Bo Knows Diddley... And So Does Bill

At first, I thought Bill Simmons' college basketball columns would fall into "so terrible, they're awesome" category, a la Ghost Dad or Bibleman (a TV show, starring the guy who played Buddy on Charles In Charge, that comes on every Saturday at 1:00 p.m. on The Bible Network. Do yourself a favor, set the DVR.) Amazingly though, the Simmons columns have transcended that level of awfulness and can only be classified in the "utter and complete shit" category, a la Leonard Part 6 or anything starring Rosie O'Donnell.
As much as I dislike Simmons, I still acknowledge that his NFL and NBA columns provide some nice insight into the games and often contain some good lines. But the second Simmons gets out of his comfort zone (like when he writes about poker, college basketball, drinking or women), his stuff becomes totally unreadable.
I've made a vow to keep up with his college basketball columns so I can rip on them, but I don't know how much longer I can stomach it. Somebody once left a comment that reading all of a Simmons column in a single sitting is sort of like competing in a hot dog contest against Kobayashi. In theory, it seems like a good idea, but in action it just leaves you feeling nauseous and like you wasted 12 minutes of your life. Yup, these are my readers!!!
A few months back I remember somebody leaving another comment about how Simmons would be serving as the color analyst for two college games this February on ESPNU. I had totally forgotten about this until he mentioned it in the column yesterday and now this sudden college ball love makes sense. Bill Simmons has never written about college basketball and even professed his dislike for the game on a few occasions. I couldn't figure out why he was suddenly interested, until it became clear that he's only doing this so he doesn't sound like a complete moron on ESPNU. Granted, he could watch college basketball 24/7 in a Clockwork Orange-esque setting and he'd still inevitably sound like a moron, but maybe he'll now be less of one. Maybe. All I can say is, the is the first time ever I'll regret not getting ESPNU.
In an ongiong mission to read Bill Simmons' college basketball blather so you don't have to, here are some of the highlights from yesterday:

* Bragging about the amount of ball he's watching
The lede to yesterday's entry read, "I watched three college games (Gonzaga-St. Mary's, Wisconsin-Iowa and Florida-Kentucky) and most of the Oregon-Arizona game on Saturday, as well as Texas-Oklahoma State and the second half of Santa Clara-Gonzaga Monday night." Anybody else wanna bet Simmons is one of those guys who counts how many drinks he has in a night? To be fair, it's probably not hard counting two Malibu Sunrise's, but how absurd is it to recite the exact lineup of games one has watched over the weekend? Just say, "I watched a lot of college basketball this weekend and here are some inaccurate observations."

* Making a common joke
Simmons describes JamesOn Curry as "the troubled guard who's been in college since the early 80s". First of all, I could debate the used of the word "troubled" in referring to Curry but that's not the issue. (While a high school senior in North Carolina, Curry sold weed to an undercover police officer in a sting that netted 50 arrests. Some say the arresting officer, who posed as a teenager, was operating by the book. Others called it entrapment. Either way, most agree Curry got the marijuana from someone else, so it's not like he was Tony Montana Jr.)
The stupider part of the sentence was using the "who's been in college since the early 80s" joke while referring to young JamesOn. Everyone who watches college basketball makes this joke about various players. Jason Kapono, Shane Battier, Eduardo Najara, Gerry McNamara, Darious Songaila, Ilian Evtimov and, currently, Nick Fazekas have all, at one-time or another, been designated as the "he's still in school?!!" guy. But nobody has ever said that about JamesOn Curry. He's a freakin' JUNIOR for crap's sake! I suppose next he'll be asking when Greg Paulus can get his membership to AARP.

* More bragging
On Chase Budinger (who has hyped in this very space last Saturday): "Everyone made a big fuss about him in the preseason because he's also a world-class volleyball player, so it's not like I hadn't heard about him before..." Have you ever heard anybody refer to college basketball's preseason before (except in reference to the preseason polls)? What's next Bill, a 500-word rant on how the umpires always seem to give Duke the calls? At the end of the sentence Simmons assures us that he heard about Chase Budinger a while ago to which... No you didn't.

