It's time for a baseball post

As we approach the end of college basketball season you'll get some posts from Chad and I on other topics as well. I know I'll post some on the NBA Draft and I'm sure we'll both post on baseball. Well, my first baseball post of the season is just this picture. Look at it! This is ridiculous! Look at the defensive alignment! Baseball at the LA Coliseum looks pretty ridiculous.

Hey, let's rank the Elite 8 teams!

1. North Carolina

As I had in my bracket from the beginning, North Carolina is the best team in the country. There’s really not much to be said about them. Their offensive efficiency has been written about ad nauseam and is outrageous. I’m mostly impressed that they decided to show up defensively and lock down on a Washington State team that admittedly is not an offensive juggernaut.

2. Kansas

Kansas is a really complete team and I think to beat them they’re going to need to be missing jump shots. That is possible, by the way. However, when they’re hitting shots they jump to number one on this list because they certainly defend better than North Carolina and really the only thing keeping North Carolina ahead of Kansas on this list is Hansbrough. A game between Kansas and North Carolina would be fascinating, obviously beyond the obvious Roy Williams storylines. No other team can match the talented depth Kansas can throw out there but I like the high end talent on North Carolina more and in a one game situation I’ll take the better high end talent over great depth.

3. Louisville

This is probably higher than most people have Louisville, but how can I argue with results? Their defense has been outstanding and the offense has been plenty good to make a blowout out of each game they’ve played and two of those games were against pretty solid competition. They have the big bodies to kill people on the glass (just ask Tennessee) and they have enough options on offense to get by. I would like it if they had that one guy that I could trust more to get that one bucket when they really need it but if they keep playing like they have been there may not be “that one bucket” that they need.

4. Texas

I really don’t have much to say about Texas other than they keep impressing and D.J. Augustin is not terrible at basketball. I questioned how well their post players would match up with the Lopez’s and Brook got his but the rest of the team was completely shut down. I’m thinking that if this Texas team shoots the ball reasonably well they are real to beat. I am probably underrating them and that’s probably because I didn’t think they’d be that great at the beginning of the year and I never got over my bias. Picking Texas to win the whole thing is not a bad pick.

5. Memphis

I refuse to overreact too much to them slaughtering a team that could only score 36 points in a game against Iowa so although they manhandled Michigan State I’m not going to jump them up to that top tier. However, I am going to jump them up ahead of UCLA in my rankings of one seeds. I am coming around on Rose though. Earlier in the season I didn’t see what the big fuss was about. Now I don’t really see why he is considered clearly the number 2 pick in the draft, assuming he comes out, but I do see why he’s considered a future pro and a lottery pick. While I’m on Memphis I want to make a quick point on the raised floor at Ford Field and Reliant Stadium. What is the point of this idea? It’s just stupid. Early in the second half when Michigan State went on a 9-0 run (which was the beginning to that 17-0 run) to crawl back to 25 (keep in mind, by the way, that I’m not exaggerating to be funny; Michigan State truly did go on a 9-0 run early in the second half to get back to 25) you could see their players jumping up excitedly under the court and Memphis called a timeout. Then the Michigan State players wanted to get on the court to celebrate the run with their teammates but somebody had to go grab a ladder first. Perhaps Kansas can use this to their advantage to throw Curry off the ledge.

6. Xavier

Watching Xavier is like watching the NBA because what happens at the beginning of the game has not been very important. Still, there are probably not a lot of teams in this tournament that would have escaped their three games thus far this tournament. Perhaps Georgia ran out of gas, but Purdue has been a very solid team and that West Virginia team had been playing awfully well. Xavier plays very good defense, they have enough bodies inside to hang with most teams’ post players, and they can shoot. The balance they put on the floor is pretty much just ridiculous; it’s a hard team to game plan for.

7. Davidson

When I look at Davidson I’d love to talk about guys like Lovedale and Richards and say that this is a real quality team that is more than just Curry. In fact, I have said that. And it’s true that Davidson played great defense against Wisconsin. But really watching them again tonight it’s tough to deny that this is just Curry’s team and his brilliance gives them a shot against everyone left in the field (even if I think Kansas will be a battle they probably cannot overcome). On a side note, Curry should do well in the NBA and it’s crazy when I hear people suggest that he’ll need to learn the point. His ability to move without the ball is one of his strengths. I understand he’s undersized but why would you put him in a situation to take away from his strengths. There are enough NBA teams that can play with good sized points that can handle the prototypical twos that Curry can defend a point. But even if Curry ends up giving some away defensively his offensive ability is so great that you can live with it.

