How's Your Bracket & Other March Madness Musings

How does your bracket look?

Honestly, I stopped looking at mine with the string of upsets on Thursday, particularly New Mexico (one of my Final Four). But with that loss, I decided that this March (and future Marches) would not be considered a success or failure based on my brackets. Instead, my focus will be strictly on my gambling account.

Does this look like a successful bracket to you?

I don't think this bracket is going to win me anything. Too many red lines too early in the tourney.

But you know what? As long as the bets I make are coming in, I don't care if this whole sheet is full of red lines.

I have had some bad bets (Montana was my worst bet of the year, possibly a top-5 all-time worst bet) - note that I don't always bet with my bracket (but usually do). For instance, one of my best bets ever came on Friday, betting on Florida Gulf Coast against Georgetown (the first half line of +7.5, game line of +13.5 & the best part, the money line of +800 - the biggest money line I've ever hit for a single game).

Are We the Champions?

The big bets still alive exist in the East bracket, where I have two teams still alive for my prop bet to win the tourney. Illinois did what they could to blow their huge lead, but ultimately held on to win. They face Miami on Sunday. I'm not really sure what to expect from them, but I'm hoping that they or California (preferably both) can pull off upsets in their Round of 32 matchups - Cali has Syracuse Saturday night.

A California title would net me $3750 on a $15 bet, while an Illinois championship would pay $4125. The odds of either team winning it are still remote, but it's still nice to see them stay alive. I hope one of them teases me with another win and a promotion to the Sweet 16.

Speaking of Illinois...

I've heard there's a lot of Illinois fans consumed with hatred of Bruce Weber, so much so that they seem to be enjoying the Kansas State loss more than their school's win. If you have any issues with Weber, you have issues yourself. I'm not sure what he did to get people to hate him so much. So what if he wasn't the best basketball coach? It's not like the guy murdered anyone - no reason to root so hard against a guy that led your school to its only title appearance in 2005.

If you're an Illini fan reading this and you're angry with Weber about his stint with Illinois....get over it. It's over and done with. Embrace the current and future Illinois teams. Enjoy watching these teams coached by a fantastic young coach (John Groce was a great hire) who has proven himself as a solid recruiter. Don't waste your energy on a part of our school's past that frankly wasn't all that bad.

Speaking of bad...

Did any of you attempt to watch most/all of the March Madness action? If so, I apologize. My eyes and brain hurt greatly from the poor quality of games so far this tourney. Forgive me if you disagree, but the quality of play from most teams was evident. I'm sure you can cite a plethora of reasons for this: (1) playing outside of normal game conditions, (2) lack of overall talent due to underclassmen going to the NBA, (3) pacing of games is choppy with all the TV timeouts, coaching timeouts and fouls, etc.

For me, especially this year, it's been almost impossible for me to watch games without having a reason to watch it (i.e. gambling). And for many of you, you'd probably not be watching these games if you didn't have bets on it or a bracket to follow. Gambling and brackets drive the March Madness, not the quality of play. We get so blinded by how great college basketball supposedly is by the 63 items to fill on those brackets that we don't even realize how poorly played these games are. Sloppy fouls, horrible turnovers, ridiculous shots that require viewers to consume shots. If you can enjoy these games without a bracket and without bets, then all the more power to you - I can't.

Good luck with your bets/brackets the rest of the tourney. I hope the games are higher quality than we've seen so far.

Brian's Bracket - 2013 Version

Nothing else needs to be said, aside from my two tourney bets that aren't reflected on my bracket:

169809293-1

3/21/13 12:54am

$15.00

$4,125.00

Pending

3/21/13 12:15pm Basketball NCAA Men's Basketball +27500 National Champion 2012/13 - Illinois

166242856-1

3/2/13 2:54am

$15.00

$3,750.00

Pending

3/2/13 12:00pm Basketball NCAA Men's Basketball +25000 National Champion 2012/13 - California

Good luck with your brackets. Here is my bracket of integrity (in an offshoot, I have New Mexico winning it over Indiana)

Sleeper Cell in Champaign: Making A Case for The Fighting Illini

It would be fitting for me to write a blog about a sleeper team as most people are snuggled away in their beds, having March Madness nightmares. Flying brackets are coming at them at high speeds, with large seeds being planted deep in their membranes. Should I pick that upset? Should I keep this team in my Sweet 16?

Yes, you should pick that upset - that's what March Madness is for. And yes, keep them there - you're always better off going with your gut instinct with these things.

