Go ahead, rub it in. And buy a T-shirt.

He had done his best answering all the e-mail individually, but finally, our resident expert gave up. He had to craft the following form letter to deal with his full-to-capacity e-mail inbox:

"Dear (Insert Name Of Loyal Reader):

"Thank you for e-mailing me to brag about correctly picking the entire Final Four, something I was incapable of doing thanks to Roy Williams and his choking North Carolina Tar Heels. I understand you must be very proud of your accomplishment, and that telling me about it helps confirm your bracketology greatness.

"Please feel free to purchase my commemorative T-shirt to celebrate this occasion, available at Cafe Press (available very soon). It reads, ‘I beat Bracket Boy in the Office Pool!’ and is available for the low, low price of $17.09. All proceeds to go directly to me.

"Cordially yours,

"Bracket A. Boy.

"P.S. — The ‘A’ stands for ‘Almost.’"

Yes, not to diminish the accomplishments of the people who are 4-for-4 in their office pool, but apparently this was not exactly the most challenging year to pick the field. One year after no top seeds reached Final Four — but No. 4 seed LSU and No. 11 seed George Mason did — chalk ruled this time.

The braggarts are lining up. Mike Scott, the talented artist who provides the daily portraits of our resident expert, picked all four. So did Jim Miller, the diligent copy editor who fixes BB’s frequent mistakes. So did Brendan Prunty, the eager young sports staffer who made his picks on Selection Sunday for the paper.

So did Matt from Sparta, who wrote in to thank Bracket Boy for helping him with three out of the four (but did not explain why he differed on North Carolina). So did "Scary" Ernest Ridlon, who keeps track of all BB’s picks, including a perfect South Regional. So did young Ryan Tracy, who sent our bummed-out bracketologist the following e-mail:

"I am a 6th grader at Halsted Street School in Newton. Why do you think you are so good since you only had three correct Final Four picks? I picked all four correctly and I did not follow college basketball until March Madness!"

So did 161,869 people who entered the ESPN.com contest. Many of you have written BB to ask how to get updates on the Bracket Bucks contest, and we’re working on that now. "But this is a safe bet," BB said. "If you didn’t pick the entire Final Four correctly, you ain’t winning."

In fact, late yesterday afternoon, Bracket Boy was sending out his form letter to all the Miss Cleos and Jean Dixons among his loyal readers when he heard a scratching sound outside the door to the secret lab. He opened the door to find a poodle standing there, wagging its tail.

"Yes, I’ll send you the form letter, too," BB said. "I’ll write it on a milk bone."

Reader mail

The mail keeps rolling in ...

"Holy Hoyas, Batman!" writes David DelNegro of Middlesex. "What kind of person picks against a Thompson and a Ewing in the Elite Eight?"

Bracket Boy responds: "I don’t know, a Smith and a Jordan?"

David Schaefer, like BB, is bitter. "Could the Tar Heels have done any worse in that OT?" he writes. "They had Roy Hibbert and Patrick Ewing Jr. on the ropes with 4 fouls and still couldn’t capitalize. The only thing separating Roy Williams and Marty Schottenheimer is at least Williams has one championship to his credit. Otherwise, his resume from Kansas to North Carolina is like Marty’s: The Big Choke!"

Bracket Boy responds: "Wow. Interesting observation, Big Dave. And I guess you could say Jonathan Wallace was Roy’s John Elway."

Finally, this note comes from loyal former reader Robert Falgares: "You’re fired. Good bye."

BB responds: "Can I keep the stapler?"