1979

Good luck, Al.

Sponsor Note: I can't get Matt Demorest of HomeSure Lending to sit down for a beer recently because rates recently dropped to the lowest they've been since 2015-'16. If you bought or financed your house in the last year or so, for some reason Matt would rather personally handling whether a refinance now can save you some coin than listen to me be mopey about football and hockey.

He also stepped up to buy us some new equipment and cover the hosting (and host) costs for Sap and I to launch our new podcast, The Teams (first episode here) where we cover one historical Michigan football season per episode. In the process we had to go through a lot of historical teams. Since I have to do the research anyway, I figured I would turn it into some offseason #content you can flip through while Matt is working on your loan.

A Tournament of Great Michigan Football Teams Past

Mostly I wanted a way to have something about all these teams in the blog history. I went with an NCAA basketball-style tournament to keep it interesting as we go. I'll take a few games per episode, pit two great teams against each other, and eulogize the loser. The seeding went like a committee might: more wins, big wins, big postseason wins etc. count, and national champs are treated like conference champs. Since football's gotten harder to win over the years, further back in time means weaker SOS, relegating Bo teams from the Big 2 Little 8 Era to low majors, etc.

M tourney.JPG

We'll start today with the play-in round.

---------------------------

16th Seed Game 1: 1885 vs. 1895

Worthy though they were, Horace G. Prettyman's squad would have gaped at the advancements in the game and Michigan's program just a decade later. Backed by hundreds of dollars raised from the students themselves, and organized by a man who would do more than anyone else to build a premier athletics program at the University of Michigan, the 1895 team would steamroll their forebears, then everyone would go down to Hangsterfer's Saloon (a Mongolian BBQ today) for drinks and songs. 1895 wins 42-2.

The 1895s advance to take on Charles Woodson and the 1997 team. Maybe they can get Prettyman back?

[After THE JUMP: About the 1885 team, and a few more like this]

Brian’s sick so Seth hosts, Craig guest hosts, and Johnny Wangler can finally visit us without fear of white tuxedoed hair fellas.

The Sponsors

We can do this because people support us. You should support them! The show is presented by UGP & The Bo Store, and if it wasn’t for Rishi and Ryan we’d be all be very sad ex-SBNation employees with “real” jobs.

Our other sponsors are also key to all of this: HomeSure Lending, Peak Wealth Management, Ann Arbor Elder Law, the Residence Inn Ann Arbor Downtown, the University of Michigan Alumni Association, Michigan Law Grad, Human Element, and Lantana Hummus

--------------------------------------------

1. RUFRgers

starts at 1:00

A very uninteresting game. Michigan didn’t play their best game, but didn’t need to. Shea never pulled the ball. Did JH troll James Franklin? Tru Wilson had a good game. Craig thinks it’ll be a three-way RB battle next year with Evans, Wilson, and Charbonnet. Lots and lots of Down G. Didn’t run a lot of pistol in this game because the zone read wasn’t a legitimate threat. Shea had a terrific game. Higdon missed a few cuts. Pass protection in the UFR was 100% (!!!). Devin Gil had a really rough game, needs to stay in his lane. Gary had a terrific game.

2. Previewing Indiana

starts at 25:30

Craig’s numbers project a 28- or 29-point win for Michigan. He thinks their record indicates they may do better than that though. Seth rebuts by mentioning that Indiana has gotten a lot of turnover luck and is not a good team. However, Indiana is the forever ChaosTeam for as long as Seth has been a fan. The Hoosiers have zero pass rush whatsoever. Shea shouldn’t need to run this week against a depleted defense. Offense isn’t awful and Peyton Ramsey has a lot of receiving options.

3. Revenge Tour: Nova

starts at 1:45:44

Seth brags about his tweets and Craig asks people about the game at a drugstore. It was a complete defensive domination, but even Craig didn’t expect Brazdeikis to have the game that he did. The charge call early on set the tone for the game. Simpson might be the best defensive point guard Craig has ever seen. Craig thinks that Brooks and Livers are the best shooters on a team that can’t shoot. George Washington looks bad.

4. Gimmicky Top Five New Stadium Traditions

starts at 1:02:14

Seth and Craig discuss the fun new things we yell this year. Of course as soon as we finished up Wangler called so we’ll get him on the podcast soon.

MUSIC:

Featured tonight: Inner Recipe, an early 2000s Ann Arbor band I used to know.

