Week 5

Thursday Morning EDIT: A question came up and I realized that players who started the season on 4-game IR may be coming off it now and I should probably clarify the procedures. 

We are set up to where a team with an 'IR Violation' cannot submit a lineup until the violation is corrected. In other words, once a player in one of your IR slots is activated by his NFL team you will need to move him off your IR before you can submit or revise your lineup. That does NOT mean a legally submitted lineup is suddenly invalid when the player is activated. Here is an example.

I have Tank Dell on my IR and he is now practising with the Texans but still on IR. I have already set a lineup for this week. If Dell is activated for this weekend, say on Saturday, my lineup would stay in place and be valid. However should I want to change it (re-submit it) I'd have to deal with Dell (activate or drop him) before doing so. And I'd have to fix it in any case before submitting a lineup next week. 

Let me know if you have any questions.

How About Those Pirates?

I don't put much stock in post-draft analysis but I do check stuff out just for grins. This year the draft site gave out one failing grade after the draft...to the Pirates. And it gave out two "A" grades... to the Legends and Holes. The Pirates are 4-1. The Legends and Holes are a combined 3-7. I guess my point is.."You never know!" I mean Dameon Pierce and someone named Germie Bernard are at the top of this week's recommended waiver priority lists. Crazy talk for sure.

There is no reason to pay attention to the Playoffs tab on the league site yet. I mean we are still two weeks from the midway point of the season. But if you go there be aware that the Populate Playoff Seedings thing is A) slow to update, it usually takes a couple of days, and B) it gives bogus results until everyone has played everyone else and the tie-breaks are established.

The Giants fell short in their quest for 300 this past weekend. Rick will give it another whirl against the Sticks in Week Six. 

It took 46+ seasons but I finally had a Hughes League-related dream last night. In it Jimmy O called me angry about something I wrote in this newsletter. 😂 Since I wrote that first paragraph late Monday night maybe I dreamt I'd already sent it and he was mad about being used as an example. Jimmy, feel free to weigh in on this!

Scoring was up three points per franchise over last week. Eight teams broke the 100 points barrier (and the Flyers were very close) which is the highest since Week One. There were far fewer 'extremes' than we had last week, that's for sure. If you look at the Scoring Bar Chart on this page, the sizes of the purple areas (Week 5) are much more uniform than they were in the yellow (Week 4). It's like someone squashed the Bell Curve, or something. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

That's it for this week. Almost five straight days of grandpa duties wore me out for sure.

30->26

Aída at her recent 2-year checkup. She's 90th Percentile for height, 75th for weight, and 200th Percentile for Adorableness!

Week Four

Blogger Sucks

I mean it sucks for reals. I'll finish my post and find that text above and below a picture/embedded video/subheadline are in two different font sizes despite my not making any changes. I'll type the entire post in one size font and then use the exact same settings to enlarge the headings and they all look different. The fuck?

All efforts to fix the problem come to naught. Last week for example, I had the top photo (the dead flies) in the middle of the first paragraph but moving it to the top screwed up the text in that paragraph.

This week I had a couple of captions for my grandbabies pics and I couldn't for the life of me get the text correct. It was so small it looked like ants crawling across my monitor. I don't relish the idea of switching platforms (again 😒 ) so I doubt I'll go back to WordPress or try to learn the ins and outs of Wix. I may try them out in the off-season. That means I'm stuck here for at least this year. Ugh. The shame of it is that for a long time Blogger was a top notch site. I just think Google sees the world moving away from blogs and doesn't give a shit if this place goes to hell.

Let's take a moment to watch my guy, Igor Shesterkin score a goal. The first Ranger goalie to ever nail one! This cheers me up every time! LGR!!

And check out this tour poster. I know there was a heavy drug culture in the late 60s but what was the promoter doing booking Jimi Hendrix, Cat Stevens and ENGELBERT HUMPERDINCK together? Holy shit. BTW...if, like me, you're wondering who the hell the Walker Brothers were...they were a mid-60s LA-based trio of non-brothers who had some success in the UK. Their biggest record was 'Make It Easy On Yourself', written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, which was covered far better by the legendary Jerry Butler.

And Now For The Usual BS:

I would have bet heavily against ever rostering Deshaun Watson again, but here we are. Full disclosure, he was my 3rd choice waiver priority but I got outbid on Penix and Geno Smith... Okay, here is the Week 4 Roll Call of Tears: Lamar, Chase AND Higgins, Barkley, DeVonte Smith, McConkey, Rice, Mariota, DJ Moore... did I miss anyone?

