Introducing the Tabloid Cover Derby!

[Guest d'Kong76]

cooby wrote: I'm not tired of it

Me needah!!

[Centerfield]

Me neither.

Of course, I'm not the one doing any of the work so...

[Benjamin Grimm]

Maybe fewer people are around. I see the vote totals going down so I figure people are losing interest. Maybe I'm wrong and it's just the holidays. And I see comments like "This is too hard so I'm going to abstain."

I'm going to let Round 3 play itself out and Round 4 will begin on Monday. Round 4 will determine the winner in each of the four groups, so we'll soon have our Final Four.

[Centerfield]

I think it is the Holidays. The board has been dead overall.

[Zvon]

I'm enjoying the seeing the covers. You should do this every year.

And this is the week between Christmas and New Years. Of course it's gonna be slow.
HAPPY NEW YEAR!

[Guest d'Kong76]

Centerfield wrote: I think it is the Holidays. The board has been dead overall.

Freakin' Wilpons!

[Benjamin Grimm]

The two polls from Round 3.3 have now closed, with one win going to the Daily News and the other to the New York Post. Six of the Elite Eight covers have now been determined, with three each from the News and the Post.


Poll 3.3.1 YES-PEDES (Daily News) defeated LARGE & IN CHARGE (New York Post) 7 to 5.
Poll 3.3.2 CAPITAL THRILL! (New York Post) defeated AS GOOD AS IT METS (New York Post) 9 to 2.

Tentative schedule:
January 6: CAPITAL THRILL! vs. YES-PEDES


. . . . . .

. . . . . .

[Centerfield]

That's going to be a tough call.

The win that dealt the first blow, versus the win that finished them off.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Poll 3.4.1 closed this morning, with APPLE JACKS! (New York Post) defeating Newsday's MURPHY'S FLAW 8 to 5. This marks the elimination of the last Newsday cover. Three Newsday covers had made it to Round 3, with all of them failing to advance to Round 4. Of these three covers, the one that received the highest percentage of votes across all three rounds was THOR'S DAY, which therefore finishes as the winner in the Newsday category.

THOR'S DAY won Round 1.1.8, receiving 30 per cent of the votes. It went on to defeat the Daily News' JUAN DIRECTION in Round 2.1.1, by a tally of 10 to 4, and then suffered a 9 to 7 loss to the Post's N.Y. CITI in Round 3.1.2

For being featured on the highest-ranked Newsday cover, Noah Syndergaard will receive a box of Rice-A-Roni (the San Francisco treat) and a bottle of Turtle Wax.

.

[Guest cooby classic]

He can share it with that scary looking family of his

[MFS62]

Benjamin Grimm wrote: For being featured on the highest-ranked Newsday cover, Noah Syndergaard will receive a box of Rice-A-Roni (the San Francisco treat) and a bottle of Turtle Wax.

He's not going to receive the home version of the Tabloid Cover Derby game?

Later

[Benjamin Grimm]

The home version of the game isn't available yet because of "production issues" at Hasbro. We do apologize for any inconvenience this may have caused.



Voting for Round 3.4 is now complete, which means that the entire third round is over and our field has been reduced to eight covers. In this latest round, we had one winner from the Daily News and one from the New York Post. Or Elite Eight is comprised of four covers from each of the city's two tabloids. All Newsday covers, as noted previously, have been eliminated from the competition.

Poll 3.4.1 APPLE JACKS! (New York Post) defeated MURPHY'S FLAW (Newsday) 8 to 5.
Poll 3.4.2 TEAM OF DESTINY (Daily News) defeated METS TAKE A HIT (New York Post) 11 to 1.

Tentative schedule:
January 7: TEAM OF DESTINY vs. APPLE JACKS!



. . . . . .


. . . . . .

[Benjamin Grimm]

Voting for Round 4.1 has finished, and the New York Post's N.Y. CITI has defeated the Post's RUNAWAY TRAIN! by a vote of 11 to 5. N.Y. CITI is, therefore, the Group One champion and will advance to the Final Four.

. . . . . .

[Benjamin Grimm]

The Daily News' "U" DA MAN! cover has romped through this competition, winning every poll fairly easily, but it finally met its match in the News' CON4TO! The Michael Conforto cover beat the Juan Uribe cover 11 to 3 in the fourth round. CON4TO! is the Group Two champion and will advance to the Final Four.

. . . . . .

[Benjamin Grimm]

Voting for Round 4.3.1 is now ended, and in somewhat of an upset, The Daily News' YES-PEDES has defeated the New York Post's CAPITAL THRILL! by a tally of 9 to 8. YES-PEDES is therefore our Group Three champion and advances to the Final Four.

. . . . . .

[Centerfield]

The toughest call so far. And a barn-burner of a poll.

