THE STORY EVERYONE IS TALKING ABOUT
Parrish: “I Don’t Really Love Sports Anymore”

If you’re anything like us, there was one great mystery left unsolved in CBS’ decision to let Billy Packer go out to pasture – how on earth were they going to hold onto the dour curmudgeon demographic? Sure, the 18-24 kids are the advertiser’s wet dream, but a network like CBS can’t ignore its base of tapioca slurpers, can it? Without Packer, where were these viewers going to get the “darn kids these days” coverage they crave?

We should have known the network brass were smarter than us. Just like their ad revenue, CBS is simply moving their crass, disinterested reporting online, in the form of Gary Parrish. From an Q&A with 35S favorite A Sea of Blue:

I mean, sitting courtside at this years [sic] national title game [as a life-long Memphis fan] should’ve been one of the highlights of my life. But it wasn’t. I was indifferent to the whole thing, and I don’t say that in an attempt to prove I’m impartial. It kinda makes me sad, actually, because the main reason I wanted to be a sports writer was because I loved sports, and I don’t really love sports anymore.

Bravo, CBS. Bra-f’in-vo. Somewhere in LA, Bill Simmons is mouthing “I told you so”. Gary, put on some Eddie Vedder and let the indifference set in.

Three more headlines, including some Grade A fan gouging, after the jump:

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Each day this week, we’ll be previewing one of this year’s Final Four participants, little gunners that they are. Oops, we’re about to drop something. What? Knowledge. (That’s powerful, but true.) But since we’re babbling idiots, we found another blogger who knows a lot more about the team than us. We’ve already handled UNC, Memphis, and UCLA; finally, the Kansas Jayhawks, with the help of Cory from Rock Chalk Talk.

We feel some sympathy for the Jayhawks, reviled by Tournament fans for holding off upstart Davidson and giving us the all-chalk Final Four that we currently enjoy. (We’re somewhat familiar with the sensation of everyone cheering against our team.) So we held their preview for last, hoping that cooler minds had prevailed. (We’re not convinced. We still haven’t put away our red and black banners. Sorry. We’ve never claimed impartiality.)

But there is great beauty in this Kansas team making its way to the Final Four. Bill Self, who has won everything but a Regional Final since first becoming a head coach at Oral Roberts (!) fifteen years ago, gets to pull a monkey off his back. Brandon Rush, who would be in the NBA were it not for a season-ending injury last spring, reaps a benefit for staying in school an extra year. And all of the KU fans we’ve met have been good-hearted, extremely knowledgeable fans who engage in surprisingly few couch burnings, considering they live in Lawrence.

But can they keep going and win the title? We turned to Cory from Rock Chalk Talk, who provided expert biased analysis as requested, and plenty of it. His responses to our questions, after the jump.

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Each day this week, we’ll be previewing one of this year’s Final Four participants, little gunners that they are. Oops, we’re about to drop something. What? Knowledge. (That’s powerful, but true.) But since we’re babbling idiots, we found another blogger who knows a lot more about the team than us. We’ve already handled UNC and Memphis; today – the UCLA Bruins, with the help of Jamie from Bruin Scoop.

We’ve been saying for a while now that we think that UCLA is the most talented team in the country, but that we’d believe they could win the national championship when they hoisted the trophy and cut down the nets in San Antonio. While you wouldn’t know it from their schedule sheet (not too many close final scores), the Bruins have let a ton of teams hang around far deeper into the game than the pregame matchup would suggest. Add the pressure building from two straight years of playing bridesmaid to the Gators, and we feel justified in our skepticism even while amazed by their skills.

But are Bruins fans feeling the same? We talked with Jamie from Bruin Scoop, who was kind enough to offer a ground level perspective. Her answers to our questions are after the jump.

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Each day for the rest of this week, we’ll be previewing one of this year’s Final Four participants, little gunners that they are. oops, we’re about to drop something. What? Knowledge. (That’s deep, but true.) But since we’re babbling idiots, we found another blogger who knows a lot more about the team than us. Yesterday we handled UNC; today – the Memphis Tigers, with the help of Sadie from Go Memphis Tigers.

You know what’s delicious with crow? Barbecue sauce, and lots of it. Strong on spice, just the right amount of sugar and rich in flavor – anything that kill the awful taste of being wrong.

Anything to make the pain go down more easily.

Sufficit to say, we were wrong about the Tigers; we thought a conference season’s worth of weak opponents would leave them ill-prepared for the tournament, but, we suppose that’s the beauty of the tournament. After a close call against Mississippi State in the second round, they’ve breezed their way to the Final Four.

For a much more informed view on the Tigers as we get ready for Saturday, Sadie was kind enough to provide some expert biased opinion. Her responses to our questions come after the jump.

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Each day for the rest of this week, we’ll be previewing one of this year’s Final Four participants, little gunners that they are. Ooops, we’re about to drop something. What? Knowledge. (That’s deep, but true.) But since we’re babbling idiots, we found another blogger who knows a lot more about the team than us. Today – The North Carolina Tar Heels, with the help of Brian from Tar Heel Fan.

You know, they’ve been overrated all season. They got bonked by a terrible Maryland team at home, and depantsed by a deeply flawed Duke team. And who cares that they blew out their first four opponents in the tournament? Two of those teams were barely mediocre, and every squirrel finds a nut. Maybe Pitino was drunk Saturday night. We’ll never know.

Ah, dammit, who are we kidding? We’ve said it before, so we might as well say it again (and again through clenched teeth) – Carolina has put on an absolute show during the first two weeks of the tournament, and comes in playing better basketball than any other amateur team in the land.

But that doesn’t mean much once the ball is tipped, and frankly we’re gonna feel weird saying anything else positive about our sworn enemy. So for a better bead on what to look for from the Tar Heels this weekend, we asked Tar Heel Fan for some expert biased opinion. His responses to our questions come after the jump.

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