Weekend winners
Tiger Woods. Wow, that was fun folks. Loads of fun, and when he drilled a 44-footer for birdie on the 71st hole, well, we all thought it was coming, right? It’s Tiger after all. The best golfer of my lifetime was a putt away from winning. (Do we really think Paul Casey was going to survive a playoff with Tiger in front of that crowd?) Woods finished a shot back but man he looked the part Sunday, right? He was dressed in his Sunday swag. He was screaming at himself. He was twirling the club and grinding. Sure, he missed a few putts we all expected him to make, but that expectation was as much about the memory as the expectation. Regardless, he was firmly in the mix and it was impossible to look away. (Side golf note about Tiger’s all-time amazingness: We could drop so many stats right here, but how about this one – after last weekend, 24-year-old Jordan Spieth has more missed cuts (19) than Woods’ 17. Think about that.) How much does golf need Tiger? While we wait on numbers from Sunday, Tiger’s role among the leaders in Saturday’s third-round produced a 3.24 ratings share. That’s the same number the final rounds of last year’s PGA Championship and British Open.
Kevin Harvick. Hey, we’ve always believed NASCAR has never been above tweaking a storyline. Well, let Harvick rattle off six straight wins and see if that can cause a ripple in the national media landscape. He’s won three in a row, and it has done much yet. Still, three consecutive wins is pretty strong, especially for a 6-inch tall Mobile Oil spokesman.
Jake Arrieta. Yes, it took longer than most expected, but the former Cubs ace still got three years, $75 million from Philadelphia. And while a lot of folks may think of that dominant, Cy Young-worthy season with the Cubs when Arrieta’s name is mentioned, that’s some serious cheddar for a guy who turned 32 last week and relies heavily on a biting slider.
Cleveland Browns fans. OK, it’s a devout group that has cheered for one victory in the last two seasons. One. Well, a flurry of deals and some major moves offer reason for Cleveland fans to be cheery, and it has nothing to do with baseball season being around the corner. Over the course of the weekend, the Browns add Tyrod Taylor as a stop-gap QB (all of this praise is off the board if they do not use pick 1 or 4 on the quarterback of the future), a No. 1 wide out in Jarvis Landry (who along with Josh Gordon, gives the Browns a nice tandem on the perimeter) and a starting corner in Damarious Randall as well as jettisoning failed QB project DeShone Kizer. Now it’s still Cleveland and there is still work to do, but let’s say they take Saquon Barkley with the first pick, and the skill players for the 2018 Browns are Taylor, Landery (who as more than 400 catches in four seasons playing with Jay Cutler and Ryan Tannehill and others), Gordon, Barkley and second-year tight end David Njoku. That’s compared to Kizer (who had an 11-to-22 TD-to-INT ratio), Rashard Higgins, Corey Coleman, Isaiah Crowell and Seth DeValve.
College football training staffs. Speaking of Barkley – Saquon, not Chuck – and while dude deserves a ton of credit for putting in the work, but wow at the transformation physically he underwent at Happy Valley. According to this 247sports.com comparison, Barkley left high school at 5-11, 190 pounds with a 4.66 time in the 40 and a 36.2-inch vertical. His combine numbers – 6-foot, 233, a 4.40 40 and a 41-inch vertical – were unbelievably improved. Other guys according to that article that made the most of college training included Da’Ron Payne (who lost 37 pounds anymore than 0.3 on his 40 time at Alabama), D.J. Chark (went from 6-foot to 6-3, gained 23 pounds and dropped his 40 from 4.46 and 4.34) and especially Bradley Chubb. Chubb arrived at N.C. State at 6-2.5, 208 pounds and a 4.83 40. His combine numbers at 6-4, 269 and a 4.65 40 will make him a lot of money.
Weekend losers
TBS. The audio early looked like a Kung Fu movie. There were power outages in New York. The satellite videos were dreadful. They brought out a poster board and handed Charles Barkley Kenny Smith Sharpies. (Seriously, Turner, with all the movie you guys save on Law & Order and Everybody Loves Raymond reruns, you can’t afford the touch screen technology. Golf coverage is trading Tiger’s shots from the fairway and around trees and Chuck is doing arts and crafts?) You can debate the format of releasing the teams first and then showing the bracket – and for the most part the social media reaction seemed to be loathed – but the technological aspects of the broadcast were down right dreadful. (As for the bracket, more of that to come.)
Odell Beckham Jr. OK, we have zero idea how to operate in the multi-million-dollar world in which ODB lives. We have no idea what it’s like to be as athletic as ODB is. But we do know that when a guy at the end of his contract wants to be the highest paid player at his position and in some ways the face of the franchise, being the star of a video – even unknowingly perhaps – that features a whole of sketchy possibilities and surroundings is a terrible idea.
