Dear Diary: Aux Armes, Citoyens! Comment Count

Seth

UM-BAMA_BO-BEAR_1080

Nice try, Jean de Valk, making the blue of your background a greenish gray, as if we wouldn't recognize le drapeau tricolore as anything but a call to arms against the Bourbons of college football.

Didn't realize the French national anthem was a bloody minded board rant did you?

This plus a wallpaper about the cheat-sheet gloves are available in the thread. Allons enfants de la Michigan, le jour de gloire est arrivé!

Every Time Michigan Loses, George Lucas Writes a Love Scene. The annual if:then prediction thread by L'oeil du tigre gives six different scenarios for the 2012 season rated from Empire to Jar Jar. I'm in agreement on the order of quality, but not that an 8-4 season, even with a fifth loss to MSU, could be as painful as Attack of the Clones. Go with me here. I could see 700, maybe even 800 more Michigan games in my lifetime, yet in all of human history we've had six Star Wars movies. And to wait for two decades of hype to get that… Argh. Honestly, if I was told I had a chance to go back and fix Star Wars Episode I or change the outcome of Football Armageddon '06, I don't know man…

…but I co-sign SO HARD on this, especially Anakin being a teen and a Vader-Padme-Obi Wan love triangle. And Mace Windu…I digress.

What Shall We Do With Fullbacks? A short but potent message by Renault en Ben: We should all Aaron_Shea_1999-thumb-300x333-79106start thinking about Hopkins and Houma and future fullbacks recruited by this staff as less like Kevin Dudley and more like Aaron Shea because Al Borges is a West Coast guy and West Coast offenses use their fullbacks as passing options in the flat. Sometimes they can run block too. Short-term I think Hopkins doesn't have the hands or the hop to be a scary passing threat like some TE-ish fullbacks, however he does have a running back's rushing skillz, so they'll use those. As for the future: eventually we'll have a U-Back to be that. Borges and Hoke say they like a low-altitude kind of player who can pop a guy low and get North-South quickly on the FB dive. Watch Houma's highlights—the second half is almost entirely dive runs. That's not necessarily a Dudley, but it's more LeRoy Hoard than Aaron Shea. Hoard was 5'11, built like a tank, and accelerated like a 1970 Boss 302 Mustang V8.

The Defenses are Back. The series that won Monsieur Couer-Vingt a DotW (plus the inaugural "hero" points) continued this week with the Returning Defense of 2012 Opponents part the first and second. He used blanket stats, which I think makes bad defenses look like they're returning more (Purdue & Minnesota) because it doesn't check for how many plays faced. Helpful user euh-tay-ah mille-vingt-deux notes Phil Steele does a similar analysis.

There was also a nice little diary by the same on Bama, ND, and Ohio State, and recent updates on those teams. I'd like something like this—better formatted—to continue throughout the season. You know, like a weekly around the opponents news thing to round up what their blogs are saying about them. Again, monsiuer couerVingt is your Diarist of the Week.

Elsewheres in analysis  LSA class de deux-mille is goofing around with a spreadsheet of Big Ten player weights and heights. Part two is by position and I'm just linking to that one because the first doesn't break it up by contributors and thus will just call whichever team with the most lineman walk-ons the biggest.

Where Legends' Jockstraps Lie.

michlockerroom

Thanks to phjhu89 (I can't translate that!). That's locker #21 in wood panels and there's a close-up of it and more in the diary (bumped from a thread). The special locker makes it all but certain they're not giving Legends jerseys to young players but using them to reward old ones. I'm with the people against this, but I'm sure it will look less weird when 11 and 48 etc. are all teaked out as well and if it's good for recruiting…

Preseason Polls Have Been Meaningless Since the Time of Louis VII. In 1149, the Associated Scribes submitted a poll claiming the Glorious Franks* would sweep the next season's European battles. Then a coalition of kings released their own poll claiming that no, it was the Holy Notre Dame Empire that would prevail by winterfell. So began pre-season polls. Actually they go back to 1950 and usually rate Michigan too high. Thou hast perform'd well in gathering us this parchment good Sir Dévot du Loup Glouton.

