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LOL I'm stretching a bit lol. Although I don't get what those two are waiting for? I was pretty surprised by Smart, I thought he'd take the Illinois job. I don't think he'll end up getting a better job from VCU than Illinois. Stevens I wasn't surprised by; he's perfectly content and will only leave for a few specific jobs (and not even necessarily "better" jobs than Illinois, I think he'd likely leave for Notre Dame, if that became available). I know who should hire him in a few years, though they'll surely mistakenly hire a disciple. I agree, hell go back and look. I said Stevens wasn't coming here. He needs to be careful though. One more sub .500 year and he doesn't look as good. I get the sense from all I've heard/read that Stevens doesn't care much. If he stays his entire career at Butler, he'll be satisfied. If a situation comes up that is comfortable for him, then he'll strongly consider that as well. I don't think he's making his decisions based on what will get him to the top. And it sounds more and more that schools like Butler and VCU will be stepping up soon. Lots of rumors that they'll be joining the A-10 along with George Mason. That will make that conference either the best mid-major or a low major (although the loss of Temple hurts).

This Indiana fan doesn't think Illinois will be bad. They do have maybe the highest variability in the conference until we see how Groce handles all the talent he'll have back. I'd be shocked if they won the conference, and very surprised if they were better than IU, but they could easily finish anywhere between 3rd and 8th in the Big 10. My guess is that it will go relatively well but not perfectly and they'll finish 4th-6th. That's assuming no Leonard-with him, they could easily be better than that.

Well, the Colts say they haven't decided yet, but I don't think anybody believes them. With that in mind and at the risk of speaking for Exile here, I'll just move this along and say the Colts pick Andrew Luck, QB from Stanford. I'll PM dew for the next pick.

It's uncertain whether Watford will be a small forward or a power forward next year. Really depends on how advanced Perea is when he shows up. I do think losing Watford would hurt though because he is so versatile. A forward that can guard PG's and is capable of putting up 20/10. That's a valuable player to have, even if some games he just disappears. Having Watford on the floor makes Indiana's lineup combinations easier because he can shift positions and be a matchup problem at either one (to a lesser extent Oladipo and Sheehey can do this as well). Hollowell reminds me a lot of Watford coming out of high school, but Watford wasn't nearly the player he is now as a freshman, so I don't think you can expect Hollowell to come close to filling his shoes. And btw SSR, of the players you're referencing, Indiana will only have 1 of them left for next year, and he is projected to be at best 9th on the depth chart (before figuring out whoever leaves, obviously if Watford leaves he jumps up to 6th or 7th). If Watford doesn't leave there's a chance he'll be out of the rotation altogether.

IIRC, there is no testing the waters anymore. If he declares, he's gone. He does get to get some advice before he officially declares, but that's it. It would hurt 2012 if Watford left, but it would help 2013 so I'm not too concerned about it. It might not even make that big of a difference next year if some of the freshmen play well.

I've always wondered why this never came up as a solution myself. I guess the NFL thinks there would be too many ties that way, and the players definitely don't seem to want to play multiple OT's like there are in other sports. But it makes sense, and it would almost completely ensure that both teams would get the ball (if you let a team control the ball for 8 minutes even with say 2 timeouts, you have less of a case for saying you didn't get a chance).

I have my doubts that Maine is making it. Sveum in a quote recently when talking about how many left-handers will make it only mentioned Russell as throwing the ball well, and downplayed the necessity of specifically having left-handed relievers at all.

The Cubs have no track record. "The Cubs" track record has to be differentiated by who was running them. You can't look at the Cubs organization right now and say "they have a history of developing some pitchers but no hitters" just because that is was the Andy MacPhail era Cubs did. OK. Like I said, I'm cautiously optimistic. I suppose my main problem is that the change in leadership is significant of nothing until they show they can produce players like they did in the past. I don't think changing leadership automatically means the Cubs system is that much better than it was a year ago. It seems to me that a lot of people are giving really rosy prognostications simply because Theo/Hoyer are now running the show. Theo/Hoyer is just one factor why the system is better than a year ago. The large amount of money they spent on the draft last year helped. The trades they made this offseason and the international signings they made this year helped. The amount of raw talent has been greatly increased since just one year ago. Adding in the player development skills that Theo/Hoyer bring just add to the movement going on in the system right now.

