Madge and A-Rod

Stuart Scott read a quote from Madonna on Sportscenter last night. He literally had to pause for a second before he read the intro to the quote. What is the world coming to when a response by Madonna to gossip column reports is read on the World Wide Leader? Why is A-Rod's wife finally filing for divorce? What, the picture of him coming out of a strip club with a $900 an hour stripper didnt do enough damage? Im sure she was just waiting until he signed a new deal, more money for her to fight for!

A Full Mind

Just a few things that are on my mind right now.

-Baseball "highlights" are the worst part of Sportscenter.

-I finished season 3 of 24 tonight. Way better than season 2.

-I need to find season 4...

-Can Eric Gagne possibly be any worse? Does anyone doubt that he was on steroids those two seasons when he was unhittable?

-Tiger Woods will win the Masters by 4 strokes. An amateur will finish in the top 15.

-Im excited to watch the Par 3 tournament while I work tomorrow afternoon.

-If I were Bill Self and my alma mater was offering a $6 million signing bonus and $3.5 million per year, I would go.

-If I were Kansas, I would not offer more than $2.5 million per year to keep him.

-Psycho T needs to return to UNC, so does Ty Lawson.

-The UCLA style of play will never win them a national championship.

-I already miss UNLV basketball. Its gonna be a long 7 months...

-My earliest memory is from a packed Thomas and Mack. I remember Tark being introduced and the shark would go around the top of the arena. Visiting teams would leave the floor instead of watch the fireworks and introductions. The only players I remember are Larry Johnson, Stacey Augmon and Greg Anthony.

-Why dont the fireworks intimidate anymore?

-Only 7 weeks until my wedding day.

-My parents are so supportive. I am glad they have let me make decisions and mistakes. It has taught me so much about life.

-There are new episodes of Scrubs, The Office and 30 Rock this week!

-Today is one of the days that I absolutely hate the game of golf. I went to the range and could not hit the dang ball. I have never been so frustrated while practicing, but I stuck around and tried to push through it to no avail...I will be back out there tomorrow.

-Lately I have been in a music funk. Im not really in the mood to listen to anything I have, and nothing new sounds good. This really frustrates me, I never listen just to listen, but that is how I have felt the last few days.

-I like blogging. It allows me to express myself and let others know what is going on in life. I dont care if no one else reads, I will still write. I write for me, not anyone else.

-I saw a flyer for a physics club meeting and thought of Alec.

-Tiffany has helped us so much with our announcements.

-I hope I have more energy tomorrow than today.

I think that is about it. I have more in my head, but nothing is forming into anything complete. Now that college basketball is over, I dont know what I will watch each night, but I am happy I wont have to hear Jay Bilas force his opinions on me.

Bracket Challenge

I made a group on ESPN Tournament Challenge for anyone who wants to join. I want to see everyone representing their schools in this group. Here is the info.

Group Name: Joe Darger's Fauxhawk
Password: fauxhawk

Even if you are already in another group, you can get in this one also. Lets get the trash talk going.

Dixon

Championship Week

Only 4 more days until I can enjoy my spring break! Not only that, this weekend we saw the beginning of my favorite sports time of year, "Championship Week."

This is a marketing device created by ESPN for the college basketball conference tournaments that decide who gets the automatic invites to the NCAA Tournament. Mind you, it lasts about 9 days, but ESPN isn't CNN, they don't have cool devices to crunch numbers! (Quick side note: How can these news channels "declare" winners of political races when 1 out of 2500 precincts have reported?) I think the purpose of the marketing blitz is the fact they show the Women's NCAA tournament and the NIT for the next month and know the ratings will be lower than the NHL, which is saying something.

I think there have 5 automatic berths handed out up until now, but the big conferences don't have their tournaments. The greatest part about all of this is the perfect timing of spring break. Now, I don't have to skip class Thursday and Friday for the 32 games played in that time period. Plus, I will be at my parents house in Vegas, which means 62 inches of pure High Definition! Hopefully Keith and Janae can come through with HD this year, they choked worse than anyone paired up with Tiger! In addition to all this, SUU is dedicating 2 new buildings, 2 remodeled buildings and a clock tower on Friday afternoon, which means classes are canceled starting at noon. I still haven't gotten my hopes up too high for this, as it wouldn't surprise me if my stats professor didn't even know about this and gives us a Friday test.

My blogs will focus on the big dance for the next month or so. We are less than 7 days away from the CBS Selection Show. All I need is for the Rebels to come through in their tournament this weekend so I can watch the show without suffering a stress related death. Depending on how BYU does, and our own performance in the tournament, I am expecting a 9 seed...maybe 8 if we beat BYU in the finals. That will be another win over a top 30 RPI team. My word of the month is bracketology...do you read it? I think it moves to daily updates this week, which will cause me even more stress because of the daily movements of my rebels. As long as we can beat TCU first round, I think we are in.

That brings me to something else, but very closely related, that I am excited for. The Mountain West Conference Tournament. Another weekend of exciting games, and grumblings from the other fans about home court advantage.

