Big thanks to Jonathan Givoney at DraftExpress for giving the heads-up.
DeJuan Blair will officially announce his intentions to enter the NBA draft in a press conference at Pittsburgh tomorrow, a source close to the situation tells DraftExpress. Blair will wait on officially hiring an agent for now, but is not expected to return to Pitt.
Coach Dixon is apparently helping Blair set it up.
Not exactly a shock to anyone. Still, good that he is at least keeping his options open by holding off on hiring an agent.
The difference between Elite 8 and your “Top 4 or %” is next to meaningless. I would have absolutely agreed with you going into the tournament and believed Pitt deserved their seeding. But that’s why they play the tournament games…..to figure out where everybody finishes. Pitt finished in the Elite 8. The season was wonderful, but using it to justify some kind of mental ranking is subjective, just like the polls are all year. Writers and coaches rank the teams subjectively and then they play the tournament to provide an answer.
Repeat — the reason they play the tournament is to resolve all the stupid arguments about who’s Top 4 or 5 or 8. Talking about who’s 4th or 5th or 8th is a waste of time. Play games and figure it out. It’s not perfect, but it’s all we’ve got.
When Dixon looks back on the year, he’ll call this squad an Elite 8 team. He won’t try to argue with people that Pitt could have given UNC the best game or that Pitt was really better than some of the other Elite 8 teams.
You’re welcome to believe Pitt was a Top 4 or 5 team. You’re welcome to believe Pitt could have given UNC a game. You’re welcome to believe Pitt was better than UNC. With your argument, why play the tournament? We can all sit around and believe what we want to believe.
That’s (objectively) my last post in this inane argument.
The tournament is to figure out 16,8,4,2 and yes, most importantly, 1. Objective finishes at each stage. No one’s interested in your obsession, which seems to be figuring out who’s ranked 4th,5th or 8th. No wonder they don’t play consolations…..nobody cares.
I never said a specific thing about UNC being able to “handle Pitt”, as you called it. I said there wasn’t a nat’l title race this year, because Carolina waltzed through the national tournament. You seem able to draw different conclusions from the way this basketball season finished. Wonderful, more power to you.
So instead of arriving at finishes, outcomes and results, let’s just debate rankings and talk about match-ups. In fact, let’s make it all fantasy basketball and not actually bother with a national tournament to decide everything. Let’s just sit in our basement and peruse stats and roll dice.
I’m going to stick with the games, thanks.