Ohio State Links: Preview, The Podcast, FFFF Offense (chart), FFFF Defense (chart).

Something's been missing from Michigan gamedays since the free programs ceased being economically viable: scientific gameday predictions that are not at all preordained by the strictures of a column in which one writer takes a positive tack and the other a negative one… something like Punt-Counterpunt.

PUNT

By Bryan MacKenzie
@Bry_Mac

As a bit of a Thanksgiving family tradition, the kids and I were watching Home Alone the other night (and yes, for those of you who haven’t seen it, SPOILERS AHEAD). We got to the part where the family is still on their front porch, when Uncle Frank remarks that their flight—an INTERNATIONAL flight, mind you—takes off in 45 minutes.  And I, as a Dad Who Has Traveled, made the obligatory snorting sound that says, “buddy you ain’t making that flight.” The derision only increases, of course, as the family sprints untouched through O’Hare Airport like Donovan Edwards through Ohio Stadium, and are then allowed onto the plane without the gate agent counting either the tickets OR the passengers. Hell, she doesn’t even LOOK at the tickets. A wealthy-looking white dude just arrives with a pile of ticket-sized papers and a pile of humans, and everyone just agrees, “well everything seems to be in order here.” And then she says… AND I QUOTE… “take whatever’s free.”

[After THE JUMP: Peanut butter jelly with a baseball bat.]

It was at this point, of course, that I launched into my obligatory Dad rant about how different the flying experience is these days, and my kids, knowing this rant is coming, humor me. And I know they are humoring me, and I don’t want to interrupt the movie, so I limit myself to a couple of examples. This year, I bypassed the usual “there used to be a smoking section” and “you used to be able to walk all the way to the gate without a ticket,” and selected the slightly off-script “there was no WiFi or in-flight entertainment system in the headrest; the whole plane watched the same movie on a big dropdown screen in the middle of the aisle.”

That had me thinking back to those times with a strange (and likely misplaced) fondness. Did any of us WANT to be watching that particular movie? Of course not. They never selected the good movies, at least not for your flight. The in-flight magazine showed the movie schedule based on date and direction of travel, and the good movies were always whatever was playing on the trans-Pacific flights. But no, you were eastbound domestic on a Tuesday, so for the month of July, that meant you were getting some milquetoast romantic comedy or a family-friendly animated film. But we all watched the movie, because… I mean, what else were you going to do? The crossword puzzle in the in-flight magazine? Sorry, buddy, but the guy three flights ago did it. Well, he ALMOST did it. The middle part was correct, but he screwed up two of the corners beyond repair. It’s the movie or nothing. So we all watched, and even if it was wildly outside our preferred genre, we tried to get into it.

For the 2023 football season, Michigan has been the in-flight movie.

The season has been remarkably devoid of outrageous on-field story lines, at least at the upper levels. In contrast to a Chaos Year like 2007 or 2013 or 2020, there have barely been any upsets that were particularly notable, let alone the earthshattering. I went back and looked, and I only found two times when Top-10 teams lost to unranked opponents (UNC lost to Virginia and Oklahoma lost to Kansas). Colorado was interesting for approximately three weeks before they became exactly what we thought they were. The “BAMA IS FINALLY COLLAPSING” headline was fun for a minute… but that’s about it. Mostly you’ve got four or five teams at the top humming along without any real intrigue. The season was set up for a titanic finish, but October was crying out for something interesting to happen . And then a private investigator—a private investigator TOTALLY AND COMPLETELY UNRELATED TO Ryan Day, yep, that’s the ticket—handed everyone a mid-flight bag of peanuts and a ginger ale in the form of the Great Stalionsing.

And I admit it. I fell for it. I got sucked into the movie.

Just a little bit. Not the whole way. Not in the deep, visceral way Ohio State and Michigan State fans fell for it. But they got me. They got me to care about all of this crap.

To be clear, they didn’t get me to think it mattered. They didn’t convince me “we can’t take Michigan seriously because of their DISGRACEFUL non-conference scheduling” or “Michigan fans should be ashamed of their head coach FLAGRANTLY VIOLATING cheeseburger-related recruiting rules.” And they sure as hell didn’t get me with their sanctimonious, hypocritical yammering about the Greatest Scandal In Sports History. No, I have this pair of afflictions where (a) I am a die-hard Michigan homer, and (b) I am cursed with a functioning frontal lobe, and as a result I was never at risk of falling for the substance of any of this pablum.

