Ray Romano, "Men of a Certain Age"

Nomination Status: The last spot is a coin flip between Romano, Kiefer Sutherland and several other contenders. This is just our hunch.

In His Favor: Have you not heard? Everybody loves Raymond. Romano earned six nominations, including one win, for his acting on "Everybody Loves Raymond." That was a pretty conventional hangdog sitcom performance and it barely gave any inkling that Romano was capable of the sort of emotional depth he displayed on his new TNT dramedy. Even if this writer didn't love the show -- that's what we have Sepinwall for -- there was no disputing how great Romano was. Coupled with the show's inevitable topical resonance with Emmy voters and it seems like a logical enough nomination.

Working Against Him: Romano's performance is impressive because of how understated and human it is, without even an iota of sitcom schtick. With only one or two open positions in this category, is "understated" really going to get you noticed?