If you’re a manga fan, you likely know about Weekly Shonen Jump - one of the most popular magazines in Japan, this weekly anthology of comics provided us such classics as Dragon Ball, Naruto, and One Piece. Indeed, because of the prestige of WSJ, many aspiring mangaka submit their creations to Jump, hoping they can hit it big.
However, while WSJ is popular, it is also one of the most cutthroat publications out there. Because of its size, it can usually only carry around 20 different series, excluding oneshots and the like. If your manga gets published in WSJ and doesn’t immediately become a hit, editors will cancel it as soon as possible to search for another hit instead.
Anyway, on places like manga, 4chan’s /a/ board, and Twitter, a sort of speculation started. You see, every issue of Jump has a table of contents page, which simply shows the location of each series in the issue as well as the weekly author comments. However, while the order changes from week to week, the general trend is that the most popular series are located near the front, where they’re more accessible to readers, while the less popular ones are in the back.
Of course, many editors and writers for Jump have noted that the head editor is the one who has the final say in the table of contents order, so they stress that it isn’t a barometer. However, one aspect of WSJ is that the print versions (probably digital versions too, though I haven’t checked) include a survey card in each issue - readers can submit which three chapters they enjoyed the most this week, alongside any sweepstakes offers or popularity polls. And there have been plenty of cases where a series ranks fairly high on the ToC and then suddenly drops to the bottom on chapter 8, which has led people to realize that it usually takes seven weeks to accurately tally survey results. So while it may not be 100% accurate, it allows people to speculate over which series are thriving and which are likely to be cancelled.
Case 1: The start of the U19 club
Of course, as mentioned above, the cutthroat nature of Jump means that low-performing books will be cancelled in about three to four volumes. However, at the time there was no real way to describe this phenomenon. That all changed in 2017.
See, at the time, WSJ was going through a massive series exodus. Popular series such as Bleach, Toriko, and Kochikame had all ended in 2016 (note: the latter had been running for 40 years), and Jump really needed something to prop up sales. To that end, they announced an unprecedented event where, for six weeks straight, they would add a new series in each issue. Usually, whenever series get serialized in Jump, they’re done in groups of two or three, so it was clear that WSJ was looking for at least some hits.
Enter U19, a series that made readers wonder how the hell it got approved in the first place. The premise is that adults have converted Japan into a 1984-like dystopia involving abusive discipline and selective breeding in order to strengthen the country and bring it back to its World War II-era glory. The main character finds out that his love interest has been deemed an elite student while he’s an F-rank, and when she is separated from him he develops a power called Libido, which manifests as a sewing needle that grows more powerful when he sees her. Then he is joined into the ranks of the U19 club, an underground resistance full of people under the age of 19 with similar Libidos.
The description I gave it in the previous paragraph does not do this series justice. The art was fairly amateur, the concept of Libidos were just quirks from My Hero Academia with a different name, the villains were written to be cartoonishly evil, and in general it didn’t seem like the author knew what they were doing. It quickly was cancelled after 17 chapters, but a edit of one of the spreads by a 2chan user, where the members of U19 were replaced by characters from other short-running series, eventually blossomed into a meme. From then on, the U19 club became the unofficial way to refer to any series doomed to end in less than 19 chapters. People who saw the TOC rankings would soon gravitate to the bottom of the list, speculating over which series were likely to join the club.
Case 2: The battle of the gag manga
Okay, when I mentioned the idea of the table of contents, there was one part I glossed over. While the lower-ranked series were almost doomed to fail, for a couple of years the last series to be featured in the ToC would usually be a small comedy series. The idea being that no matter how unsettling or uncomfortable the rest of the books are, at the very least the magazine will always end on a happy note. For the longest time, this position was filled by Isobe Isobee Monogatari, but then it ended in 2017.
So in a September 2018 issue, to the surprise of everyone, two gag series premiered in the same issue at the same time. The first, I’m From Japan, was about a young boy who is obsessed with the various prefectures of Japan and uses them in fighting styles. The second, Teenage Renaissance David, reimagined the Michelangelo sculpture as a hot-blooded high school student. It was clear that Jump was hedging its bets on a new gag series to be their mainstay, but the question was: which one?
There was obviously a regional gap for this issue. Japanese fans were more likely to enjoy I’m From Japan, simply because the various puns and in-jokes made more sense to them. Western fans found Teenage Renaissance David better, because the classical art references were more familiar. What compounded the issue even more is that every issue, the two series would switch places - one would be in the middle of the magazine, while the other would be near the bottom. Compounding this issue was the unbelievable fact that in December of the same year, I’m From Japan was confirmed to have an anime in development (for reference, most Shonen Jump manga only get an anime greenlighted after at least a year of serialization, while IFJ had only been around for a few months at best - meaning an anime was planned before the series even started).
While western fans were in disbelief, people soon came to the realization of why IFJ was promoted over David - tourism. The fact was that IFJ basically had every chapter talk about the top exports, notable attractions, and famous people of each Japanese prefecture - which made it perfect in terms of advertising people to go to those prefectures in question. Ultimately, Teenage Renaissance David ended after 35 chapters, while I’m From Japan was transferred to sister magazine Saikyo Jump... only to end after 45 chapters. In the end, nobody won, although the author of Isobe recently started a new serialization that may become the new gag series.
Case 3: Chew Harder - The Tale of Samurai 8
While most of the titles I’ve been talking about so far have been obscure, you most likely know about Naruto. The ninja manga was published in Jump in 1999, and author Masashi Kishimoto made it into a massive work spanning over 70 volumes and 15 years. It’s arguably one of the most popular series to have ever ran in Jump.
So it was surprising to hear that after Naruto ended, Kishimoto noted that he actually had plans for a new series. In late 2018, more information came out - his new publication would be called Samurai 8: The Tale of Hachimaru, and it would be a science fiction title centered around cybernetic samurai. Notably, due to wanting a break from drawing, he would only write the series while one of his former assistants, Akira Obuko, would be doing the art.
Considering that such a famous author would be writing another series, Jump immediately went to advertising S8 however it could. Animated YouTube ads done months before the series actually started, expansive murals in subways, even putting pamphlets of the first chapter in other Jump manga. While it had done some promotional acts for other manga before, it was on a completely different level with Samurai 8. In essence, they were setting it up to be one of the core pillars of Jump before it even started.
And then the series actually started. While some people were optimistic, others noted that it wasn’t exactly a good start for the series. From the first chapter alone, the reader is bombarded with samurai lore that would honestly be better suited for explanation across chapters rather than in a massive exposition dump. The plot also became more complex - while the first chapter of Naruto framed the conflict as a plucky young ninja possessed by a demonic nine-tailed fox wanting to become the head of his village, the first chapter of Sam8 framed the conflict as a sickly young boy who wants to become a samurai, only to suddenly get a cybernetic body after committing seppuku and then he is told by a blind samurai master in a cat’s body that he must find the seven keys to Pandora’s Box, an artifact that could endanger the whole galaxy. The artstyle used to portray cybernetics made pages look cluttered, which made fight scenes difficult to understand.
In essence, while Samurai 8 had the prestige of being written by the author of Naruto, everything else seemed to be changed - not necessarily for the better. Compounding this were two separate facts. The first is that when the first and second volumes of the series were released simultaneously (another marketing stunt to encourage binge reading), Kishimoto wrote in the first volume that he would compare reading Samurai 8 to chewing dried squid - if the flavor doesn’t come out, just chew some more (i.e. buy the second volume, I swear things will get better I promise). The second was an interview with one of the former editors of Naruto, which revealed that many of the most popular parts of Naruto were editor suggestions rather than Kishimoto’s own work. Compounding this was an interview with the Samurai 8 editor, who seemed to revere Kishimoto; this made fans believe that he wasn’t policing Kishimoto’s work as much, similar to how George Lucas made the original Star Wars trilogy with the help of various editor suggestions and then the prequel trilogy with virtually no supervision.
The effects were noticeable. In 4chan, it became a meme to refer to Kishimoto’s chewing comment whenever Samurai 8 was discussed. TOC-wise, it dropped in the rankings until it was almost always near the bottom. Sales were night and day compared to Naruto, and ultimately, after the constant promotions over other WSJ series, Samurai 8 ended after five volumes and 45 chapters. Which seems okay enough until you realize that I’m From Japan, of all series, was compiled into six volumes.
Case 4: Time Plagiarism Ghostwriter
In May 2020, the same issue when one of Jump’s more popular series Demon Slayer ended, a new series called Time Paradox Ghostwriter started.
The premise of it went like this: An amateur author whose manga has been rejected by publishers constantly gets his microwave struck by a bolt of lightning, which turns it into a time machine. When he opens it up, he sees that it contains a copy of Weekly Shonen Jump from ten years in the future. Upon seeing that its premiere series, White Knight, is the perfect manga, but believing it to be a dream, he copies the first chapter the following day and sends it to his editor, who immediately greenlights it as a series. Suddenly the amateur author must contend with the high expectations pushed onto him - as well as the original author of White Knight, who is surprised that someone else has used her idea.
Maybe it was because of the premise alone. Maybe it was because it was one of the few Jump manga out there which didn’t fall into the typical conventions of being a battle, sports, or gag manga. Either way, TPGW immediately became popular in the west, with many people talking about how they love it. Many were immediately convinced that TPGW could immediately become a top seller for Japan. So, seven weeks after the first chapter, people were eager to see the first ratings for the series - only for it to debut in the bottom half of the magazine and drop lower every issue afterward.
People were surprised, to say the least. Why was a series with such an amazing premise flopping? Pretty soon, people came to a conclusion as to why this was happening: plagiarism. More specifically, in a magazine primarily aimed at young boys, the first few chapters tried to justify the main character plagiarizing White Knight and still paint him as a good guy, by having people constantly tell him that so many people are in love with WK and it would be a disservice to stop now. Even the original author, after meeting the main character, writes off the similar plot between his White Knight and hers as a fluke. And given how the Kyoto Animation Fire, one of the worst mass murders in Japan’s modern history, was caused because someone thought KyoAni had stolen their idea, it makes sense that people would be hesitant to like a series which pushes all of its consequences to the side.
So anyway, the first volume of TPGW was released, compiling all the magazine chapters while removing any reference to plagiarism in the text itself. Even then, it sold terribly. The author quickly tried to pick up the pace of their manga, glazing over plot points and moving the story at a breakneck pace, but it was too little too late. The series ended in only 15 chapters - unusual for Jump, as even more recent U19 series have gotten more time before getting axed. People were upset, claiming that Japan just didn’t have as good of a taste as the west and being upset that the previously-mentioned gag manga by Isobe’s author was immediately started the week after. So yeah, people were upset.
Anyway, that’s the long and short of some notable instances of Jump drama. I could add in some more stuff, like the quick cancelling of Act-Age or the drama surrounding mangaka like Kentaro Yabuki and Haruto Ikezawa, but I’ve written enough as is.

Elephants on the Field: Week 2

Elephants

Winning at fantasy means making predictions and acting on them prior to other players. To do that, you don't always have the privileges of hindsight and deduction. You will need foresight and inference. I hope to offer a some good if not somewhat inferential arguments for why some early moves on this weekly (if I have time) post.
Fantasy thinking is often over-obsessed with statistical correlations at the expense of firm causal understanding of what is happening on the field. The forest is often lost for the trees. A combination of understanding the game of football, recognizing interconnected changes that will influence teams, and eye testing the games themselves is the best antidote to the groupthink, herd-mentality of fantasy football expertism which, time and again, proves spotty at best in anticipating changes.
Last week I posted this as "Eye-tested Takes" but I realized that's not what I was aiming for. A variety of posters and services watch the whole game and give you maximally thorough takes on every snap. I won't offer much of an opinion on players/teams I don't watch. I'll always watch enough. However, a lot of what I'll make as the case for picking up (or dropping) a player will be based on obvious things that are happening that rankings-myosis may miss.
There's always an elephant in the room that no one want's to acknowledge. This post gives fantasy advice that accounts for the elephants on the field.

Things I'm right about (so far):

1. Rivers Noodle Arm = Colts Lean into Jonathon Taylor:

With the quality of that offensive line, Mack going down, and Rivers looking like shit, Jonathon Taylor may end-up being a top-5 back this year. TY Hilton and Parris Campbell are going to disappoint you.

A bunch of commenters disagreed, insisting Hines was the guy to get and Taylor as a top-5 was nuts. This is an instance of the eye-test making people too smart. Yes, Taylor netted 22 yards on 9 carries week 1. Who cares, he was great in college (larger sample size) and more importantly, Rivers looks SOOO spent that Taylor is the only obvious bell-cow RB for what is probably the best O-line in the league. You want that. Rivers threw it 25 times in week two (down from 44). Taylor had 26 carries, 2 receptions, 110 yards, and 1 touchdown. It was obvious what had to happen in Indy but fantasy groupthink herded everyone toward Hines.
If you had the audacity to ignore me on this (/s), the good news is there's still time. His trade value has skyrocketed on most charts but he's not quite valued as a top back yet. If you get the feel someone is under-valuing him, don't wait longer because his first 2 TD game is going to make him inaccessible in a trade. The Colts defense is also looking good enough to maintain a lead throughout a game, opening-up more run play calls. (Rivers sucking is going to do that all the time anyway).
And if you still don't believe me, watch his highlights from this week and you'll see why he could be such a focal point. He does a lot of things that coaches like to lean-into: great ball security, adds 2-3 yards to the end of runs, explosive speed when he has big holes.
2.Browns Offense is fine:

Don't panic about the Browns offense. Baker Mayfield looked like trash but the running offense actually looked pretty good at times...Stefanski is the guy you need to believe in... The biggest takeway from the game isn't the Browns offense is bad, its that the Ravens defense is great.

