Down Goes Brown prediction contest results: Did anyone have a perfect entry? And would that be enough to win? (2024)

Seven months ago, days before opening night of the 2021 regular season, I decided to try something new: A prediction contest, one in which readers would make their picks for what would and wouldn’t happen during the upcoming season.

The idea was simple. I’d ask eight questions, all of them relatively straightforward. You’d choose how many answers you wanted to give, with the option of playing it safe or going aggressive to chase higher point totals. But the twist was that even one wrong answer hit you with a zero for a question, so you had to be sure.

The questions were designed to seem easy, but every NHL season serves up a few surprises. The easy answers are always so obvious, right up until they’re not. So how confident did you feel?

I’ll admit, I didn’t think the concept all the way through, especially when it came to tallying up the results. I’d have to do that by hand, which could get tricky. But I figured I’d get a few dozen entries, maybe even over 100 if people really seemed to like the idea, and that would be manageable.

Then over 800 of you entered. Whoops.

Ah well, what’s one more addition to my “overly complicated spreadsheet” folder. After digging through the entries, I think I’ve found the highest scores, including our winner. Did anyone manage to pull off a perfect entry, with points on all eight questions? We’ll get there, but first, let’s walk through the questions and how you all did.

First, a reminder on the rules. The contest consisted of eight questions, and entrants had the option of giving anywhere from one to five answers to each. You got one point for the first correct answer, two for the second (for a total of three), all the way up to five points for the fifth (for a maximum of 15 points for a 5-for-5 answer). But even one wrong answer hit you with a zero for the entire question.

The first two questions were straightforward and, as it turned out, the easiest ones to run the table on.

1. Name up to five teams that will definitely make the playoffs this year.

2. Name up to five teams that will definitely not make the playoffs this year.

I figured that both questions would be harder than they seemed, since just about every NHL season sees at least one team that everyone thinks will be good bottom out, and at least one that everyone writes off ends up making a surprise playoff run. But that didn’t really happen this year.

Question 1 had a couple of teams to watch out for, as the Blues made a few of you nervous, as did the Bruins, but both ended up being safe picks. The Flyers didn’t, and they showed up on over 100 entries, along with the Stars on almost 50. Those two teams were responsible for most of the zeroes on this question, but for the most part, everyone went with obvious teams like the Lightning, Avalanche, Golden Knights and Maple Leafs, and there were lots of 5-for-5s here.

Question 2 ended up being even easier. Just about everyone went with some mix of the seven teams that had missed the expanded postseason in 2020, and all seven missed the playoffs this year too. A handful of you took teams like the Wild and Panthers, and there were some nervous moments in the first half for anyone who picked the Hawks and Kings, but otherwise, this one ended up being close to a freebie.

The bottom line for the first two questions: If you wanted to be in the running to win, you really needed to bank at least 25 of the maximum 30 points here.

3. Name up to five coaches that will definitely not be fired or otherwise leave their job before the first day of 2021 free agency.

4. Name up to five GMs that will definitely not be fired or otherwise leave their job before the first day of 2021 free agency.

Your picks had to have been hired after Jan. 1, 2020, but otherwise, you had plenty of options to choose from. And a lot of the picks that felt safe — Barry Trotz, Steve Yzerman, Jon Cooper, Joe Sakic and even Ron Francis all showed up on a ton of entries — did indeed end up being easy points. But there were a handful of big names that turned out to be entry-killers.

We had a total of six changes on the coaching side, including David Quinn (who was on about 60 entries), Claude Julien (30) and Geoff Ward (25). Only two entries in the entire contest included Rick Tocchet, although 40 of you had John Tortorella and somehow 20 had Ralph Krueger.

The GM side was more stable, with only two changes, but both were big surprises. Jim Rutherford’s resignation took out 40 entries while Jeff Gorton’s late-season firing did the most damage yet, resulting in 135 entries taking a zero on the question.

