Participants,

Now that we have the playoff teams all figured out (last minutes entries by Denver, Cincinnati and the New York football Giants), let’s get ready for the 2012 HSBT competition!!

LEAGUE RULES
Please re-read the League Rules at the top so we don’t have any issues this year (like forgetting to submit your SB pick on time…).

SUBMITTING PICKS
Remember – your picks for all games each weekend must be submitted (use the ‘Submit Picks’ tab at the top) before the kickoff of the 1st game of the weekend.  For the WildCard games, that means you need to submit your picks (which will have a timestamp when submitted) before the kickoff of the Cincinnati @ Houston game on Saturday afternoon.

TRACKING EVERYONE’S SCORES AND POINTS
Greg the Great will post the 2012 tracking spreadsheet, which will be updated real-time by The Commish.  Just click on the ‘Standings’ tab at the top to see your progress (or lack of) for each game.

MEMBERSHIP CLARIFCATION – FOLLOW UP TO THE ‘BLOVIATING’ COMMENT
If you read the ShoutBox comment on our website last year, you would have seen the following: Guest_4969 : just a shout out from a female representative of the Hewes contingent – great site, Greg , and as always, Commish – wonderful bloviating !

The Commish did a little digging on this, as it was not clear who ‘Guest 4969’ is and the reason for the verbal assault.  Well, come to find out, the guilty party just happened to be in Hamburg, NY for a Christmas Day celebration and identified themselves when the topic was brought up in conversation.  While the word ‘bloviating’ was originally coined in Ohio by a former US President (check it out, if you want) in speech-writing, it has never been used by The Commish on any HSBT communications…

In addition to the identification of the guilty party (and those of us who were also in attendance – Buffalo, Bill, Comeback Kid and  2012 Winner), the bloviating commenter also wanted to re-visit the issue of female eligibility in the HSBT competition.  So, being The Commish, I did some research into the league rules and discovered the following excerpt (which you can also find on the website) written by league founder, The Englishman, when the competition started 23 years ago:

• “This is a friendly (usually) annual competition conducted during the NFL playoffs, beginning with the 4 Wild Card games and ending with the Super Bowl – for a total of 11 playoff games. Participation is by invitation only and all participants must have a relational connection (by blood or marriage) to the Hewes family.”

As innocuous as this seems, The Englishman was very careful with his founding father words, as you can decipher below (I have highlighted the key letters in red font and capital letters for easy viewing):

• “This is a frieNdly (usually) annual cOmpetition conducted durinG the NFL playoffs, beginnIng with the 4 Wild Card games and ending with the SupeR Bowl – for a total of 11 playoff games. Participation is by invitation only and all participants must have a reLational connection (by blood or marriage) to the HeweS family.”

Sorry, Guest 4969…

Look for my next Post with predictions (typically very accurate) for the WildCard weekend games, and possibly additional predictions for the order of finish as everyone vies for the coveted HSBT Trophy (currently in possession of 2012 Winner).

Best of luck to all participants!