Tournament Tea-Leaves, Following the Money, Steph Curry's Future Revealed?
Three-Dot Monday 3.17
So, I’m watching the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament selection show on Sunday with another interested party, and the only Bay Area team that was going to make the field was the Saint Mary’s Gaels. It’s early in the show and we’re watching the East Bracket reveal…
The other interested party says, “Where do you think Saint Mary’s is going?” and right then the blank bracket says the Friday games in Cleveland will be a 7-10 and 2-15 matchup…
The moment of clarity struck, and I said, “Right there.”
And seconds later, the bracket reveal showed Saint Mary’s as a 7-seed in Cleveland.
I had similar clarity on Saturday, when I realized that no matter how many people were arguing that North Carolina and Texas shouldn’t get into the tournament, the committee was going to take both the Heels and Longhorns…
There are plenty of on-court metrics that show why both teams should probably not make the field. But there were plenty of reasons why the committee was going to take both of them: dollar bills…
You’re telling me the NCAA tournament committee was intentionally going to not take any money from the fanbases of North Carolina and Texas?
Of course not. The more the teevee pundits argued neither team should make the field based only on what they did on the court, the more I was convinced they would make it…
I told people, “You could put them both in the First Four in Dayton. That way you’re at least getting the fanbase interest for one game, and you’re also spiking interest in the First Four that you wouldn’t get otherwise if you put in whatever directional school the bracketologists were saying they should take instead.”
And what happened Sunday? Both North Carolina and Texas made the tournament- as part of the First Four in Dayton. Outrage continues, but the bottom line is…. Well, the bottom line. They’re taking the money…
And the prognosticators are fretting. “What does this say about what’s going to happen in future years?”
Well, it’s pretty simple. It says if you are a school with a massive, moneyed fanbase and you’re a fringe tournament team, you’re going to get the benefit of the doubt because of that massive, moneyed fanbase…
Because ultimately, it’s a teevee show and they’re trying to draw eyeballs. Not taking North Carolina or Texas eliminates millions of those eyeballs…
So, what if they both flame out in the first game? At least you’ve gotten one game with those fanbases. And if either of them wins and makes it to Milwaukee for the first round? Well then, now you’ve gotten two games…
And if they lose then, the tournament has gotten two games with two major fanbases, and then the regular madness of the tournament will have taken over and we’ll all be Saint Mary’s fans or whatever for the next two weeks…
As the man said, follow the money…
I also had my moment for the Women’s NCAA Tournament field. When it became obvious that both USC and UCLA would be one-seeds and host first and second round games, it also became obvious that the Cal women’s team would end up playing in Los Angeles because they were right around an eight-seed, which made them perfect in the 1-16 and 8-..9 slot…
So, watching the women’s bracket reveal, when UCLA was announced as the top overall seed and the eight seed in that bracket wasn’t Cal, I knew that Cal would be the 8-seed in the USC side of the bracket. And they were…
Follow the money and read the tea leaves, it’s what I do…
ROCK CHALK YIKES: Oh yes, and now about those Kansas Jayhawks in the men’s tournament, we’re a 7-seed and have a heck of a coaching gauntlet to run through, we face 10-seed John Calipari and Arkansas in the first round, and if we get through that we face the revitalized Rick Pitino and 2-seed St. John’s in the second round.
And those games are in Providence, where Pitino first rose to prominence as a head coach, coaching the Friars to the final four in 1987 with point guard Billy Donovan…
By the way, if Bill Self somehow leaves Kansas after this season- and I only think it would be to coach the NBA’s San Antonio Spurs if Gregg Popovich steps down because Bill is best friends with Spurs CEO R.C. Buford, who hosted Bill on his recruiting visit to Oklahoma state and they’ve been pals ever since- then KU’s first call should be to Billy Donovan to see if he would want to return to the college ranks…
Anyway, if we don’t lose to Calipari we’re losing to Pitino, and if we somehow win both of those then I’ll see you in San Francisco, as the Jayhawks are in the West Regional this year, and that is taking place at Chase Center, home of the Golden State Warriors…
A CLUE TO THE FUTURE: And one Warriors tidbit to finish. When Stephen Curry became the only player in history to make 4,000 three-pointers, they asked Warriors head coach Steve Kerr how many threes Steph could possibly make in his career…
Steve joked, “Eight thousand?”
And when they told Steph this, his immediate response was “I don’t think he wants to coach that long,” which only confirmed my tea-leaf reading that Steph will never play for another coach in the NBA than Steve Kerr, and when Steph retires, Steve is gone from the Warriors as well…
They’ve never said that, but both their contracts run out at the exact same time. And that’s the closest Steph has come to saying it out loud…
The answers are there most of the time if you look for them. And sometimes they come in moments of clarity. And sometimes you just need to follow the money…
I have always been puzzled why more pundits fail to acknowledge how simple certain predictions can be---follow the money.
A lot of hot air was expended when the future was clear--North Carolina and Texas will always be welcome. But, teevee air time requires content...
Another crisp, thoughtful article!