Vacationing the way to victory

Just three weeks into the season and it looks like the Junior Bro has figured out the formula for prognostication success: take a vacation. Yup, the four-time defending champ was treading water with the rest of the Gehlke Bros after opening weekend, but since changing longitude from West Coast to East Coast in Week 2, he has opened up a three-game lead.

While Senior Bro and the Chaos Kid were glued to the TV watching their picks, Sean was taking a liesurely drive through America's heartland and probably was blissfully unaware that his Chicago Bears were pulling out a last-minute 25-19 comeback against the host Seahawks in Seattle to help him take the week's only split with Glenn. And he was probably also unaware that his nephew Ben, who had been deadlocked with him at the top of the standings coming into the weekend, suffered a tough series of defeats that saw him slide four games.

Nope, Junior Bro was enjoying the pretty red hues of the Badlands and the amber waves of grain that make up the Wyoming prairie while new pages of football history were being written. Brett Favre tossed one of his famous long-distance TD's to douse the visiting 49ers at the Metrodome, and Ben Roethlisberger lost for the first time in his pro career in his home state of Ohio, as the Steelers fell to the Bengals. And sadly, Sean couldn't be in front of the TV to see the Lions snap a 19-game winless streak against the hapless Redskins. Nor could be see the Raiders' fisticuffs during their defeat against the Broncos... well, he might have been able to had he been near a TV, as the game was only blacked out in the Bay Area.

But you can bet that Sean is by now well aware of his solid 13-3 record to take Week 3. Glenn was 12-4, which in many weeks might have been good for a win, but not this one. Ben... well, we don't call him the Chaos Kid for nothing. He was 9-7, sliding from a tie for first to last place in the season standings. We all correctly picked Green Bay, New England, Philadelphia, Baltimore, Denver, Indianapolis and Dallas for wins. But we all were surprised by Cincinnati's upset, and no one was feeling daring enough to call Detroit's win.