But they got me to care that OTHER people might be taking it seriously. And that one is completely my fault. If y’all follow either Raj or me on Twitter, you’ll know that we put in an unnecessary amount of time and effort countering the grand levels of bullshit being spewed by grand spewers of bullshit. We parsed legalese as if we were discussing these matters with people who cared about such things. I let these morons sap some of the joy from Michigan’s season, and for no good reason. We long joked about Michigan’s season not starting until Veteran’s Day, but instead of just enjoying the two preseason months of weekly defenestrations, I wasted mental energy on what it meant in the minds of talk radio buffoons in East Lansing or Columbus. Which was dumb.

There is one dumb narrative, however, that I have time to retroactively ignore before toe meets leather today, and that is this bizarre notion that Michigan is the program under more pressure this afternoon. I wrote as much in the Purdue Punt/Counterpunt, where I basically said that Michigan was playing the rest of 2023 to validate 2021 and 2022. Which was stupid, and I’m sorry for putting that out into the world. 2021 happened; Aidan Hutchinson and David Ojabo and Hassan Haskins and Cade McNamara really did bludgeon Ohio State to death en route to a Big Ten Title. 2022 happened; JJ McCarthy and Blake Corum and Donovan Edwards and Mike Sainristil really did lead Michigan to an undefeated regular season and a Big Ten title and beat Ohio State by a billion points in the Shoe. It doesn’t matter if BuckeyeDefendr42069 agrees. It doesn’t matter if Paul Finebaum declares such things “VOID” with a comically oversized rubber stamp. You saw it. I saw it. We all saw it.

And Michigan is going to do it again. JJ McCarthy and Zak Zinter and Blake Corum and a Clown Car Full of Murderous Defensive Tackles are going to beat Ohio State. Again. For the third year in a row. And this time, they’re going to do it with an interim head coach, an interim linebackers coach, and no Connor Stalions anywhere in sight. And if they do that, it is Ryan Day who suddenly re-loses those 2021 and 2022 games. Because he’s the one who started all of this. He’s the one implicitly arguing, “I know before the reasons were the snow and the flu and Five Little Big Plays, but in reality, THIS is the reason.” He was unable to live with his own failure. He couldn’t own it. Everything is someone else’s fault, or no one’s fault, or Lou Holtz’s fault, or some grand conspiracy masterminded by a middling vacuum repair man. He’s put it all on the table here. He’s pushed all of his chips to the middle, with today as his “I am not John Cooper” game. A Michigan loss would be a gargantuan bummer, but only a 2023 bummer. It would be a missed opportunity that will stick with people for a while. But an Ohio State loss will be an extinction-level event. And if Day has any self-awareness left, he knows that.

364 days ago, Mike Sainristil got to assess Ohio State in this situation. He saw them with their backs against the wall. And his assessment, in real time, was, “we know who the fuck they are; they are exactly who we thought they are.” And who am I to disagree with Mike.

Michigan is going to win this football game. Michigan 24, Ohio State 13

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COUNTERPUNT

By Internet Raj
@internetraj

I was 8 years old when I became a Michigan football fan. I had no affiliation or familial ties to the University. But Michigan always played on national television and had very cool looking helmets. Thus, a fan was born. Those first few years, I eagerly soaked in all the ins-and-outs and unique eccentricities of college football. The traditions. The rivalries. The chaotic hodgepodge of bowls. The absolutely bonkers way national champions were chosen. I was hooked.

I was 11 years old when I attended my first Michigan football game. My oldest sister had just enrolled as a freshman and, knowing how much I loved the team, she’d snag an extra ticket for a couple games a year and bring me along. These are some of my most cherished memories of my childhood. Hearing the jubilant marching band strike up after every score, jangling my dad’s extra set of Ford Taurus car keys on critical third downs, and accentuating the “Go Blue” cowbell chants with a triumphant double fist pump. I’d sit right in the thick of the student section with her, only vaguely aware that her friends around us were all heavily inebriated (that their collective breath tinged with Natty Ice as they’d hoist me up and toss me in the air for every point we scored against Notre Dame should have probably given it away). At this passionate stage of my fandom, every win was a euphoric high; every loss was a devastating sucker punch to the testicles of my soul. My emotions and quality of life ebbed and flowed with how the Wolverines performed.