  • “Clear the Rain”
  • “Shape Shifter”
  • “The Stones Thrown”
  • “Across 110th Street”

If you or a friend made some good tunes and don't have a label out scrubbing for them we'd be happy to feature you.

THE USUAL LINKS:

So you don’t subscribe to the theory—put forth by exactly nobody until me just now—that Michigan was dogging it to match the Penn State score?

150121234102-cnn-tonight-deflategate-nichols-brennan-robbins-00034401-tablet-large[1]

MAYBE

The dumbest thing in the world. We are all very fortunate that we experienced the overblown seriousness of NFL reporters for a solid month before ballghazi hit. Otherwise the sheer concentrated stupidity of it would be killing us all right now. People who have tested these things tell you that it's extremely hard to distinguish between 10 PSI and 12, and yet:

image

And that's from Peter King's site. King is the unofficial voice of the NFL, and even he's reduced to throwing a million different articles on his site about a nothing issue.

Elsewhere lunatic screechers have demanded the Pats' removal from the Super Bowl and the ejection of Bill Belichick from the Earth's gravity well. It's enough to turn yesterday's press conferences into bravura performance pieces by the Patriots even though they were the legal crap-speak version of "both teams played hard." I'm down with anyone expressing open contempt at the assembled NFL press corps.

When this happened in college football, the Pac-12 fined Lane Kiffin and we all rolled our eyes at him, then got on with our lives. The NFL has to be so damned serious about everything, though, so we get a solid week of questions like "what can you possibly say to the children about this travesty?"

And there but for the grace of Dave Brandon's uncontrollable urge to email go us.

Harbaugh in the Orange Bowl. I enjoy the bit where he tells Tyrod Taylor that he did indeed throw a spectacularly unlikely touchdown.

Interesting times in Knoxville. A day after Tennessee (and former Michigan DL coach Steve Stripling) cut loose defensive end Marques Ford for no reason whatsoever two weeks before signing day…

"It's an ugly business," LaRosa said. " … In the nasty business, they kept it sort of honest by at least saying that they had other commits and they were pulling his commitment."

…their offensive coordinator pulls up stakes and bolts for the NFL. Turnabout is fair play there. This would be going too far in penance, though:

Jones always has maintained a tight relationship with Mike DeBord, a longtime college and professional coaching veteran, whom NFL sources told VolQuest.com this week could depart an executive-level post in Michigan's athletics department for assistant coaching opportunities back in the NFL.

That would be bonkers. DeBord hasn't coached since 2012 and hasn't had a coordinator spot since 2007.

Ford immediately committed to Rutgers, FWIW.

Angelique on Drevno. Former players are fans:

"We were a team that was pretty beaten down," former Stanford offensive lineman Chris Marinelli said. "Their first order of business was getting us stronger and we pretty quickly became a pretty scary, forceful team. We mauled people. I think people (who follow Michigan) will see that pretty fast. He will get all those guys in tune very quickly. He's one of those people who gets people in line, especially the young guys in terms of breaking habits. It will be a pretty quick turnaround."

FO and SB Nation writer (and former All-Pac-12 OL) Ben Muth:

"Drevs is O-line through and through," Muth said. "He's going to impart toughness on that offensive line. Michigan's offensive line is going to be tough and play physical.

"The great thing about that staff -- they have an identity, and they're going to impart it on you. That's something we didn't have at Stanford, and when Harbaugh got there. He said, 'This is what we run, this is how run it, and other teams are going to have to adjust to us.'"

Having an identity is going to be a welcome change after years of turnover going back even to the Lloyd Carr days, when DeBord came in and went to an exclusively zone stretch system.

HAIR. Via Dr. Sap, here's Rick Leach and Kirk Gibson chatting with each other on a 1979 edition of Michigan Replay:

Another thing on Peppers to safety. Marcus Ray points out something I'd forgotten:

In fact, Ray got an early signal from Peppers in his true freshman season.
"During the season, he told me, 'Hey, I would have preferred to play safety, but I'm a team player,'" Ray recalled. "He said he made a lot of plays at safety in high school. He said he just feels more comfortable there. I think that's a great move.

He played the spot in high school. Ray also thinks he can be Michigan's best there since… 1997. But definitely no longer than that.

Etc.: Hockey scores a lot of goals. O'Bannon legal team now suing over UNC academic scandal. Dylan Larkin putting up a lot of points.