General

This is a friendly (usually) annual competition conducted during the NFL playoffs, beginning with the 4 Wild Card Weekend games (expanded to 6 games in 2021) and ending with the Super Bowl – for a total of 11 playoff games (expanded to 13 in 2021).  Participation is by invitation only and all participants must have a relational connection (by blood or marriage) to the Hewes family.

The official HSBT is awarded to the participant with the most points after the conclusion of the Super Bowl.  The current trophy holder is responsible for engraving the name of the new winner on the trophy and for shipping the trophy (securely wrapped and insured for up to $1 million) to the new winner.  This process should be completed within 30 days after the Super Bowl.

Any and all grievances, complaints, suggestions and comments must be filtered through The Commish (lifetime appointment that only he can relinquish upon retirement from this lofty position) via www.hewessbt.com to ensure that all participants have equal voice in all HSBT matters.

The Commish is responsible for league administration duties, including but not limited to, maintaining of the scoring system during league play, communicating weekly scores and updates to all participants, league statistics, and any other duties deemed necessary to ensure fairness of competition (to include insuring there is enough smack talk going on during the competition and also in the off-season).

Rules of Participation

Each participant is responsible for picking what he (no females in this league, which is OK, since we’re a private club) believes will be the score of each of the 11 playoff games (13 games starting in 2021).  Scores are to be submitted to The Commish on a weekly basis prior to the kickoff of the first game of each respective weekend.

The competition is comprised of the 4 NFL Playoff weekends:

• Wild Card Weekend games (formerly 2 games on Saturday & 2 games on Sunday, but expanded to 3 games each day in 2021.  Subsequently, the NFL adjusted the playoff schedule to 2 games on Saturday, 3 games on Sunday and 1 game on Monday night)
• Divisional Round games (currently 2 games on Saturday & 2 games on Sunday)
• AFC & NFC Conference Championship games (currently both games on Sunday)
• Super Bowl

Method of submission of scores to The Commish is through the “Submit Picks” link on the official HSBT website (www.hewessbt.com) to ensure that a time stamp is electronically created.  The picks for each weekend’s games must be submitted in advance of the kickoff of the first game of the respective weekend.  Any communication of picks that is deemed to be late (i.e., the electronic date stamp is later than the kickoff of the 1st weekend game), will result in a penalty (see Scoring section below for details).  NOTE: This was a huge bone of contention during the 2006 NFL Playoffs, so please don’t create another mess.

Each participant must have a name that is not currently used by any other participant.  Name changes are acceptable on an annual basis, but not once the NFL playoffs commence.

Predicted scores for each weekend must include the scores for all games played that weekend.  For example, the scores for the 6 games on Wild Card Weekend must be submitted in advance of the kickoff of the first game on Saturday.  The same rule applies for the Divisional Round and Conference Final weekends.  Scores for the Super Bowl game must be submitted by 6:00pm Eastern time on Super Bowl Sunday.  There is zero (that means – zip, nada, none) tolerance for late scores (see Late Picks section for details).

No game points will be earned for any and all “partial scores” – we had an incident (I won’t name the guilty party because he’s a police officer and I don’t want to get into any trouble) with a partial score, something like “Chicago 21, Carolina.”

Scoring

HSBT league founder, Donn W. Hewes, established the scoring system in 1988 and this proprietary (see U.S. Patent #89-39583-56) method shall be used for all current and future scoring during league competition.

The participant with the most earned points during the NFL playoffs will be officially proclaimed the winner.

Scoring is based on 2 separate calculations:
a. Picking the winning team, and
b. The difference between the actual game score and your predicted game score, computed against the same calculation by all other participants (called “Variance”)

Picking the Winning Team

If a participant correctly chooses the game winner, he will be awarded the below number of points for each such pick:

• Wild Card Weekend game – 10 points
• Divisional Round game – 25 points
• Conference Final game – 50 points
• Super Bowl game – 100 points

No points will be awarded for picking the losing team to win the game (or for picking your nose…).

At the conclusion of the Wild Card Weekend games and prior to the start of the following weekend games, each participant can also predict who he believes will win the Super Bowl (this is called the Super Bowl Bonus Pick”), based on the remaining 8 teams in the NFL playoffs.  That team prediction must be officially submitted along with the scoring predictions for the Divisional Round games.  If that team wins the Super Bowl, he will earn a 100-point bonus.

