Historical significance of this World Series trip
1 other B1G team has been to the College World Series since Michigan last did it in 1984.
Indiana in 2013. The outright B1G Champion and host of a regional. This was before the NCAA seeded to 16 teams, but they were pretty much the defacto 10 seed. The NCAA starting giving national seeds shortly after.
Michigan was listed in the last four in field of the NCAA Tournament selection committee. Michigan was 1 out away from the season ending in Omaha but in the B1G Tournament against Illinois last month. The comeback win against the Illini and the two B1G Tournament wins that followed is what secured the NCAA bid.
Michigan wasn't just an unseeded team nationally but we were a regional 3 seed in Corvallis. So 16 national seed Oregon State and regional 2 seed Creighton were supposed to win that regional before us. Then this team goes on the road to the #1 ranked team in the country in both the polls and the NCAA Tournament seeds and eliminates them. And quite frankly should've swept them.
This is as big of a shock to the college baseball system/landscape as there has been in many years. If you look hard enough on twitter you'll see fans of other B1G teams rooting for us because this is a Midwest vs everybody thing. The deck is stacked against teams from this region.
1953, 1962, 1978, 1980, 1981, 1983, 1984 and 2019. It's been a long road back since the NCAA scandal that gutted the program in the early 90s.
Just to be clear, there is no way to actually know that they were 1 out away from the season being over against Illinois. People just keep saying that because it adds to the story.
Sure... you’re wrong... but ok....
I'm sure your friends on the committee confirmed that for you.
We get your point - there is no actual way to tell if UM would, or would not, have been picked for the tourney had they lost to Illinois. The problem people have with it, is that without those 3 extra wins in a pressure packed conference tournament, Michigan would have been just another early loser in a largely weak and irrelevant baseball conference.
There was no promise of a tourney invite had Michigan won those games. But it was a virtual lock they would have been excluded had they lost. Stop trying to be the smartest guy in the room...
It has nothing to do with being the smartest guy in the room. Would just prefer we stop sensationalizing the story. It's good enough as it is.
Just to be clear, they were one of the last 4 in i believe, and that's after the Illinois, Maryland and Nebraska wins in the B1G tourney
It's as 99.99% certain that those 3 wins got them in.
Illinois was ranked 28 and Nebraska was ranked 35 in the final RPI. Without those two wins, it's more than likely Michigan wouldn't have gotten in the tournament.
Michigan finished with an RPI of 39 if anybody is wondering.
Good research. RPI for Big Ten teams + teams in Michigan regional/super-regional brackets.
2 UCLA
20 Oregon State (Michigan did not play OSU(ntosu))
23 Creighton
28 Illinois (lost to 38 Clemson and 89 Jacksonville St)
35 Nebraska (lost to 7 Ok St and 29 UConn)
36 Indiana (lost to 9 Louisville and 26 Illinois St)
39 Michigan (well, yeah, you know)
96 Cincinnati
We take on 8 seed and 11 rpi Texas Tech next.
Just happy that we no longer have to hear about the marine layer every 5 seconds.
But the outfielders are playing too deep.
Or that the outfielders are playing no-doubles too close to the warning track.
Seriously. I wonder why the marine layer "causes the ball to carry further".
If you're serious...
https://physics.csuchico.edu/baseball/Pubs/MarineLayer.pdf
http://www.theweatherprediction.com/habyhints/285/
https://www.popsci.com/best-weather-for-hitting-home-run-baseball
The first one is less a scientific , physics-based analysis and more of a statistical analysis, but the basic idea is that humidity makes air less dense. Higher air temp is also less dense than colder air temps, so warm and humid would seem to be more likely to create better hitting conditions. However, data suggests the effect is relatively minimal.
IANAP (I am not a physicist)
Good info, but the consensus was just the opposite. Whatever the Marine Layer is, when it moved in off the water the ball supposedly didn't carry as well. That's why Donovan's 9th inning shot to the wall didn't make it out. And somebody else hit a warning-track fly late yesterday that, according to the announcing team, would've been a home run earlier in the game. The implication all weekend was that the Marine Layer reduced ball flight.
Thus concludes my discussion of the Marine Layer for this lifetime.
