Slick's opinion of bracketology is . . .

wrong. That's right. This marks the first time that a blogger is being called out for his opinion by a fellow blogger in a scandal that I have wittingly dubbed "Bracketologygate."

For those of you unfamiliar with the branch of science know as bracketology, basically it's college basketball experts who study past tournament trends use them to create the NCAA tournament bracket at various points during the season. Slick argues goes something like this. "Who cares if a team would be a 5 seed in fucking December? A team could be in the tournament one day, lose a game and be out the next. It doesn't matter until March when the bracket comes out so stop talking about it because I don't give a shit. Also, you're just some fucking analyst who makes predictions. You don't even have anything to do with picking the fucking brackets so shut the fuck up." Solid argument. But I'm here to tell you as the world's biggest college basketball fan that bracketology is great. I check it all the time to see how my favorite team is doing, even though it's just some guy's opinion and not even a real bracket.

Let's think about it another way. You order something online. Maybe a shirt or shoes or a video game or books (which apparently are still written and sold. Who knew? Thanks Jon.) So your order is shipped and you check the tracking to see when it's supposed to arrive and where it is right now. Why do you do that? Who cares where it is now as long as it gets to your house when it's supposed to, right? Well you check it because you want to make sure it's on track to get to your house. That's exactly why people like bracketology. They like to see if their team is on track to get into the tournament. Yeah they could be in during January then go on a losing streak in be out, but when you check in January, you want to know where your team stands. Maybe its not the best comparison but it makes sense. How about one more relevant. I know that our main audience consists of Red Sox fans. Do you ever check the standings in May or August or any time before September (I know you check them in May cause you love to tell me that they're in first, but I'm not as sure about August). Why do you check? It doesn't matter because anything can change and usually does. We check the standings to see if our team is holding on to a playoff spot; to check how big their lead is in the division or the Wild Card. If we only cared about if they made the playoffs, we wouldn't care if they had a 5 game lead at the All-Star break. But we do. NESN shows the standings during every broadcast. The paper prints the standings everyday. Sports fans care about where their team stands.

There are hundreds of teams in college basketball. Bracketology is the best way to compare a team like Ohio St. and Maryland to a team like St. Marys or Gonzaga. The two teams play on opposite sides of the country. Ohio St. and Maryland. are in power conferences (Big Ten and ACC) and the others are in the mid-major WCC. Ohio St. is 24-7. Maryland is 22-7. Meanwhile St. Mary's just won the WCC and is 26-5 and Gonzaga finished second at 25-5. Based on these records it would be hard to decide who was best. St. Mary's had the best record, but play in a weaker conference so how does that compare to Maryland, who had a much tougher schedule? Bracketology shows you exactly how the Selection committee will view these teams. As of now, Ohio St., Maryland, St. Mary's and Gonzaga are seeded 2, 6, 10, and 7. It would be impossible for fans to examine all factors that go into these rankings, like RPI, schedule strength, road wins, etc. Bracketology analyzes these factors for you so you can compare all these teams.

Look. I understand that hearing bracketology everyday can get annoying. But they don't shove it down your throat until the last few weeks of the season. Its only on Sportscenter starting in late February. It isn't Brett Favre or the NFL draft. Slick is sick of it cause he hears about it all season long because I watch a lot of college basketball. College basketball fans like hearing the debate about which teams are tournament-worthy, so it's discussed on college basketball shows all season long. When the more casual fans want to hear about the tournament as it approaches and they are preparing to fill out their brackets, it becomes more mainstream.

So sorry Slick but you're wrong on this one.

(By the way, I saw Shutter Island. I was gonna write a review of it but I didn't wanna pull a Martelly and spoil anything and it was too hard to write a review worthy of this website without potentially ruining any parts of the movie for our wide audience. So I'll just say me and my friends all liked it. It's definitely worth a watch, especially if you have $10-12 laying around that you really want to spend.

And Punta Cana is an awesome place to go for Spring Break. I think. I don't really remember. Good thing girls like to take so many pictures.)

-Matt