The Boring Part
Week Seven was a sleeper - few games over the Holiday. Let's get it over with:
Winners: Babs (14 pts), Boaris (12 pts), Progress, CEO & Akaoni (11 pts each).
Losers: Musashisan (4 pts) & Phunmunki (5 pts).
Team(s) of the week: Creighton (3-0) & St. Mary's (3-0). Nice work over the holidays!
Now it gets good!
Conference Play Begins! Brothers Feud! Spouses Spat! Jut Faces Iowa!
Monday starts off with brothers Jutdog and The CEO facing off twice: Boston v. Cornell, Villanova v. Temple. But the big game will be the UCONN - Georgetown game, the first of weeks of head to head Big East blowouts.
Tuesday we get the brothers Akaoni and Turtle facing off: Wright State (Akaoni) v. Cleveland St. (Turtle) in some Hot Horizon League play. We also get our Spousal Spat with Tulsa (Babs) facing BYU (Phunmunki).
Wednesday kicks off the Big 10, with Jut's Ohio State facing his greatest fear - losing to Iowa. Michigan State Minnesota might be a good game. Phunmunki gets a chance to knock off North Carolina with Nevada (hey - it could happen!)
Thursday brings us a new year and more brotherly love as Villanova (CEO) faces Marquette (Jaybird) in the Big East.
Friday features the Grudge Match between Babblemur and Boaris: Arizona State (10-1) vs. Stanford (9-0).
Saturday's grudge match features Illinois St. (11-0) against Creighton (11-2) in the suddenly competitive MVC. Oh and Georgetown faces Pittsburgh in the Big East (yawn - I'm growing bored with the Big East already...)
Sunday - Louisville - Kentucky - May it be a good game.
Post your own thoughts here - lets get the trash talkin going agin.
27 comments:
Oh, in case you missed it, I'm still in first place. Thank you CEO for defeating Boaris' crappy team.
Babs
Jutdog and brother CEO split their games tonight - CEO remains 3 points ahead of Jut. Go, CEO!
Look out! NotaTurtle is creeping up on Jaybird!
With North Carolina leading off, Jaybird needs to be kept as close to the basement as possible, if not in it.
Go Butler!
Go Nevada!
After examining the upcoming schedule, it appears that I will climb into first place on January 17th. Save the date.
By "first place" do you mean "ninth place"?
Is that like a legal thing - first means ninth?
Babs
No, as a lawyer I am committed to precision in language. For instance, when I say that Babblemur's team is "sucky," I mean that Babblemur's team is "of or pertaining to something that sucks, is unpleasant, or lacks value." It's quite simple, really.
The "suckiness" of Team Babblemur is in Inverse Proportion to the "suckiness" of Team NotaTurtle.
Example 1:
"pertaining to something that sucks":
First one must define "something that sucks", and I submit evidence that the Detroit Lions suck. Given that your teams over all record is much closer to that of the Detroit Lions, Team Notaturtle "pertains to something (Lions) that sucks" while Team Babblemur does not. (The presence of Michigan State in the same state as Detroit is irrelevant.)
Example 2:
"unpleasant"
Evidence: http://sports.espn.go.com/ncb/news/story?id=3777703
Against Notaturtle
For Babblemur
Clearly Notaturtle is "unpleasant" while Babblemur is "pleasant".
Example 3:
"Lacks Value"
Lets compare my best team, Syracuse, with your best team, Baylor. Both are 3rd round picks, so this should be fair.
1. Salaries in Syracuse, NY are 11.1% higher than salaries in Waco, TX.
2. Cost of living in Syracuse is only 10.9% higher than Waco, TX. (Better value vis a vis salary differentials)
3. Cost of gas in Syracuse, NY: $1.59 a gallon
4. Cost of gas in Waco, TX: $1.27 a gallon (okay you win this one)
5. Syracuse: no raids on any compounds full of apocalyptic followers of false messiahs.
6. Waco, TX: April 19, 1993.
Clearly Syracuse has "value" while Baylor does not other than the cost of a gallon of gas.
Therefore, I think the evidence clearly indicates that Team Notaturtle is "sucky", and Team Babblemur is "Anti-Sucky"*
Babs
*By "Anti-Sucky" by no means does this imply that Team Babblemur "Blows".
I hope to add 10 pts by Wednesday night.
Then only another 15 pts over the next week.
What I'd like to see:
-UAB over Butler
-San Diego over Miss St
-Michigan St over Minnesota (still upset over Louisville loss)
-GB over WMI
-Northeastern over Memphis
-Ohio St by 30 over Iowa
-Evansville over Ill St
-Marquette over Villanova
-Seton Hall over Syracuse
-Illinois over Purdue
-Louisville over UNLV
If I get overe half of these, I will be pleased.
~ Jut
In addition to valuing precision, experience as an attorney has also endowed me with the ability to quickly identify and respond to logical fallacies (such fallacies, being the favorite employ of knaves, cannot be taken seriously, and should not be responded to as if they were real arguments, lest we fall into a deplorable state of sophistratic confusion).
