By John Feinstein
Saturday, March 29, 2008; E09

CHARLOTTE

Everyone knows why the NCAA men's basketball tournament is a must-watch event. We all love the unveiling of the brackets; we all love San Diego and Western Kentucky and we really love Davidson. We all agree Tennessee's band should get a bid every year if only to play "Rocky Top" at least a dozen times a game, and there are few things better than being in a building when a major upset is brewing and all the so-called neutral fans start screaming for a group of kids none of them could have picked out of a lineup two hours earlier.

That's all good. But the NCAA tournament is far from perfect, in large part because the NCAA, in spite of all its yammering about doing what's best for the "student-athlete," sold its soul years ago and continues to put it up for resale to make a few extra bucks every year.

So, today, as a public service, we bring you all the things we can't stand about the NCAA tournament.

¿ The hypocrisy of the news conferences. It's just sickening to listen to the moderators who are under strict orders from the basketball committee to always refer to the players as "student-athletes." (It is literally in the handbook given to those who work at tournament sites.) They welcome the "student-athletes"; ask for questions for the "student-athletes"; thank the "student-athletes" for coming and note that the "student-athletes" will be available for a few more minutes in the locker room.

Let's not even get into the fact that men's basketball players graduate at a rate of about 44 percent. Here's the question: What's wrong with being a called a player? The reason these guys are sitting where they are is because they play basketball, not because of their accomplishments (or, in many cases, non-accomplishments) in the classroom.

¿ TV timeouts. First, can we please stop having the PA drones call them "official timeouts" or "media timeouts"? No one has ever once granted me a timeout, even on deadline. They exist so TV can show commercials. Everyone knows it. Just say so.

What's worse, though, is how many there now are and how long they take. There are now five in each half of every game, and each lasts at least three minutes. Technically, there are four, but these days the first timeout called by a team in each half, even though it is technically a 30-second timeout, "becomes" a full timeout.

Frequently this leads to six minutes of timeouts with about 15 seconds of basketball in between. On Thursday, Louisville Coach Rick Pitino called a timeout early in the second half. Everyone sat for three minutes. The ball was inbounded, deflected out of bounds -- the play took three seconds -- and then everyone sat for another three minutes because a TV timeout was due.

¿ Twenty-minute halftimes. These first came into existence in 2003 at the request of CBS so it could use the time for updates on the war in Iraq, which began the night before the tournament started. Much like the war, the 20-minute halves apparently are with us indefinitely, though the updates are long gone.

¿ Starting times. There should never be a basketball game that tips off after 10 p.m. local time. The night doubleheaders should start no later than 7:02 and if CBS insists on staggering starting times to stagger finishes -- which is silly anyway since games are rarely played in exactly the same amount of time -- then start other games at 7:07 and 7:12. It is not fair to players or fans to have games ending after midnight, especially on Thursdays.

What's more, the new starting times for the Saturday region finals, 6:40 and 9:05, are a joke. Forget the fact that they blow up Saturday night newspaper deadlines for two-thirds of the country (although the NCAA should care about people being unable to read about a game that decides a Final Four slot on Sunday morning). More importantly, it means the players have to sit and wait for a late start that helps no one except, apparently, CBS. Fans have to kill time all day, too. The old times, 4:40 and 7, were too late. This is ridiculous. The only reason the Sunday games are more reasonable (2:30 and 5) is so CBS doesn't lose "60 Minutes." Thank God for "60 Minutes."

¿ Corporate "champions." What is it with the NCAA and euphemisms? Sponsors are sponsors just like the players are players. Call them what they are: people lining your pockets. Nothing wrong with that in America.

¿ The signs and banner in arenas. If you want to host the NCAA tournament, you must take down every piece of signage in your building. We're not talking about your corporate sponsors' signs. They, of course, have to come down so the NCAA's corporate "champions" get the sole exposure. That's fine. Those folks pay a lot of money to be champions. But team banners, retired numbers -- everything has to come down. Would someone please explain to me how the presence of Yvon Labre's retired number in Verizon Center would have hurt the NCAA tournament last weekend?

¿ The pod system. It served its purpose -- distracting people from the fact that the committee screwed up in 2001 when it sent three Washington area teams (Georgetown, Maryland and George Mason) to Boise, Idaho. Once, the committee needed to keep teams close to home to sell tickets. That's not the case anymore. North Carolina should be in Houston this weekend and Texas should be in Charlotte. If Memphis as a No. 1 seed has to play Texas as a No. 2 seed on what will sound like a home court for Texas, it's flat-out wrong. It's also wrong for Louisville to play on a virtual home court for North Carolina, but that's a flaw of the current rules. Change the rules.

¿ No students to be found other than cheerleaders and band members. Isn't there some way to ask each school -- all of whom are raking in millions from this thing -- to designate 200 seats apiece in their big-bucks section for actual student-non-athletes? Those are, allegedly, students playing in the games, right? If you do see any students, they're up in the rafters, several miles from the court. There's nothing worse than the big-bucks fans who might not have seen a game all season sitting in the front row bellowing at the officials on every play as if they have any idea what they're talking about.

Then again, they're usually quiet during the official timeouts and the 20-minute halftimes while the PA guy thanks all the corporate champions, tells everyone the second game will start at 10:10 and reminds everyone that NCAA "student-athlete" day is April 6.

Seriously, they do that.

Thank God for Davidson.