Rick Pitino. Rick, please go away. Please. Your 15 seconds are up. And yes, you want another coaching gig. You know what, we want $3 million in unmarked $100 bills. Maybe if we sit around and close our eyes and really, Really, REALLY hope for it, our dreams will come true. (Sadly, here’s betting someone gives Pitino another chance. For Pete’s sake Dave Bliss got another gig and he tried to cover up a murder among his players.)
State’s tax revenue. According to the American Gaming Association, there will be more than $10 billion wagered on March Madness. Of that, according to the AGA, around $300 million will be wagered legally. That’s 3 percent friends. Think of what the state could do with the coin generated from a couple of dozen (or more) sanctioned and regulated betting outlets around Tennessee. (Side note: For those interested, here are the lines for the First Four and the opening round of the NCAA tournament.) And while most of that $10 billion on March Madness is done on office pools and the like, here’s betting that taxing even 2 percent of legalized sports gambling would generate tens of millions annually.
Conference tournaments. Gang, finishing the big-boy tournaments on Sunday is unfair to the fans, the schools and especially the players. How long did Kentucky get to celebrate winning the SEC tournament? Yes, for UK players that feels like a predetermined birthright any way, but seriously. An hour, maybe? Then it was talk about, well, are we a 4 seed or a 5? Of course, UK is just an example, but think how much more enjoyment Michigan players got for winning the title last week and strolling around campus to the high-fives and back-slaps last week. And if you move all the one- or two-bid league tournaments to Saturday and Sunday leading into the selection, then the smaller conferences get a) bigger platform, b) potentially more TV dollars, and c) more drama from the weekend. As a testament to the last reason, Davidson’s late two-step to get to the Dance cost one of the bog boys (likely Notre Dame) a spot in bracket. What we have now is, in truth, Auburn was better served by losing to Alabama in its SEC tournament opener, flying home and resting for this week’s Dance than Tennessee which left everything on the floor, played two extra games in two days, flew home and arrived in Knoxville late Sunday night to face a quick turnaround trip to Dallas for a Thursday nooner.
Bracket racket
One shining moment my tuckus.
Man, the only thing more predictable than the committee gagging – again – is that John Calipari was going to be complaining about how the committee is out to get Kentucky.
“We’ll probably get a 12 and play the play-in game in Dayton” Calipari said Sunday night, using his tired Dangerfield-esque “We get no respect” refrain. “Is there a site in Anchorage?” (This time, though, considering that UK could have to go through Arizona to get to the second weekend, he may have a point. More on that in a moment.)
Still, as we do on Mondays with winners and losers, let’s take an overview of this tournament.
First, if you want to be a winner, enter the “Madly Marching through the March Madness: Last In/First Out Contest.” It’s easy, email to jgreeson@timesfreepress.com the double-digit seed you think will last the longest and the No. 1 seed you think will be bounced first. (Reminder on scoring: The double-digit guess is worth 1.1 points; the bounced 1 seed is worth 1 point.) We will settle ties as they come up. Questions? Tournament winners:
Villanova appears to have the easiest track to the San Antonio among the 1-seeds. And amazingly, Xavier has the next easiest draw for the top seeds. Virginia was the top overall seed, yet will have to beat either Kentucky or Arizona to get to the Elite Eight, and Kansas is in the same bracket as Duke and Michigan State. Here’s a bet that all six of those teams would be favored over Villanova and Xavier.
Syracuse. The Orange were the last team in the field, and in typical committee fashion, the rules are merely suggestions. How a Syracuse team that went 4-8 against Quad 1 teams (whatever the hell that means) and 7-11 against quad 1 and 2 foes is puzzling.
The Hurley clan. Bobby (Arizona State) and Danny (Rhode Island) each got their teams to the party.
Tournament losers:
Man, Dickie V had a rough go, especially in the eyes of Johnny Vols Fans on the Twitter. (Don’t check that TIME-line, BABY!) Then he unloads on the selection committee for omitting Oklahoma State over Oklahoma. We love Dickie V the person. Sweetheart of a fellow. Seriously. But for a guy who backs Pitino and all other coaches that type of impassioned rant kind of rings hollow, no?
Oklahoma State. That’s not to say, Okie State did not get jobbed. Two wins over Oklahoma, two wins over Kansas, a win at West Virginia is a better resume than what the Sooners brought to the table.
Anyone with the “Did they hold it against the teams in the FBI probe” theories. Yes, Louisville, Oklahoma State and USC were held out. But Auburn is in. So is Arizona and Miami who was also believed to be one of the redacted teams.