One team you shouldn't sleep on is one that practically fell asleep mid-season, but was fairly awake for the beginning part of the year along with wet dream games against Ohio State and Indiana. In fact, they lay claim as the only team in the tourney that can say they beat three of the top eight seeds in the tourney.

Yes - Illinois fits the role of the Cinderella. Will the shoe fit?

Beating the Big Boys

It fit when they traveled to Spokane in the early part of the year when they shot lights out against Gonzaga in a hostile environment. A month later, they never trailed in a blowout of Ohio State at home. Another month after that, a spirited second half comeback helped the Illini upset then No.1 Indiana.

Sure, they've had their clunkers (see: plenty of the Big Ten schedule, especially games against Northwestern at home and at Wisconsin). Not too often an 8-10 Big Ten team is worthy of a 7 seed in the tourney, but the Illini's strength of victory has to be considered when the bracket is put together.

This blog might be useless come Friday afternoon if they lay a dud against Colorado (possible). But the way Illinois has played this season, they feel like they are just as likely to advance to the Elite Eight as they are to lose in their first game.

Yes, I believe they can beat Colorado, Miami and their third opponent (whoever it may be). Hell, if Indiana is still standing at that point, I believe Illinois could beat them as well - they already proved earlier this year that they can play with them.

Track Record

Besides, let's not forget what their new coach John Groce did with mid-major Ohio last year, leading them into the Sweet 16 and taking top-seeded North Carolina to overtime before just missing a chance at an Elite 8 appearance.

When Illinois is playing at its peak, it has proven it can beat the top teams in the country. Here's to hoping, especially as an alumnus of the Fighting Illini, that they can find some of their early season magic, which led to a 12-0 start and win a string of games that can take them into the second weekend of the tourney and beyond.

I have Illinois losing to Indiana in the Elite Eight, for what it's worth. I might take a shot before the tourney starts at Illinois' 275/1 odds to win the tourney.

When they lose in the first round against Colorado, don't say I didn't warn you (and don't say I covered my ass by including this disclaimer - talking out of both sides of our ass is what writers/prognosticators do).

If the shoe fits....we shall see.

Dos and Don'ts of March Madness Bracketing

Wanna be charged with a case of bracketeering?

Don't get on my bad side when it comes to filling out March Madness brackets. I'll point out the few types of folks that bother me the most.

(P.S. If you want to join my Yahoo bracket league, click on the following link and join: http://y.ahoo.it/Z7vBSl5l or just look up Group 12771 on Yahoo's Fantasy Sports Tournament Pick'Em page)

Don't Be The...

1. Guy Who Fills Out 10 Brackets...and then is bragging when one of them has an upset that occurred. If you want to fill out several brackets, that's cool. But one of your brackets has to be the master copy - the one which has what you think will actually happen, not every single upset possible just to brag when one of the 30 comes in.

2. Guy Who Picks a Square Bracket - Will each bracket feature a #1 vs. #2. in the regional final? Probably not. Will the top 4 seeds in each bracket make it to the Sweet 16? I'm going out on a limb and saying no. Please, please, please....don't be that guy who picks nothing but the highest seeds to advance in every round. Even if you're in a money pool, there's a handful of people already doing that, so you will need some variety to your picks.

If your bracket looks like this, don't join my pool. Or any pool for that matter. Your brackets need a little variety and spice.

3. Guy Who Picks Notre Dame over Montana in the NCAA Final: According to a friend of mine, he knows someone who has this match-up as the championship game of the tourney. If anyone does this in the groups I entered, I will say - thank you for your donation. At this point, you've probably picked so many upsets that winning the pool is completely unrealistic.

I'd be willing to donate a testicle to science if this is the NCAA final game.


On the other hand, you should be the....

1. Guy who has a handful of double digit seeds winning in the first full round. What fun is it to pick all the top seeds (1-8)?

And while we're at it, you should sprinkle in a few of these teams into the Sweet 16. Not all of them, but some of them.

2. Guy who has 1 or 2 #1 seeds in the Final Four. The likelihood of all 4 #1 seeds making the Final Four pays off at a 50/1 clip on 5dimes. On the other end, the likelihood of no #1 seeds making the Final Four is a 4/1 proposition - 12.5 times more likely to happen than all #1s. The best odds lie in 1 or 2 top-seeds to make the Final Four. My bracket fits this bill.

For what it's worth, the sportsbooks have the over/under of the total sum of all seeds in the Final Four to be at 12.5 - which my picks are slightly under that. I'll post some more of the fun props below.