The Strawmenn have picked up their 300th win! Under the guidance of Mark Kuhlmann and Mike Padilla this original franchise has joined an exclusive club. The 300 Win page has been updated to reflect it. Congrats, Mike. You are an asset to the Hughes League for sure. The Smenn defeated the Nats for that milestone win and the Nats will face the Giants this week who have 299 and are looking for one to get their franchise over the line.

This week was the third time in our history that two teams had over 150 points. Unless my quick research missed anything, it last happened in 2019 when the Smann and Holes both were above the 150 mark in seperate games. But prior to that we had the 'Agony Bowl' in which the Bliz beat the Holes 155-151 in Week 8 of 2015. Ouch.

This is the second week of four this season that the Rbacks have had above average games and gotten beat. Sorry, Dave. At least you can gloat over the Cowboys...the Heroes had the top score last week and the worst score this week, chicken salad to chicken feathers (or something).. the Sticks rolled off the edge of the table as well... even with the two 150+ teams we only jumped 5 points per team over last week...

I'd already won my game going into Monday night but if I hadn't, and had lost by a handful of points, Brian Robinson poaching three TDs from Bijan would have...well, you wouldn't have this news blog post, or maybe this league. 😟... here come the Bye Weeks. I dunno why the weak-ass NFL players need a week off. If we can play every week, so can they!

After completing most of this post I decided that maybe I'd use Google's Gemini to clean the code and I could avoid the issues I mentioned. I tried it, asking why Blogger screws with the post and here is what I got back (along with cleaned-up code):

Blogger's visual WYSIWYG editor is infamous for wrapping text in random inline HTML tags (like <span style="font-size: large;"> or <div><br /></div>) whenever you cut, paste, press enter, or move images around.

If one Google product says another Google product is 'infamous', well, who am I to argue? And I may just have to try cleaning the code that way from now on. It's certainly quicker than redoing the whole f'ing thing from scratch three times like I did last week.

35 --> 31

Here's a bonus, Jerry 'The Iceman' Butler from 1962. Enjoy!

BTW... Jerry Butler will appear later in my Top 50 list.

Aida is normally the happiest kid around. Dunno what this is all about. Maybe she drafted Puka, Achane, Jefferson, Bowers, and Dart.

Bombs Away! (Week Three)

 The Hits Keep Coming

You keeping track? Cause I am... De'Von Achane, Justin Jefferson, Hughes Bowl 44 MVP Baker Mayfield, Mike Evans, Breece Hall, Jalen Coker, Travis Etienne, Jalen McMillan, Terrance Ferguson, Mark Andrews, did I miss anyone? Over the first three weeks of the season six of the first 27 players we drafted have had their play limited or ended by injuries. 

I mean we can't be all that far from a bidding war for Davis Mills. 💀

Scoring across the league was down less than a point per team this week...the Giants remain undefeated but with Rick's guys among the wounded he'll have to work some magic to remain that way as we head for the bye weeks...

Hey, we had a trade last week, Nats and Pirates. You remember what a trade is, right? It's when two teams decide to swap players. It's not that hard to do (or at least it shouldn't be). Try it some time. 

Hey, how 'bout my guy, Case Keenum? Doing the Cougars proud. Not bad for someone who was told he'd never last in the NFL.

He was a Flyer in 2014 and 2016. Here is his EHFL history:

And his NFL career prior to Monday night:

James sent me a graphic that showed Keenum has won a game for SEVEN different NFL clubs. Only Ryan Fitzpatrick has done that besides Case.

Waiver Cash Auditing ;-)

I think I mentioned some time back that I would be trying to keep a close eye on the waiver funds as I thought MFL has been kind of glitchy in tracking them. I've kept a notepad with all the transactions so far and it all adds up correctly. I'll give it a few more weeks and if nothing is 'off' I'll quit worrying about it.

New MFL App

MFL Live is just out and in my limited time to play with it I've been impressed. It has a clean interface, and does the basics well. It is supposed to also have a 'commish abilities' mode but I wasn't able to find it. I reached out to the developers and they are looking into it. They have fixed the 'commish' page but I've found a couple of other minor issues that I've notified the team about. Hopefully that can get them worked out because it really is a nice looking app.

I also asked about cost since there is a line in their FAQ about 'in-app payments for premium features'. They said that they are planning to incorporate AI features at a later date (next year probably) and they would charge for those as an option.

As an owner I like it quite a bit. It's in the Apple App Store and Google Play. My advice is to bookmark it and wait until the issues are addressed. But is it well worth a look. 

