Ice Balls

On the way into work, a woman called into one of the Detroit radio stations and said ice balls were falling. Not freezing rain, sleet, snow, or even hail, but ice balls. Yeah, the commute to and from work was interesting. This morning, I almost went headfirst into the pavement walking to the car (I think I was still half-asleep). It took me a good 10-15 minutes to get most of the ice off my car. Luckily, the freeways were better than I expected. I-275, the western bypass of Detroit, was a little dicey. Everyone slowed to 45mph instead of the 70mph speed limit. Once I got onto I-96, the freeway was better, and traffic moved comfortably between 60-65 mph.

For the drive home, I walked out to sunny, white-out conditions. The snow was coming down hard, yet the sun was peeking through, go figure. I merge onto I-75, which is backed up heading into downtown. In Detroit, I-75 goes through downtown, while I-94 intersects with I-75 on the northern edge of downtown and I-96 dead ends into I-75 on the southern end of downtown. In between you have the Lodge freeway which heads to the north-northwest after dead ending into Joe Louis Arena basically. Well, 75 was backed up where it splits at Ford Field and Comerica Park with I-375, which becomes Jefferson Avenue after a couple of miles. So I got off 75, unwilling to sit in traffic, got back on 75 north and took 94 west to 96 west. That way is actually the most direct way for me, but it's always backed up, and I found 75 north to 96 west is a lot quicker. But with the accident, I sucked it up and sat in gridlock for 20-25 minutes, but it ended up being the right choice as I heard on the radio the accident on 75 was just getting cleared when I got back to my apartment. Just another day driving in Detroit.

Here's your March Madness update:

• The biggest two upsets came in the Southern Conference where the bottom two teams, UNC Greensboro and The Citadel, both won their 1st round games. In the Northeast Conference, top seed Fairleigh Dickinson (remember them) squeaked by Quinnipiac in their quarterfinal matchup.
• Syracuse is out, or at least they should be after that intramural-like performance at DePaul. DePaul won 108-69. 108 points scored by DePaul?!?!?! This is the same DePaul team that failed to break 50 in 3 games this year, including an 87-46 loss at Old Dominion. ODU is a decent team, but not that good. The Big East may just get 7 if Cincinnati can't beat West Virginia Saturday.
• Tonight's my first chance to watch Memphis since the beginning of the year, and they've become a lot like Gonzaga in the fact that both are being hurt by playing against their weaker conference foes. They're playing down to their competition, which won't help them in the NCAAs. Memphis has great athleticism, and they play really well together for such a young team. But can they win a half-court game which is what the NCAA tourney is. They've got guys who can shoot the 3, but can they do it consistently. Their press showed some holes and they don't play much team defense and don't rebound at the defensive end particularly well. I don't think Darius Washington Jr. can go left. Watch him. When he puts the ball in his left hand, it's immediately back in his right hand or he gives it up. I like Memphis, but they're still a big question mark as to how they'll play in March.
• In the next couple of days, I'm going to revisit some of my preseason picks haha. Let's just hope my bracket looks a little better than some of my preseason picks.

If you remember, last year's Ford Championship at Doral was arguably the best golf tournament of the year because it was Tiger vs. Phil in the final round, with Tiger winning by 1 after an action-packed final round. There's no way they can do it again, right? Well, after round 1, Tiger leads at -8, Phil is tied for 2nd at -7. One more time!!! One more time!!!!

And I like the fact that Andre Agassi is skipping the clay court season to focus on Wimbledon and the US Open. The clay court schedule is often played in cold and damp conditions, which doesn't work for the 36 year old Agassi's back. He can train in sunny, warm Las Vegas where he'll be loose and rested for the summer season.

One more thing about the World Baseball Classic. One of the Detroit radio shows had a great quote this morning. "What I want to see is how good those Chinese Taipei little leaguers are now since they're no longer 16 year olds playing 12 year olds from other countries. Let's see how they do in an evenly matched environment." I always wondered about them, now we'll see where they are and what they're doing.