alabama

Eatin': taken. One of our new MGoShirts is this:

I was sent the usual batch of ideas to thumb up or thumb down and thumbed this one up because I'd either missed or forgotten the fact that Martavious Odoms had put together a charity for a hurting city of Pahokee with a shirt based around the same concept. As the kids who are now about 35 say, my bad.

We've taken the thing down for now and are in the process of reaching out to Hope For Pahokee so we can put it back up and donate the proceeds to them. I'll let you know when we get cleared.

Ufer. A recut version of a Ufer thing I've posted before.

Honor Willis Ward. The Michigan State game marks the 78th anniversary of the Georgia Tech-Michigan game that saw Tech protest the existence of Willis Ward. Gerald Ford had to be talked out of quitting the team after Ward was benched; Michigan won 9-2, defeating racism forever*.

Anyway, the state legislature is making October 20th Willis Ward day and the filmmakers who have been publicizing his story are trying to get something together for the Michigan State game. It seems like this would be one of those things where you talk to someone in the athletic department and he says "of course," but must not be since the guys behind the idea are assembling an online petition to help bolster their case.

Hit it up. More details are available at MVictors.

*[Probably. I haven't done a whole lot of research on this point.]

Oh my God run around in circles yesss. Sunday Morning QB returns. Matt Hinton's still writing for a couple of other outlets, so its glory may not reach the heights of long long ago but at least now there is a place for Hinton to put the things that are 1) very good and 2) not likely to end up on the Yahoo front page because they're not viral™. See: a comprehensive overview of the have-nots. Bookmark/RSS away.

This is more like it. Indiana just announced a student loyalty program that actually seems worthwhile:

Under the new priority seating system, students earn -and have earned– priority points while they are in school by purchasing men’s basketball and/or football season tickets each year. To reward the most loyal student fans, the 3900 students with the most priority points heading into the 2012-13 school year will be guaranteed the lower bowl seats for the highly anticipated North Carolina game on November 27, 2012.

IU students earn priority points while they are in school by purchasing men’s basketball and football tickets. Students receive 5 points each time they purchase season tickets with a maximum of 10 points per year if they purchase them for both men’s basketball and football season. Also new this year, students will have an additional opportunity to earn loyalty points by attending the games for which they have tickets, or making certain their tickets are used by other students. One point will be given for each game attended or each time an individual ticket is scanned at the gate. Only the original ticket holder can earn loyalty points for the use of their tickets. The more loyalty points a student earns, the better chance they have of obtaining the student tickets allocated for post-season tournaments (NCAA, Big Ten Tournament, etc.). Student point totals for purchased season tickets are automatically transferred to alumni point totals following the student’s graduation from IU.

They also base ticket availability at certain other premium games on their points. No check-ins, a tangible reward that really matters to the students in question (sweet seats and good tickets) and is not a t-shirt.

Oh, man. The MZone makes a thunderous return by rounding up videos of Alabama fans on Youtube.

I'm not sure about anything anymore.

Yes please. The SEC is loosening their rules for in-stadium video replays, but why did they have this one in the first place?

In the past, the SEC had a one real-time replay policy for all plays in all sports.

These companies that suck up digital rights and try to monetize them are all pretty bad—try explaining fair use to one—but XOS is the worst by far. Anyway, the SEC is now going to allow replays from the TV network broadcasting the game (again, why prohibit this?) during reviews. I'm guessing that decision is to prevent biased home-field folks from ramping up outrage by selectively picking favorable angles. It makes sense.

The stated reason for the change is to keep fans coming to games by making the in-stadium experience not worse than sitting at home. Here's hoping Purdue and other schools that have trouble selling out ram this through in the Big Ten.

Um? Brady Hoke has a much different take on the new kickoff rules than any I'd seen before:

On the new kickoff rules: "I think as it plays out, there will be a little more we all learn. You try to use the NFL model from a year ago the best you can. The one thing you learn from the NFL, guys are taking it out of the end zone 8 yards deep. I think you’ll see more of that. Personally, if we can get the ball or give the opponent the ball at the 25, that is something I’ll be happy with."

