedom of Speech.” As court cases have confirmed over hundreds of years of this republican experiment, public speech where a person outright lies about another person to harm them (Libel) or encouraging violence amongst your followers (Incitement) are illegal in certain circumstances. But our country has defended every other type of speech imaginable including the right of racists to speak their abject nonsense online. In this day and age where racism in this country has declined tremendously from just twenty years ago while our culture still needs to analyze areas for improvement, any violation of these rights by corporate entities is a personal attack against me. Because social media has become the primary source of news aggregation in this country, the ability of these private companies to manipulate and propagandize your news feed should send chills down your spine. The American people need to rise up and demand that these companies respect the public political sphere. If not, then it is time to start looking at other options. Next Week: I will lay out some of these options. Addendum: The news continues to get worse. Biden is promoting a bill affectionately called Patriot Act 2.0. The contents of the bill have not been released to the public but expect one of the provisions to legalize “indefinite detention” of American citizens on the homeland as well as many forms of censorship. The War on Terror has finally come home to roost. Looking back on the predictions I gave for this COVID-affected 2020 NFL season; it is not wrong to say that my predictions were better than most of the people who get paid large sums of money every year on television. Like anything in life, the more knowledge you have about any topic, the more your analysis will be based in some aspect of truth. Let’s look back on my predictions.
AFC East: 1) New England, 2) Buffalo, 3) New York Jets, 4) Miami Actual AFC East Results: 1) Buffalo, 2) Miami, 3) New England, 4) New York Jets After watching Josh Allen’s performance in the wild card game last year, my pre-season expectations for Buffalo were timid. I also thought that Cam Newton would reattain the swagger he carried during the early part of the 2010s. I was wrong on both counts. Buffalo is a legitimate contender for the AFC crown. The Miami Dolphins, on the strength of a much better defense than expected, just missed the playoffs. New England struggled through a 7-9 season and the New York Jets were pathetic except for their two late season wins against 2020 NFL playoff teams. I had New England losing in the AFC Championship. Instead, Buffalo will be the team that loses in the AFC Championship. AFC North: 1) Baltimore, 2) Pittsburgh: Wild Card, 3) Cleveland: Wild Card, 4) Cincinnati Actual AFC North Results: 1) Pittsburgh, 2) Baltimore: Wild Card, 3) Cleveland: Wild Card, 4) Cincinnati This was one of my most accurate projections. I did not expect the mid-season swoon that cost Baltimore the division title. But at the end of the season, they were the best team in the North. Because of this, Pittsburgh and Baltimore reversed their positions in my prediction. Cleveland did finish third and got back to the playoffs for the first time in 18 years. The Browns are exciting and will be an interesting watch during wild card weekend. Cincinnati found their quarterback of the future but still have a lot of talent deficiencies compared to the rest of their division. I am sticking with my Baltimore prediction of winning the Super Bowl. More on this later. AFC South: 1) Houston, 2) Indianapolis, 3) Tennessee, 4) Jacksonville Actual AFC South Results: 1) Tennessee, 2) Indianapolis: Wild Card, 3) Houston, 4) Jacksonville I did not believe that Ryan Tannehill could be a franchise quarterback, but he was fantastic this season. Mixed with Derrick Henry’s unbelievable season, they were able to win games despite a terrible defense which I thought would be their downfall. I expected Indianapolis to have a winning season but miss out on the playoffs. They snuck in as the 7 seed and have the herculean task of defeating the Buffalo Bills in their wild card game this weekend. Houston took a horrible step back as their defense collapsed despite DeShaun Watson being all-world, and Jacksonville as predicted was the worst team in the league. Not a terrible prediction but just surprised at the large difference in records between Tennessee and Houston even though the teams are quite similar. AFC West: 1) Kansas City, 2) Denver: Wild Card, 3) L.A. Chargers, 4) Las Vegas Raiders AFC West Actual Results: 1) Kansas City, 2) Las Vegas Raiders, 3) L.A. Chargers, 4) Denver Other than Kansas City who will go in as the top seed in the AFC playoffs, my predictions here were off for Las Vegas and Denver. The L.A. Chargers remained inconsistent like expected and their football coach paid the price with his job after the season ended. Denver was burdened with injuries, COVID-related problems and unstable quarterback play all season long. I expected this team to ride its defense through the season like when they won Super Bowl