Heef

No one happens to have seen a QO for Bill Crider anywhere, I assume?

Ah jeez. Bev Congdon. One of my early cricket icons. One of NZ's best of the pre-(Richard) Hadlee era.

Is anyone keen for a 2019 round of the Birthing Pool?

Extraordinary! Join us around the grounds as we start our in depth coverage of the Premier Deathpooling Cup competition. Our correspondents will bring you the goals and the near misses and a whole load of clichés. There'll be some upsets on the way and we'll be waiting to see who can book their slots for the Wembley finale. It's about consistency here in the Cup. A big win doesn't net you any additional plaudits We're underway. No goals yet, but we're barely half-way through the first minute of the round. PRESS THE RED BUTTON FOR COMMENTARY FROM ALTERNATIVE FIXTURES

It wouldn't be the Deathlist Cup without AHB being on your team.

Grant Fell, bass and keyboards of the Kiwi band Headless Chickens died. I'll have to give gaskrankinstation a spin later.

Is this about right, Joey? Bracknell, Leah Bush Sr, George Cappotelli, Matt Douglas, Kirk Gascoine, Jill Gilbert, Greg Goodwin, Vanessa Harper, Valerie Hawke, Bob Hawking, Stephen James, Clive Jones, Terry Jose, Jose Jowell, Tessa Kaunda, Kenneth Kumar, Dilip Lima, Devin McCain, John (Joker) Miller, Liam Mitchell, Joni Moss, Stirling (Joker) Mugabe, Robert Nevin, Catherine (Joker) Perez de Cuellar, Javier Ricketts, Simon Ricksen, Fernando Scales, Prunella Stefansson, Stefan Karl Stiles, Nobby (Joker) Trintignant, Jean Louis Tsvangirai, Morgan Vervoort, Marieke (Joker) von Sydow, Max Williams, Shirley Wouk, Herman Zeffirelli, Franco Caballe, Montserrat Lynn, Vera Nolan, Linda de Havilland, Olivia Graham, Rev Billy Banks, Gordon Cameron, Earl Day, Doris Poitier, Sidney Atkins, Ronald Al-Baghdadi, Abu Bakr Dodd, Ken Kelly, Elizabeth Skinner, Dennis Subs: Ackland, Joss Parsons, Nicholas Tajimi, Nabi Harris, Rolf Ure, Gudrun

Still time to get in here? If so, I might have a stab later today.

Oh, Good luck to all first rounders. But I've seen enough of John Key over the past 9 years, so go gcreptile!

Ah jeez. Gets a bye through the first round and then hits the losing finalist in round 2. Where were the seedings!!! Still, an extra month for the lads to be put through their paces. I expect them all the undertake the bleep test, with the frequency increasing up to the 28th Feb. A few laps of the local playing fields, some burpees and with a bit of luck they'll be fucked at the starting line.

All Blacks backroom staffer Kevin 'Chalky' Carr has also died: https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/rugby/100583301/former-all-blacks-manager-kevin-chalky-carr-has-died

I was thinking of having a Deathlist for the combination of Australia/New Zealand. Who would be on your list? Can we draw up a 50-long antipodean deathlist? Eligibility rules: Selections must be Australian/New Zealand citizens, dual citizens or residents. Must get a qualifying obituary in a National or State-wide newspaper/website (e.g. stuff.co.nz, rnz.co.nz, abc.com.au, nzherald.co.nz, smh.com.au, Herald Sun, The Australian, Courier-Mail, Mercury etc.) Must have had a wikipedia page created before 1 January 2015. 1. Vanessa Goodwin (Aus) - Terminally ill Tasmanian AG 2. Sir Brian Lochore (NZ) - Former All Black great, has had two different cancers though has survived them both 3. Sir Ngatata Love (NZ) - Convicted fraudster, potential dementia though could be overplaying it 4. Clive James (Aus) - Poet, writer, wit. Has been ill for some time 5. Thomas Keneally (Aus) - Booker prize winning author 6. Graham Richardson (Aus) - Australian politician 7. Neale Daniher (Aus) - Former AFL player 8. Lloyd Geering (NZ) - Aging theologian who faced heresy charges in the mid-60s. 9. Dick Quax (NZ) - Briefly world record holder in the 5000m, silver medal in the '76 Olympics 10. Mike Moore (NZ) - Former NZ PM 11. Jessica Falkholt (Aus) - Home and Away actress 12. Rolf Harris (Aus) - Disgraced artist and wobbleboard afficionado 13. Darrell Eastlake (Aus) - TV and radio presenter, heavy smoker 14. Bill Hayden (Aus) - One of the last 5 ministers from the Whitlam government 15. Bob Hawke (Aus) - Former Australian PM 16. John R Reid (NZ) - Former NZ cricket captain and all-rounder 17. Olivia Newton-John (Aus) - Neutron bomb 18. Ted Mack (Aus) - Australian politician who stood down as an MP to avoid winning a third election and securing a government pension 19. Sir Frank Lowy (Aus) - Businessman, head of Westfield corporation There'll be plenty of other candidates already in this thread, so I'll have a read through, but feel free to suggest additions or removals.

I don't think I had one as I was doing my list on the phone. So, I guess Bill Crider is my joker. Given how little mileage Jim Anderton got from QOs, there's 0% chance of Sir Ngatata Love getting a QO in my opinion. He was already only an outside chance anyway.

