Just a post about the things I like about sports

Before I start this post, you should know that I went through, like, three different beginnings for it.  Which is stupid because it's just a post about the things I like about sports (in case you didn't gather that info from the title).  Still, I think it's important that you people know how much I care about bringing you the best possible internet quality product since 2008.  I take this serious.  I flat out bring it.

BRING IT.   Here we go.

Basketball:
I've written before about basketball before, but let's be honest- you just want me to write about it again.

I didn't start playing basketball around 6th grade, but when I did, by golly it grabbed right a hold of me and didn't let go for a long time.  Even when it did let go, it didn't really let go.  It has this very intoxicating rhythm that really drew me in immediately- the bounce of the ball, the squeak of the shoes, the sound of a perfect 'swish' (or a bank shot), the lock-and-load of the shot, the pacing of how the players move up and down the court.  Basketball is basically full-body hypnosis played at full speed.

Things I like about basketball:
- The cutting down of the nets after certain championships.  One of the coolest traditions
- Even though there are different positions, the statistics are the same for all players.  This helps because it is still possible to compare players at a specific position while also allowing for a much more meaningful picture of a player's all-around capabilities.
- A bounce pass caught in stride and taken in for a lay-up/dunk.
- The first weekend of March Madness for being the one sporting event in which upsets are routine.  Nothing like rooting for David knowing that at some point, he's going to slay Goliath.  Just as long as it's not your Goliath. 
- The intimate context of the game.  More than perhaps any other sport (other than maybe golf and tennis, but I don't count those), basketball is performed in the crowd. Fans sit right beside the court, right next to and behind the bench.  Players don't wear helmets, masks, or special padding- shorts and tank tops.  It's all right there, man.  Factor in the crowd noise, and how players feed off of it, and you have arguably the most immersive experience in sports. 
- That calm-before-the-storm moment, when the crowd is starting to get frenetic, and the defense gets a big stop, and they bring the ball back up the court and shoot a three-pointer, and everybody is just sort of suspended in the moment...I love that small period in time, especially when that shot falls and the crowd explodes.  It's probably the most fulfilling moment in sports.
- The back and forth nature of momentum.  I love how one play or one sequence can completely change the nature and complexion of a game- at least until the next one.
- Pistol Pete, Manu Ginobli, and pretty much anyone else that is a physical manifestation of unorthodox genius.

Hockey:

I went to a few hockey games as a young man (although I don't recall much about them), but it was a sucker punch loss that really drew me in.  It was 1994, and the top-seeded and heavily favored Detroit Red Wings lost a heart breaking game 7 to the San Jose Sharks.  As much as it sucked (I suppose it didn't totally suck- I was still a cursory fan at that time, after all), it did cement the Detroit Red Wings as my favorite local team and hockey's place in my heart.

It doesn't hurt that since I've started following sports (early '90s), the Red Wings have had the most success of any local team.  It's a heck of a lot easier to buy in as a fan when you can follow a team that is having success.  Oddly enough though, it's the season-ending losses that reinforce the fandom much more than any Stanley Cup (or equivalent trophy) could.

What I like about hockey:

- The tradition.  Out of the four major sports in the U.S., hockey is the one (well, probably baseball too) that feels like it still has strong ties to the origins of the game.  Football and basketball are drastically different from their genesises (geneses?  genesi?  What's the, um, plural on that?).  Hockey seems like it has remained largely the same (other than equipment changes).  Also, I'm often wrong.
- The Stanley Cup.  I suppose this ties in with the tradition, but it's a specific tradition that I love.  Hockey's postseason tournament is, in my opinion, the most grueling of all of them.  So the Cup, even without taking into account its historical allure, is highly coveted.  Factor in that the winners get their names engraved on the pages of forever, and you can see why players will play through missing teeth, broken ankles, broken noses- you name it, hockey players have probably played through it in pursuit of Lord Stanley's Cup. 

I love seeing the captain (who, a week or so earlier, probably refused to even touch the conference championship trophy, which is another tradition that I love) go grab the cup, skate a victory lap, and then go hand the cup to a person of his choosing (often a long-Cupless vet).  Who could forget when Stevie Y handed the cup to Vladdie back in 1998?  I get chills just thinking about it.