The Cubs have no track record. "The Cubs" track record has to be differentiated by who was running them. You can't look at the Cubs organization right now and say "they have a history of developing some pitchers but no hitters" just because that is was the Andy MacPhail era Cubs did. Not to mention that while the Cubs have been bad overall lately at bringing up talent, they've been better at bringing up hitters than pitchers in recent years. Soto and Castro are great hitters for their positions. Barney is ok. And Jackson is on the way. That's been much better than the pitching they've been developing recently. And then there are bunches of hitters at the lower levels.

Happened to us vs ucla in 2007. San Jose != home game for UCLA. It's 350 miles away from Westwood. C'mon, dude. You don't think a location in california--even Norcal--isn't a home court advantage for UCLA over a team from Kansas? Sure, UCLA had an advantage but it wasn't a "home game." It was a similar distance for Kansas in this game. 287 miles from Lawrence to St. Louis. As for how something like this could happen, it's not easy to make the bracket totally immune from these things. In this case, Duke was ineligible from being in this bracket because North Carolina was the 1, and obviously Missouri would have even been worse than Kansas in this spot. Ohio State was the only real option, and they are only 140 miles further than Kansas is from St. Louis. It's possible Ohio State would have been a better choice, but I don't know if all the bracket rules could have been followed if they moved there (obviously Purdue would have to go to another bracket, and I don't know how many chains of events that would set off).

I think they're a possible contender even if he leaves, but it would take a couple of the elite freshman taking on major roles and/or Oladipo developing a jump shot. The biggest issue with Watford leaving isn't his offense (which is great when it's on like tonight, but very inconsistent) but the fact that they've been hiding Hulls by having Watford guard point guards the last half of the season.

Oh well. To beat the better team, Indiana was going to have to either get really hot from the 3 point line or have Kentucky make a decent amount of mistakes. Neither happened tonight. It was a good effort hanging in there when Kentucky played so efficiently. Only bad thing from tonight is that Watford played so well, which might help him to try to leave. Regardless of who leaves though, it should be a fun season next year. Looking forward to it.

No, but the best over anybody anywhere near the caliber of Kentucky. They scored 54 in the first half against Iowa, 52 against Howard, and 51 against Evansville.

It was raining all day. So he was drawing in chalk during the rain? He's not going to Illinois though. It was nice in Indy this afternoon after the rain this morning.

2011 tournament-4 seed, lost to 8 seed Butler 2010-4 seed, lost to 12 seed Cornell 2009-12 seed, lost to 4 seed Xavier 2008-3 seed, lost to 10 seed Davidson 2007-2 seed, lost to 7 seed UNLV 2006-9 seed, lost to 8 seed Arizona 2005-6 seed, lost to 1 seed North Carolina 2004-6 seed, lost to 3 seed Pittsburgh 2003-5 seed, lost to 1 seed Kentucky 2002-8 seed, lost to 1 seed Maryland In Bo's 10 years including this one, he has 3 total wins over top 8 seeds. All of those were over 5 seeds. And as TT said, only 1 win over a higher seed. They have 4 losses against teams seeded worse than them, and all of those teams were substantially worse than they were. It's not an awful tournament resume, but it's not good. The main reason for their success over that time period is because they've had 4 different seasons where they got to play multiple double digit seeds, and two of those seasons they got to play 3 different double digit seeds.

They added Volstad, Maholm, and possibly Wood. That could be over half the rotation. There are three big reasons the rotation will be quite a bit better than last year. First is the depth. 49 starts combined last year between pitchers that people knew were not major league caliber starters and proved that last year: Russell, Lopez, Ortiz, Coleman, and Davis. This year, unless you think Samardzija will crash and burn miserably, the number of starts from pitchers like that should be under 10. That's a whole season's worth of starts from one starter plus a little bit. Second is that of the pitchers remaining, based on past history and peripherals Dempster and Wells have more room to go up than down while only Garza has more room to go down than up. Maholm and Volstad don't have huge hurdles to cross to be equal or better than Z and Wells were last year. That leaves Samardzija/Wood to replace all the horrible starters the Cubs threw out last year. Third is the defense. The Cubs made two defensive upgrades (3B and RF) with only one downgrade (1B). They have two upgrades that will likely come up midseason (CF, 1B). Byrd should continue to decline defensively in CF, while Castro will likely improve at SS. Overall, the defense should be better, especially in the second half of the year. That will help the rotation, especially the pitchers without huge strikeout rates. Could the bullpen be bad? Absolutely. It should be better when the starting pitching goes deeper in games which will test the middle relief less, but they also have downside risk especially if Samardzija moves to the rotation. That one is a lot harder to project than the rotation though because of the few innings and the rotating cast that will likely be in the bullpen this year.