Taken together, Questions 3 and 4 were tougher than the first two, and more entrants chose to play it safe by opting for fewer than the maximum five answers. But as it turns out, this was another case where you needed to bank some big points — at least 10 per question, and preferably the full 15 — to stay in the running. Fortune favored the bold on the first four questions; if you had the full 60 points in the bank you were feeling good while taking a zero anywhere meant you were playing for pride the rest of the way.

Here’s where the contest really got started …

5. Name up to five goaltenders who will definitely start at least 60 percent of their team’s regular-season games this year.

This one basically boiled down to “Name some goalies who’ll stay healthy and keep their job” and it ended up being just about my favorite one in the contest. A goalie needed 34 starts to qualify, and with 15 names hitting that mark, almost half the league’s starters ended up being correct answers. That list included some obvious picks, including Andrei Vasilevskiy, Connor Hellebuyck, Jacob Markstrom, Jordan Binnington and John Gibson. And in fact, more than a few entries featured those exact five names, banking 15 points.

That said, there were also more than a few “obvious” picks that didn’t make the cut, and this was the first question where we saw some real carnage. Sergei Bobrovsky was responsible for way more zeroes in this contest (about 140) than he was on opponent’s scoreboards. Matt Murray took out over 100 entries, Carey Price was on the hook for over 200 and Frederik Andersen topped that with 250.

But the big name here was Carter Hart, who showed up on over 400 entries. He was pretty much the perfect illustration of what this contest was trying to remind us. Coming into the season, it seemed inconceivable that a healthy Hart wouldn’t be the Flyers’ go-to guy. He was 22 and had two very good seasons under his belt, and was backed up by creaky veteran Brian Elliott. If anything, you’d have bet on Hart to be a Vezina candidate before you’d think he’d lose his full-time starter’s job. But he did, posting awful numbers, and was going to miss our cutoff even before he was shut down due to injury at the end of the season. Sometimes, the surest of sure things don’t go the way we’re all expecting.

Question 5 may have ended up being the most important one in the contest. There were 10 or 15 points there for the taking, and plenty of you did exactly that. But most of you had at least one of Hart, Price or Andersen on your entry and took a zero that knocked you out of the running.

6. Name up to five rookies who will definitely finish in the top 10 of Calder balloting this year.

Hoo boy.

Yeah, this one was a wasteland, thanks to a lackluster season from top pick Alexis Lafrenière. He appeared on over 700 entries, one of the highest totals of any answer in the contest, and I spent the season wondering if he might show up on enough Calder ballots to crack the top 10 just based on name recognition. He didn’t end up appearing on even one.

That took out just about everyone. And of the entries that didn’t include Lafrenière, almost all were because you went conservative and only listed one or two names. I’d thought that a few of you might try a contrarian strategy where you went with five names but left off the obvious one, hoping to bank a massive edge if Lafrenière got hurt or struggled, but that didn’t really happen. And it was still a tricky category, with Ilya Sorokin also lurking as an entry-ruiner.

So points were hard to come by here. And somewhat ironically, that meant that this question didn’t end up being all that important, since almost everyone took a zero and the few who didn’t only picked up a handful of points.

7. Name up to five players who will definitely finish in the top 15 of Hart Trophy voting this year.

The top three were a bit of a gimme, with Connor McDavid finishing as the most popular entry in the entire contest with almost 800 appearances and Auston Matthews and Nathan MacKinnon also being majority picks; they ended up being the award’s three finalists. Leon Draisaitl showed up on about 250 ballots, and his eighth-place finish was good enough to bank points.

From there, things got tricky. The big hit here came from Artemi Panarin, who had a great season but missed time and his team missed the playoffs, costing about 350 entrants a zero. If you dodged him, you still had to contend with injured stars Jack Eichel (about 250) and Elias Pettersson (200), or popular picks Brayden Point, David Pastrnak and Alex Ovechkin.