And then the fact that each player gets the Cup for a day during the offseason?  Awesome.  Simply awesome.  I love hearing stories about what each player decides to do with the cup.  Even though some of these things may, on the surface, seem to be "sacrilegious" to the sanctity of the Stanley Cup, I believe that they only add to the prestige and mystique of the sacred chalice.
- The Red Wings uniforms- Clearly this is my being an biased fan, but you gotta admit, it's pretty awesome.  It's so simple in its design, with such an elegant and classic logo- yet it captures something magical.  It serves both as a portal of history- a link between the past and the present- and as a banner of conquest, a unit draped in the flags of conquest.

Sidebar- I love the teams with classic, unchanging (or minorly changing) uniforms- Yankees, Tigers (the Olde English D is always a constant), Celtics, Lakers, Cowboys, Steelers, Blackhawks, Browns, Redskins- there are more, surely.  Yes, a new look can galvanize a fan base for a short time and in some cases even be an improvement, but there's much to be said for tradition playing connect-the-dots over decades. 
- Watching Pavel Datsyuk.  Dude is sweet.  Please watch the video and try to imagine yourself doing these things on skates.  I did and I woke up tangled up so tightly in the couch cushions they needed the Jaws of Life to get me out.  I love watching "court" magicians, people that are so skilled they easily make the best in the world look like beginners.  Datsyuk has skill with the puck similar to Maravich on the court or Barry Sanders on the gridiron.  Some people were just made to make other people look silly.  Those are guys I love to watch.
- The Captain's "C"- Other sports have captains, but they're more of a ceremonial thing.  The NFL seems to award captaincy to anyone who can walk.  Basketball captains don't really anything.  Baseball don't even have captains, yo.  But hockey captains not only have prestige (my friend Phil literally went up six levels of prestige in my eyes when I found out he donned the captains' "C" in high school) but are the only players on the ice who can communicate with the officials, and (as mentioned) are the first people who get to touch/not touch certain trophies. Plus, they get that cool looking "C" on the front of their jerseys. 
- A tip play in front of the goal, when a player lets loose a blast from the blue line and a player in front of the net uses his awesome hand-eye coordination to get a blade on the puck and send it whirling in a completely different direction, sending the goalie scrambling in vain while he watches the puck settle in the net behind him.
- Speaking of goals, the whole post-goal thing- love it.  The sirens blaring, lights spazzing, the team surrounding the offending goal scorer and engaging in an orgy of 'daps' and smiles, then the scoring player skating past his bench and getting even more ridiculous love from his fellow skaters.  It's a wondrous feeling to behold, especially when it's your team scoring in a playoff series against the freaking Predators.
- Playoff beards.  As a facial hair enthusiast, I can't say enough about the playoff beard.  Actually, I'll just show you what I'm talking about.

Oh.  Crap.  Not that one...let's see here...

BOOM.  There we go.  See what I mean?

- Goalie masks.  Just Google "Goalie Masks".  You'll understand.

Baseball:

America's game- I guess?  I do like baseball, don't get me wrong.  It was the first sport I played, and the playing-catch-with-dad meme basically timeless.  Baseball movies also tend to be the most believable out of all sports movies.

Well, okay, but...

I'll give you that one, but..

OKAY, OKAY, I GET IT!!!

Alright, now you're just being mean

I like baseball- when it's the only game in town.  Apologies to those baseball fans who have read down this far, expecting me to wax poetic and help you connect with your favorite game in a deeper, more spiritual way.  But my unconditional love with the game died the day that I dropped that fly ball in the majors that lost us the game.  

Still, there are some things that I enjoy about baseball (other than being the bridge between hockey/basketball and football):

- Crack of the bat.  Or the 'ping' in college basketball.  Bonus points for that special 'crack' that a home run bat gives off.
- Sticking with the sensory stuff, the baseball mitt itself.  The sound that a ball makes when it snaps in there, the smell of the leather, the feel of a nice, broken-in mitt in your hands.  A baseball mitt is probably the most iconic piece of sports equipment in our time.  At least, it's the most tactile.
- Strikeouts.  Specifically, when power pitchers Justin Verlander strike people out with their offspeed stuff.  I mean, the hitter is just standing there, waiting for the heat, anticipating the heat, knowing that the heat is coming- and they get a wicked bender that just makes their knees buckle.
- The All-Star game.  Something about the fact that each player wearing their own unique uniforms while playing on the same team is aesthetically pleasing to me.
- Differences between the leagues.  Actually, this is probably my favoritest thing about baseball.  I love that both leagues are treated like separate entities- different rules (pretty much just the DH, but still- awesome), different stats- sometimes I wish that other sports did that too.  Like the AFC only had three downs to make a first, or Western Conference games only permitted five fouls. 
- Randy Johnson.  I miss watching a dude pitch that could throw hard enough to eviscerate a bird in flight.  Plus- mullet.
- The old stadiums quirks.  The ivy walls of Wrigley (which are quite spectacular in person), the Green Monster of Fenway, the Water Spectacular of Kauffman, McCovey's Cove out in San Francisco.  Obviously every sport stadium has many artificial differences, but these features (and others like them) make each ballpark a completely individual experience. 
- Finally, I mentioned this before, but it deserves special mention in the baseball section: The Olde English D.

