Bench Memos

Obama’s Strong Picks

No, I’m not talking judges. Rather, seeking your indulgence for my occasional foray into sports, I’m talking NCAA basketball. Now there’s an area where President Obama appears to combine a deep knowledge with a genuine passion. Too bad we don’t see the same combination in, say, decisions about military intervention in Libya or about how to reform health care.

As it happens (and I readily acknowledge that luck—especially my picking U.Conn. to make the final—was the major component), I trounced Obama in the NCAA bracket picks. I finished with 81 points—96th percentile among the millions of submissions to the Yahoo pool. Obama, after a remarkably strong start, ended up with the equivalent* of 65—87th percentile in the ESPN pool.

Now, if President Obama would only let me pick his judges for him ….

* Committing score inflation, ESPN multiplies the traditional score by a factor of 10, so Obama’s score in its pool is 650, and mine would be 810.

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