Why would you run the ball out eight yards deep? Because the kick return guys can't get there in time? I'd be surprised if there was that much of a difference. Certainly not enough to justify a KO attempt where you have to make it 33 yards to break even. Touchbacks ho.

Plead down. MLive's Kyle Meinke just tweeted this out:

Michigan RB Fitz Toussaint, facing operating while intoxicated charge, pleads down to operating while visibly impaired

A quick googling turns up a bunch of sketchy law firms, but the Michigan site has the various penalties for these things and OWVI looks almost identical to OWI. Still assume that Toussaint is suspended for Alabama and Hoke is playing silly fun games with Nick Saban, who is totally fooled.

Etc.: Chantel Jennings Mike Rothstein on Desmond Morgan.

one I agree with!

1: pew pew pew  2: a man Al Borges isn't 3: an alternate universe

Ojemudia redshirt?

I think there is no way Mario O plays.  A ton of guys could be put on field before him.  Several combos could fill the WDE spot better, eg Ryan-Cam Gordon combo puts our best, or at least most experienced, backup on the field, Ryan-Avery is similar, or how about flip back Roh for a Roh-Brink/Heitzman/Wormley/Black(?) replacement.  Given how important a redshirt could be to Mario, I would think coaches will be creative.  

-Dirk

I agree with you philosophically. Ojemudia should get a redshirt. I get frustrated when certain players have theirs burned for what seems like no reason. I'm with you, man. But… I don't see how he doesn't get on the field if Clark's issues are severe.

The problem with the above scenarios is that they reduce Michigan's specialization by flipping guys around and they still leave Michigan an injury from putting Ojemudia on the field. Is that injury reasonably likely? Yeah. So it seems to make more sense to leave Ryan at SLB full time, where he is still getting a grasp on all the particulars, and Roh at SDE, where he needs every snap he can get to figure out how to deal with his size limitations. The immediate payoff here seems real, and given the way Michigan is recruiting they figure they will be able to insert a Taco Charlton or 2014 kid into the lineup when Ojemudia graduates without losing too much. Of course, Mattison just told everyone that he was comfortable with the idea of Ryan at WDE in practice and proclaimed his faith in Cam Gordon's ability, so what do I know?

But even with that move, you're still juggling just three players between two positions. That's not tenable. If the coaches know Clark is going to be back relatively promptly, then I can see holding Ojemudia out the first couple games and getting him the redshirt. If Clark's out until Notre Dame or later, I think you have to blood Ojemudia and worry about the consequences in the distant future.

Triple option?

Brian,

This may be a non feasible idea, but why not kill two birds with one stone by creating a triple option package for Denard and company? Everyone says its really hard to prepare for Air Force, and we could prepare our defense while surprising the crap out of Alabama. Think about it, our RB, FB, QB combo are familiar with zone reads and are a lot better than any combo air force will ever have. We surprised Ohio with the inverted veer last year, and Bama's young defense won't know what hit 'em.

In addition, I can't help but think kicking and coverage teams, plus Denard's (hopefully) reduction in interceptions will make up for the fortunate 80% fumble recovery rate. The special teams will likely improve with the influx of talent and depth we are getting, or negated by rule changes. Either way its a net gain for Michigan in special teams.

Jim

Unfortunately I think we have to file that under "not feasible." Triple option is not something you can go into halfway. Hell, Michigan's speed option last year was mostly a Denard run off-tackle that had little if any chance of getting to the tailback. The one time Denard pitched it was a fumble caused when a blitzing linebacker met him after he'd taken one step playside. While it had the excellent benefit of keeping defenses honest and shooting Denard into secondaries, calling it an "option" is being generous.