For the type of player Cespedes is projected to be, 6/36 was a good deal, but 4/36 really wasn't. Especially considering the higher-than-average bust risk he holds. He only has to be worth about 2 WAR/year to be worth that contract. Not guaranteed but it's not a big risk. That just doesn't seem realistic to me. That would mean someone like Coco Crisp is worth that contract, and I think that's absurd. http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/linear-dollars-per-win-again/ http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/a-retrospective-look-at-the-price-of-a-win/ The counterpoint is this. The 5 million/WAR is for free agency. So a better way to say it is a 10 million player producing 2 WAR is about what you should expect on the free agent market. Whether than player is actually worth 10 million to that team is based on a whole lot of other factors. In the Cubs case, their park being so small makes having 3 good defenders in the OF not be as important. That combined with the players they already have locked in (specifically Jackson+Dejesus for 2013) make Cespedes a little less valuable to them. The Cubs also have internal options that can play above replacement level for the minimum, which makes Cespedes a little less valuable again. There are also payroll, roster space, and playing time constraints to consider. Adding another 2 WAR outfielder who's locked in at a non-discount price over the next 4 years probably hurts the Cubs more than it helps. They are forced to trade DeJesus and probably get less value than he's worth if they want to develop any OF besides Jackson. They are also forced to trade him if they want to sign a free agent or make a trade to acquire an elite OF. It's a perfectly fine free agent deal if you look at just it alone, but it would be a disappointment for the Cubs is that's what Cespedes would give them.

I have no doubt they'll get there. The only tough games left are @ATL, @OKC, vs MIA, @MIA, vs DAL, @IND. I'm looking forward to the OKC game. I hope we can at least have Rose healthy by then, if not Rip. The two games vs the Knicks should be interesting as well. A possible first round playoff preview, and the Knicks look like a completely different team with their new coach. It's too soon to tell if it's just the momentary bump you get when you fire a coach midseason, but they look like they're finally playing defense and could be scary if so. Of course, if they play really well down the stretch they could catch teams like Boston or Philly.

If you would like to continue the costed discussion, please start a thread for that purpose. Let's keep this one on topic please.

I'm going to go ahead and move this to site suggestions so Tim can hopefully see it.

I think he'll be a more athletic Pritchard as a freshman. Some rebounds, some garbage plays around the basket, will challenge some shots but also be foul prone. I do think Watford leaving wouldn't hurt that much because of Sheehey and Oladipo. Their ability to play multiple positions makes Zeller pretty much the only one who would be concerning if he left. If Watford leaves, IU can still go big (Perea, Zeller, Sheehey, Oladipo, Hulls) or small (Zeller, Sheehey, Oladipo, Hulls, and Yogi). Either way, those six plus Hollowell and Elston will be the top 8, and then some possible good options behind them to fill out the rotation. Obviously, it will still be better if somebody else leaves, but I don't think any of the freshman will have to be spectacular even if one of the better players leave. Another year of experience plus the freshman being a little better than the current seniors will be enough to improve.

Yes. He was only playing spot minutes before that. But with the Jones injury, Indiana is down to 10 healthy scholarship players and everybody but Etherington has been playing.

I didn't mind the first 2 point attempt but even on that one, the defense was collapsing and there was an open player on the wing to the guy's left. Would have been an easy pass to make. I don't even like the first 2 point attempt. Reasonable best case scenario is that he makes it with 5 seconds on the clock, team fouls, other team makes 1 of 2, and then you rush it up court for an ok look at a game tying 2 or game winning 3. Look at how many ifs there are in that scenario vs just passing it out for an ok look at a game tying 3. Under 10 seconds left, IMO the only 2 you can take in that situation is a dunk or open layup.

That would fall under being a fan which IMO is perfectly fine. Being a homer (when used negatively) is IMO completely different from that.

I chuckled that Syracuse was almost allowed to shoot 3 free throws the last time they went to the line. He made the first two, and then everybody stood there and he was about to release the third one when somebody finally woke up (I don't know if it was a ref or the scorers table) and told them he couldn't shoot any more! That was a fitting finish for those last few minutes.