* Joakim Noah = Chris Paul
I have to give credit where credit is due. Simmons hit this one on the head, as both Noah and Paul are very similar, in that each played college basketball in the United States. Other than that... Not so much. Here's the offending sentence: "Speaking of Noah, I love how his draft stock dropped because he stuck around for an extra season and everyone started picking him apart. Um, didn't we learn from the Chris Paul debacle?"
This excerpt is sort of like one of the appetizer platters that come with nachos, wings, mozzarella sticks, potato skins and mini egg rolls. There's so much good stuff it's almost impossible to know where to dig in. But dig in, I will.
1) Who says Noah's draft stock has slipped? Last year he was the presumptive (note: presumptive) #1 pick in what was called the weakest draft in over a decade. This year he's clearly behind two players (Oden and Durant) who would have been rated higher than him last year too, if not for the NBA's new age-requirements. As for Brendan Wright, who ever trusts mock drafts in February? I can guarantee Andrea Bargnani wasn't atop anybody's board one year ago. And Tyrus Thomas? Bill Simmons hadn't even heard of Tyrus Thomas at this point last season and he ended up going #2! And how can anybody make a mock draft when the most important components of a mock draft - the eligible players and team positioning - won't be known for months? It's sort of like making bets for who will win the 2008 Oscars (I'm looking in your general direction, Fantastic Four 2: Rise of the Silver Surfer).
2) Who says Noah is slipping (again, besides idiots making mock drafts)? I'll admit Noah isn't getting much buzz (nor is Florida, which is sort of amazing considering they have only lost two close games and will likely enter March as the favorites to repeat), but nobody says he's slipping.
3) And now, for the Chris Paul comparison. Let's do a little Tale of the Tape:
Joakim Noah, April 2006: Much-buzzed sophomore on a national championship-winning team and likely top-three pick in upcoming NBA Draft, makes announcement that he will stay in school with his teammates to attempt to become the first squad to repeat in 15 years.
Chris Paul, April 2004: ACC Rookie of the Year on an up-and-coming team that will be expected to make a run at the National Title next season makes no announcement that he will return to Wake Forest for his sophomore season, mainly because nobody actually thought he was coming out.
There was hype surrounding Noah after his MOP in the Final Four and he had a big decision to make: Stay in school or wait until 2007, when Oden and Durant would likely be occupying the top two slots (don't let Simmons brainwash you into thinking Durant just came out of nowhere. He would have been a top-five pick if not for the age-minimum). In the end, the allure of staying in school with his buddies was too much and Noah made a decision that nobody can criticize. (Particularly because, with his wealthy parents, he doesn't need money and, less importantly, the NBA's rookie salary structure is set up in such a way that the difference between getting picked second and fifth isn't that big of a deal. In the NFL, highly-drafted players get rich on their first contract. In the NBA, they get rich on their second.) When Noah announced his intention to return to school, it was done at a massive press conference, with the banner headlines following.
On the other hand, Chris Paul wasn't going anywhere after his freshman year at Wake. There was no chatter about it, he wasn't appearing on (valid) mock drafts in February and there was no press conference to announce he was coming back. Everyone just knew he was. Only CP and his family and coaches know for sure, but I'd bet that there was no more than perfunctory talk about going pro after one year in college, if that. There was talk in some circles (probably from losers doing mock drafts in FEBRUARY) but Paul said later, "after my freshman year at Wake Forest, a lot of people asked if I would leave (college) to come out to the NBA early, but I knew I wasn’t ready." Noah (and friends) had a, uh, different reaction.
Lastly, Chris Paul dropped to #4 not because people were questioning his game (he was often referred to as the best PG to enter the NBA since Jason Kidd), but because NBA GMs are among the biggest idiots in sports not named Bill Simmons.
Bogut at #1? Fine. Big men are sexy, I get it. Marvin Williams at #2 to a team that desperately needed a point guard? And you wonder why the Hawks haven't been in the playoffs since Michael and Marcus Vick were holding up lemonade stands with super soakers. And the Jazz took Deron Williams ahead of Paul because they thought his game fit in better with Jerry Sloan. Williams is playing great, but the Jazz still made the wrong pick.
Paul's slippage wasn't the result of holes getting poked in his game, it was the result of stupidity, the same thing that happened to another Wake Forest All-American, current All-Star Josh Howard who dropped to #29 despite winning ACC Player of the Year Award. If I had had this site at that time, you would have probably read 100,000 words about how unbelievable it was to watch the following guys get taken before Howard: Troy Bell, Chris Kaman, Reece Gaines, Mike Sweetney, Dahntay Jones (yes, that Dahntay Jones), six forgeign and high schools guys you've never heard of and Jarvis Hayes (same position, same size, 5% of the talent - can you imagine how great the Bullets would be if they had Josh Howard instead of Jarvis Freakin' Hayes? And to think, if Ernie Grunfeld had been GM at the time, it probably would have happened!) I write about this at least twice a year, but it never ceases to amaze me. Here was Howard, All-American, ACC Player of the Year, a five-tool guy with a great attitude and defined leadership qualities and people were opting to go with Dahntay Jones instead. This is why I cannot stand the NBA.
Oh, and a much better analogy would have been Joakim Noah to Matt Leinart.

