The Internet Simulation Football League Newsletter
Volume #13 Issue #4 – September 14, 2009
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Current League Officers
Commissioner: Mark McNeil (blades99@rochester.rr.com)
League Statistician: Mark McNeil (blades99@rochester.rr.com)
ISFL WWW site: http://www.blades99.com/ISFL/ISFL.htm
ISFL Review Board: Jeff Barricelli, Dave Stewart, Don Antonelli
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LEAGUE NOTES
I. Message from the Commissioner
II. News from Around the League
III. Standings
IV. Week 3 Results
V. Week 4 Schedule
VI. Transactions
VII. Other News including Players of the Week
I. MESSAGE FROM THE COMMISSIONER
Another solid week as the games were all done well inside of the deadline and game contacts have been going well, keep up the good work
guys!
We have lost an owner, but immediately gained a replacement who I think will be a solid owner for us going forward. Larry Hill has
decided to step away from the game as he has lost the fun and just wasn’t getting anything positive from it and I can’t blame him for
doing so as what is the point if you aren’t having fun? Larry was a long time coach in the league and will be missed. His replacement
is Daniele Miozzi, our third addition from the Italian contingent, and he seems to have a good handle on the game and should be able to
step in without any problems. Daniele already played the week three game for Larry and as of this newsletter is now the official owner
of the New England Patriots, so please, welcome him to the league if you get a minute and he will be their contact going forward. You
can reach him at miozzi@libero.it and I’m sure he will let us know his AOL IM if he has one as we get a chance to know him better.
Don’t forget, if you lose a player for 2 or more games, you can ask for an injury replacement, but it must be done the same week as the
injury, so don’t wait, get those requests in right away and take advantage, especially the teams who are already challenged for the amount
of games they have to work with.
Reminder that you MUST send a boxscore and writeup to the league after each game. The home team is responsible for this, but either team
can do it, as long as it does get done. Also, you MUST send me the game export immediately after the game is complete. It takes about
30 seconds, so I shouldn’t have to chase you down for that file after a game, just get it in right away so I don’t have to guess whether
a game has happened or not.
Other that this stuff, just keep up the good work and good luck to all for week 4!
II. News from Around the League
In the AFC, Cleveland pulls a big upset as rookie QB Joe Flacco has his best day as a pro, throwing for a pair of TDs and leading his team
to a fourth quarter win on the road in Chicago. Indianapolis goes to 3-0 on the season as they beat up on the Vikings, while the Jets
also stay undefeated with a big win over the Patriots. The Steelers finally find their first win of the season as they are able to beat
the visiting Seahawks despite Garrard being picked twice and sacked 5 times in the game. Buffalo gets their second win, this time over
Matt Ryan and the 49ers, while Tennessee takes the lead in the AFC West with a big win over the division rival Chargers.
Buffalo tries for their 3rd win of the season as they host the Broncos in week 4, while Tennessee and Dallas fight it out for the division
lead in the AFC West in a big, early season matchup. Indy puts their undefeated record on the line, against the Patriots, while San Diego
and Minnesota fight to stay out of the AFC West basement. Houston and NY Jets both look to stay perfect against some rebuilding teams in
Carolina and San Fran who will both still look for the big upset. Fresh off their upset of the Bears, the Browns come to Pittsburgh
where the Steelers will be trying to keep in touch with the teams at the top of the division as a 3 game deficit might be too much to
overcome. And speaking of the Bears, Chicago faces a tough test as the champion Lions come to town, looking to go to 4-0 on the season
in their quest to repeat.
In the NFC, Detroit continues their title defense with as they send Carolina to 3-0, while Kansas City is one of the early season surprises,
pulling a huge upset over the Cowboys for their second win of the season. St. Louis continues their normal regular season roll over the
Dolphins, while the Eagles get beat by Eli Manning and the Texans who continues their roll. Tampa Bay gets their first win of the year
over the Broncos, while Green Bay puts a beat down on the Jags who drop to 1-2 on the season, not something you expect to see from Jax.
Arizona wins a huge NFC West matchup as they squeak by the Saints to take the division lead at 3-0, while Atlanta bottles up Peyton Manning
and Pennington leads his club to another win.
Week 4 has the Chiefs looking for win #3 against Tampa as they try to keep pace with the Rams who face a new and improved Arizona club who
are looking to win their 4th in a row. A big divisional game for teams looking to stick with the Cards, Saints and Eagles both need the
win as the loser could find themselves in big hole to dig out of. Green Bay will also look to keep pace with the rams as they face Miami
and another big division matchup pits the Jags versus the Giants with both teams in danger of falling out of the race very early in the
season. Atlanta has to watch for the trap game as the face the Seahawks who are looking for a win to get their goose egg off the board.
Below is a coaching profile for one of our newest coaches and if anyone else would like to provide one of these, I would be happy to
include it in a future newsletter as well as articles about pretty much anything!
Coach: Hank Sienzant
Team: Denver Broncos
Hank Sienzant is the coach of the UFFL Denver Broncos, but his favorite NFL
team is the New York Giants. But the vacant Giants team was taken by his
brother Walt, who joined the UFFL a few weeks earlier, so Hank got the
Broncos and kept the name.