Football:

If baseball was the first sport I played, football was the first sport I loved.  It was also the first sport that broke my heart.  It was the University of Michigan against Michigan State in 1990, with the Wolverines ranked the top team in the country.  I will go to my grave believing that Desmond Howard was flagrantly violated on that 2-point play.  I was visibly upset for hours and the pain wrought that day still resonates in my dislike of the green and white.

Football dominated my early sports experience.  Like many boys, we would wage in epic backyard gridiron battles- I was convinced as a youth that my dad should have played QB in the NFL.  Afterwards, I would take the football outside and play pretend games, throwing the ball to myself, making spectacular play after spectacular play.  I even made up my own football league (based on states' nicknames) with its own rosters, stats- I even made football cards for it. 

'Sup.

What I like about football:
- The pacing.  Football lies beautifully between the extreme pace of hoops and the slower gait of soccer and baseball.  It's back and forth but you still have time to breathe.  This makes for a more fulfilling emotional experience- yes, there are "bang-bang" plays that get your heart pumping instantly, but there are also lulls which allow for the momentum to build gradually.  A long scoring drive, followed by a three-and-out, into another long drive that may or may not result in a score- but the end result is that you are firmly in the throes of excitement.  
- All those statistics.  As I love basketball for the solidarity of its statistical measure, so do I love that football has so many statistics.  Not because I think it is some hyper-efficient way to compare players- I'm just somewhat of a numbers junkie, and football has numbers in spades. 
- The padding.  With all the helmets and shoulder pads and such, football players are much like the modern equivalent of the knights of old.  If a player happens to wear a visor in that helmet, it's even better.  I love me some visors.
- Sideline catches.  Definitely one of the most difficult displays of athleticism and coordination in my opinion.  Knowing where you are, being in complete control of all of your extremities, while also having to worry about the defenders who are trying to smash you into pieces touch you with both hands to make sure you're down. 
- Barry Sanders.  Man I miss that guy.
- The option offense.  I think this stems from the first time I saw the Air Force Academy play football- it was some sort of bowl game, and I was blown away by:
A) The fact that there was an Air Force school that got to play football
B) The fact that their mascot is the Falcons but the logo on the side of their helmets is a bolt of lightning
C) The option offense.

As you may have guessed, I'm a big fan of sleight-of-hand type maneuvers in athletics.  Whether it's Pistol Pete doing some crazy pass or Pavel Datsyuk weaving in and out of defenders, I really derive a lot of enjoyment over those special athletes that can take you past what you think is physically possible.  The option offense is pretty much that in unit form.  Eleven men working in unison to basically break the ankles of their defensive counter part.  When it works, it's sick.  Just sick.

Soccer:

I've only been a soccer fan for about four years.  It's definitely the baby of my sports family, so there's admittedly a "new car smell" bias on this list.  I should probably check back in ten years and see how I feel about soccer then.  Of course, if I'm still running this blog in ten years (and you're still reading it), then we should both just immediately fall on our swords to preserve our honor.

Still, I do enjoy many things about the beautiful game.  Such as:

- Crowds- The fans are soooooo passionate, it modifies the enjoyment of the game exponentially.  In real life, soccer crowds are probably too crazy for me (unless I decide one day I'd like to be trampled) but sitting at home, watching on my in-laws 52 inch HD-plasma-whatever TV, I can leach off of their collective passion like a tick sucking on...OH MY GOD THAT'S A TICK ON ME!!!!!
- Running clock.  One of my biggest pet peeves of American sports is all the freaking TV time-outs.  I understand that companies are paying large sums of money for these TV spots which somehow help keep these leagues solvent...or something.  But I love watching soccer because once that ball is in play- it's all action, all the time.  No dead balls stoppages, no time-outs, no breaks for injury- and that's no small thing.  If you've ever watched a soccer game, you realize that it is a common occurrence for players to have near-death experiences.  Especially when that player is in the penalty area.

