What makes March Madness so popular? Its knockout nature

This has probably been the most ... well, let's be kind and just say "ordinary" -- the most ordinary college basketball season. First of all, as the Super Bowl

Frank Deford | Mar 9, 2011

What makes March Madness so popular? Its knockout nature /

This has probably been the most ... well, let's be kind and just say "ordinary" -- the most ordinary college basketball season. First of all, as the Super Bowl drifts into February and NFL television ratings soar, poor little college basketball gets ignored for longer and longer. Didn't you have the feeling this year that Dick Vitale didn't arrive in our consciousness until he suddenly appeared like a bald Cupid on Valentine's Day?

And there have been no outstanding teams, and only one player who's caught anybody's attention. That's Jimmer Fredette of Brigham Young. Of course, it helps that he has a neat name and is white, which is always a novelty when it comes to good American basketball players. So far, in fact, the thing about college basketball that has most intrigued the sporting fancy is that one of Jimmer's teammates got thrown off the BYU squad for sleeping with his girlfriend. Did Mike Huckabee turn the lovers in?

But, notwithstanding that college basketball has not only been under the radar but outside the tweet this season, suddenly this Sunday, when 68 mostly unknown teams are slotted for the NCAA tournament, millions of citizens will rediscover the game and fill out their brackets. Why is March Madness so popular?

Well, I believe the main reason is a simple one. It's the largest national single-elimination competition anywhere in the world. Every game, all 67 of them, the losing team is sent home. Season over, voted off the island. TKO: Team Knockout. In a nation that prides itself on second chances, there are none. No we'll get 'em tomorrow back home. No interminable seven-game series. The finality of the NCAAs is as vicarious for us watching as it is terminal for the losers.

Likewise, while the soccer World Cup starts off with a round-robin, it really grabs the globe once single elimination begins. Our professional football is too brutal to have anything but one-game showdowns -- but nothing is more popular. And do you remember last year when the U.S. and Canada played for the Olympic hockey gold medal -- one game. Americans who didn't know a hockey puck from a badminton birdie got hooked. One game, winner take all, losers walk.

Has either the National Hockey League or the National Basketball Association ever pondered this: a one-game championship? Sure, for the early rounds, play those interminable seven-game series where the same two teams give us athletic Groundhog Days, but when you get to the finals: one game. Scheduled in advance. Neutral site. Can you imagine it: Kobe Bryant vs. LeBron James, just one time. I guarantee you that single-elimination game would bring more attention and more profit to the NBA or the NHL than those protracted series now do. Less is more.

But for now, ladies and gentlemen, if you will just come into the tent, college basketball is finally about to begin again.

Published Mar 9, 2011

FRANK DEFORD

Frank Deford is among the most versatile of American writers. His work has appeared in virtually every medium, including print, where he has written eloquently for Sports Illustrated since 1962. Deford is currently the magazine's Senior Contributing Writer and contributes a weekly column to SI.com. Deford can be heard as a commentator each week on Morning Edition. On television he is a regular correspondent on the HBO show Real Sports With Bryant Gumbel. He is the author of 15 books, and his latest,The Enitled, a novel about celebrity, sex and baseball, was published in 2007 to exceptional reviews. He and Red Smith are the only writers with multiple features in The Best American Sports Writing of the Century. Editor David Halberstam selected Deford's 1981 Sports Illustrated profile on Bobby Knight (The Rabbit Hunter) and his 1985 SI profile of boxer Billy Conn (The Boxer and the Blonde) for that prestigious anthology. For Deford the comparison is meaningful. "Red Smith was the finest columnist, and I mean not just sports columnist," Deford told Powell's Books in 2007. "I've always said that Red is like Vermeer, with those tiny, priceless pieces. Five hundred words, perfectly chosen, crafted. Best literary columnist, in any newspaper, that I've ever seen." Deford was elected to the National Association of Sportscasters and Sportswriters Hall of Fame. Six times at Sports Illustrated Deford was voted by his peers as U.S. Sportswriter of The Year. The American Journalism Review has likewise cited him as the nation's finest sportswriter, and twice he was voted Magazine Writer of The Year by the Washington Journalism Review. Deford has also been presented with the National Magazine Award for profiles; a Christopher Award; and journalism honor awards from the University of Missouri and Northeastern University; and he has received many honorary degrees. The Sporting News has described Deford as "the most influential sports voice among members of the print media," and the magazine GQ has called him, simply, "The world's greatest sportswriter." In broadcast, Deford has won a Cable Ace award, an Emmy and a George Foster Peabody Award for his television work. In 2005 ESPN presented a television biography of Deford's life and work, You Write Better Than You Play. Deford has spoken at well over a hundred colleges, as well as at forums, conventions and on cruise ships around the world. He served as the editor-in-chief of The National Sports Daily in its brief but celebrated existence. Deford also wrote Sports Illustrated's first Point After column, in 1986. Two of Deford's books, the novel, Everybody's All-American, and Alex: The Life Of A Child, his memoir about his daughter who died of cystic fibrosis, have been made into movies. Two of his original screenplays have also been filmed. For 16 years Deford served as national chairman of the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation, and he remains chairman emeritus. He resides in Westport, CT, with his wife, Carol. They have two grown children – a son, Christian, and a daughter, Scarlet. A native of Baltimore, Deford is a graduate of Princeton University, where he has taught American Studies.