All-Americans Drive The Bandwagon

Quick thanks to Jimmy Traina at Sports Illustrated’s Hot Clicks for linking to the Part I & Part II of the top 25 breakdown the past couple days. The traffic is appreciated. For those of you new to the site, thanks for stopping by, and join as a follower through the site or on facebook through the links on the right panel.

Selection Sunday is only 4 days away, and we are keeping our focus on the tournament. As you know, I leave the whole bubble thing to guys who have much better access to a research department, and young data monkeys to pull it for them.

What does it take to win the tournament? There are a ton of theories on qualities a team should have including strong guard play (I’ve mentioned the Fat Point Guard Theory too many times already), an inside presence, tough defense and a good coach. Well, that’s all true, but pretty obvious. If a team has all of that, they would be expected to win. Another aspect is the presence of a star player with the ability to carry a team. There are plenty of examples of it, and in the past 10 years, 8 of the champions have had at least one player on the first or second team consensus All-American team. The only exceptions were in 2008 with Kansas and 2006 with Florida. Kansas had Brandon Rush make the third team from the NABC, and Mario Chalmers was AP honorable mention, while Florida had Joakim Noah who was AP honorable mention in 2006. (You can check out all the historical consensus All-Americans here)

Where does that lead us when we look at this year’s field? We only have the early picks for All-American teams from the Sporting News and Yahoo! Sports as our reference points, but since that’s what we have, that’s what we’ll work with. Using that small sample, the consensus first team guys are John Wall (Kentucky), Evan Turner (Ohio State), James Anderson (Oklahoma St) and Scottie Reynolds (Villanova). Greivis Vasquez (Maryland), DeMarcus Cousins (Kentucky), Sherron Collins (Kansas) and Wesley Johnson (Syracuse) are also on either the first or second team for both sources.

That leaves us with the teams we’d expect to have the best chances of winning it all, Kentucky, Kansas, Syracuse, Ohio State and Villanova. James Anderson is in a role similar to former Kansas State All-American Michael Beasley, or Arizona State’s James Harden – a guy who can light up the scoreboard, but doesn’t have enough help around him to advance deep in the tournament. Vasquez is hoping to match former Maryland All-American Juan Dixon in leading the Terps to a title, but he is more like former Texas A&M All-American Acie Law who couldn’t get past the sweet 16.

More interesting is to look at who among the top seeds this eliminates from title contention. Duke, Purdue, West Virginia and Kansas State are in contention for #1 or #2 seeds and do not have the All-Americans to drive them to the title. Potential #3-#5 seeds who are eliminated include New Mexico, Michigan State, Pittsburgh, Tennessee, Vanderbilt, Wisconsin and Baylor. Again, it’s not a hard and fast rule, but the odds are definitely against one of these teams cutting down the nets at the end of the tournament.

And since many of you probably found the site through Hot Clicks and came back looking for more pictures of talent, I’ll just randomly throw up a picture of an a girl who wouldn’t make any consensus All-American teams, but she still manages to carry a show (Big Bang Theory) that otherwise is relying on the guy who played Russ in Christmas Vacation. Enjoy Kaley Cuoco.

Degenerate Friday!! Divisional Playoffs

First, let me say thanks to Jimmy Traina of Sports Illustrated for linking to yesterday’s story on NFL Theme Songs in his AM Hot Clicks which drove a tremendous amount of traffic to the site. Let’s keep the momentum going and don’t forget to sign up on the facebook fan page, become a follower of the site (on the lower right hand side of this page) or subscribe to the RSS feed.

Speaking of songs, yesterday I’m waiting in the subway station and there is an old Mexican man playing the guitar and wailing about some woman that left him. After that lovely song ends, he breaks out into a pretty good rendition of “Happy Birthday” - which kind of sounded like a mash up of "Happy Birthday" and "LaBamba". Only he’s singing happy birthday……to himself. He belts out “Happy Birthday to Meeeeeee! It’s Saturday. Saturday – I’m 77.” Then finishes the song and lets everyone know that his mother died in 1977 and he’s turning 77 years old on Saturday. I’m not sure how any of that is connected, or even why this story is relevant. It just seemed comical that he was singing happy birthday to himself.

