Member for

15 years 8 months
Points
2363.00

Recent Comments

Date Title Body
Didn’t see this in the…

Didn’t see this in the manifesto… on the VERY rare occasion that Michigan scored 11 goals and we thus ran out of fingers, we used to hold up a shoe for the goal count instead. (Presumably because we were using our toes to count now too?)

You must be loads of fun at…

You must be loads of fun at parties.

John U. Bacon is…

John U. Bacon is ridiculously overrated.  For being a self-proclaimed "insider," he contributes absolutely nothing to reporting on what's actually going on.  All of his cryptic, no-real-information tweets end up mirroring the general consensus that the dedicated fanbase reached at least 24 hours prior as to what must be going on behind closed doors.  And when was the last time that he was so close to what's going on that he actually scooped, say, an ESPN reporter?

Dude, how many times have…

Dude, how many times have you hit copy and paste on your “I guarantee…” statement tonight???? 40+ times over multiple threads? WE HEAR YOU, YOU’RE NOT THAT AWESOME.

Dude, how many times do you…

Dude, how many times do you feel you need to say this on this thread???

Nice. Maybe don’t be such…

Nice. Maybe don’t be such weirdos about the type of paper this time so there’s actually enough copies to go around. 🤷🏻‍♂️

Siiiiggghh. Goal lines don’t…

Siiiiggghh. Goal lines don’t have shadows; goalposts do. The correct phrase is “shadow of their own goalPOSTS.”

Welp, I guess Carson…

Welp, I guess Carson Barnhart is just going to let everybody run by him today.

WHO ARE YOU CALLING COOTIE…

WHO ARE YOU CALLING COOTIE QUEEN, YOU LINT LICKER?!?!

This is a damn shame. I…

This is a damn shame. I watched my grandfather’s decline and death from Parkinson’s 30 years ago, and similarly watched my father’s death from Parkinson’s last weekend. There appears to be no management of the disease when it’s late-onset (as opposed to early e.g. Michael J. Fox). When my dad was diagnosed I thought that surely there’d have been some advances toward management in the 30 years since my grandfather died, similar to the amazing advances against cancer in that time, but no luck. It’s a death sentence within a few short years. The difference nowadays is the prevalence of Hospice care. In the end, patients now can be made much more physically comfortable than they routinely were 30 years ago.

Goal lines are flat on the…

Goal lines are flat on the ground. They don’t have shadows. The correct saying is, “in the shadow of their own goalPOSTS.”

Just like some moron at some point idiotically started referring to a hook-and-lateral play as “hook and ladder.” There are no ladders out there. Just laterals after the guy running the hook route catches the ball.

I remember around 20 years…

I remember around 20 years ago, Meijer ran a television commercial of a judge in a courtroom with some other grocery chains on trial for making their customers sign up for membership cards to get the good deals. The judge exclaimed, "But I don't want your card!"

The Rock with Sean Connery.

The Rock with Sean Connery.

There once was a girl named…

There once was a girl named Sally

Who enjoyed the occasional dally.

She sat on the lap

Of a well-endowed chap,

And said, "Sir! You're right up my alley!"

I am a Michigan probate…

I am a Michigan probate lawyer. What are you expecting from my brethren in Florida? That they quote you a small flat fee without looking into anything for you yet? Without knowing where the end is? Would you expect a caterer to quote you a flat fee without your giving them a guest headcount? Would you expect a mechanic to quote you a flat fee without checking out your car first? How about a painter without seeing your house? Your issue sounds like it's got "mess" written all over it. A deposit and hourly are absolutely appropriate. If a probate is necessary, the legal heirs are entitled to notification, no matter where or who they are or why they weren't around. Your mother made this bed for herself, and she's going to have to pay some professionals to be able to sleep in it.

No. Tom Goss was AD in 1998…

No. Tom Goss was AD in 1998. Bill Martin didn't start until 2000.

In an early round at the…

In an early round at the Buick Open in Grand Blanc in 2002 I believe, a buddy of mine, Luke (who happens to be the little bro of former Wolverine pitcher Nick Alexander) and I were walking around from group to group.  We were down the right side of the fairway on the par-5 13th, when a ball from the tee winds up near us in the rough.  There's no one else around for 50 yards, so we stand next to the ball and wait for its player to claim it.  Turns out it was Billy Andrade's.  The 13th at Warwick Hills is a reachable par-5 with a few huge specimen trees down the right side (either maples or weeping willows), with the green tucked a bit to the right immediately over a pond.  So Andrade's got about a 220-yard shot with his ball in the moderately thick rough, with one of these big trees about 70 yards in front of him, with the pond and the green directly beyond.  He's talking with his caddie right in front of us, still with no one else around for many yards.  Andrade decides he's going to hit a 3-iron out of the rough, with a low cut under the tree and over the hazard, and somehow stop his ball on the green.  In short, this is an absolutely ridiculous shot that Nicklaus in his prime couldn't have pulled off in a dozen chances.  It's one of those shots that just isn't physically realistic, regardless of one's talent.  I just start chuckling, and Luke looks at me and asks, "What?"  I said, "Luke, I don't think he's got that shot in his bag!"  Of course we're only eight feet away, and Andrade just rolls his eyes and shakes his head as his caddie shoots daggers at me.  Andrade ends up totally screwing up the shot, hitting it way thin and advancing it about 30 yards further up into the rough, with the ball never getting much more than a few inches out of the grass.  Luke doubles over and starts guffawing, and Andrade turns around and glares at him.  Despite that shot, I recall that he might have had a respectable finish in the tournament.

