The March Madness pool lost a valuable FOP (Friend of Pool) in January of 2010 when Dave Juon died of a heart attack at the age of 62. Dave was a devoted family man, a good friend (one of my favorite pics of my daughter Izzy is when Dave played Santa Claus for her as a little baby), and a faithful and valued alumnus of Iowa State University (the President of the ISU Alumni Association attended his funeral). Dave was a terrific guy with a great sense of humor and is one of the few stalwarts who has been in this pool since the start. I always enjoyed his annual email banter come tournament time (he was usually defenseless--I mean, his team was Iowa State, after all).
In Dave's memory, I introduced a side game to the March Madness festivities in 2010--the Dave Juon Memorial Underdog Award (DJMUA, pronounced "DEE-JAY-MOO-YAH"). The DJMUA is a winner-take-all contest based on your first round picks only. In this side game, for each correct pick in the first round, you will receive the number of points equal to the seed you picked. Therefore, higher seeds (we call them "underdogs"--getting it yet?) will result in more points but are obviously a higher risk. Remember, this is a side game--THESE POINTS HAVE NO BEARING ON THE REGULAR POOL STANDINGS. However, you will not make a separate set of picks for the side game...your first round picks for the pool will be entered into the side pool.
And hopefully, Dave is smiling somewhere and saying "I still don't get it"
