My family's doing a little bracket competition this year, and since the main team I root for (BYU) didn't make it into the top 64, I'm not going to be too torn up as to who actually wins the final, whenever that happens. Here's a link to the bracket I'm currently using (for whoever is curious), and somehow it's doing pretty well, though I admit that I pretty much just followed the numbers and picked who was the higher rank for most of the match ups.
I also just want to take a second and voice how bizarre I think it is how we as a nation (and many other countries, for that matter) put so much attention on some of these sports. We have the biggest game of football of the year called the Super Bowl and is easily the most televised event of the year, with some companies paying millions just to air for less than a minute. This entire month is devoted to college basketball, and even if you're not a huge fan there's a good chance you hear about who's beating who, whose brackets are still doing well, upsets, etc. Baseball has the "World Series", despite only including American teams in the competition. (Although the title may come from being named after a newspaper, as its Wikipedia article states.) There are these big, gigantic productions for these and many other sports that, a month or two after they're over, we barely even remember because of how focused we are on the next one.
Is it bad that we pay so much attention to these sports and devote so much time to each one, to the randoms, to the players, supporting them wherever they go and however they do and in some cases even idolizing them? Not completely, no. Sports are great, healthy, friendly competition is good for the soul, for those playing it they get the feeling of accomplishment for going so far and feel even more accomplished if they win. And it's a form of entertainment. (A lot cleaner than many forms of entertainment out there these days, too.) But it really doesn't just stay that friendly and clean; we hear all the time about players who end up taking steroids or other drugs to cheat, we see the bad calls that all the referees make, we create rivalries that end up making some people despise others simply because of who they support. It's not everyone, obviously, but it's enough to notice that it's a problem.
I dunno, this is just a bit of a rant tonight. Again, I'm not too torn up about who's actually going to win because that's not where my priorities lie. Doesn't mean I want to bring down anyone else's fun, so if you're still focused on having your bracket make it to the top then I wish you the best of luck. (Because sometimes that's really what it ends up being for us – as we've seen with all the upsets this first week, numbers don't always mean everything.) Enjoy the madness!
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| Get it? Because he's the "Mad" Hatter? ...anyone? |
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