Subscribe
Sign in
Home
Notes
Chat
Basketball
Baseball
Football
Hockey
Racing
Other Sports
Forecast Models
Weekly Round-Ups
The Junk Drawer
Archive
About
Who Will Advance In the AFC Playoffs This Weekend? Flip a Coin — Literally.
The numbers say Patriots-Texans and Bills-Broncos are both effectively toss-ups — which mostly means we have no idea what’s about to happen.
18 hrs ago
•
Neil Paine
10
4
1
College Hoops Is a Weird Scramble of Banners and Baggage This Season
Some of the top men's teams are exactly who you'd expect — and some are decidedly not.
Jan 15
•
Neil Paine
8
1
🏈🎙️ Football Bytes: Who's the Chaos Quarterback Now?
We’re hunting value in a Divisional round where the numbers — and the vibes — don’t always agree.
Jan 15
•
Neil Paine
and
Tyler
1
1:08:23
Mike Tomlin Was the NFL's Ultimate Floor-Raiser
For nearly two decades, he never let the Steelers be bad — even as his teams increasingly struggled to be great when it mattered most.
Jan 14
•
Neil Paine
12
2
1
What We Learned From the NFL's Wild Card Round
A chaotic opening weekend showed how little separates this crowded field of Super Bowl contenders.
Jan 13
•
Neil Paine
11
1
College Football's Expanded Playoff Works. Its Rhythm Doesn't.
The 12-team CFP is (mostly) what college football needed competitively — but its scattered timing has spoiled tradition, drained momentum and trapped…
Jan 12
•
Neil Paine
18
1
1
The Bills and Jaguars Are Too Good to Exit the Playoffs This Early
But unfortunately, only one can survive what is becoming an increasingly dangerous wild-card round for Super Bowl hopefuls.
Jan 9
•
Neil Paine
11
1
2
After Decades of the Same Dudes, the Super Bowl Is Due for a New QB (or Two)
The 2025-26 NFL playoffs are set up to produce at least one first-time Super Bowl starter — and likely a first-time winner — hinting at a long-awaited…
Jan 8
•
Neil Paine
10
1
1
Recommendations
View all 115
NASCAR
NASCAR
Inside The Newsroom — The Newsletter For Journalists
Daniel Levitt
Plot the Ball
Ben Wylie
Mike Tanier's Too Deep Zone
Mike Tanier
JFresh’s Newsletter
JFresh
Updating Models
View all
🏀 2025-26 NBA Elo Forecast and Player Ratings 📈
Track how I'm forecasting every team’s chance to make — and win — the NBA Finals, all season long.
17 hrs ago
•
Neil Paine
31
13
🏒 2025-26 NHL Team Elo Power Rankings & Goals Above Replacement Player Ratings 📉
Power ratings and forecasts for every NHL team and player this season.
17 hrs ago
•
Neil Paine
15
14
📈2025 NFL Power Ratings and Projections🏈
Ratings, rankings and forecasts for every NFL team this season.
Jan 13
•
Neil Paine
31
19
8
🏁 2025 NASCAR Cup Series Driver Rankings 🚗
Tracking the top drivers in the sport, all season long.
Nov 3, 2025
•
Neil Paine
12
15
Who Will Win Super Bowl LX?
Let’s forecast the 2025-26 NFL playoffs using a composite of my two prediction models.
Jan 5
•
Neil Paine
22
What Would a Championship Version of Trae Young Look Like?
As trade talks swirl, let's look at why Young’s offense-first profile has proven so hard to build around — and what would need to change for him to play…
Jan 7
•
Neil Paine
9
2
Beyond the Streak: What — and Whom — is Standing Between the Sabres and the End of Their Drought?
A 10-game heater made Buffalo relevant again. But ending a 14-year playoff drought will depend on what happens from here.
Jan 6
•
Neil Paine
10
1
📈2025 NFL Power Ratings and Projections🏈
Ratings, rankings and forecasts for every NFL team this season.
Jan 13
•
Neil Paine
31
19
8
Just How Bad Is the NFC South, Really?
Measuring one of the NFL's weakest divisions — maybe ever — and why it's still guaranteed a home playoff game anyway.
Jan 2
•
Neil Paine
10
1
What I Learned From the 344 Posts I Wrote in 2025
I categorized every post I published in 2025 by type and sport to see what I actually spent the year writing about — then picked out the stories that…
Dec 31, 2025
•
Neil Paine
28
6
2
The Chiefs Are Doing the Weirdest "Relocation" in Pro Sports History
Is it a short commute of a stadium-switch or a full-blown franchise move? Yes.
Dec 30, 2025
•
Neil Paine
6
2
2
The Spurs Have Suddenly Made the Thunder's Title Defense a Lot More Interesting
OKC still looks like a dynasty-in-waiting — but Victor Wembanyama and the Spurs have exposed a matchup problem that history says can’t be ignored in the…
Dec 29, 2025
•
Neil Paine
11
1
How the NFL Grinch Stole the NBA's Christmas
For decades, Christmas belonged to the NBA — until football realized the old rules of the sports calendar no longer mattered.
Dec 23, 2025
•
Neil Paine
18
3
2
The Super Bowl Shuffle and the Lost Era of Renegade Teams
The 1985 Bears didn’t worry about backlash or "bulletin-board material". In today’s buttoned-down sports world, that kind of swagger is in short supply.
Dec 23, 2025
•
Neil Paine
8
2
1
Bowl Season Is Dying. Long Live Bowl Season.
College football bowls seemingly lost their purpose when we finally got a playoff. But they were always messy, exclusionary, arbitrary — and mostly…
Dec 22, 2025
•
Neil Paine
13
1
2
Remembering Greg Biffle, NASCAR's In-Between Great
A late bloomer who never fit neatly into any era, the late driver of the No. 16 car came closer than anyone to winning championships across all three of…
Dec 19, 2025
•
Neil Paine
10
2
See all
This site requires JavaScript to run correctly. Please
turn on JavaScript
or unblock scripts