Also that day, we were right to next to Fred Couples as he hit a beautiful little wedge out of the rough through the tiniest gap up in the trees, and landed his ball three feet from the pin.  The crowd went nuts all around us, including a huge guy right behind me (think "Guns don't kill people; I kill people") who started yelling, "Yeah!  Big, big titties, Freddie!  Great big funbags!  Whoooooooo!"  Couples turned around and grinned.

It really is a shame that tournament doesn't exist anymore.

Yes, yes, yes, but NCAA…

Yes, yes, yes, but NCAA decision or not, those games were actually played.  It's nice having the cushion that the vacated wins provides, but I'd rather be ahead of ND straight up.  And honestly I would not be surprised if those wins are restored at some point.

In 2011, with Northwestern at

In 2011, with Northwestern at the Michigan 37 with 7:00 left and driving for the tying touchdown, Jordan Kovacs ripped off Dan Persa's helmet without tackling him on fourth down.  The officials blew the play dead because the ball carrier's helmet came off.  First down going the other way, and Michigan salted it away.  Seemed to me pretty fishy that a defender can make the play dead by ripping off a helmet without getting flagged for a blow to the head or facemasking.

In 2003 in the opener against

In 2003 in the opener against Washington Braylon Edwards pretty clearly dropped a 4th-and-2 pass at midfield with 26 seconds left (and it was abundantly clear from his own body language that even he thought he dropped it as the defender hit him).  But Michigan pounced on the ball, the refs ruled it a fumble and first down before Washington went on to get flagged 15 yards for too many men on the defense, and Phil Brabbs became a hero as time expired.  It was a bad call then, and never would've withstood replay today.

Since 1969:
Playing as AP

Since 1969:

Playing as AP #7:  19-7-0, .731

Playing as AP #15:  13-3-1, .794

Epstein was a great kickoff

Epstein was a great kickoff man, a good punter, and had a strong leg, but he was only ever okay for accuracy. He was only 26-for-42 on his career, with 3 missed extra points.  And never forget the 2000 game at UCLA, the 23-20 loss, in which he missed a 46-yarder, a 24-yarder with 3 minutes left, and an extra point.

I am not at all confident

I am not at all confident that the vacated records will stick upon ND's appeal.  ND's initial response to the sanction actually sounded pretty good to me, better than similar statements by other schools in other situations... (1) this was a situation of a student on the very fringe of the school's football officialdom helping out players in a few isolated incidents, and once officialdom found out about it they shut it down and did everything right to report, cooperate, etc.; and (2) according to ND at least, there's no precedent for vacated record in that kind of situation.

If (2) is indeed true, I'd bet vacating of wins doesn't stick.  This wasn't like OSU systematically turning a blind eye to tattoo-gate and then Tressel trying to cover it up.

In the lead-up to ND's game against Duke earlier in the year, I wrote a diary (link) about the historical race between U-M and ND for all-time wins and winning percentage.  I'd hate to see that historical relationship now made moot for something like this; I'd much prefer to see U-M now maintain and widen its advantage through domination on the field.

And I LOVE the idea of ND simply being the #2 also-ran to U-M.

Yeah, I definitely thought

Yeah, I definitely thought about this, and didn't spend enough time thinking about it to come up with something good.  The question should probably be something like, "At what point are you ahead by more than one score with an unreasonable amount of time on the clock for the opponent to be able to come back to beat you?"  But it's tough to determine just how subjective one should be; second- and third-string players come into play, as well as momentum and morale.

For instance, in weeding out the garbage-time scores... take a look at this year's MSU game.  Michigan went into bleed-the-clock mode early-ish in the fourth quarter, up by 20 points.  The game was, for all intents and purposes, over.  MSU scored with 7:31 remaining to close the gap to 13 points, 30-17.  In the flow of the game at that point, this was probably a "garbage-time" score, given also the quality of the teams.  It wasn't a meaningless score, however; MSU was only down 13 points with half of the fourth quarter left.  Teams have come back from farther behind with less time on the clock than that.  However, I did consider the touchdown with 0:01 left on the clock to be a garbage-time score, because that score truly was meaningless.

