If I had to guess, I’d say both of us are equally excited and nervous to officially meet each other. We’ve exchanged a few Twitter DMs and made eye contact once or twice in the past, but this five hour flight together on Wednesday or Thursday or Friday (hoping to get a travel itinerary some time soon) is about to be a whole new ballgame. Some people assume it’s going to be a slightly awkward encounter, but others seem to think it will be catastrophically fucking awkward and weird. Either way, I’m fully on board, literally and figuratively.

Wow. What a weekend of sports. Four days ago, I honestly couldn’t name one player on Oregon’s roster. Today, I still can’t. But after two of the most exciting, and only, college basketball games I’ve watched all year, I can’t thank those young men enough for giving me the once in a lifetime opportunity to potentially have a real conversation with my boss for the first time.

Aside from Dave, the rest of the Vegas crew (not sure who else is going yet; hopefully someone I know personally) probably breathed a gigantic sigh of relief when they realized that I was the one and only employee who gets to join them for the festivities. I even heard whispers that I might get added to a group chat with them. Maybe it will be named something cool and fun like “Degenerate Boyz” or “Sin City Squaaad.”

As far as partying in Vegas goes, I’d like to think that I can compete with the best of them while still maintaining my composure around attractive girls and F-list celebrities. If you were one of the 17 people who watched my Snapchat story when I went there for spring break in 2016, then you already know the exact type of shenanigans I got into at Wet Republic, along with my infamous debacle with Steve Aoki.

Plus, I’m fresh off spending a weekend at the NCAA wrestling championships, so I’m still riding the high that comes with being around a large amount of adult men who are shorter than me for the first time in a year. Confidence is at an all time high.

To be fair, there was never really a doubt with this pick. I saw that they were a 12 seed and instantly assumed the bracketologists made an error. The fact that 6 people went before me and still didn’t draft Oregon is honestly kind of fucking embarrassing, considering we’re a sports company. Easiest decision of my life.

But if there’s one person who’s going to have to deal with a lifetime of regret, it’s my coworker Ellie Schnitt, who was originally supposed to be on my team for the competition.

Ellie is like the female version of me, in the sense that she also works for Barstool, so I was happy the committee paired us up together. I assured her that we would win.

But at the last minute, inspired by a foolish lack of trust in my basketball expertise, she bailed on me to go solo.

Maybe next year.