God I'm going to be 38 soon. What was I doing when I was 16??


Hmmmm...let's go back to 1986 and flashback to the world of sports....Jared style:

-Penn State has a memorable year, culminating in their 2nd National Championship in 5 years. Okay, the Fiesta Bowl technically was in 1987, but still...One of my greatest momements as a fan. Smacking Alabama around that year( in the regular season) was truly fun! Beating a heavily favored Miami to end the season was the icing on the cake!

-My high school's wrestling program started their 50th season in 1986-1987. That was my brother's freshman year and a memorable one for him, placing 5th at state's at 98lbs. That year had a bumper crop of lightweight wrestlers, and Pennsylvania was one of THE toughest states to wrestle in. The winner in that class would go on to be a four time AAA state champion, still very rare at that point (Ty Moore).

-NY Mets-Boston. Classic World Series. You had to be high not to notice (DOC Gooden probably was by that point) 108 wins by New York. The Angels, known as California at the time, blows a 2-0 ALCS lead and a relief pitcher eventually kills himself over the walk-off HR by Dave Henderson. The Houston-NY Mets NLCS was a classic, nearly derailing the Mets' run at glory.

-The Chicago Cubs? 70-90 and amazingly not in last place! Thank you Pittsburgh! This was actually Barry Bonds' rookie year. Both him and Roger Clemens were playing way back then. Both pre-steroids, especially Bonds, who was anorexic at that point.

-The damn Redskins upset the Chicago Bears (who were 14-2 that year) in the playoffs, thusly starting my now for-life hatred of the Redskins. I believe Darrell Green had his classic punt return that game.

-Lousiville beat Duke for the NCAA Basketball championship; LSU becomes the first #11 seed to make the Final Four. This was the first year I entered a bracket pool at school. I think we were ahead of our time.

So.......what will happen this week in the Sweet Sixteen?

My predictions: UNC, Lousiville,Kansas, Wisconsin, Memphis, Texas, UCLA and Xavier are my winners. Everyone but Wisconsin were in my original Elite Eight and I will not back away from them. I'd love to see Davidson pull the upset, but I do have loyalty to Wisconsin, my birth place being in Madison.

Could be boring, but I see the key games being Lousiville-Tennessee, although Lousiville could blow them out. WVU-Xavier could be fun, as long as there's no couch burning. Potential Upset alert: Michigan State over Memphis. My good feelings about Michigan State have re-emerged.

I will have some baseball related stuff later....