They're Ballin in Australia Right Now...

Man, the Australian Open just concluded in pretty spectacular fashion.  Of course the conclusions aren't really that interesting...Federer wins on the men's side, Serena Williams on the women's side, the Bryan brothers win men's doubles, and the Williams sisters win women's doubles.  But man, this Australian Open men's final was quite the rollercoaster.  Andy Murray, the only professional tennis player with a winning record against Federer (still winning, 6-5 after today), played like an amateur through two sets.  Well, maybe not an amateur, a standard pro then, which Federer made look like an amateur.  Although even through those two sets he showed a pretty strong ability to hold his serve, aside from the games where he was broken.  In the 3rd set, he finally put it all together and he and Federer put on an amazing show.  Murray couldn't capitalize on the myriad opportunities which he had, as he was up a break at one point and also had multiple set points in the tiebreaker.  But man, what a tiebreaker.  Murray and Federer went shot for shot, point for point, as the best of 7, win by 2 tiebreaker concluded at 11-9.  Federer showed why he is an absolute machine (three best clutch athletes in the world - Federer, Kobe, Tiger), and Murray showed that he absolutely can compete.  I'm very interested to see if Murray is able to put it all together in another major...maybe Britain will get their first Wimbledon winner in over 70 years.

Does Anyone Want to Be #1

In each of the last 3 weeks the team ranked number 1 in the poles has lost and dropped from its position as the nation's best. The trend began 3 weeks ago when Kansas lost a barnburner to an undermanned Tennessee team. This came only days after Kansas had to struggle at Allen Field House to fight off a valiant attempt by Ivy League CORNELL! The following week Texas, heralded by many as the best team in the country lost to Kansas State. Since then Texas has lost 2 of 3, including an overtime thriller today against Baylor in AUSTIN! And to start this week my beloved Kentucky Wildcats turned in a pathetic performance against South Carolina and became the third team to succumb to the curse of number 1. This recent series of events has reminded me much of the 2008/09 football season when the number 1 team continuously failed to consolidate their position as number 1.

In other College Basketball News this Saturday was filled with a number of amazing games. First, the (suspected) new number 1 Kansas escaped Manhattan, Kansas with a win that you could argue was given to them by the refs and KSU's free-throw game (including 2 lane violations). Current number 1, Kentucky, was back in action in Rupp Arena to take on the number 1 team in the SEC Vanderbilt. Despite a minimum contribution by phenom John Wall the outcome of the game was never really in question and Kentucky took over first place in the SEC. Another big game today that attended by President BARACK OBAMA, did not live up to its billing. Georgetown coming off an earlier loss this week to Syracuse came out on fire and shot near a record high 72% to wax the floor with a less than game Duke Blue Devils (Let's Go Duke! ~ had to throw that in there as member of the Duke Class of 2010) who were visiting the home of guard Nolan Smith. Duke is now 1-4 on the road this season. (Yikes, not good with a trip to Chapel Hill in only in 11 days)

Elsewhere around the country Syracuse held on to beat an 8-13 Depaul team by 2! Gonzaga fell in overtime to an 8-14 SF. Rick Pitno lost his religion following a call which he believes cost his team the game against WVU. And UCONN lost another game without their coach following their upset of then number 1 Texas.

My NEW NCAAB Top 5

1. Kansas

2. Villanova

3. Kentucky

4. Syracuse

5. Michigan State

Tim Tebow will be a mediocre NFL player

So everyone has heard the stats for Tim Tebow's college career, and one must admit that they are more than impressive:

The 1st sophomore ever to win the Heisman Trophy

The only player in NCAA history to rush for at least 20 touchdowns and pass for at least 20 in the same season

86 touchdown passes and 57 rushing touchdowns for his career

2 time National Champion

Sounds like the prototypical guy that should be a great starting quarterback in the NFL except that every NFL scout that sees this guy constantly talks about how his skills cannot translate to the NFL level. Horrible throwing mechanics, an elongated release that allows the pass coverage to discern his intentions, sub-par accuracy, bad footwork and an inability to take snaps from under center well. All of these things were evident in the Senior Bowl and it seems as though Tebow, who was projected to be at least a late first, second round pick should probably not be taken that high by any team looking for a franchise quarterback.

But if not quarterback then where is Tebow supposed to play? Half Back? Wide Receiver? It seems to me that any team trying to take Tebow to be a QB on their team is going to be restricted to using him only in Wildcat or short yardage QB like situations. To me Tebow just looks too slow to play any other position on the field. His inability to make the defender miss when running basically limits his abilities as a running back. And while he probably has serviceable hands, I don't see him as a NFL receiver.

So in the end this all begs the question, why would any team waste a pick higher than the 5th round on somebody who is just an athletic but ambiguously suited skill player?