Unverified Voracity Wraps It Up

That's what she said?

...read the MGoBoard very often.  If he did, I don't think he would have typed this:

Practice chatter has been silent on [Hopkins] even as guys like Cox, who has never seen the field for a reason, get unearthed and evaluated.

The emergence of Hopkins seems to be a theme here: Practice Recap from GBMW *

* Several large grains of salt notwithstanding

“At one time or another, every back (has shown flashes),” Borges said of the downhill running style his offense covets last Tuesday. “As you ask that question, I’m trying to put some of our better runs in my mind together. Cox has done it. Shaw came back the other day, he did it. Stephen Hopkins is just that kind of runner, period.”  

-Borges in the linked Michigan Daily running backs article

I think that rates as a Hopkins mention and since I am a positive-tea leaves guy I'm assuming Borges considers Hopkins a solid option to run the "power play."

as i understand it, the residence life board did not issue a suspension, but HC Kelly would be able to.  most likely won't, but the story isn't really over until kelly says it is.

also, annarbor.com has a spring report, but at the bottom it features this:

Up to 300 former Michigan players will meet on Friday night before Saturday’s alumni game that is expected to draw 85 past Wolverines to the field. Show host Jim Brandstatter said it was a sign of Hoke “bringing the family back together” after the much-discussed rift that existed with football alumni during Rodriguez’s tenure.

“There’s too many legacies out there … too many good things that go on at this university, and in Schembechler Hall, for us not to be united,” Hoke said

i know the RR rift thing is a totally unfounded meme that has gone on too long and is impossible to prove and i hated it while i argued against it, but isn't 300 alumni proof of the opposite of that meme, therefore making the meme true?

The player on the far right in the first picture looks like he's puking pine trees.  I think that would hurt, and is a very fitting image for the end of the hockey team's season.

So, points...

TWB's reaction to Sunday was mine as well. I thought, wow, this would be the perfect Ann Arbor day, and symbolism of the Sun shining again on the school...if we had won the night before. Sigh.

So Red is making veiled complaints about the officiating...does that mean it's ok for us to do so too? Or is Red whining and not giving credit to the other team too? Because, while I think it was 50-50 dumb penalties and bad calls....there were bad calls.

The recruiting services thing is just whack.  I mean, anyone can subscribe. You're telling me that the fact Universities have money (duh) doesn't give them ALL sort of "recruiting advantages" over the public. What next NCAA? You banning the Internet? (All Bookmarks to MGoBlog in the Athletic Department must be getting deleted...)

Hopkins- See MGoShoe.

And we have figured out the Jim Nantz love - he's in bed with the head guy. (pun kinda intended).

Regarding videos: I don't know about the Michigan site because I don't subscribe there.  I subscribe to the UVA Rivals site, though, and videos in general seem to be one of the primary reasons people subscribe.  The UVA fans that haunt Rivals are wildly (and often nauseatingly) enthusiastic about videos, to the point where nobody calls them "videos", they call it "film" as if they're watching the same stuff the coaches study, and there are several folks that attempt to be amateur scouts based on highlight reels.  Take the videos away and people won't subscribe.  Make them free and I think people will still subscribe, but who knows?

So could Rivals ditch camp videos and still maintain their revenue stream?  I think probably.  But could they ditch highlight videos?  I doubt it.  Certainly not for basketball where at least half the videos are from AAU tournaments because it's a lot easier to send a couple guys to one tournament and get videos on half the database than to send them scurrying all over the country to every high school gym.

I don't know if I'll ever be able to look at The Horror in any light other than what it is.....an absolute atrosity. 

Cox is the front runner after the spring, but don't forget Shaw is injured. I was hoping Touissant would be the man, but he hasn't emerged so far.

But my guess is that Shaw, with his blazing speed and experience will win out and he will be your 2011 starter.

"if you were in the comments yesterday complaining that I was too down you don't follow the hockey team closely enough"

I hope that was Brian's snark amplifier turned up to 11, b/c I'll put my following Michigan hockey closeness up against anybody... I just don't write a blog. I honestly believe that the general tone of depressiveness is just getting a bit over the top in these parts-- not saying we all have to be Jerry Reed Pretty Mary Sunlight's around here, but the acting like your dog died, got run over by a bus, shot by Terrell Pryor in Ted Saskian's corvette, and then eaten by Justin Boren b/c we lost in overtime for a national championship to a team that was ranked #1 in the country for some time and did have the #1 scoring line in college hockey while we fielded one of the weakest offensive attacks in Michigan hockey modern history is just a bit too self-flagellating for a Red Sox fan, much less a michigan hockey fan.

