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Even during the great 1996 run to the Final Four by my Alma Mater up in Amherst (they'll never strike that appearance out of my record book, gang). Even when you could hear Storrs, Conn. explode in ecstasy about a year ago at this time. Even when my other Alma Mater, Michigan, eked out an overtime win in 1989 against Seton Hall to claim the title.
I come here in body, but not in spirit. I come here, still with visions of Dwayne McLain, Dereck Wittenberg and Keith Smart dancing through my head. I come here, still wondering how Fred Brown ever got over his pass to James Worthy to win it all two years later. I come here, still wishing that Larry had stuck it to Magic in Salt Lake instead of vice versa.
This is the Final Four, dadgummit. And I feel so unmoved. So unemotional. So uncaring.
And you're reading the words of a former March Madness Maniac. The kid here used to grab the very first bracket that he laid eyes on, and write in all the winning teams as the tourney went on. There were a few years when I would go so far as to write down the CBS announcers for the first two rounds. Why I did that, I'm still not quite sure.
Today? Boredom. Apathy. Disinterest.
Ouch. My poor ears. Please stop your screaming. If you'll give me a second, I'll explain why I feel this way. Calm down. Take two deep breaths. Watch Karate Kid and see how Mr. Miyagi does it.
College basketball is a shell of its former self. The sport was perhaps at its best during perhaps 1972 to about maybe 1993 or 1994. This is not to condemn pre-1972, but as the years wore on, the NCAA Tournament field kept expanding literally every year. It's been 64 teams since 1985.
There are four major reasons why college basketball is no fun to watch anymore. Some of these reasons have been around for quite a while. One in particular has been around only recently, and is the reason that pushed me over the edge into a sea of apathy.
Disagree? Watch what happens when a show you want to watch is preceded by a college basketball game. If the score is close, you'll join your show at least 30 minutes in progress. If you're lucky. One such example was the 1998 Division I-AA college football title game. UMass fans missed the whole first quarter thanks to college basketball.
Going a step further, in college hoop you are allowed to call a timeout immediately after your own score. In the NBA you have to surrender the ball after a score, and you can call a TO when you regain possession. Why isn't college ball like this? Is this a modified rule for younger players? It never has made sense to me, and is infinitely more flow-disruptive than the NBA timeout rules are.
Timeouts should be limited to three per half, non-cumulative. Just like football. You can throw TV timeouts in there if you insist (and believe me, they will). Some fans out there might argue that "in basketball, timeouts are important throughout the whole game, using them as momentum-breakers!" Fine. Use them as momentum-breakers. What a great finish that game will then have. Sometimes the best plays are ones that are created spontaneously rather than concocted in a huddle.
Red Auerbach had a great take on this issue. In huddles, he thought the idea of drawing up a play was ridiculous. Why design a play his team had never run before? He asked his players if they had anyone they could exploit in a given situation, then ran a set play. If no one could stop a Celtic fast break or a Celtic pick-and-roll, why run a different play in its stead?
Reduced timeouts will force players to think better out on the court. It will also make the ends of close games more thrilling and less plodding. How many of you hated all those sidebars at the O.J. Simpson trial? Play the game, guys.
Now, hold on a minute. This is not to advocate coddling of poor free throwers. The Celtics have plenty of them, and NBA free throw rules still manage to expose them as such. College guys need to make their charity tosses just as much as the next one. But if they have two free throws coming to them, they should by golly get their two.
Everyone loved Michigan's Fab Five teams of 1992 and 1993 (yours truly sure did). But beating them was easy. All you had to do was foul Jalen Rose. Sure, Rose should have been a better free throw shooter. But it just shouldn't be that easy for East Podunk U. to beat a powerhouse just by fouling superstars who can't hit freebies.
You all know how bad Shaquille O'Neal is at the line. Ditto for Wilt Chamberlain. They are/were two of the greatest free throw bricklayers in history. Their teams won nary an NCAA title. Did the one-and-one make the difference? You never know.
Having the one-and-one is an unfair advantage to the trailing team. It simply makes catching up too easy, it rewards penalties (fouls), and it is simply wrong from a moral standpoint. An upset should be borne out of a superior effort by the underdog, not by manipulation of the rules. Strategy is one thing, but the one-and-one makes strategy in this case too easy and too unfair.
Because he'd be off the air, thank goodness.
Vitale enjoyed a decent career as Titan head coach, and led them to the NCAA tournament in 1978. After that year, he embarked on a brief and unsuccessful run as head coach of the Detroit Pistons. He was fired after 12 games into the 1979-80 season. But instead of heading back to the college ranks, he headed to a fledgling cable network called ESPN.
Over the last 20 years, Vitale has established himself as a leading expert in college basketball. His knowledge of the game rivals that of Peter Gammons in baseball. He has quick facts and stats at his fingertips, and is as credible an announcer as there can be.
