Here at PtR we (being me) like to give back to our loyal readers.  All 37 of them.  Man, that joke never gets old.  Is anyone curious how many people actually stop here on a daily basis?  Well, it's no secret.

So, the contest.  First, the most important aspect:  the prizes.  The first and second place winners will each receive gift certificates to Amazon.com; $30 and $20 respectively.  That's not a lot of money, I know, but it's $50 more than I've ever made off blogging.  I plan to keep a leaderboard posted on one of the sidebars, so you will be able to track your progress as the season moves along.  It will be like having your name in lights!  Except it will be in pixels and nobody will care.

Now if you don't manage to finish first or second you won't go home empty handed.  Or, I guess in this case you won't stay home empty handed.  Everybody wins.  Because you're a big winner.  I'm gonna ask you a simple question and I want you to listen to me:  who's the big winner here tonight at PtR.com?  Huh?  You, that's who. You're the big winner.  You win.

What do you win?  A Spurs Related Prize!  Could it be tickets to a Spurs game of your choice?  Of course not!  Are you crazy?  Have you seen my therapy bills?  Here's something more realistic:

That's no ordinary Uwe Blab basketball card.  Well, actually, that one is.  But the one you receive will be an Official PoundingTheRock.com Contest Spurs Related Prize!  It will be individually numbered by yours truly!  I may even sign it with my very own autograph!  

Everyone wins!  I don't care if you live in Boerne, TX, or in a small village outside of Bahia Blanca, Argentina, or on an alpaca farm in the hinterlands of Slovenia!  I, or someone from your national postal service, will track you down and deliver your Official Prize!  That feeling in your stomach right now?  That's excitement!  That's anticipation!  That's titillation!

What do you have to do?  Pick the outcome of Spurs games against the spread.  Most of you probably know what this entails.  In case you don't, here's a quick explanation.

Every game has a "line."  For example, the Spurs play at home tomorrow against the Knicks.  The Knicks suck big donkey balls, therefore the "line" is SA -13.5.  In other words, the Spurs are 13.5 point favorites.  If you think the Spurs are going to win by more than 13.5 points then you would pick SA.  If you think the Knicks are going to win (ha!) or lose by less than 13.5 points you would pick NY.

Each user will start with 500EFDs (Entirely Fake Dollars).  You can wager anything from 10EFDs to your entire balance.  I'll keep track of your balance from game to game and post contest updates.  You'll be able to fake wager on every Spur game this year, including the playoffs.

If your balance gets to zero, you're done for the season.  So don't go crazy putting 500EFDs on the first game.

The contest ends after the last Spurs game of the season, including the playoffs.  Whoever has the most EFDs wins.  Pretty simple.

While the money is fake, I want to keep the game realistic.  So I'll be using official lines and all wagers will be -110.  What that means is that you have to wager 11 EFDs to win 21 (your original 11 plus the 10 you won).  That extra ten percent is called the "juice" or "vig" and assures the casinos they will make money on what is essentially a 50-50 proposition.  So, for the sake of easy bookkeeping, please keep your wagers divisible by 11.  If the line matches the final point spread then everyone gets their fake wager back (obviously not possible with in this case with a 13.5 point spread).

So, how do you place a fake wager?  Simply post a comment in the appropriate game thread.  Each game thread will have the official line for the game.  You must get your comment in before game time.  The team name and wager is all you need.  You don't have to wager on every game.

Everyone is eligible for the prizes except yours truly.  Don't worry about stampler; given his NFL picks he's going to need some help to win (oh burn).  Matty da Blade has a gamblers nickname already, so ya'llz pretty much playin' for secondz.

The open thread for tomorrow's game won't be posted until tomorrow, but if you're all itchin' to get started go ahead and post your wagers under this thread.

Line:  SA -13.5.

[Update:   I understand not wanting to have even fake money riding on a Spurs game, so I have decided to add an additional non-Spurs game at my choosing.   You can only wager on one game per day.]