Mid-majors. MTSU and St. Mary’s took it on the chin. But that should surprise no one considering the NCAA has to keep the big boys smiling and cashing those checks.
As for the committee, well, it’s getting harder and harder to believe that they are doing the best job that they can.
There is no consistency to the process. There is very little logic.
And most of all, there is no transparency. If they allowed one reporter – Bilas, Seth Davis, they could even pick who they want it to be – in the room, so many of those questions would go away.
But, not unlike the doofus who was the committee chair during his TBS interview, we will still be in the dark as the committee does exactly whatever the heck it wants.
This and that
– Simply put, there is too much to get to today. In addition to all the stuff above, the NFL starts its flirting phase. Teams can contact free agents today and the chatting can commence up to Wednesday, which is the start of the 2018 NFL calendar.
– Interesting – and smart – stance here for Will Cain. We discussed this some in last week’s mailbag, but Cain’s voice allows him to position himself in a void in the sports media landscape, especially at ESPN, which has fairly or unfairly been tagged with a liberal bias tag by a lot of folks.
– Whoa! Joey Lawrence, the former teen heartthrob declared for bankruptcy.
– Speaking of former teen stars, how about that Daniel LaRusso? Yes, Ralph Macchio, who was actually well into his 20s (and maybe 30s) when he was stilling playing teenagers in movies, is part of the production team bringing an adult Karate Kid back. LaRusso and Johnny Lawrence (no relation to Joey) are back on a Karate Kid TV series. Put ’em in a body bag.
-Anthony Davis, on his 25th birthday, dropped a triple double on Sunday. Yes, there are a lot of triple doubles on an almost daily basis in today’s NBA. David, though, got his this weekend with 10 blocks. If we had to pick a dude to join the elite quadruple double club, he’s the starting point.
– Speaking of golf, yes Tiger turned all the heads and grabbed everyone’s attention. And we’re guilty too. Still, Baylor School grad Luke List continues to grind and cash checks. Luke finished T-16th this weekend at 3 under and made $77,295.83. His money total continues to climb (he has made $1,534,441 this year) and potentially more importantly, so does his profile. During the morning ESPN hits on golf, yes, Tiger was the talking point, but when they showed the top-eight scoreboard, List’s name was listed among the “Notables” to the right. (Side note: Luke led the tournament in driving, averaging 328 per measured tee shot, including a 374-yard drive. Egad that’s a bomb.)
– Also of note, Baylor School and UTC alum Stephan Jaeger had a strong, 1-under weekend – going 71-70 – to finish T-49 and collect $15,431. He has made $201,309.55 in his first full PGA Tour season. Want to know how small the divide between List, who is 19th on the money list, and Jaeger, who is 148th, in golf terms? List’s average score is 70.2; Jaeger’s is 71.4. So about one shot a round is worth more than $1.3 million guys.
Today’s question
Will you enter our “Madly Marching through the March Madness: Last In/First Out Contest” before Thursday? How about the Press Row bracket contest? (Link is here.) (Link is here.) Pretty much there’s a contest for everyone.
As for breaking down the brackets, which we will discuss more at length tomorrow, we’ll start with this question: Who was the biggest snub? We think Oklahoma State has a right to be hot. We think USC, which was Pac-12 runner-up in the regular season and the tournament, has a right to be hot. We think St. Mary’s, which was ranked in the final seven AP Top 25 polls of the season, as well as Notre Dame, which was 14-5 with star Bonzie Colson in the lineup, have beefs too.
Of course, you can dish on who won the weekend and who lost it. (Other than Tiger of course.)
As for today, March 12, Coca-Cola is sold in bottle for the first time in Vicksburg, Miss. And considering what Coca-Cola bottling money has done for Chattanooga, well, today we should all say a silent prayer for Jack Lupton.
The actor who played Buckwheat on the “Little Rascals” was born on this day in 1931. Frank Welker was born on this day in 1946. If you are saying, “Who’s Frank Welker?” that’s OK. No, he’s of no relation to Wes. He’s the voice of Scooby Doo and Curious George.
Aaron Eckhart is 50 today. He’s got a sneaky strong IMBD page.
Dale Murphy is 62 today. Dont’a Hightower is 28.
Wow, today is the birthday of a slew of guys who had all-world skills and had painfully underwhelming pro careers. Isaiah Rider and Raul Mondesi each turn 47 today. Darryl Strawberry is 56 today.
Let’s go with the Rushmore of MLB players who had Hall of Fame skills and a Hall of Shame career. Or, if you’d rather, in honor of DAR-RYL! DAR-RYL!, you can go Rushmore of people with a fruit in their name? Go.