Unverified Voracity Remembers Hideki
Random Canadian Bo appearance. Fire as per usual:
More Jaylen Brown. Brown sat down with Evan Daniels to talk about his recruitment. On Michigan:
Michigan is definitely going to be in the front runner of things. Talking to Coach Beilein, he’s like an offensive genius the way he gets these guys that aren’t really ranked high to be lottery picks in the draft is amazing. It’s definitely something that drew my attention. Also Michigan is a great education school. They have one of the top public universities in America with Cal-Berkeley, UCLA and North Carolina.
He also said that "I took a lot of visits and nobody's basketball programs was as good as Kentucky," so temper that enthusiasm. Rivals is continually throwing cold water on any speculation Michigan might get him, but it sounds like Sam Webb is talking to a lot of people close to the situation while Rivals cites national analyst Eric Bossi.
FWIW, nobody is saying Michigan is a lock or even necessarily a leader: the difference here is between Scout guys thinking Michigan has a legitimate shot and Rivals saying not so much.
UPDATE: Brown told ESPN that he would be going to an Adidas school, flat-out. That would knock out Kentucky, leaving Michigan up against Kansas and UCLA.
Legends update. MVictors talks to Ben McCready, the godson of Bennie Oosterbaan:
Nothing is official, but U-M is indeed evaluating the Legends program and considering changes.
The evaluation is being driven, in part, by feedback from the players.
McCready’s understanding is that they do intend to maintain the Legends distinction, but are considering honoring those players in a different way.
All options are on the table including a presence in the stadium to recognize the Legends.
I'm mildly distressed by the "feedback from the players" bit since in the past that's been used as a won't someone think of the children cover for Adidas pandering and the like. Suspect that they don't actually dislike it enough to make a difference. But some sort of in-stadium note that hey, Desmond Howard played here would be nice—with the boxes there is a ton of blank space to act as canvas.
An excellent example of the hockey tournament's absurdity. Providence was literally the last team in the field—if Michigan had won the Big Ten tourney they would have bounced the Friars. They happen to host this year, so #4 seed Providence got to welcome #1 seed Miami.
They won that game in a looney-tunes 7-5 contest in which Miami played with an extra attacker for almost half the third period after falling behind 6-2, then beat Denver the next night and are now in the Frozen Four. This happens almost every year. RIT took out another overall #1 seed in the opener. That's the hockey equivalent of a 16 over 1 upset, something that has never ever happened in basketball but has been achieved by a single small school in upstate New York twice.
Single elimination basketball can be random; it is much less so than hockey. Good basketball teams win almost all their games. Good hockey teams win two thirds. Look at the pro level to see the spread between good teams and bad. Hockey is closer to baseball, where 100 wins—a measly 62%—is considered the benchmark for an excellent team, than basketball, where three NBA teams cleared 70% last year with Indiana a game back of that number.
So Miami has a season worth of a one seed and their reward is to fly cross country to play Providence in Providence in a one-off game in a building that was half empty* even by the inflated official count. I defy you to come up with a system more nonsensical than that. Can't be done.
Okay, okay, can't be done outside of cricket.
*[Two-day attendance of 14,234 in a building holding 12,400.]
Um? Hockey recruiting coverage is scanty and Auston Matthews is a big deal so let's hold on to this for a brief moment:
Matthews, who is expected to be selected No. 1 in the 2016 NHL draft, will center Heinen and Moore if he chooses DU over Michigan, among others, and the major-junior route.
Later that article reiterates that Matthews's top college choices are those two schools, and reading between the lines it appears that intelligence comes directly from the Denver program. Everett, a WHL team based in a midsize Washington city, has his CHL rights.
I remember. Harbaugh on his CSG presidency aspirations:
Disappointed w/ 4th place finish 4 @umich student body Pres. Competitive juices flowing! Hat in the ring for 2016 & will campaign w/ #EUTM!
— Coach Harbaugh (@CoachJim4UM) March 30, 2015
Yes, that is a hashtag for "enthusiasm unknown to mankind" that I will be enthusiastically, if ironically adopting.
But the best part of all this is that a Rivals commenter reminded me of the existence of Hideki. Hideki, a contemporary of mine at the university, won the then-MSA presidency in a landslide because he had a silly sign he carried with him everywhere:
These were the halcyon days in which the the student government's main function was dealing with BAMN so the rest of us didn't have to. We could safely dispatch an amiable man without a platform or a solid grasp of English as our representative, and we were rewarded with petty imbroglios like "that one time the vice president said the president had difficulty communicating and was called super racist":
Wong called for an apology from Secreto for "allowing the election to become a vehicle to foster racism on campus."