Adding a true triple option and trying to get him to better understand Borges's West Coast passing attack is way too much to bite off in one fall camp. Since Borges is what he is, he's going to do what he does, and that's get Denard to throw more accurate balls that are less frequently intercepted.

The inverted veer is a different business because it's a handoff. The worst thing that happens there is you make the wrong decision and you eat some yardage. We almost saw the worst thing with the option last year, and that's the last thing an offense trying to cut down on turnovers needs.

IN RE: making up for fewer fumbles recovered. I'm not sure the special teams will be much better than last year except in the realm of punting. Gibbons is still Gibbons, kick returns just got nerfed, and it's damn hard to have an impact punt return game these days what with everyone spread-punting their way to seven gunners. Punting should be better because Hagerup will either get his foot on straight or a quick hook for the steady Wile, but we're talking a few yards a game.

The interceptions, sure. Denard's interception rate dropped over the tougher second half of the year and he should improve somewhere between noticeably and spectacularly in year two with Borges. That still leaves Michigan treading water even in the most optimistic turnover scenario, and the schedule has taken a turn for the bear-like.

brian,

pre-bama thought experiment. in december of 2006, alabama offers rich rodriguez their head coaching job. he accepts. what happens to both alabama and michigan from then on?

trippwelborneID

Well, let's start with Alabama. They struggle through an RR-at-WVU transition year probably a little bit worse than their initial 6-6 Saban year, with Star Jackson taking over for the Bama bangs QBs midseason. Jackson doesn't end up transferring to nowheresville and becomes something like Pat White but probably not as good. No one gives six hundredths of a crap about the academics of RR's incoming recruits or Rita's jaguar pants, but RR probably still makes his fatal "I don't need Casteel that badly" error. With a somewhat more secure powerbase and money-providing demons, he does not hire GERG on try #2 and cycles through one of the then-available proven SEC DCs (Jon Chavis, for example).

This plus the better fit with his recruiting makes his defense not the worst ever assembled at the school he's coaching. He gets his QB a year earlier and has considerably better talent than he inherited at Michigan. He's replacing a total loser, one of many such since Bear. He does at least okay, probably pulls off an SEC title game or two, maybe wins it once, and sees a BCS bid or two.

He's probably still at Alabama in a Pelini-esque state: decent success, the fanbase is relatively happy with him, but they'll start to sour after a subpar year and two means you're out, buddy.

Meanwhile, Michigan finds itself adrift in the middle of the Les Miles/Bill Martin boat thing without a seemingly A-list candidate willing to jump. At that point I have no idea what they do. At the time I was muttering about how Jim Grobe mutterings were just the worst. Ferentz was out, Schiano was out, Miles was out, and Tedford was seemingly uninterested. Michigan clearly had no idea where to go, whereupon Rodriguez fell into their lap.

If Rodriguez is not there… does it matter? I'm not sure it matters. Lloyd was not Bo but he did have an impressive winning percentage, a national title, and the continuation of a record bowl streak. Would a pro-style coach have been able to turn Threet/Sheridan/no OL/nobody at all into a bowl appearance? I don't think so. At that point you're working from behind the eight ball and you have to be really fantastic to pull yourself out of that tailspin. Would Hoke have survived that? I doubt it; at that point his resume was a bunch of .500 seasons at Ball State. Would any outsider Michigan could have acquired have managed to hang on? Maybe by another year or two.

Even if we have no clue about who takes the reins in RR's absence in 2008, we can hazard a guess at their fate: similar hammering by OSU, flameout in 3-5 years, replacement. That's the way of things whenever you replace a legend, and if Carr wasn't a legend (debatable) he was definitely the continuation of Bo. It would have taken a truly A-level coach to not bomb out with no quarterbacks and no safeties and no offensive line, and it didn't look like any were available.

In the end, both programs are probably happy with the way things turned out. Alabama's case: duh. Michigan's: Rodriguez was such a terrible fit that Michigan rejected it in three years, at which point Hoke was just plausible enough to show up and shock everyone by doing everything right for going on 18 months.

