Gary Parrish, now it's your turn

Aside from thinking the ACC will be the 3rd best conference in the country this year, which is so stupid, as they'll be #1, Gary thought Duke was the second best team in the ACC this year in Men's basketball. Newsflash Gary - If Duke is #2, then the ACC is on par with the MAAC in terms of how good it is this year.

My email rant below.

Gary Gary Gary,

Why do you and so many other writers think that Duke is going to be good this year? This is a team that finished 8-8 in ACC play and for once was actually considered a bubble team! You take away McRoberts from that team and replace him with unproven freshman. What are you left with? A bad PG in Paulus and a horrible player in Shire. Nelson is the only good player on Duke's roster who played big minutes last year.
My biggest problem with your predictions is that you make the argument that Duke is returning 3 guys that started several games last year and that young talent will take them the rest of the way. Yet, Maryland is returning Vasquez, Gist and Hayes, all of which started or played most of the game last year and has several young kids coming in as well. Yet you argue that Maryland will be 7th in the conference because of this "unproven" young talent and you say Duke will rely on young, unproven talent, yet you rank then 2nd. You can't say MD could be good or bad based on their freshman and then turn around and say Duke will be good, even though they'll rely even MORE on their freshman!
Maryland also has Osby coming off the bench or starting(who scores more points per minutes played then the departed Obekwe) and Milbourne who is very athletic but was stuck playing behind Gist, Obekwe and Osby last year as a freshman.

Please Gary, tell me why Duke will be better than Maryland?
Remember, Duke lost TWICE to Maryland last year. I'd have no problem if you ranked Duke 6th and MD 7th, fine. But how do you justify a 5 place discrepancy between the two?
Yes, losing Jones and Strawberry will be a big loss, but I guarantee, having Vasquez and Hayes on the floor at the same time will allow Vasquez to be the shooting guard and by the end of the season, he'll be one of the leagues leading scores, right there with Gist.

How much does Duke pay you Gary? Are you the offspring of Dookie Vital?

Sincerely,
-Dave