Heartbroken

Words cannot begin to describe what I'm feeling right now.  In one of the best, most well-played, dramatic games in NCAA Tournament history, my team came up on the short end of the stick.  We left our hearts out on that floor, and everyone on the team made some solid plays at one point or another.  Sam Young played another fine game, consistent with his entire NCAA Tournament.  DeJuan Blair showed why he is a human vacuum cleaner and will grab any rebound in and out of his reach.  Levance Fields played an extremely gutsy game, and I challenge any one of you to have to hit 2 free throws with your entire college career on the line.  And of course, he came up successful.  However, the difference tonight of course, was the free throws.  Pitt didn't shoot particularly terrible from the charity stripe, 21-29 (better than 70%), but Villanova would simply not miss from the line.

Of course, the most painful thing about this loss was the final minute.  When you're down 4 points with 47 seconds left against a team who hasn't missed a free throw all night, you don't expect to win, or really even have a shot to win.  But then Sam Young hit a clutch 3, and breathed some life back into our team.  Then Nova hit two more free throws, and Fields missed a 3 pointer.  Again, the game seemed over.  Even when Nova finally missed a free throw, it was still a 2 possession game with 15 seconds left.  Blair hit a wide open layup (he didn't miss all night), but our hopes still seemed grim with 10 seconds left.  And then something miraculous happened.  For some inexplicable reason, Nova decided to go for the touchdown pass...and it didn't work.  And the next thing I knew, I was laying on the floor ready to have a massive heart attack as Levance went to the line.  Mr. Ice came up cool once again, and hit both of his free throws.  At that moment, I knew we were going to OT, and I knew we were going to win.  Nova was out of timeouts with 5 seconds left, and we had the inbounds pass guarded beautifully.  They almost didn't even get the ball inbounds on time.  But then Scottie Reynolds snuck through our defense, and stuck the dagger through the net on a runner with less than a second left.  When Levance's 70 foot Hail Mary missed by inches, it was officially over.  The valiant run our team had made was crushed, and our best tournament chance in 35 years had come to a screeching halt.

This is just awful.  Over the last 20 minutes I've gotten countless text messages speaking of the carnage this has caused my friends around the country.  We are collectively in pain right now, suffering one of the most heartbreaking losses in NCAA history.  Like I said, I can't really describe how I'm feeling right now, just heartbroken for our loss.  At least I can hold my head high, knowing our team played a tremendous game, and left everything they had on the floor.  Maybe one day, we'll finally reach the Final Four.  But it won't be with this team, and that's a shame, because there's something extremely special about this team.  To Sam Young and Levance Fields, it has been amazing watching you guys mature over the past 4 years.  Both of you stepped up your games beyond all expectations, and really characterize what Pitt Basketball is all about, being that gritty underdog who never gives up.  Tyrell Biggs, you played a very solid role off the bench for four years, and always provided some interesting moments.  I wish all of you the best in the future, whether those futures are in basketball or elsewhere.  To the rest of the team, remember this loss.  Remember how it made you feel, and next year, use it for all it's worth.  Use it to motivate you to push through during those tough practices, when you just want to collapse.  Continue the Pitt legacy, and continue to make us proud.

I don't have anything left to say.  I just want to crawl up into a ball and disappear.

- Kaps

Huge Game Today

Okay, maybe the title of this post is the understatement of the season, but tonight's Pitt v. Nova game has huge implications for Pitt's basketball program.  Over the past 5 years, I have felt that our program has gone largely unnoticed and disrespected by most analysts.  I have a variety of theories to explain the lack of respect we receive, ranging from playing in a small city to the insane amount of success experienced by other programs in the Big East to our lack of being able to recruit McDonald's All-Americans to our lack of success in the NBA.  However, when you look at the facts, you'll realize that we've been to 5 Sweet 16s in the past 9 years, have one of the greatest home court advantages in the nation (The Oakland Zoo), and consistently perform well in the best conference in the nation.  Yes, all you ACC readers, the Big East is much better than your conference, and don't give me that shit about we have 4 more teams.  When was the last time the ACC had 4 teams in the Elite 8?  I rest my case.