But the guy is an absolute horror to listen to. Annoying? At least. Aggravating? Definitely. A better coach than announcer? Call up former NBA star John Long and ask him first.
Vitale seems like a very nice man. What would he say to me if I met him someday and said to him, "You have caused me to hate college basketball! You just won't shut up!" I believe he'd care very much about this opinion. But the next 100 guys would make him say "Awesome, baby!!!" or "The guy's a major PTP!!!", and ol' Bob G. would be long forgotten.
Vitale has such a cult following that he has become the most imitated person in America this side of Richard Nixon. Colleges have Dick Vitale imitation contests, and Vitale himself is often the judge. Words pour out of his mouth much like the late Howard Cosell, except Cosell was a 28.8K baud rate whereas Vitale is more like a T3 line.
I may be in the minority. But it is wrong when someone like Vitale manages to turn me off of college hoop, a sport I followed so religiously in younger years. Sure, he doesn't do every game (thank goodness Vitale doesn't work for CBS), but he's all over ESPN and ABC, mostly the former. You simply can't watch a ton of college hoop and avoid Vitale.
I once called Andres Cantor (soccer broadcaster on Univision) Mexico's answer to Dick Vitale. Cantor goes nuts on goals scored. Vitale goes nuts when he wakes up in the morning. Moderation, my good man. Practice it someday.
Kobe Bryant is a four-year NBA veteran. He turns 22 in August. College hoop wasn't for Kobe. He was too good.
Jermaine O'Neal of Portland is just like Kobe. 22 years old. Fourth year in the NBA. No college time whatsoever.
Kevin Garnett got a $100 million contract from the Minnesota Timberwolves. He played zero minutes in college ball. Never even went to one. Dang.
Al Harrington of the Indiana Pacers is a two-year vet. He just turned 20. Went to the NBA straight from high school. His teammate, Jonathan Bender, is a 19-year-old rookie. College? Are you kidding?
Rashard Lewis of Seattle. Tracy McGrady of Toronto. Same story. No college. Right into the pros.
And these are just the guys who did no time in the NCAA. There isn't enough space here to list all the guys who left early after three, sometimes only two years in college. The seduction of big NBA bucks is always the sum of the equation.
CBS's Billy Packer is quick to defend the integrity of college hoop, insisting that it is still every much the great sport it's always been. Packer, himself a knowledgeable college hoop man, is either in extreme denial or is a paid huckster for both the NCAA and CBS.
If the sport is every bit as good as it was, why are the best players either leaving early or bypassing it all together? Say what you want about NBA contracts, but if the best 19-22 year-olds are in the NBA, an idiot can conclude that the best college players simply aren't out there. The facts speak for themselves.
Magic Johnson left early, after his sophomore year. Back in 1979, it was called "hardship". Today, it is called "common".
You can't sit there and tell me that these sophomores jumping to the NBA are all in Johnson's class. These kids who think they've got what it takes to play pro ball before age 22 literally have no reason to think otherwise. And a lot of the blame lies at the feet of the NBA itself.
If the NBA would stop signing all these under-22 players, they'd stay in college. But these pro teams, starved for talent and panic-striken enough to overpay these kids, have set a market for very young players that makes it actually stupid for some of these kids to even attend college. Given a choice between a mega-million dollar payday or a college degree, these kids will opt for the big house for their moms and big cars for themselves every time.
And these young kids can exist in today's NBA because they have taken over the league. The NBA as it exists today is a lousy league, with players who can't create shots properly, shoot free throws or play disciplined offensive basketball. Average scores are way down from the 1980s, and it's becoming clear that it's not because of sophisticated defenses. The league is full of players who needed that extra year or two in college. It is painfully clear with every NBA game you watch night in and night out.
To blame all this on Kobe Bryant would be unfair to Joe's son, but it may not be that far off a claim. Moses Malone jumped to the ABA in 1974 straight from high school, and Darryl Dawkins did the same a year later in the NBA. No one complained back then because they didn't start a trend and the leagues didn't suffer because of them. Bryant has started a trend of young stars skipping college completely. Never mind just the two or three years. No college, period.
Both the pro and the college games have suffered because of immature players jumping to the NBA too soon. It will never stop, but if it did, I'd appreciate an honest retraction from Packer on his denial-ridden props for college hoop as it is today.
It's like the old joke. Put Santa Claus, the Easter Bunny, a senior playing college hoop and Packer in the same room, and see who walks out first. Packer will, because the others are all fictitious characters.
March Madness lives, with or without Bob G. in their corner. Go ahead and like it like you always have. Keep March Madness in your own way, and let me keep it in mine. Bah humbug.
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© 2000 by Bob George. All rights reserved.