Both Browns running back scored multiple TD's and registered more than 150 yards each week 2. Baker continued to suck and it didn't matter. Stefanski's offense is good and his coaching career is a testament to his talent. All-Ivy-League Football Player. First coaching job was in the NFL. They wouldn't let him leave for 14 years because they knew he was a talent.
So don't run from Chubb or Hunt yet. And if you have them both, start them both and don't feel bad (unless you have a clearly better option like Zeke too...then probably favor starting Kareem Hunt the larger your ppr value, but its a tough call). The Browns are a perfect storm that make both startable: (a) Both Chubb and Hunt have top-5 rb talent and it comes across when you watch them on the field. With good combinations of strength and speed, each one is TD risk on every snap. (b) Sefanski divides snaps very well. Both are getting touches-a-plenty. They just signed they're "back-up" RB to a new contract (I mean, how often does that happen in the modern NFL?). KS also divides snaps by drive, unless a drive gets very long, so even if Chubb is doing well, he's going to give Kareem Hunt a whole drive. (c) starting both is fading Baker which is smart. The Browns are going to increasingly realize that their offense is more effective with Baker doing less. They may even move to Case Keenum (their back-up, legit didn't know that last week) and that's fine for Chubb/Hunt.
I wouldn't run from OBJ or Jarvis Landry yet either, though Baker's ineptitude has got to make you worry. Think about what Minnesota offenses did over the years with Diggs, Theilen, etc. Both OBJ and Landry are going to be solid bets for big-play TD's (like OBJ's last Thursday) here and there but likely not breaking the top-10. Still, the talent ceiling is high with both so a buy-low scenario where you get them in a trade could pay-off if you bet on Stefanski more than Mayfield.
3. Deandre Hopkins is the WR1

Deandre Hopkins will be the #1 fantasy receiver this year... And most importantly, the offensive situation in Arizona is the perfect storm for his fantasy situation. Kyler Murray is good, but he's not working his way through progressions yet.

Hopkins nabbed a TD but only had 9 targets this week. I'll admit that I only watched Kyler Murray's highlights so forgive me if its there and I didn't see it, buuuuut...He's not completing passes to 2nd and 3rd reads. Its one read then run. That's great for Hopkins' stats because the further into the season they get, the MORE Hopkins is going to be involved on plays designed to chuck it to him, no matter what. Hopkins is one of those guys that's always open, and Kyler is a smart player who knows that AND knows he's not good enough yet to start looking for someone else if Hopkins is "covered". That may hurt the Cardinals at some point. But Hopkins is getting fed this season.
And obviously, a rash of injuries at WR has made this look to be a better prediction. Hopkins is already a stud in that offense and he's still learning it. His stock is only going up from here.
Its true the WR's new offenses typically do poorly. A couple of reasons why that's not true of Hopkins: (a) he's physically the most gifted receiver in the league. Randy Moss kicked ass his first year with the Patriots. Some players are talented enough that it doesn't take time, as long as they're smart as hell like Randy Moss or (b) Hopkins is an intelligent dude. He negotiated his own contract and didn't fuck it up. He wants to be G.M. Big brained guy, he'll pick up quickly. You can see that on the field, he's constantly looking back at Kyler to make sure he did the right thing on each play. (c) HOF'er in the WR room: Fitz will get him up to speed fast.
Quick note about Kyler Murray: He's tearing it up. One encouraging thing that you might not see how little he's allowing himself to be tackled. As a fantasy owner, that's encouraging because it suggests he can sustain a high running floor and not get injured. And there's an added assurance that he's putting those slides for zero yards (for example) on tape because the coaches see that too and are more willing to call more of those plays down the stretch. Still, I wouldn't compare him to Lamar Jackson last season yet. Lamar Jackson was throwing TD's to his 4th and 5th read in week 1 against the Dolphins last season. Murray may hit a scheme ceiling where defenses, especially good ones, start to take away his 1 and 2 and contain his run game (though it is strong and he has good vision).

Things I was totally wrong about: zero things!

HA! Next section!

Things I'm not right about yet but pretty soon I will be:

1. Joe Burrow AJ Green is going to be good.

If you watch the game, you see Joe Burrow fitting the ball into tight windows in clutch situations. In fact, he wasn't finding a lot of open receivers, he was throwing the ball well/correctly into great coverage and making lemonade. Also, AJ Green is looking fully healthy and like his old self.

Well, AJ Green was targeted 13 times and caught...3 of those passes for 29 yards. So clearly, the chemistry between them was oversold by me last week. Still, 13 targets is encouraging and so is the Bengals inability to run the ball. No matter how much they try, they're wretched run-blocking always leaves them down late in games and in 3rd-and-forever situations. They just let a rookie throw it 61 times.
Another consideration is that Denzel Ward was covering Green all night:

A.J. Green has had an up-and-down career vs. the Browns. Thursday’s game was on the down side, and it had mostly to do with Denzel Ward.
Green had three catches for 29 yards. Overall, Ward broke up three passes against the Bengals. And according to Next Gen Stats, Ward was making life difficult for Joe Burrow all night, forcing eight tight window passes in 11 targets as the nearest defender.

Green is still pretty low on trade value charts but stands to have a huge upside as Burrow's primary target.
2. Rodgers is back.

...are there really any physical traits that are important to his game that would fade significantly at 36 year's old? I didn't see any missing zip off of his throws. I did see fucking darts getting tossed all over the field into tiny windows.

Aaron Jones is the #1 fantasy RB right now so obviously saying Rodgers is fully back is pre-mature. However, he is impressing with some very, very pretty darts.
Also, the elephant on the field for the Packers is that Aaron Rodgers is a player driven by ego. Not a knock on him, he's just a guy who needs mojo to play at his finest. Maybe it required the stimulation of an insulting draft pick to prod him back into his HOF form. I'm not saying Rodgers can be a top 3 QB this year with Jackson and Murray running so well, but 4 or 5 doesn't seem out of reach.
Rodgers is pff top-graded QB right now btw.

Fresh takes:

1.The Ravens are the best defense in the NFL.
The loss of Earl Thomas is doesn't matter as much as what has been gained with Patrick Queen and L.J. Fort. Queen is incredibly fast and explosive underneath, getting into the backfield and making big plays. And L.J. Fort (top rated pff lb right now) combine to give them rangey-coverage, tackling, and pass break-up ability over the middle they didn't have before which has further weaponized they're depth at CB (Humphrey, Peters, Smith). Peters specifically is a ball hawk that's found a great home in Baltimore; he couldn't scheme well anywhere else but Harbaugh has found a way to give him the freedom to ball hawk. Over the long haul, Harbaugh has maintained a great defense, regardless of departures/changes, for years and years. When he has this much talent, his defenses are typically dominant.
Be warry of starting iffy players against them at any position.
They're worth trading for, I think the turnovedef TD potential makes them worth it.
2. J.K. Dobbins will break-out out as the preferred option in the Ravens backfield.
Mark Ingram and Gus Edwards have both proven to be reliable RB's for the Raven offense. But Ingram is 30 with over 200 carries in 3 of the last 4 seasons. Edwards has been reliable, a home-grown UDFA. But at 238lbs and without elite speed, he's leaving many big runs on the table.
Dobbins didn't attend the combine. But ran a 4.44 40...in high school:

Dobbins posted a 4.44s 40-yard dash, 4.09s short shuttle and a 43.1-inch vertical jump as a high school senior at the event. There are also many reports that Dobbins squatted over 700 pounds.

He has power running balance and break-out speed that NONE of the other backs in Baltimore have. 4th rounder Justice Hill was their attempt of to develop that speed last year but didn't break out.
A couple of elephants make this one a good bet:
(a) Lamar's durability -- right now, he's taking a bunch of carries because he's the only one in their backfield that has the speed to break huge runs. If Dobbins can fill that role, Lamar Jackson can afford to take fewer chances and John Harbaugh can opt to only drop him back to pass 7 times in the second half when they're winning, like what happened in week 2.
(b) that defense -- Baltimore's defense is going to be great enough this year to take over games, making steady doses of run plays inevitable as they'll spend a lot of games up by 2 scores. Yes, they were up like that a lot last year but their only homerun hitter in the backfield was Lamar (see above, Justice Hill wasn't getting it done).
Here's an example: this is a shot from Gus Edwards' 22 yard scamper last week:

https://preview.redd.it/mhhhpzmkrxo51.png?width=1920&format=png&auto=webp&s=3cdf46ac4bcce3e503729f909c0e787f85459eb9
The Ravens offensive line is good at opening holes like this. While it didn't prove important in this game (BAL was up 30-16 at the time), each run like this where a more explosive player could scored is an opportunity cost for the people calling plays. And its not just points left behind, its points scored while Lamar is watching like a fan. Its points that could allow more aggressive defensive play calling. If you're a coach for Baltimore, you don't necessarily want Lamar to have a gaudy stat-line every week if you're winning. If he can throw 16 passes in a game and then sit-out the 4th quarter, that's ideal from the franchise's perspective (though not so much for Fantasy managers). Each Ingram/Edwards run that coulda been a touchdown means there's more time on the field for Lamar, larger portion of the game where they're not playing a dominant lead, and higher chance that they'll lose because points were left on the field. They need someone else hitting home runs in the running game.
Am I fading Lamar because of all of this? Not yet. Eye test = that guy is a singular talent. His throwing motion is smooth like Vick's, just a gifted, effortless release. He's also great at mostly avoiding contact (though all contact is bad contact if you're his coaches). Great decision maker too. Makes multiple reads on plays. Can't say enough about how great of player he is. Still, Baltimore is well put-together enough that they may be able to functionally win without him. So don't be surprised if, especially approaching the playoffs, Baltimore starts calling plays that don't involve as much Lamar. What's scary is that they may be a complete football team without him and he's the reigning MVP.
Finally, Dobbins had two carries last week. One was for a 44 yard gain where the blocking was good but not nearly as good as the image above. Even if the transition to him isn't fast, he could force the issue like Chubb did his rookie year, gaining 100 yards on 3 carries in a game.
No matter what, the Ravens will run by committee but there will come a point where the player to start out of the trio is Dobbins without a doubt.
3. Minshew is the truth and his team situation makes him a great fantasy player.
Minshew isn't the most talented QB in the league. But above all things, he is competitive and scrappy. The Jags are good but not great so he's going need a lot of that scrappy-iness (lol, just say that sentence out loud, you'll hear it). James Robinson is very good and they're going to lean on him a lot. But when the time for much needed yards and points, it seems like the Jags tag Gardner Minshew II's Id in at offensive coordinator. Minshew isn't likely going to be top-5 qb but he might make the top 10 and is likely easier to get than other top targets.
Part of the reason DJ Chark isn't getting the production folks hoped is because Minshew is effectively spreading the ball around. Good for the jags, bad for fantasy owners. I wouldn't panic.
One of his targets I picked-up to stash is Laviska Shenault Jr. He's getting a legit number of carries each week and averaging over 10 yards per reception. He's an interesting pick-up because he doubles as handcuffs for Robinson. Seems like his carry count could go up to 10ish no problem if the Jags lost Robinson. So pay attention to what position he's listed in your league, scoring rules about how carries count in ppr, etc. But he passes the eye test, very shifty and fast on the field.
4. Teams that are quickly turning into dumpster fires that you should across-the-board fade:
Jets
Gase is the worst. Never underestimate the ability of a shitty boss to ruin a workspace and make everyone fucking hate themselves, even though they're well compensated to play a game for a living. Listen, I know there's always gems on bad teams. But I have high blood pressure. So tuning into games with players I need to play well and watching the offense go 3-and-out 5 times in a row...I'm literally too old for that shit now so I try to stray-away from dumpster fire teams.
Vikings
Kubiak has got some big Stefanski shoes to fill and he's doing a bad job so far. I wouldn't panic about Dalvin Cook yet but another bad couple of weeks and I'd start shopping him. See the Browns thing above: Stefanski may have made the Vikings offense look better than it actually was for a decade. Combine that with the defense whose secondary would be better if they were scare crows and you're looking at a team that can't plan to run the ball for more than a quarter or 2.
Teams to be worried about:
Broncos
Whew, the injuries. They're basically just starting with new team. We'll see how things go.
Detroit
Matt Patricia may have lost this team. And coaches like him don't recover team faith/confidence well in a loss-spiral.
Texans
BoB is going to crash that plane into a mountain while we all watch. Poor Watson, just watching Deandre Hopkins ball-out. One thing you can still bet on for awhile out of the Texans offense; Bill O'Brien is ego- and career-invested in David Johnson doing great things. He'll role with him when he shouldn't to prove to everyone that he was right to trade Nuk. Its dumb. But he's dumb.

Fortune Favors The Bold (FFTB) Predictions

WARNING: What you're about to read is not necessarily good fantasy advice, but things for me to say "told you so" about a week from now. I take no responsibility for any money you lose (and all responsibility for the money you win). Still, Alexander the Great said, Fortune Favors the Bold.

JK Dobbins scores more fantasy points than CEH this week. (This prediction is backed-up by the time-honored tradition of spitting in one's hand and shaking on it so this shit is serious. Its also painful because I'm a Chiefs fan.)
Laviska Shenault scores a running and a receiving touchdown tonight.
Jonathon Taylor is the RB1 this week and its not close.
Danny Dimes throws 3 TD's this week against the 49ers.

I'm probably wrong about most of this shit but FORTUNE FAVORS THE BOLD!

Thanks for reading! If I continue to be kind mostly right and people find it a good read, I'll keep posting these each week. Good luck!