- Mystery stoppage time.  At the end of each half, some additional time is added to the end to compensate for the fact that the clock never stops (even when the action does).  But it's always sort of mysterious- how much time gets added on?  Who decides, and how is the decision made?  Do they tell the players?  I imagine if you've been running around on the field (sorry, pitch- more on this in a sec), you're probably ready to get to that locker room STAT.  Really, the whole thing is probably just some sociological experiment to see how far you can push people in competitive settings.
- The international aspect.  I know that there is yearly club soccer, but I don't get into that as much.  National teams though?  I eat that stuff up.  I've always loved international competition.  The idea of groups of people playing for something other than individual accolades- playing for a sense of national pride, is likely naive, but still something to root for.  It's like you're not watching players compete- but entire nations.  And that's pretty sweet.

And when it comes to international competition, the World Cup is where it's at.  Yes, there's the winter and summer Olympic games, but realistically, nobody cares about many of those sports.  Besides, no other sport has the competition rate that soccer does.  I mean, jeez, everybody plays soccer.  So when a team wins the World Cup, it can really lay claim to the title of Best in the World. 
- Soccer uniforms.  Soccer uniforms fascinate me, plain and simple.  From the walking billboards that club teams become, to the sometimes-inconsistency of the color schemes, to the fact that goalies wear completely different uniforms (not just equipment- different uniforms), to the exchange of jerseys after a game (I wonder how they decide who to exchange with, and if they actually keep those sweaty, stinky new jerseys)- I simply dig everything about soccer uniforms.  They're the last unexplored frontier.
- Different names for routine things.  Some of this is probably not soccer specific, but still- the vernacular of soccer has been a breath of fresh air.  The field is called a pitch, jerseys are kits, a pass is called a ball, a tying goal is an equalizer, a shutout is a clean sheet, and exhibitions are called friendlies.  I've come to terms with the fact that I'll never learn a foreign language- but I'm well on my way to being able to speak Soccer. 

As hard as it is to believe, these lists are (largely) just off the top of my head.  I'm sure that I could come up with many more.  However, I'll save you all the trouble of reading through another novel and summarize it all like this- sports rule!!!

PICS- Crosby- http://guymanningham.com/wp-content/uploads/2012/04/sidney-crosby-playoff-beard.jpg
Commodore- http://bleacherreport.com/articles/675897-nhl-playoffs-2011-top-25-playoff-beards-in-nhl-history/page/26
Rookie of the year- http://img191.imageshack.us/img191/3599/rotydvdcover.jpg
The Scout- http://ecx.images-amazon.com/images/I/51yvdSMI7-L._SX500_.jpg
Little Big League- http://www.slicksportstalk.com/sites/default/files/post_thumbs/Little%20Big%20League.jpg
Angels in the outfield- http://www.detroitmommies.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/10/Angels_in_the_Outfield_Poster.jpg
English D- http://waiversharks.com/spirit-of-detroit/files/2008/04/old-english-d.jpg

News Flash- Ohio State President is Idiot

There are things that I am, and things that I am not. And one of the things that I am not is afraid to sit here at my computer and say mean things about people. After all, isn't that what we bloggers do? Sit behind our fortresses of facelessness and beef up our bravado?

I read an article today on ESPN.com where The Ohio State U president E. Gordon Gee (Is that his real name? Was he born on Sesame Street? Thank you Santa for the early Christmas Present), or EGG as I will dub him, spouted off his opinion about mid-majors Boise State and TCU and their unworthiness of a national championship game appearance despite their undefeatedness. Now, the presidents of Boise State and TCU have already responded (which makes me smile), but I, the nameless and faceless hero, have not. But I can take it no longer- the silence has made my blood boil, and now I must unboil the blood by being unsilent. Besides, surely an NMU graduate calling out a major college president isn't the silliest calling-out to happen today.

First of all- let it be known that Gee is obviously biased in his assessment. After all- if Boise State and/or TCU get at-large bids in the BCS- well, there is a good chance that OSU is on the outside looking in, since they trail Wisconsin in the most recent BCS standings (and the BCS standings would determine the Big 10 champion if it ended in a 3-way tie), and they trail Boise State and TCU as well. There is a lot of money to be made, and right now, EGG is only in a position to window shop that money.