Here is what I have to say on that subject. Yes, we get a home court advantage, and I have no problem with that. They do all they can to make it feel like a neutral court, i.e. UNLV logos are not seen on the court or in the arena, the rebs use a different locker room, they have to stay at a hotel instead of at home. But all in all, the Vegas fans show up in droves. Any team would give up all those things to host the tournament! To anyone who wants to make comments or complain about this, I would like to direct you to your favorite teams coach and athletic director, they voted in favor of it. As one assistant athletic director said last week, "No one is complaining when the revenue check comes in the mail!" Every team knows from day one of the season the tournament will be in Vegas...deal with it. On a related note, UNLV went to the finals of the tournament 2 of the 4 years it was held in Denver...although not many people would know that since there was no one actually at the game.

Anyways, back to what I was talking about. The Wyoming fans are definitely the most annoying. WYO, WYO, they chant staggering around to find the right seats, since they cant read their tickets through the massive buzz they are enjoying. I will go out on a limb and say the conference has liked the fact they made mini runs through the last two tournaments, it definitely boosts alcohol sales! Since I cant get to Vegas until Thursday afternoon, I was hoping to miss the Wyoming game, but they will probably be BYU's sacrificial lamb in the late first round game.

New Mexico has a crazy tattooed guy that always comes. I expect a big number of NM fans, since they need a good run to lock up a tournament spot. And Air Force always has the few cadets that make the trip. As always, BYU will have their fair share of fans, but since it is a football school, they wont really show up until the finals. AS for the other teams, I don't think San Diego State really has any fans. TCU is just too far away for them to play in our league, although they make our football seem better. Colorado State hasn't won a game yet in conference, which equals a play in game exit wednesday morning. I don't know who would pay to see just that game. Utah will have a smattering of fans, but they wear red and will blend in with the UNLV and New Mexico fans.

I will make predictions later in the week, but let me just say this. The one team I do not want to play is Utah. Luke Nevill is a much better NBA prospect than Trent "I am such a horrible free throw shooter my wife is addicted to pain killers" Plaisted.

All in all, it is shaping up to be a great month. Wedding plans are gliding along smoothly, Shay will even be joining me for the conference tournament. As will one of my good friends, who just happens to be a BYU fan. Trevor "Cosmo" Tripp and his fiance Lauren will be staying with us.

To end, I have one complaint, why does this all have to happen in March when the weather starts getting warmer and it is absolutely beautiful outside?

Signed,
Bracketologist in training

The Mitchell Report

Excuse me while I rant...

Never before have I been so disgusted by ESPN as I am this morning. As many of you know, the Mitchell Report comes out later this afternooon which will basically show that baseball knew that its players were taking steroids and HGH but just looked the other way because of the huge numbers being put up. Huge numbers = more publicity and income. Thats all that matters to Bud Selig. People say Gary Bettman ruined the NHL, why does Bud Selig get a free pass?

Anyways, it came out this morning that Roger Clemens will be named in the report as someone who received steroids. This is huge news, because he is one of the best pitchers of all time, as well as one of the biggest D-bags of all time. Well, Peter Gammons, who was a Red Sox beat writer when Clemens was there, came on to talk about how big this is. He started off saying something that almost caused me to throw my tv through the front window. He said that we are dealing with an interesting situation because of the mitchell report. These names were given by talking to general managers, trainers and clubhouse attendants among others. Basically, people that could get steroids to players. Gammons stated that we need to take this news remembering none of these players actually tested positive, so we dont know for sure if they took them. Where has this statement been for the last 3-5 years that steroid use has been coming into public knowledge? People like Paul Byrd, Rick Ankiel and others who have been linked to buying steroids were in the same position that Clemens is going to be in!

Here is a disclaimer. Barry Bonds is my all time favorite baseball player. Never before has he tested positive for steroids. Do I think he took steroids? Yes. Was it against the rules of baseball at the time? No. If I was in his position, would I take them? I think I would. Bonds is a scapegoat for the whole steroids issue because he is so apathetic towards the media, which is understandable. Gammons went on to say that he believed the whole Game of Shadows book, loosely based on Bonds' alleged steroid use, but would take the Mitchell report with a grain of salt! This is ESPN's number one baseball analyst! He will believe a book written by a biased reporter looking to make money, which it has with movie rights being bought by HBO recently, but will not trust a 20 month investigation by a former senator? I understand Mitchell was contracted by MLB to investigate the situation, but from what has come out, he is saying MLB is partly liable for the whole thing, therefore he comes to a somewhat unbiased conclusion.

I do not completely disagree with the point Gammons made, it just bothers me that it took the connection of one of the 10 best pitchers of all time* (if Barry's home runs have an asterix, anything related to Clemens should too) for him to express that opinion. We will never know for sure who took steroids until these players come out and say so. The best scenario for MLB would have been to give players a one month window to come out and admit they were using steroids before it was against the rules without any chance of suspension or fines. Too bad Bud Selig doesnt have the balls to open up the game like that. For now, we will have to trust these reports linking players to steroids. Personally, if they are buying them, they are using them. At the same time, these guys make millions and millions of dollars in a very competitive market. If it were me, I would use every advantage I could within the rules to get a leg up on the competition. I dont blame these guys for using steroids. I blame baseball for not changing the rules because they are a greedy, moneymaking machine. Enron had the same thinking, lets hide everything and tell everyone business has never been better, but we will leave out that it is artificially enhanced! Sometimes I wish MLB could go the way of Enron...