For my money, the best rush when betting the NFL season comes through a survivor pool. After all, when you bet a weekly ticket and lose you always have the next week to make up for it. However, in a survivor pool (a.k.a. an eliminator or suicide pool) it's all-or-nothing and any single loss ends your season. With just one pick in the pool you can go from top dog to drowned at the Bad Newz Kennels in the span of one week.

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Last year, two games made and broke my suicide pool season. The high came in Week 7 when Brian Urlacher and Devin Hester heard my cries from Northern New York and grasped victory from the beaks of Denny Green's Arizona Cardinals on Monday Night Football. However, just one week later I got kicked to the curb faster than Alberto Gonzales when I backed Philadelphia on the road in Tampa Bay. If you recall, that was the game in which Matt Bryant blasted a 1,062-yard field goal to eliminate me.

If you're not familiar with a survivor pool or an eliminator pool, the concept is simple: you have to pick one team each week to win straight up. If your selection wins you move on to pick again the following week. If you lose, you're done. Last man standing collects the cash and gets bragging rights in the office. But here's the catch: you can only use each team one time, so forget about picking New England every week.

This year at Doc's Sports I'll be offering advice each week to help you out in your suicide-eliminator-survival pools. I've signed up for five of them myself, with payouts ranging from $50 to $200 for just a $5 investment in each. I'll show you my picks and my best bets throughout the year, and you'll know pretty quickly if you can get lucky going with me or if maybe you should pick against me!

But to get you up to speed here are some simple strategies and game plans that you should consider before taking that pen anywhere near the poster board hanging in the break room:

1) Before I make any of my survivor pool picks I first peruse the largest spreads released by Las Vegas. Since in most suicide pools you only have to pick a winner straight up those lopsided games are a great place to start.

2) One situation that I've seen burn many a player, including myself, is when people back a road favorite in a divisional game. Just like betting against the spread, this is a huge no-no in eliminator pools. Of course, rules are made to be broken but all too often violating such an edict will come back to haunt you.

3) Don't over think things. There seems like a lot of pressure - one wrong pick and I'm eliminated. But when has obsessing and adding stress ever made anything better? Just realize that 16 teams are going to win each week (14 on weeks with byes). All you have to do is find one of them.

4) It generally gets easier as the season goes on. After a few weeks most of the preseason pretenders have been exposed. I would suggest avoiding highly touted and overhyped teams early in the year until you've seen if they were for real or not. Remember a few years ago when Minnesota was supposed to be the favorite in the NFC North? They had dumped Randy Moss and Daunte Culpepper was coming off a huge season without him. Well, it didn't exactly work out the way everyone planned for the Vikes, who missed the playoffs. Why do I remember that team so clearly? Because I picked them in Week 1 and got bounced from the pool.

After completing this article view our NFL Season Win Totals page. Doc's NFL Europa resource is a must read for NFL wagering. Doc's Sports NFL Division Winner Predictions page is and excellent NFL resource as well. Is there and NFL betting or handicapping topic you would like to see covered? Email service@docsports with your recommendations.

5) You do want to look ahead and plan out when would be the best time to use certain teams - but you don't want to look too far ahead. Don't wait too long to use the Patriots or Colts or whichever team is hot. Sometimes when I'm having a hard time picking between two games, I'll look at the next week. If one of these teams has a cupcake or a real tough matchup on the horizon, I'll play accordingly. After all, you don't want to get stuck picking a team that's looking ahead or leave yourself with no good picks just seven days down the road.

So get ready, I'll be studying up and will be ready to dispense all of my survival pool picks next week. The NFL did a good job lining up some matchups that seem pretty even or have a road favorite in the early goings, so it could be tricky coming out of the gate. Parity is the NFL's goal, while exposing disparity is the goal of any good elimination pool player.

Oh, and one more thing to watch my over/under on digs at Michael Vick. Right now, it's set at eight for the whole season. We'll see…