So what else to do, except go out into the media and plead your case to the masses. I remember Nebraska doing the same thing in 1997- Michigan and Nebraska were both undefeated, but Michigan was number 1, and there was no BCS back then, no way for them to actually settle it on the field. Naturally, what else is a Cornhusker to do except make a lot of noise about how they would just destroy Michigan on the football field (well, that and to have legendary Nebraska coach Tom Osborne retire just before their bowl game. Interesting timing Tom).

Now that we've established that EGG is at best unreliable because he is too close to the situation to be a really objective observer, we can begin to rip on the things that he said.

Far be it from me to judge another human being though. So while I allow the very words of EGG to echo throughout all of teh interwebz, I'll let you make the call. Well, I'll let you make the call after I tell you what he said and then provide my own possibly-slanted commentary.

The following are actual EGG quotes

-"Well, I don't know enough about the X's and O's of college football"- No commentary. Slam dunk. Anytime someone admits that they are ignorant about something, you just slide into 'pretend to listen' mode. If you are trying to speak authoritatively on a subject and then admit that you don't really know much about that subject- then you just laid an egg. EGG.

- "I do know, having been both a Southeastern Conference president and a Big Ten president, that it's like murderer's row every week for these schools." First of all, I've seen The Longest Yard. Both of them. So I can definitively say that you do not play murderer's row every week. Maybe armed robbers row? Or white collar criminals row? I don't know- I'm sure Ohio and Eastern Michigan are not perpetrators of any violent crimes.

-"We do not play the Little Sisters of the Poor. We play very fine schools on any given day."-Oh right, how silly of me to forget that the Big 10 is home to such football goliaths as Indiana (4-7), Purdue (4-7, lost to Toledo), and Minnesota (2-9, lost to South Dakota). On second thought, I believe you owe Little Sisters of the Poor an apology.

-"So I think until a university runs through that gantlet that there's some reason to believe that they not be the best teams to [be] in the big ballgame."- Aside from structurally being a confusing statement- you've already admitted that you don't know much about football. There's much more to the game then the name of the school, or the name of the conference.

-"If you put a gun to my head and said, 'What are you going to do about a playoff system (if) the BCS system as it now exists goes away?'"- What kind of sick masochist thinks of this kind of stuff? Why would somebody ask you a question like that with a gun to your head? They aren't making you do something against your will- they're merely asking for information. 'Give me your opinion or I'll shoot you'. Yeah, that's not how it works- trust me, I've seen Taken.

-"It's not about this incessant drive to have a national championship because I think that's a slippery slope to professionalism"- Because there aren't any athletes getting paid in college sports at this time.

-"I'm a fan of the bowl system and I think that by and large it's worked very, very well."- Let's ask 1994 Penn State about that bowl system. I guess the success depends on how you define your goals. If you want a bunch of meaningless games played in warm weather locations in front of sparsely populated stadiums? The bowl system has been amazing. If you want a definitive national champion? The bowl system sucks ass-assin.

-"You know, it's a mystery," Gee said. "We were No. 1 then No. 11 then No. 7 and we ended up playing for the national championship. I think I kind of like that mixed-up mystery."- You know what else would have mystery and intrigue? Putting the names of all the colleges in the country onto a dartboard, and then putting on a blindfold and throwing darts until you hit the name of a school on the dartboard, and then proclaiming that college as the National Champion.

Mr. EGG, I don't know much about you, other than the fact that you have an amazing name and that you are president of one of the most prestigious universities in all the land. As sole owner and contributor to this blog, I have made many posts that ended up making me look like a fool. This is, of course, in addition to the countless accolades of foolishness I have accumulated over a lifetime of being a fool. When it comes to being a fool, I am peerless as an expert.

So believe me when I tell you that your comments about college football- well, they made you look like a fool. Admittedly, there is no love lost between me and your university (well, there was a little love lost when my bestest cousinfriend Chris went to your school)- but please- I am extending the olive branch now. Leave football alone, and concentrate on the academics of your fine institution

If you continue to put your nose where it doesn't belong- you might just end up poached. Oh come on, I was on a roll. You know you love it.

Eulogy to the Victors, valiant

This post is awesome! I understand this man's reasons for turning his back on his birthright! I'm not sure why I'm screaming!

