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Keep NCAA Office Pool Business To Yourself

The Associated Press

Think FSU can be a spoiler or Duke can't miss as a No. 2 seed in the East? Keep it to yourself, writes Martin Fennelly.

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By MARTIN FENNELLY | The Tampa Tribune

Published: March 16, 2009

TAMPA - Show us your brackets.

Not.

There have been many great achievements in man's long and storied history on the planet. The secret of fire come to mind. Them flying machines and talkie pictures were huge.

The computer and cell phone, well, what can you say? Great stuff. Another bowl of rice for their inventors.

And then there are NCAA Tournament pools.

For the next three weeks, from the offices to the bus depots, from the streets where we live to the halls of the Vatican to the cave walls of the Afghan mountains, the NCAA Tournament — the original "American Idol" — will transform even nonsports fans into beasts.

Annoying beasts at that.

You see, as much as it pains me to say this — breaks my heart, really — I don't care whom you have in your brackets.

I don't care how you're doing in your pool, or pools.

You shouldn't care how I'm doing, either.

The NCAA Tournament brackets remind me of what I've thought ever since talk radio became big and every monkey with a phone started chiming in. It simply proves that everyone doesn't really need to have their opinion heard.

Likewise with the brackets.

Shocking as it might sound, I don't care which teams you have in your 8-9 games, or whom your upset special is, or how you go by the teams in your favorite colors, or how your dog puts his right-front paw on the winners for you, or how you would have won last year if Michigan Home for the Criminally Insane had beaten Purdue in the second round.

Ever feel like one of the Iranian hostages when someone corners you and starts going over their first-round picks?

Ever wish they keep Gitmo open long enough to waterboard the guy who keeps reminding you that if Syracuse makes the Final Four, he's in the money?

I know our new president has a lot on his mind, but if I may, I'd like a constitutional amendment making it a federal crime to fill out more than one bracket for the same pool. It's worse than a Ponzi scheme.

Actually, I might be remotely interested in hearing how you put together your Ponzi scheme as opposed to why you're picking Yeshiva Institute to make the Elite Eight.

I don't care whether you have this funny story about how your grandmother closes her eyes, takes her yarning needle and points to the winners on her bracket — save it for "America's Funniest Home Videos," which I believe comes on right after "America's Funniest Rail Disasters."

There is probably a 5-year-old who helped her daddy pick all his Sweet 16 games.

May it remain a state secret.

Somewhere along the way, everyone in this country became convinced that everyone else wants to hear how they made their picks. Over the next three weeks, beware the phrase, "How you doin'?" because as sure as the sun rises, you're being set up for the ol', "Man, I thought I nailed Ohio State-Siena."

Try to avoid crowds. Try to avoid everyone.

I openly admit that I was part of the problem. Twenty years ago, I actually ran an NCAA Tournament pool; ran it with such compulsive obsession that I drew a huge bracket on graph paper — on graph paper — that listed the standings each and every round. I would rather admit to you that I wear rubber underwear than I did a bracket on graph paper.

By the way, if you wear rubber underwear, or a wedding dress and roller skates to bed, or eat the beating hearts of bunny rabbits every full moon, I would love to hear about it.

Just don't mention your 7-10 games.

You've been warned.

P.S.: North Carolina, Xavier, UConn and Michigan State.

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