I was a student at OSU at the time, Boone was so drunk that he passed out at the wheel and smashed into a parked car.  He was not only underage, but the accident happened on campus.   

Can you even imagine how much a guy who was 6'7" 300 lbs had to drink for that happen, and Boone's drinking abilities were well known among the students.  The fact that he didn't even get a one game suspension for the opener against Northern Illinois was deplorable. 

Losing to Tressel never pissed me off as much as his bullshit public image (ok, maybe it did).  The thing I'm happiest about in light of his recent troubles is that he's no longer seen as a beacon of morals.

"you have no control over something you have completely banned and lots of control over something you are working with."

This past Sunday I called up the John Bacon/Jamie Morris show on WTKA to ask Morris if he thought Hoke's hiring was enabling the divisions among the alumni players to begin healing. He basically dismissed or sidestepped that thought, saying that it's up to each individual player to decide what his opinions about a coach are, and that Hoke's job is to win games, not contact alumni players. However, that was before I found out about the Wolverine 300 coming in for the Spring game weekend, and it basically belies part of Morris's response. I doubt that all 300 just spontaneously and individually themselves decided to come in, especially since it's for a meeting that Hoke will be attending, so Hoke & Co. must have specifically reached out to alumni players.

Which is just another very smart and appropriate thing for Hoke to have done. It doesn't necessarily have anything to do with what kind of football that's played next fall, but Hoke continues to be pitch-perfect in his dealings with the current team, the media, and former players. The fact that he is benefitting from a media reaction that is 180 degrees from what RR encountered from the beginning of his tenure isn't Hoke's fault.

It also doesn't necessarily support the idea that RR didn't reach out to alum players; that was hogwash when he was here and it's still hogwash. I know personally of more than one player who did NOT feel welcome around Schembechler Hall while Carr was coach, and I was told back in 2008 that RR had embraced all alum players in a way that Carr supposedly didn't. It's undoubtedly the case, however, that the problems RR's teams had on the field effectively sabotaged his efforts to reach out, because it's simply human nature for former players who experienced a great deal of success when they played to be critical of an outsider coach whose teams played poorly.

Thank God that's all water under the bridge so far. Morris was correct in saying that ultimately Hoke's primary—maybe only—job is to win lots of games. If Hoke does that, he'll be embraced in a way that RR never was. If his teams aren't more successful than RR's, support for Hoke will disappear just as surely as it did for RR.

I talked to my buddy last night (the one that is dating the daughter of the O-coordinator at ND) and he gave me some unreleased information on Michael Floyd.  He has 3 arrests, but the first came while he was technically enrolled at ND but before he had arrived on campus, so apparantly according to ND res life  they can not factor this minor consumption into their decision on whether/whether not to suspended him.

The second arrest happened in South Bend on campus.  This one counts, but 1 PI/MC will not get you kicked out of school in 99% of the colleges across America. (made up that stat to bring more validity to my point)

The third and most recent arrest, the DUI, it sounds like they moved some red tape around to make it inadmissable.  Floyd was pulled over by the Indiana State Police.  The arresting officer was a member of the ISP.  He was then handed over to the County Sheriff Department, processed, and booked.  Local Media picked up on the story and reported it shortly thereafter.

Again...In this third arrest...at no time was Floyd on campus or involved with campus police.  The new reslife head has chosen not to factor this in to his decision, bringing the grand total of alcohol related offenses by Floyd according to ND to 1.

I do agree with reslife's decision not to suspend a student for a semester for a single alcohol related offense.  I was arrested for marijuana once when i was in 8th grade and again when i was in 9th grade.  Because one was in middle school, at a junior high, and the other was in high school, i was able to skirt the system and not be considered a repeat offender by anyone but my own parents.

Kelly has announced that Floyd has several things he needs to do before he steps back on the football field.  However, my buddy has announced that they are going to reinstate him just before the season starts...that keeping him suspended for now is a show of good faith for the NCAA.

Notre Dame has now saddled its self right along with the (Sowhat Everybody Cheats) conference and that school in the worst state ever.