Alex Kirshner's tweet--He gets us!
From Alex Kirshner in Brian's Bullet points today: "Michigan basketball fans have the highest chill-to-stress ratio of any fanbase in the country. Michigan football fans have the opposite. These are almost 100% the same people. They're a fascinating psych experiment. These are almost 100% the same people."
Guilty as charged. I guess happiness is a function of expectations, and our expectations for hoops = 1/expectations for football for the last 5 decades and counting.
UM has been searching for the next Bo since the 90s, to no avail and most of us take the hoops team for granted despite enjoying not one but 2 amazing coaches in a row and a natty and Fab 5 before that.
Ironically IU has the next Bo. Tom Allen is clean, hard nosed, fair and tough. And they take him for granted while they continue searching for the next hoops savior.
Expectations...
I'll admit the opposite. Glady enjoy a National Championship in MBB over a OSU football win easy.
Absolutely. I was way more excited for our NC game against Louisville than any football game in my live except the 1998 rose bowl. And looking back on highlights, I get WAY more emotion watching Spike go off, or Trey called for a phantom call than I do watching Tai Streets haul in those long TDs.
I'm more fanatical about football and I can even say FUCK that.
Give me 10 MBB Natty's in a row and 10 straight losses in "The Game". That is the deal of a lifetime.
No way. Give me the national title in hoops any day. I would never trade winning it all in one of the big two sports for anything less than the same. And to me, the big two sports are equal in importance.
he does get us, and this comment section proves his point.
"yes, we're neurotic about our football team, but we deserve it, i mean look how crappy we've been"
Hmm, if you read the game threads during basketball season, they don't seem that chill.
I stopped reading game threads on here long ago. Too many chicken Littles who know nothing about the game.
"UM has been searching for the next Bo since the 90s, to no avail and most of us take the hoops team for granted despite enjoying not one but 2 amazing coaches in a row and a natty and Fab 5 before that."
I think the football chill-to-stress number would change a bit over time if more people were finally willing to allow Bo to sleep peacefully in his plot over on Geddes. That said, I saw the tweet and it is spot on really. Basketball losses tend to get processed quickly and we move on, whereas football losses are something many struggle to completely process, and indeed, they are often relitigated in forums such as this one for weeks, sometimes months. The phenomenon plays out here on this blog in ways that are both hilarious and not quite so hilarious - I'll put it like that.
Hello I am Indiana Football I am 1-28 and clearly the superior football program.
Great IU opposite comparison
Hey, I remember the 80s and the 90s. As football fans, we were chill as hell. Then the late Carr era happened, and well, you know the rest of the story.
Trust me, we came by our PTSD honestly.
I don't think fans were chill at all when Mo had two four-loss seasons in a row.
But, in general, I think the OP sentiment is correct; football, with its fewer games and more constricted access to the playoffs, is a game with much more at stake each game and so fans are going to be more concerned about each competitive matchup.
Tom Allen as the next Bo Schembechler?
They’re really not the same fans. I barely even watch basketball and know zero about the sport, so I barely post about it. Completely different for football. So, the fans aren’t all the same.
Alex is a good guy. Met him a couple of times.