(Actually because of the final go-for-two debacle, this year's MSU game didn't play into the adjustment to the calculation for garbage-time points, because Michigan beat 17 points at the same time it beat 23 points... when Michigan's total hit 24 with 0:39 left in the second quarter.)

 

The Paul Bunyan trophy has

The Paul Bunyan trophy has never been exchanged on the field/sideline (at least not in the past several decades).  It's always been done out of sight in the locker rooms.  Between statue, base, and wooden stand, it's huge.

Ready to go.

Ready to go.

FWIW, the graphic in that

FWIW, the graphic in that link is wrong as to ND's numbers.  It lists ND's record as 894-316-42, .7308.  They forgot the hurricane last Saturday.  ND now stands at 894-317-42, .7302.

Also, this is stupid.  Need to play big-time football to be listed with the big-time schools.

Whoops, my bad lol.

Whoops, my bad lol.

What makes it even more

What makes it even more amazing is that most of Michigan's non-conference games in the Point-a-Minute era were less than the regulation 70 minutes (two 35-minute halves).  The teams would agree before the game to play 20- or 25-minute halves, etc., and the losing team would often concede at some point in the second half (as Stanford did in the first Rose Bowl).  What allowed Michigan to run up such high scores in many shortened games was the kickoff strategy back then... the team that was scored upon had the option to either kickoff or receive.  In that era with games often massively turning on a turnover or penalty, teams usually chose to kickoff back to their opponent who had just scored, to try to keep the ball out of their own end.  Michigan spent huge chunks of those games on offense.

vs. Illinois in 2010; 69-67,

vs. Illinois in 2010; 69-67, 3OT.

Interesting that none of

Interesting that none of those are close games at all, and most feature goose eggs, whereas if you'd expanded your criteria by one more point to include games in which Michigan scored 69, there'd be a 69-67 game up there.

Great post.  I love creative

Great post.  I love creative use of stats.

Utah was unranked for its

Utah was unranked for its game with Michigan last year, although Utah would finish the season ranked #17.

After the final AP poll this year I'll give a report on Michigan's record post-Bump against teams that finished the season ranked, rather than against rankings at game time.

No, it's not even that the

No, it's not even that the page you've linked isn't updated yet for this season... it's just completely wrong.

Notre Dame's official online media guide for this season (http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/nd/sports/m-footbl/auto_pdf/2016-17/misc_non_event/16-media-guide.pdf ... scroll to page 139) lists the Irish's all-time record as 892-313-42 (now 893-315-42 after three games).  Your buddy's link lists 892-314-41.  I don't know how you reconcile that at all, except to say that whoever runs the site at that link was working with very poor information or has very fat thumbs.

Michigan's official game notes for this week (http://grfx.cstv.com/photos/schools/mich/sports/m-footbl/auto_pdf/2016-17/release/release_20160919aaa.pdf ... scroll to page 2) lists the Wolverines' all-time record (updated as of last weekend) as 928-331-36.  Your buddy's link lists 925-333-38.  Again, I have no idea how you reconcile that.

(Also, to review the history of the winning percentage and wins races, I went season-by-season for each school, adding up the cumulative record per each school's official season record history... in each case, the totals added up to each school's published official all-time record, as one would expect.)

Your buddy and his goofy site are just plain wrong.

 

Moreover, if you want to

Moreover, if you want to include FCS schools, Yale is actually 3rd on the wins list, with 890.

Ha yes, good point.  I'll let

Ha yes, good point.  I'll let you argue that one for history.  Every school started off at either .000, .500, or 1.000.

And for that matter, Michigan's win percentage after the 1880 season was .8333 (2-0-1), but it seems silly to count that... like something STAEE would do. 

Yup, 861 not 681.  Thanks.

Yup, 861 not 681.  Thanks.  *edited*

Thanks!  *edited*

Thanks!  *edited*

Don't know if Colorado is

Don't know if Colorado is bringing the band this weekend, but if they do, you'll likely hear a little bit of one of the worst in the mediocre division.

Yes, I mentioned several

Yes, I mentioned several "other" songs of schools ("Eyes of Texas" is one of these).  Although several are great ("Buckeye Battle Cry" and "Hike, Notre Dame" in particular could've made the top ten list), I restricted my rankings to the schools' "official" primary fight songs.

Yes, Miami in particular is

Yes, Miami in particular is in the running with Maryland for the booby prize.

See response to Michigan

See response to Michigan Arrogance's comment above.

