Your feelings on neutral site games?
Michigan unfortunately plays another neutral site game at Jerryworld in 2017 against Florida to open the season. My guess is McElwain will be on the hot seat by then.
With all this talk of Texas' out of touch, tone-deaf AD aka Dave Brandon 2.0 trying to play a game in Mexico City and Dubai(!), what are your thoughts on neutral site games?
ND has whored themselves out to various NFL venues across the country part of their "Shamrock Series" in which they wear horrendous looking uniformz.
Lest we forget about Tennessee and Virginia Tech playing in the Redneck Bowl in 2016 at Bristol Motor Speedway.
what are you thoughts on neutral site games? i think they're a load of shit and should be banned forever. this includes neutral site playoff games sans championship game.
DISCUSS
hate it
DEATH
Home games are more fun for everyone and more profitable for the university. There is literally no advantage to anyone except corporate assholes at ESPN.
better than a home MAC game I guess. If we had to do it, I wish it was in Detroit, Cleveland, Green Bay, Indianapolis, Chicago etc. that I could drive to. At least playing in Texas helps our Texas recruiting.
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TING!!!
This should end the whole discussion.
The Notre Dame games are rooted in some tradition...they used to do that a long time ago as well, particularly going to Yankee Stadium quite often.
I prefer home and homes. The Jerryworld game is an interesting spectacle I guess, but a bad atmosphere by all accounts. The worst is the conference championship games on neutral sites... lame lame lame. Save them for bowl games.
One neutral site game I guess I wouldn't mind seeing in the next few years, since the regular series is dormant and I doubt they'll start a new home and home, is a game against Notre Dame. Play it in New York or Chicago where a ton of alumni are for both schools and have at it. It'd be an interesting way to restart the rivalry and then transition back into playing each other again.
It's more fair no question, but seems like everybody has always complained about the game in Indianapolis being a bad location, no atmosphere, etc. Maybe it works for some conferences (seems to for SEC with the Georgia Dome) but I'd rather the team with better conference W-L get to host, and then tie breakers if necessary. It should be played on conference and home field should be a factor to reward regular season success.
The B1G should move their headquarters to Chicago and play the championship game at Soldier Field weather be damned.
I just don't see the need for conference title games at all. If there are two or three teams tied for first place, good for them.
I'd like to play as many games on campus as possible. Scrap the conference title games and make that weekend, or the one after. the first round of the playoff and host it at the higher-seeded team's stadium.
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I don't see how they really any different from a bowl game. You're getting matched up against a team you wouldnt otherwise play, in a new city and it's kinda of a big deal to the media. I've been to a lot of bowl games and went to the Alabama game and they werent that different to me (at least until the game started and we got our ass kicked).
And just like bowl games, when you win the night of the game and trip home are a blast. You celebrate, party and wear your Michigan gear proudly (see 97 Rose Bowl & 2011 Sugar Bowl). But if you lose you dont really feel like partying that night and flight home takes FOREVER (see 86 & 2004 Rose Bowls & 2012 Kick Off Classic & Outback Bowl). And it sucks when people at the airport see your shirt and say "hey man, I'm sorry" like they did after the Alabama ass-whooping.
When it's something that has some tradition behind it, like the Red River Showdown, it can be cool. Otherwise it's just one more chance for the home schedule to suck every other year. Home-and-homes are better.
Fuck playing Alabama or Florida in Texas, who wants to go to Dallas on a random weekend in September? I'd rather go to Tuscaloosa or Gainesville.
Bowl games are different because they're the last game of the season. I have no reason to give other than pure feels as to why that makes them different, but it does. Maybe it's that other than if you make the CoFoPoff or if you're in an elite bowl there are really no consequences, unlike a regular season game where a big win or big loss can really affect the rest of the year.
It it just another money grab supplanting the pageantry and traditions of college football and therefore looks and feels sleazy.
They used to be played for a reason other than money.
