But then the tournament started, and Georgetown decided to wet itself against a team that, eighteen hours later, I can't even remember their colors. And just like that, the annual crumbling of brackets everywhere was underway.
It's an annual rite of sports fandom: After going on and on about how little you know about college basketball, three games into the first day you have deemed yourself an expert and started day-dreaming about what your pool winnings may buy. Then, sometime later in the first day or early in the second, some team you chose -- for me it was Georgetown, for you it might have been Notre Dame or Vanderbilt, or some yet-to-play four or five seed -- loses to some school you've never heard of, thus shattering your interest in the tournament.
What's that? I can still win the pool without Georgetown? Of course I can. But I also have great confidence that Villanova or Syracuse will let me and my little highlighted sheet down, and leave me where I'm left every year: a little poorer and a little dumber.
So: For illegal gamblers everywhere, this week I bestow the dishonor of Shmuck of the Week upon whoever your Georgetown may be. You deserve better.
Meet more shmucks in our Shmuck of the Week archive.
