Ohio State, Duke, Syracuse, Kansas, Villanova, and Wichita State all have something in common and it isn’t something to be proud of. They all have been upset thus far in the NCAA tournament — sent home packing much earlier than many people expected. March Madness is known for its crazy shenanigans, but so far this tournament has been the craziest that I can remember. There are still many good teams left in the tournament, but what has transpired thus far is unexplainable.

Despite this picture being from 2009, not even Barack Obama could have predicted what would transpire thus far in the 2014 tournament, Pete Souza [Public domain], via Wikimedia Commons

#1 Florida vs #4 UCLA

#1 Virginia vs #Michigan State

#3 Iowa State vs #7 Connecticut

#1 Arizona vs #4 San Diego State

#2 Wisconsin vs #6 Baylor

#4 Louisville vs #8 Kentucky

#2 Michigan vs #11 Tennessee

This NCAA Tournament has given us some really good match-ups in the Sweet 16 and it’s looking like more of the same in the this weekend. Now here is my preview for what will transpire in the next few weeks:

Sweet 16:

#1 Florida vs #4 UCLA (Florida),

#10 Stanford vs #11 Dayton (Dayton)

#1 Virginia vs #4 Michigan State (Virginia)

#3 Iowa State vs #7 Connecticut (Connecticut)

#1 Arizona vs #4 San Diego State (Arizona)

#2 Wisconsin vs #6 Baylor (Wisconsin)

#4 Louisville vs #8 Kentucky (Kentucky)

#2 Michigan vs #11 Tennessee (Michigan)

Elite Eight:

#1 Florida vs #11 Dayton (Florida)

#1 Virginia vs #7 Connecticut (Virginia)

#1 Arizona vs #2 Wisconsin (Arizona)

#8 Kentucky vs #2 Michigan (Kentucky)

Final Four:

#1 Florida vs #1 Virginia (Virginia)

#1 Arizona vs #8 Kentucky (Arizona)

NCAA Championship Game:

#1 Virginia vs #1 Arizona

I’ve got Arizona holding up the trophy after its all said and done with the final score being 76-69.

What do you think? Did I even get close? Comment below.

Over the last two years I’ve grown increasingly fond of Marcus Smart. The six-foot, four-inch sophomore guard has reignited Oklahoma State basketball and displayed a mature calm on the court, similar to his pro comparison: Jarret Jack.

I believe Smart has a higher upside than Jack, reminding me at times of James Harden who, like Smart, felt comfortable as a controlled combo guard playing in a post-oriented offense. Smart is dangerously athletic, a great finisher around the rim and, like Harden, he is a lockdown off-ball defender.

On Saturday, my flattering opinions of Marcus Smart were in question.

Gallagher-IBA Arena is one of the most iconic in the midwest. Away from home Marcus Smart has been the subject of controversy this week. By Ashlux at en.wikipedia, from Wikimedia Commons

The star Oklahoma State guard was ejected from a game against Texas Tech, after shoving a fan. That fan, a fifty-something “super fan” named Jeff Orr, sat three rows from the court. Diving for a loose ball, the gritty guard worked his way back up with his teammate’s help, and then wham: before anyone could react, Orr was thrown back and the broad shouldered guard led off the court.

Memories of that epic Pacers-Pistons fight came to memory, something I, along with many college hoops fans, never would have associated with the court-quiet Cowboy star. But as the story continued to cycle, the truth illumined.

It has been reported that Jeff Orr called him a racial slur. Jeff Orr says he called him a “piece of crap.” Orr’s self-suspension (he vowed not to attend any Texas Tech games for the rest of the year) on the surface, seems noble, but not entirely honest either.

The resolution for Marcus Smart was a national apology, an ensuing character assassination and a three-game suspension handed down by the Big XII. And I have a serious problem with that.

While I understand a 3 game suspension—considering the slippery slope the Big Ten would find themselves in, if letting Smart off free—I don’t understand sports pontificators siding with Orr in the incident.

Driving home Sunday from the bay area, radio personalities Adam Schein and Chris Russo characterized Smart as an irrational teen with a serious bone to pick; Russo at one point referencing Smart as a ‘hot head.’

My issue is that the majority of sports TV and radio personalities are white. The majority of those calling the kid a ‘hot head,’ or wishing he’d ‘been the bigger man and walked away,’ have never experienced vehement racism. It’s easy to have demands of others when never having walked in their shoes.

But I won’t do the same.

Yes, I’m white, middle class, live in a predominately white suburbia, and have only a small handful of African-American friends. But that doesn’t make me ignorant either. I’m fully aware of racism’s insidious prevalence in today’s “progressive” America.

Smart has never been ejected in nearly two years, until Saturday. He’s never even received a technical foul. His coach Pat Ford, called Smart a young man with a “tremendous heart.” Smart himself — though (at some level, possibly) justified in his actions — apologetically asked the media, his fans and teammates for forgiveness. That doesn’t sound a whole lot like a hot headed thug. That sounds like a young man learning to live in his skin. Something I, and many of you reading this, will never have to confront.