This was the 1992 Kentucky-Duke game.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Voting for Round 4.4.1 is complete, and after the voting thread was bumped due to a lingering 6-6 tie, the Daily News' TEAM OF DESTINY surged to a 12-9 victory over the New York Post's APPLE JACKS!

TEAM OF DESTINY is therefore the Group Four champion and advances to the Final Four.

. . . . . .

[Benjamin Grimm]

Ladies and Gentlemen...

THE FINAL FOUR!


GROUP ONE CHAMPION
Winner of Round 1.1.1
Winner of Round 2.1.4
Winner of Round 3.1.2
Winner of Round 4.1.1

N.Y. CITI
New York Post, February 25, 2015
In spring training, Curtis Granderson says that the Mets are ready to take over the town.





GROUP TWO CHAMPION
Winner of Round 1.2.7
Winner of Round 2.2.4
Winner of Round 3.2.2
Winner of Round 4.2.1

CON4TO!
New York Daily News, July 26, 2015
Michael Conforto goes 4 for 4 and scores 4 runs in a 15-2 Mets win over the Dodgers at Citi Field.





GROUP THREE CHAMPION
Winner of Round 1.3.7
Winner of Round 2.3.3
Winner of Round 3.3.1
Winner of Round 4.3.1

YES-PEDES
New York Daily News, September 10, 2015
Helped by an 8th-inning two-run homer by Yoenis Cespedes, the Mets beat the Nationals 5-3 in Washington, completing a key September series sweep.




GROUP FOUR CHAMPION
Winner of Round 1.4.6
Winner of Round 2.4.4
Winner of Round 3.4.2
Winner of Round 4.4.1

TEAM OF DESTINY
New York Daily News, October 27, 2015
With the World Series about to begin, the Daily News publishes a special wraparound cover.




The New York Post had eight of the Sweet Sixteen entries (compared to five for the Daily News and three for Newsday) but the balance of power has shifted to the News, which has three of the four remaining covers.

The fifth round of competition will get underway next week, with N.Y. CITI facing CON4TO! and YES-PEDES facing TEAM OF DESTINY.

The final round of the 2015 Tabloid Cover Derby will occur the following week.

[MFS62]

Now we're getting serious.
Many years from now, when baseball historians look back on the list of the annual winners in this esteemed contest, the winners should reflect the moments and performances that were crucial to the story of each year.
Cast your votes wisely.

Later

[Benjamin Grimm]

What with the blizzard, I forgot all about the Tabloid Cover Derby. Today the two semi-final rounds ended, with YES-PEDES defeating N.Y. CITI 11 to 8, and CON4TO! defeating TEAM OF DESTINY 12 to 6.

The elimination of N.Y. CITI marks the end of the New York Post's hopes of winning this derby, as the final two covers are both from the Daily News. As the featured player on the highest-ranked Post cover, Curtis Granderson will be awarded with Rice-A-Roni (the San Francisco Treat) and Turtle Wax.



The final round, YES-PEDES vs. CON4TO!, which should have started this morning, will be delayed because of weather and will kick off tomorrow morning instead.

The winning cover, you may recall, will be on display in the lobby of the CPF International Headquarters in Stockholm, Sweden.

[Guest d'Kong76]

Wonder if the re-signing of YES-PEDES will help this woeful cover*.
Vote CON4TO! and vote often with all your user id's!

*(it's an ok cover, just politicking)

[dgwphotography]

the best cover didn't make the finals, so meh.

[Guest d'Kong76]

Which one was that?

[dgwphotography]

[Centerfield]

I'm surprised that a Daniel Murphy or NLCS cover didn't make it through.

When scrolling through the possibilities way back when, I really didn't think it would come down to these two.

[Guest d'Kong76]

dgwphotography wrote:

Got tired of that one as weeks passed, so meh.

[batmagadanleadoff]

Centerfield wrote: When scrolling through the possibilities way back when, I really didn't think it would come down to these two.

I don't think anybody did. The final covers so disappoint me that I don't even feel like voting anymore.

[Edgy MD]

Candidate fatigue. Let's hope it works on Trump.

[Benjamin Grimm]

Centerfield wrote: When scrolling through the possibilities way back when, I really didn't think it would come down to these two.

It really is impossible to predict. If we all chose our favorites from the original list it's quite likely that none of us would have chosen either of these final covers. But this is a collaborative thing, and the different perspectives we all have influence the outcome in unpredictable ways. What can really be said about our final two covers is that they had what it took, whatever undefinable thing that was, to make it through the first five rounds.

Me, I really liked these two covers because they're both visually compelling, but they didn't go far at all. The one from the Post never had much of a chance, because it was a bad-news cover, but I found it very eye-catching. The one from Newsday, however, was one that I thought would do very well, but neither of them made it out of the first round. I like them both better than I do either of the finalists.

[dgwphotography]

I agree with the Murph Newsday cover. It's very clean, and looks more like a magazine cover than a newspaper cover