EDIT: Thanks for the awards and upvotes strangers! I'll bring the column back next week. Appreciate the comments too, thanks for the banter, shit-talk, and criticism. I'll be spittin in palms again soon.
EDIT AGAIN: Thanks again for the feedback. This is fun and I'm going to enjoy doing it again next week. Some of the comments have suggested that the post doesn't really go out on many limbs. I'll do that more in the future. I've also added an extra section with a few "FFTB predictions" for this week.

Unpopular Opinion: The Sharks are going to compete this season

Nintendo's missing franchises and their chances of coming to Switch (long read)

“I want X for Switch”, “when is X coming to the Switch”, “X is perfect for the Switch!” How often have you heard or said these sentences? Quite a lot, probably, especially about Nintendo franchises. Nintendo fans really like first-party games, and they’re always asking for their favorites to come back. Problem is, even though Nintendo owns dozens of franchises, there’s only a few that are guaranteed to show up during any given console, so fans of smaller franchises are left wondering when they’ll play them again.
Well, today I’ll try to mostly answer these questions. I’ll take a look at several, Nintendo-owned franchises and try to figure out what are their chances of coming to Switch. I’ll be basing myself on this such as release schedule, success of previous entries, popular demand, market niche and internal interest at Nintendo.
However, keep in mind two things. One: Nintendo owns a shit-ton of IPs, and I won’t cover them all. I’ll focus on the ones that have multiple entries, and even then, I might skip a few if I feel I have no meaningful insight.
And two: No matter what I or anyone else says, the chances for any of these games to come back is NOT ZERO. Nintendo is unpredictable and they’ll sometimes bring something out of the blue when you least expect it. This year alone we saw the return of Brain Age (a franchise not seen since 2012), Clubhouse Games (a sequel to a game from 2005), and Famicom Detective Club, a franchise with two games from 1988/89, which then received a remake in 1998 and then nothing until twenty two years later. Granted, it’s another remake, but it is still a modern installment in a franchise twenty two years dormant. If Famicom Detective Club can come back in 2020, so can your favorite franchise. Now, let’s begin, in alphabetical order:
Art Academy
Starting off with a small one. Art Academy is a series of drawing games that started on the DS in 2010 and then released pretty consistently over the following years, with three entries on 3DS and two (well, one and a half) for the WiiU between 2010 and 2016. Already this feels like a franchise with a pretty consistent release schedule, even though it hasn’t been seen for four years now. I don’t think any of the games were blockbusters, per se, but they also don’t need to be. They’re small games, probably inexpensive to produce that seem to do consistently well enough to get new sequels.
There are several obstacles that present themselves to the release of a new Art Academy, but I think all of them are easily overcome. For starters, AA is the type of casual game that thrived during the DS/Wii eras, a Touch Generations game. Since the Switch released, many have noted that Nintendo may want to distance themselves from that era due to the failure of the WiiU, and there may be some truth to that, but I feel like this is starting to change. Again, this year saw the return of both Brain Age and Clubhouse Games, both casual, Touch Generations DS games. I feel like, at the start of the Switch’s life cycle, Nintendo was indeed trying to focus on core gamers, but now that they have secured that core gamer audience, they may be more comfortable releasing more casual fare.
Furthermore Art Academy is developed by Headstrong Games, a British developer that doesn’t seem to do much other than AA. However, in 2017, that team was absorbed into its parent studio, Kuju Games. This move, which happened the year after the last AA game released, may have something to do with the franchsie’s MIA status. But, Kuju games is still active, having released a game just last year, and I don’t see why they couldn’t take up the mantle.
Finally, some speculated a few years ago that AA was dead due to the Switch not having a stylus but, OH WAIT, Brain Age fixed that too!
All in all, even though Art Academy is hardly a hot franchise, there’s very little standing in the way of its return, and little reason to doubt that it will.
Chances: Good
Chibi-Robo!
We may have started on a positive note, but here comes a downer. Chibi-Robo is probably not coming back anytime soon. This cute little robot debuted in his self-titled Game Cube game, developed by Skip Ltd. Like most games by the developer, it was quirky and fun, and not very popular, but had its fans, and Chibi-Robo must have endeared someone at Nintendo, because he kept showing up here and there. He got two DS sequels, though the second one was Japan-only, already a red flag. In 2013, he starred in a 3DS eshop game that was very different from the main games, more of an experimental spin-off, and was not well-received.
But the real final nail came in 2015, with Chibi-Robo Zip Lash! The game was announced to be a 2D platformer, and many fans identified the change in genre (from a unique adventure game to one of the most over-saturated genres in Nintendo consoles) as a total sell-out, and they were totally correct! The developers basically admitted that they did it to try and get more players (red flag). Series producer Kensuke Tanabe then said that if the game didn’t sell well, it could be the end of the franchise (RED FLAG). And then, the unfortunate but inevitable happened. Zip Lash was a critical and commercial bomb, and neither the developer nor the franchise has been seen again. Aside from the inevitable Smash Bros mentions, Chibi-Robo has only been seen on that infamous flaming tweet from 2018 (I told you someone at Nintendo really likes them). To make matters worse, there are increasing signs that Skip Ltd may be going under
So, a struggling franchise makes a desperate move to gain fans, a developer expresses concerns for its future if the game bombs, said game bombs and now the developer may be going out of business? It seems the writing is on the wall.
Now, even if Skip goes under, that is not necessarily the end of Chibi. Nintendo would still retain the rights, as they did for Trace Memory and Hotel Dusk after developer Cing went under. As for whether or not Nintendo would want to give the franchise a second (third? Fourth?) chance, it doesn’t look good
Chances: Very bad
Custom Robo
From one diminutive robot to another, the Custom Robo series is and robo-battle series that began on the N64. It was Japan only, as was its N64 and GBA sequels. Afterwards, Nintendo did try to expand it, releasing a GameCube game in NA, and a DS game in NA and Europe. However, despite the fact that players of these games will attest to how good these games are, they didn’t seem to do very well, and the franchise has not been seen since 2007.
There was one statement of internal interest, when a developer in 2014 said that he heard demands both inside and outside the company for a new entry, but that there were no plans for one, and he was unsure when there would be. Six years on, it seems there still aren’t. In fact, the developer itself, Noise, is also strangely MIA. Though they are officially still active, with their website being updated for 2020, they have not worked on a game since 2015.
Then, in 2018, many fans watched in horror the news that Nintendo let the trademark expire. Some have pointed out that this isn’t as bad as it seems, as it refers specifically to games on optical discs, which Nintendo doesn’t make anymore, but I don’t know enough about the subject to say for certain. Regardless, it’s evident that Nintendo still owns the franchise, as Custom Robo content appears in Smash Ultimate.
On the other hand, one of the series creators, Kohji Kendoh, is still thinking about it. He is working for another developer, and released a suspiciously similar game called Synaptic Drive just this year, as well as talking about Custom Robo in social media. It seems like a Mighty no9/ Yooka-Laylee/Bloodstained situation, in which the owner of an Ip is not using it, so the creator releases a spiritual successor.
Bottom line, there seems to be demand for Custom Robo. A developer saw it six years ago, and the creator is seeing it now. Whether or not thinks this demand is enough to revive the franchise, is tough to say, but doesn’t look great.
Not as bad as Chibi-Robo, though
Chances: Bad
Daigasso! Band Brothers
Here’s a franchise Americans never got. Daigasso! Band Brother is a rhythm game released for the DS in 2004 and stars Barbara the Bat, who has an uncharacteristically risqué design for Nintendo. The game was Japan-only but seems to have been successful, it received a sequel in 2009 (released in Europe, but not NA), and another in 2013 for the 3DS. Despite not having received new games since then, the series is far from inactive. Barbara the Bat in particular, like Chibi-Robo, seems to have fans inside Nintendo because she pops up everywhere. She had cameos in a few other DS games, she was an AT in Brawl and a spirit in Ultimate, she was a costume in Mario Maker, she appeared in a comic strip with WarioWare’s Ashley, and the series has a Twitter account that was super active all the way up to April of this year (more on that later). In 2017, that account even tweeted a comic strip of Barbara demanding a Switch. That was probably not a tease of anything, as it’s been 3 years and nothing, but stuff has happened with the franchise even more recently.
Last year, in 2019, six years after the release of the 3DS game, there were 30 songs added to the game in celebration of the series 15th anniversary. So as late as last year, Nintendo was celebrating this franchise with an in-game event. Now, the servers for the game were shut down earlier this year (hence the end of the Twitter account), and the game was removed from the eshop (as it is basically pointless without the servers), but with recent news that the 3DS has ceased production, it’s pretty clear that the game’s end is a consequence of the 3DS’ end, and not a lack of players. So if the series is alive, but can’t be on the 3DS, it has to go somewhere, no? Bottom line: the games are successful, the series is active, and the character is popular. I don’t know if Barbara the Bat’s next tour will be an international one, but I’m confident it will happen
Chances: Very Good
Dillon’s Rolling Western
DRW is a unique western-themed tower defense game released on the 3DS eshop in 2012. It received mixed reviews, but had a dedicated fanbase, and was successful enough to spawn two sequels, one in 2013, and a post-apocalyptic themed one in 2018. With a game having released just two years ago, its reasonable to say the series is not dormant, so the prospect of a new game is always likely. The developer, Vanpool, who mostly works on smaller scale stuff like this, is both still active and still working at Nintendo.
So, really the only reason to believe the series wouldn’t continue would be if the latest game bombed really hard. It’s hard to say that it did, as sales figures are unavailable, but it was a 3DS game in 2018, probably didn’t set the charts on fire. But then again, unless Nintendo had some really unrealistically high expectations, I don’t think it could have bombed hard enough to kill the franchise that fast.
There’s not much more to say. There aren’t any rumblings of a return, but also no reason to be pessimistic.
Chance: Above Average
Earthbound
Let’s make one thing perfectly clear: There will not be a Mother 4
The Creator of the series, Shigesato Itoi, has said that he would not work on a fourth installment, as he feels the story is complete. Now, normally, Nintendo could just say “screw creative integrity, let’s make a fourth game anyway!” but Shigesato Itoi directly co-owns the series’ copyright so they actually can’t. So unless Itoi changes his mind, or he dies and Nintendo decides to ignore his wishes (neither scenario is completely outside the realm of possibility), Mother 4 is not happening.
So, if new Mother content is made, it’d be either a remake, or Mother 3 localization. We all know demand for this last one is overwhelming, Nintendo themselves have acknowledged it multiple times, but it still hasn’t happened, and it doesn’t seem things have changed. A remake is possible, but don’t hold your breath for it.
Despite the series’ popularity, I think all we’ll see of it is the first two games in NSO.
Chances: Bad
Excitebike
This is a hard one to pinpoint. Excitebike is one of those classic NES games that Nintendo likes to reference all the time, like Ice Climber, Balloon Fight, Wrecking Crew and Duck Hunt. Unlike those, Excitebike actually received sequels and established a franchised. There was a great entry on the N64 and three entries on the Wii, but nothing more since. I can’t imagine the Wii entries were super successful, and there really hasn’t been any word from Nintendo about any interest in reviving the series, either from developers, or the fans. The developer of the Wii games, Monster Games, is still active, and still makes racing games and extreme sports games, but hasn’t worked with Nintendo in 5 years.
Now, one point I see often, and that I’d like to address, is the idea that Nintendo doesn’t want multiple games from the same genre on the same console. I can’t agree. With the exception of the WiiU, every Nintendo home console since the SNES has had multiple Nintendo-published racing games released for it. WiiU didn’t but that console is an exception to many norms. I don’t see why Mario Kart, behemoth that it is, would stop any other racing game from being made, especially when they are so very different (although the fact that MK8 has an Excitebike track doesn’t inspire confidence).
No, I don’t think Mario Kart is the problem, I think is just lack of interest. And though Excitebike is not a franchise Nintendo will ever truly forget, it’s not really revving up for a comeback either. It could happen, it could not
Chances: Medium
Fatal Frame
This horror franchise wasn’t originally a Nintendo product, being released on the PS2 by Tecmo. However, since the fourth game, each title in the series has been published and copyrighted by Nintendo, and this seemingly applies to all future entries, as the series producer said the series’ future is up to Nintendo. So, how does that future look like?
Well, the last game in the series, Maiden of Black Water, was a WiiU game, which means it didn’t sell well, but not as badly as you might think. From all I could find, which is admittedly not much, sales for the game seemed to be only slightly less than previous entries, a gap more than explainable by its console. So, if the series was getting sequels before, the WiiU game’s sales wouldn’t be the reason why there wouldn’t be more. And though Nintendo of America has had to take baby steps into accepting the franchise overseas, Nintendo of Japan seemed satisfied with it, releasing four games between 2008 and 2014.
So sales aren’t an evident problem, what about the developer? That developer is Tecmo Koei, who is not only active and buddies with Nintendo, their current project is none other than Nintendo’s big holiday title. There’s obvious trust there. As for interest, there is a lot. From Koei Tecmo calling it a valuable IP, to the series producer stating multiple times, including this year, that he’d like to bring it to the Switch
Now, this comment pretty much confirms that a new Fatal Frame is not in development as of now, but it has a chance of happening. And remember, the last game is on WiiU, and if we know anything about those, is that they like to come to Switch. And though I don’t see Nintendo breaking their necks to make a new entry, I don’t think they’d oppose it if Tecmo pitches it to them, especially if it’s just a port.
Chances: Good
Fossil Fighters
This game is not Pokémon, or so its fans tell me. Fossil Fighters is a DS game from 2008 where you collect various species of dinosaur and battle with other ~Dinosaur Trainers~ Fossil Fighters in RPG battles. It didn’t receive great reviews, but was successful enough to get a sequel two years later, and another one on the 3DS in 2014. Three games in six years is a pretty good release schedule, and things were looking alright, until that 3DS game came. It was primarily developed by a different studio, and it showed. The game received abysmal reviews, and fan reception was similar. Sales weren’t awful, but not great either.
Since then, the series has been completely quiet. The developer, Red Entertainment, is still active, but hasn’t worked with Nintendo since the 3DS game. As for interest, there hasn’t been a peep from Nintendo about this series at all. No interviews describing vague interest in bringing it bad, no acknowledgment of fan demand, no cameos in other games (aside from Smash, which doesn’t count, Smash has everything). Even fan demand doesn’t seem too high, most of what I’ve seen is a Change.org petition which has been up for a year and has not reached its 2500 signatures goal.
It looks like this series could become a fossil itself. Someday some might dig it up and revive it to use in battle, but I’m not feeling it.
Still not as bad as Chibi-Robo
Chances: Bad
F-Zero
This is the reason you’re reading this.
Oh, F-Zero. If fan demand alone was the deciding factor, F-Zero would be top priority. People want F-Zero, people beg for F-zero, people who have never played, beg for F-Zero. And Nintendo knows this, they’ve acknowledged it. They themselves haven’t forgotten it. Even putting Smash aside, there was an F-Zero minigame in Nintendo Land. There are F-Zero tracks in Mario Kart. They’ve done everything but make a new F-Zero game, but why the hell not?
