Weak Five

 

I've never been one to draft with bye weeks in mind and sometimes I get lucky, sometimes I don't. But either way, they are a pain in the butt. I wonder why the NFL can't balance them out more. Why are six teams off in Weeks 12 and 14 and nobody sits out Week 8?  

League Stuff... Looks like things are sorting out after five weeks. But the ‘sorting out’ doesn’t mean it's becoming clearer. The Flyers have rebounded from a crap first week and have won four straight. I’m not getting too smug, though. I watched a lot of football this past weekend and kept seeing players getting carted off… the Scofield Mafia took a hit with both the Nats and Pirates falling short. The Rbacks and Holes are on two-game win streaks and now the Barenholtz is up for grabs. Over in the Kuhlmann the Strawmenn flexed some muscle with 124 points, just a fraction off the Sticks total topping the league. Draw your own conclusions. 

Not a full-blown research project but a quick observation... I went back over the last five years and looked at scoring for the eventual champ through five weeks. What I found was interesting (at least I think so). Note that the numbers refer to total points scored.

2019..Giants were 5th in scoring, 40 points below the league leader. 

2020..Giants were 9th in scoring, 40 points below the league average in total points.

2021..Giants were 3rd in scoring and well above the league average.

2022..Blizzard were 6th in scoring thru 5 weeks.

2023..Strawmenn were 6th in scoring.

They all went on to win the Hughes Bowl. Never Give Up! Never Surrender!

Updates/Research/Corrections/Trivial Stupid Stuff:

I referenced last week when all teams in a division were at or above .500 in the final standings. The reference was made to the wrong team. It wasn't the Strawmenn from 1991 (they weren't even in the Wice Division) although they did come back from 0-4 to 7-7 as stated. The correct info is the 1990 Wice Division and the Blizzard were the team that bounced back to 7-7, had the best PPG, but missed the playoffs. Here is the graphic again (in a clearer version)...

But looking at that I wondered if there had been other instances of a division having all .500 or better clubs. Turns out there have been four.

1990 Wice as referenced above was the only example across the first 23 seasons of the league. 

In 2003 the Barenholtz Division had all four teams, not just at .500, but above .500!

16 years later and we have the next example. In 2019 it was the Kuhlmann Division with four winning teams.

The very next year, 2020, had another full division of teams with winning records. This one probably gets an asterisk since we were in our brief four divisions of three teams mode. But still. 

You probably noticed that three of the divisions had a team shown in green. That green color indicates Hughes Bowl losing clubs. Interestingly none of the teams in these divisions went on to win the big game. Italicized teams were Wildcard clubs. 

I don't know if any of that means anything but I found it interesting. I have another research project that I will feature in a week or two.

Three unique versions of one of the great songs of the 70s. Hell, one of the great songs, period. Enjoy.

We welcomed in a brand new baby granddaughter yesterday (Monday, the 7th). Aida Jane Glusberg checked in at 7 pounds after an arduous pregnancy that saw her Mama hospitalized for two months. She's doing great despite some early breathing problems that had her on a CPAP for 24 hours. Hopefully, she'll be home with her brother and moms by the end of the week. 

Ellis can't wait to meet her new cousin!