* Wanting to change the rule book after two weeks of watching
Simmons thinks the five-foul-and-out rule is too much of an x-factor ("particularly in March Madness" because, presumably, teams foul out more in March? I don't quite get that one) and wants it changed. His suggestion: Make it six fouls for disqualification, but give opposing teams two technical free throws (in addition to whatever free throws they are shooting) whenever someone gets their fifth. Congratulations, New Coke, you've been replaced at the top of the heralded "all-time dumbest ideas" list.
Imagine the following scenario: Duke and Carolina are playing a tight contest, but the Dukies have the ball, and a one-point lead, with 10 seconds left. UNC tries to foul in the backcourt, but Duke quickly gets the ball ahead to Josh McRoberts, who only has Tyler Hansbrough between him and the basket. Hansbrough, with four fouls, is forced to quickly foul in order to put McRoberts on the line. But, oops! That was Hansbrough's fifth, so now the Dukies get four free throws; they hit three of them and take a four-point lead, effectively ending the game.
And that scenario was the first thing that popped into my head. I'm sure there are 500 other ones that would expose how amazingly short-sighted this idea is. (Well put. Short sighted.) NCAA players get one foul per eight minutes, just like in the NBA. Just because coaches are far too cautious in playing a guy with two or three fouls doesn't mean the system is bad, it just means that coaches would rather sit a guy early than being forced to sit him late after a DQ.

* Pre-praising his predictions and predicting how said predictions will cause NBA teams to change their line of thinking.
After discussing a very far-fetched scenario that could result in the Suns getting Noah in the Draft, Simmons separates his shoulder trying to simultaneously rub his own ass while slapping himself on the back: "(By the way, if anyone in Phoenix's front office is reading this right now, they're probably screaming, "Shut up! Shut the hell up! Dammit! He's ruining everything!")
Yes Bill, because the jackasses who read your drivel while on the toilet at work are somehow going to gum up the works for one of the best-run franchises in the NBA. Apparently "yup, these are my readers," no longer means "can you believe how many morons read this?" and now instead means "yup, my readers are NBA superspys that infiltrate opposing organzations and feed them tips about how to covertly acquire last year's Final Four MOP without anybody noticing."

* Confusing "always" with "tonight, the one time I've seen him"
He says he doesn't watch much college basketball, so how can Simmons possibly know Corey Brewer always seems to make 2-3 big plays down the stretch?

* Not understanding the CBS rights package
When discussing inevitable March suplots, Simmons warns us to watch out for various reaction shots of Alando Tucker's mother on "every network." Yes, Bill, I'll pay keen attention to what FOX and ABC are cutting away to during the Tournament, although I'm guessing it will mainly be American Idol and Grey's Anatomy, repectively, shows those networks actually have the rights to. I guess his confusion is understandable, as CBS only received exclusive rights to the NCAA Tournament in 1982.

* Santa Clara Shocker?
While discussing Gonzaga's decline (about two months to late in that department), Simmons tells us to watch out for Santa Clara (don't say he didn't warn us!!!):

But here's what WAS shocking: Have you seen Santa Clara yet???? First of all, nobody on the team averages more than 10 points a game and they're 19-7. (Seriously. You can look it up.) Second, they threw a whitewash at Gonzaga for the entire second half. (At one point, I was half-asleep and mistakenly thought I was watching Brunswick Academy battling Rye Country Day in the Fairchester League playoffs.) And third, their two slash-and-kick guards (Brody Angley and Danny Pariseau) look like they're on hiatus from "Maui Fever." Still, they're one of those whole-exceeds-the-sum-of-the-parts teams that could definitely steal the WCC bid next month, then pull off one of those crazy "15-seed over the 2-seed" upsets in Round 1 of the NCAA Tournament when CBS shows their bench jumping up and down like little kids at least 200 times. Don't say I didn't warn you.

How, exactly, would Santa Clara winning the WCC bid be "stealing" it, considering that they currently lead the WCC standings. But let's say they do, indeed, "steal" the bid. How does Simmons possibly figure they'll get a 15-seed in the Tournament? Santa Clara has an RPI of 80, just 16 spots lower than Gonzaga (a team currently seeded #11 in Joe Lunardi's Bracketology). The WCC is also rated 14 out of 32 conferences, meaning, at the minimum, 10 schools would be behind any presumptive WCC Tournament Champion (barring a miracle run by a school like Portland or Pepperdine). At worst, Santa Clara would be a #13 seed if the Tournament started today. At best, they'd be a #11. Don't say I didn't warn you.