With the first pick of the second round (50th overall), the Washington Nationals select … Cal second baseman Jeff Kobernus.

Turns out the scouts weren’t lying to Bears coach David Esquer when they told him Kobernus wouldn’t last past the third round. Kobernus is a tall, lanky middle infielder with good range who helped his own cause by spending the last month or so of the 2009 season in an unconscious state every time he picked up a bat.

And as we speak, Bears right fielder/first baseman/designated hitter/pitcher Blake Smith is drafted with the 56th overall pick by the Los Angeles Dodgers. Smith and Jackson were the ones who got all the hype going into 2009, Smith mostly because of his performance last summer with the Team USA Collegiate National Team.

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After months of waiting and wondering where he would go in the 2009 MLB Amateur Draft, former Cal baseball center fielder Brett Jackson will simply be trading the block “C” on his cap for one of a slightly different shape.

Jackson, who was projected by most mock drafts to go in the mid- to late-first round, was drafted No. 31 overall by the Chicago Cubs on Tuesday evening, becoming the fourth-highest pick in Cal program history and the third first-rounder that coach David Esquer has produced at the Bears’ helm. The Orinda, Calif., native was the 10th outfielder drafted and gave Cal a first-round pick for the second straight year. The Toronto Blue Jays drafted David Cooper 17th overall in 2008.

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Barack Obama unveiled his NCAA tournament bracket picks earlier today in the New York Times and in a 10-minute spot with Andy Katz on ESPN.com, strengthening his hold on the title of “Coolest President Ever.”

The President picked a Final Four of three No. 1 seeds and a No. 2 — Louisville, Pitt, North Carolina and Memphis. He has the Tar Heels winning a North Carolina-Pitt championship game. But out of the few upsets that he picked, one of those, inexplicably, was No. 7 seed Cal losing in the first round to No. 10 seed Maryland.
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On Monday, the U.S. Basketball Writers Association named Cal men’s basketball coach Mike Montgomery a finalist for the Henry Iba Award, coming one step closer to proving that good work doesn’t go unnoticed even in the Pac-10.

Montgomery is one of 10 finalists for the award, which is given annually to the Association’s national coach of the year. He and Utah State coach Stew Morrill are the only two finalists whose teams aren’t currently in the AP Top 25.

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Still bitter about the Cal football team’s BCS snub in 2004 and Texas coach Mack Brown’s “politickin’”? If so (and we can’t say we blame you), this might be the perfect outlet for your four-year grudge.

According to the website BCSReform.org, California congressman Gary Miller has introduced H.R. 599 in order to “bring about college football playoffs.” Apparently Miller’s main change would be prohibiting the receipt of all federal funding by any school whose football team competes in the FBS unless a playoff is established. Yikes. The site calls for help from “college football fans across America” to persuade Congress to pass a “playoff law” that newly inaugurated President Barack Obama—admittedly a proponent of the playoff system—can then sign.

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Back to back losses to Stanford and Oregon State didn’t seem to hurt the Cal men’s basketball team’s image too much, at least in the eyes of Joe Lunardi. ESPN’s resident bracketologist still has the Bears as a No. 6 seed in the NCAA tournament as of Monday morning.

Cal is one of only four Pac-10 teams in the projected bracket. UCLA, experiencing a mini-meltdown partway through conference play (which in Westwood means a 15-4 record) is a No. 7 seed, current Pac-10 leader Washington is an unlucky No. 8 seed and Arizona State is a No. 4.

Women’s hoops, meanwhile, was a projected No. 3 seed on Jan 20—the last time that Charlie Creme updated his prognostication of the Madness. That was before the Bears swept the Oregon schools on the road last weekend, so we’ll see if they snag that coveted two-seed this week.

The Cal women are also tabbed at No. 7 in the latest AP poll.

Participating in a postseason all-star game/NFL scout field day that’s as much about the week leading up to the game as it is about the event itself, former Cal football players (technically) Alex Mack and Zack Follett both seem to have upped their draft stock at the 2009 Senior Bowl.