I really wish you hadn't asked me about that thing, you know, that
I know let's talk about bunnies
I like bunnies they are fun
sometimes I call them funnies

But what will actually happen to Penn State? This space has talked at length about what should happen to Penn State, but what actually will is an open question. NCAA president Mark Emmert certainly made it sound like something is coming down the pipe in an interview with PBS, because, yeah, PBS!

"This is completely different than an impermissible benefits scandal like (what) happened at SMU, or anything else we've dealt with," Emmert told Smiley. "This is as systemic a cultural problem as it is a football problem. There have been people that said this wasn't a football scandal.

"Well, it was more than a football scandal, much more than a football scandal. It was that but much more. And we'll have to figure out exactly what the right penalties are. I don't know that past precedent makes particularly good sense in this case, because it's really an unprecedented problem."

He said that after refusing to dismiss the application of the death penalty out of hand. So… there will be some sort of action. Michael Buckner has been quoted…

"Even though there's no authority under the [NCAA manual], I could see President Emmert still proposing to do something," said Michael Buckner, a Florida-based attorney who specializes in sports law. "I could see some kind of sanctions, and Penn State would be hard-pressed to fight it. Imagine Penn State trying to argue that the NCAA doesn't have the authority in the realm of public pressure?"

…stuff is going down.

The Bylaw Blog points out that the NCAA is in a lose-lose situation here, what with New York Times columnists blasting it and demanding Penn State's head on a platter, an advocacy group for athletes has announced it would like Penn State players to be able to transfer without penalty—which everyone learned was automatic when postseason bans got handed down in the USC case—and people of Facebook are not sane.

UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE UPDATE!

You will now think "ERMAHGERD" whenever Denard does a Denard thing this fall.

Via EDSBS and /r/cfb. Explanation.

Michigan hockey summer: the funnest summer. I think we thought we were out of the woods after losing Chris Brown to Phoenix and Connor Carrick to a bout of insanity, but it seems like Merrill is not 100% to return based on this NHL.com article:

"I'm happy with the way my game has developed," Merrill said. "Everything they do at Michigan, I stand by, and have no complaints. If I go back to school, I can develop in a great university and if I leave, I'm in a great organization like New Jersey; so it's a win-win."

Michigan coach Red Berenson, who left Michigan after his junior year to play with the Montreal Canadiens, has traditionally encouraged players to remain in school rather than signing minor-league contracts. The Devils don't seem to be pressing Merrill on the issue.

"It's undecided right now," Lamoriello said. "He's here for the week and we'll sit down at the end of the week."

It does sound like all parties are leaning towards Merrill's return, but Michigan hockey + summer  == doom.

Berenson exit imminent. Not like, imminent-imminent, but Red said he's probably not going to have another contract after this one:

“I mean let’s face it, I’ll be 76 when this contract is over. So I would say it’s the last contract,” Berenson said. “In theory, you would say this will be the last contract. I would be surprised if there would be another one after this.”

…“The way I look at it, I’m not picking a goal or a situation to retire. The thing I’m looking at is what’s good for our program, are we moving forward, are we competitive, are we living up to the expectations of Michigan and are we one of the dominant players in college hockey?” Berenson said.

When Red does retire I think it's time to put his name on the building. Something, anyway.

"More?" An Alabama legend called out Auburn for its dirty recruiting tactics after GA LB Rueben Foster ostentatiously flipped from 'Bama to AU recently. He might want to pick his words better:

“Because Reuben was paid more (by Auburn) than Alabama was willing to pay him. We got boosters out there that weren’t willing to pay Reuben Foster and boosters willing to pay him in Auburn.”

Where rebounds go. An analytics company has found out and put together a cool flash application so you can see where rebounds go off NBA shots.