Etc. The Twin City socks mentioned in Three &Out are comfy, but to be honest they're less comfortable than my ski socks. Anyway I don't think the socks in the Northwestern photo are the TCs, but horray to Section Une for finding M's on socks of M history. And in things less important than socks: two meta articles on an MGOpoints system that isn't used anymore, because there is no such thing as data that our readers won't put in a spreadsheet.

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* Yes "Franks." Louis's son Phil was the one who started calling it France.

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Best of the Board

AARON SHEA PLUS ALL THE POINTS. UMdad wanted to find video of this one play where Aaron Shea blocked three guys at once…you know, that one:

aaronshea

"… But that's my job, to go out there and block a linebacker, or, you know, all of them."

The hero of the day is helpful reader Carcajous, who found not just the Daily excerpt above but the video too. I highly recommend poking around in the video to relive the setup before the triple-block run and Clarence Williams at his Clarence Williamsiest. I don't recommend poking around in that issue of the Daily because I was 18 and had only recently discovered the long dash.

BETTER NOT TO SHOW THE OPPONENTS

2012-Michigan-Season-Tickets_Illinois2012-Michigan-Season-Tickets_MSU

That day once a year when your season tickets come, and you get really excited and put them out on the kitchen table to stare at them until you realize the last four are the only ones you really give a damn about. Sigh, even years.

UNOFFICIAL OFFICIAL TAILGATE MIX. Mine has a lot of the band plus the UM Hospital's cool version and Across 110th street (the Michigan Replay song). I say mix more of those in.

HELLO: MICHAEL FERNS!! HELLO: MICHAEL FERNS!! HELLO: MICHAEL FERNS!! HELLO! Before he (I'm guessing accidentally) somehow turned his account into a function that auto-posted Hello: Michael Ferns posts to the board every few minutes, user kaykay put together a "Projected Depth Chart for 2015" thing every fan base puts together in the depths of the offseason when every incoming freshman and recruit is going to reach all of their potential. I rescued the thread from that smoldering account to save my response, a Projected Depth Chart for 2012, as we thought it would be in 2009.

ETC. Lacrosse rules seem to favor more offense and less standing around, which as a casual fan who knows nothing about the sport I say thee yea.

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Your Moment of Zen:

Ln Dn Ds O Form RB TE WR D Form Type Play Player Yards
O15 2 G Offset I TE Twins 2 1 2 4-3-Over Plus Run Counter Sweep Thomas 15
Badgers pressing with 3 LBs cheated to the eventual playside and a safety up for good measure. Michigan runs right into it (RPS -1). Line downblocks to seal three linemen while a double by Campbell and Jansen (+0.5 each) escorts the playside DE 5 yards downfield. However that safety plus three unblocked linebackers are set up and should have this play dead. The safety tries to leap into the backfield and gets helped by Hutchinson, leaving three LB versus Shea and Thomas. From here it's all Shea (+4) who reaches the first linebacker, then DETACHES TO TO BLOCK THE SECOND LB INTO THE 3RD!!!! (!!!!!) [breathe] (!!!!!!!!). Thomas walks into the end-zone wondering where everybody went. Barry Alvarez quits football.
RUN+: Campbell, Jansen (+0.5), Shea (+4) RUN-:
Drive Notes: Touchdown, 21-7, 1 min 2nd Q. Since this is 1998 a 14-point lead means Wisconsin is cooked; everyone go back to reading the Kenneth Starr report.

Comments

Billy Seamonster

August 10th, 2012 at 8:21 AM ^

What happens if someone that comes in as a freshman/sophomore, turns into an All-American both years.  Then they switch to a legends jersey, say #21. They are then an All-American, Heisman trophy winner, etc. for 1 or 2 years.  How do they honor this kid in the future?  Split the honors jersey?

