Saturday, March 31, 2018

Tag, you're it

We've had a topsy-turvy tournament. A 16-seed beat a #1, the South Regional final was between a #9 and a #11, and brackets everywhere were busted in what seemed about 45 seconds. But what better indicator of these past few upside-down weeks than the fact that in our contest, lawyers (229.88) outscored humans (223.10)? Dogs (185.00) whimpered away with their tails between their legs, and the vision of members of the afterlife (180.00) is apparently more clouded than it looks on TV.

Of course, all is not utter chaos, as evidenced by the annual tradition of females (228.33) trouncing males (221.00) once again. In perhaps the closest competition of the year, children (223.57) squeaked by supposed adults (223.04). In a bigger rout than either of the above, the average pool participant (222.03) clobbered the average contest commissioner (208.00).

In what we guess is the main event, D'Zuro and Friends (242.25) won the Tag Team competition, beating out Ripley's Believe it or Nots (235.00) and Readers of DBR (233.40). Mired in the middle, Whiteside and his Enemies (222.25) were a little bit better than the Marshall Plan (217.00) and people past-and-presently associated with Urban Engineering (210.40). In a rite as old as the contest itself, the ubiquitous Leach Gang (208.11) hung out at the bottom, this year ahead only of the former residents of 12A (206.67).

If your name is Bob (246.50), you're pretty good at picking pools for the second straight year, and just a little bit better than David (240.00) and Kevin (237.00). Neil (230.50), Mike (222.67), names-beginning-with-"Lu" (222.50), and Rick (219.00) were about average, while if you answer to John/Jon (213.80) or George (208.00), you should probably lie on your name tag. If your name is Matt (201.50), you might want to consider witness protection.

Most of our favorite schools didn't make the tournament, but you can still hold your head high if you like Maryland (244.00), Temple (233.00), or GW (230.50). Penn State (220.25) and VCU (203.00), not so much. Only two teams that got more than a single vote made the tournament, and of those Duke (222.57) outshone Villanova (205.00), though perhaps not in the metric that counted.

Our top occupation, not surprisingly, was "retired" (241.40). Those who fiddle with computers (241.00) apparently crunch numbers better than accountants (234.29) or those in financial management (220.00), and may manipulate language better than attorneys (233.20), as well. What's up with engineers (210.33), we shudder to think. The state of education in this country can be neatly summed up by the fact that one of the teachers (234.67) in this contest spelled his occupation as "Teaher," but the educators still beat out those they "teah" (students: 224.00) fairly handily.

Regionally this year, the further west you go, the better off you are, as the Far West (248.00) beat out the Midwest (234.75), the Northeast (221.78), and the Southeast (202.83). Even locally, the western suburbs of Philadelphia (221.24) bested the city itself (219.00). On a state-by-state basis, Oregon (254.00) was tops, over California (245.00), New Jersey (243.25), Illinois (234.75), Tennessee (221.00), Pennsylvania (220.74), and Virginia (184.50).

Tomorrow, the Rivalry Report. Enjoy tonight's games.

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