TheRob8801;1676723; said:
So what exactly is wrong with this whole thing and how would YOU fix it?
jlb1705;1676726; said:
I have a job I'd like to keep, so I'm gonna sleep on that one and get back to you later.
TheRob8801;1676728; said:
Cute.
But it's not an answer...
I think the committee did some things that don't make much sense to the educated fans and viewers this year but until the tourney plays out we can't forget the fact that this is these guys' JOB and the basic idea is to create a balanced, fair, entertaining set of games.
...if these upsets were blowouts it'd be a different story, but these teams were all closely matched...isn't that the point?
Cute.
Here's an answer.
The committee does not have a duty to create an entertaining set of games. They have a duty to set up a fair and legitimate national championship. This tournament is entertaining in it's own right. The selection committee does not need to make entertainment value a priority in its selection process - not that I'm saying they did.
What they did admit to doing this year has me scratching my head almost as much. First of all, they made geographical proximity one of the foremost factors in distribution (and perhaps seeding). I could understand doing that decades ago, but not in the modern era of the tournament. The NCAA and the participating schools are making money hand over fist in this thing. They can and gladly will travel. The participants are not equally distributed geographically, and neither is the balance of power in college basketball. Treating the field as if it is balanced in those ways is going to result in an unbalanced bracket. If I were running the committee, geography would be one of my last considerations in assembling the field, not one of the first.
Also, this committee seeded the top 1-seeds but did not seed any of the 2s, 3s, 4s, etc. If you're not going to follow that concept to its logical conclusion, why bother seeding the teams at the top? If you're going to bother to determine that Kansas is the top overall seed for instance, wouldn't it make sense to make sure that the rest of their bracket follows the s-curve that comes along with seeding the teams like that? If I were running this thing, the top overall seed would be in a bracket with the lowest 2-seed, highest 3-seed & lowest 4-seed. I'd apply that same methodology throughout the rest of the tournament.
Finally, the committee was inconsistent in what criteria they were using to select and seed teams. On one hand they say that Duke was a higher 1-seed than Syracuse because of the way both teams finished the season. Villanova finished like ass though and got a 2-seed. At least they were applying a merit-based criterion in these cases, but they need to be applied consistently.
I've been watching this long enough to know you can never make a perfect 64-team bracket. There are just too many factors that go into it. I've also watched long enough to know that this year's field doesn't live up to the standard of pretty much every other year I can remember in terms of competitive balance and appropriate seeding. The things I suggested that I'd do - these are things that past committees have done to get the best bracket possible. This committee didn't and we're seeing the results.