Now that the public service announcement and story hour are over, let’s get to it. This is a huge weekend with good matchups in the NFL Divisional playoffs. After being wrong in all four games during the wildcard weekend, it’s time to double it up in the divisional round and make some money……..ummmm, if gambling were legal. Each game needs a title, so they’re given one of the movies that won Best Picture during the past decade.

Standard disclosures: picks are for recreational purposes only, spreads from the NY Post, home teams in caps, etc.

The Departed (2006 Winner)
Cardinals (+7) over SAINTS
This game has an all-star cast of offense, from Kurt Warner, Larry Fitzgerald and Beanie Wells to Drew Brees, Marques Colston and Jeremy Shockey. The over/under is at 57, so Vegas expects another shoot out, which is pretty much what most of The Departed turned into. The difference between the movie and this game is at the end of the game, the old man in charge won’t end up dead. I see Kurt Warner being able to carve up the Saints secondary and the Cardinals playoff experience comes into play as they are not bothered playing in the loud Superdome. History says two road teams win during the divisional round, and here’s one of them. If the Vikings win, this would set up a geezer show down in the NFC Championship. And mark it down, this is the first time I've mentioned Kurt Warner without making fun of his wife for looking like Annie Lennox of the Eurythmics and then getting a make over to more resemble a woman....or Rod Steward. Dammit, I guess my streak continues.

A Beautiful Mind (2001 Winner)
COLTS (-6.5) over Ravens
This just refers to Peyton Manning’s intelligence and ability to make adjustments. Although it could also compare the tempers of Ray Lewis and Russell Crowe – keep knives away from Ray-Ray and cell phones away from Russell. Baltimore will be trying to slow the game down with their running game, playing keep away from the Colts offense, yet Manning proved against the Dolphins, he doesn’t need the ball very often to be dangerous. The biggest problem the Ravens will face is that they do not have a cornerback who can run with Reggie Wayne, which could provide him with a few opportunities for deep passes. I’m a little nervous about laying this many points in a game I expect to be close, but I expect the Colts to come out ready to play and ready to put points on the board. If the Ravens need to pass to keep it close, Joe Flacco is not ready on the road.

Million Dollar Baby (2004 Winner)
CHARGERS (-7) over Jets
Rookie quarterback Mark Sanchez is the Million Dollar Baby in New York, and well, we all know how the movie ends……spoiler alert……the Million Dollar Baby doesn’t make it. It’s going to be a similar ending for Sanchez in his homecoming to the West Coast. The Jets running game will be able to shorten the game, but they won’t be able to put up enough points to keep up with the Chargers. San Diego invades Revis Island with an army of giant receiving threats, with both WRs and Antonio Gates over 6’5”. That will allow them to go up and over the top of Revis and the other members of the Jets secondary. If the Jets fall behind, they don’t have the ability to score quickly. This is the one game this weekend where I could see it getting out of hand and being over by half time. Side note – they couldn’t have found a better actress to for the part than Hilary Swank – she scares me. I mean, she played a boy in “Boys Don’t Cry” and then she was a female boxer and then shows up at the awards shows trying to look hot. She’d be better off showing up wearing a tux.

No Country For Old Men (2007 Winner)
VIKINGS (-3) over Cowboys
Based on the movie title, it would appear I should be picking against the old man, Brett Favre. The Cowboys come to town as hot as any team in the league and Brett has never beaten the Cowboys in the playoffs (remember his only Super Bowl winning year, Kerry Collins and the Panthers upset the Cowboys). Yet the Vikings play well at home, and will be able to physically beat up the Cowboys – something the Eagles and Saints couldn’t do during the Dallas winning streak. As long as Favre can control his ego and doesn’t try to force the ball down field, Minnesota will outlast the Cowboys. And it also builds up the expectations and the hype even more for when Favre throws 4 interceptions in the NFC Championship and joins Gary Anderson among infamous Vikings playoff failures (Anderson didn’t miss a FG all season and then missed a chippy in the 1998 NFC Champsionship when the Vikings lost to Atlanta).