The Russ Abbot show was fucking awful. Really shows the diabolical standard of mainstream comedy in the 80s. Still, Emberg was an icon of the time

I didn't pick Rayya Elias as I'd never heard of her before she appeared on here. Not in the slightest. I'm not a fan of picking people I'd never heard of at all.

I just hope someone else picked him in the DDP, otherwise I've done myself out of a unique. Sad hit though. It's not that long ago he was a key figure in National (that's NZ-wide, not the National Party) politics, and only recently he'd been fighting hard for the Cathedral rebuild in Christchurch. EDIT: Interesting Reuters used the term 'idealistic'. 'Principled' is the other side of that coin, depending on where on the political spectrum you fit, I guess. Not quite NZ's Tony Benn, but reasonably close in recent years.

Jim Anderton (Former NZ MP and Deputy MP) died today. He was at least in two of my teams. No QO yet, and there's probably only an outside chance of one. I'm going away from the next 7 days on voluntary work, so if anyone sees anything, check it in. Cheers! Would have been #1 on a NZ Franchised Deathlist, for the record.

Well, he was a highly principled politician, who left the Labour party when they turned to neoliberalism under David Lange. One of NZ's great politicians of recent times. I wonder if he'll get a DDP obit, as I did pick him.

Have a look through last year's Deathlist Cup thread. There weren't that many draws tbf and one team bagged six (I Think) hits in the month. Still a reasonable number of unique picks and hits too.

Simple is good. Just in the last tourny, you could beat someone despite getting fewer hits if you could nail some of those unique bonuses. Now, in order to win with fewer hits, you'd need 3 unique hits to equal one standard hit. So, four unique hits are required to overcome a shortfall of a single death. In the previous year, there was a real balance between using FFBI to get a one-pointer or the fact a unique hit could bag you the equal value - i.e. one of the reasons there were so few FFBI selections is that the rewards were so poor in comparison. No problem with FFBI being removed, but I'd say there's a lower incentive for uniques as the relative value to standard picks is diminished by ~1 third. 2 + 1 seems more appropriate than 3 + 1 (plus, crikey - how many points would DI have got in the semi-final(?) on a 3 + 1 basis) Definitely like the clarifications on the timing rules etc. - though given the decent spirit that last year's tournament ran in (excluding Morbidguy's paddy) hopefully the same common sense approach can work this year if in doubt.

Definitely back in, though I think I'll struggle to go as well as last year. Really like the obit rules in this one as it gives those of us from more remote climes If FFBIs have gone, why have the points for a standard death increased? I guess the only impact is that it slightly devalues the unique hit bonus vs. last year.

Joint 10th in the theme league with BBC Heaven. Not bad. Not as obvious a selection as Bruce Forsyth to boost the scoring for the team in 2018 though. Will struggle to keep up with that expectation. It would have been disappointing if no one had picked Prof. Heinz Wolff though. The Great Egg Race was a fantastic show. Right up there with the Adventure Game. Anyway, thanks for running the show TMIB!

If they're farming out franchises, then I'm happy to host a New Zealand focused one.

Was tempted by Nathan Haines and Mike Moore, though Moore hasn't seemingly deteriorated and it sounds like Haines' prognosis has improved somewhat.

Here's my teams. I did want to put in a Flying Nun theme team, but doubt many would get a QO The Heeflich Manoeuvre 2018 (no theme) 1. Bill Crider 2. Jim Anderton (former NZ MP) 3. Sir Brian Lochore (former All Black great) 4. Sir Ngatata Love (convicted fraudster) 5. Terry Jones 6. Leah Bracknell 7. Stefan Karl Stefansson 8. Steve Gleason 9. Fernando Rickson 10. Stirling Moss 11. Thomas Keneally 12. Joss Ackland 13. Kenneth Cope 14. Clive James 15. John R Reid (cricketer) - not John F Reid 16. Devin Lima 17. Bernard Tapie 18. Tessa Jowell 19. Marieke Vervoort 20. Catherine Nevin Heef's Politics XX (Politics theme team) 1. Vanessa Goodwin (Tasmanian AG) 2. Nuon Chea 3. Egon Krenz 4. Hosni Mubarak 5. Michael Somare 6. Atal Bihari Vajpayee 7. Vojislav Seselj 8. Reynaldo Bignone 9. Morgan Tsvangirai 10. Kenneth Kaunda 11. Jim Anderton 12. Nikolai Ryzhkov 13. Jacques Chirac 14. George HW Bush 15. Tessa Jowell 16. Daniel Arap Moi 17. Alberto Fujimori 18. John McCain 19. Robert Mugabe 20. Graham Richardson (Aussie politician) BBC Heaven (BBC Legends theme team) 1. David Attenborough 2. Tom Baker 3. Barry Cryer 4. Bill Oddie 5. Nicholas Parsons 6. Kenneth Cope 7. Andrew Marr 8. Jenni Murray 9. Harold Snoad 10. Michael Checkland 11. Kate Adie 12. John Craven 13. Bill Oddie 14. David Jason 15. Noel Edmonds 16. Rachael Bland 17. John Cunliffe 18. Peter Firmin 19. Hugo Myatt 20. Prunella Scales