Obama and McCain: Who's the Big Basketball Fan Again?

Your Gaggler has spent far too much time this afternoon trying to make sense of some very confusing statistics and numbers. And, no, we are not talking about Tim Geithner’s new bank bailout plan. We are talking about NCAA brackets. Now before you get all uppity, truth be told, your Gaggler is actually more of a football fan and has traditionally left all the hand-wringing over these matters to others. But we were tipped off over the weekend that all might not be well with President Obama’s much ballyhooed bracket. On Saturday morning, Bloomberg’s Hans Nichols—a newlywed and friend of the Gaggle whom you might recognize as the “prom virgin” from The Daily Show (heh heh)—shouted a question at Obama as the president walked the South Lawn to board Marine One en route Camp David. “Is the ACC overrated?” Hans yelled. “Apparently so,” Obama replied. The ACC is the Atlantic Coast Conference, and two of Obama’s picks from the ACC—Wake Forest and Florida State—lost in the first round of the NCAA championships. In fact, Obama guessed the wrong outcome in 11 other games coming out of round one. According to ESPN--which has posted the president's bracket here--that put Obama in the bottom 5 percent of those participating in their tournament pool. Yikes. But Obama didn’t blow it entirely. By Sunday evening, the president had miraculously rebounded, correctly guessing 14 of the teams making it into the Sweet Sixteen. Obama is now ranked in the 53rd percentile on ESPN—or to be exact, he’s ranked 2,167,290. Among those currently trouncing Obama: John McCain, whose picks did extremely well this weekend. Obama’s former rival is ranked at 293,772 on ESPN’s pool or in the 94th percentile of those playing. Like Obama, McCain has picked North Carolina to win the championship.