Eye of the Tiger

August 10th, 2012 at 9:22 AM ^

Did I miss something or did you forget to name a DotW? Or is it still the returning defenses series?

Also, yes Attack of the Clones is a very bad movie, but I was forced to choose the 5th best out of 6 for that scenario, and well, it was better than Phantom Menace, if nothing else...

Brendan

August 10th, 2012 at 9:28 AM ^

If given the chance I would totally go back and fix Episode I over changing the outcome of that game.  I would probably go back in time just to take Jar Jar out of the existing movie.

Section 1

August 10th, 2012 at 11:08 AM ^

Etc. The Twin City socks mentioned in Three &Out are comfy, but to be honest they're less comfortable than my ski socks. Anyway I don't think the socks in the Northwestern photo are the TCs, but horray to Section Une for finding M's on socks of M history. 

The "Northwestern" socks 

are absolutely, demonstrably, assuredly, Twin City socks.  I have the originals, in the original packaging, given to me by the team's supplier (I will tell you and Brian privately who it is and how you might get some) on direction from Jon Falk.  I gave Bacon a pair of the Northwestern socks.  He sure as hell earned them.  Send me an email at my registered MGo email address (Brian has it of course), and I'll ship you a picture that you can post, if you know how to appropriately web-host it for your purposes.

M-Wolverine

August 10th, 2012 at 12:28 PM ^

I don't think that guy ever followed up and did "what if Star Wars Episode II was good?"  And when I first saw it and didn't agree with everything, he had a lot of great ideas. Even when they announced casting for the first movie it was like..."what? kid Vader?"  Teenage Vader the first movie, with a more (rumored) Kenneth Branagh type Obi-wan casting, so he can be petulant and cocky. What those movies are missing the most is a Han Solo character.  We get another whiny Luke, when we really needed him to fail because he was Han Solo with Luke's power.   And then the whole Padme relationship isn't so creepy, and when you go ten years in the future you you have a guy in his mid to late 20's by the time Sith is done, and then 20 years later in the original movies you have a 50 year old guy when you take the mask off and he goes all "spirit".  They could have even salvaged it by making Obi-wan that cocky in the first, so when he takes over it shows why he wouldn't have been as good a teacher, but really thought he was...then transferred that over to "Ani" in the 2nd and have with maturity Kenobi realize how he had been failing.  But I really digress.

And your socks may be more comfy, but the Twin City socks don't make you look like a rejected Image Comics superhero.

Since it was front paged I'm kinda glad I took the board advise and didn't post the seat numbers or bar code. (Those are cropped from my pick right? Not that I'm complaining, I just figured it was what I scanned by how angled and off center they are. Just about anyone else would have done a better job than I did).

And I for one vote for more retroactive fake UFRs.  Maybe not now, but in the off season, might it not be fun to do a UFR for some classic game that A. you get to pick so it's fun to watch (and know we're going to win) and B. you don't really have to do a good job for any data base reference, and can kinda wing it and have fun rather than rewinding twenty times?  Just say "1997 ABC camera work sucked...play skipped." Who wouldn't like to see how a Charles Woodson or Tom Brady performance might rank with modern UFR analysis. Or the 1969 Michigan-Ohio State game. With as much snark and hindsight references as possible, please.

hart20

August 10th, 2012 at 1:46 PM ^

Teams for the season and probably throughout the year, if I can. Do you have suggestions on the formatting? Perhaps including the links in a sources section at the end will make for an easier read?

BlueDragon

August 11th, 2012 at 3:22 PM ^

And in things less important than socks: two meta articles on an MGOpoints system that isn't used anymore, because there is no such thing as data that our readers won't put in a spreadsheet.

For unimportant material, these two diaries generated strong reader interest--a combined 105 comments between the two of them! Perhaps the community response should play a bigger role in determining what is and what is not important.