Seriously, we get it already!

Okay, so my bracket took a significant step towards recovery last night, as I was 4-0 in the first night of Sweet 16 games, and moved up from a tie for 21st into a tie for 11th. Now, the best I can do tonight is 2-2, since 2 teams I had winning tonight were knocked out in the 2nd round. I could really use some help. A Davidson win would be nice, but a Michigan State win over Memphis would be huge. I need Memphis not to make the Final Four, because if they do, I don't think I can get ahead of at least one player who has UCLA over UNC in the final like I do.

But, that's not really why I'm writing this post. While I watching the late games wrap up last night, I flipped over to Spike and watched portions of the season finale of Pros vs. Joes. If you're unfamiliar with this show, the basic concept is that they have a bunch of amateur athletes (the Joes) compete in a variety of events against several former professional athletes (the Pros). The show is in it's 3rd season, and I found it as quite a novelty at first, but haven't really watched it much since the first season. Ultimately, the show centers around the banter between pros and joes, and around the pros generally making the joes look pretty silly in their events. It's not really about beating the pros in the various competitions, as much as it is about losing to them by less than the other joes.

They changed the format around this year, and one thing I noticed in the few times that I watched was that for the most part, the competition now centers on the pros beating the living crap out of the joes physically. One of the events invariably involved going up against a former football player and getting crushed, and on several occasions, the Joes were asked to get into the ring against a retired boxer.

The finale, however, took this to a whole new level, due to the participation of Bob Sapp, a 6' 5", 375 beast of a man who was briefly an offensive lineman in the NFL, before becoming a beast of an MMA fighter. The last chance for the Joes to qualify for the decisive "overtime' competition involved an attempt to survive 3 minutes in the ring with Sapp, who was about 200 pounds heavier than either Joe he faced, and obviously more skilled. One of the Joes stepped into the ring with Sapp having 9 stitches in his chin from a semi-final mishap, and a deeply bruised rib from an attempt to tackle former Pro Bowl RB Jamal Anderson earlier in the final. Needless to say, both Joes were quickly and mercilessly dispatched. For added measure, Sapp had donned football pads and blocked for Anderson in the first competition of the night.

I really have to ask what we've come to when this kind of thing seems like a good idea for TV. Please, don't get me wrong. While I'm not a big fan of boxing and MMA, I at least recognize the appeal of those sports, where well-trained athletes fight each other. But we're basically talking about guys who are/were world class athletes getting to use average guys who stand zero chance of defending themselves as punching bags, and in most cases really seeming to enjoy it. I don't think that one guy surviving 8-10 seconds longer than another against that kind of punishment is really any kind of worthwhile measure of their athletic ability. I watched the show, but I really did not enjoy that segment.

And, while I understand they are being paid, I have to question what kind of athlete signs up for this sort of assignment, and takes joy in it the way a lot of these pros clearly do. Not that they've gotten any real A-list athletes on the show, but my opinion of several of the athletes I've seen on the show has been significantly lowered by their conduct, whether they are mainly just playing for the cameras or not. I understand these guys are competitors of the highest level, but you'd think they could find a different way to exercise that competitive edge, and take a little less joy in embarrassing people who we all know have no real business being out there with them to begin with. I'd love to see the show return to it's earlier days, when it was much more about the actual skill of the competitors than it was about their ability to absorb a physical beating without actually dying.