Many representatives and constituents said race was not the reason they were unhappy with Tsutsumi"s term.
"My problems are not with his language," said LSA senior Rodolfo Palma-Lulion. "It"s with his ideology."
"I don"t support the attacks on Hideki, but I don"t see them as racist," Kinesiology Rep. T.J. Wharry said. "I can"t understand what my grandparents say but they"re just as white as I am."
Tsutsumi said he felt all attacks on him were politically motivated and that he is "above the fray of party politics."
Drop that mike, Hideki. You clearly had all the vocabulary required to be a politician.
These days the CSG is serious business. It has to fix the athletic department's student ticketing policies, and cannot be solely deployed as a hilarious parody of national politics.
You'll never believe me. It turns out that Nick Saban doesn't care about one solitary thing in this world other than how to win many football games. It's almost like he's a robot programmed to act like a human being… poorly.
Etc.: On gentrifying the stadium experience. Jon Teske highlights. Gundy adapting.
March 31st, 2015 at 12:50 PM ^
Worst tournament ever.
if there's a Jeebus in heaven, the NCAA will follow through with the hockey committee chairman's suggestion to go to 1st and 2nd round tourney games to be at the home rink of the higher seed, preferably with 2 out of 3. I'm all for craziness in national tournaments to make them fun, but there has to be some reward and balance maintained for rewarding an entire season's work over a miracle 1-weekend run (as in our beloved B1G tournament). Tilting the odds in favor of the higher seed with a home game I think is a good balance.
March 31st, 2015 at 12:57 PM ^
Wow, if Jaylen Brown chooses an Adidas school, the odds of Michigan landing him went up quite a bit.
Might need to look out for Louisville. They just lost basically their entire starting 5 so there's a ton of PT to be had there right now. Then again, after watching that MSU/Louisville game, I'm not sure I'd entrust Coach Pitino with my desire to become a better offensive player.
I guess he could go outside the schools he's announced as his top picks, but as of now our main competition (among Adidas schools) is Kansas and UCLA.
Brown told ESPN that he would be going to an Adidas school, flat-out
Wow, that's just so wrong. I'm sorry, it just is. John Wooden is rolling in his grave.
Ok, you can come back on my lawn. Philosophical rant aside, I wonder how many top recruits we've lost out on because we are not Nike? Live by the AAU shoe company, die by the AAU Shoe company.
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March 31st, 2015 at 12:58 PM ^
Why single out Cricket?
/sobs uncontrollably.
Similar to the NFL playoff seeding. And awarding one point for overtime loss in NHL. And counting away goals as two in soccer. But making the higher seed visit the lower seed definitely takes the cake and eats it too.
p.s. One can always mention Marty Mornhinweg electing to kick off the OT as... never mind. That's still a nightmare.
March 31st, 2015 at 12:59 PM ^
Didn't Charles Woodson have a post on facebook about the legends jerseys going away just about a week ago?
If we got Brown I dont even know what I would do. I for sure thought he was waiting to see who leaves Kentucky but if he is chosing an Adidas school I like our chances a lot more.
I remember Hidecki so so well! Those signs were as well known as Faz of Hello Pizza.
I knew Trent Thompson pretty well. He was the MSA President a couple years before. There was some controversy around his election, but he was a solid guy through and through.
Dear Lord. I remember BAMN and their intolerable leader, Jessica Walter (or something like that). To this day, I cannot support their cause simply because they were such assholes.
We had a party on S. Forest St. and somehow sidewalk chalk was introduced to the equation. The next morning a good portion of the sidewalk in front of our hourse was graffiti'd in some manner, and I was awakened by some pissed off BAMN members banging on our door and accusing us of being racist for the content (it was not). They were reaching so hard and wouldn't go away - taking pictures and threatening to turn us in. Obviously, nothing ever came of it.
BAMN is just as insufferable now. They haven't met anyone or anything that wasn't racist.
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But some sort of in-stadium note that hey, Desmond Howard played here would be nice—with the boxes there is a ton of blank space to act as canvas.But the name, not the number as most people (normal, non MGoBlog people) will not associate the number to a specific player wore 20, 40 or 60 years ago. There is plenty of space to do it very tastefully, and allows additional player to be honored (Anthony Carter, Charles Woodson, HARBAUGH!)
