The only bad thing about Syracuse Orange basketball victories is that you have to wake up the next morning and listen to people who probably didn't watch the game give back-handed compliments or outright complaints about the team.
And because the Big East is "down," those complaints will only continue as long as the Orange keep winning (God forbid they lose...we'll be "exposed as frauds" I'm sure).
I spent the morning having a hissy fit on Twitter over Mike DeCourcy's midseason award list (no Fab on Most Improved Player, no Dion in Surprise Player and SU named "toughest team to judge"). And that's before I saw Gottlieb's comments.
I was ready to pop so I took a walk with the dog. And by the time I got back, the experience of walking in the chilly Seattle morning and scooping some quality poop gave me a little perspective.
"Nobody knows nothing." And that includes college basketball's self-described experts. It includes me, too.
Especially when it's so obvious that they don't watch the games. They just look at stats and check the schedule and dip into their subconscious where Syracuse wasn't a preseason favorite and doesn't tell the right story and regurgitate the same generic blather.
Plus, they've got radio shows to promote, you know? It's why Doug Gottlieb woke up this morning and decided it's "hard" to rank SU No. 1 and is thinking about bumping Baylor past them. Gottlieb knows what he's doing. He knows we'll hate him and we'll get angry and we'll call his radio show. Try not to.
And that's why I want to start a t-shirt list. It's a list of folks who seem adamant of proving to anyone within earshot that Syracuse isn't worthy of the top ranking, your time or a chance at winning the National Title. So that when we do win the title, we'll pool our resources and each of them a championship shirt that they can wear proudly.
And when we identify someone who deserves a t-shirt, we can tweet #AddHimToTheList.
And at the end of the day, it could all be worse. We could be Pitt. Or Louisville. Or a 13-5 Syracuse team that no one cares about. But if everyone is going to care so much about what a horrible, undefeated, No. 1 team we are, we might as well get them something nice for it.