Morals of the story:

• They mostly go long.
• Boy, people try a lot of layups.
• Offensive rebounds are far more common on those layup attempts than anything else.
• Long twos are horrible, horrible shots: there are a couple zones beyond the arc near the corners. Threes from the corners go in at a 36.6% rate. Step inside the line and it's a 37.6 rate for one less point. The differences are greater from what I'll call the Aarghaway zone but still very slim: long twos around the top of the key go in at just under 39%; threes from the top going at around 33%. These are NBA numbers and can't be directly transported to the college game but since the main difference is that a chunk of the long two space in the NBA is worth three in college I'd guess those shooting percentages are even more compressed.

Long twos are horrible! Long twos are hoooooorrrrrrible! Long twos with 25 seconds on the shot clock are grounds for a civil lawsuit based on pain and suffering!

I dislike long twos.

[Via @kjonthebanks]

And nevermind all that also. Nevermind all the thats. Raising the bowl eligibility threshold to 7-5 has seemed like a thing that would happen for a while now, but now the Big Ten is backing off of that, too:

Delany said he has “heard from friends in different parts of the country, some of the major conferences, that they are in favor of (keeping it at) six. I suggested that maybe there’s middle ground. If a program hasn’t been to a bowl in five years … it’s an exciting thing.”

As long as the bowls at the bottom are prevented from acting as parasites on college football, whatever. The existence of the Illinois-UCLA Fight Hunger Bowl is at worst an opportunity to launch zingers… as long as those two schools aren't forking over 500k for tickets they know they can't sell.

Additional doo-dad. It must be fun being a Big Ten athletic director these days. Every year the conference is like "whoops, forgot to give you these three million dollars," the Rose Bowl is suddenly worth triple what it was, the Big Ten Network is steadily increasing in value, and maybe the guy before you built a giant cash factory on top of the football stadium. MSU doesn't even have the last item in that list (or at least hasn't added it recently) and they've been dumping money into football. An ESPN article recently boggled at the money Indiana is flat-out burning in a futile attempt to keep up with the meekest and most humble of the Joneses by way of noting that everyone in college football is building everything.

One of many results at Michigan:

Michigan athletic director Dave Brandon is putting forward a proposal to the school's Board of Regents on Thursday asking for $2.8 million for an "informational marquee" that can be viewed from Stadium Boulevard. The plan is to use "visual and audio technology" for information on upcoming events and welcoming guests to the facilities.

I'm a little leery about audio being included in this thing but whatever. It'll be a big billboard type thing on Stadium that will announce things. It costs money, and it is being done because it can be.

Etc.: Red signs three-year extension, as expected. Syracuse fans are sad about leaving the Big East. CHN on the Kitchener nuisance lawsuit. M seems to lead for 2015 IN G Chandler White. Obviously a long way out there. Scouting the Adidas Invitational. Zak Irvin scouting video.

The glory of signing with Alabama. Three-star DT Darius Philon announced he'd be going to Alabama on Signing Day. He did it like this:

If that seems unusual, it's because Philon had probably just been told that he wasn't actually going to Alabama. Alabama swung a decommit and pulled his offer; Philon ended up signing with Arkansas, a school he hadn't so much as visited. The actual video is… weird:

The AJC says the "moral of the story" is…

If you commit to Alabama, it’s safe unless you get injured or Alabama has the opportunity to upgrade at your position before you officially sign the paperwork.

Inspiring stuff.

Horford redshirt update: happening. Jon Horford's injury redshirt has been increasingly likely with every game he misses and now seems all but certain. Horford himself says as much:

"If coach said, 'We absolutely need you to come back,' I could come back," Horford said Sunday following Michigan's 64-54 loss to Michigan State. "But other than that, I've missed so many games that I feel like coming back at this point would almost be a waste of a season."