Well, it’s important to understand that the F-Zero series declined in sales throughout its life. The best-selling game is still the first, and though the following games were fantastic, they sold less and less, and yet, strangely enough, between 2003-2004, Nintendo released THREE F-Zero games. Around the same time, they also released an anime. There are several great articles and videos about what happened to F-Zero, but the best point I’ve seen is that Nintendo tried, in 2003, to really push F-Zero, but it didn’t work. So, with their attempt failed, they let the series sleep, and just never woke it up, even as fan demand increased.
In 2015, Miyamoto commented on the series, and said that, though he heard the demand, he was unsure on what to do with the series, on how to make a new game. Many fans scoffed and said he’d just need to make a modern F-Zero and that’d be great, but I think internal concern runs deeper. Just doing F-Zero failed in 2003, so why would it work now?
That said, I think there is hope. Fan demand is powerful, and more and more we see a new generation of Nintendo developers pushing the company forward. These younger developers are the ones behind new IP like Splatoon and ARMS, and great reinventions of existing ones like Odyssey and BotW. It’s possible that these same younger developers could hear the fan demand, and want to take on the series without the hesitation of their older peers.
It’s been 16 years, but Kid Icarus was gone for 19, wasn’t it?
Stranger things have happened
Chances: I want to believe
Golden Sun
And here’s the other one.
Few Nintendo fans are as vocal and dedicated to their dormant franchise as Golden Sun games. For those who don’t know, Golden Sun was a couple of excellent GBA RPGs released in 2001 and 2002, with a DS sequel in 2010. Such erratic release schedule would make predicting the series’ future difficult at the best of times, but the DS game was seen as a disappointment by many fans and sales were unimpressive. With ten years having passed with no new game, is the series done for? Well, let’s look at it.
In 2012, one of the developers gave an interview in which he straight up said that, if there was fan demand for it, there would “naturally” be a fourth game. We know that developer interview doesn’t immediately guarantee a sequel, but this is also a much more positive statement than Custom Robo and F-Zero’s “We know there’s demand, but we don’t know what to do with it”. This is “If there’s demand, it will happen.” So, is there demand?
You bet your ass there is. And it feels like it is growing. There was a high-profile hoax about a fourth game in 2017 (a similar hoax happened some time before the third game, by the way). The series received notably more content in Smash Ultimate than series of similar standing (quite possibly an acknowledgment of its popularity). And last year, Cory Balrog, director of 2018’s GOTY God of War, tweeted about all the franchises he would trade for a new Golden Sun. Nintendo could hardly have asked for a higher profile endorsement within the industry.
So if fan demand is there, why hasn’t it happened yet? Well, it helps to look at the development history of the series. The first game took eighteen months to develop, considered a long time for a handheld game at the time. And though the eight years between the GBA and DS games may have you believe it took a long time to greenlight a sequel, that’s not the case. Signs point to internal discussion about a sequel to the GBA games as early as 2002, with developers quoted as saying that Nintendo was asking them to make a new one. One of the series producers also said that the series takes a long time to make because of its complexity. After the DS game failed to meet expectations, its understandable that Nintendo may not have been as enthusiastic for a new game as it was before, but it seems like, even if the series is alive and well, the long hiatus would not be uncharacteristic. In that same interview quoted before, the developer even said that a new game would take a long time. In fact, if GS4 had started development shortly after that interview, if it took as long as Dark Dawn, the game would be wrapping up production around now.
Then there’s the developer, Camelot. Aside from Golden Sun, they pretty much only make Mario Tennis and Mario Golf. They release schedule is also super consistent, with a new game every other year, sometimes every year. We already got a Mario Tennis on Switch two years ago so, if not for COVID, their new game would probably have released this year. All things point, then, for the next Camelot game to hit the Switch next year. Smart money would be in Mario Golf, but maybe it is finally Golden Sun.
Finally, I don’t think, as others do, that Xenoblade is the reason GS is not happening. Again, I don’t see evidence to support the idea that Nintendo doesn’t want to publish more than one game in the same genre. Both the GBA and DS had more than a dozen Nintendo-published RPGs, and the Wii and 3DS got RPGs even after Xenoblade released for them. I don’t see why Xenoblade would stop a Switch Golden Sun, especially when they are very different kinds of RPGs. GS is actually closer to Octopath Traveler, whose success was enough to impress SE, why wouldn’t Nintendo want a piece?
Really, I think the biggest obstacle is that Nintendo might want to prioritize the safe investment of Mario sports games over Golden Sun, but the more I research, the more I feel like GS’s chances are higher now than they were at any point in the last ten years.
I feel there’s hope this sun will rise again
Chances: Above average
Kid Icarus
Sorry to keep you waiting.
Kid Icarus was an OK NES game that had a forgotten Game Boy sequel and then nobody cared about it for 19 years until it was unexpectedly revived for the 3DS in 2012. This story is a testament to the fact that, just because its been a long time, it doesn’t mean it will never happen. But in order to know if it will happen again, let’s understand how it happened in the first place.
It’s important to mention that reviving Kid Icarus was not the intent behind KI: Uprising, it was the idea of its director, Masahiro Sakurai. Nintendo had given him a project and Sakurai decided to use an established franchise for it. He briefly considered Star Fox, but decided to use Kid Icarus, for which he probably had a soft spot, considering he had added Pit to Brawl some years earlier. So, there wasn’t an exec at Nintendo who woke up one day and decided to bring Kid Icarus back, they gave the director a project, and, after some deliberation, he decided to use Kid Icarus for it.
That director is currently busy developing Smash Bros DLC, but even after that’s over, he probably won’t revisit Kid Icarus. He has shot down the idea of him working on a sequel or a port. His words were: "For now, my thought is that perhaps we'll see someone else besides me make another Kid Icarus in another 25 years." Yikes. That’s pretty damning. Sure, Nintendo could get someone else to make the game, but if it was only Sakurai that was interested in the series in the first place, what is the hope of that?
Well, that statement is not super accurate. Before Uprising, there was actually a Kid Icarus reboot in development for the Wii. It was cancelled, and thank God for it, as it was an awfully stupid gritty reboot, but it showed that there was interest in the franchise even before Uprising. Naturally, you’d expect interest to be bigger now than before.
The fact that Uprising not only grew the series’ fanbase, but the that there are Kid Icarus characters in Smash Bros, means that the franchise has a permanent place in the interest in Nintendo fans. Smash in particular means that there are 18 million people who know Pit and Palutena and would turn their heads if a new game was announced. Furthermore, Nintendo’s new CEO is interested in bringing 3DS franchises to the Switch after the success of the Switch Lite, especially now that the 3DS is officially dead, so the opening is there for it.
There is definitely demand for a new Kid Icarus game, but it is too sporadic a franchise to be certain, and if it were to happen, Nintendo would have to find someone new to do it. But, in the end, the series is definitely in a better place now than it was 10 years ago.
Chances: Medium
Legendary Starfy
Legendary Starfy was a 2D platformer for the GBA that was apparently really successful, as it received four sequels in the span of five years. Not only that but, like Barbara and Chibi-Robo, Starfy himself was quite popular. He had cameos in Mario & Luigi and Super Princess Peach, music of the series was in Donkey Konga, he is a regular Assist Trophy in Smash and was a costume in Mario Maker. Though the series took until the last game to come to the West, there were plans to bring the first four games too, as well as consideration for expanding the series to the Wii. The series was widely advertised, with animated commercials and tons of merchandise, including plush dolls, CDs, pencils, birthday balloons, casino cards and two manga series. When asked if there were plans for a sixth game, the developer answered “Yes!”, no ifs, not buts, straight-up Yes.
And then… nothing. The series just stopped. And the reason why is: I have no idea. Maybe if the last game bombed spectacularly, but it doesn’t seem to be the case. Sure, Japanese sales declined with each entry, but not by that much. Maybe NA sales weren’t what Nintendo was hoping for, but surely not enough to kill such a steady franchise.
The confusion only grows when we look at its developer, Tose. Now, this is interesting. You’ve probably played a Tose game without knowing. They have worked on over A THOUSAND GAMES, but they never receive credit. They merely assist with development in the shadows. As one exec puts it: "Our policy is not to have a vision. Instead, we follow our customers' visions. Most of the time we refuse to put our name on the games, not even staff names." They are a ghost developer. Even its Wikipedia page admits that the list of games on it is purely speculative. There are probably hundreds more, that we don’t know about.
The only exception is the Starfy series. That series was their vision. So why did they stop? Could they have decided that it was against their vision to make a game of their vision? We can only speculate.
The fact that the series’ end was so unexpected, and its developer so mysterious, means that any speculation about it is a shot in the dark. All I can say is that there’s no particular reason to expect it.
Chances: Not Good
Nintendogs
Here’s a big one. Nintendogs was one of the biggest successes of the casual era, on par with Brain Age and Wii Fit, but unlike those, it remained a multi-million seller during the 3DS/WiiU generation. And though Nintendo may have tried, at first, to distance the Switch from that era, the return of Brain Age and Clubhouse Games indicates that other casual games would follow, and Nintendogs would be a no-brainer.
There is, however, one big problem: the Switch does not have a microphone. While Brain Age on the DS also used the microphone a lot, it was not essential to it. You could easily make Brain Age without it. But not Nintendogs. Issuing voice commands to your virtual pup is integral to the experience. No microphone means no Nintendogs.
But with that said, Nintendo did go to the trouble of making a Switch stylus, seemingly just for Brain Age, so maybe they could make a microphone peripheral. Sure, a microphone would be more complex to make than a stylus, but not inconceivable. They did something like that with the Wii Speak. I’m sure for that nintendogs money, Nintendo would do it.
Worst case scenario, Nintendo releases Nintendogs and forces you to use the NSO app’s voice chat to talk with your dog. You know they’d do it.
There’s also the fact that another developer released a nintendogs clone for the Switch last year, but I don’t think Nintendo gives a shit.
Chances: Good
Nintendo Wars
You may know this series better as “Advance Wars” and you may also know that it is fantastic. In fact, it is one of the highest rated Nintendo franchises on Metacritic, and had a pretty consistent release schedule between 1988 and 2008. All was looking pretty god. But unfortunately the series has been dormant since the last entry on DS. Part of it may be because the series, though originally Japan-only, was never all that popular in Japan. In fact, that last game only saw a limited release as a My Nintendo reward in the region.
There is, however, still demand for the series, both externally and internally. Producers from both Nintendo and developer Intelligent Systems have expressed enthusiastic support for a new entry, although they’ve also expressed some uncertainty on what they’d do with it, similar to the Custom Robo and F-Zero responses.
The developer for the series is Intelligent Systems, who do a ton of stuff and will be discussed multiple times in this post. They used to release multiple games a year, but have slowed down this past game to just one or two games a year, another possible reason why Advance Wars has been deprioritized, especially in comparison with that boogeyman of Advance Wars and Smash Bros fans alike: Fire Emblem. There is real concern that Nintendo might not want to make a new Advance Wars when they could just make the similar but more popular Fire Emblem instead.
That said, IS has already released a Fire Emblem and Paper Mario for Switch, and though we definitely will get at least one more FE during the Switch’s life cycle, there’s enough years left for IS to release some other games, whether they be AW or one of the three other franchises we’ll discuss in the future. Problem is, of those franchises, AW might be the most difficult to produce, and the most risky, so it could probably be lower priority. When asked about the series last year, one IS producer gave a pretty evasive answer, so things aren’t looking too good, but they aren’t hopeless either.
Chances: Medium
Ouendan/Elite Beat Agents
This rhythm series for the DS is widely beloved by those who played it, but its life cycle was pretty limited. One game in 2005, and Americanized version in 2006, and one sequel in 2007. Nothing more since The games were critically acclaimed, but not blockbuster hits.
The series creator said back in 2016 that he would love to create a new game, but nothing else has been said about it. The game’s developer iNis, doesn’t appear to be super active either.
All in all, there is very little pointing to a return
Chances: Bad
Pilotwings
The biggest obstacle to seeing this series of arcadey flight sims on the Switch is that the series has a very specific purpose: it’s a tech demo. All three games were launch titles for their systems and explicitly meant to show off each system’s new tech. The original game was made to show off the SNES’ Mode 7, the N64 game was meant to show off the console’s polygonal graphics, and Resort was meant to showcase the 3DS’ stereoscopic 3D. With the Switch’s release far behind us, and its graphics not really needing a showcase, Pilotwings chances seem low. Granted, Pilotwings doesn’t need to be a tech demo, but it could be how Nintendo views it as.
There is some fan demand for it, but not as much as F-Zero or Golden Sun, and no developer has commented on the possibility of a return. Pilotwings has always been moderately successful, but not enough to justify constant releases. The only glimmer of hope is the comment from Nintendo’s CEO about wanting to bring more 3DS franchises for the Switch, but it’s quite possible that he didn’t have Pilotwings in mind when he said that
Chances: Bad
Punch-Out!!
Another series popular enough to get a Smash character but not popular enough for consistent sequels, Punch-Out is a beloved classic with a consistent fanbase, but with a very erratic release schedule. After the SNES game in 1994, the series lay dormant for 15 years until it was revived for the Wii in 2009 and then laid to rest again. One explanation is that the series was never really popular in Japan. Neither the NES or SNES games were even available as full releases in the country, being instead, distributed as prizes or rewards. And though the Wii game got a full retail release, it sold very poorly. It’s always been a game more for Americans, so it is understandable that the Japanese developers at Nintendo aren’t super enthusiastic about it. That said, it was Nintendo who pitched the reboot in the first place, so they may want to do it again someday.
The developer for the Wii game was Next Level Games, who release a game every three or two years, and they also develop Mario Strikers and Luigi’s Mansion. Having already released LM3, it’s likely they’ll release another game for the Switch some time soon. That could be Punch-Out, but it is just as likely that it could be Mario Strikers, or something else entirely.
Some think that the series use of flagrant national stereotypes would impede it from coming back in today’s political climate, but frankly, I don’t think that’s as definitive a problem. Worst case scenario, they simply make a new cast, just like Super Punch Out, but less racially insensitive.
Another interesting development is that Mike Tyson has been talking about wanting a new Punch-Out this year. I don’t think Nintendo cares what he says, and they definitely don’t want to associate with him again, but it is a pretty high-profile person talking about the series, which is bound to raise interest. Whether that’s enough for Nintendo to consider a new game? I don’t think so. But regardless, Punch-Out is popular enough that the door is never truly closed for it.
Chances: Not Good
Pushmo
This acclaimed puzzle game was released for the 3DS eshop in 2012 and was successful enough to get three sequels. Although it hasn’t been seen since 2015, there doesn’t seem to be anything impeding its return. The developer is our good friend Intelligent Systems, and, of the aforementioned IS franchises still to launch on the Switch, Pushmo, being a simple, but beloved, puzzle game, seems like the safest investment. It likely could be developed alongside another major game.
There is demand for it, and considering Nintendo’s eshop efforts, Pushmo would fit in perfectly alongside Snipperclips and fellow 3DS eshop puzzle star Boxboy. All in all, there’s no reason not to expect Pushmo to come back.
Chances: Good
continued in comments

