Congratulations To Kirill Muzyka, Chief Justice of FantasySCOTUS for OT 2024
The October 2024 Term of FantasySCOTUS finally came to a close. On the whole, this term was a less predictable than some recent terms. In the aggregate, our crowd predicted 76.36% of the cases accurately, down from 83.05% of the cases accurately last term.
I am happy to announce that the Chief Justice is Kirill Muzyka. Players receive ten points for each correct prediction of a Justice’s vote. We recorded 55 merits cases (DIGs do not count). A perfect score would have been 4,950 points. Kirill scored 4,840 points.
Here is the Top 10:
I usually ask the winner several questions to figure out their approach to predicting cases. Kirill’s response was so thorough and insightful, that I reproduce it in its entirety:
My name is Kirill Muzyka. I’m from St. Petersburg, Russia, and I’m currently finishing my master’s degree in Political Science at the London School of Economics.
My interest in American politics began quite some time ago, but I became especially focused on the U.S. Supreme Court in 2020, following the death of Justice Ginsburg. Her passing turned the Court into a major topic of public debate during the election, and that moment drew my attention. I eventually wrote a paper during my undergraduate studies on the Supreme Court’s role in the polarization of American politics, and my interest in the Court has only grown since then.
What particularly drew me in was the contrast between the legal system in the U.S. and in my own country. The Supreme Court’s dual nature — both legal and political — was fascinating to me. I was also struck by how the Justices manage to maintain respectful, even friendly, relationships despite deep ideological divisions. That kind of civility seemed rare and especially meaningful in today’s political climate.
Since 2022, I’ve been listening to all oral arguments and making predictions about case outcomes for myself. In 2023, I began submitting predictions publicly through FantasySCOTUS. I’ve also read all of the Court’s opinions from the past 2 terms. I really enjoy trying to understand the different perspectives each Justice brings, and I often try to reconstruct their arguments myself to det
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