College World Series

The College World Series starts today, and I might get to watch it for a change. I have always been a big fan of this event, but I haven't been able to watch much of it the last few years for various reasons. I started watching when I was in college. At that time, someone I played little league with (Pete Stanicek) was playing for Stanford.

It was kind of funny back then. For a couple of years, our little league team had a future major leaguer (Pete) and the worst hitter in the history of organized baseball (me).

College baseball is a little harder to follow than football and basketball because it doesn't get nearly the TV coverage, but that is improving. I was able to follow the end of a pretty decent season by my Boilermakers on the Big Ten Network, and if you get one of the cable/satellite sports packages, you can see most of the good teams play in the regular season. Also, ESPN covers some of the tournament regionals on its basic channels. That's how I saw Stanford, which is the only CWS team I saw more than a few innings of this season.

Like every sport, the college game is different than the pros in the level of ability (advantage pros), and the spirit with which the game is played (advantage college). Baseball is the only one I'm aware of where there is a significant difference between the colleges and the pros in the equipment used. College baseball uses aluminum bats, which is a huge advantage to the hitters, especially if the ball doesn't hit the sweet spot. Bats don't break and balls travel farther. As a result of that (and the fact that pitching and fielding aren't as good), there's a lot more runs in college baseball.

And, if my friend and CSTV colleague Eric Sorenson is right, it might really be bombs away.

So at the risk of making a complete fool of myself, here are my picks for the CWS.

Bracket 1 (Miami, FSU, Georgia, Stanford)

Florida St over Stanford and Georgia over Miami today.
Miami eliminates Stanford, Georgia beats FSU.
FSU eliminates Miami, then beats Georgia twice to get to the title round.

Bracket 2 (North Carolina, Rice, LSU, Fresno St)

Fresno St over Rice and UNC over LSU tomorrow
LSU eliminates Rice, UNC over Fresno
LSU eliminates Fresno, but loses to UNC to send Tar Heels to the title round.

UNC beats Florida St 2-1 to win championship.