I’m a commentator for a tournament of nightmares. I’m not sure the participants are willing.

You’d think being a psychiatric ward for 38 months would be enough to deter a guy from ever going back to a sport that involves watching human beings at the height of their physical prowess beat the living shit out of each other. Sometimes regulated, sometimes not.
But, here I am, fresh outta the loony bin and reading the most unusual advertising slogan I’d ever laid eyes on;
“The most terrifying tournament has come around once again! Conquer your fears in the NFC*…* literally.”
This was the business card that accompanied my black envelope as it was handed to me on the discharge ward by a well dressed and gangly fella with an uncomfortable wide smile. He didn’t say much of anything, just that his name was “Watson” before bowing and holding up the envelope.
“Heh, like the butler, right?” I said, taking the envelope from his plasticine hands. His smile ripples across his face and he nods slowly, his perfect hair unmoving in the strong wind before he turns on his heel and walks back to the black sedan.
The cold air chilled my bones, and I pulled the medical bracelet from my wrist, grimacing at the marks underneath before following Watson to the Sedan and hauling my luggage into the trunk before setting off, not knowing how I came to even be there in the first place.
I guess right now, that doesn’t really matter.
What matters is where I am now and what I’m doing.
"blood strewn across the canvas, frayed brain matter sailing across my head and splattering against the wall, a woman standing in a pool of blood as the deformed creature twitches on the ground"
My name is Sal “Motormouth” Sabotta, I’m a sports commentator by trade. Be it combat sports, pro wrestling, death-matches or martial arts tournament, I’ve done it all.
I won’t lie; Work can be hard to come by. I’ve spent months struggling for rent and resorting to less tried-and-true commentary methods in order to survive. That has, at times, involved trying my hand at some of the more underground competitions; unregulated fights, sick, illegal games bet on by people on the dark web and worse… Things I’m not going to detail here. Things I’m not proud to have taken a hefty pay-check for from greasy, sweaty fucks in Armani tracksuits and stinking of cheap booze and coke all the way up to well-dressed bitcoin farmers in their 20s who probably own child slaves.
In short, I’m no stranger to the grim underworld or the secrecies with which they conduct their work. I see money and an easy way to make it with my voice; I don’t ask questions.
So when I received an email the day of my discharge from the hospital and I’m told “you’ll receive a letter from Mr. Watson, take it and follow the instructions to the venue. Pay up front as agreed.”, I don’t question it. Especially when the note is personalised, and the doctor says my medical fees were covered.
We drove past numerous landscapes, vistas and neighbourhoods before veering off into an industrial estate and entering an underground tunnel. Half a mile in, Watson stops the car and peers back, smiling.
He directs a thumb to the service door in the side tunnel and rubs his neck, a scar running from ear to ear. Was he a former fighter? Gangster?
I sighed and got out, still in my medical gown and hauling ass to the door. It opened before I could reach out and a tall, muscular woman in her late 30s greeted me with a smile. She was imposing, powerful in her gait, a black eyepatch with several seals adorning the sides accompanying a thick scar down her face did nothing to stop her beauty. She wore a tank top with a black cloak with white fur on the tops and sleeves, a thick black chain clasp around the neck. I won’t lie; she looked badass. Terrifying, but badass.
“‘Bout time ya showed up, Sabotta!” She grinned and put a cinderblock of a hand on my shoulder. I’m 5’10 and 180lbs, but she made me feel like a child in front of her. The power emanating from her fist was unbelievable. “C’mon, the trial match is starting and I don’t want no tourney without a broken in commentator! You gotta know the ropes of this place!”
“You know your driver was standing right outside when I was discharged, right? Couldn’t think to give me an extra day or two to freshen up?” I frowned. This wasn’t normal protocol, even for back-alley promotions like this. She just laughed at me and slapped my shoulder.
“The tournament waits for nobody, Sal. Times a-wasting.”
The hallway is dimly lit and the sounds of a ruckus above us are as impossible to ignore as the sounds of thudding, screaming and snapping. As we pass several doors with one-way mirrors on the front panes, I hear sounds I could have never placed in the animal kingdom or otherwise; gurgles, clicks, grunts and even otherworldly whispers.
“What the fuck is that? You guys doing animal fights down here? I mean I called a monkey fight once, but it’s not exactly… pleasant.” I shuddered, thinking of the violence chimpanzees can inflict on one another, let alone humans. She never stopped walking or staring directly ahead when she responded.“Those ain’t animals. Not by a long shot.”
Before I can probe further, I’m hurried into a changing room and practically swept off my feet by her strength. I turn back and she’s already poking her head out the door.
“You’ve got 5 minutes, get your shit and head up the left stairs, Watson will guide you.” She grinned, and I saw gold filings in her teeth that glinted as much as her bedazzled eye patch. “Ya came highly recommended… I expect good things!”
I do as instructed and within 5 minutes I’m back in my commentary clothes; an open buttoned Hawaiian shirt with my old Hotel Inertia shirt underneath, skinny black jeans and shimmering black shoes. I found some old slick gorilla powder in my hair and dusted it up, opting for the dishevelled look as I knew I’d be sweating by the end of the ordeal.
“You shouldn’t bother putting in so much effort, y’know. They’re not gonna care how good you look, only how well you talk.”
Standing in the doorway was a woman in her 40s, dark-skinned and hair clad in meticulous dreadlocks, tied back into a large bun with a pair draped down the sides of her head. She held a thick book in one hand and pocketed a serrated blade in the other before motioning to me.
“We’ll have to do the pleasantries on the way, the match is starting and you don’t wanna miss that. The commissioner isn’t the type you want to upset. Especially when you’re not here by choice.” I looked for a moment, dumbfounded.
“I’m here because I was invited, already got my pay from the woman who let me in.” I shrugged, pocketing the envelope and getting my equipment from the suitcase. The woman gave a sad smile and shook her head.
“Of course you’d think that. She likes it that way. Bet she didn’t introduce herself either, did she? C’mon.”
I follow her down and after a few minutes we come to a fork in the hallway, an elevator system to our right and a stairway to the left. Dutifully, Watson stood patiently, still grinning and motioning us to go up.
Once we’re situated in our booth upstairs, I set my equipment up and look down at the table, expecting a slew of papers and fighter information in front of me. I look to the woman to ask, but she doesn’t break her stare in the darkness, looking down at the arena floor some 100ft below us.“You won’t need that. Not for this match.”
The lights flicker on and the enormity of this venue reveals itself to me. It’s a structure of imposing steel, dried blood, claw marks and other unknown substances that littered the 40ft wide circular pit the fighters contested in, a black lift on either side from the fighters corners that I can only assume ascended up from their locker room area. Around them were chain-link fences that rose up to the audience stands above, situating around 300 people across all four sides. At the very top sat our booth, the commissioner’s office directly opposite, the judges booth to our right and the fight analysts/medical area to our left. Standing in the centre with a spotlight over them was the commissioner, microphone in hand and an energy that was almost palpable.
“Ladies, Gentlemen and Freaks of all kinds out there in the universe. I welcome you once more to the annual Nightmare Fighting Championship Tournament! It’s been a long year, but we have new blood to pit against our resident night terrors and some fresh fears to feast on the fortuitous soul that frolics into their den. As always, our contestants will be fighting for their freedom, a chance to get their wish or to fight for the ultimate prize.” The crowd cheers and the majority are hidden behind thick plexiglass and lighting, but I can see some have Karate Gi’s, weapons in hand and others with demon masks as they whoop and holler. The clientele here were, at least in my estimation, experienced. But I was feeling a lump in my throat at that one phrase The Commissioner so surreptitiously added in without issue;
“As always, our contestants will be fighting for their freedom*”*
I leaned to the woman next to me and as if she knew what I was going to ask; she put a finger up and shook her head. Eyes awash with fear and a grimness I had only seen on that of trainers who knew their fighter was not ready for the bout ahead. She pointed the finger down to my machine, then to the pit. Turning it on, I looked down as the commissioner began to talk, readying myself to commentate on whatever weirdos came up to battle.
“But before we get to that, we have an exciting exhibition match for our loyal supporters who bankroll this event every year. Without you elite few, we could not do this. You are the pound for pound goats of support! Now, without further ado; let’s get this show on the road!”The rest of the lights clicked on and spun around the venue as they raised the profile of the bout, the elevators both whirring into action as the right one arose first.
“In this corner, from the marionettes shop and accompanied by his Bunraku doll “Mr. Stares”, it’s the man who pulls the strings… THE PUPPET MAN!”
Out steps a tall, thin Japanese man in full clown makeup. His head shaven save for two ridiculous strands of hair stretched out and fluffed up to their limits, like red antennae. His eyebrows large m’s that practically cover his forehead, the nose a completely vacant slot with a black hole drawn in and the mouth… the fucking mouth was nailed shut. Literally. Sharp rusted nails had been hammered down through the lips with such force that they’d bent. A sickening crimson red face-paint stretched across the entire bottom half of his face, making it seem far larger by comparison. He carefully held a small bundle underneath a sheet and bowed deeply to the audience before standing at his designated spot.
“In the other corner, from the streets of god knows where and the womb of someone who misses him… "Hulked Up" Michael O’Donnell!”
I watched with wide eyes and a stomach threatening to evacuate its contents at any moment as the smoke cleared and a boy no older than 17 rushed out, beating his chest and screaming to the crowd as if he was the Incredible Hulk. I don’t know if they drugged the poor kid, but he clearly had no idea where he was.
“There are no rules, no referees and judges only exist in case of a draw or unclear victory. Our commentary team will take over and we wish you a phenomenal match.” She drools a little before she speaks again, looking up at me and winking. “Let’s make this a violent one.”
She snaps her fingers and leaps for the fence, climbing up with ungodly ease before sitting on her makeshift chair in her office.
I have no idea what I’m seeing but every cell in my body is urging me to run; I feel my knees tense and my frame rise ever so slightly before the woman next to me puts her hand on my thigh, pushing me down with great force.
“You have a job to do, so do I. Trust me, you think you can leave but if you get out of this chair, not only will YOUR life end. Mine will too.” She unsheathes the serrated blade and looks at me with pity. “We both have a part to play here, so put the headset on and let’s do our job, no matter how hard it is.”
Hands shaking, I pick up the headset and connect it to the portable recorder and take a breath.
“I… I need your name. What is it you do?” I stutter, trying to calm myself. She hands me a bottle of water as the surrounding lights dim and the spotlight focuses on the spectacle below.
“I’m Madame Nelle Lockwood, cryptid hunter and your co-host to guide you through tonight. Good to meet you, Sal.”
-
NFC EXHIBITION MATCH: "Hulked Up" Michael O’Donnell vs The Puppet Man w/ Mr. Stares
“Welcome fight fans from around the world, god knows how you’re listening to this or WHY, but here we are. I’m your host Sal “MotorMouth” Sabotta, wishing this was all a bad dream. Joining me this evening is our cryptid specialist and all round badass Madame Nelle Lockwood. How are you doing, Nelle?”
She looks at me with a bewildered look on her face before blinking and coming to her senses.
“Uhh… good! All things considered… boy, you really have a professional knack for this, huh? I can see why Commissioner Alduin brought you in."
“Ahh, yes. That’s right, folks! NFC Commissioner Alduin invited me here personally and our exhibition match proves to be… challenging. Let’s check in on the action below.”
I look down and see The Puppet Man sat down and gesturing to the figure under the sheet, like he’s got a negotiation going on. The boy, undeterred and furious, rushes towards him and takes his back, slapping his head and even pulling on his hair with extreme prejudice.
“Well take a gander at that, that kid has absolutely NO fear. When I was his age, I would have stayed FAR the fuck away from a nightmare spectre like that. But hell, this is all part of the show, right? Hope they’re paying that poor guy down there a sizeable sum to throw a fight to a child. What do you think, Nelle; is this the weirdest make-a-wish fulfilment task or what?”
I look over to her, hoping she’d indulge me and that I could believe this was just going to end with a pissed off actor storming away when the child hit him too hard. But Nelle was scanning her now open book and looking for information on dolls.
“He’s talking to his doll because it’s desperate to be let loose. He’s trying to bargain with it to spare him. This is the nature of the puppeteer and his master.” She pushes the book to the centre of the table and shows me a faded illustration of a pristine Bunraku doll; a kind of meticulously crafted Japanese take on the ventriloquist doll. The limbs are thinner and the face is more minimalist, but still no more frightening. “They usually have a symbiotic relationship, but it seems this one obeys the doll and will not want to face more punishment.”
“What do you mean more punishment?” I ask, looking back down at the feverish puppet man as he tries signing frantically under the sheet, even putting his head under as the kid bites his arm and kicks him, screeching.
“The nails, Sal. Those aren’t to silence him, they’re to punish him.”
The rest happened in slow motion; the sheet fell down. The puppet man stood up and walked to his side of the fighters corner, facing the elevator and placing his face into his forearms as he shook. The boy followed to keep attacking, but with one swift kick to the midsection, the boy was propelled back to the centre of the pit where the doll sat.
If there was a human face, I didn’t see it. Instead, I was staring down at a small wood carved spider, the head sporting black geisha hair and the makeup still present, but rows of sharpened black teeth protruded from the clicking mouth and two larger eyes jutted out from the base of the skull, smaller ones dotted closely around it. It was like seeing a puppet ogre spider.
“Looks like The Puppet Man has let Mr. Stares out to say hi and I can certainly see why he was under that sheet, this one isn’t pretty folks! The face doth fit the name. The question is, what’s he doing to do ne-
“I didn’t need to finish the question. My hands shook, and the world spun around me as this creature crawled towards the still wheezing boy with ungodly speed and perched itself expertly beside him. I don’t know if it was my eyes or the distance from where I sat, but this was NOT a small puppet. He was easily half of the boy’s height and that became more unnerving when he reared up on his back legs, the head clicking up and the raspy voice hissing out like a gas leak in a building.
“Hey, hey, kid! Wanna make a deal?” The kid rubbed his eyes, seemingly realising where he was as he calmed down and an air of utter confusion around him.
“If you let me be your new master and you promise to take care of me, I’ll let you go!” His head spun around and the jaw clicked ferociously as he giggled, extending out a clawed paw. “Whaddya say?”
The boy, still confused, slowly reached out his hand and the moment immediately reminded me of a slew of nature shows I’d seen as a kid; where a predator waits until the prey is lulled before striking. I felt the chill up my spine as he extended his hand and grabbed Mr. Stares.
In that moment, he leapt up the arm and bore his way into the boy’s mouth, down his throat and shredded his flesh. The sound was so horrifying, so visceral that it outshines any backyard stabbing, joint snap or broken nose. The boy didn’t even have time to scream, he simply looked up with tear-stained eyes as the puppet disappeared.
Then he started walking without him realising. He looked down at his limbs, terrified, looked over at The Puppet Master, who still had his head to the elevator and pleaded with someone, anyone to help him. I looked to Nelle who refused to take her eyes away, studying the battle in an almost morbid scientific curiosity, detached entirely from the scenario.
I couldn’t fathom how she did it, how she ignored this boy begging us to get him out of there.
I wanted to. Every instinct in me as a fight fan and a decent human was to scream “STOP THE FIGHT!”.
But clearly, when my own life is at risk and money is involved...
I am not a decent human.
Instead, with bile in my throat and a sweating forehead, I did my job.
“M-My goodness! The P-uppet, I mean, “Mr. Stares” has BECAME the puppet master, surely the fight will be over with our young competitor incapacitated? What does our commissioner have to say about this?”
She stared at me, her one eye gleaming and her face elated with the violence.
“It ain’t over yet, church boy. We haven’t even seen the finale, have we Puppet Master?!” She laughs and slaps her knee, the puppet master sobbing as he sinks to the floor and she continues.
“He ain’t done feeding, not yet.”
The way she said that word “feeding” nearly made me lose what food I had in me. That was a young man, somebody's baby boy…
“What does she mean by that, Nelle? What is the strategy to victory here?”
Nelle looked down at her book and traced her finger across a passage before wiping her forehead and pushing the locks aside. If her composure wasn’t breaking yet, it would do soon.
“This kind of parasitic doll feasts on its prey and targets non-essential organs first, controls the host with the neurotoxin in its tail and then, when it’s finally content, it gives the brain a second injection.”
“What happens then?” I asked, my own professionalism hanging on by a fucking thread at this point. She shook her head and pinched the bridge of her nose.“I guess you’ll see in a moment, I sure as hell don’t want to. Not again.”
Before I can prompt her further, the boy lets out an ear-piercing shriek and falls to his knees, gripping at his head before it turned red, then purple and finally an ugly shade of puce before…
The sound of a watermelon hitting the ground from a great height is the best comparison you’re going to get without making me want to rush to the toilet to puke for a third time. But that’s what happened. His head burst and chunks of his skull, flesh and brain matter sprayed the pit and the walls, some hitting my desk and making me audibly shriek, much to the commissioner's delight.
“HA! You didn’t run! I like you, Sal. You pass for the tournament!” She hauls her body up and slams down to the pit, applauding as the microphone descends from the heavens. “And your winner; The Puppet Man and Mr. Stares!”
The crowd erupts with applause as the weeping puppet man pulls the blood-soaked puppet out, places him under the sheet and silently begins to walk back to the elevator while attendees clear up the boy’s corpse.
“What… what the fuck IS this place?” I ask Nelle, pausing my recording.
“This is where nightmares are kept and set upon mostly unwilling competitors for the world’s amusement. You HAVE done dark web fights before, right? Mafia snitches being put into lions pits, bum fights, addicts fighting women to score… this can’t be THAT unusual to you?”
I stared at her incredulously. Was that even a question?
“I did the dark web ONCE and it damn sure didn’t involve monsters!”
She scoffs and closes her book, stretching before looking at me with contempt.
“Oh, it did. Just not the ones you hear about in fairytales. Good luck with the selection process. I’ll be back for the opening round. Don’t try to run, they’ll devour us both in minutes, if you think this is the pinnacle of what lurks beneath this club, you're in for a rough night.” She sauntered off, leaving me deflated, sickened and terrified. Unable to leave and frustrated to the point of tears that I couldn’t express that concoction of emotions, I did what I always do; I regressed and pressed “record” on the device as Commissioner Alduin continued.
At that moment, however, I was deaf to it all. The gravity of the situation had fully enveloped me…
They weren’t kidding about the unwilling participants, I just didn’t realise I would be one of them.On every side of me sits men and women with a desire for violence that goes beyond the norm, beyond the sane and beyond the boundaries of humanity.Below me are an untold number of creatures rattling their cages and howling for blood.
Across from me is a woman so powerful she could crush my skull beneath her boot with the utmost ease if it so amused her.
That invitation was nothing more than my own ransom note in pretty colours and flattering platitudes.
I was in a tournament housing nightmares incarnate.
And it would only get more violent from here on out.
-
The opening round was a blood bath.