Variance

The primary source of earning points is through the Variance algorithm.  Each participant will choose not only what team they believe will win each respective NFL playoff game, but also what the final game score will be.  That predicted score is compared to the actual game score and a variance is calculated based on how far off from the actual score each participant’s prediction is.

For example:

• You pick the New York Jets to defeat New England, 27-20.
• The Jets beat New England, 28-13.
• Your game variance is 8 – you were off by 1 point (28-27) on the Jets score and 7 points (20-13) on the New England score.

Now – the variance for each participant is determined similarly and compared against all other participant’s variance for each.  The participant with the highest game variance (farthest away from picking the actual game score) will earn zero variance points and all other participants will earn some points based on the following calculation algorithm, represented by the example below:

For example (using the above actual game score of NY Jets 28, New England 13):

• Participant A picks New York, 44-35 (for a game variance of 38)
• Participant B picks New York, 21-10 (for a game variance of 10)
• Participant C picks New England, 24-23 (for a game variance of 16)

Participant A had the highest game variance will earn zero variance points.

Participant C will earn 22 variance points (from Participant A).

Participant B will earn 34 variance points (28 from Participant A and 6 from Participant C).

The variance has a multiplier, based on what week of the NFL playoffs is being played:

• Wild Card Weekend games – 1 times the variance
• Divisional Round Games – 2 times the variance
• Conference Finals – 3 times the variance
• Super Bowl – 4 times the variance

So, for our example on the previous page, here is the number of points each of the 3 participants would have earned for the New York Jets vs. New England game if it were the Conference Final game (winner going to the Super Bowl):

Participant A

• Earns 50 victory points for picking New York to win
• Earns zero variance points, since he had the highest variance
• Total for the game = 50 points

Participant B

• Earns 50 victory points for picking New York to win
• Earns 102 variance points (34 actual variance points, times the 3X multiplier)
• Total for the game = 152 points

Participant C

• Earns zero victory points, since he did not pick New York to win the game
• Earns 66 variance points (22 actual variance points, times the 3X multiplier)
• Total for the game = 66 points

Late Picks

This is mentioned again for those of you who have been guilty over the years – and despite numerous attempts to change the treatment of late picks, we are abiding by the intent of The Englishman when the original rules were created in 1989.

Each participant is responsible to communicate his weekly scores for all games that weekend in advance of the kickoff of the first game of the weekend.  Failure to do so in a timely manner will result in a deduction of 25 points for each game scheduled on the first day (typically Saturday).  When there are games on both Saturday and Sunday, there is no point deduction penalty for the Sunday games.  For Divisional Round games, the Super Bowl Bonus pick must be submitted in conjunction with the Saturday game scores.  There is no point deduction for not submitting the Super Bowl Bonus pick on time.

Failure to submit picks for the Sunday games in conjunction with picks for Saturday games will result in zero points for any and all Sunday games.

For example:

Games are scheduled for Saturday with kickoff times of approximately 1:00pm, 4:30pm and 8:15pm and Sunday kickoff times of 1:00pm and 4:30pm (this schedule has been used recently by the NFL).  A participant submits his scores for all 4 weekend games at 4:45pm on Saturday.  This will result in the loss of 25 points for each Saturday game, for a total loss of 50 points.  The participant will not earn points for the Sunday games.  By delaying the submission of picks, participants waiting for more current information on injured players, weather conditions, etc. that could possibly influence score predictions may have an unfair advantage over other participants who abided by the rules and submitted their respective Sunday scores prior to the 4:00pm Saturday kickoff.

Scoring Example

Visual Example:

Player 1 – Total of 21 points

• No points for picking the wrong winner
• 20 points on variance Player 2 (42-22)
• 1 point on variance from Player 3 (23-22)

Player 2 – Total of 10 points

• 10 points for picking the correct winner
• No variance points, since he had the highest variance (42)

Player 3 – Total of 19 points

• No points for picking the wrong winner
• No points on variance from Player 1
• 19 points on variance from Player 2 (42-23)

Any questions? Good – now let the games begin!