The 2006 College Football Blogger Awards: The Jay Sherman Award

by Joel on Jan 31, 2007 1:19 PM EST in College Football Blogger Awards Comment 2 comments

If you just joined us, we're announcing the winners of the 2006 College Football Blogger Awards today and tomorrow. Here's what you may have missed so far this morning:

Best New Blog
"The Trev," or the funniest blog
The "Dr. Z Award" for best analysis
Best Mainstream Media Blog
The "Jenn Sterger's Rack Award" for the best gag

Now for the Jay Sherman Award. First, the nominees:

The Jay Sherman Award
FOR: The blog best keeping tabs on the man and calling out all of the injustices in the college football world. CRITERIA: Consistently ahead-of-the-curve on controversial issues in college football.
	Braves and Birds Mark May Be Wrong The Corporate Headquarters of the San Antonio Gunslingers The Wizard of Odds

And the winner of the 2006 Jay Sherman Award is . . .

Mark May Be Wrong

Unlike a lot of other blogs, Mark May Be Wrong launched, on July 26, 2006, with a clear mission:

[So-called college football pundits] insist on trying to pass off their opinions as facts, their personal feelings cloud their judgment, and they recklessly predict the outcome of every game with no one holding them responsible. These "professionals" get paid to do what we do for free, and the only repercussions they will get for sucking is . . . well nothing (maybe a promotion). College football is the only sport where the media has a significant say in deciding the National Champion. One need look no further than Auburn in 2004 when they were screwed out of a shot at the National Championship Game because they were held in lower esteem by the media early in the season.

Well, that is where we come in.

Our mission at markmaybewrong is to document, evaluate, and publicize every prediction, statement, or off-handed remark any self-proclaimed college football expert makes in a public forum.

The three writers of Mark May Be Wrong first leveraged their combined six degrees in aerospace engineering to evaluate the accuracy of pre-season AP polls. (They found that the polls were surprisingly accurate at predicting national champions, but not so good when it came down to Nos. 2-25.) The self-confessed dorks then followed up that post with one showing how a process using a random number generator actually outperformed the AP. Mark May Be Wrong makes mathematics fun through the publishing of its weekly Suck-o-Meter, a contraption designed to measure the accuracy of any particular prognosticator's weekly predictions:

Mark May Be Wrong, congratulations on winning the 2006 Jay Sherman Award.

RUNNER UP: The Wizard of Odds, primarily for targeting the wicked old witch (Clock Rule 3-2-5-e) throughout the season. Perhaps Burnt Orange Nation's Peter put it best:

The Wiz is simply without peer . . . . Reporters Notebooks, Columnists Corner, live odds, tracking expert predictions, clock rule fallout - the list is virtually endless. I'd wager there are dozens of us that count on the Wiz for our first stop each morning.

No doubt, and congrats to Da Wiz.

UP NEXT: The Keith Jackson Circa 1995 Award (for the most consistently expressive and excellent writing), over at MGoBlog at 2:00 EST.

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