Any player who can score 30 points regularly in Division 1 college basketball, like he has over the past few years, will probably be a first-round draft pick. He is a prolific scorer and shooter, but what will really allow him to excel in the NBA is not his shooting ability. Mike Penberthy was a really good shooter and was out of the league quickly. Shawn Respert was an AMAZING shooter, but that didn’t keep him in the league.

Fredette’s ability to score also won’t keep him in the league for a long time. Lots of scorers in college have flamed out in the NBA.

What will make Jimmer not as bad as people are predicting is his athleticism. Because he won’t be required to dominate 75 percent of his team’s possessions, he will be able to spend time working to become a better defender than pundits think. His athleticism will allow for improvement that wouldn’t be possible for less athletic players.

Jimmer fits the profile of a stereotypical non-athletic chucker. The only problem is that he is very athletic. He needs to improve his ball handling and defense, but his athleticism and drive make him capable of both. He’ll do just fine in the NBA. — OM

Let me explain.

The sports media is there to show me a game or talk about a game. If there is some analysis, fine. Especially when it’s Charles Barkley or Charlie Sheen doing the analysis, and especially when they’re analyzing the game itself. The media should be, well, the media – a conduit – through which sports can be transmitted to my eyes and then into brain.

Charlie Sheen’s Baseball Analysis pt. 1

Charlie Sheen baseball analysis part 2

Love when Barkley’s on TV.

Sometimes, though, the media forgets their role. Sometimes they think they ARE the story. Sometimes, unfortunately, they report on themselves.

For people with dissenting opinions, there is one main time that it is OK for the ratings to be reported on—the Super Bowl. The Super Bowl is an event bigger than just the game, so reporting on how many people watched it (over 100 million this year, according to Yahoo! Sports) is fine. The ratings for the Super Bowl are a newsworthy story.

Here is another example of where reporting on ratings is OK—in a magazine in the Business section. Ratings affect the business of advertising, and so it would be appropriate to have an article in the Business section of, in this case, Time Magazine.

Let’s look at inappropriate places to report ratings. The first, is on a sports page of a newspaper or a sports website. In this case, Yahoo! Sports reported on ratings like it’s something that should matter to me as a sports fan. In the story, they give the facts, that the viewership for the World Series was down this year. Great. What the hell am I supposed to do with that information? How should I interpret it?  Should I feel bad because I did not watch it (and am still trying to forget)? Should I feel badly for Major League Baseball? Should I have a worse impression of the sport because other people do not watch it? Should I be worried for the players? The owners? The network that carried that sport? Should I watch a certain network more, to make up for the guilt I feel from knowing that their ratings weren’t good?

Like everything else, there are shades of gray when it comes to reporting on ratings. A blurb like this one in the LA Times probably wasn’t in the Sports section, so might pass my litmus test of being OK. But again, it’s borderline. Crossing that border here, a Times blogger talks all about the ratings for Game 7. I like Diane Pucin and the Fabulous Forum, but it’s inappropriate.

The NCAA Basketball Tournament is reported-on, non-stop, for the revenue it makes the NCAA. If it is reported on as part of an illustration of the effect gambling has on viewership or to illustrate why NCAA players should be paid for their services, then that is fine. When it’s reported on just to be reported on, then we have an issue.

Print media reports on the ratings, but sports radio may be the worst of all offenders. When I hear someone making a point about sports by using the ratings that particular sport gets (here’s looking at you Herd), I can’t stand it. It is almost instant cause for station surfing. For someone to make the point, for instance, that College Football is better off without a playoff because regular season games get more viewers, is like saying it is better for someone to be heinously injured in a car accident because it causes more people to slow down and look.

If my career was in advertising, information about ratings might be meaningful and useful to me. I would consume it, then I would move on. If I was an “Advertising Fan” and not a “Sports Fan,” then I might even need the information about the World Series ratings or NBA Finals ratings, or overnight ratings after a big Sunday in the NFL. But I’m not an advertising fan. I am a sports fan.

Side note- I would love to see something along the lines of Terry Tate—Office Linebacker for fans of advertising… but I digress…

Ratings can be a good way to tell which sport is most popular. Here is a blog from the Washington Post talking about whether the Capitals or the Wizards get better ratings. Again, unless you’re trying to decide where to advertise, why would it matter?

As a fan, I either like the team/sport or I do not. I watch the team/sport or I do not. I will follow the team/sport or I will not. The more important question than ratings, is whether a sport is on TV and in this day and age, the answer is usually that it is. If not, I can probably find it online.

As a consumer of sports, I do not need ratings to tell me what to do. I will not watch sports based on its high ratings, nor will I not watch it if because other people don’t. This is not a popularity contest. It makes no difference to me and (for me) makes the sports websites that feature ratings articles, the equivalent of 24-hour news networks: in other words, media diarrhea. And media members that continue to spout out ratings stats to back up their opinions about sports either a) have an all-advertising industry audience or b) are narcissists. What other conclusion could I come to for a media that uses its power of reporting to report on… itself.

As I conclude, I wonder to myself, “If I hate media talking about ratings, isn’t my blog (when I post this) going to be media talking about media talking about the ratings?” We need to stop the madness. Please.