2010, A Retrospective--UPDATED!!

As we look forward to the new year, I can't help but feel a twinge of sadness remembering those we've lost.  Dennis Hopper, and Cory Haim!  Kama Chinen and Josephine Ray!  More than half of the teams had hits this year, and TnT wins for most hits with 6!  Jaws of Life goes without, yet again, but Bring Out Your Dead gains a hit redeeming the family name. 

The prize winner, however, appears to be Undercooked Pork, totaling 198 points and garnering the trophy, the winnings and many accolades from near and far.

The year had its share of controversy.  Chemical Ali died by execution and yet the Lifeguard still awarded points in a curious twist of the Saddam Hussein Rule.  The Lockerbie Bomber was released from prison with liver cancer on "humanitarian" grounds only to receive a hero's welcome in Lebanon and survive the year.  And Japan released a statement that, through poor census taking techniques, bad monitoring of social benefits and widespread greed, many of the oldest Japanese have actually been dead for a while.  While this sent ripples of murmuring through the Western practitioners of Eastern medicine and their claims of longer life (actually no, it didn't.  It was quietly ignored.....) Kama Chinen was still well documented and confirmed as having lived for 114 years and now is deceased. 

And now we prepare ourselves for the coming year and the surprises that lay in waiting.  Will Charlie Sheen cheat the Grim Reaper one more year?  Who will be this year's Princess Diana, shocking everyone with the tragedy that is our grief?  What teams will we see accept this challenge for the coming year?

Look over the Rules, put your list together and join us for the 2011 Hangover Recovery and Dead Pool Draft on January 1.

UPDATE -- January 2, 2011

As exhibited in the Comments (below), I am not always right.  In fact, I make it a habit to commit at least 3 mistakes every day.  This keeps me humble.  So I would like to amend the above statements. 

1. Abdel Baset al-Megrahi is dying of prostate cancer.  I wrote "liver."  I'm not a doctor, nor do I play one on TV.
2. The Lockerbie Bomber was released to Libya.  I wrote "Lebanon."  I'm not a cartographer, either. 
3. Our US media and government reported the release on "humanitarian grounds" rather than the more appropriate "compassionate" grounds.
4. As reported in The Guardian, a British newspaper, cables released through WikiLeaks suggest, "Muammar Gaddafi, the Libyan leader, made explicit and "thuggish" threats to halt all trade deals with Britain and harass embassy staff if Megrahi remained in jail, the cables show. At the same time "a parade of treats" was offered by Libya to the Scottish devolved administration if it agreed to let him go, though the cable says they were turned down."

I thank all of my readers in helping to this a better blog.