bukie

Going by the top 100 in WAR in 2010, the Cubs still only had one player: Marlon Byrd. Soto, Dempster and Marmol were just outside the top 100. In case someone else is curious... Josh Hamilton Rangers Joey Votto Reds Albert Pujols Cardinals Ryan Zimmerman Nationals Cliff Lee - - - Adrian Beltre Red Sox Jose Bautista Blue Jays Evan Longoria Rays Matt Holliday Cardinals Carl Crawford Rays Roy Halladay Phillies Troy Tulowitzki Rockies Robinson Cano Yankees Justin Verlander Tigers Josh Johnson Marlins Ubaldo Jimenez Rockies Felix Hernandez Mariners Miguel Cabrera Tigers Adam Wainwright Cardinals Rickie Weeks Brewers Francisco Liriano Twins Andres Torres Giants Kelly Johnson Diamondbacks Carlos Gonzalez Rockies Jered Weaver Angels Aubrey Huff Giants Jon Lester Red Sox Shin-Soo Choo Indians Brett Gardner Yankees Brian McCann Braves Jay Bruce Reds Adrian Gonzalez Padres Justin Morneau Twins Zack Greinke Royals Chase Utley Phillies Tim Lincecum Giants CC Sabathia Yankees Stephen Drew Diamondbacks Dan Uggla Marlins Joe Mauer Twins Nelson Cruz Rangers Scott Rolen Reds Jayson Werth Phillies Jason Heyward Braves Angel Pagan Mets Daric Barton Athletics Clayton Kershaw Dodgers Ichiro Suzuki Mariners Roy Oswalt - - - Yovani Gallardo Brewers Chad Billingsley Dodgers Chase Headley Padres Dan Haren - - - C.J. Wilson Rangers Colby Lewis Rangers Hanley Ramirez Marlins John Danks White Sox Gavin Floyd White Sox Anibal Sanchez Marlins Tommy Hanson Braves David Price Rays Chris Young Diamondbacks Hiroki Kuroda Dodgers Paul Konerko White Sox Michael Bourn Astros Kevin Youkilis Red Sox Ryan Braun Brewers Carlos Ruiz Phillies Marlon Byrd Cubs Nick Swisher Yankees Rafael Furcal Dodgers Prince Fielder Brewers David Wright Mets Mat Latos Padres Ricky Romero Blue Jays Matt Cain Giants Brett Myers Astros John Lackey Red Sox Brandon Phillips Reds Victor Martinez Red Sox Vernon Wells Blue Jays Buster Posey Giants Adam Dunn Nationals Martin Prado Braves Alex Rodriguez Yankees Edwin Jackson - - - Mark Buehrle White Sox Cole Hamels Phillies Alexei Ramirez White Sox Austin Jackson Tigers Chris Carpenter Cardinals Jason Hammel Rockies Max Scherzer Tigers Clay Buchholz Red Sox Brandon Morrow Blue Jays Placido Polanco Phillies Alex Rios White Sox Cliff Pennington Athletics Wandy Rodriguez Astros Jim Thome Twins

Illinois: Best case, worst case Best Case: Unsatisfying, underachieving season takes a turn at the 11th hour, when a team led in scoring by three seniors finally finds its sense of urgency. Demetri McCamey racks up 20 points and 10 assists against UNLV. Then, in the Jilted Fan Base Jihad Game against Bill Self and Kansas, coach Bruce Weber devises a brilliant game plan to neutralize the Morris twins and the Illini score their biggest win since 2005. They then defeat Louisville to reach the final eight before losing to Notre Dame. Weber is freshly appreciated by Illinois fans. As an added bonus, coach Bruce Pearl and Tennessee are routed in their first game and Pearl is given a one-year show-cause penalty. Worst Case: Unsatisfying, underachieving season continues on same dismal path for 40 more minutes, when senior-led team loses ugly to UNLV -- coached by another former Illinois boss, Lon Kruger. Illini go 6½ minutes without scoring in the middle of the second half to blow an eight-point lead and lose by two when 7-foot-1 Mike Tisdale turns a low-post catch into a fadeaway 18-footer that misses at the buzzer. Tired of looking at the skinny upper bodies of Tisdale, Bill Cole and Mike Davis, and tired of listening to fans call for his job, Weber at least changes strength coaches. Meanwhile, Self wins another title and Pearl goes to the Final Four. I...can't help but agree, except if they go that far in the best-case scenario, a FF bid is not out of the question. Michigan fans, this may be the only time in history every Illinois fan on the planet is rooting hard for you.

Poor, neglected Soto. Although, if Tyler Colvin blossoms into a top 100 star, the Cubs are set.

