Just a reminder that our charity pro football underdog pool kicks off this coming week. The big daddies will start banging on Thursday night, and our players will be trying to pick one underdog team each week that can win its game outright. Winners score the number of points that their victorious team was favored to lose by, and the player with the most points at the end of the playoffs wins the game. The prize is that the highest-scoring players get to steer our pool of entry fees (20 bucks a player) to their favorite nonprofit charitable organizations.

Although the first games are next weekend, entry fees aren't due until September 15th, which means you can play the first week before you even pony up. For more details on the game, check out the complete rules here. To enter, shoot us an e-mail message here. We've got 16 paid players so far, and there's room for many more.

Just to whet the appetite, here's Week 1: Minnesota at New Orleans; Carolina at NY Giants; Atlanta at Pittsburgh; Cleveland at Tampa Bay; Denver at Jacksonville; Indianapolis at Houston; Miami at Buffalo; Detroit at Chicago; Oakland at Tennessee; Cincinnati at New England; Arizona at St. Louis; San Francisco at Seattle; Green Bay at Philadelphia; Dallas at Washington; Baltimore at NY Jets; San Diego at Kansas City. Underdogs and points will be announced on Tuesday.