Clemson's version of "Tiger

Clemson's version of "Tiger Rag" is far and away the best; I don't think it's close.  It didn't really qualify as one of the top ten in my book because the song was initially a popular song... not written as a fight song.  And so many schools use it in some way.

See my comment above for

See my comment above for "Ramblin' Wreck from Georgia Tech" re. Army's fight song.

Navy's official fight song, "Anchors Aweigh," is great, but I really consider it more of a military march than a fight song.  Although it was written partly to be an athletics song, it has no lyrics regarding athletics, winning the game, etc.; it's just a naval song.  A great one, but not really a fight song.  To me it's just a tad slow to really be a crowd rouser.

Air Force uses "The U.S. Air Force" (Off we go into the wild blue yonder...) as a fight song, but it's not the academy's official fight song.  The official song, "Falcon Fight Song," is not bad at all.  Not top-ten worthy, though.

I absolutely agree with you

I absolutely agree with you on the richness of sound in Victors vs. Victory March, but pure musicality isn't going to be the only criterion for just about anybody putting together a list like this.  And yes, there's not much science behind it... mostly personal preference.

I love Tennessee's use and

I love Tennessee's use and arrangement of "Rocky Top."  But although they use it as a fight song, it's not their official fight song.  "Down the Field" is.

 

I actually thought they

I actually thought they looked pretty good; it's a classic and classy helmet design, after all.  The uses I don't like are the tri-color version, with base color 1, wings color 2, and stripes color 3.

Game was more competitive than the score indicated.  Running an entirely new system, some fundamentals were forgotten.  The Winged T offense moved the ball pretty well in stretches.

Possible additions?

Hero of Tiananmen Square (John Pollack, king of futile Big House preservation attempts)

nailcoeds.exe (computer program executed by Chad Henne after a robotically awesome performance)

First Yakety Sax Game / The Fucking Beat Down I (ND 2006)

Second Yakety Sax Game / The Fucking Beat Down II (ND 2007)

The Blip (Wisconsin 2008)

Dr. Vorax (Greg Robinson's stuffed animal)

Dilithium (Denard Robinson running the ball)

TGMFWITHOMFW (The Greatest Mid-February Weekend In The History Of Mid-February Weekends; Feb 17-19, 2012; hockey sweeps NMU, basketball upsets OSU, 8 4-star football recruits commit)

Pit Bull Game (Penn State 2006)

Buffalo Stampede Game (Minnesota 2003)

Dinopunt/Puntosaur (traditional punt formation/tactics)

The Post-Apocalyptic Oregon Game (Oregon 2007)

Football Armegeddon (OSU 2006)

Year of Infinite Pain (2005)

Most Legendary Press Conference Ever (Brady Hoke introduction)

The Ryan Mallett Experience (Wisconsin 2007)

Resumption of Normal Service (ND and Penn State 2007)

Baby Seal State Game (Delaware State 2009)

Fandom Endurance Games (I, II, III, and IV) (is there a IV yet?)

Threetsheridammit (the two-headed quarterback of 2008) 

Hero of Tiananmen Square

Hero of Tiananmen Square (John Pollack, king of futile Big House preservation attempts)

nailcoeds.exe (computer program executed by Chad Henne after a robotically awesome performance)

First Yakety Sax Game / The Fucking Beat Down I (ND 2006)

Second Yakety Sax Game / The Fucking Beat Down II (ND 2007)

The Blip (Wisconsin 2008)

Dr. Vorax (Greg Robinson's stuffed animal)

Dilithium (Denard Robinson running the ball)

TGMFWITHOMFW (The Greatest Mid-February Weekend In The History Of Mid-February Weekends; Feb 17-19, 2012; hockey sweeps NMU, basketball upsets OSU, 8 4-star football recruits commit)

Pit Bull Game (Penn State 2006)

Buffalo Stampede Game (Minnesota 2003)

Dinopunt/Puntosaur (traditional punt formation/tactics)

The Post-Apocalyptic Oregon Game (Oregon 2007)

Football Armegeddon (OSU 2006)

Year of Infinite Pain (2005)

Most Legendary Press Conference Ever (Brady Hoke introduction)

The Ryan Mallett Experience (Wisconsin 2007)

Resumption of Normal Service (ND and Penn State 2007)

Baby Seal State Game (Delaware State 2009)

Fandom Endurance Games (I, II, III, and IV) (is there a IV yet?)

Threetsheridammit (the two-headed quarterback of 2008)

 

The mock committee was torn

The mock committee was torn between Wisconsin and Syracuse for the last 1-seed.  They gave it to Syracuse based on fewer losses (the mock committee really didn't like Wisconsin's horrible January run).  That made Wisconsin the overall #5, the highest ranked 2-seed.  Michigan IIRC was the last 2-seed, overall #8.  So Wisconsin got placed in its nearest regional before Michigan did.