I lived for a few years right near the UCLA baseball stadium and the marine layer is a real thing, but it was usually a morning thing. I don't really remember it happening at night.
The marine layer is the greatest layer in the world.
The general oddity of color guy Wes Whatever-his-name-is can not be overstated. That dude made no sense all weekend long. Hopefully that's the last we hear of that announcing team.
Yea one of my favorites was Friday night, his saying a "long single" would get the guy from 1st, home...no brah, no it wouldn't have, the deep playing outfielders are, contrary to popular belief, allowed to move and go TO the ball!
As someone who lives year-round with the marine layer, I am grateful for it's existence. That's what keeps Redondo Beach in the mid-60's when it's high 90's inland. I have no problem with "May gray" or "June gloom". It's the "blistering heat of July and August" that I have a problem with. That, and the earthquake swarms. Those are never fun.
I've been frustrated with the gray this year, given the historically rainy winter. But I gained a new appreciation for the marine layer this weekend when it blew off while I was playing tennis. Would much rather play when it's cloudy and 65 than sunny and 85.
My question is who is the next baseball coach for UM? Who is coaching the team right now? Interim? Whoever fired Bakich after they were down to Illinois looks like a genius because this team has really responded.
Fire Bakich
Submitted by goblue85 on May 23rd, 2019 at 11:31 AM
Time to let him go is now. Year after year with disappointment to end year.
Fire ? Bakich‼️
With our 3 starting pitchers we could be in it to win it, as long as we stop goofing off defensively.
I think our hitting will somewhat come around---after all, UCLA had the overall best team ERA in the NCAA this year and slowed but didn't completely stop our hitters.
We probably have a one year window of opportunity this year. Let's make the best of it!
The CWS is set up for teams with great starting pitching. Unlike the regionals, where Michigan had to play 4 games in 4 days, there is no point where a team would have to play more than 3 games in any 4 day period.
Depth-wise Michigan is in over its heads, but that didn't stop them this week. You never know what can happen.
IMO, we weren't helped by the late start, and long duration of game 2 with those errors. The game finished @ 2am our time, and all 5 or 6 errors came after the 8th or 9th inning. So pretty obvious to see that our guys were half asleep and couldn't fully concentrate. Gotta think we will be fine in that regard in omaha.
What was the scandal in the 90s?
The baseball team was in charge of selling the programs on football Saturdays, under the supervision of the coach (Bud Middaugh). Some of the money from program sales somehow ended up in the players' pockets.
The AD at the time (Bo) fired Middaugh, turned him in to the NCAA, and tried, very unsuccessfully, to press embezzlement charges. NCAA gave Michigan 2 years probation and a scholarship limitation. The Michigan athletic department seemed to have encouraged the NCAA to punish the baseball team beyond all proportion, maybe because Middaugh had filed a wrongful dismissal suit against the University. That suit was eventually settled out of court.
Turned in for taking some money selling programs. Long live Bo!
while others are selling their programs (integrity) to make some money.
LOL ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS??
ONLY MICHIGAN would torch its basketball program and baseball program for shit that everyone else does.
The stupidity in the AD never ceases to amaze me
NEVER CHANGE Michigan NEVER CHANGE.
It was a different time. We thought the rules applied to everybody.
Ethics are timeless. I will never fault UM for adhering to them.
Not paying college athletes isn’t an ethical stance at all.
Are they paying for tuition? Room? Board? Books? Tutors? Training? Medicals? Publicity? Sounds like they are getting quite a bit of ethical compensation as it is (and that's just the above-the-board benefits).
All which pale in comparison to the amount of money they produce for the school especially basketball and football.
Not ethical. Try again.
Michigan loved (prior to this summer) to shake its head at the Fab Five era, but did the school give back all the money it made during it? No? Okay, so the whole system is an exploitative sham. Got it.
All of their own choice as well. In fact, they beat out hundreds (if not thousands) of other potential student athletes for those opportunities. Must be a good deal for that kind of demand.
This made me LOL.
never change, cube, never change.
"everyone does it" is the worst justification there is, for anything you can name, and i'm not even talking about sports. if you believe in honesty and integrity you don't say it.
and if you think bo goddamned schembechler would've responded any other way, you really, really, really, really, really, REALLY don't understand bo schembechler. at all.
