After a ten day multi-beer odyssey, we were able to input, review and cut the OBE data six ways to Sunday. Below are some of the more interesting facts about the 2019 Old Blue Eyes Memorial Celebrity Death Watch. The more beer you consume, the more interesting the information becomes...

A total of 148 Death Watchers are playing this year. That's down 1.3% from last year's count of 150 participants.

Death Watchers from 32 states in the U.S. are playing as are Death Watchers from three other countries. The states represented and the number of Death Watchers from each are: AL(1), CA(14), CO(8), CT(1), FL(7), GA(4), IL(6), IN(12), KS(1), LA(3), MA(5), MD(1), ME(2), MI(2), MN(1), MO(5), MS(2), NC(1), NE(5), NJ(14), NY(9), OH(7), OR(1) PA(7), TN(5), TX(5), VA(2), VT(1), WA(2), WI(4) and WV(3). The countries represented and the number of Death Watchers from each are: Australia(3), Canada(3), and England(1).

One Alternate was exercised this year. One player entered a list in early November. The player had George Bush Sr. on their list. If ya didn't here, George croaked. The former president's death caused the alternate to be exercised.

148 lists should result in 1924 total picks entered. However, several factors reduced the total pick count (as is typical). Have some popcorn, open that second beer and read on, you'll find out all about it. We're presuming That first beer was done somewhere between KS and WV.

We had some crazy stuff happen this year. We had one player submit a list with no number five position, no number 11 position and two number 12 positions. That basically means the player had 12 instead of 13 picks. We also had a second player enter a list one pick short in the number 13 position. This player also will play with only 12 picks. So, we're down to 1922 picks now.

Check this out. We had two players list the same pick twice on their lists. Yup, one player listed Kirk Douglas twice (they must REALLY want that guy to go). The other player (and we really can't believe this one) listed Don Rickles twice. We can't believe it because Don Rickles died in 2017!! And they listed him TWICE! So, we removed one of the doubles from each list making the pick total 1920. We'll remove the remaining Don Rickles (who is still dead) when we discuss dead picks below. If you're counting, we're down to 1920 picks.

It's true, someone always picks a dead person. In fact, seven someones picked dead people this year. We really can't believe this still happens. It's called Google folks. You put in the Celebrity name. It tells you if they're alive. Simple. None-the-less, one player each picked the already deceased King Abdullah Bin Abdulaziz, Ernest Borgnine, Peter Falk, Mary Carlise and the aforementioned Don Rickles. Since you can't score on people who are already dead (ewww, that's an unpleasant double entendre), an additional four (4) picks were removed, making our pick total 1916. Note Don Rickles was only removed once here because the second (also dead) Don Rickles was removed in the last paragraph. Seriously. Grab another beer and go back and have a look. Also note that Mary Carlise is not being removed here. Why? Because we would have deemed her ***Not A Celebrity*** anyway (which we did in 2014 when she was still alive). So Mary will be removed with our next topic, explained in the paragraph below. Probably time for another beer.

Oh, and then late in January 2019, the death of Morton Sobell was announced. Thing is, he died on December 26, 2018. That means the death didn't count in the 2018 OBE (it was announced after the Jan 10 deadline). Also, three players had Morton on their 2019 lists. Each of those lists was submitted on December 31, 2018, AFTER Mr. Sobell died. So, none of those lists got to exercise their Alternate either. Crazy stuff from old Mort bringing the count down to 1913 active picks.

Hopefully you grabbed two beers, you might need them. 61 new names were entered as picks this year. That's down from the 83 new picks entered last year. Of the 61 new names entered, 42 (68.8%) were deemed to be celebrities. If you've been using your fingers and toes, you've figured out that 19 new names were deemed ***Not A Celebrity***. These 19 names occupied 24 pick positions across 20 lists. That means the loss of 24 more pick positions, making our active pick total 1889.

A few comments and thoughts. As we mentioned, one pick that we eliminated, Mary Carlise, had also been deemed ***Not A Celebrity*** back in 2014. To make matters worse, Mary is also dead (August 1, 2018). Five other ***Not A Celebrity*** picks had also been deemed ***Not A Celebrity*** in prior years. One of those five, Kamala "The Ugandan Giant" appeared on the website's ***Not A Celebrity*** page throughout 2018 as Kamala was also picked for the 2018 Death Watch and denied. Still someone picked him. Interestingly, one pick who had been deemed ***Not A Celebrity*** in the past (2009) was accepted this year. The reason for this is that the pick's notoriety has increased in the last decade, making her name readily known to us. That pick was Mavis Staples. This has only happened once before (in 2015 with Paul Allen).

To see who got deemed ***Not A Celebrity*** Go to the NOT CELEBRITIES portion of our website. To see our entire existing database of people who are celebrities, click on Frank Sinatra's image on the home page for the OBE or just click HERE. Now, have another beer, go to the rules page and reread the Ronnie Hawkins Requirement. This Requirement clearly prohibits a player from "belly-aching, whining, sniveling, wincing, guffawing, or donning of faux expressions of shock" about their pick(s) being deemed ***Not A Celebrity***. We struggled with several of these ***Not A Celebrity*** decisions this year. In the end however, we applied the criteria outlined in the rules and the tried and true method of asking a cross section of folks some of the names. You get what you get and you don't get upset. Now let's get that beer.

"Guys! Guys! What about donations?" 75 players (50.6%) donated to the OBE this year. Last year 75 players donated too. This year, 51% of our players presumed the other 49% would support them. That's so not right. Fortunately, it's not too late to rectify this situation. We take donations all year long via mail and PayPal. If you mail a donation after January 10, please let us know via email so we're sure to visit the PO Box (which we don't do very often after the Death Watch is under way). One more thing about donations. Three people who are not playing made donations (very thoughtful).

Lot's of information so far, right? Lot's of beer too if you've been doing what we told you. So, before we get into the nitty gritty, why not get a beer...

We're at 1889 active picks across 148 lists. Those 1889 active picks are comprised of 386 different celebrities (11 less than last year). Of the 386 celebrities picked to keel over, 191 (49.5%) were on only one list (the Tad Szulcs), 63 (16.3%) were on only two lists (the double whammmies), 48 (12.4%) were on three or four lists (the mortage a trois) and the remaining 84 (21.8%) were on five or more lists.

The number one pick this year has been a top five pick since 2005! That pick is Kirk "I'm the new Zsa Zsa" Douglas. Mr. Douglas appears on 110 (74.3%) lists!! We're amazed that the other 38 of you DIDN'T pick Kirk! Bob Dole took the number two spot this year, appearing on 75 (50.7%) lists. Olivia de Havilland rounds out the top three appearing on 74 (50.0%) lists.

A complete breakdown of celebrities and how many players picked 'em is presented below for your reading pleasure. It's most definitely time for another beer.