I have still yet to break the elusive .500 mark this season, and not just on the season as a whole; I haven’t broken .500 in any single week either. I went 2-4 last week, but was this close to going 4-2. I called the split of Colorado and Washington, but for some reason I decided that the Stealth would win in Colorado and the Mammoth would win in Washington. They did split, but each team won at home.

This is the first season that I’ve really made an effort at individual game predictions during the regular season. I have come to the following stunning conclusion: it’s hard. When the experts over at IL Indoor (and yes, I write there too but I’m just a fairly knowledgeable fan, those guys live and breathe lacrosse) are all under .500, what chance does an amateur like me have? You can go with “gut feelings”, but we all know how reliable they are. Or, you can attempt to use logic, but you end up with contradictions. Take the Philly-Toronto game from a couple of weeks ago:

• The game is in Toronto, so I can clearly not choose Philadelphia
• Philadelphia has a winning away record while the Rock have a losing home record, so I can clearly not choose Toronto
• Toronto is the reigning NLL Champion, so I can clearly not choose Philadelphia
• Philadelphia beat Toronto in their last meeting, so I can clearly not choose Toronto
• Toronto beat Philadelphia in the game before that, and by a greater goal differential, so I can clearly not choose Philadelphia
• Philly has Kevin Crowley, a potential rookie of the year, as well as former MVP Dan Dawson, so I can clearly not choose Toronto
• Toronto has perennial top scorer Josh Sanderson and former MVP Colin Doyle, so I can clearly not choose Philadelphia
• Philly has beaten the Bandits twice this year while the Bandits beat Toronto in their only meeting, so I can clearly not choose Toronto

I decided to go with Toronto, and Philly won. After using my dizzying intellect to do all that analysis, I picked the game wrong. The real choice should have been obvious: don’t make picks.

Record: 16-25 (.390)

Game	Comments	Pick
BUF @ TOR	I believe I’ve chosen the Rock to win every game they’ve played this year, so perhaps I am a homer when it comes to that. But in my defense, it’s not like the Rock is a terrible team and my picks make no sense. Could the Bandits beat the Rock in Toronto? Sure. The Rock are under .500 at home this year, Cosmo’s shaken off a lot of rust, and John Tavares has stolen a game or two in his career. But I seem to go with trends for my picks – until Buffalo proves to me that they are worthy of a pick (and losing 6 in a row is not the way to do that), I won’t be picking the Bandits.
MIN @ BUF	Gotta go with Minnesota on this one, mainly for the same reason as above, though Minnesota has been playing really well lately, so I might have picked them even if Buffalo wasn’t last in the league.
EDM @ PHI	Toughie of the week. I picked Philly to beat Edmonton a couple of weeks ago because the Wings were in first in the East and Edmonton was second-last in the west. The Rush won. Now Philly’s in first in the east and Edmonton is last in the west. I gotta go with the odds and pick Philly again.

Previous weeks:

Week 1 – 0-1
Week 2 – 2-2
Week 3 – 2-2
Week 4 – 2-4
Week 5 – 2-2
Week 6 – 1-3
Week 7 – 2-2
Week 8 – 1-3
Week 9 – 2-2
Week 10 – 2-4