Quinn’s Quickies: Final Four thoughts, Phillies need more than homers, Embiid’s back, Picks Record Correction

A few quick thoughts heading into the weekend:

·       I don’t love either Final Four game tomorrow. My picks have been weak for the Tournament, going 1-4 for -$43.48. (I’ll have a picks recap below, including a correction to my overall record.) I might try to pull the spreads down for a parlay, but earlier in the week, the “juice” was too high. I still like my pick on Connecticut to win it all at +500 for $100 to win $500. I thought about doubling down when they were basically even money going into the Elite Eight. But Purdue worries me a bit. Obviously, I’m thinking UConn and the Boilermakers win on Saturday.

·       Larry Bowa said what I’ve been thinking for quite a while. On Ah Jeez, speaking of the Phillies, he said, “When we hit home runs, we win. You know, we got to get away from that.” I don’t know when the front office is going to get that through their heads. For years, I’ve watched this team start slow, heat up in the warmer months, and the playoffs become a crap shoot. I’m almost praying they play teams in warmer climates in the playoffs. Home runs simply don’t come as much in cold weather. The Phillies opened the season 2-4 in two home series against Atlanta and Cincinnati, going 1-2 in each. The Braves look better than the Phillies, but the Reds aren’t projected to be good. The Phillies scored 4 runs in the two losses to the Reds. Granted, the weather was terrible on Wednesday when they lost 4-1 to the Reds, but both teams played in it. I’m not panicking, the season’s not lost. But I get tired of seeing the same thing every season.

·       Joel Embiid is back, and the Sixers are suddenly relevant again. After two wins against Oklahoma City and Miami, people are talking about the Sixers winning out and avoiding the play-in nonsense to make the playoffs. I’ll admit, early in the season, my attitude was “wake me when the playoffs start.” When Embiid went down with a knee injury, I was actually curious to see what they would look like without him, and it just wasn’t good. If he stays healthy, and they avoid potentially matching up with Boston or Milwaukee, I think they are clearly the wild card of the playoffs. They could make the NBA Finals or once again bow out in the second round.

·       I went back over my football picks to breakdown my record in terms of college versus the NFL for my own knowledge next season. In doing so, I discovered an error in recording my wins and losses in Week 4 of the NFL season. For the sake of transparency, I had 7 losses that week, not 6. The money total was correct. So, I went 3-7 that week -$46.55. The error was in the NFL. All proceeding posts mentioning my overall record have been corrected, as was the post reviewing week 4. Again, the money total was correct throughout. For the record, my picks through the Super Bowl, which included one college basketball loss for -$5, went 31-52-3 for $210.98. In the NFL, I was 15-31-1 for $47.23; college football picks went 16-20-2 for $168.75.