3. Guy who has a top 3 seed winning the tourney.  Realistically, the top 3 seeds are the best bet when determining who will be the champion. In the 30 previous Final Fours of my lifetime (including 1983), there have been only four teams who have been seeded 4th or higher that won the title, and none since Arizona as a 4 seed in 1997.

Many of you are entering pools when doing these brackets, so why not think over some of these tips when entering your brackets? I wish everyone the best of luck with their brackets. I will post my bracket on Thursday.

In the meantime, ponder some of these props that are on 5dimes:

Thu 3/21		15743 All #1-#4 seeds in Final 4		+173
1:40PM		15744 Any #5-#16 seed in Final 4		-205

Thu 3/21		15731 Exactly three #1-#3 seeds in Final 4		+135
1:40PM		15732 Not exactly three #1-#3 seeds in Final 4		-155

I already have a bet from late last month on California to win the tournament at 225/1 odds - 15 to win 3750. I am considering some other long shots (Kansas State at 100/1 & Illinois at 275/1 are crossing my mind).

Hawaii 5-0: 50 Awesome Things About the Aloha State

Rather than write an actual blog, I'm going to list 50 things about Hawaii that I like/reasons to visit Hawaii. It took me several days to write this blog. In no particular order, here we go:

Probably the best view from my hotel room. How can you not want to go to Hawaii?

1. 85 and sunny

2. Fresh pineapple

3. Running views like this:

4. Catamaran trips

5. Hearing waves crash in the night sky

6. Delicious local brew

7. Fruity drinks - not just for women and effeminate men. At least not in Hawaii. Shhhhh....

8. Last in the Union, but certainly not the least

Delicious Kona beer

9. Isolation - all by itself in the Pacific

10. Natives treat you like family

11. Pro sports start at 1pm local time - not sure I'd like NFL starting at 7am though.

Not even 10 mins off the plane and I got leied. 

12. Leis - how can you not feel welcomed after being greeted with one?


13. Exotic animals

14. Whale watching

15. Swimming year-round

16. No snow - ever (this isn't a selling point for me, but it should be for others)

17. Pearl Harbor

And this isn't even the best view

18. Hotel views like this:

19. Polynesian Cultural Center

20. Luaus

21. Hawaiian shirts - usually only associated with festive folks. I once embraced these shirts after becoming great friends with Jeremy Spencer. Now, only one Hawaiian shirt remains in my collection.

22. Being named Chief Bolek thanks to interaction with New Zealanders at #19

Before being named Chief - a dance that us Tango2ers were all in sync for

23. Paddleboarding - didn't do this activity, but I imagine it would be worth living in Hawaii for.

24. Being called "cousin" or "uncle" by people you don't even know. Goes back to #10

25. Running into random celebrities, like Donovan McNabb.

26. Poolside TVs

27. Leaving window open and hearing the waves as I fall asleep

28. Skydiving, 29. Sushi. 30. Snorkeling - I didn't try or have time to consume all of these activities, but all of the co-workers who did seemed to enjoy themselves when they did. I'll have to recommend on their behalf.

31. Leaving the work laptop from arm's length for the most part of the trip - it's so hard to remove myself from all of the technology that I use on a daily basis, especially as it is related to work. I recommend leaving all electronics in your room if you stay in Hawaii if at all possible

32. Making people jealous with continuous photos posted on social networks.

33. What good is a trip to Hawaii without awesome people to hang out with? Again, couldn't have enjoyed Hawaii without the great company of Tango2 folks.

34. No need to wear pants. I mean, still need to wear shorts...so don't get any ideas of turning Hawaii into a European beach.

35. Getting a ride from the cab service to the airport, having him apologize for the weather for the week, when only the initial arrival (a rare rain storm) was remotely bad. If that's as bad as you got, I'd like you to meet Ms. Chicago. Ms. Chicago, meet Honolulu....discuss.

36. Nothing but sandals. Everyone gets to see my unpedicured feet, with ten toes that have way too short of toenails. Too much information...I digress.

37. Time change where you can call your g/f before you go to bed, but after she wakes up from sleep for work. This happened once on the trip.

38. Participating in a volunteering event. We volunteered at a shelter, repainting the building's doors, sanding down tables and powerwashing the outside. The best thing about Tango2 - how we give back to the community.

39. Golf course - again, one of those things I didn't do. When driving by the course, it looked amazing. Perhaps it's my lack of golf playing in the past couple years.

40. Have you made it this far down the list? Gonna have to start making things up. I'll go with "Aloha". It's such a versatile word - "Hello", "Goodbye", "Love" are just some of its many upbeat meanings.