I was 18 years old when I enrolled at Michigan as a freshman. This is an era of my fandom that became inextricably intertwined with 8am tailgating, making friends, and making even more memories. These four years overlapped with the last gasps of the Lloyd Carr era, marked by excruciating embarrassments like the home loss to Appalachian State and a systematic dismantling at the hands of Oregon, the latter of which served as a fitting metaphor of Michigan’s dinosauric schemes on the brink of extinction. But at least I had the privilege of drinking deeply from the chalice of frothy optimism shared by disillusioned college football fans everywhere: the Coaching Search. The mystique, juicy rumors, and list of tantalizing candidates involved in a national coaching search is even more enticing than wins on the field. It was at this point I became fully immersed in the MGoBlog, hitting refresh on the main page and boards at least 10 times a day. And it all culminated with the glorious hiring of one of the hottest commodities in coaching: Rich Rodriguez. “We are back on the path to a national championship,” I triumphantly told myself. Please remember, I was in college. I was an idiot.

I was 26 years old when I finally left Ann Arbor after graduating law school and moved to New York to start my professional life. At this point, the doldrums of the Brady Hoke era started to crystallize in the deepest trenches of my soul. I couldn’t escape the profoundly depressing realization that Michigan was forever stuck as a second-tier program. That we could never rise to the likes of the Bamas, or Ohio States. In a way, this era set off my slow but unmistakable detachment from Michigan football, which became more of a social excuse to see friends (shout out Professor Thom’s, Brother Jimmy’s, and the Ainsworth) than a deeply rooted fixture of my life. I was still a passionate fan, but I became increasingly desensitized to losses, especially as I focused on building my career, marrying my wife, and tending to other miscellaneous Life Milestones™.

I was 30 years when I moved to Singapore, where most games kick off past midnight. At first, I stayed up for them all. And then I had a kid. And then another kid. I cut back the games I stayed up all the way for and DVR’d the rest. I just don’t have the bullets in the chamber these days to stay up until 4am to watch Michigan boat race Bowling Green. Over time, I’ve largely shed my other sports teams and only casually keep up with the Pistons, Lions, Tigers and Red Wings. But Michigan football never dropped off the radar. Sometimes I wonder why and periodically let myself dwell on existential questions like “why do I even watch this sport?” College football fandom, objectively, to its very core, is ridiculous. These are 18- to 22-year-olds, with whom I share only a tenuous affiliation, play a game thousands of miles away from me that I have no control over, and, on balance, cause me more stress than happiness.

But I think my relationship to Michigan football, through its ups and downs, its excitement and disillusionment, remains constant because Michigan football remains constant. My life has undergone twists and turns, but Michigan football always remains. The houses and restaurants change, but the pilgrimage down State Street is just as enthralling. The band members change, but the fight song is just as triumphant. The students change, but the student section remains just as raucous. My piss may not have as much Natty Ice in it, but the bathrooms are just as congested and gross. And they may not jangle literal keys on third down anymore, but they still wave their hands and make some noise.

Institutional tradition in the face of personal change is more than comforting nostalgia, it’s a reminder that some things are bigger than us. My memories cheering alongside my big sister. My memories getting rowdy with my friends in undergrad. My memories coming back once a year for law school reunions. And soon, I hope, the memories I’ll make toting my two boys to a beautiful fall gameday in Ann Arbor. This consistency, this anchor to something recognizable is all the more important to me as an expat currently living across the ocean in Asia.

Counterpoint: some things should change.

This past week, though, has rekindled a long dormant spark from 11-year-old Raj. That feeling of my stomach lining slowly dissolving in the face of constant stress. My heart rate quickening at the thought of today’s kickoff. That feeling of, “we better win because a loss will literally make me combust into vaporous dark cloud.” It’s a combination of the world’s greatest rivalry, the uniquely high stakes, and the last chance to drive a nail through the annoyingly swelling narrative that Michigan cheated their way the last two years. Oh yeah. I’m all the way back. It’s anxiety-inducing, sure. But I wouldn’t have it any other way. As the Big Ten moves to a divisionless structure and playoff field expands to 12, future chapters of The Game may lose some of their ubiquitous high drama and larger-than-life significance. So, join me in popping some antacid, sitting back, and at least trying to enjoy this one.

Score prediction? Ah right, score prediction. Well, let’s see. I was thinking 21-17 Michigan. But I do think Jim Harbaugh’s absence is worth 3 points. So that’s 18-17 Michigan. And then, let’s not forget, all the anonymous coaches who claim that that Michigan’s sign stealing scheme is worth “21 points per game”.

So that shifts the needle down to Ohio State 17, Michigan -3. I guess America’s Team will just have to prove the world wrong. The 11-year-old in me wouldn’t have it any other way.