But if you take out every one he made, the numbers don't look nearly as good.

Considering defenses are sitting back on him, and the Bulls have the highest margin of victory in the NBA since December 3, I don't have a problem with him working on his 3-point shooting during games. The only way he's going to get better at it is to shoot it more. Plus, the Bulls are so good at offensive rebounding, it doesn't really hurt them to try.

Wow, Bayern totally blew that. In World Cup news, since FIFA rejected the proposed 4th CONCACAF bid, they've scrapped the two-group final proposal, and are going to propose the Hex final qualifier again.

Ahh, yes, it does include the postseason games. It's less weird now. For a second there, it was really odd, since 2008 had the exact same pattern.

Out of curiousity, I did the same thing for last year's data and field, and there were 6 teams difference in the field: 6 teams out: Notre Dame (6, lost in first round to ODU), Florida (10, lost in first round to BYU), UNLV (8, lost in first round to Northern Iowa), Utah State (12, lost in first round to Texas A&M), Minnesota (11, lost in first round to Xavier), Louisville (9, lost in first round to Cal) 6 teams in: Dayton (won NIT), North Carolina (NIT runner-up), Rhode Island (NIT Final Four, lost to UNC), Virginia Tech (NIT final 8, lost to Rhode Island), Mississippi (NIT Final Four, lost to Dayton), VCU (CBI winner...no idea why they didn't at least get an NIT invite) Yes, Illinois would have still been out, but it was just odd that the 6 added teams were all very successful in the postseason, while the 6 teams out all lost in the first round. EDIT: Same thing for 2009: 3 teams difference. Out: BYU, Boston College, Tennessee, all first round losers. In: Penn State, Notre Dame, Baylor, who were the NIT champ, runner up, and final four participant. Weird.

I disagree, I think it's the way it should be done, really. I'd much rather see a team that accomplished more during the regular season, even with dubious talent (Harvard) get a bid than a team that accomplished much less during the season, but would possibly be a better team (USC). Granted, it gets a little odd seeding straight by talent, but in reality, for tournament seeding, it'd be the most balanced if it were sorted by quality of team, and not so much accomplishment during the year. And yes, I realize it tosses Illinois way out to a 5 seed, as they're one of the outliers that performs exceedingly well, many blowouts, but is terrible at closing out close games. Call it luck, call it poor offensive strategy, but they have one of the biggest discrepancies between ability and accomplishment of anyone in the NCAA (Maryland is probably the biggest overall).

Based on Nate Silver and John Gasaway's assertions that bids should be handed out based on merit, and seeding should be done based on talent, I went and took the two parts of Jeff Sagarin's ratings (ELO for merit, Predictor for talent), and just straight took the top 37 at-larges from the first and seeded based on the second, just to see how it'd look. So, as far as tournament selection would have gone: Last 4 in: 48. Clemson 49. Georgia 50. UCLA 52. Saint Mary's Last 4 out: 53. Colorado 54. Cleveland State 55. Boston College 57. Tennessee Next 4 out: 58. Northwestern 59. New Mexico 60. Oklahoma State 61. VCU Others out: 78. USC Then, a straight S-Curve based on talent: And translated straight into bracket form (without taking into account conference rules or geography or whatever beyond the 1 seeds, because it's not really worth the time overall): First Four: 1. (51) UCLA vs. (82) Harvard 2. (60) Georgia vs. (63) UAB 3. (205) Hampton vs. (310) Alabama State 4. (215) Arkansas-Little Rock vs. (225) Texas-San Antonio Bracket:

Carolina got a lucky draw? :-k Fortunate seed, fortunate geographical location. Really unfortunate probable second round opponent, though Right, which is why they're not nearly as fortunate as Florida, who hit the trifecta, and may have the most fortunate draw in NCAA tournament history.

Carolina got a lucky draw? :-k Fortunate seed, fortunate geographical location.

Nate Silver uses various metrics to calculate the luckiest and unluckiest draws of the tournament: http://fivethirtyeight.blogs.nytimes.com/2011/03/14/talent-is-nice-but-luck-is-vital/ Luckiest draw? Florida, which drew a combination of an overseeding, a favorable geographical location, and other overseeded teams on their half of the bracket. Unluckiest draw? UNLV, which drew a combination of an underseeding, an unfavorable geographical location, and an unfortunate set of matchups in their pod.

Well, Miami just took San Antonio out back behind the woodshed tonight.

Nothing like the quick answer to perk up the crowd.

It's about the equivalent of holding practice on back to back days.

