Stop Lying About Your Bracket

Stop it. Just stop. I don't want to hear about you picking George Mason. I don't want to have your LSU pick shoved in my face. Know why? Cause you're lying! You didn't pick them, you just didn't. Maybe some LSU fans had them going Elite 8. Maybe a George Mason fan had them winning in the first round over a tired Michigan State. But to the people who have actually said to me 'yeah, I saw this coming', SHUT UP. Admit that you picked 10 different brackets. And once you do, throw out the one bracket that you have left, because it's pointless. Picking 10 different bracket possibilities is like allowing someone to take a free throw 5 times. Eventually everyone will get ONE. It's just not skill if you make up an 'upset' bracket and then smile from ear to ear when you produce the single bracket that is left standing from the grinder that was the Elite 8.

Oh sure, you saw the George Mason over UConn upset. Even with the potential upset possibilities with UConn playing below their talent level at times, it was extremely unlikely that anyone saw that the Washington DC region would play out as it did. If you were the one George Mason fan that DID see this coming, and there wasn't even a hint of homerism in your picks, kudos to you sir. However, let's just cut the crap for the rest of the 299 million March Madness warriors who have seen about as much college basketball as Billy Packer has this year.

That's another thing...March Madness warriors kill me. You know who you are. You picked Washington to go to the Elite 8 because he was your favorite Founding Father. You chose Georgetown because an uncle of yours went there for two semesters before dropping out. Bradley was little March Madness Warrior's name, so you had them going far too! Can we please get two regions for every pool? One side for people who paid attention (Though come on, NOBODY outside of 12 schools on the Atlantic Coast watched any games from the Colonial Athletic Association. I think I caught about 3 Drexel University games and a Hofstra game or two. And maybe Hofstra has a bone to pick about being left out) and one side for those who pick teams based on jersey color or number of cool afros on each team.

Now, everyone has a right to do whatever they want with their bracket, I guess. But let's not act like there's some big accomplishment in picking upset teams when you give yourself more than 5 chances. I picked one bracket. One. I went with Duke, Texas, Kansas, UCLA, Connecticut, George Mason (I kid, I kid....actually Michigan State), Villanova, and Ohio State. That was my one Elite Eight that I put in 4 different pools. Obviously the Big 10 didn't bother showing up as they left their athleticism behind, so that was what did in Michigan State and Ohio State. Kansas simply decided to do what they did all year, tease, tease, tease. If they pull that first round game out against Bradley, who knows if they still might be playing. That's the way the tourney has gone this year. Duke...I figured Redick alone would propel them to the Elite 8, but then they'd crap out after they realized that they rely too much on one player for all their offense, and a player that had little ability to create off the dribble. They figured this out one round too early. So I got 4 teams in the Elite Eight: Texas, UCLA, Connecticut, and Villanova. I had Texas, Villanova, Kansas, and Connecticut in the Final 4. So in a matter of two days I went from still having a great possibility to win 3 of 4 pools and place 2nd in the other to being knocked completely out. And I accept it because those were the picks I went with, those were the teams I put my trust in. I didn't go the easy way out by having special little 'upset' brackets or conference-heavy brackets or brackets with all 2 seeds being picked.

But maybe I should've, I could've won a lot of money