Planet Digger

In lieu of a pregame analysis, today's post will instead attempt to decipher just what the hell Digger Phelps is thinking. I hate the fact that I'm even doing this though, because it has become increasingly obvious that this character's desire for attention is at a level slightly above your typical three year old girl who just found out she has a baby sister. Needless to say, the highlighter thing has lost its luster – then again, that assumes it had some to begin with. But hey, if I was already a douche anyway and Accent wanted to pay me just to highlight (pardon the pun of course) that fact, I suppose I would drag it on as well. But once you start having your book promoters announcing that you may run for president and begin starring in plays with the title, Love Letters, it's probably best that you don't pretend you know a thing about college basketball any more.

Case in point; the charade he and the lovely Stacey Dales put on the other night. Let me preface this by saying that I actually believe Memphis deserves to be #1 right now. I don't think they're the best team, but up to this point they've done slightly more than the Jayhawks.

Digger: Memphis and Kansas have a common opponent, Arizona - and Memphis won by more.
{Ignored and equally valid points: 1) Arizona was without their best player, Jerryd Bayless when they played Memphis; 2) Each team has also played USC. Kansas beat them by 4 in LA. Memphis beat them by 4 in OT in New York.; 3) Each team has played Oklahoma. Memphis won by 10 in New York and Kansas won by 30, though Blake Griffin left due to injury.} I've got to assume that even Digger actually knew that they had other components, but was simply unable to process all of this information.

Stacey: Kansas is better because of their bench scoring.
{Misstated fact: 1) Adding up the scoring average of every player that doesn't start for each team, Kansas) 34.8 ppg.; Memphis) 37.6 ppg.} You watch the two play, you know Kansas has a deeper team, but don't go spouting off stats that you obviously haven't researched.

Digger: Memphis has been to the Final Four twice, losing to aOSU and UCLA. They have the maturity it takes to win it all.
{Misstated fact: Memphis has been to the Elite 8, losing first to UCLA and then to Ohio State}
{Ignored and equally valid points: 1) Kansas also was in the Elite 8 last year, losing to UCLA; 2) Kansas has more seniors who play significant minutes (4-3), one less junior (2-3), and most importantly, they do not rely on a freshman to run their entire offense!} I'm not even going to bother pointing out the lack of logic here.

It's one thing to cross up a fact here and there or to stumble over your words, but this Good Cop/Bad Cop routine was just butchered, mostly on account of Mr. Phelps' ineptitude. It's because of people like him and instances like this that I am forced to wonder, "Why am I not running ESPN?" Or at the very least working alongside Jay Bilas. Not to toot my own horn (because this is more an indictment of Digger than a flaunt of myself), but is there one person out there that doesn't think I could do his job better than him? And if so, why? Because I'd be willing to bet that I could spend about 2 hours interviewing candidates and come up with no less than 10 people, myself included, I would have complete confidence in to go on the air and discuss basketball more competently than Planet Digger. (*Note* I call him this because he typically wears a Planet Hollywood bomber jacket.) That's probably enough Digger for one day.

For the Methzourians out there. There are many, many other reasons out there, but you can point to things like this as one of the factors that kept you out of the Orange Bowl.

But now, in being fair, here's a look at the rankings. And below them the Top 10 in disparity from their kenpom ranking. So apparently, Methzou and the Purple are better than publicly perceived. Moral of the story: you only have so many chances to make an impression before it sticks. And these two dug their graves a long time ago.

For some outside perspective on the Allen Fieldhouse experience, read this take from a Sooner's first encounter. Well said, sir.

I can't even describe how much more I would like to attend a tennis tournament than anything the NHL has to offer. Until it's an outdoor sport, we really need to cease acknowledging that it exists. Yama Hama!

And now for the less attractive women. I was saying from the beginning that this Roast needed to be televised. Case in point.

On the opposite end of the spectrum, something that should be nowhere near a television. But of course will be, incessantly.

As for the game tonight, Iowa State actually presents some matchup problems as they only start one player under 6'7". But then again, they lost to the newly ranked Drake Bulldogs by 35, so this one should go similarly. My guess is that it won't be quite that bad though, because the players also know that they lost to Drake by 35 and may not be all that hyped up. But anything less than a comfortable win will be considered a disappointment.

Kansas 84 Iowa State 60