"I was a big Marlin Briscoe and Floyd Little fan back in the 1960's, but I
haven't really rooted for the Broncos as a team," Sienzant said. "I've kept
the name for continuity purposes, and because I now have a website dedicated
to the UFFL Broncos" (www.ufflbroncos.bravehost.com).
Hank grew up in Newark, NJ, where his first sim action was playing a grammar
school classmate in a Yankees baseball simulation. It was a board game that
came with cards for all the Yankees and many MLB All Stars at the time
(Mantle, Kubek, Maris, Berra, etc. on the Yankees, Aaron, Mays, etc. on the
All Stars). "You rolled two dice and got a number from 2 to 12 and that gave
you the result of the plate appearance," Sienzant recalls. "It was my
friend's game and he always took the Yankees. I soon found out why."
According to Sienzant, the game wasn't statistically accurate and was stacked
in favor of the Yankees, with their hits placed on the cards at the dice
results that come up more frequently, like 6, 7, and 8. Meanwhile, Sienzant
says, the All-Stars had their hits at the less frequent numbers like 2, 3, 11
and 12. Pitchers did not affect the outcome of the at-bat, per Sienzant.
"This was in the late 1950's or early 1960's. We were in maybe 4th or 5th
grade and had no idea how to compute the percentages of each outcome, so we
simply counted up the number of hits on each player's card. It seemed fair,
because each Yankee and each All Star had maybe four hit results scattered
around their card. Of course, I was always getting clobbered 12-1 or the
like, so I soon lost interest in playing that game, despite my friend's
protests. It never occurred to us to have a draft and pick players so we each
had our share of Yankees and All-Stars."
"But having the deck stacked against me was excellent training for the UFFL,"
Sienzant jokes, where his expansion Broncos had a 10-54 record after their
first four seasons - including losing their first 20 in a row and having
another streak of 15 in a row. But they've turned it around since then,
winning more than half their games over the past two years.
"I discovered APBA football and baseball games, as well as Stratomatic
football in high school. Those games were more statistically accurate, and
offered strategy as well."
Sienzant played in a few leagues, mostly with his younger brothers for a few
years, but put the game aside until the mid-1980's after entering college in
1972. "I played four years of college football at Rutgers-Newark (not to be
confused with Rutgers New Brunswick). Our opponents were teams like Jersey
City State, Seton Hall, and Fordham, not exactly Notre Dame and USC," he
recalls. "We didn't win too many but I had a lot of fun."
He met his wife of 26 years - Ann Marie - in 1980, and married her two years
later. Almost six years to the day of their first meeting, their daughter
Kristen was born.
In the early 1980's Sienzant picked up the dormant APBA bug again and joined
a play-by-mail football league using the APBA board game. He soon was the
commissioner, when the founding commissioner resigned. "The league was a lot
of fun, especially once my brother Walt (also in the UFFL as coach of the
Giants), joined. Although officially play-by-mail, the members got together
for games when they could. Typically about half my games or more each year
was across the table from someone. My favorite game was my second Super Bowl,
played against Walt's friend from Allentown, Doug Brock (Doug, ironically,
would be the original coach of the expansion UFFL Broncos years later). I
wound that Super Bowl 3-0. Late in the game, Randall Cunningham bootlegged
for 20 yards and a big first down when I was running out the clock." Sienzant
made it to the SuperBowl three times in that league, winning two.
He published a monthly newsletter for the league every month for his span as
commissioner, editing it on his Kaypro computer. "It had two floppy drives -
the five-and-a-quarter, not the three-and-a-half kind, and no hard drive. And
just 16k of memory, if I remember correctly. But she served me well for many
years." The newsletter was "a minimum of 16 pages, and many months more. But
it wasn't all me. We solicited contributions and gave money (for free agency)
back to the owners who contributed, which encouraged everyone to contribute
at least one article once a year."
In his spare time, for a few years in the 1980's, Sienzant also wrote a
monthly football column for the APBA Journal, a magazine by APBA fans for
APBA fans. "That was big for me, in a networking way," Sienzant laughs. "I
got a job in the early 1990's partly because the guy who was interviewing me
was also an APBA fan and a contributor to the APBA Journal on occasion. I
recognized his name and he recognized mine. We spent at least half of the
interview talking about APBA and sports."
But married, with a child, and a full-time job, Sienzant's focus was on other
than APBA and football sims in the 1990's. He even stopped following the NFL
religiously for more than five years - heresy to some who knew him way back
when. As his daughter grew up, however, he found more time on his hands, and
he started to get back into football.
Sienzant discovered Action Football in 1999 or 2000, after nearly a decade
away from APBA. After playing replays against the computer for a few years,
and doing some serious testing of the game engine ("some of the things I
found out would make an interesting article someday", Sienzant says), the
league bug bit him and he joined the KRFL (Knute Rockne Football League) in
2002. Six months or so later, he was the commissioner when the founding
commish resigned. "And they say history never repeats itself," Sienzant
laughs. Commissioner of the KRFL for five years, Sienzant stepped down from
that post this past year, due to a lack of time. But he retained his coaching
spot, and his Newark Bears are 9-2 thus far in 2008, and 46 - 13 since 2005.
