Tim Wood's Brain Dump: Tiger, Tebow, Terps and Terrible Decisions

Tiger looks worse after the latest interviews. It’s just more controlling the situation with ESPN and Golf Channel. He would only talk for five minutes. The interview couldn’t air until 7:30 p.m. He had to be standing really close to the interviewer. He would only reply to questions beginning with a prime number. The whole act is just wearing thin.

Just zip it until your first Masters round, Eldrick. There are no more answers here. Tiger is just spewing psychobabble now. He said he did some really bad things but won’t say what.

The problem here is he already looked and sounded insincere in his press conference without taking questions. So when he dodges questions now, it just confirms that he’s insincere.

It’s like he has a checklist for contrition, so he mailed in a quickie one-on-one to check that off the checklist. Now he can say, “Hey, I did my interviews, I’m not doing any more.”

On a sidenote, what’s up with Tom Rinaldi? He was the ESPN interviewer. He’s the guy that usually has a piano or pan flute playing during his features. And Sunday, he put extra cheese on the end of every question, so much so that it sounded like a bad Capt. Kirk imitation.

Someone’s to blame for Tebow. All we heard in the months leading up to his senior season was that Tim Tebow went back to become a better NFL quarterback.

Now, Tebow apparently learns more about being a pro QB in four weeks than in his four years in Gainesville under Urban Meyer and no one wants to blame the program. Every coach says that one of their top goals for each kid is to prepare them for the next level.

But Tebow was simply not prepared or coached to be a pro. You can’t have it both ways. If you say, “Well, to change his delivery midway through college would be detrimental to the program,” then you don’t have Tebow’s best interests in mind.

I still think it holds true: Someone is going to take a chance on him early in the second round and they’re going to get a gem. The Patriots have 84 second-round picks, so I selfishly hope it’s them.

I would love to see him after two years in the system. If Cassel can look like a Pro Bowler, Tebow might look like Kenny Stabler.

How’s your brackets? We’re all in a weird spot today. As a viewer, it’s an unbelievable tourney. As a wannabe bracketologist, this is a nightmare. So do you root for the story or your sheet?

It gets annoying to see folks doubling back on their picks now, saying, “Kansas had plenty of holes” or “The Big East wasn’t that good.” Again, you can’t have it both ways. I just want to see these experts stick by their predictions.

It’s like they forget we have DVRs or YouTube. We know what you said, Dickie and Digger. Don’t tell me that Ali Farokhmanesh was an under-the-radar star. That just means you didn’t have the guts to pick Northern Iowa or you never saw it coming.

How’s my bracket? I picked some upsets like Murray State and Cornell. I thought the Pac 10 deserved more teams, but that said, I had Cal in the first round, but I whiffed on Washington.

In all, I have eight of the 16, the lowest I’ve had in years. But my Final Four is still alive. I went with Kentucky, Syracuse, Ohio State and Baylor with the Buckeyes against the Wildcats in the final.

I like big names this time of year, so I went with Turner and Wall. I wish I’d had the guts to pick Cornell into the Sweet 16 and to give Xavier a bit more respect. And yes, I admit that I gave too much love to the Big East.

I am in 32 bracket challenges all told. I’m in so many online brackets, I can’t remember the sign-ins to all the sites.

Maryland, you killed me . What a tease that was. The game looked over with four minutes to go. Just as the Ohio State game ended, it’s like Maryland realized the entire country was watching and woke up.

The Terps go up one, did everything they had to do to comeback and then leave Lucious open for a clean look at a trey. Ugh. That buried me. Serves me right for not picking Tom Izzo.

His top star, Kalin Lucas, was gone for the entire second half and the Sparties still won. I am officially convinced: Izzo could take the third string of the L.A. Clippers and still win the tourney.

Stupid rules are stupid. There is no way that Stephen Strasburg should be going down to the minors. The only reason the star pitcher was demoted was to save the Washington Nationals money.

By sending down their phenom, they buy themselves an extra year before he’s eligible for arbitration. It happened last year with David Price. At least then, the Rays could say, “Hey, we made the playoffs. We know what we’re doing.”

What do you say when you lost 100 games and send down a guy that had a 2.00 ERA in the spring?

Finally, a star the Yanks or Sox won’t get. The Twins signed Joe Mauer to an eight-year, $184 million deal Sunday. This is good for the sport to see a mid-market team keep its superstar.

That said, if Target Field isn’t packed and the Twins tank this year without a closer, there’s an even better shot Mauer’s in pinstripes now that he’s signed long-term.

Man U stole one Sunday. A bogus penalty gave them one of their goals in a 2-1 win over Liverpool. My Reds are going to struggle to get into the top four to qualify for the UEFA Champions League.