In the long run that's probably a good thing for the program as it will move Horford out of Jordan Morgan's class and give the team a fifth-year senior to rely on after he departs (and who knows what Mitch McGary's going to do). That will help bridge the gap between this generation of posts and the Bielfeldt/Donnal setup. Speaking of Bielfeldt…

Bielfeldt hype. Beilein talked up the redshirting freshman in a conference call recently:

He came in here with really bad tendonitis in his knees and was not nearly as athletic as he (had shown in the past)," Beilein said during the Big Ten coaches teleconference. "He was really just struggling. But he's young, with a young birthday, and given the fact that we were still evolving with some positions here, it did not make sense for him or for us to burn a redshirt."

The tendons have gotten better and allowed him to play scout-team center:

"He's a big man with good hands, and those aren't a dime a dozen," Beilein said. "He's a tremendous rebounder. Where he's not gifted vertically, he's really good in small spaces."

It'll be interesting to see what he plays like… and where. He doesn't seem like either a four or a five at 6'7", 240. Presumably he'll be a backup at both spots for his first couple seasons.

The move. I'm not in agreement that Belichick's decision to let New York score in the waning moments of the Super Bowl was "the ballsiest call in Super Bowl History." It was obvious. The choices there are between watching an NFL kicker attempt a virtual extra point with no time on the clock or giving Tom Brady a minute with which to attempt the comeback.

It would have been ballsy if Belichick had come out of the two-minute warning with a red carpet and instructed his defense to bodily carry any Giant with the ball into the endzone. It also would have been correct:

The smartest play of all would've been for Belichick to have allowed the touchdown even earlier. The Patriots certainly could have done so on the play prior to Bradshaw's touchdown run, when he was stopped for a one-yard gain, forcing New England to burn its second timeout. In fact, they probably should have allowed a touchdown as early as the two-minute warning.That's the point at which the Win Probability of receiving a kickoff down by four or six points (0.23) exceeds the Win Probability of trying to stop the Giants from bleeding the clock dry (0.2). The Patriots would have had almost two minutes, two timeouts, and all four downs available to get a touchdown and steal the win. The lesson: New England didn't lie down soon enough.

Always quit, son.

The difference. There are many reasons I couldn't give two craps about the NFL. Many derive from the fact that merely contemplating Tom Coughlin's staid, fun-murdering face seriously damages my quality of life.

Many others are summarized by the Lombardi trophy presentation. Michael from Braves & Birds contrasts Barca's celebrations after winning the Champions League with the ceremony last night:

Instead of a football icon handing the trophy over, we get Roger Goodell, a life-long NFL suit who is most noted for giving himself the power to suspend players for any reason he sees fit and for persuading Peter King to write the most sycophantic cover story that I can recall reading in Sports Illustrated. Instead of a [Barcelona FC] totem like Puyol or a cancer-survivor like Abidal accepting the trophy, we had the New York Giants' owners getting the honor. Puyol and Abidal got the right to hold the trophy aloft because they established themselves as some of the best players in the world at their positions; John Mara and Steve Tisch got the right to hoist the Lombardi Trophy because they inherited the team from their parents.

The Michigan equivalent would be handing the Sugar Bowl trophy to Dave Brandon. This, thankfully, does not happen. Instead we get Junior Hemingway breaking down.

Juxtaposing a Michigan-MSU game at Breslin with the Super Bowl on the same day really drove the point home.

I am much more invested in the stories of people who have reasons to do what they are doing other than "I have a contract."

Tooley. Derek Dooley is amazingly hypocritical:

“I’m still trying to figure out what I’m missing,” he said. “You have these contracts. It’s called quid pro quo. We give you this. You give us that. But if they don’t give us that and we decide not to give them this, then it’s the worst thing you can do. I’m still struggling to understand that issue…”

This verges on "I'm not even mad, I'm impressed" territory.

Etc.: Jim Herrmann might be coming back to be Iowa's DC, which would be the most Kirk Ferentz move ever. NCAA president urges school presidents to support multi-year scholarship offers. 2012 hockey recruit Justin Selman's stock seems to be on the rise.

[Tardy thanks to MRI, about which more later, and Stonum going poof. Please excuse any datedness that may appear.]

