Friday, March 20, 2009

Oh Yea?...Well...You're Boring!

I have to admit, I was highly entertained by the basketball I watched on Thursday. It was a good day/night of basketball. My heart (and my bracket hopes) was pounding as I watched American drill three after three against Villanova and during Nova's comeback. Clemson's comeback against Michigan (and Michigan holding on) kept me on the edge of my seat. Actually rooting for Purdue to win as they hung on against Northern Iowa. Memphis outlasting Cal St. Northridge. I'm probably not going to remember any of these games a year from now, let alone a week from now, but still, I was entertained as a basketball fan.

So when I woke up this morning to ESPN.com and CBS Sports headlines about the first round being boring and a "yawner", I shook my head. Were they watching the same games as me?

As I read on, I found that most felt Thursday's basketball was boring because no upsets by super-tiny schools had occurred. Yes, Western Kentucky "upset" Illinois, but that wasn't enough. Only one major upset means a bad day for college basketball and tournament viewers? Please.

Perhaps the reason for so little David over Goliath upsets is because there aren't as many Davids in the tourney anymore. By now you've seen the graphic on ESPN or read about the trend of the dwindling amount of mid-majors that receive at-large bids. It doesn't take a genius to figure out that if you have less Cinderella schools in the tournament, you will probably have less slippers fitting. No wonder there were so few upsets.

So just fucking deal with it. It just irks me to hear people complain. You can't have 5 buzzer-beater games every round, every year. There are so many games played throughout this tournament that you just have to sit back and appreciate the basketball that is being played. Like Pitt and ETSU today. 10-point Pitt win, but fun as hell to watch. Just enjoy the games, with four on at once, you can find a good one, and when the good moments come, enjoy them.

And if not, well, fuckoffanddie.

One word.

~Mikey D

1 comments:

Adam said...

We had the same exact conversation at work today. All in all, I felt it was fairly exciting. Granted, there weren't a ton of upsets, but there were close games and near upsets. I really think the next few rounds are going to be exciting because there are a lot of competitive teams out there. After all, a cinderella usually ends up having a boring Sweet 16 or Elite 8 game against a far superior opponent. If we're having more competitive basketball in the later rounds, isn't that a good thing??