The thing is, there's definitely a huge distinction between the Elite 8 and the final weekend of the tournament.  No one really remembers the losers of the Elite 8, but you consistently hear about teams reaching the Final 4 (George Mason anyone?) and reaching that plateau absolutely validates your program for years to come.  Pitt absolutely deserves to make this Final Four, to validate everything this program has accomplished over the past decades.  Jamie Dixon is one of the most respected and classiest coaches in the nation, and motivates his players like few others can.

So with all that said, Let's Go Pitt!  I hope you all enjoy the game, unless that is, you're rooting for 'Nova.

- Kaps

Prediction - Pitt 63, Nova 57

Song of the Day:  Blues Traveler - Hook

Wisdom Teeth and Cheat Codes to Life

I was scheduled to get my widsom teeth removed today which meant a couple of things.  Most importantly, I got a day off of work.  It's really sad to say, but I'd prefer to have surgery over spending a day at work.  I was really pumped I was able to have a 4 day week, even if it did mean the extraction of 4 of my teeth with a drill.

Another item that came up throughout this process was an interesting theory that Heath and I developed over the past few weeks.  Heath got his wisdom teeth out a few years back, and was told not to eat anything for hours before the procedure due to complications that could arise with the anesthesia.  He forgot about those doctor's orders and got a muffin and chocolate milk at Wawa around 12:26 AM in the early morning before his procedure.  Heath went through with the surgery regardless, and had one of the smoothest transitions from surgery to normal life.  He didn't have to take any of the pain pills, and was even playing basketball later in the day.

So how does Heath's surgery impact me?  Good question.  As a joke, Heath mentioned that the reason he had such an easy time with the surgery was because of the accidental blueberry muffin and chocolate milk.  A few weeks back, we actually began to ponder if that actually was the reason he didn't experience much pain.  What if, in life, there were actually "cheat codes," that could get people through traditionally difficult situations with relative ease?  That sounds ridiculous, right?  Not so fast.  Anyone remember playing Mortal Kombat or Sonic, and entering a random series of buttons to give yourself unlimited lives or unlock secret levels?  In normal circumstances, they seemed absolutely ridiculous, but they actually worked in enhancing the game experience.   The programmers entered those options on purpose, and we were more than happy to take advantage of them.  Well, what if life's programmer (presumably God or some other higher power) made cheats available in life, but no one ever realized them because they seem so absurd and have no obvious correlation to the activity you're trying to accomplish?  Sounds insane, but it's kind of interesting to think about.

What if the way to cure cancer is to drive your car exactly 10 miles, run around it 7 times yelling "Silly Balls," drink a caramel frappuccino from Starbucks at 3:47 PM on a Thursday, and then watch 3 consecutive episodes of Lost?  You would never realize it because the series of events is so random and has no relation to cancer.  But that's the whole point of cheat codes, they don't make sense and have no relation to what you're actually trying to do.  So the next time something odd or extremely improbable happens in your life, re-trace your steps.  If you know someone who is in the same situation as yourself, tell them to try what you did and see what happens.  You just never know.

Needless to say, last night, at around 12:26 AM, I went to Wawa with Heath and had him pick out a blueberry muffin and chocolate milk for me.  We went back to his house, and I ate and drank away, not knowing what would happen today.  Well, so far, I've had extremely minimal amounts of pain, except for right when I came home from the oral surgeon's office.  I took one pain pill, and I'm not sure how much that is contributing or if it's the chocolate milk and muffin.  While I haven't played basketball or anything like that, I feel absolutely normal except for some minor jaw pain, and definitely feel like I could resume normal life activities tonight.  And come to think of it, I am watching basketball right now (2 boring blowout games between Louisville and Arizona, and also Oklahoma and Syracuse).  Very interesting...

