Some major issues in NCAA hoops
STUDENT-Athletics: A few years ago, CBS gave listing academic majors of players in the NCAA Tournament a shot. That became a farce when the most popular major was shown to be “General Studies” — we never knew anyone with a degree in that — and a player from a Frenchspeaking African country was listed as a French major. Parlez vous hoops?
While we’re at it, why would players from Montreal, Sudan, Nigeria, Slovakia, Netherlands, Mali, Atlanta and Jacksonville this season choose to play for Jim Boeheim at Syracuse? That’s an easy one: the climate!
And for the uninitiated, NCAA Tournament bracketology is similar to a colonoscopy — the prep is worse than the procedure.
➤ Local TV now seems to be sparing the credibility of its broadcasters by inserting generic bad-odds, sucker sports gambling ads into game telecasts — saving their most public employees both their dignity and potential law suits for being party to “get-rich-quick” come-ons.
➤ Here’s a wild idea: This baseball season all broadcasters in all booths and trucks should cut way down on stats, starting with Michael Kay on YES. Too many stats are misleading, misinterpreted, irrelevant, circumstantial and easily contradicted to hold any applicable enlightenment. ➤ Not sure how Jets safety Marcus Maye’s agent, Erik Burkhardt, best serves his client by bashing the Jets on Twitter, but he joins the legions who choose “social” media to make matters worse.
➤ So let the record show that the media, print and broadcast, gathered to pay homage to Tiger Woods on the occasion of at least his third reckless driving episode. Keepin’ it real. ➤ Boxing champ Floyd Mayweather is still drawing celebrities and big shots, including President Biden’s brother, to pose by his side. The same Floyd Mayweather with a history of assaults on women, including an arrest for beating the mother of his daughter and another for the beating of his girlfriend that deposited him in jail for two months. But in some stars’ cases, that’s no one else’s business. ➤ Colleague Andrew Marchand reports that Fox/FS1 will now pay Skip Bayless $32 million over four years to retain his transparent, let’s-force-an-argument and just-make-noise shows. Heck, my sister-in-law could do the same for half the price.