Front Page

Welcome to RotoGuru's 2010 Market Madness Contest!

For additional commentary on Market Madness Contest strategy and results, please check out the Market Madness message forum.

Tuesday, Mar. 16
If you are new to the Market Madness format, don’t despair when you read the scoring rules. Even if you don’t “get it”, fill out a set of picks and try it for a year. Once you’ve lived through a tournament, you’ll catch on, and be much better prepared next year. If you want a few simple tips, try these:

For your shorts, look for first round upsets, and short the loser. For example, if you think that Lehigh(16) will beat Kansas(1), then short Kansas. You might also try shorting one or two of the top seed baskets (1-3). For example, shorting the #1 seeds gives you plenty of opportunities to profit from an early upset - as long as the tournament doesn't go too “chalky”!
For longs, pick the 4 teams you expect to survive to the Final Four. In many instances, it's good to take those teams not only as single teams, but also in their basket forms - unless you think the other teams in those baskets are really overrated.
Pick one or two double-digit seeds as longs. These will pay off well if they make it to the Sweet 16.

Actually, my best advice is to use the scoring simulator. Pick each of the games as you would for a typical bracket, and then let the simulator calculate the returns under your scenario. Use those returns as a basis for your picks - picking your longs from the top of the listing, and your shorts from the bottom. Or let the simulator do that for you (if you're running it while logged in to the contest site).

Every year, there is a lot of attrition between the contest registrations and the actual entries. It's not unusual for as many as 25%-30% of the registrants to not submit a set of picks. I'm sure that some of that is simply forgetfulness, but I suspect a larger issue is the confusion factor. One of the dominant feedbacks that I get from people who play for the first year is that they felt pretty befuddled when making selections, but once they see how the tournament and the scoring play out, they can't wait for next year. The simulator was designed to help you get over that initial hump.

Sunday, Mar. 14
Brackets are loaded, and prices are set. You may now make your picks, and continue to revise them any time until the opening tipoff of the first game on Thursday, March 18.

The #16 seed in the East Region will be the winner of the Arkansas-Pine Bluff/Winthrop game on Tuesday. There are not separate units for these two teams, and that game does not count for contest scoring.

Once again this year, you may have the scoring simulator process your picks for you. At the bottom of the simulator scoring page, you will have the option to save an optimal set of picks based upon your tournament scenario. If you don’t want to figure out the scoring ramifications, you can simply fill out a standard contest bracket, click twice, and you will immediately process an entry configured to benefit from your crystal ball. If that set of picks is a valid entry, it will automatically be saved as well. If it is not a valid entry, you will be given an opportunity to fix it before saving.

Please report any apparent errors, discrepancies, anomalies, or things that need fixin’.

Tuesday, Mar. 9
Welcome to the 2010 version of the Market Madness Contest. The contest site is up and running, and ready to accept your registration. And while you obviously can't enter your 2010 selections until after the brackets are announced, the site tools are still loaded with last year's brackets for you to dabble with, if you wish. You can even enter a set of picks of last year's units, and then immediately see what the score would have been. Of course, all "preseason" picks will be erased once the 2010 brackets are announced and loaded.

The rules for 2010 are the same as last year.

Everyone is eligible to win one of the two top prizes (see the rules for a more complete explanation). But in order to win one of the seven "GuruPatron Prizes", you must be registered as a GuruPatron by March 18th. GuruPatrons provide most of the financial support for RotoGuru.com, and thus it seems only fair that those Gurupies should get preferential treatment when it comes to prizes. If you have not yet become a GuruPatron and would like more information, please click on the link at the very top of this page.

Prior to making your selections, you may wish to try out the scoring simulator. This tool allows you to simulate the contest scoring for any possible set of outcomes. If you can fill out a standard tournament bracket, then the simulator will figure out what each unit score would be (ranked from best to worst), which you may wish to use as a guide in completing your entry. (Prior to the announcement of this year's brackets, the simulator will be configured for the 2009 pairings. This still may be helpful to you as a scoring example.)

The Standings page still shows last year’s final results. I’ll leave that there until this year’s tournament starts. You may find it helpful to drill down into some of last year’s successful entries to see what worked.

If you notice any apparent glitches in links, format, or content, please report them. You may use the GuruMail link (in the left menu panel) for this.

Thanks for your support!