Last item of business related to my surgery is that this was the first time since I was a year old that I had gone under anesthesia.  They told me I was about to go under in about 30 seconds, and I really didn't feel anything.  I was trying to stay awake (absolutely pointless) and was out within seconds.  The next thing I knew, I was in a waiting room with my parents, apparently repeating myself 3 or 4 times.  I guess me repeating myself doesn't only occur when I'm telling strippers how fantastic they smell.  The anesthesia thing was pretty cool because it's not like you're falling asleep and groggy, it's basically just time that is completely lost.  It can best be equated to when you've had a little too much to drink (OK, a lot too much) and you don't remember many hours of the night.  Glad that my surgery was able to bring me back to my college years.  All in all, a pretty successful experience.

You can expect many more posts from me throughout this weekend and this week, since I probably won't leave my couch until Monday morning.  Check back often.  Enjoy.

- Kaps

Song of the Day:  Ludacris - Blueberry Yum-Yum

As if the Pirates Weren;t Bad Enough...

...they now have to contend with the drama featured in the article listed below.  I have just one question.  Why the hell is a 20 year old Major League Baseball prospect married to a 43 year old?

Ok fine, one more question.  Why is he married to a babysnatcher?  

What a sad, sad franchise.

http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=4013539

P.S. - I'll bet anyone a case of beer the Pirates lose more than 100 games this year.  Any takers?

Song of the Day:  Radiohead - Bodysnatchers (close enough)

March Madness

In honor of the best day of the year, the first day of the NCAA Tournament, I want to share a little story with all of you from the 2006 NCAA Tournament.  As most of you know, I consider myself pretty knowledgeable about sports, especially college basketball.  I watch a good deal of games, take in the analysis, and follow the big teams throughout the season.  In the spring of 2006, I was in the second semester of my sophomore year, and was taking one of the most stimulating classes offered by the College of Business Administration at Pitt, Business Communications.  In "BusComm" as we lovingly call it, we learned how to write memos, use proper business etiquette, and prepare letters.  A great class...if you're 14 years old.

Anyway, one of the projects for BusComm was a "How To" project.  Simple rules:  give a presentation that explains how to do something, and bring a visual aid.  We could have chosen anything.  Because it was the beginning of March, and the NCAA Tourney was right around the corner, I decided to do a "How to Choose Your NCAA Bracket" presentation.  Pretty simple, I would make a PowerPoint presentation showing a bracket, and print enough blank brackets for the entire class.  I prepared the presentation in all of 10 minutes with a few simple rules for picking an NCAA bracket.  Since I'm anal and save every document I've ever developed from high school and college, I just opened up the presentation and would like to share some of the contents with you.

Here are the contents of Slide 5, which explained the "Do's" of the "Do's and Dont's:"

Do:

• Put at least one #1 seed in the Final Four.
• Pick at least one #12 seed to upset a #5 seed.
• Pick Florida to lose in the first round.
• Choose the hot teams.
• Pick at least one major upset.
• Pay attention to the tiebreaker.

Notice anything wrong with those recommendations?  Well, if you're any sort of college basketball fan, you would realize that my advice was to pick the NCAA CHAMPION - Florida Gators to lose in the first round.  Not only did Florida win the championship in 2006, they won it again in 2007 for good measure.  Luckily for me, the presentation was graded before the conclusion of the tournament (I got an A).  If  my professor would have waited until the end of the tournament to grade me, she should have given me a F for shitty advice.  The one positive out of all of this?  Everyone was so bored during the 2 weeks of presentations, I don't think anyone listened to my advice anyway.  That's usually a good thing.

That reminds me.  During these presentations, one of the kids in the class gave a "How to Tie Your Shoes" presentation.  He actually gave a 2 minute presentation on how he tied his shoes.  After he finished, the professor asked, "You weren't at all prepared, were you?"  He knew he was caught, and didn't even put up a fight.  I wonder what he got on that presentation.