If you wanted to contend, you needed points here, ideally from the Big Four of McDavid, Matthews, MacKinnon and Draisaitl. If you slipped in a fifth correct choice for extra points, all the better, but on a lot of ballots, it was that final pick that cost you a zero.

8. Name up to five players who are currently on an NHL roster that will definitely change teams between the start of the season and the end of the first day of NHL free agency.

The wording was key here — a player had to switch teams to qualify, which meant that he had to show up on a second roster at some point during the contest timeframe. You had until the end of the first day of free agency, which was last Wednesday, meaning any unsigned UFAs who were still on the market wouldn’t count. (This turns out to be important.)

Of all the questions, this was the one with the most variety as far as answers. It also had the widest spread of strategy, with some of you going for the max five names and others playing it safe with one or two. A few of you even passed, which didn’t make sense but I respect the honesty.

There did seem to be two main approaches here. The first was the focus on players who were showing up in early-season trade rumors. That paid off for anyone who listed Patrik Laine, Pierre-Luc Dubois and Jack Roslovic, who were traded for each other days into the season. (Shout out to Marcus B. and Lauri T., who had just those three on their entries and took an early lead in the contest by banking six points. The lead did not hold up.) Other names you figured were likely to be traded and that eventually paid off included Taylor Hall (the leading choice, with about 200 entries) and Kyle Palmieri (150) as well as Tyler Johnson (also almost 200) and Marc-Andre Fleury (100), although those two made you sweat until the day before the contest closed.

The second strategy involved looking toward the offseason by picking players who were assumed to be headed to free agency, or viewed as potential expansion bait. That ended up being much more hit and miss. Trying to forecast what the Kraken would do ended up being especially tricky. Not a single entry listed Mark Giordano. Philipp Grubauer and Yanni Gourde each showed up on only one, but almost 100 of you figured T.J. Oshie would be on the move. Other common picks that didn’t move included Detroit’s Marc Staal and Bobby Ryan, both at around 100 entries, as well as Derek Stepan, who signed with Carolina a few days late for the roughly 80 of you who listed him.

All in all, this was a tough question with very few perfect scores. The sweet spot was to try to bank points on three or four answers; you didn’t need the max 15 points here, but you probably needed something.

And the winner is …

First, a disclaimer: It turned out to be a huge pain in the neck to sort through all these entries, and I did the best I could. I’m pretty sure I came out with the right winners, but if you’re completely convinced that your score is better than the ones below, let me know and I’ll hook you up with a prize.

OK, first things first: With all of those potential zeroes lurking on names like Lafrenière, Panarin and Hart, did anyone actually manage to land a perfect entry that scored points on all eight questions?

Yes. As best I could tell, there was exactly one entry in the entire contest that didn’t have a single incorrect answer. It belonged to Garret E., and looked like this:

1. Playoff teams: Toronto, Tampa Bay, Vegas, Colorado, Boston (15 points)
2. Non-playoff teams: Chicago, Ottawa, Detroit, Los Angeles, New Jersey (15 points)
3. Safe coaches: Keefe, Cooper, Bednar, Trotz, Brind’Amour (15 points)
4. Safe GMs: Yzerman, BriseBois, Lamoriello, Sakic, Francis (15 points)
5. Goalies: Hellebuyck, Vasilevskiy, Gibson (6 points)
6. Rookies: Kaprizov (1 point)
7. Hart trophy: Matthews, McDavid, MacKinnon (6 points)
8. Players that will switch teams: Hall (1 point)
Total: 74 points

As you can see, Garret basically figured out a near-ideal strategy in terms of dodging wrong answers. He loaded up on the relatively easy first four questions, played it fairly safe when things got tricky on Questions 5 and 7 and did the bare minimum on the two most dangerous questions, 6 and 8, including being one of few entrants to avoid the Lafrenière trap. Add it all up, and there’s not a single miss to be found here. Brilliant work.

Except for one thing. Garret didn’t win.

While it’s perfect in terms of avoiding mistakes, his entry ends up being too conservative. With only 14 points on the back half, he leaves the door open for a more aggressive entry to pass him at the finish line.