Holidays are a time for many things, and one of the main thing is self-reflection. It is a time when we tend to look in the mirror and really give ourselves the once over. And I don't think we usually like what we find, hence New Years Resolutions. Comparing ourselves to the ideals of the Christmas season (Love, Sacrifice, Hope, Retail) we often find our own qualities lacking. We decide then that changes need to be made. We make room for the new by sweeping out the old.

It is then with a heavy heart with which I deliver this news- I am no longer going to be a University of Michigan fan.

Now, take a pause to let that sink in. Those of you who really know me know how much I love Michigan football...I love it so much that I get downright angry when they lose. Scratch that- I get downright angry when they throw an incomplete pass! I get very passionate about their successes and failures, and the 1997 National Championship is one of my most cherished football memories, right up there with Charles Woodson and his Heisman and Desmond Howard and his Heisman and Brandent Englemon and his Honorable Mention All-Conference season.


Unfortunately, there have been many more disappointments than appointments...er, um, victories. Two of the most vivid involve the hated Spartans of Michigan. One of them is from 1990, when the then #1 Wolverines lost 28-27 because Desmond Howard was raped in front of over 100,000 people and a two point conversion attempt failed. The second is from 1999, when the Spartan clock operator accidentally thought that 1 second was more like 30 seconds, giving the Spartans time for one last play, which they parlayed into the game winning touchdown. I was so mad that I didn't speak to anyone for the next couple hours. I just sat in the living room, brooding. I also have bitter memories of bowl losses to Washington, Tennessee, Oregon, Texas, and a couple to USC.

Well, in the past couple of months, I've started to reflect. And I've started to think. By the way, the thinking thing has gone on much longer than the past couple of months, smart alecs. There is actually evidence of me thinking as early as 2004 A.D., so hahaha the joke is on you. Anyways, I realized that my intense passion had impacted me to the point where I don't even watch the games anymore because I hate what it does to my mood when they lose. Scratch that, when they blow ONE SINGLE SERIES- I basically explode.

Maybe my expectations are too high- I mean, it's impossible for any team to go undefeated and unscored while scoring on every single one of their possessions...I haven't even managed to pull that off on Xbox, which actually isn't very realistic. But I blame the hype machine for fostering an atmosphere that gives birth to unrealistic expectations.

The fact that Michigan had a losing season and broke a 30+ year bowl game streak is only one thread in a tapestry that has slowly unwoven itself over the past several years and is now a pile of old maize and blue string lying at my feet. The first frays really started in the mid 90's, and our string of four loss seasons. Sure, we were owning the Buckeyes during that time. But why should one victory, even over a hated rival, douse the sting of mediocrity? The 1997 championship provided temporary reprieve, but we followed up that season by losing our first two games of 1998 to Notre Dame and the Donovan McNabb-led Syracuse Stupid Mascot Names. Ugh. More pain.

Watching the Michigan towel boy get leveled in 'Waterboy' and the subsequent LMAO chipped a little more away from the aura of invincibility. A few years ago, I actually stooped to buying a hated Spartan shirt at Steve and Barry's (I still own the shirt, it actually looks fabulous on me). These are things that die-hard fans don't do, and here I was, doing them. But the thing is, I didn't feel dirty. At all. I felt...kinda good.

Once my unfailing devotion to the Wolverines came into question, the curtain fell rather quickly. It was not unaided, however. Tom Brady played a big role in this process. As a Wolverine, I adored Brady, and would have gladdly drank the sweat from his game socks. As a New England Patriot? I would gladly dump gallons of sock-sweat on his pretty-boy face. How could I so callously hate own of the Family? I didn't realize it at the time, but my foundation as a Wolverine had crumbled, to the point where my loyalty to Michigan could be stripped away by something as simple as utter hatred of anything to do with the New England Patriots. Of coures, it doesn't help that over the past few seasons, the Big Ten has been unable to compete on the national scene. Michigan and others have had some scattered success in bowl games and high-profile non-conference games, but there has been this sense that everyone else was taking their games to the next level, while the Big Ten was content to live with this notion of 'Three yards and a cloud of dust'. When we play schools like USC and Texas, it's amazing at how much faster they are than we are. And yeah, we beat Florida last year in the bowl game. Why? Because it was Lloyd's fairwell party. If Lloyd would have been back this past year, I'm pretty confident that Florida would have Tebowed us into submission.

