Permutation Thursday at the Houston Chronicle!!

Drew Brees broke an NFL record for yards in a season Monday night. But the important numbers, at least to Jimmy O, were the 31 points he posted that helped erase a 17 point Blizzard lead as the Holes won the 31st Hughes Bowl, 88-80.

With Matt Bryant kicking in a dozen the Holes were able to pass the Bliz during the third quarter of the Saints-Falcons contest and maintained a slim lead until Brees’ last TD pass late in the fourth. That toss put the game out of reach for the Bliz who got 15 from Julio Jones and were thus able to stay within shouting distance of the Holes for most of the game.

Congrats to Jimmy for his second Hughes League Championship. He had the best season record and the high points average as well. Quite a season I’d say. Nicely done.

Later this week I’ll update this page with more details, MVP voting results and notes on refreshed league spreadsheets and much more.

EDIT (Dec 27 @ 2:30)… Except for the Team v. Team spreadsheet I have updated all the numbers that are listed in the ‘Links’ section of the league site. Team Profiles are up to date as well. The ‘rule book’ is in the process of being changed to conform with next season’s revisions. The special championship Hughes News edition is being worked on and I’ll send it as a file later this week.

Let me know if you find an error or if you have a suggestion. I hope everyone is enjoying the holidays. Go Texans!!!

Once again the Hughes Bowl will come down to the final Week 16 NFL game. With the Bliz leading 62-45 the heavily favored Holes will trot out Saints qb Drew Brees and Falcon kicker Matt Bryant. The Bliz have one weapon left, rookie Falcon wr Julio Jones. With the potential for a high octaine shootout tonight this could be real interesting.

Brees has only had one game under 20 points this season and posted 22 in his earlier matchup with Atlanta. Bryant averages 8.1 for the season with three double digit scores in his last six games.

Jones, who missed a trio of mid-season games with an injury, has had 22 and 14 points in his last two outings. In the games he was healthy he’s averaged about 11 points.

The pick here is for the Holes to cover the 17 point deficit by scoring 38 points and Jones scoring 15 for the Bliz. Call it a narrow and uncomfortable win for the Holes when the dust settles.

One thing for certain, these two clubs won’t have to deal with the extended week that pushed the conclusion of last year’s HB 30 into Tuesday night. The snow in Philly delayed but didn’t dampen the Flyers’ win over the favored Giants. Not much could push a Superdome game off track….oh, wait……

Adding some background on the two clubs competing for the top prize in the Hughes League, two teams with fairly similar histories:

The Holes….. they’re 1-3 in Hughes Bowls with the win coming over the Bombers in 2001. They’ve lost the game twice since, first when trying to repeat in ’02 and again in 2005….the eleven wins they posted in 2001 is a record for the franchise and their first double digit win total since they went 10-3-1 in 1984…. this is O’Conner’s  fourth time to post the league’s best record and the second time to lead the league in points. Their 1202 total is the highest since 2006 when both the Sticks and Giants surpassed 1200 points. They are one of two clubs in history team to sweep the ‘Triple Crown’ by winning the Hughes Bowl in a season they also had the best season record and highest scoring total….they pulled it off in ’01 and are trying to repeat that rare feat a decade later. The only other team to do it even once was the ’96 Flyers….This is their tenth postseason appearance and they are 9-8 in 17 total games. [Update--The Holes point total for 2011 is the second highest in the new scoring era, the summary of top seasons is available here] The Holes probable lineup:

• Drew Brees
• Shonn Green
• LeSean McCoy
• Jermichael Finley
• Steve Smith
• Victor Cruz or Hakeem Nicks
• Stephen Gostkowski

The Blizzard…this is Paz’ twelfth postseason and his fifth Hughes Bowl, the first since their 1998 championship…. the club has split their four title games… they are now 9-8 in postseason completion… they are attempting to become the first team in history to win a Hughes Bowl after posting a sub .500 record… they are unofficially the only team to ever appear in a title game in that circumstance (I’m not through researching that)…. The Blizzard probable lineup:

• Tom Brady
• Adrian Peterson
• Mike Tolbert or LeGarrett Blount
• Wes Welker and two of the following:
• Jabbar Gaffney, Aaron Hernandez, Mario Manningham, Julio Jones, Jermaine Gresham, DeSean Jackson
• Dan Bailey

Prediction: It’s tempting to jump on the underdog Blizzard because so few teams have won that previously mentioned ‘Triple Crown’. But the Holes were so dominant this year that I can’t fight the tide. I’ve got it 103-80 Holes. We’ll see.