Follett didn’t start the game, but he finished with four tackles, three of which were solo stops. “Tenacious Z” was also mentioned by Rob Rang of NFLDraftScout.com in his Jan. 22 breakdown of the linebackers and defensive backs at the Senior Bowl. Apparently, the linebacker “showed better instincts than expected, blowing up a screen during the scrimmage…” Wonder who the unlucky slot receiver was on that play. That’s a sight we’ll miss around Strawberry Canyon.

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The Cal football team is back in the national rankings today after putting up a 66-spot on Saturday.

The Bears are No. 23 in the AP rankings and No. 25 in the USA Today poll. I’d venture a guess that everybody associated with the team will stress just how much unimportant the rankings really are. Coach Tedford is going to say that he hasn’t seen them (which is probably true.) But that little number goes a long way in the eye of the national viewer.

5:25 p.m. So the Bears go out not with a bang, but with a whimper. Austin Booker looks at an inside fastball for strike three, and Long Beach State lives to play another day with a 9-2 victory over Cal. It’s a disappointing end to a dream season in which the Bears ascended to No. 6 in the country before coming back down to earth at USC and Arizona State. And then, in their first postseason appearance in six years, the Bears go two and out at the Long Beach regional.

That’s all for today from Long Beach. Check Monday’s Daily Californian for full coverage of this weekend’s action.

5:18 p.m. In another nod towards seniority, Dane Ferguson comes in with two outs to try to record the final out for the Bears, facing Jonathan Jones with a runner on third.

Ferguson hits Jones with an inside fastball and walks Brandon Godfrey on four pitches, but he settles in enough to coax a ground ball to first base out of Shane Peterson. Cal goes into its last at-bat still down by seven runs. It’ll be Satin leading off, followed by Jackson and probably a pinch hitter. Ryan Hanlon was swinging a bat between innings and it looks like Austin Booker might have a helmet on.

The PA system is playing “The Final Countdown.” It’s ominous.

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5:17: So that’s it for the Daily Cal’s live blog of the NFL Draft. Chris Berman may have just put it best: this year’s Draft wasn’t “sexy.” Almost half of the first-round picks were lineman. A lot of skill players were passed over until the late first and early second rounds. Cal’s big-name receiver wasn’t taken until the 49th pick, although he did beat the changeover to ESPN2.

And yet, what’s strange is that DeSean still managed to become a big figure in the Draft. Along with the other big-name receivers, like Malcolm Kelly, James Hardy and Limas Sweed (who was finally picked 54th by the Steelers), Jackson’s name came up repeatedly mainly because he fell so far from where he was projected. Yes, he was called “diminutive” and “small,” but the ESPN guys talked several times about his speed and his playmaking ability. We’ll see how he holds up taking hits in the NFC East.

The Draft continues until the end of the second round this evening, with rounds three through seven tomorrow. Cal still has hopefuls for tomorrow—Lavelle, Justin Forsett and Thomas Decoud, to name a few. We’ll keep our fingers crossed for them as well. From all of us here at the Daily Cal Draft live blog—and by that I mean my roommate and myself—thanks for tuning in.

4:57: And there it is. DeSean Jackson goes to the Philadelphia Eagles with the 49th pick. I’m pretty sure there was a mock that predicted that. Just not in the second round. So DeSean goes to the Eagles, where he’ll be catching passes from Donovan McNabb and trying to boost a receiving corps that was anchored last year by Kevin Curtis, a 3rd-round pick out of Utah State in 2003.

4:52: DeSean is on the phone. I repeat, DeSean is on the phone. And wearing sunglasses indoors.

4:48: The Bengals take Jerome Simpson, a wide receiver from Coastal Carolina. Yes, it’s an obscure school. But he makes one-handed catches and he definitely jumped over a standing defender during a game. I guess DeSean never did that.
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