L. But the wheels came off early and their season was over. The Las Vegas Raiders have a great offense but a terrible defense. If they can improve their defense just a little bit, they will make the playoffs next season. Overall, I predicted four of the seven playoff teams even though I swapped the positions of the Baltimore Ravens and Pittsburgh Steelers. Two of my misses were related to the difficult seasons that both teams had while my third miss predicted accurately where the team would finish but not expecting them to clinch a playoff spot. Overall, a decent prediction for my least favorite NFL conference. NFC East: 1) Dallas, 2) Philadelphia, 3) N.Y. Giants, 4) Washington NFC East Actual Results: 1) Washington, 2) N.Y. Giants, 3) Dallas, 4) Philadelphia This entire division was a gigantic shitshow. The only thing I got right was the fact that this would be the worst division in football. Other than that, I got the final positions of every team completely wrong. But when your division winner goes 7-9 and wins a final game where its opponent was obviously tanking, it is hard to know which garbage team is going to survive. Let’s hope for a rapid demise of the remaining NFC East team at the hands of Tampa Bay. NFC North: 1) Minnesota, 2) Detroit: Wild Card, 3) Green Bay, 4) Chicago NFC North Actual Results: 1) Green Bay, 2) Chicago: Wild Card, 3) Minnesota, 4) Detroit This was my worst set of predictions. I expected Green Bay to fall back this season. I underestimated how good of a coach Matt LaFleur was going to be. The Packers are not a fluke and I was wrong about that. I also thought that Matt Patricia would get Detroit’s defense up to par this year and carry them to the 7 seed. I was also wrong on both counts as the defense was awful and Detroit fell into the basement and is currently looking for a new coach. Minnesota, who pulled the wild card upset over the New Orleans Saints last year, took a surprising step back even though I believed this team was on the rise. Chicago, who had a six-game losing streak mid-season, rose up to get to 8-8 and snag the last wild card via tiebreaker over Arizona despite a tremendous amount of offensive problems. Nothing went my way with my NFC North predictions. NFC South: 1) New Orleans, 2) Tampa Bay: Wild Card, 3) Atlanta, 4) Carolina NFC South Actual Results: 1) New Orleans, 2) Tampa Bay: Wild Card, 3) Carolina, 4) Atlanta This may have been my best prediction. New Orleans continues to roll and slides into the playoffs as the number 2 seed. I expected with Tom Brady at quarterback, the turnovers that plagued the talented Buccaneers would be limited and they would get into the playoffs. This absolutely happened even though the Saints kept them in second place by sweeping the season series. I expected both Atlanta and Carolina to have losing seasons which did occur. I believed Atlanta had more talent than Carolina. Despite their positions being reversed, both teams need a lot of work. NFC West: 1) Seattle: NFC Champions, 2) L.A. Rams: Wild Card, 3) San Francisco, 4) Arizona NFC West Actual Results: 1) Seattle, 2) L.A. Rams: Wild Card, 3) Arizona, 4) San Francisco I almost nailed this one right on the nose also. Seattle took the NFC West back this season and Russell Wilson showed once again that he is one of the best quarterbacks in football while the defense showed signs of life. The L.A. Rams offense was actually equally mediocre to the previous 2019 season which cost them a playoff spot. But the one game improvement can be directly tied to having the number one defense by yards in the league. I still believe Arizona has the least amount of talent in the division, but the 49ers extremely difficult season tied around their Super Bowl hangover allowed them to slide into the third spot. Despite the miserable season, the 49ers will likely contend for the title again next season. While my NFC East and NFC South predictions were abject garbage, I again predicted all four playoff teams and their proper positions out of the NFC South and NFC West. Many of the things went almost according to plan in these two divisions. Overall, I was able to successfully predict eight of the fourteen playoff teams. I successfully predicted an underwhelming three of eight division winners and both my Super Bowl picks are alive and well coming into the 2020 playoffs. Now, here are my playoff predictions. Even though I am sticking with Baltimore in the AFC, I am going to change my pick for the NFC winner. Here you go! AFC Wild Card Games Buffalo 38 Indianapolis 30 Pittsburgh 23 Cleveland 13 Baltimore 34 Tennessee 31 AFC Divisionals Baltimore 42 Kansas City 38 (Upset) Buffalo 30 Pittsburgh 17 AFC Championship Baltimore 33 Buffalo 30 O.T. NFC Wild Card Games New Orleans 31 Chicago 7 L.A. Rams 20 Seattle 16 Tampa Bay 26 Washington 9 NFC Divisionals Green Bay 25 L.A. Rams 17 New Orleans 38 Tampa Bay 27 NFC Championship Green Bay 41 New Orleans 19 Super Bowl Pick Baltimore 31 Green Bay 20 Enjoy the playoffs! |
AuthorEXPERT OF SOME Archives
October 2024
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