2020 Lions Fan Guide to Bandwagoning

After last season/the Bears loss/the Packers loss, it’s become clear to all of us that the 2020 Lions are a completely unsalvageable pit of despair from which there is no escape.
Patricia should have been fired at the 50 yard line of Lambeau and then beheaded for his crimes against humanity.
Quin should be exiled from the land by a pack of ravenous hounds that chase him back east across Lake Huron.
Hopefully Stafford can catch a ride on a ship to the Undying Lands and get a fat contract from a QB-needy team before he retires. Killing Barry and Calvin AND Stafford is more than I can handle as a fan, let somebody be happy for the love of god.
That said, what to do for the rest of the 2020 season? Time to pick a team to bandwagon! It’s important to pick a good bandwagon team now if you want to have a chance at riding another team’s coattails all the way to the playoffs. Let’s go through the list (by last week’s power ranking) and discuss.
The Top 5
Here’s where you go for your best bet at sure-fire contenders. This section is for bandwagoners who want to see their team go to the Super Bowl in order to get some semblance of the shine of the Lombardi trophy on your face, even if you know in your heart you cheated to get there by becoming an imposter in the fanbase of a foreign team from foreign lands.

Chiefs – Last year’s super bowl winners with the new hotness Patrick Mahomes at QB and lovable BBQ-eating Andy Reid at HC, plus Travis Kelce. Historic underdogs finally having their moment in the sun is a perfect fit for a Lions fan to root for. This is bandwagoning on easy mode, the clear pick in my opinion. Number one in the rankings, number one in my cold dead 2020 heart.
Ravens – The only better pick than the Chiefs is the Ravens. Lamar Jackson playing QB is probably the most fun thing you can watch on television right now period. I bandwagoned the Ravens all through last season while dreaming that Stafford’s back healing up might make a difference in 2020 (oh how young and naïve I was) and it was a great time! They imploded a little bit in the playoffs but hey, this could be their year!
Seahawks – This is a nice pick for some history, familiarity, and stability. The Seahawks are always in it as long as they have Russ and Pete Carroll, and last night we watched them go 2-0 against the Pats in a serious nail-biter finish. You know you’re at least going on a deep playoff run if you bandwagon the Seahawks.
Saints – Watching Brees continue to cement himself as a top all-time QB, potentially in his final year, with an actual defense, Michael Thomas, and Kamara? It’s sure to be a fun ride! Plus, the Saints are another team that knows a lot about long droughts of success, hanging around the bottom of the league, kicked while they’re down, nobody ever believing in them. They’re soul mates in pain, and it’s fun to watch those teams succeed.
Packers – No. Never.

The Middle of the Pack
So you’re not looking for a sure thing, you’re interested in a bumpier bandwagon ride. The middle of the pack of is for you! These teams will have ups and they’ll have downs, and if they make it to the Super Bowl, or even the deep playoffs, the victory will be all the sweeter.

49ers – After Sunday I believe every single player on the 49ers has a torn ACL or something like that, but hey, they made it to the SB last year and they could do it again! 49ers are historic and who doesn’t like to root for a classic franchise?
Bills – A true sister-ship team of the Lions. Forever frustrated and disappointed fans now getting their chance to root for a QB who throws over 400. I like Josh Allen because to hear his bio it really sounds like he just found himself in the NFL by accident and is somehow pulling it off. Plus now he’s got Stefon Diggs, who is no longer our divisional problem. Classic underdog pick, go Bills.
Steelers – Roethlisberger is back, JuJu is great, and the Steelers are always in it. If you want that authentic “we’re more blue collar than you” experience, Steelers are a solid pick. Bonus: revisit the days of Ebron and watch him brick-hand pass after pass, and feel some semblance of relief that out of all the problems the Lions have this year, he’s not one of them.
Titans – A great pick for the Lions fan who wants a long-shot with good odds. If Tannehill keeps his breakout alive and Derrick Henry keeps trucking people, they’re a tough team to stop. Plus now they have Clowney (how could Patricia not go after Clowney Jesus Christ are you kidding me he had a chance to grab an elite DE in free agency and shore up in pathetic pass rushers and we didn’t even hear about him trying to land him how fucking pathetic can you believe this guy… wait no don’t think about that!) Titans are a sleeper for the SB and I think they’ll continue to surprise everybody this year.
Patriots – No Brady, no problem. Patriots still look great as always, plus Cam Newton is way more fun to root for than Brady ever was. Watch Belichik potentially use his evil powers for good and get Cam a ring. Patriots can feel dirty to root for but it’s also like eating a whole chocolate cake after you’ve been on a years-long diet. Sometimes it feels good just to give in.
Rams – This is the team you want to root for if you’re a big NFL conspiracy theorist and think hidden capitalists are pulling the strings behind the scenes to rig games. “The NFL wants LA to succeed because it’s a huge and largely untapped market of a city. For that to work, either the Rams or the Chargers have to go deep every year until LA is turning out their pockets for that sweet football merch.” Maybe it’s true, maybe not, maybe who cares! Also a great team to watch if you want to see Aaron Donald wreck people every single play. Remember, Donald could have been ours but instead we drafted Ebron. I’m just kidding, I know you didn’t forget. How could you?
Cardinals – Kyler “Calamari” Murray, DeAndre Hopkins and Larry Fitzgerald pulling this team out of the depths and into something respectable would be a fun ride to watch. Another franchise with historic pain, a dark horse long-shot, it speaks to my Detroit-hardened heart.
Cowboys – Rooting Cowboys is like going after the dumb hot girl. She’s not going to amount to much but she sure does get a lot of attention. If you want to watch a lot of primetime games and hear about your bandwagon team in sports media constantly, may as well pick the Boys. Win, lose or draw, for some reason we all have to talk about them all the time. Also, it’s fun to root for Kellen Moore, and it’s fun to watch Zeke be a wrecking ball. Successful run game teams actually exist!
Vikings – Ew. I guess. Kirk Cousins can play football and Dalvin Cook is a running back. Riley Reiff used to live here. Kyle Rudolph has a fun name if you’re a big Christmas person. I don’t know. This seems like a pointless bandwagon unless you really like the color purple.
Buccaneers – Never count Brady out. Love him or hate him (hate him) Brady is historic and worth watching. If you want to watch Belichick-less Brady in his final year(s), reunited with Gronkowski, tearing up the ground with Fournette, this is a solid band wagon pick.
Texans – Another great fit for the Lions: watch an incredibly talented QB get hamstrung by his incompetent coaching staff and wasted in his scheme, all while his good-on-paper defense continues to let him down on the field. JJ Watt is still fun to watch, and moreso if you close your eyes and pretend is 2013 and we all still love him.