I’m going to reiterate, paying college athletes is not a question about moral ethics or integrity.
yah, well, go ahead and see if i said that.
what i did say was that "everyone does it" is not an argument i would make, nor is it an argument i would want my alma mater to make.
if you think "everyone does it" is a case that should or would get made by the university of michigan, you don't get this place at all.
What I expect is the school to do the bare minimum to comply when it comes to "self-punishment."
Michigan went out of its way to crater its basketball, and apparently baseball, programs for no reason. None other than some stupid sense of a "moral high ground."
That is just stupid.
the flip side, of course, is the sort of "ha-ha, we punished ourselves but not really" bullshit that we complain about whenever it happens with another school.
i'll take our approach with no regrets.
Middaugh was one of the more successful coaches Michigan baseball has had. But the very moment Bo found out about the payments, he fired Middaugh without even talking to him about it.
'You did what, now? You're fired. Get out, we'll box up your stuff and send it to you.'
I distinctly remember the Detroit papers having a slight hissy fit because it all happened so abruptly. Fucking with Bo about integrity issues is just something you didn't get away with.
CWS & Middaugh - the rest of the story (sometimes I feel as old as Craig Ross)
He replaced Moby Benedict, who, whatever his faults, was a word up straight arrow man of faith.
Moby was the last coach not hired by Canham.
Back in the days of a 32 team tournament with 8 regionals, the NCAA would usually put one in the Northeast and one in the Midwest.
So EMU hosted in 75 and 76, and Michigan in 78, which we won.
So, we also hosted in 1980, 1981, 1983, and won them all, as well as winning the 1984 regional hosted by CMU.
Before Middaugh, track coach Jack Harvey and wrestling coach Billy Johannesen ran the football program sales.
The rugby and lacrosse club team members were eligible, and the end of the season program commission check went to their sport.
(programs were a buck, and the 7% commission was raised to 10% in 1977)
A stadium pass was also issued to program sellers, as these were the days before 100k crowds every game.
Baseball players were also eligible to sell programs but got to keep their commission checks.
They also got free use of the golf course.
PERFECTLY LEGAL UNDER NCAA RULES AT THE TIME
These would both be NCAA violations now.
Middaugh was apparently fudging the commission checks so that pitchers and other favorites got more $, no matter how many programs they sold.
Also, he was illegally working out high school pitchers in A2, during which at least one guy injured his arm and ruined his career.
Apparently, some high school players were told they had some kind of scholarship (baseball uses lots of partial ones) only to show up on campus and find out there was none.
Pitcher Ross Powell did not show for his 1989 post-season appointment with Bo, new in the AD job, who was investigating what had been going on in the program, instead turning pro, having been drafted in the 3rd round after his junior year. (10-0, 2.48 ERA, team MVP)
Middaugh resigned that July.
Others may have more of the ugly details
I know both you and Craig, and, while you are old, you are NOT as old as Craig
i seem to remember that middaugh created "manager" positions for a few players and paid them more than the other football program sellers; similar to what you state. and that was the ncaa violation.
I can only tell you what I experienced. I was given the opportunity to sell programs before the football games and I was paid a small commission just like you described. It wasn’t much, but it was the exact amount it should have been, based on the number of programs I sold. If others had a “special deal”, I wasn’t aware of it. It was a shame what happened. I remember reading that Don Canham said that Bud was “railroaded”.
You are right that Moby was a straight arrow. He used to say that, “you represent the University of Michigan, the Baseball Team, and your family. If you do anything to embarrass any one of them, you will no longer be part of this Team.”
As long as we’re talking history, the program with the most wins in college baseball is Fordham, followed by Texas, followed by ... drum roll ... Michigan.
third is NOT GOOD ENOUGH
we are a BASEBALL SCHOOL you know
I thank you for sharing this, because you could have given me 200 guesses and I never would have picked Fordham as the all-time leader. Moreover, Fordham is about 1,000 wins ahead of Texas, which is about 600 wins ahead of Michigan.
(I suppose it should not be surprising that Michigan is #3 all-time since the celebration of 150 years of Michigan athletics a couple of years ago was in honor of Baseball Team #1 in 1866.)
