The Law of Large Numbers says this effect will wash out and the home team will assert itself as the season progresses. I'll offer Home Team Wins even though, so far this season, the home team is just 17-15. Simply pick the home team in every contest and you are likely to be right about six times out of 10. Many paid professional football pundits, gentlemen who yak about the NFL for a living, barely bested 59 percent in their 2005 picks: Jay Novacek of MSNBC came in at 63 percent, for instance. The home team won 59 percent of the time in 2005. Next let me offer my off-price ultra-generic private-label prediction: Home Team Wins. This forecasting formula has the virtue that you don't need incredible insider information - or even need to know who's playing. I predict Home Team 20, Visiting Team 17 will happen more than any other outcome in 2006. This score happened four times in 2005, representing the most common generic outcome. Next, let me issue a generic final score prediction: Home Team 20, Visiting Team 17. Obviously this won't be right, but will it be closer than the countless pseudo-scientific forecasts floating around? I bet if you analyzed the last, say, 20 years, endlessly predicting every team would finish with the same record as the previous season would do you better than actually thinking about your prediction.

First, I predict that every NFL team will end the 2006 season with the same record as it did in 2005.

So if one of my predictions was actually correct you would receive - oh, never mind. Recently I forecast each NFL team's final record, bearing in mind this column's motto: All Predictions Wrong or Your Money Back.

Daffy wide receiver game