The Bottom Half
Bandwagoning to win is for pussies, you’re here to bandwagon a team that is either an extra-super long-shot, or another team with no chance to pair with your Lions heartbreak. You sick son of a bitch, I respect it, but I don’t think it’s good for you.

Eagles – Good pick for It’s Always Sunny fans who want to root for Jim Schwartz.
Raiders – Cool uniforms, cool fans, another chance at an NFL conspiracy team due to the move to Vegas
Falcons – If you can’t watch Stafford succeed, you may as well watch his buddy Matt Ryan also not succeed.
Bears – Chicago is cool and nearby, and the Bears haven’t been successful in a long time, so it doesn’t feel completely gross. Any win they can get with Trubisky at the helm they damn sure deserve.
Chargers – Actually looked legit good against the Chiefs with their new QB Justin Herbert, plus you got Joey Bosa and Melvin Ingram on defense. This is probably as far down the list as you can go and find an actual contender. This is your longest long shot for the true masochist who still wants hope involved.
Broncos – Good pick for big South Park fans. Also I guess if you’re still high on Von Miller.
Colts – Their colors are similar to ours and Indiana is pretty close. This strikes me as a particularly hopeless bandwagon pick, but they do have a running back, which could be fun to watch.
Jaguars – Minshew Mania makes this a solid pick. Plus it’s another cat team.
Washington – Chase Young, oh what could have been.
Lions – "Bandwagon? Bandwagon?! We don't need no stinking bandwagon!" Ride or die motherfucker, it's Lions Only for your fandom. You're a captain going down with the ship, you're gonna sit here and watch Patricia waste another year of Stafford's career, fail at the run game, fail to adjust, fail on defense, fail at everything all season long. Because when we go 0-16 again, you'll be able to look back and say you were there. You'll bear witness to our heroic Tank for Trevor Lawrence, and the pride that comes before the fall of the house of Quintricia. And when we see flashes of greatness from Stafford, 100 yard rushers from AD, interceptions from Okudah, and long-yard FGs from Prater, you'll be there to cheer on the Lions as always. Win or lose, rain or shine, Detroit vs. Everybody.
Bengals – Root for Joe Burrow. Plus it’s another cat team.
Panthers – Blue cat team.
Dolphins – Tank for Tua actually happened and honestly good for them. Plus a little dose of Fitzmagic in your life.
Giants – Daniel Jones is an Eli clone and honestly that kind of science should be studied. Might be worth checking out.
Browns – Great pick if you’re done with the Lions but don’t want to improve through bandwagoning in any way shape or form. A true historic and present lateral move, a decision forged in Midwest hopelessness and gallons of beer. Godspeed to anyone choosing to bandwagon the Browns this season.
Jets – The "just let the pain flow through me" option.

Comments analysis after 24 hours
The names I'm seeing the most after 24 hours and 48 comments are Seattle, Buffalo, Arizona, and Chargers. So 3 outta 4 you guys are goddamn gluttons for punishment! Lions fans through and through, you won't even bandwagon a sure thing, it's gotta be a long-shot underdog story of a long-suffering franchise that MIGHT have some success this year. Goddamn, never change guys.

Wall Street Week Ahead for the trading week beginning October 5th, 2020

Good Friday evening to all of you here on StockMarket. I hope everyone on this sub made out pretty nicely in the market this past week, and is ready for the new trading week ahead.
Here is everything you need to know to get you ready for the trading week beginning October 5th, 2020.

Trump’s health and fiscal stimulus fight will steer the markets in the week ahead - (Source)

President Donald Trump’s health and the state of a fiscal stimulus package will be the main focus for markets in the coming week.
In the early morning hours Friday, President Donald Trump tweeted that he and the first lady tested positive for Covid. Stocks sold off hard, but the S&P 500 came off its lows in Friday trading and closed down just under 1%. It was up 1.5% for the week.
The market was helped by signs that a stimulus package is still a possibility, after House Speaker Nancy Pelosi asked airlines not to furlough workers. She promised either a stand alone aid bill, or a bigger negotiated relief legislation that would help the industry.
“The market is going to watch health updates from the White House medical staff, and it’s going to watch how the president communicates with the public,” said Julian Emanuel, head of equities and derivatives at BTIG. “Will we see him in person in the next week in any form? What’s his volume of tweets? All as a way to first gauge the severity of the case.”
Trump and Melania Trump are reported to have mild cases, but as time goes on the market will turn to how the illness could impact the presidential election.
Former Vice President Joe Biden gained slightly in the polls after the first debate Tuesday night, and now the calendar for further debates is in question. The market has seemingly warmed to Biden, and even though he would raise taxes, it is assumed Democrats would quickly pass a major infrastructure package if there is a Democratic sweep of Congress.
Trump, however, is widely seen on Wall Street as stronger on the economy and better for markets.
“What you’ve done from a campaign perspective, is you’ve taken away the thing that gives him the most energy - his ability to interact with crowds,” said Emanuel. “The president had wanted to paint the economic recovery of the last three or four months as the cornerstone, and this basically puts the virus back as topic number 1, number 2 and number 3. And it’s all the more so because the data is coming in weaker than expected.”
The market is fixated on the prospect of stimulus to help business, the unemployed and state and local governments. The House passed a $2.2 trillion package this week, but there is still no agreement with Republicans. Treasury Secretary Steven Mnuchin has pushed for a $1.6 trillion package.
“I think there’s an underlying bid under the market because nobody wants to be super short if we get a stimulus approved, but you can’t be too long in case his mild symptoms turn into severe symptoms,” said Scott Redler, partner with T3live.com. “We’re in a tough spot but overall we’re still pretty constructive.”
Emanuel said the fact the president is now ill could hurt confidence and slow down some of the improvement in the economy.
“The underlying tone is, again, whether its directly or later, there’s going to be stimulus,” Emanuel said. ”’Whether it’s this month or November, this reinforces the need for stimulus because the president falling ill signals to, at the margin, the person whose thinking about going out to dinner to think again. It’s a significant economic and psychological hindrance.”
Also coming up in the week ahead is a speech Tuesday by Fed Chairman Jerome Powell to the National Association of Business Economists.
Powell is also expected to push for the stimulus package to boost the economy so the recovery does not stall.
“I think his whole objective is to try to get Congress and the Administration to sign onto a fiscal rescue package,” said Mark Zandi, chief economist at Moody’s Analytics. “He’ll all but come out and say [the recovery] is not a ‘V.’ Without additional support from lawmakers, risks are pretty high that we backtrack. I think that’s the kind of outlook he’s going to give. It’s going to be full-throated.”
September’s employment report, released Friday, was seen by some as a warning that the economy is not rebounding as expected. There were 661,000 jobs added in September, well below the 800,000 expected.
Besides Powell, there are a half dozen other Fed speakers. There are also minutes from the Fed’s last minute released Wednesday afternoon.

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #3!)

Make Up Your [email protected]#$%^&* Mind!
We've all had versions of this conversation where you or the person you were talking to just couldn't make up their mind. At the end of the day, it only causes trouble and plans are ruined.
The market is having its own back and forth this year trying to decide between growth and value. Just today, growth stocks are getting slaughtered while value stocks are up marginally. As an example, the Russell 1000 Growth index is down 1.8% on the day while the Russell 1000 Value index has managed to rally 0.25%. The chart below shows the daily performance spread between the Russell 1000 Growth index and the Russell 1000 Value index for each day in 2020. Today's performance spread between the two indices marks the ninth time this year that value has outperformed growth by more than two percentage points. At the other extreme, there have also been eight trading days where growth outperformed value by more than two percentage points.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
So how does this year's frequency of days where the performance spread between the two indices was more than two percentage points stack up to other years? The chart below shows the daily performance spread between the two indices going all the way back to 1990. Over the last thirty years, the only two periods where we saw a frequency of these large daily dislocations was back in 2008 and the period spanning 2000 and 2001. In fact, with 17 days this year where the performance spread between the two indices was greater than two percentage points, the only other years that saw a higher frequency of large dislocations were 2000 (54) and 2001 (28). If you think the market has been indecisive this year, in 2000 we saw these types of daily dislocations an average of once per week.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Election Anxiety Weighs on October Market Performance
October often evokes fear on Wall Street as memories are stirred of crashes in 1929, 1987, the 554-point drop on October 27, 1997, back-to-back massacres in 1978 and 1979, Friday the 13th in 1989 and the 733-point drop on October 15, 2008. During the week ending October 10, 2008, Dow lost 1,874.19 points (18.2%), the worst weekly decline in our database going back to 1901, in percentage terms. March 2020 now holds the dubious honor of producing the worst, second and third worst DJIA weekly point declines. The term “Octoberphobia” has been used to describe the phenomenon of major market drops occurring during the month. Market calamities can become a self-fulfilling prophecy, so stay on the lookout and don’t get whipsawed if it happens.
But October has become a turnaround month—a “bear killer” if you will. Twelve post-WWII bear markets have ended in October: 1946, 1957, 1960, 1962, 1966, 1974, 1987, 1990, 1998, 2001, 2002 and 2011 (S&P 500 declined 19.4%). However, eight were midterm bottoms. Over the last 21 years, October’s performance has been solid. Average gains over the last 21-years range from 1.3% by Russell 1000 to 2.4% by NASDAQ. Small caps have still struggled though with Russell 2000 gaining a modest 0.5%

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Election-year Octobers rank dead last for Dow, S&P 500 (since 1952), NASDAQ (since 1972), Russell 1000, and Russell 2000 (since 1980). Eliminating gruesome 2008 from the calculation provides a moderate amount of relief, as rankings climb to mid pack. Should a meaningful decline materialize in October it is likely to be an excellent buying opportunity, especially for any depressed technology and small-cap shares.

What Have Democratic Sweeps Meant for the S&P 500?
Headed into the first presidential debate Tuesday night, betting markets (ElectionBettingOdds.com) placed Democratic candidate Joe Biden as the slight favorite to take the White House in November. The debate resulted in Biden gaining another 5 percentage point chance of winning the Presidency. As of this morning, Biden's odds to win are at 59.8% versus Trump's odds of 38.9%. Additionally, Democrats are slight favorites to win control of the Senate (58.4% to 41.5%) and big favorites to maintain the House (82.8% to 17.1%). Given these odds, in the chart below we show the average performance of the S&P 500 from the three months before Election Day through three months after Election Day for all election years post-WWII that resulted in a sweep of the executive and legislative branch by the Democrats.
As shown, on average the S&P 500 has been on the decline in the weeks leading up to Election Day, though in the days just before the Election there has been a small rally that sharply reverses once the results come in. After the initial post-Election drop, the market has trended a bit higher, but by three months after the Election, it has only found itself around the same levels as Election Day; on average a 2.6% loss versus where the index stood three months prior.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
The composite shown above is comprised of six different years: 1948, 1960, 1964, 1976, 1992, and 2008. While on average the S&P 500 has traded lower, it is not necessarily a sure-fire thing. For example, 1948 and 2008 were the only years that saw the S&P 500 trade and stay significantly lower in the wake of the election. In 1976, there was similarly a sell-off in the immediate aftermath of the election, but the index did make its way back up to the highs of that six-month time frame later on albeit no new high was put in place. Meanwhile, 1960, 1964, and 1992 all saw the S&P 500 run higher after the election even despite some periods of consolidation after initial moves higher. In our B.I.G. Tips report from Tuesday, we show these same charts for all Presidential election years post WWII including a look at the average performance given every potential election outcome.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Current Returns Stack Up to History
Even after September's weakness, the S&P 500's trailing 12-month total return stood at an impressive 14.9%. Given the events of the last 12 months, one could even say that performance is remarkable. What's even crazier is that the S&P 500's performance over the last 12 months is more than three times stronger than the 12 month period before that (+4.25%). The chart below compares the S&P 500's annualized total returns over the last one, two, five, ten, and twenty years and compares that performance to the historical average return of the index over those same time periods.
The S&P 500's historical average 12-month return is 11.7%, so the current 14.9% gain exceeds that average by more than three full percentage points. Over a two-year window, though, the S&P 500's annualized return of 9.4% is more than a full percentage point below the historical average. Looking further out, the S&P 500's trailing five and ten-year annualized return has been much stronger than average, which makes sense given the long bull market we were in. Over a 20 year window, though, the S&P 500 is only just starting to work off some of the declines from the dot-com bust and as a result, the 6.4% annualized gain is a four and a half percentage points below the long-term average of 10.9%.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)
Below we show how the current performance of the S&P 500 in each of the time frames shown compares to all other periods on a percentile basis. The S&P 500's performance over the last year, ranks just below 56th percentile of all other periods, while the two-year performance ranks just below the 42nd percentile. Even as the five and ten-year periods have seen well above average returns, they still rank in just the mid-60s on a percentile basis. The S&P 500's ranking over a 20-year time period is a completely different story ranking in single-digits on a percentile basis. Even with the equity market right near record highs, the last two decades have been forgettable for US equities.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Seasonals Are Back In Style Again
There is no denying that market seasonality has not worked so well this year. But we have been here before and history is on our side. Over the long term, intermediate term and short term market seasonality has suffered brief periods when seasonality was overridden by more powerful forces. The COVID pandemic and economic shutdown certainly qualifies. But it is only a matter of time until repetitive human behavior patterns and people and institutions return to moving money around in the usual daily, weekly, monthly, quarterly and seasonal patterns.
The return of perennial September weakness is emblematic of a return to normal market behavior and a reflection of the fact that despite the continuing concerns about surges in coronavirus cases life is beginning to return to normal. In our area, about 25-30 miles north of New York City, our kids are beginning hybrid learning, playing rugby, lacrosse and other sports (yes with some COVID protocols, but tackling and facing-off), golf outings are happening and people are going to restaurants and out and about.
The chart here shows the historical One-Year Pattern of the S&P 500 Since 1950 versus 2020. The black line shows the seasonal pattern since 1950. The blue represents the pattern since 1988. We use 1988 as it is the first year after the 1987 Crash when the market underwent a major systemic change with the implementation of downside protection circuit breakers and collars. It is noteworthy how the seasonal pattern persists during both the 70-year and 31-year timeframes.
2020 is plotted on the right axis due to the magnitude of the move this year. The yellow box highlights the rebirth of seasonality this September, especially during this notoriously negative Week After Triple Witching Week as detailed page 108 of the 2020 Almanac, indicated by the two black arrows
Years like 1980, 1982, 2009 and 2016 with unseasonably early weakness and bear markets like 2020 returned to normal seasonal patterns in short order. And years like 1954, 1958, 1980, 1982, 1995 and 2009 that exhibited double-digit gains in the Worst Six Months still proceeded to deliver further sizable gains in the subsequent Best Six Months (page 52, STA 2020). We believe the return of market seasonality is upon us. So remain cautious through the end of September and be alert to Octoberophobia, but remain ready to pounce on our Best Months Seasonal MACD Buy Signal, when it triggers.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending October 2nd, 2020