From 1889-1902, Michigan played in 24 regular season neutral site games. They played at places like Bennett Park, the home of the Detroit Tigers that stood on the ground of what would eventually become Tiger Stadium in 1912. Places like the Detroit Athletic Club Field, Armory Park that was home to the Toledo Mud Hens and National League Ball Park in Chicago.
This was due to the expected crowd those games would draw. Regents Field only had a capacity of 6,800 and had a capacity of only 400 until those grandstands burned down in 1896.
There's a reason Michigan stopped playing neutral site games after that time period (unless it was against Army and Navy who played some games at Yankee Stadium/Baltimore Stadium).
They went 87 years without playing a regular season neutral site game that were not at either of those special locations. Because it wasn't needed. Michigan eventually built stadiums to match the size of their success.
Neutral site games are a load of horseshit. But I guess that's the only way you'll ever get to play Florida in the regular season since they're from the same band of idiots who think it's freezing in Michigan in June.
tl;dr- play college games on college campuses. This goes for all sports.
Hate. I would take a home-and-home over a bad opponent before scheduling one of these neutral site games. It gets great ratings for TV and is nice for fans in those areas, but when you only have 12 regular season games a year, it's just too big of a deal to pawn one off to Dallas or Indianapolis, etc. In basketball it works because there are so many games, but not in football.
I liked going to Dallas for the Bama game. There was no need to ever schedule another game there. It's been done.
I'd rather go to a neutral site game than a game in Ann Arbor vs the MAC or App St.
What about a neutral site game against App State at the Panthers' stadium?
/DB'd
pass. Qualtiy would have to be a requirement.
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The thing that irks me is we are left with idiotic scheduling left by the previous athletic director.
I was hoping to have heard we bought out or canceled that game by now. And I still hope we do.
I don't like the neutral site games.
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First of all the neutral site games are never neutral. That's all we really need to know about them.
Unless you play it in the city that no roads lead to.
The city that sits upon permafrost.
The northernmost point in the country.
Barrow Stadium in Barrow, Alaska.
And also the scariest football field pic of all time.
Pandas might be cuter but they can be nasty bastards as well.
"When you're throwing the out, be sure to hit your receiver as soon as he's out of his break...last year Dale threw an out too late and that's how Jim got mauled by a polar bear.
Sad."
Don't like them, but they should have scheduled UM-MSU at Ford Field instead of playing in East Lansing two years in a row. I was surprised DB didn't try to do that.
Yeah, see, that's not a bad idea if you're going to do one. Moderation is key.
On the other hand Illinois moved all of their home games vs Northwestern for the rest of the decade to Soldier Field. So their biggest rival (unless you want to say Indiana who now plays in another division) they basically have a road game against for 5 years in a row (although to be fair Northwestern doesn't exactly pack the stands).
I'm cool with this. The neutral site games that really bug me are when teams play say, LSU and they ask for a neutral site game and offer up the Superdome. Seriously?
They don't give up home games to play at a neutral site.
It would be cool to play a road game against Army at Yankee Stadium.
It's a television game now and nobody but true fans of UM will be watching a Sat noon game at the Big House vs. a directional in-state school. I would prefer ALL games at the Big House, but we can probably better help ourselves with national recruits if we play some major, nationally televised games against perceived national powers like Bamma or Florida--and that will most likely happen in a neutral site game. It's just my opinion, but we probably would have a much more positive take on the Bamma game at JerryWorld if we had kicked their ass during a nationwide broadcast, instead of the way it actually went.
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1. Neutral Site games suck because they're almost never neutral and largely a cash grab. Not only that, it takes away a game that would have likely been a home game in the schedule. I would much rather have Mich play a home and home because it would be amazing to see how fired up people get for their teams. I want to show the SEC fans how crazy and passionate we can get up here in the north.
2. Why do you think McElwain will be in hot seat by 2017? He did great quickly turning around Colorado St. and was a solid OC at Bama. He also has Nussmeier as his OC at Florida and though he didn't work out at Michigan, Nussmeier is regarded as one of the better coordinators around. I saw McElwain as a Gus Malzahn type hire and if he successfully puts in his system, Florida could be a team to watch out for.