To be honest, this is probably the most top-heavy bracket in years, as the quality of the teams really tails off after the 4's. In my opinion, there are only four vulnerable top 4 seeds at the pod level: 1) Florida, who's playing in Tampa and would have a second-round matchup against severely underachieving MSU or a completely inconsistent UCLA team. 2) North Carolina, who's playing in Charlotte, but would have a really tough second-round matchup 3) UConn, who probably got overseeded thanks to their tournament run, but were a worse team over the course of the season than their likely second round opponent, Cincinnati, and don't really have much of a geographical advantage. 4) BYU, playing slightly worse without Davies, but playing in Denver against the weakest 6 seed (and the strongest 11). Granted, there are always upsets that don't follow any line of logic or reason (see: Kansas vs. Northern Iowa), and I'm really tempted to just pick Belmont anyway, but I only have two teams of the top 4's not making the sweet 16 this year.

Now I'm a little nervous. I don't have any 4 seeds advancing past the first weekend. This is going to be an ugly bracket. How? The 4 seeds are all underseeded (Louisville is the closest), and the 5 seeds are all overseeded (WVU the closest to being correct). Other than that, Utah State is by far the best of the 12 seeds and hasn't won a tournament game since the Truman administration, Clemson is easily the second best 12 seed and has to win a game just to play the toughest 5, and Belmont, the best 13 seed, is a team I'd take against any 5, but not these 4s. EDIT: The most plausible non-4 winning pod I see is Wisconsin-Belmont-KSU-Utah State, and that's because the moronic committee gave Utah State a huge geographical advantage.

Also, here are the closest matchups of the first round: Diff Matchup 1 Temple-PSU 2 G Mason-Villanova 2 UNLV-Illinois 2 Butler-Old Dominion 3 Texas A&M-Florida State 3 West Virginia-Clemson 4 Xavier-Marquette 8 St. John's-Gonzaga

24 hours later, all I feel for sure is that the 4 seeds are unusually strong this year. Looking at Pomeroy ratings, here are the matchups where the lower seed is higher rated: - Marquette over Xavier - Illinois over UNLV - Florida State over Texas A&M - Old Dominion over Butler - Utah State over Kansas State - Gonzaga over St. John's - Michigan State over UCLA Here are other matchups where the ratings are a lot closer than the seed matchups: - Wisconsin-Belmont - Georgetown-USC - Vanderbilt-Richmond - Temple-Penn State - Cincy-Missouri - West Virginia-Clemson Here are matchups where the seed matchups are a lot closer than the ratings: - Clemson over UAB - Kentucky over Princeton - Washington over Georgia - Arizona over Memphis - Texas over Oakland - Louisville over Morehead State - USC over VCU - Michigan over Tennessee

John Gasaway just posted an article (Insider) on his 3 good draws and 3 bad draws of the tournament: Good draws: - Florida - Overseeded in a friendly pod location in a half of the bracket full of overseeded teams (UCLA, MSU, BYU, St. John's). - USC - Not only made the field, but play-in game against a VCU team that nearly finished the season 0-7, for the right to play a Georgetown team that finished the year 0-3 and may struggle to integrate a key player back into the lineup. - Cincinnati - Drew an 11 seed that hasn't looked good in a month, and after that could get a UConn team that not only just finished up a 5-games-in-5-nights gauntlet, but that they also outplayed during the conference season. Bad draws: - St. John's - Playing a Gonzaga team in Denver that scored an efficiency margin of 0.17 in conference, while the Red Storm was just +.02 in conference. - Wisconsin - Playing a Belmont team that is grossly underseeded, coming off 4 years of tournament losses to Cornell, Xavier, Davidson and UNLV. - North Carolina - Possible second round game against the best team in the Pac-10, then a possible third round game against Syracuse in Newark.

Kevin Love's double-double streak ended last night at 53 just as everyone suspected it would: not scoring enough points against Golden State.

I'm pretty sure St. Mary's was in the top 100. I'm not so convinced it is a flaw in Pomeroy's ratings, as Sagarin is also a lot higher on Belmont/Utah State than RPI and seeding suggests. It's a factor of including scoring margin in the analysis, which is often more valuable than just looking at wins and losses. Sometimes a team just can't schedule quality competition, so you're left with how they do against the competition they do face.

I'm going to go ahead and doubt the committee planned that one.

Champ: OSU Runner-up: Notre Dame Final Four: Wisconsin, Duke Elite Eight: Washington, SDSU, Louisville, Gonzaga Sweet 16: Kentucky, Syracuse, Texas, Cincy, Illinois, Purdue, Pitt, Michigan State First round upsets: Bucknell, Marquette, Utah State, VCU