Tournament of Exposure

Many argue that the end of March is the best sports time of the year.

I whole-heartedly agree.

The NBA and NHL seasons are winding down, the MLB season is just about to begin and of course the NCAA tournament captivates the country. March Madness is phenomenal, amateur athletes playing for their schools with no other allegiances or endorsement deals (except for USC). There is something so pure and real about the emotion and the way the games are played. Also, throw in the office pools/brackets and you have involved the sports casualist as well. Who doesn’t love a little incentive to watch more television?

Whether it’s watching the opening Thursday and Friday games at work or furiously checking your brackets, the tournament holds your undivided attention for a solid three weeks. Buzzer beaters, upsets and Cinderella are tournament lingo that will reach its wear-out level until the following March. The tournament as currently structured has 65 teams with 31 automatic bids. But, there have been some discussions this year about expanding the tournament. The proposed new tournament will be 96 teams large. This means there will be a ton more “play-in” games. Part of the reason for this is that the NCAA also owns the NIT tournament and they are looking to bury it in the next coming years. The other reason is money! Shocking right? ESPN will be making a bid to air the expanded tournament on it’s family of networks.

Usually I would be all for more college hoops, especially in March. But, at what point does March Madness become over-exposed? Would it be possible for it to “jump the shark”? Jumping the shark is a term that refers to a television show or actor that was once successful and critically acclaimed, but has hit a point of over-exposure and annoyance. What about the cliché “If it ain’t broke don’t fix it?”. There is absolutely nothing wrong with the current tournament structure and changing it could be a mistake.

To put this potential over-exposure into perspective let’s take a look into the life of Diddy aka P Diddy aka Puffy aka Puff Daddy aka Sean Combs. Sean Combs started out as a party promoter and developed a friendship with Christopher Wallace and the rest is history. But, now Diddy has his own vodka, clothing line, cologne, bands, reality shows and probably his own toilet paper. Diddy obviously is willing to brand himself with anything and everything. He now lacks credibility because its quantity over quality.

Other pop-culture examples of this are, but not limited to, Dane Cook, Paris Hilton, Lindsay Lohan and the CSI franchises. The first three are relatively self explanatory and CSI has a new location every month. I love watching David Caruso take off his sunglasses and say corny things as much as the next guy, but when is enough, enough? Once CSI Poughkeepsie starts I think that will be the end for me. My fear is that the NCAA tournament one day reaches this Diddy state when they expand it even further…