“Was that wrong? Should I not have done that? I'm sorry, I'm gonna have to plead ignorance on this one, because if I had known that sort of thing was frowned upon...” stated George Costanza in a famous episode of Seinfeld after getting caught with the cleaning lady where he worked.
Some people might ask similar questions while questionably filling out their NCAA March Madness brackets. They need George’s help to justify their methods. Often the stakes are hight for winner of March Madness brackets like money or even demonic plastic heads that resemble a certain pedophile looking Gonzaga player. Even if there is not money on the line or a creepy plastic trophy there is still a lot of pride for the winner. What am I talking about? I’m talking about 3 kinds of March Madness bracket filler-outers who are basically cheating when they fill our their brackets. I’m here to call you out.
First, and certainly the most offensive is the person who fills out their bracket exactly with all the higher ranked teams winning every game all the way to the final four. Almost every year I see a person who fills out their bracket straight by the numbers. What is the point of filling in the brackets if you’re just going to copy the numbers? I guess you have some hard decisions when you get your four #1 seeds to the Final Four. Too bad the brackets don’t tell you which team will win it all by the rankings, so sorry. The most logical pick would be just to take the best overall ranked team to win it all.
I do realize that these rankings are given by college basketball experts, but come on people take a chance. Filling out a bracket like this is just plain boring. Why not solve a really easy Sudoku puzzle instead because that’s basically what you’re doing. Not to get sexist, but I’m going to because I swear it’s always a girl who thinks she is so smart who picks all #1’s. It is stupid though. Only once in history has all four #1 seeds made it to the final four which was recently in 2008.
The second offenders are the ones who copy exactly what an ESPN analyst has. It’s not wrong to look at these experts opinions are, but to copy exactly their picks is dense. I know these are so called experts, but they are wrong all the time. This takes a little more work than the first offenders so I commend them for their determination. Think for yourselves people. This is supposed to be fun, not see who can copy and paste correctly.
Another offender in this category is one who waits till the end and copies exactly what their knowledgeable friend has except for one game; therefore, making that game the deciding factor. This is an especially jerk-store move when the only game difference is one game that the other person might be gambling on. Anyone one who does this is basically the spawn of Satan and should be treated as such.
The third and final way to bracket cheat is one that I have been guilty of, but I have repented and will not do this again. Some might say that this isn’t cheating, but it is just increasing their odds. I say it all depends on what is at stake and how much you are going to brag after the victory. For instance, if I am in 10 different March Madness bracket groups and I pick different winners in each, then my odds for winning at least one of them increases, but my chances for losing the other 9 are probably higher. It’s not cheating to be in 10 different leagues or even to fill out more than one bracket, but it is very lame if you get worked in 9 leagues and then boast that you are this March Madness genius to the only league that you picked correctly.
I would like to see people pick the same teams in all their leagues. Put their money where their mouth is kind of thing. Then if you’re right you could win all 10 leagues. How sweet would that be? How much more satisfying is it to root for the teams you picked in all your leagues instead of saying, “Well it doesn’t matter who wins because I have a contingency plan for every possible scenario because I filled in so many brackets. This isn’t your stock portfolio, this is Madness. Let the 300 jokes stop here, because if you’re going to fill out 300 brackets I don’t want to hear it from you.
So now you know that these kinds of things are frowned upon. And yes George, it was wrong.
