Meet Alex Herrmann, a 17-year old Chicago-area kid who loves college basketball.  He is not to be confused with the late, great Alex Herrmann, a world-famous magician in the nineteenth century.

Herrmann the Magician, Part II (courtesy: Deadspin)

You would be forgiven if you were a little confused, though, as Herrmann the Younger is conjuring up a good amount of magic himself when it comes to filling out this year’s NCAA Tournament brackets.  An NBC Chicago report that came out today introduced the world to the teen who is making the seemingly impossible claim that he picked the entire first two rounds correctly (48-0) on his bracket.  The odds of doing that are approximately 13.5 million to one, which means that the autistic teenager needs to get Tom Cruise on the batphone to scoop him up and make a beeline for Vegas, stat.

His explanation for his incredible prescience (which we’ve never seen nor heard of before, ever).  “I’m good at math.  I’m kind of good at math and at stats I see on TV during the game.”  He’s either one lucky SOB or he has a crystal ball in that head of his because if his national champion pick of Purdue comes through then we’ll be taking the ’49 Buick Roadmaster by his house ourselves to get his picks for next year.  Here he is discussing his strategery.

Here’s the best part.  He entered his picks into the only CBS Sportsline game that doesn’t offer any prizes.  The other two CBS bracket games offer as much as $5,000 per perfect round while Yahoo! and others offer millions for a completely perfect card.  Right.  He may be a brilliant bracket-filler, but he could use a little work in the gaming department.  For a nominal fee, we’ll be happy to help him out with that.  Here’s his bracket.