41. Greeted with a smile everywhere. Being on a resort area sure helps, but even off the resort area, people seemed happy. Hard not to be, as described by everything above.

42. The Naked Pirate. It's a drink, not what I'm dressing up for Halloween as (at least not in the plans). If you've never had the drink, it contains gin, rum and pineapple juice. I thought it'd be stronger than it was.

43. Plenty of reading time...in airplanes. There's no short path to Hawaii, so you'll have time to catch up on some book/magazine reading. I was able to start/finish a couple of books.

44. Seeing the oil still bubbling from the USS Arizona at Pearl Harbor. Over 70 years later. Mind-blowing.

Mitsuo Fuchida

45. This book is worth your money if you visit Pearl Harbor gift shop (or if you want to buy it on Amazon):


46. A nice year-round tan, if that's your thing. Just make sure you carry sunscreen.

47. Tropical, casual clothes to work meetings.

48. Did I mention pineapple already? I did? It's worth mentioning twice.

49. And pineapple.....and....yeah.

and finally 50...something to look forward to when I come back to the mainland: a rose, a pineapple, and a pretty g/f.

The Big 3-0-0: Looking Back at What My Blog Was & What It Has Become

The blogs are starting to add up. Now serving #300.

I'm delighted to get to such a high number. When I first starting writing these in September 2010 under the blogger.com domain, I wasn't sure how long I'd be writing these for. Other attempts at maintaining blogs failed miserably. For the life of me, I can't remember the blog site that I wrote a couple dozen postings on during my college years, and I probably deleted most/all of the posts as I became more aware of the permanence of all things Internets. Then, Myspace entered the picture and I was able to share with everyone my emotion at the time of writing the blog as well as a song to go with it. I finally got around to deactivating my Myspace about a year ago.

I'm not even sure what got me writing again. I guess it was the easiest way for me to express my sports thoughts. It may have been out of boredom, not really sure. -My first blog set the tone somewhat for what was to come with this setting: a blog about sports, gambling, and uhhh, sports. From there, there was a fair share of immature, pointless blogs (kinda like this one). The blog after that was titled, "Florida: America's Wang." Classy, I know.

But I believe it has become a tad more mature and a lot more well-rounded. I've tackled some issues that have bothered me. I've had fun at my dad's expense, although I'm not sure where the picture for this blog went. I've tried to predict the past three seasons (including this season) of baseball, basketball and football, at a very low success rate. I believe the only prediction that's come close to being right was predicting Miami over OKC last year in the NBA Finals - didn't really take a brain surgeon for that.

I've also gotten political lately, starting with last year's SOPA madness that resulted in me writing a few letters to my local senators, even getting a nice response back from Mark Kirk. I won't bother linking the Dick Durbin one since, well...yeah. I also threw my support behind a president for the first time in my life. The last time I voted before 2012 was for John Kerry (as reluctantly as one could vote for someone), so these writings about Gary Johnson were refreshing to transcribe, as his beliefs align with my own about government's role in our lives and our society.

But what really took my blog into a new readership was the introduction into my online dating life. Based on the enormous views that I got from those blogs (three of my top 10 viewed blogs came from that seven-chapter series), there's nothing y'all like more than the juicy tidbits of single people's love lives. One of these top-viewed blogs comes from my date with the lovely and beautiful Jen, who I am still with to this day. One thing that came out of this blog series, outside of people being really curious with my love life, was the realization that my blogs about personal stuff (not the "what I ate for dinner" crap but more the "here's a fun new thing I'm trying out or a realization I've come to") were well-received and well-read. That doesn't mean I've abandoned my bread-and-butter which is sports, but I've kept that in mind while trying to balance the sports stuff with the fun, random life observations.

There's plenty of other things I could link up that I'm proud of writing, like my series on fans of out-of-town teams (I am looking to expand on that for next season - goal is to get at least 6-8 more fan bases represented). It was fun to get people to interact with me and make their stories come to life a little bit.

I originally titled this blog Hawaii 3-0-0, thinking I might end up writing about my pending Hawaii trip. As I've been known to do, I went off on a little tangent and ended up writing exactly one paragraph about it. Which reminds me, I created an urban dictionary word five years ago when hanging out with my cousin Frank. I found it as I was looking for the old blogging page that I used in 2004/2005. Here's the word, in case you are interested in looking at it: http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=tangentation.

Anywho, I hope you all continue to read my blogs, no matter the subject. I hope to come up with some new ideas for blogs in the near future, including some potential new series of blogs.

