We’re just one day from the NCAA men’s basketball tournament starting; otherwise called March madness. Now I’ll be the first to admit that I don’t know a whole lot about college basketball, but I filled out a tournament bracket. I think there are a lot of people in the same situation as I am. What I’d be interested to know is; how did you pick your bracket? Now I’m not the kind of person who fills out multiple brackets to try to get the best outcome. I actually do two bracket and they always seem to end up being pretty much the same. I one of my brackets I have Villanova, Duke, Kansas and Louisville in the final four with Duke and Kansas meeting in the finals and Duke winning it. My second bracket has Duke and Kansas in the final four again, but this time they’re joined by Florida St. and UCLA. My finals match up is Duke vs. UCLA with UCLA winning it all. I don’t know if this will actually help anyone and I doubt it will, but those are the teams I went with.
My next question for you about March madness is; what’s your favorite part of it? Now for me I like the first weekend of the tournament more than the rest of it. You always get those big upsets in the first weekend. Sometimes it’s a #5 seed beating a #12 or like last year we got a #2 seed losing to a #15 seed. Of course the one upset we’ve yet to see is a #1 seed going down at the hands of a #16 seed. I don’t think that we’re going to see one of those upsets this season, but it would be fun if we did. Who’s your big time underdog team that’s going to pull off these upsets. It seems as though the experts like Wichita St. who drew a 10th seed, but everyone seems to think is better than that. I think after all the hype I heard about Wichita St. I picked them to win their 1st round game, but I’m not sure if I have them going any farther than that. There always seems to be that one team that wins a couple of games that no one was expecting and this of course can make or break your bracket. I’d love to know which higher seeded team you picked to make a tournament run.
With NFL free agency still rolling along a running back has finally signed with a team. I think most people thought we’d see Adrian Peterson or Jamaal Charles be the first running back to sign, but it turned out that Eddie Lacy was the guy. Lacy signed a 1 year $5.5 million dollar deal with the Seattle Seahawks. $3 million dollars in Lacy’s deal is guaranteed.
Lacy is looking to bounce back after a disappointing 2016 season. Lacy played just 5 games last season. Lacy was averaging 5.1 yards per carry before he injured an ankle that required surgery and ended his season. Lacy was a 1000 yard rusher his first two seasons (2013 & 2014) in the NFL, but rushed for just 758 yards in the 2015 season. Lacy can also be a factor in the passing game as he has a career high of 42 receptions in 2014.
The biggest issue with Lacy seemed to be his weight. He was listed at 235 pounds by the Green Bay Packers, but I’m not sure anyone ever believed that. Seahawks coach Pete Carroll mentioned that they’d like to see Lacy’s weight in the 240’s.
Lacy is being brought in to help a Seahawks running game that averaged 3.8 yards per carry and ranked 24th in the NFL last season. It was a tough season for the Seahawks running core as they struggled though injuries which led to 18 different guys getting a carry during the season. Lacy will join Thomas Rawls and C.J. Prosise in the Seattle backfield mix. Rawls had a very good rookie season averaging 5.6 yards per carry and rushing for 830 yards. Last season Rawls battled through multiple injuries playing in 9 games last season and rushing for 349 yards and 3.2 yards per carry. Prosise was a rookie in 2016 playing in 6 games and rushing for 172 yards and averaging 5.7 yards per carry. The Seahawks are hoping that Prosise will blossom into a 3rd down back. Carroll has said often that his preference is to go with multiple backs. Lacy is the favorite to get the bulk of the carries, but Rawls and Prosise will also factor in.
Now there was another running back signed, but again it wasn’t Peterson or Charles. Rex Burkhead signed with the Super Bowl champion New England Patriots on Tuesday. Burkhead spent his first three seasons with the Cincinnati Bengals, but was the #3 running back behind Jeremy Hill and Giovanni Bernard. Do to injuries Burkhead saw a little more playing time last season. I the final week of the season Burkhead rushed 27 times for 119 yards against the Baltimore Ravens. Burkhead has returned kicks as well as playing other special team role and he has lined up as a slot receiver. With that kind of versatility he seems like a good fit for the Patriots. Burkhead will compete with Dion Lewis and James White in the New England backfield, but should see more time on the field than he did in Cincinnati as the Patriots use all of their running backs on the roster.
It appears that the two teams that everyone expected to make it to the NBA finals have it a regular season wall. The Cleveland Cavaliers did right their ship a little last night with a 128-96 win over the Detroit Pistons, but even with that win the Cavaliers have lost 4 of their last 6 games. The Golden State Warriors also managed to get a win last night, but they struggled to do that. Golden State beat the Philadelphia 76ers 106-104 Tuesday night. Coming into that game the Warriors had lost three games in a row. Now the Cavaliers are still on top of the Eastern Conference by 2 1/2 games, but Golden State has fallen off the top of the Western Conference standings. The San Antonio Spurs have taken over the top spot in the Western Conference by 1/2 game. Both teams are dealing with injuries to top players and the NBA regular season is long even with the days off. With both teams hitting this bad stretch do you think will see anyone else in the finals besides the Warriors and the Cavaliers?
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