Here's a peek at a couple of the functions:

IR Status and Me (Rant #1)

Alec Pierce got hurt in Week Two for the Colts. By Monday it was obvious he'd be gone for awhile. On Tuesday morning every site said "the Colts have placed Alec Pierce on IR". On Friday evening (as I type this) he is still listed as 'Out'. So four+ days after he was reported to be on IR he isn't. Which means I was unable to put him in an IR spot on my roster and fill the void. My choice (if I was really in a bind) would be to cut him loose. 

So, who is to blame? The Colts for dragging their feet on the paperwork? The NFL for not making it official in a timely manner? MFL for not changing his status? To be fair, the other platforms I was able to peek at (ESPN and Sleeper) also have him as 'Out', not 'IR'. Maybe its the fault of the reporters covering the club/league for jumping the gun?

I dunno, but it pisses me off. MFL has the option to allow 'Out' players to go on our league IR but that's a can of worms I'd rather not open. 

UPDATE: Pierce was 'officially' placed on IR on Saturday. A few hours later MFL changed his designation and I was able to make a roster move. I did note that ESPN made the update hours earlier. 

Commissioners are can be idiots (Rant #2)

I check in on a couple of web forums that focus on being a commissioner. I see a lot of "One guy traded X and Y for A and B. Should I veto it/put it up for a league vote?" Usually X=a stud, Y=a replacement level guy, and A & B are good or very good players. I'm baffled by 'vetoes' in any case besides blatant collusion. And completely baffled as to why some dopes think we could answer that question with no f'ing context. 

I mean so many things go into trades:

Some teams are in dire need at a position and are willing to overpay.

Not every owner values every player the same way. 

Some owners have favorites, play hunches, do different research than the other owner.

We don't know if the league has 8, 10, 12, or 30 teams. That matters. A lot.

So does the scoring system, roster size, and league type.

If I ever suggest going to routine trade voting, quit this league because I will have lost my mind.

Thanks for attending my TED Talk.

40-->36

And a suggested bonus track. Very nice!

Week Two

 Call the Doctor!

Maybe it's always like this and I'm just overreacting. I dunno. But it sure seems like the injuries to key players are mounting at an alarming rate. Three QBs went down this week (I'm not including Justin Herbert who isn't hurt but he is killing me for fucks sake). I suspect the waiver wire will be a popular destination between now and Wednesday evening. 

Random League Thoughts... we have two teams at 2-0, two at 0-2, and eight at 1-1. I don't think that means anything in particular but I found it interesting (it last occured in '23)... our league-wide scoring average was down over 11 points from Week One (109.05--->97.82). it might be a reflection of the injuries, or maybe not... last year the average jumped from Week One (90.09-->95.50)... 

...Giants doing a nice job of winning while adhering to the 'Zero RBs' approach... I bet it's been awhile since a team had both its QBs get KO'd like the Heroes, but Hogan managed to grab a win... We have two teams approaching the 300 win milestone, the Smenn and the Giants. I have a countdown (count up?) going on the homepage...

I've disabled (I hope) the 'pop-up' notifications for the league site as they were deemed too annoying. I thought I'd filtered them to where you only saw them once and then not again until there was an important notice but I failed, apparently. There are quite a few switches to throw in the template code to get stuff like that done so if you are still getting them, let me know. 

I've added the 'Pending Trade' module to the top right column of the league homepage. You should also subscribe to 'trade offer' email in the My Franchise-->Franchise setup --> Contact info dropdown.

The Ed Hughes Book

The locals saw this at the draft but I wanted to share it with everyone. Over the years I've collected quite a bit of memorabilia (ephemera is probably more accurate a term) related to Coach Hughes. It's displayed on the News blog here via the Ed Hughes Tribute page linked on the right. But, after many stops and starts, I finally sat down and organized it all. I thought the huge-ass binder was going to be too big but as it turns out I needed it. Below are a few pics giving you an idea of what it contains. 

The plate on the front came from our trophy provider. It's the only cheap, free shipping purchase I've ever made with them! Turned out nice I think.

I loosely organized it with oddball items, trading cards, and autographs first. (You can click any pic to expand it). 

I have some league historical things in there that are not directly related to CEH. A bit of Flyers and '71 Oilers stuff as well.

I've updated the Hall of Fame for the league and dug up a card for every player included. Yes, that's a signed Eric Dickerson. 

The 'Type 1' photos are next.

And finally the game programs from his college, pro playing and coaching career. 

Numbers 45-->41

And a bonus track!

Someone had a birthday yesterday!!!