Da-na-na-na-Dun-daa-na-na

Without gambling, the Madness is the Duke's Mayo Bowl

Can you hear it?

The national call to blow off work on a Thursday afternoon. National Multi-Screen TV Day, the biggest event of the year for. . . copy machines!

A month of overarching boredom elicited by Bracket Guy, who wants to tell you how “his teams’’ did in the pool. Bracket Guy makes Fantasy Man seem like Howard Hughes. Just don’t.

Da-na-na-na-Dun-daa-na-na.

Great month for chicken wings.

Normally sane people profess unswerving love for Hofstra, but the smart money is on Yale.

Man, do I love Drake.

Without gambling, the first wacky weekend of the tournament would be as universally compelling as the Duke’s Mayo Bowl. We simply can’t say that about any other sporting event.

Asking you if you will wager on the Madness is a needless question. The better question: Would you watch if you didn’t?

Betting has always fueled sports interest. No event is more driven by wagers than this one.

How do you know that, Doc?

Honestly, I don’t. I can read this. . . In 2022, Statista.com estimated 36.5 million American adults filled out a bracket.

That doesn’t account for online gambling and gambling with sportsbooks, which has merely mushroomed in the past few months, as more states have legalized gambling.

I can talk to everyone I know personally, and everyone I don’t. None, I mean absolutely no one, will say they did not or will not place some dollars on a bracket or 10. That’s been true for, I dunno, 40 years.

You might suggest Super Bowl wagering tops the Madness. OK, but I doubt it involves as big a cross-section of participants.

So. , .

If wagering on the NCAA men’s basketball tournament were somehow eliminated, would you still watch between now and the Final Four?

Of course not. Money is what turns us into instant Utah State fans. Money guarantees that for one shining day, we’ll be Iona fans because, we-own-a little stake in the Gaels success.

Nothing brings out the optimism in us like putting pen to bracket. This is the year. My year. I will nail the 5-12 upset(s). I will know that 15 Vermont will beat 2 Purdue in Round 1, same as St. Peter’s beat Kentucky last year. Will Creighton, Xavier and Marquette make the Sweet 16? Of course they will, you fool.

I will be leading the pool until I’m not, at which point I will return to my regularly scheduled Friday afternoon programming. Without gambling, the tournament is CSI re-runs.

I love quasi-am basketball. The only beat I ever covered was University of Virginia basketball, back when giants roamed the earth. Literally. Ralph Sampson was the Cavaliers center. At 7-4, he had to duck through doorways and take a shower from his knees.

In those years, I witnessed the unleashing of Michael Jordan, had breakfast with Dean Smith and lunch with Charles Grice Driesell (some knew him as Lefty) and witnessed Indiana beat mighty Carolina because Dan Dakich played better than Jordan for one shining evening in the East Region. Second-best college game I’ve ever seen, right behind Xavier’s 2OT-loss to Kansas State.

But to casual fans, quasi-am hoops is a one-month season that started this past weekend. Imagine saying that about the NFL, MLB or even MLS. I don’t know about the NBA. I haven’t watched the NBA earnestly since Moses Malone.

But man, what a month. You think the NF of L has games written by Hollywood? Not even they could write UMBC taking out Virginia.

Not only does college basketball produce Davids on cue, but it also has the good sense to show them the door after the first weekend, so the Goliaths can take over. That might not be true this year, given the lack of dominant teams at the top. If ever there were a year for madness. . .

Michigan might be out. North Carolina almost definitely will be. UK was getting last rites six weeks ago; now, the ‘Cats are a sleeper. Only in the Madness could we consider UK a sleeper.

Starting next Sunday, we’ll spend more time on our brackets than on our tax returns. Unless we simply pick winners based on which team has the better colors or cutest coach. Next Thursday and Friday will be the most concentrated fun some of us will have all year. All because of 10 lousy bucks donated to an office pool.

Now, then. . .

FRIDAY WAS THE WORST DAY OF THE WINTER. . . The sun never rose, yeah? Correct me if I’m wrong. We watched two movies, They sucked, too.

(1) The Green Room (my pick) about a bad metal band that plays bad metal at a remote dive in Oregon. Ownership isn’t nice at all. Bad slashing is rampant, almost as rampant as the bad dialog. Yawn. Gag me with a nose ring.

(2) Bullet Train (wife’s pick). Mindless action. One of those movies where everybody gets punched in the face a million times but no one bleeds. Colossal waste of Brad Pitt. Wife thought it was funny. I laughed once, when it was over, at my stupidity for agreeing to endure this load of wretchedness.

WHAT WAS ENTERTAINING, THOUGH, was the two-hour NBC Dateline on the Murdaugh murders. Alex Murdaugh, the red-haired, drug-addled, too-rich dad, murdered his wife and son, because. . . because. . .

Well, they never really said. Something about him hoping to elicit sympathy for his bad, rich life or because his now-dead son’s trial for crashing a boat and killing a female passenger was looming or because dad was a 20-year pill junkie.

Beats me.

Murdaugh was so guilty, Columbo could have convicted him.

Like the egomaniac he was, Murdaugh went against the advice of his lawyers, who told him he shouldn’t testify. Prosecutors lunched him. He lied some. When he wasn’t lying, he was scamming his clients and stealing his law firm’s money. And mis-remembering all over the place.

NOT JUST ANOTHER PRETTY FACE. . . Finished The Mosquito Bowl, Buzz Bissinger’s book about marines who played a football game on Okinawa in the last days of WWII. These were mostly college guys who’d been drafted or volunteered to serve. Most had played college ball at a high level. A few had even been NFL-drafted.

The book’s not about the game. It’s about the 88-day death slog to capture Okinawa. The steadfast bravery of those men never stops amazing me and I hope it never will.

HAS ANYONE MENTIONED THE FATTER BASES will also give an edge to speedy runners hoping to leg out more infield hits? Suddenly, the close outs will be close safes. Just thought I’d mention it, in case you were thinking of taking Jon Berti in your fantasy draft.

YOU PLAY FANTASY BASEBALL, YOU LOSER? As a matter of fact. . .

I’m still mystified as to how I didn’t win the whole damned Willie Mays Hays League last summer. I mean, my outfield alone was Betts, Kyle Tucker and Julio Rodriguez. I had a 20-game winner (Kyle Wright) and a K machine (Carlos Rodon). I had the Other Diaz (the Mets closer) and Jordan Romano.

I played in the losers playoff bracket. I lost.

You’re sounding like Bracket Guy.

Do you play fantasy baseball? It’s infinitely better than football, because it’s every day. Diligence matters. There are no fluke winners. Because of fantasy baseball, I learned a lot about the AL and developed a fondness for the Guardians. (I had Jose Ramirez, too. Tell me again how Iost.)

It’s become a highlight of the summer. I recommend it highly.

SOME TMLs ARE MAGIC. And some just kinda lay there. Like this one. I’m like a decent quasi-am basketball coach. Only as good as my material. I’ll do better tomorrow.

TUNE O’ THE LAME DAY. . . Kind of a lame early 90s band, with a lame name. I did like this one, though.