It's the equivalent of a No. 13 seed winning March Madness. Fresno State's RPI, if translated, would be in the high 80s, giving it a mid-seed in the NIT. And now the Bulldogs are national champions.
Of course college baseball doesn't get the same attention as college football or basketball. Just the nature of the game.
But this is like George Mason actually winning it all. GMU making the Final Four was unprecedented and made you shit yourself for the full week before the semifinal games. But this is like them actually winning the thing.
Baseball, of all the major sports, is probably the easiest for the top team to lose. You catch a good pitcher, streaky lineup or, simply, a hot-as-fuck team, on the wrong day and you could be in trouble; the best team rarely wins it all in baseball (see: 2001 Arizona Diamondbacks, 2002 Anaheim Angels and 2003 Florida Marlins).
Still, unfucking believable. This is an upset for the ages. Throw out every cliché and it will be fitting for a championship of this magnitude.
Are there any bigger upsets in the college ranks? Pros? Miracle on Ice?
Raise your glass to the Fresno State Bulldogs. College World Series champions. Geez!
7 comments:
A West Coast team winning the CWS is never a Cinderella story. Ever.
I agree with NFL Adam. Plus, Fresno State isn't exactly a nobody school. And really, comparing it to Miracle on Ice? C'mon dude.
College baseball is crazy time. How about the fact that not only did unheralded Oregon State win once, but they came back the next year, started out the season crappily, then went on to win AGAIN? And you know when that happened? The past two years.
They had 31 freaking losses! Amazing.
Zach, I'm sorry for what I had to do to you. But as a West Coast guy, I expected better.
West coast baseball is well more deep than southeastern U.S. That Fresno had so many losses is probably representative of that fact. Also, this is nowhere close to Mason winning it all. That's a single-elimination tournament of six games played over three weeks. This was a three-stage double elimination tournament. And also, Fresno had to play under lower expectations and media exposure than Mason. It's impressive, but it's a world of difference when you go from non-revenue sports to the revenue sports.
No, its not even close. They were ranked in the preseason, star pitcher got hurt, but they were still a very good team. They won more games than UGA did
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