Phil: you could have been Tim's 50th participant. He is royally bummed out that he has fallen short on yet another one of his goals:
I tried to join your NCAA group via Environmental Economics, but I lollygagged and didn't get it done in time. Too bad, cuz I would have been the winner!
Au contraire, mon ami, au contraire.
My experience leads me to the conclusion that sports economists really don't know all that much about sports. In the same way as environmental economists really don't know all that much about the environment. And labor economists don't work very hard. And macroeconomists ... [awkward pause] ... and macroeconomists don't know all that much about the macroeconomy.
And while we're on the subject, what am I going to do the next three weeks?
It was an appropriate, though difficult ending for Kentucky's 2008 basketball season as a heroic effort by senior Joe Crawford nearly kept the Cats' courageous season alive in a 74-66 loss to Marquette in the NCAA Tournament on Thursday.
Answer: root for anyone playing against Duke and UNC!
Also, in the excerpt above, "courageous" means "sucky." Rondo (2 and done), Morris (3 and done), Bradley (4 years but not a classic point guard) and Crawford (4 years but only figured it all out in January of his senior year) are the most disappointing recruiting class in UK history. Huge expectations and they’ve won nothing. But, hey, they're college kids and grown ups shouldn't get too terribly involved a silly sports game played by 18-22 year olds.
Anyway, thanks to Bradley and Crawford for sticking around for four years. The 2008 part of the 2007-08 season was lots of fun to watch, and that's all we can hope for from sports.