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 10.4.20

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())

(VIDEO NOT YET POSTED.)
Here are the most notable companies (tickers) reporting earnings in this upcoming trading week ahead-

$DPZ

$PAYX

$RPM

$HELE

$AYI

$LEVI

$LW

$LNDC

$SAR

$EXFO

$RGP

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)

Below are some of the notable companies coming out with earnings releases this upcoming trading week ahead which includes the date/time of release & consensus estimates courtesy of Earnings Whispers:

Monday 10.5.20 Before Market Open:

([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

Monday 10.5.20 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

Tuesday 10.6.20 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 10.6.20 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 10.7.20 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 10.7.20 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 10.8.20 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 10.8.20 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

Friday 10.9.20 Before Market Open:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

Friday 10.9.20 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR FRIDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())
(NONE.)

Domino's Pizza, Inc. $433.78
Domino's Pizza, Inc. (DPZ) is confirmed to report earnings at approximately 7:30 AM ET on Thursday, October 8, 2020. The consensus earnings estimate is $2.73 per share on revenue of $944.53 million and the Earnings Whisper ® number is $2.83 per share. Investor sentiment going into the company's earnings release has 76% expecting an earnings beat. Consensus estimates are for year-over-year earnings growth of 33.17% with revenue increasing by 15.07%. Short interest has decreased by 31.5% since the company's last earnings release while the stock has drifted higher by 7.4% from its open following the earnings release to be 22.3% above its 200 day moving average of $354.71. Overall earnings estimates have been revised higher since the company's last earnings release. Option traders are pricing in a 7.3% move on earnings and the stock has averaged a 8.2% move in recent quarters.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Paychex, Inc. $79.43
Paychex, Inc. (PAYX) is confirmed to report earnings at approximately 8:30 AM ET on Tuesday, October 6, 2020. The consensus earnings estimate is $0.56 per share on revenue of $895.39 million and the Earnings Whisper ® number is $0.57 per share. Investor sentiment going into the company's earnings release has 49% expecting an earnings beat. Consensus estimates are for earnings to decline year-over-year by 21.13% with revenue decreasing by 9.74%. Short interest has decreased by 9.7% since the company's last earnings release while the stock has drifted higher by 2.8% from its open following the earnings release to be 6.0% above its 200 day moving average of $74.91. Overall earnings estimates have been revised lower since the company's last earnings release. On Friday, September 18, 2020 there was some notable buying of 1,269 contracts of the $90.00 call expiring on Friday, March 19, 2021. Option traders are pricing in a 4.8% move on earnings and the stock has averaged a 2.1% move in recent quarters.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

RPM International Inc. $82.64
RPM International Inc. (RPM) is confirmed to report earnings at approximately 6:45 AM ET on Wednesday, October 7, 2020. The consensus earnings estimate is $1.21 per share on revenue of $1.49 billion and the Earnings Whisper ® number is $1.26 per share. Investor sentiment going into the company's earnings release has 65% expecting an earnings beat. Consensus estimates are for year-over-year earnings growth of 27.37% with revenue increasing by 1.17%. Short interest has decreased by 39.7% since the company's last earnings release while the stock has drifted higher by 3.3% from its open following the earnings release to be 12.4% above its 200 day moving average of $73.51. Overall earnings estimates have been revised higher since the company's last earnings release. Option traders are pricing in a 4.4% move on earnings and the stock has averaged a 2.3% move in recent quarters.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Helen of Troy Ltd. $199.83
Helen of Troy Ltd. (HELE) is confirmed to report earnings at approximately 6:30 AM ET on Thursday, October 8, 2020. The consensus earnings estimate is $2.39 per share on revenue of $451.26 million and the Earnings Whisper ® number is $2.57 per share. Investor sentiment going into the company's earnings release has 62% expecting an earnings beat. Consensus estimates are for year-over-year earnings growth of 18.91% with revenue increasing by 9.00%. Short interest has decreased by 6.4% since the company's last earnings release while the stock has drifted lower by 4.4% from its open following the earnings release to be 12.8% above its 200 day moving average of $177.13. Overall earnings estimates have been revised higher since the company's last earnings release. Option traders are pricing in a 5.7% move on earnings and the stock has averaged a 8.9% move in recent quarters.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Acuity Brands, Inc. $105.61
Acuity Brands, Inc. (AYI) is confirmed to report earnings at approximately 8:40 AM ET on Thursday, October 8, 2020. The consensus earnings estimate is $2.01 per share on revenue of $814.63 million and the Earnings Whisper ® number is $2.12 per share. Investor sentiment going into the company's earnings release has 46% expecting an earnings beat. Consensus estimates are for earnings to decline year-over-year by 28.21% with revenue decreasing by 13.16%. Short interest has increased by 62.6% since the company's last earnings release while the stock has drifted higher by 5.6% from its open following the earnings release to be 4.1% above its 200 day moving average of $101.43. Overall earnings estimates have been revised higher since the company's last earnings release. Option traders are pricing in a 5.8% move on earnings and the stock has averaged a 9.0% move in recent quarters.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Levi Strauss & Co. $14.15
Levi Strauss & Co. (LEVI) is confirmed to report earnings at approximately 4:00 PM ET on Tuesday, October 6, 2020. The consensus estimate is for a loss of $0.27 per share on revenue of $766.84 million and the Earnings Whisper ® number is ($0.20) per share. Investor sentiment going into the company's earnings release has 40% expecting an earnings beat. Consensus estimates are for earnings to decline year-over-year by 187.10% with revenue decreasing by 47.01%. Short interest has increased by 3.9% since the company's last earnings release while the stock has drifted higher by 7.3% from its open following the earnings release to be 3.5% below its 200 day moving average of $14.66. Overall earnings estimates have been revised higher since the company's last earnings release. On Friday, October 2, 2020 there was some notable buying of 8,166 contracts of the $14.00 call expiring on Friday, October 16, 2020. Option traders are pricing in a 10.6% move on earnings and the stock has averaged a 6.9% move in recent quarters.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Lamb Weston Holdings, Inc. $67.93
Lamb Weston Holdings, Inc. (LW) is confirmed to report earnings at approximately 8:30 AM ET on Wednesday, October 7, 2020. The consensus earnings estimate is $0.30 per share on revenue of $877.60 million and the Earnings Whisper ® number is $0.28 per share. Investor sentiment going into the company's earnings release has 36% expecting an earnings beat. Consensus estimates are for earnings to decline year-over-year by 62.03% with revenue decreasing by 11.26%. Short interest has decreased by 21.7% since the company's last earnings release while the stock has drifted higher by 4.1% from its open following the earnings release to be 1.8% below its 200 day moving average of $69.17. Overall earnings estimates have been revised lower since the company's last earnings release. On Friday, October 2, 2020 there was some notable buying of 1,580 contracts of the $70.00 call expiring on Friday, October 16, 2020. Option traders are pricing in a 8.3% move on earnings and the stock has averaged a 6.7% move in recent quarters.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Landec Corp. $9.43
Landec Corp. (LNDC) is confirmed to report earnings at approximately 4:20 PM ET on Tuesday, October 6, 2020. The consensus estimate is for a loss of $0.11 per share on revenue of $127.86 million and the Earnings Whisper ® number is ($0.09) per share. Investor sentiment going into the company's earnings release has 41% expecting an earnings beat. Consensus estimates are for year-over-year earnings growth of 31.25% with revenue decreasing by 7.82%. Short interest has decreased by 5.1% since the company's last earnings release while the stock has drifted lower by 12.3% from its open following the earnings release to be 8.4% below its 200 day moving average of $10.30. Overall earnings estimates have been revised lower since the company's last earnings release. Option traders are pricing in a 16.7% move on earnings and the stock has averaged a 10.6% move in recent quarters.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Saratoga Investment Corp $17.27
Saratoga Investment Corp (SAR) is confirmed to report earnings at approximately 4:00 PM ET on Wednesday, October 7, 2020. The consensus earnings estimate is $0.47 per share on revenue of $12.95 million. Investor sentiment going into the company's earnings release has 48% expecting an earnings beat. Consensus estimates are for earnings to decline year-over-year by 30.88% with revenue decreasing by 6.75%. Short interest has decreased by 60.5% since the company's last earnings release while the stock has drifted higher by 6.3% from its open following the earnings release. Overall earnings estimates have been revised lower since the company's last earnings release.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

EXFO Inc. $3.24
EXFO Inc. (EXFO) is confirmed to report earnings at approximately 4:00 PM ET on Wednesday, October 7, 2020. The consensus earnings estimate is $0.07 per share on revenue of $64.85 million and the Earnings Whisper ® number is $0.07 per share. Investor sentiment going into the company's earnings release has 30% expecting an earnings beat. Consensus estimates are for year-over-year earnings growth of 40.00% with revenue decreasing by 7.59%. Short interest has decreased by 17.5% since the company's last earnings release while the stock has drifted lower by 14.7% from its open following the earnings release. Overall earnings estimates have been revised higher since the company's last earnings release.

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

DISCUSS!

What are you all watching for in this upcoming trading week?
I hope you all have a wonderful weekend and a great trading week ahead StockMarket.

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Things I'm right about (so far):

Things I was totally wrong about: zero things!

Things I'm not right about yet but pretty soon I will be:

Fresh takes:

Fortune Favors The Bold (FFTB) Predictions

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2020 Lions Fan Guide to Bandwagoning

Wall Street Week Ahead for the trading week beginning October 5th, 2020

Trump’s health and fiscal stimulus fight will steer the markets in the week ahead - (Source)

This past week saw the following moves in the S&P:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL S&P TREE MAP FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Indices for this past week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR INDICES FOR THE PAST WEEK!)

Major Futures Markets as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE MAJOR FUTURES INDICES AS OF FRIDAY!)

Economic Calendar for the Week Ahead:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE FULL ECONOMIC CALENDAR FOR THE WEEK AHEAD!)

Percentage Changes for the Major Indices, WTD, MTD, QTD, YTD as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

S&P Sectors for the Past Week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Major Indices Pullback/Correction Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!

Major Indices Rally Levels as of Friday's close:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Most Anticipated Earnings Releases for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Here are the upcoming IPO's for this week:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Friday's Stock Analyst Upgrades & Downgrades:

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #1!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #2!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART LINK #3!)

Make Up Your [email protected]#$%&* Mind!

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Election Anxiety Weighs on October Market Performance

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

What Have Democratic Sweeps Meant for the S&P 500?

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

How Current Returns Stack Up to History

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

Seasonals Are Back In Style Again

(CLICK HERE FOR THE CHART!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: Stock Market Analysis Video for Week Ending October 2nd, 2020

(CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!)

STOCK MARKET VIDEO: ShadowTrader Video Weekly 10.4.20

([CLICK HERE FOR THE YOUTUBE VIDEO!]())

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S MOST NOTABLE EARNINGS RELEASES!)

(CLICK HERE FOR NEXT WEEK'S HIGHEST VOLATILITY EARNINGS RELEASES!)

Monday 10.5.20 Before Market Open:

([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())

Monday 10.5.20 After Market Close:

([CLICK HERE FOR MONDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!]())

Tuesday 10.6.20 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Tuesday 10.6.20 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR TUESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 10.7.20 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Wednesday 10.7.20 After Market Close:

(CLICK HERE FOR WEDNESDAY'S AFTER-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 10.8.20 Before Market Open:

(CLICK HERE FOR THURSDAY'S PRE-MARKET EARNINGS TIME & ESTIMATES!)

Thursday 10.8.20 After Market Close:

Make Up Your [email protected]#$%^&* Mind!