Some progress. Over the summer the SEC further clamped down on oversigning by reducing a Houston Nutt-induced cap of 28 signees in any particular year—a fig leaf—to an actually impactful 25. You only have to look at Michigan's projected 2012 class of 27 or 28 to know there's at least some teeth in the SEC's latest cap, but if you want more direct evidence, Georgia running back Justin Taylor provides it:

One of Georgia’s top running backs said that was told by Alabama’s Nick Saban this weekend that he will have to wait until next year to sign with the Crimson Tide. …

Coach Saban just said I’m the 26th commitment. I would be the 26th signee. I guess he went and picked up somebody else. He said I make 26 and they only get 25. They talked about bringing me in next January.” [Note: Alabama has 27 commitments]

That somebody else was Auburn decommit and five-star TJ Yeldon. Taylor, a generic three star who lost his senior year to a knee injury, is now adrift two weeks before signing day after spending almost a year committed to the Tide.

In a hilarious effort to create a binding commitment between a party with no power and College Football Stalin, Saban proposed they deploy a +5 Napkin of Ultimate Bonding:

"He said he was going to sign me with the next class. But he also said he would sign a piece of paper to show that they are keeping their word – they are going to sign it and they want me to sign it to make sure I know I still have my scholarship"

You have to hand it to Saban. That is weaselry worthy of Magnetar. The HSR suggests a T-shirt:

So Saban is still a disingenuous weasel. Here he does exactly what Sevon Pittman did to MSU, except he's a millionaire adult instead of an addled 18-year old with two dollars to his name. He is still committed but looking at options, which means he's trying to find a landing place as fast as possible.

At least Taylor found that out before he signed a document that committed him to Alabama but not vice-versa. This is still not ideal since 25 x 4 = 100 and it seems like a reasonable number to average on a yearly basis is 22, but it does forcibly hack the worst oversigning offenders' practices in half.

To repeat the brilliant suggestion of an Oversigning.com commenter, the best way to fix the problem is to do away with an 85 player limit entirely in favor of a yearly limit on letters of intent somewhere between 22 and 26. This removes any incentive to take kids off the team. Unfortunately, Title IX probably makes this impossible.

Indiana State could not be reached for comment.

Decline and fall. Virginia Tech's special teams looked surprisingly weak in the metrics tracked by the NCAA, but that fails to account for blocks and whatnot that were a large portion of the "Beamerball" free touchdowns. I wondered if that had evaporated recently. Survey says:

One blocked kick with major upside per year each of the last three,  with a couple of blocked PATs thrown in there. Foster's defense is keeping them afloat these days. Not that there's anything wrong with that. I just thought it was interesting.

We're really mad now, you guys. The NCAA is going to get serious… just in time for Ohio State to get off mad easy. I'll believe this when I see it:

"We were damn mad and not going to take it anymore," Ed Ray, Oregon State president and chair of the Enforcement Working Group, said.

Given Miami AD Paul Dee's comeuppance after the "high profile compliance" shot against Reggie Bush, expect Oregon State to be swallowed whole within the year. The working group has created a penalty matrix that provides two different violation levels with a total of eight tiers between them. No one seems to know what goes in those categories but hoo boy, getting hit with a Significant Level I violation would net you a 2-3 year postseason ban and a loss of 38-50% of your scholarships. Dang.

Apparently even Michigan's piddling violations would have netted a four-scholarship loss "per year"—not sure how many years we're talking about here—which is more than OSU's massive year long head-coach-lying carnivale got them. Again, believe it when I see some athletic department burned to the ground.

At least they didn't take dumb action. The totally outrageous proposal to hack down scholarship numbers in an era when TV networks can't throw enough money at schools was voted down. Also it sounds like the 2,000 stipend may return in some other form and the board of the directors is going to make schools who want to override the multi-year scholarship proposal get a 5/8ths majority to vote it down.

So okay. The Indiana States of the world can stew.