Here's two more reasons. Appalachian State. Toledo. Who? These are two of the teams that have come from completely off the radar to deliver humiliating home losses to the Big House. I mean, do Florida and Texas and Oklahoma lose to 1-AA teams at home? Granted those schools schedule the scum of 1-AA, but they just don't lose those types of games. Not like we have the past two seasons.

But the final straw has been the current Buckeye domination of the Winged Helmets. I know that these things are cyclical, and that in the 90's, we had OSU's number. But when Terrell Pryor turns down a chance to be The Man from day one at Michigan running an offense that was designed by God for his talents to attend the bitter rival...well, that's not cyclical. That's something deeper and more mysterious.

And let's just say that we have another unbeaten season that culminates with a National Championship. What then? What is the point? There is no lasting fruit bore, no spoils to enjoy. The thought always goes to the next season. There is no enjoyment. Next season looms, with its challenges, stresses, and inevitable defeat waiting, lurking. Ugh.

I enjoy watching football, I do. And I find that the most enjoyment that I have is not when I watch Michigan win. No, its when I watch a well played game. It's when I see amazingly awesome big plays. It's when I see hard hits. I like watching upsets, hail marys, goal line stands. These things can happen during any game, at any time, and even more so when I am free of my partisan responsibilities.

Now that I am shedding my emotional millstone, I will be free to enjoy football at any and all times. Sure, when I see Michigan play there will be those feelings of longing. Kinda like when you see an ex girlfriend- you remember the good times, and hope she's doing well, but you can't go back with her because she broke your heart and stole all your records. I'm sure some of you will read this and think I'm overreacting, or that I'm a quitter. 'Wait out the storm', you say, while others might call me a fair weather fan. But you know what? I don't care. Because I'm free. I'm free and I love it.


I'll see ya at the Humanitarian Bowl. Or the Tangerine Bowl. Or the Toilet Bowl. And you'll see me, watching football, having fun, and walking away from it all, smiling.


'Jason, again, I think that you had an excellent post. And even though my first season sucked majorly, and my second season could be just as bad, I can hold a press conference with a smile on my face knowing that I have played a part in pushing away a very loyal fanbase'.


Rich photo #1- blog.nj.com/rutgers_football/2008/06/Rich%20Rodriguez%20Rutgers%20Michigan%20WVU.JPG
Rich photo #2- thewareaglereader.files.wordpress.com/2007/12/rr.jpg

Sending out an S.O.S. for U-M football

Okay, I have to put in a disclaimer that I didn't watch the Michigan game today. I haven't watched much Michigan football over the course of my lifetime. That's because I am a DIEHARD Michigan fan...at least I consider myself one. 'How can you be a DIEHARD fan if you don't even watch their games', you might be thinking, especially after I put the question in the blog. Well, the reason I don't watch is because I'm SO passionate about the Wolverines, that I get very angry when watching them if things go bad- like throw stuff angry. Now, I'm not talking 'give up a touchdown' to lose the lead bad. I'm talking simple stuff, like overthrowing a wide-open receiver in a meaningless game against a MAC school.

At least, the games against the MAC USED to be meaningless. Now, understand, I'm not trying to knock the MAC. I cut my college teeth at CMU, and am very proud of the progress that the MAC has made against big college programs. And if Toledo had beat any other major conference team on the road (like they did in 2000 when they beat Penn State), I would have been whooping it up for the underdog. But see, here's the thing- this wasn't just any other major conference team- this was the MICHIGAN WOLVERINES!!! And this wasn't just any other stadium- this was the BIG HOUSE!!! How do we let, in back to back years, little football peons come into OUR house and walk out as victors? Sure, we have a new coach and a completely new system (which I am actually excited about), and Toledo is historically a solid mid-major program. But I am hurting at the realization that we are not going to have a winning record this year, we are not going to a bowl game, and barring a miracle, we are not going to beat Ohio State. That last one irks me most of all- maybe it's just payback for the Cooper years- because I hate Ohio State- even my Scottish cousin, Chris, who is more like a second brother, couldn't remove the stain of my hate when he chose to attend there. Then Terrelle Pryor rubs it in my face by choosing the Buckeyes over us...okay, I'm getting off on a tangent. My point is that this college football season is already a lost cause for me- and we aren't even halfway done. At least there is the Lions...um...crap. The whole football season is shot.

Go Red Wings!

Photo taken from ESPN.com