8. UCLA

Well, this is obviously my most controversial pick. Sure the UCLA backcourt is strong and sure Love is terrific. Well, I don’t see a lot on the UCLA front line beyond Love. And Love has this odd compulsion to occasionally venture out to the perimeter when he is a force inside so he sometimes takes himself out of the game. On the perimeter I question their ability to handle real quick guards and that was played out with Brazelton’s second half. (I don’t know how they can contain Lavender.) Collison did nothing to inspire a lot of confidence with his play against Western Kentucky with four turnovers and a handful more that the refs just missed. It was nice of Shipp to show up Thursday but why should I believe that Shipp and Westbrook are going to excel, or even play adequately, with their play of late? Right now UCLA is not passing my “eye test.” Of course it goes without saying that the good news for the Bruins is that my “eye test” means nothing.

Friday's Sweet 16 Preview

(10) Davidson – (3) Wisconsin

Davidson is more than just a nice story as their run to this weekend included wins over two really good teams. They beat a real solid Gonzaga team and then they beat arguably the best team in the Big East. No, neither game was easy but these were tough teams they beat. Also don’t make the mistake of thinking this team is just Stephen Curry. Sure, Curry takes them to another level but they have other guys too. Jason Richards is a fantastic point guard. Andrew Lovedale has also been in double figures both games this past weekend. Well, as much as Davidson is more than just Curry they’ll likely need a big effort from their stud to get past Wisconsin. That could be tough as I assume defensive stud Michael Flowers will be charged with guarding Curry and that will be a great match-up to watch. Wisconsin was able to hold Kansas State to 0-13 shooting from three although I do think at least some of that was just Kansas State’s doing. It will also be interesting to see how Davidson handles Wisconsin in the post. Although they lost the rebounding battle to Kansas State they were able to demolish tiny Fullerton team on the glass by over 20. Although Davidson’s inside guys are not exactly Fullerton’s inside guys they’re also not exactly Wisconsin’s inside guys. Davidson was competitive on the boards with Gonzaga and Georgetown and you have to figure they’ll need to be competitive with Wisconsin as well. This should be a great game, especially if Curry shows up for both halves. Like I said, I think Davidson is more than just a nice story. They’re a really dangerous team and if they were able to beat Georgetown I really don’t see why they are not capable of beating Wisconsin. This should be a real well played, close game and one of my rules is when in doubt I pick the team with the best player on the floor. Well, if you think that is anyone other than Stephen Curry you haven’t been paying attention. I’ll take Davidson by 3.

(12) Villanova – (1) Kansas

This really does not look like a terrific match-up for Villanova. They have some real dangerous guards, obviously led by Scottie Reynolds, but Kansas can lock you down pretty well with that perimeter defense. Villanova can occasionally be prone to high turnover games and Kansas can force turnovers with their defensive pressure. The team that has the guards that Villanova has played that reminds me the most of Kansas’s guards is probably Marquette and Villanova lost by 10 behind 23 turnovers in that game. In addition, Kansas can throw big bodies in the post that Villanova likely will not have an answer for. Perhaps Reynolds will prove me wrong and take his star to a level higher than I think he is capable of but that will likely be necessary if Villanova is to pull off this upset. I just don’t see it happening. I see Kansas winning by about 15.

(3) Stanford – (2) Texas

My gut reaction is that Stanford cannot keep up with D.J. Augustin and A.J. Abrams and I do think that’s true but I also am not sure I see what Texas will do to handle the Lopez twins because I do not really trust Texas’s size. In fact, Texas is not a great rebounding team. If the Longhorns could not keep Austin Peay off the boards how are they going to keep Stanford off the boards? I’m not sure I know the answer to that. So, in this game I really need to decide between Stanford’s post play and Texas’s guards. Normally I’d easily jump on the Texas guards because it’s easier to get the ball in the hands of the guards but Stanford’s guards probably are capable of playing into Stanford’s strengths. Mitch Johnson really takes care of the ball (how about that 16 assist, 1 turnover performance against Marquette?) and Anthony Goods is a capable enough scorer to keep the defense honest. So, I’m actually taking Stanford, possibly against my better judgment to win by about 5 points.