Guh. A portion of a paywalled interview with Brandon on playoffs brings up an old canard that's annoying when bloggers deploy it and doubly so when it's your athletic director($):

"This whole notion of a playoff is ridiculous because I don't care what you come up with, it's not going to be a fair playoff. You've got a bunch of teams that don't play one another and play different competition and in different time zones in different conferences in different stadiums in front of different crowds and different weather and suddenly at some point in the year you are trying to arbitrarily decide which one is better and which one deserves to be in a four-team playoff or a six-team playoff."

This is a downside of a playoff that the current system doesn't have? Except infinitely worse because you can literally win all your games and still get passed over? Are these even questions? No?

Rothstein challenges Brandon on his arguments, to his credit, but you'll have to have Insider to see the result. Spoiler: it's the usual pastiche of academics and wear and tear that apparently only applies to I-A, with an added bonus of "kids love bowl games." CBS surveyed players on the four teams in the Fiesta Bowl and SEC West Division Championship Game. They found 19% favored a bowl game and 43% a playoff with 38% abstaining.

The thing that bothers is not the opposition to a playoff, which is a somewhat tenable position as someone who believes the current system benefits his schools. It's that the arguments put forth are all logically inconsistent.

BONUS: Weird that he went from four teams to six instead of eight, eh? MGoPlayoff's tentacles extend.

Winter Classic: official? Not officially official but someone is now saying it is a done deal instead of something discussed in nonbinding chats over tea:

The NHL, the Detroit Red Wings and the University of Michigan have finalized a deal to hold next season’s Winter Classic at Michigan Stadium, a source told MLive.com.

They're going to build a rink at Not Tiger Stadium as well to "appease Mike Ilitch." Maybe the GLI will be there. Or something. I don't know. It's weird.

Michigan may now lose its own record for hockey attendance and force a bunch of people to choose between that and the inevitable New Year's Day bowl Michigan will find itself in unless it manages the same at-large BCS trick it did this year or makes the MNC game. But, hey: incremental revenue.

Star turn. CBS's Jeff Goodman was in the house yesterday; he profiles Trey Burke:

"I knew pretty quick in the summer," Novak said. "Trey was doing things right away that it had taken me four years to pick up. He has such a high skill level -- and you can tell he wasn't fazed by anything."

Speaking of things it took Novak four years to pick up, how about the shots he's generating off the dribble now? Needs more usage.

Head: removed. Entertaining board thread on Hardaway's emotive pictures notices that… uh… he has opted out this time.

Photos via UMHoops

I don't like the socks either, trueblueintexas.

If you'd like to revisit the old bad thing, BHGP has put up their Fran Graphs on the Michigan-Iowa game.

Recommended. It was interesting hearing Beilein talk about the five games in thirteen days thing as a major factor… but in retrospect Michigan has shot like total crap from the outside lately. Hopefully they can get their legs before facing down the all-press all-the-time Arkansas runs (even when it's just giving Anthony Davis dunks).

Personal note that may affect you at some point. If you follow the mgotwitter account you may know that Michigan is bad at scheduling MRIs. This is because I had one. I had one because ten months ago a guy put his spikes into my knee when I was playing indoor soccer. I went to the doctor; the doctor said "walk it off," basically. I tried that but the knee was obviously unstable even after the swelling and whatnot had gone away.

Since I was getting married, going on a honeymoon, and not missing football games there wasn't much point in finding out until now. I'm in the process as we speak. In all probability I'm going to find out my ACL is no longer extant and get the surgery, which means there is going to be a period of time I'll be taking an involuntary vacation.

Yes, the "Michigan Difference" commercials are currently making me peevish. BONUS: I am passionately arguing for red cards whenever I watch anything, especially NASCAR.

Etc.: New soccer coach Chaka Daley on WTKA. Michigan lax is taking on Detroit-Mercy in Warren if you're from around there. Van Bergen's Sugar Bowl foot injury was a lisfranc sprain. I would bet on Van Bergen in a fight with a bear.