Success hasn't come has easily as in his APBA league over a decade earlier
however, as he has only made it to one Super Bowl in the KRFL, and he lost
that 20-17 on a last-second TD.
Sienzant joined the UFFL in 2004, taking over the hapless Broncos when they
were 1-26 and the laughingstock of the league. Under Sienzant, they are 26 -
43, a big improvement, but one that also didn't come easy. "There were times
I wanted to quit, that's for sure. At times I felt the rules were so stacked
against poor teams, that we could never win. But thankfully, we had some good
drafts and some good trades - although we don't trade much. Asked for his
best of each, Sienzant says without hesitation, "Drafting Bob Sanders late in
the third round. I think a lot of UFFL coaches shied away from him because of
his size, but we saw some of his action at Iowa, and felt he could be a
player. And trading-wise, perhaps the deal where I traded a kicker (Neil
Rackers), who had one phenomenal year, for a second round pick and another
kicker. I got Andrew Whitworth with the second, and the other kicker, Jason
Hanson, has out-kicked Rackers every year since the trade."
"Another favorite is the acquisition of Roddy White," Sienzant recalls. "I
liked him a lot and while subbing as a GM for Green Bay during the UFFL
draft, I drafted him for the Packers. After the draft, the Packer got a new
owner, and I contacted him and inquired if White was available. We soon made
a deal." White is probably the best player - and the lone superstar - on the
Broncos offense today.
And what of the future? "I hope to be in the UFFL for another few decades at
least. I've got some unfinished business here. And I may start a league of my
own someday. The concept would be simple, everybody gets the same 8-8 team,
which will have strengths and flaws, and nobody trades. The winners would be
the best - or the luckiest - coaches. Every year, a different 8-8 team would
be the team of the league. One year it might be a team with a strong running
game, another year a strong defense, etc. It would really test your coaching
mettle."
And what of that daughter? How'd she turn out. "Oh her," Sienzant laughs.
"She did okay, graduating from MIT with a degree in Biology. And she's
attending dental school in Newark NJ, not two miles from where I grew up.
Funny how that works out."
III. STANDINGS
http://www.blades99.com/ISFL/Standings09.htm
IV. RESULTS – Week 3
New York(A) 24 New England 10
Houston 20 Philadelphia 10
Buffalo 21 San Francisco 17
Tampa Bay 24 Denver 17
Minnesota 10 Indianapolis 27
Cleveland 30 Chicago 20
Carolina 10 Detroit 23
New York(N) 20 Atlanta 27
Jacksonville 3 Green Bay 30
Dallas 10 Kansas City 24
Arizona 24 New Orleans 21
San Diego 14 Tennessee 31
Miami 12 St. Louis 28
Pittsburgh 23 Seattle 7
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V. SCHEDULE
Week 4
Denver @ Buffalo
Tennessee @ Dallas
Kansas City @ Tampa Bay
Indianapolis @ New England
San Diego @ Minnesota
Carolina @ Houston
New Orleans @ Philadelphia
San Francisco @ New York(A)
Green Bay @ Miami
Jacksonville @ New York(N)
Cleveland @ Pittsburgh
St. Louis @ Arizona
Atlanta @ Seattle
Detroit @ Chicago
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VI. TRANSACTIONS
AFC
BUF –
CHI –
CLE –
DAL –
DEN – Sign Craig Stevens to replace Dawan Landry through week 17.
HOU –
IND –
MIN -
NE -
NYJ –
PIT – Sign Josh Bell to replace Patrick Surtain through week 8.
SD -
SF -
TEN –
NFC
ARZ –
ATL -
CAR –
DET – Sign Jason Fabini to replace Damion Cook through week 10.
GB -
JAX –
KC -
MIA -
NO -
NYG –
PHI –
SEA –
STL – Sign Corey Smith to replace Derrick Burgess through week 8.
- Sign Jamar Fletcher to replace Champ Bailey through week 10.
- Sign CJ Mosley to replace Ty Warren through week 7.
- Sign George Foster to replace Bryant McKinnie through week 8.
TB -
DRAFT PICKS FORFEITED:
None
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VII. OTHER NEWS:
PLAYERS OF THE WEEK:
WEEK ONE
OFFENSE: Larry Johnson, PHI – 16 carries, 106 yards, 3 TDs
DEFENSE: Mike Brown, CHI – 2 INTs, 5 tackles
WEEK TWO
OFFENSE: Tony Romo, NO – 21 of 29, 246 yards, 4 TDs
DEFENSE: Chris Gamble, IND – 2 INTs, 9 tackles
WEEK THREE:
OFFENSE: Philip Rivers, GB – 24 of 32, 267 yards, 3 TDs
DEFENSE: LaMarr Woodley, SEA – 2 sacks, 1 INT, 7 tackles
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