Mortal Lock for NCAA title: Either Kentucky or UConn!

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Well, I've embarrassed myself enough trying to make tournament picks, so I'll just slink away from basketball prognosticating for now!

Still, I do love the NCAA tournament. I love it when everybody is wrong, even when one of those everybodies is me. It is the one sporting event that never, ever disappoints -- and this year's tourney has been one of the best ever.

Funny that Kentucky and UConn, two of the most successful, big-time, big-name programs of the post-Wooden Era, have become underdog darlings, no?

Obviously, I wish Marquette had been one of the two darlings remaining, but we Warrior Eagle fans got our surprise a few weeks ago when Buzz Williams took less money to take an inferior coaching job, at Virginia Tech. There's way more to this story than we've been told, because that kind of thing simply doesn't happen.

Buzz gave us five excellent seasons (and one not-so-excellent season) and was an improvement on his predecessor, Tom Crean. And now I'm hoping our new guy, ex-Dookie Steve Wojciechowski, is an improvement over Buzz.

Awww ... who am I kidding. I'm just hoping I don't have to spell Wojciechowski too often! Let's go with "Wojo" from now on, OK?

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Finally, appropos of nothing, I received a bit of an honor a few days ago when a highly respected Seeking Alpha writer named me one of the 25 best authors on the financial Web site.

I'm not gonna lie: It's always nice to have folks say nice things about you!
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Oh Monday morning, you gave me no warning of what was to be!

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The Mamas & The Papas had it wrong.

Monday, Monday ... CAN trust that day.

This week, anyway.

Last week wasn't the best sports week of my life. I lost the first two games of my coaching career, including a close heartbreaker on Thursday. And then my Marquette Golden Warriors looked like a bad 7th/8th grade basketball team in falling to Ohio State on Saturday.

Then came Monday, and I was living large.

First, I hung out in downtown Charlotte with one of my fellow SeekingAlpha.com writers, a Boston transplant who now lives in South Carolina and goes by the pen name "Chowder" -- shoulda been "Chowdah," I always tell him. We had a great two hours talking about investing, sports, families and life. There was plenty of playful trash-talk, too, as he's a big Patriots fan and I'm a relatively new Panther Backer.

I drove from downtown to the city's south side, where my Scholars Academy Eagles took on United Faith Christian. And we played our best game of the season, using absolutely swarming defense to get our first win. We still had trouble hitting shots, but you don't need to hit many if you hold the opponent scoreless.

Yes, that's right, we pitched a shutout!

Here are five of my gold-clad -- and victorious -- Eagles:

Hannah, Maddie, Sienna, Olivia and Charlotte. 

The girls have worked so hard, it was satisfying to watch them finally have reason to celebrate on the court. Winning isn't everything at this level, but it beats the heck out of the alternative. They have improved so much and they care even more. What a fun group to coach.

Finally, the Panthers capped off Monday with a dramatic, well-deserved victory over Cheatin' Bill and his Patriots. Cam Newton, extremely talented but criticized for never leading comeback victories, used his incredible skills to rally the Panthers in the final minutes. Tom Brady had one final chance -- as he almost always does -- but his last pass was picked off in the end zone.

It was an incredibly fun game to watch and it cemented the Panthers as legitimate contenders. They now have won six straight after a 1-3 start -- the last two victories coming at San Francisco and at home over the Patriots. It's fun to have a relevant sports franchise in my adopted town.

So maybe The Mamas & The Papas had it right after all:

Monday, Monday ... so good to me.

Monday, Monday ... it was all I hoped it would be!
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Casey Martin rides again!

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Remember the caterwauling more than a decade ago, when Casey Martin won the right to ride a golf cart in professional tournaments due to the rare circulatory condition that renders his right leg almost useless?

Dozens of players will start claiming medical reasons to ride, ruining the very fabric of the sport! Golf has an endurance component to it, and this will give Martin an unfair competitive advantage! Walking is traditional; golf is tradition-bound; ipso fatso, this will end tournament golf as we know it!

"Someone else along the line will use this, I promise you," Jack Nicklaus warned after a court order allowed Martin to use a cart lo those many years ago. "It will happen. There will be another mess someplace."

When it comes to golf, Jack isn't wrong often. But he and the many other top golfers of the time who argued against Martin were dead wrong about this.

Not one other championship-level golfer has tried to gain the right to use carts during tournaments. Nobody has suggested that carts be used in events on brutally hot days. It's a non-factor, a non-issue.

Somehow, golf has done just fine despite Martin's attempts to "ruin" the sport.

Martin is back at the U.S. Open, his first competitive event in five years. He got the right to play this week in San Francisco the hard way: He earned it through qualifying. (And, yes, he did use a cart to get around the course.) He is now a 40-year-old golf coach.

I'm rooting for him to at least make the cut.

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On a completely unrelated note ...

I wrote another financial article for the Seeking Alpha site last week. Here's the link:

http://seekingalpha.com/article/646301-johnson-johnson-yielding-4-lockheed-martin-5-not-so-fast

No guarantee that reading it will make you a billionaire.

Or even a hundredaire like me.

Not just another pretty sportswriting face

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Doing some financial writing, too, for an excellent dividend-stock-investing site called Seeking Alpha.

Here's my latest article:

http://seekingalpha.com/article/631201-shedding-funds-building-cash-and-getting-ready-to-shop

Follow me on my trip down investing lane, and I can make a zillionaire out of both of us. All you have to do is provide the 2 zillion bucks!

But seriously folks ...

As I, um, mature, and given my employment situation (or lack thereof), I'm trying to figure out the best ways to make the most of what I do have. I have decided that investing in excellent, dividend-paying companies is one major way to do that, and have found a community of similar souls at Seeking Alpha.

You might get some ideas yourself. Or you might think this is exactly what you don't want to do. Either way, getting exposed to numerous ideas never hurt anybody.

Happy reading. I'll share links to my future articles here, too.
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