Now, astute observers of our little competition who have some passing knowledge of basketball will, no doubt, easily identify the cause of my current ranking: the lack of teams playing in preseason tournaments combined with my "mid-major" teams playing many games against major conference opponents (which, of course, allowed those teams to gain valuable experience that they will be able to use in their quest to win their own conferences). Astute observes can also see my path to victory. For instance, once conference play begins, teams such as UCLA and UTEP will begin accumulating points when they play weaker teams such as Arizona State and Tulsa. In addition, virtually all of my teams will compete for their conference titles, unlike, say, teams such as Syracuse and West Virginia, which, while they have scored some points against weaker opponents, will henceforth be relegated to the second or third tier in their respective conferences, which will, no doubt, cause much gnashing of teeth and rending of garments in some households. Even the lowly Cal State Northridge, roundly mocked in earlier comments by the quick-tempered barbarians among us, just trounced their first conference foe, and will undoubtedly go on to, as predicted, win their conference.
If I am not in first place by January 17th, I will be soon thereafter.
Au contraire, mon frere, your arch enemy Jutdog used some of these same arguments with me just last week.
Note that winning a regular conference title and tournament together is worth 10-12 points depending.
Syracuse and West Virginia only has to beat TWO of their Top 10 rivals in the Big East (currently Pittsburgh, Louisville, UCONN, & Notre Dame, but Georgetown may be in the Top 10 after this week...). That is 8-10 chances to pick up a 5 point victory, half those chances at home.
While last year I suffered (OH how I suffered) from the "gamble" - the loss of two points with every loss, this year that ain't there. So Syracuse and West Virginia are both going to wade on into the Big East, beat some teams up, get beaten up some, and both go to the Big Dance with a higher seed than Cleveland State or Northridge, Cornell or Stephen F. Austin.
UCLA vs. Arizona State - I'm betting they split their games and both beat up on every other Pac 10 team. You can have the conference tourney, I won't need it, point wise.
UTEP vs. Tulsa = both will lose to Memphis.
What else do we have? Really? That's it? Turtle and I only share two conference competitors???
Well sheet on a shingle! We ain't rivals at all!
Turtle Rocks! Go Turtle! Boo Jutdog! Boo Jaybird!
-babs
Bringing the lowly Lions into this disucssion is completely unnecessary. Quit piling on!
Ha Ha! Akaoni likes the Li-ons! Akaoni likes the Li-ons!
Lil' Babs
Turtle,
Does your plan to take first place on January 17 depend at all on either Cleveland State or Mississippi winning any games? Just curious. Go Turtle!
Interesting debate, in fairness to turtle, it looks like some teams don't have their full schedules loaded, so it could appear, based on what is there, that Turtle could move into first (I have no desire to calculate it).
On your point Ron, you and I will prove out what works and what doesn't. I totally went the way of mid-major or lower conference winner, NCAA tourney participant vs power conference mid to lower tier teams. We'll know by the end of March who was wiser. No doubt early in the year it benefits you as I have some tough losses (Mt St Mary's at Virginia Tech by 5 pts (they led most of the game), Boston University led for the first 33 minutes of the game at Notre Dame until falling by 7, Sienna lost to Tennessee, Pittsburgh, and Oklahoma State (by 2, but I think Sienna was likely a Vegas favorite in that one so shame on them). I think it built the character that Turtle talks about that they leveraged in their come back from down 17 at St Joe's in the second half on Sunday to win.
It's been interesting up to this point, and looks like things are starting to get a little tighter.
Any thoughts on Illinois taking Purdue down tonight????
-The CEO
Wow, Arkansas takes down Oklahoma (who would think that Oklahoma could lose when they get 53 from Crocker and Warren, that just doesn't sound right). Arkansas with only one loss could be a player in the SEC, this win certainly legitimizes them, Nice win Gunz.....
-The CEO
Akaoni and Jutdog really scored last night. Gunz's win was big - SEC is going to be a mess.
I take back everything I said. If I can't beat freaking Wright State I got no chance.
Or Santa Clara. Or Southern Mississippi. At least I didn't get negative points by losing to Shawnee State.
I suspect here is the issue with Louisville ball:
1. Lack of clear floor leader
2. They may not be in good enough shape to continue full-game full court pressure. Samuel looks tired often, and some of the takes to the hole by the big men often lack strength and any height in their jump.
Based on the genious of Pitino and the amazing athleticism of the players, they'll get their shit figured out and will dominate. Just not as soon as we'd all like.
Down with Villanova.
~jut
The proud TurtleEater:
"Even the lowly Cal State Northridge, roundly mocked in earlier comments by the quick-tempered barbarians among us, just trounced their first conference foe, and will undoubtedly go on to, as predicted, win their conference"
Pacific - 84
Northridge (home)- 78
Off to a great start Iowa.
~ Jutlordan
I take back everything I said. If I can't beat freaking Wright State I got no chance.
12/31/2008 10:12 AM
Yup, Turtle already confessed his hopelessness.
Tally: 3 Iowans beating Jutdog in standings
Go Creighton!
babs
Oh! Is that Minnesota over Ohio State??? Ha - Jut was just talking yesterday about how over rated Minnesota was. Suck that Gopher, dog.
Ron / Jut,
The spreadsheet of death is missing a line, everything has shifted up one, so someone somewehere may be missing a team, or a header line at the top got deleted. I could not figure out why my teams were playing the wrong teams, and then I saw that it appears the whole sheet has shifted.
I'm not seeing that problem. Maybe try again but give the sheet a little time to fully load before scrolling up and down it
Apparently the BC victory over UNC shocked everyone into silence. I know it made me happy.
I've been sick. -Babs
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