SEC Game of Interest (Week 12)

In 1999, two psychologists at Cornell identified a somewhat surprising phenomenon: the worse someone is at some task, the more that person tends to overrate their ability to perform it. This is known as the Dunning-Kruger effect. We say that it is "somewhat surpising" because it absolutely will not come as a surprise to anyone who has worked in a corporate environment or, for that matter, to anyone who has been reading this column this season. Last week we were certain that LSU could cover the spread against Alabama. Although things looked good for us when the game went into overtime, we ultimately lost by half a point. That failure of foresight brings us to 6-16-1 against the spread on the year, and we assure you that we were just as confident about all of those other incorrect picks as well.

This week's SEC Game of Interest is kind of a no-brainer. It's airing in primetime, and it will help determine a divisional race. Of course we're talking about Missouri at Texas A&M (-5.5).

The pick: Texas A&M -5.5

Why you should care: If both Georgia and Texas A&M take care of business this weekend, we're back in the driver's seat in the SEC East race.

Rationale: You might have heard that Texas A&M beat Auburn last weekend. It was awesome, and it wasn't just awesome in the way that any Auburn loss is awesome. It was karmically awesome. The WarTiglesMen fumbled the ball TWICE in the fourth quarter while looking to take the lead, once at the Aggies' two yard line. We know that every hackneyed sports writer has already said that Auburn's luck finally ran out, but it did, and it was satisfying.

Anyway, as much as we like Mizzou fans, Mizzou is just not a very good football team this year. Although they are currently leading the SEC East race, they lost to Indiana, which, as you might recall, is a B1G team. And notwithstanding the Aggies' lackluster October, they've still managed to outscore the Tigers from Columbia by nearly 9 points a game. If the same Texas A&M team that beat Auburn last week shows up this Saturday, this game won't be close.

Bonus Pick: Mississippi State +7. We're going to keep picking against Lane Kiffin until MaconDawg fires us.

Go Dawgs! Beat Auburn!