But I digress.  Anyway, my Final Four this year is Louisville, Memphis, Pitt, and Oklahoma, with Louisville beating Oklahoma in the championship game.  Let's hope I'm wrong and Pitt wins it all.  Enjoy the best time of the year, March Madness!

- Kaps

Song of the Day:  Thursday - Resuscitation of a Dead Man

My Economic Prediction

This post is brought to you by my favorite Finance professor, Jay Dubs, who believes that "Barack Obama and everyone in his administration are left-wing kooks."

I haven't really touched much on the economy, so I'm going to throw my 2 cents in to the mix.  First off, the irrationality we're currently seeing in the market absolutely amazes me.  Everyone is blindly selling their investments, and shoving their money under their mattress for fear that there will be a massive bank failure and the Great Depression II is going to hit.  The government will NOT allow that to happen.  If one bank in this country were to be unable to deliver on its deposits, mass hysteria would ensue and there literally would be rioting in the streets.

Also, I think the market has under-priced the shit out of itself over the last few months, and is extremely undervalued right now.  I won't get into the technical details of all of it for fear of boring you all to death, but I have read a number of reports that say that stock prices are all out of whack due to the economic crisis we're facing.  I'm not saying that they won't go any lower (See next paragraph) but from a technical, sound trading perspective, most equities are generally undervalued right now, which means the opportunity to make some money exists.

I don't think we've seen the bottom of this crisis.  I feel that we're really close to hitting rock bottom, but we're not quite there yet.  This market has one more wave of panic it needs to get out before things begin to improve.  I think this will happen over the next few weeks and we'll see Dow around 6000 and the S&P around 600.  After that, people are going to realize that some of the Obama administration's policies make sense and job loss will fall off.  A few months after that, the new government policies are going to help create jobs, credit will ease, people will begin buying homes, and the economy will begin the slow, laborious road to recovery.  We're going to start seeing improvement in the stock market around May/June, and I think we'll see a nice rally in the second half of 2009.

Personally, I'm going to dump a good deal of money in the equity markets in the near future.  Once I see the final wave of panic hit, I'm going to buy, and I the opportunities will be plentiful.  If you have the money (and the balls) to hang in the market in a few months, you can really do yourself some good.  With that said, things you're going to want to purchase are:

The British Pound v. The American Dollar - The pound is near record lows v. the dollar, and considering both governments are pretty stable, expect to see the pound rise from its $1.40 low to around $1.60-$1.65.

*BEWARE - currency investing is very risky and not for the feign of heart.

Bank stocks - Yes, you heard right, bank stocks.  I'm not saying to invest in the entire industry, that would be stupid and irresponsible.  What I'm saying is to do some research, see which stocks appear to be emerging from this mess in the best position (PNC comes to mind) and purchase some of their shares.  Many bank stocks definitely took more of a beating than they deserved due to the failures of their competition, but the ones that survive are going to thrive in the new marketplace.

Good ol' American Blue Chips - GE is ridiculously underpriced right now.  Ford is a penny stock.  Many others aren't too far behind.  The blue chips that survive this crisis (and yes I think Ford is going to survive) are going be be great buys this year.

Vanguard S&P 500 Fund - This mutual fund gives you a wide range of stocks that mirrors the entire market.  If you are expecting an overall upward trend in the market, want to diversify, and don't want to pay a lot of management fees, this is a great deal.

Obviously, the aforementioned information is just my opinion, and is subject to market factors and forces beyond my control or foresight, so it should not be relied upon as sound investment advice.  However, it will be interesting to see how this prediction holds up over the next year or so.  And remember, "buy on the rumor, sell on the news."

- Kaps

PS - I think it's going to take the market 5 years from now to recover to pre-collapse levels (Dow - 14,000)

Song of the Day:  The Beatles - Dear Prudence