And finally, I’ve fixed the links in the Links section of the home page. I found what I hope is a reliable host for the pages and files. Please let me know if you have any trouble accessing them.

After plowing through the Barenholtz Division with a glitzy 11-2 record the Holes drew a bye and then this weekend made short of the Lombardi champ Heroes, 111-81. Having about 35 points from Drew Brees by about 2:00 on Sunday likely made the rest of Jimmy’s weekend fairly stress free. Add in LeSean McCoy’s 28 and the result is that even pedestrian weeks from the rest of the lineup gave the Holes their ticket to their first Hughes Bowl since 2005.

The Blizzard edged their toe into the playoff door with a 6-7 record in the Kuhlmann Division but once they had the opening they took full advantage. They defeated a favored Bomber squad 68-54 with 30 points from Tom Brady. The win was a measure of revenge for the Bombers semi-final ousting of the Bliz in 2007. This Hughes Bowl will be the first one for Paz’ crew since they participated in (and won) the 1998 HB.

I’ll try to post more on the two Hughes Bowl teams during the week.

Meanwhile I’ve been unable to access the files I linked in the EHFL Links section of the home page. It looks like my web host (my3gb.com) has thrown itself on a cyber sword. I’ll have them available again soon. I plan to update the files as soon as the season ends with results through the ’11 season.

The Heroes disposed of the Flyers 87-77 (not far from my projected score, yes?). The Heroes now have ‘earned’ the right to take on the steamrolling 11-2 Holes in the semifinals. Good luck with that.

The Blizzard, on the rebound from a 6-7 regular season put together a big week to trounce the Giants 113-73. As close as I was on the Heroe-Flyer score prediction…I was waaaaaay off on the Giants-Blizzard. Hey, the Bliz had a big week in them, who knew?

The Blizzard now move on to challenge the Lombardi champion Bombers.  Off the top of my head I’ll pick the Bombers 90-83 and the Holes 459 to 77. And take the ‘over’ on that game.

If I can I’ll have a bit more up later in the week.

TEXANS IN THE PLAYOFFS!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Flyers (8-5) versus Heroes (9-4)

The Flyers, defending Hughes Bowl champs, outscored the Heroes and beat them twice. All that means squat because the Flyers scored most of their points early in the season and the Heroes, frankly, are a better team. The Flyers have Rice and Foster sure, but their best receiver, Steve Johnson (96 points), hasn’t scored as many points as the Heroes worst receiver, Brandon Marshall (106). When your 5th wr option is Brandon Marshall you should win some games. Add to that the Flyers run of the mill qb play and a diminished kicker and it adds up to the Heroes gaining a bit of revenge for the Flyers’ regular season dominance. Call it 89-79 Heroes. 

Giants (7-4) versus Blizzard (6-7)

In the years since we changed our scoring system we’ve never had a team win a division with a sub .500 record. The Blizzard took the Kuhlmann with six wins. And that is after a 5-1 start. WTF? Yup, 1-6 over the last 7 weeks was good enough for them to tale the division. The good news is that everyone is now 0-0 and Adrian Peterson may be back this week for Paz so I give them a sporting chance. With Mike Vick back in the picture to go along with Demarco Murray for the Giants this could be a very interesting game. I see the potential for either team to have a big week, and, without looking closely at matchups, I’m having a hard time predicting this one. So I’ll go on a hunch (and recent results) and pick the Giants, 90-78. that’s as good a guess as any.

The bracket is posted on the web site. Remember that the semi final games will be the Holes versus the lowest remaining seed and the Bombers versus the next lowest. So the games listed as the Semis may not be reflected correctly at this point. I have a few ideas about making changes as to how teams are seeded and I’ll run them by everyone in the near future.

I hope to have a more in depth look at the playoff teams and the Wild Card games later in the week.