linkpile

I have much links today, some of which don't even have anything to do with the dickjobbing handed out to us by the drooling morons at the NCAA. Let's get those ones out of the way first.

- Jeff White takes a look at the next-year future of the lacrosse team, including some speculation on who will step up and replace Glading, Billings, and Gill on the attack. Schedule-wise, next year will see visits from Syracuse and Hopkins instead of the other way round like it was this year.

- White's a busy man today. But not as busy as the other subject of his blogging, Sylven Landesberg. Check out the offseason schedule he sets up for himself.

- Here's a preview of the upcoming Irvine regional, which mostly manages to focus on the actual baseball and not the moronitude behind it.

Let's take a look at some of the things folks have to say about this whole Irvine mess:

- "Laughable." (Sean Ryan of collegebaseballinsider.com)

- "Virginia got royally screwed. ... The committee had to go out of its way to job Virginia the way it did." (Aaron Fitt of BaseballAmerica.)

- "[Virginia and UC-Irvine] got expletive deleted." (Fitt again, on podcast with John Manuel.) Click the link and pick the May 25 podcast to listen. Another funny quote from the same podcast: "That's what happens when you're so confident in the data you have, like the RPI, and you ignore other data, like, knowing college baseball." (That's more about the inclusion of Baylor and Oklahoma State, because if the committee was truly blind to everything but RPI, WE WOULDN'T BE IN FRIGGIN CALI.) It's a worthy listen if for no other reason than you'll never hear a media outlet rip the NCAA so strongly ever again. They got lotsa great quotes like that one.

- "A little harsh." This is why I like writing a blog. I don't have to understate things.

Here's what numbnuts has to say about this, courtesy of the above link:

“We can certainly understand Virginia getting sent to the West Coast seems like punishment,” Weiser said. “But the Cavaliers had a less than stellar record against top-100 RPI. Some are going to say this is punishment, but I look at it as more rewarding other teams for playing well against some of the top RPI teams.”

Let's take a look at one of those teams they rewarded. The average RPI ranking of teams on our non-conference schedule is 180 - it didn't help that the Coastal Carolina game was rained out. The same average for Middle Tennessee's non-conference schedule is 137. We went 27-1 against that schedule; MTSU was 22-8. They did play Tennessee and Vanderbilt - and went 1-3 against those two teams, being outscored in the four games 36-21. Apparently 5-4 qualifies as a stellar record against top-100-RPI teams, as MTSU also split a series with borderline-top-100 team Mississippi State and swept Missouri State; I defy you to say we did worse against the top-100's in our conference. Would MTSU have a good argument for a better seed than us? Sure - if they didn't play in the fucking Sun Belt Conference.

MTSU is going to Louisville, apparently on the strength of having taken three games from Missouri State - a non-tournament team. Either that or the lesson is you don't have to beat the good teams, you just have to play them. Asshat.

Short of chaining Tim Weiser to home plate at Davenport Field clad only in a loincloth and arming 3,000 pissed off 'Hoos in the seats with paintball guns and rotten fruit, there's only one way to get rid of the rage: Win the regional and transfer it to Irvine. Better them than us.