And that’s what happened. Garret actually didn’t even land on the podium, as he finished behind a handful of entries that banked 75 points by going a perfect 5-for-5 on the first five questions before zeroing out the last three (a list that includes Bradley J., Uziel S. and Geordie P.)

But even 75 points wouldn’t have been enough. Let’s have a look at Scott D.’s entry.

1. Playoff teams: Colorado, Vegas, Tampa Bay, Toronto, Carolina (15 points)
2. Non-playoff teams: Detroit, Chicago, New Jersey, Los Angeles (10 points)
3. Safe coaches: Trotz, Cooper, Keefe, Bednar, Brind’Amour (15 points)
4. Safe GMs: Lamoriello, Francis, BriseBois, Yzerman, Sakic (15 points)
5. Goalies: Vasilevskiy, Binnington, Markstrom, Hellebuyck, Blackwood (15 points)
6. Rookies: Kaprizov, Shesterkin, Stützle (6 points)
7. Hart trophy: Eichel, Marner, Matthews, McDavid, Gaudreau (0 points)
8. Players that will switch teams: Hall, Palmieri, Johnson, Paquette, Ryan (0 points)
Total: 76 points

Scott gets off to a near-perfect start over the first four questions, although he leaves five points on the board by only going with four teams on Question 2. He hits the goalie question out of the park and is one of the few entrants to score multiple points on the rookie question. But he whiffs on the Hart thanks to Eichel and Johnny Gaudreau, and then he goes all-in on the final question, with the maximum five names. He banks the first four, then has to wait out the first day of free agency to see if Bobby Ryan would find a new home. He didn’t, meaning Scott takes a heartbreaking zero on the last question. If Ryan had signed, Scott’s impressive 76 points would have been a jaw-dropping 91.

Did that matter? It did, because of this entry from Michael M.

1. Playoff teams: Colorado, Vegas, Toronto, Tampa Bay, Boston (15 points)
2. Non-playoff teams: Detroit, Anaheim, Los Angeles, Chicago, Buffalo (15 points)
3. Safe coaches: Berube, Cassidy, Trotz, Bednar, Cooper (15 points)
4. Safe GMs: Armstrong, Lamoriello, Yzerman, Holland, Sakic (15 points)
5. Goalies: Hellebyuck, Jarry, Vasilevskiy, Binnington, Gibson (15 points)
6. Rookies: Lafrenière, Shesterkin, Kaprizov (0 points)
7. Hart trophy: McDavid, Draisatl, Mackinnon, Matthews (10 points)
8. Players that will switch teams: Dubois, Hall, Holtby (6 points)
Total: 91 points

Intentional or not, Michael pretty much nails the perfect strategy for this year’s contest. He runs the table on the first four questions. He nails the max scores on the goalies. He whiffs twice on the rookies, but it’s the one question he can afford to miss. He banks 10 points by picking the four “easy” Hart candidates and then knows to back off, avoiding everyone else. And then he tops it off with a decent score on the final question, with six points thanks to Braden Holtby’s jump to the Stars slipping in just under the wire.

It’s not perfection, but it doesn’t need to be. Michael takes the crown, winning the grand prize of two signed copies of my book and (probably far more importantly) bragging rights until next year’s contest. Michael, shoot me an email and we’ll figure out how to get you your prize.

And while he didn’t win or even come all that close, I feel like Garret should get something for being the only perfect entry. Garret, get in touch and we’ll hook you up with a consolation prize.

Thanks to everyone who entered the contest. As a first attempt, I think it went about as well as it could have. We’ll be back with a new edition in time for next season, perhaps with a few new questions and/or tweaks to the rules (and I’m open to suggestions on either front).

Until then, enjoy your offseason and start trying to figure out what’s obviously going to happen next year.

(Top photo of Connor McDavid and Leon Draisaitl: Perry Nelson / USA TODAY Sports)