Greetings Friends.
The Online Tournament Pool (or OTP) is a fun, friendly, personally run NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament prognostication pool.
If submitting your picks for who will win the 2024 NCAA Men’s Basketball Championship (for a modest fee) for the chance to awe friends, family, and social media followers - AND taking home a nice chunk of reward money – does not pique your interest, my apologies for clogging your inbox.
However, if you ARE ready to jump into March Madness with the intensity of Abe Lincoln riding a grizzly bear with a machine gun and the Gettysburg Address, then the OTP is for you!
Read on…
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Besides, March Madness is as poetic as it comes and, as Frost wrote, “That’s what she said.”*
Ahhh, the sound of easy wind and downy flake…
…is almost as sweet as the sound of sneakers squeaking on the hardwood, basketballs whistling through the net, the buzzer blaring, and the crowd in full, throaty roar. The greatest sporting event of the year, the NCAA Men’s Basketball tournament, is nearly upon us, and the OTP is your chance to crank your level of fun from a 10 to an 11.
Good fences make good neighbors..
… perhaps, but what truly makes good neighbors are good brackets! Next week everyone will be discussing their March Madness picks. Don’t be left out! Make some new friends! Break down the walls/fences that divide you from your neighbors and join the OTP. Sure, everyone will be part of one Yahoo contest or some ESPN pool or another. But the OTP gives you a chance to compete against people you know - or soon will know.
Would I rather be feared or loved? Easy. Both. I want people to be afraid of how much they love me…
Lifelong friendships have been formed via the OTP. As a participant in the OTP people will love you so much it will scare them. Join the OTP community and enjoy daily commentary and analysis, the ability to view the brackets of your competitors and keep track of how your picks fare. You can view the picks of last year’s competitors here for now, and this year’s entries after Thursday.
They cannot scare me with their empty spaces…
One thing OTPers are not afraid of is a blank bracket. Unsure of which 12 seed will be the one to make it to the second round this year? Uncertain about which #1 seed will flame out first (Hint: rhymes with Fondue)? I, your trusty pool master, am here to give you insight into each team that gets their name called on Selection Sunday. The OTP blog will be available here.
Some say the world will end in fire. Some say in ice…
A thousand Christmas trees! - at what apiece? He felt some need of softening that to me: “A thousand trees would come to thirty dollars.”
Did I mention joining the OTP will cost you only $10? That’s far less than a thousand trees. Speaking of trees, were you aware that the OTP was the FIRST online NCAA Men’s Basketball pool, starting in 1997? Back then many trees were laid to waste as would-be NCAA pool competitors mimeographed paper copies for distribution. Yes, everyone is now filing picks online, but only one Pool has been doing it for 27 years! On the topic of history…
Abraham Lincoln once said, “If you’re a racist, I will attack you with the North.”
And following the great leadership of old Abe, racists are not welcome here at the OTP. But everyone else is! The more the merrier! Invite friends, family, neighbors (see above). Brackets will be available by Sunday evening (3/17), and completed brackets and entry fees will be due by Thursday, noon (3/21).
When the son of the deposed king of Nigeria emails you directly, asking you for help, you help! His father ran the freaking country! Ok?
Even if you do fall for the old Nigerian Prince scam, please make sure you retain $10 for your OTP entry fee. Due by noon 3/21.
Somewhere ages and ages hence
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I,
I took the one less travelled by,
And that has made all the difference.
Only a Pulitzer Prize winning, Congressional Medal of Honor awardee, and United States Poet Laureate could best elucidate the significance of the Online Tournament Pool. Leave the Yahoos and ESPNs aside, take the truth path, the path of the OTP, it will make all the difference. Click to visit the OTP page here.
The woods are lovely dark and deep
But I have promises to keep
And miles to go before I sleep
And miles to go before I sleep…
BUT BEFORE YOU DO! Check out our page. View the rules and scoring system. Submit your bracket and entry fee.
One could do worse than be a swinger of birches…
But one could not do better than be part of the Online Tournament Pool.
Thanks for reading. Enjoy the Madness!
*Some quotes while possibly attributed to Frost, are in fact those of Michael Scott, Regional Manager at Dunder Mifflin, Scranton branch.