(5) Michigan State – (1) Memphis

With the pressure that Memphis puts on ballhandlers it would take a pretty heroic performance by Drew Neitzel and Kalin Lucas to keep them in this game. These Spartans don’t seem as tough and talented inside as previous years so Michigan State will have to get it done with Neitzel, Lucas, and of course Raymar Morgan. Neitzel has shown the ability to take over games so that could be OK. For Memphis I could say that they need to hit their free throws but we all know that’s not going to happen. But the thing is they’ve won a lot of games this year despite not having any idea what to do from the line and I don’t think Michigan State is necessarily good enough to take advantage of that obvious problem. Memphis has been the pretty obvious answer of the first number one seed to lose but I don’t see how that happens against Michigan State. Memphis’s lack of shooting ability will probably keep this close the majority of the game but their talent should win out by 5-8 points by the end of the game.

Thursday's Sweet 16 Preview

Thursday’s college basketball action is coming up and while typically I look more at what has happened today I’m going to take a bit of a look ahead. I'll get to Friday's games in the next day or so.

(7) West Virginia – (3) Xavier

I noticed that West Virginia is actually giving points in Vegas to Xavier and I think that’s probably a result of two things. The first is that West Virginia beat Duke and people for some reason think Duke was good enough that the WVU win was really impressive. That’s probably not worded well; it was a nice win for WVU but Duke was a pretty weak 2 seed. The other reason why WVU is favored is probably because Xavier has decided to fall behind by 23625 combined points in their two wins last weekend. I would argue that WVU is better than Xavier’s first two opponents in this tournament but the same is obviously true in reverse. Xavier’s perimeter defense should give WVU trouble on the perimeter and Xavier clearly has more post weapons than Duke. WVU winning would likely take a big effort from Joe Alexander and the fact that he’s awesome means that’s certainly possible (and if you like him enough you might even argue probable). Ultimately Xavier is likely the better team and that should show down the stretch as Xavier wins by about 5.

(12) Western Kentucky – (1) UCLA

UCLA clearly plays some great defense even if they get a bit of help at times. Texas A&M was completely unable to get anything accomplished inside. It seems unlikely that Western Kentucky will try going inside a whole lot as they have two of the active 2008 NCAA tournament scoring leaders in guards Courtney Lee and Tyrone Brazelton. Brazelton has been really terrific and the match-up between him and Darren Collison should be fantastic. Those Western Kentucky guards should be able to hang with UCLA but what is WKU’s answer for Kevin Love? I really have no idea what the answer to that question is. The biggest hope for the Hilltoppers is probably that Love decides to hang around the perimeter and shoot threes and for some reason that even happens on occasion. WKU is good enough to stay around in this game and if Lee and Brazelton are REALLY hot then a win is possible. That still seems like an unlikely scenario and I’d guess UCLA wins by 10 or so.

(4) Washington State – (1) North Carolina

Do you realize Washington State has only given up 81 points total this tournament? In fact, North Carolina has been averaging over 30 points per game more over their first two NCAA tournament games than those 81 points Washington State has given up overall. I think it might be safe to suggest that it’s possible that this game could have a bit of a battle for tempo. Even if Washington State wins the battle of tempo they’re still going to need to score some points. Washington State tends to be pretty efficient offensively and North Carolina occasionally decides to not pay a ton of attention on the defensive side of the floor and that won’t fly against Washington State. Really Washington State is going to need to be sure to get back on defense and force North Carolina to run their offense in the half court. The Tar Heels are not incapable in that type of situation but it would obviously feed right into Washington State’s strength and give them a shot. The problem is that I’m not sure Washington State will win even if they do control tempo. Because of that the pick here is for North Carolina, but I figure it to be in single digits, probably 7-9 points.

(3) Louisville – (2) Tennessee

Louisville is really playing terrific basketball right now. Their wins this past weekend were impressive, particularly the rout of Oklahoma. Even before that, despite entering the tournament on a two game skid, they had been playing real well. Tennessee has not been playing anywhere near that well. In fact, they really haven’t impressed all that much since the Memphis win. While Tennessee is clearly a good team I am becoming more and more convinced that they have been overrated all year and their strong resume is partly due to being in a weak SEC. Even in the non-conference although they beat a lot of good teams (Temple, West Virginia, Gonzaga, Western Kentucky, Xavier, and the aforementioned Memphis game is an impressive collection of scalps) but they won most of these games in close fashion. There is something to be said about winning games; actually, there is a ton to be said about winning games. It is impressive. But maybe they are not the dominant team I kind of assumed they were all year. I think this is a battle of a team trending upwards (Louisville) and a team trending downwards (Tennessee, although maybe they’re hanging steady at a level below what I thought they were all year). This should be a fantastic game but I like Louisville to win by a margin I can count on one hand.

UCLA is a pretty lucky team

Don't get me wrong, UCLA is a really good team. Seriously though, do they really need this much help on such a regular basis?