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      Goodell supports change to overtime rules

      March 22, 2010 /

      Per Pro Football Talk…

      Commissioner Roger Goodell, in a press conference held in conjunction with the annual league meetings in Orlando, spoke out in support of the tweak in the overtime rules proposed by the Competition Committee.

      The proposal would prevent the team that receives the kickoff in overtime during a playoff game from winning with only a field goal on the first drive.

      This is definitely a case where the league could let perfect get in the way of better, and while the proposed system is better, it still has its faults. First, there is still a lot of emphasis on the coin flip because the team that gets the ball first in overtime (Team A) would get it first once sudden death starts if Team B were to match Team A’s field goal. There’s also the matter of Team B not getting a chance to match Team A’s touchdown since the game would be over. No matter how you slice it, the loser of the coin flip is at a disadvantage.

      Goodell supports a system that would retain the sudden death format, and I tend to agree with him. That’s why I like the blind bid idea that we’ve discussed at length on another post. It successfully devalues the initial possession (by using poor field position) so that sudden death can proceed as normal. Due to the sheer difficulty that some have in getting their heads around how the bidding process works (and how it devalues possession), I know that this idea will never come to fruition.

      So this proposed change is better than nothing.


      Photo from fOTOGLIF

      NFL

      Source: Tournament expansion ‘will happen’

      March 22, 2010 /

      SPORTSbyBROOKS has a source that has confirmed that expansion to 96-teams is pretty much a done deal.

      In the past week I’ve learned from a CBS source that the NCAA has privately informed its current March Madness television partner that 96 teams “will happen.” The change will likely take effect beginning next season. 2012 at the latest.

      Earlier this month, I wrote the following on the subject of expansion:

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      College Basketball, March Madness

      Previewing the Sweet 16

      March 22, 2010 /

      We lost Kansas and Villanova this weekend, but the other six #1 and #2 seeds are still standing. Bracket-wise, I thought I was dead after losing my overall winner Kansas, but it turns out that if my other FF picks come in — Syracuse, Duke and West Virginia — I can still win. Come on, Mountaineers!

      Jeff Sagarin’s ratings are doing pretty well across the board. In games where the favorite has an advantage of three points or more, they are 23-7. Sagarin is 4-2 in predicting winners where the favorite has a 2-3 point advantage, and is 10-2 in games where the favorite has a 0-2 point advantage. That last part is pretty impressive, and way out of Sagarin’s norm in predicting winners in the last few years.

      Ken Pomeroy’s ratings are 19-4 in picking picks where he gives the winner a 70%+ chance of winning, 4-2 in the 65-70% range, 2-2 in the 60-65% range and 11-4 in the 50-60% range. Basically, the slight favorites have ended up winning a vast majority of the games, and it’s helping Sagarin and Pomeroy’s records in tight matchups.

      Here’s a look ahead at the Sweet 16 games:

      Michigan State vs. Northern Iowa
      Line: MSU -7 (off?)
      Sagarin Line: MSU -2.08
      Pomeroy: MSU (51.0%)
      Even before Kalin Lucas’ Achilles injury, both Sagarin and Pomeroy saw this matchup as a virtual tossup. With Lucas out, I have to think the Panthers are the favorite. They have a nice mix of shooters and big men, and are coming off of a huge win against the top overall seed in the tournament. UNI’s confidence is high and they have all the tools to beat the Spartans, who will have to go without their best player. The game is in St. Louis too, so if the Panther faithful show up, UNI could have the crowd on it side. My pick: Northern Iowa +7 and straight up

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      College Basketball, March Madness

      Kelvin Sampson’s fingerprints still linger

      March 22, 2010 /

      Kelvin Sampson may be gone — he’s an assistant coach for the surging Milwaukee Bucks — but his former players (and recruits) are doing a lot of damage in the tourney.

      Six guys who either played for or were recruited by Sampson all made the field in different uniforms and five of them were still playing when the second round tipped off.

      “I hadn’t thought about that, but I guess there are a lot of us,’’ said West Virginia’s Devin Ebanks, a top five recruit who decommitted after Sampson was booted at IU.

      Damion James, ousted in the first round when Texas lost to Wake Forest, was supposed to play at Oklahoma but he was released from his scholarship after Sampson left OU for Indiana, leaving a trail of NCAA stink behind and no players for Jeff Capel.

      Scottie Reynolds could have been James’ teammate. Instead Capel let him out of his commitment, too. On Saturday he and Villanova lost to St. Mary’s in the second round.

      Armon Bassett, angry at the university’s decision to force Sampson out, was reportedly part of a pack of players that threatened not to play after Sampson left. He was dismissed by interim head coach Dan Dakich, reinstated by Crean and then booted again. On Thursday night, Bassett led Ohio University to one of the more stunning first-round upsets, scoring 32 in a win against Georgetown.

      With players leaving left and right, Jordan Crawford told Crean in June 2008 that he, too, would be leaving Bloomington. He transferred to Xavier. The Musketeers will play Pitt in the second-round on Sunday.

      Sampson sure could recruit, but one wonders if all those illegal texts and phone calls were the reason why.

      College Basketball, March Madness

      Tiger Woods: “I was living a lie.”

      March 22, 2010 /

      Taking questions from the media for the first time since he crashed his SUV outside his Florida home last November, Tiger Woods admitted to ESPN’s Tom Rinaldi that he was “living a lie.”

      From ESPN.com:

      “I was living a life of a lie, I really was. And I was doing a lot of things … that hurt a lot of people. And stripping away denial and rationalization you start coming to the truth of who you really are and that can be very ugly. But then again, when you face it and you start conquering it and you start living up to it, the strength that I feel now … I’ve never felt that type of strength.”

      “I hurt a lot of people, not just my wife,” he told Rinaldi on Sunday. “My friends, my colleagues, the public, kids who looked up to me. There were a lot of people that thought I was a different person and my actions were not according to that. That’s why I had to apologize. I was so sorry for what I had done.”

      “I’m sure if more people would have known in my inner circle, they would have stopped it or tried to put a stop to it. But I kept it all to myself,” he said.

      “I’m a little nervous about that to be honest with you,” Woods told ESPN’s Tom Rinaldi, who asked him what he expects when he returns to golf on April 8 following an auto accident which led to an indefinite leave from professional golf and an admission of multiple affairs. “It would be nice to hear a couple claps here and there.”

      Tiger is a scumbag for cheating on his wife with multiple women and he’s paying for it through public embarrassment. But here’s the thing, outside of hoping he learns some humility throughout this situation, there’s nothing else more that he needs to do. He’s apologized publicly to his wife and his family, he’s gone through treatment and he’s spoken with the media. He doesn’t owe any explanation to anybody outside of those close to him. So in my eyes, he’s already gone above and beyond. (I don’t want to throw a parade for him – I just don’t think he needs to do anything else but move on.)

      I don’t know Tiger personally – I just know what I see and hear on TV. He could be down to earth guy or he could be a pompous ass – I have no clue. But the guy has made a mistake and he’s paying for it. And quite frankly, when you strip everything away, his personal life has very little to do with his golf game. So if he gets booed at the Masters next week, then I think people need a reality check.

      Everyone is entitled to their own opinions about him, but in the end he owes us nothing.


      Photo from fOTOGLIF

      Golf

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