If there was ever a voice and a personality that could control a room, it was Bo. What a guy.
All Day I Dream About Soccer
That's a way of remembering it. But it actually comes from Adi Dassler's name.
I can still see the headline - "Hideki Wins in Landslide" or something to that effect. Dude showed commitment and enthusiasm unknown to man.
I also remember walking past him on the diag at 2 a.m. and him whispering to me "please vote for me..."
If Brown is waiting to see who leaves for the NBA draft, does Caris leaving help or hurt UM's chances to get Brown? Caris is SG and Brown SF, so it's not about position. But if Caris returns, he's the primary guy for UM next season, whereas teams like Kansas and UCLA may not have a primary scoring threat.
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How rare is it for a kid to pick a school based on their apparel sponsor?
Not sure I've seen that too often.
Is he actually basing it on apparel or is he just saying that as a weird way to cut down his list of schools?
It's not about apparel or fashion. It's about which company sponsors his AAU program / team.
That seems kinda shady from an NCAA standpoint. Would it affect his eligibility to admit to that?
Not likely. It's not like shoe company reps give cash payments to kids or anything (though there have been scandals when that's happened). Instead, the companies are the team's corporate "sponsors" and as such are allowed to provide shoes and equipment to the team. It's one degree separated from actual grift.
A staggering majority of players who play on AAU teams end up going to a college sponsered by the same apparel company. It's just something that isn't being acknowledged. As far as possible violation, I doubt anything could come of that. Maybe he just really likes Adidas.
Sam Webb specifically referred to this today... apparently Brown's determination to go to an Adidas school is because of all the support Adidas has provided during his HS career. What exactly that support is he didn't get into.
Picking a college because of which apparel company it works with is ridiculous, even if it does end up benefitting Michigan.
that would seem like an odd criteria for where you're choosing to go to school.
Hrmm, I really like Michigan, but I like the fashion options at EMU better. Decisions, decisions.
My guess is that it's neither common or rare, but that you never hear about it because A) Kids don't come right out and admit such a thing (as they say in the ESPN vid) and B) Because Nike kids don't need to say they're picking a Nike school since Nike has contracts with most of the big Div. 1 schools.
If Pitino is speaking about it, I'm guessing it happens more then we know.
usatodayhss.com/2014/basketball-recruits-shoe-contracts-nike-adidas
I am unable to listen to the video (at work). Is there any chance that this young man just mispoke and was trying to say he wouldn't eliminate a school because they had Adidas?
Like he would go to an Adidas school, but he also would go to a Nike school?
[Edit]: Can someone expand a little on this for me?
No, he said it once and they quoted on it, then went back and asked him again and he repeated it.
The quote goes on about his relationship with Adidas from the AAU circuit and ends with "I will definitely be going to an Adidas school."
Take it with your typical teenager grain of salt, but the way it was said didn't leave much room for interpretation.
Alright, cool. Thanks for clarifying.
hi hideki ftw!
So do we love Adidas now?
.....maybe.
"Brown told ESPN that he would be going to an Adidas school, flat-out."
So its OK for corporations to "guide" where recruits go but not people. Huh. NCAA FTW.
Welcome to the world of AAU. One organization perhaps even more corrupt* than the NCAA.
(*Edit: Maybe better to say "ethically shady".)
There's nothing dirtier than AAU basketball. The person running the team gets to decide who gets access to players and who doesn't.
This stuff happens more than you think, like that progam from Washington who would only give teams access to recruits if they hired one of their coaches.
The gentrifying article was pretty disturbing. I'm glad for the link. There's no way any stadium should be publicly financed. Just ridiculous.
I was never opposed to the luxury boxes at Michigan, and am glad they were built. But what is disturbing is pricing games out of the range of normal folks to go to a single game or two. When you can't bring in water or seat cushions, when a single hot dog approaches $10, when the hoi polloi spend well more than a $100 a game for for a ticket, parking, food, etc., it doesn't work anymore. I really hope that the branding and gouging that happend under Brandon is gone for good.
are the main issue for people I think. I never really considered their financial impact until I had kids. Even just going to see a movie can get pretty pricey when you add a couple kids to the tab.
There is no practical reason why people shouldn't be allowed to bring their own snacks in, other than money. And unopened bottled water too (if you're trying to keep booze out).
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