Thanks for reading. Hope you continue to read for another 300 more and beyond.

My Struggle to Get Interested in the Blackhawks and Hockey in General

Streak or not, the only way this season can end in true success for the Blackhawks is a reappearance of this Cup in city limits, at least in my eyes.

One thing you may have notice is missing from my blog site lately (aside from blogs) is coverage about the Chicago Blackhawks. Being as big of a sports fan as I am, hockey is one sport I have never been able to get into, even during the past 4-5 years with a much-improved and watchable hockey product on Madison Street.

Will this be on Chicago Theater in June 2013?

I tried getting into the Blackhawks when they were going through their Stanley Cup run. I was happy when they won it, even though I (like just about everybody but Patrick Kane) didn't actually see the goal that won the Stanley Cup for them. I even went to the parade and enjoyed myself, aside from some assholes throwing things into the massive crowd. A real Indian would have cried himself to death if he or she saw how littered the street was after the Stanley Cup celebration was over. (As usual, I digress).

A parade this time around could net about double the attendance.

Following the championship, my interest (or lack thereof) in hockey never changed. As much as I tried to get into hockey, my interest in the Blackhawks and the NHL in general was faint at best. I could name some of the Stanley Cup winners from the past X amount of years (not like I could with Super Bowl/World Series/NBA Finals winners - I could name all of those in every sport since I've been alive). I was even able to recite the last Canadian-based team to win the Stanley Cup off the top of my memory when the subject came up weeks ago (Montreal in 1993), although I credit that memory to my interest in Sega's NHL video games at the time - NHL 93 & 94 come to mind.

Hockey is a sport I wish I could get into, but I just can't. Maybe it's because the product translates poor to TV (at least to me). Maybe it's the lower scoring - although I'd disagree with that because I love me a 2-1 baseball game more than anyone I know.

I know I hate their way of distributing points in overtime/shootouts. The idea that a team can earn a point even when they lose the game seems absurd to me - a loss of any sort in any situation should not be rewarded, even if it comes in extra time. Think about it this way - would you want other sports to give losing teams credit for forcing overtime or extra innings and have weird baseball records like 78-72-12? Personally, I think the system before was just fine - maybe add about 5 minutes to overtimes and if it ends in a draw, so be it. To decide a winner on such an arbitrary process (the shootout) seems stupidly silly. Like my friend Jay said, it'd be like basketball ending in a free-throw contest (Dwight Howard vs. Blake Griffin could go on for days).

Perhaps me writing this much about hockey is actually a reflection of my inner-fan coming out - after all, why would I write this much about the problems I have with hockey if I didn't care. I don't think I'll ever be an active fan, which is a shame. Most of my close friends are big into the sport, and during these non-NFL months, it would bring me into the sports conversation for an extended period of time. At least long enough to pass the time until NFL comes around.

So to bury the lede - yes, I have noticed that the Blackhawks are on a historically sick run. Part of that has resulted in foolish decisions on my end, as I've bet against them a few times in this streak when a really high betting line presented itself. I think the streak is good for the NHL - hell, any positive coverage, even if portrayed by an ignorant hockey entity like ESPN, should be viewed as a good thing. With how bad a second lockout in ten years could have been for the sport, the NHL needs as much of this as they can. The longer this streak goes, the better it will be for them. This is somewhat comparable to what Cal Ripken's streak did for the MLB. Coming off of a strike in 1994, baseball needed a great story to attach itself to. And what a better story for them to come along than one that involves a sacred number (2,130) in a sport that attaches itself to sacred numbers.

As long as the Blackhawks continue to add to this streak, the NHL needs to do everything it can to promote  it. Hockey has very little opportunities in the national spotlight and needs to capitalize on this so that they can turn casual fans like me (but not necessarily me - people who haven't experienced the sport) into lifelong fans. The long-time Blackhawks fans can bitch all they want about the bandwagon fans coming along for the ride, but I don't see the wagon getting any smaller anytime soon. With the old Wirtz in there, there was little reason for people to actually care about the Hawks - I give many props to those who toughed out those years as fans and stuck with them through the thinnest of thins.

As far as the bandwagon subject goes...To those long-time fans who complain about the bandwagoners, I say - Be open and accepting to their presence. Teach them about some of the nuances of the game (like explaining offsides, icing, etc.). As long as they are willing to become genuine fans of the Blackhawks and hockey in general, give them the respect you would want when you are learning about or finding interest in something for the first time. Besides, these fans aren't going anywhere.

As crazy as it seems, this crowd WILL be larger if there's a parade in 2013.