Help me explain this situation to family/friends that think Michigan football is cheating

I think Dan Wetzel's writing on it has been really on point.

https://sports.yahoo.com/either-everyones-guilty-or-no-one-is-134758477.html

Tell them that it's like this: every student cheats on a test, Michigan is just in trouble because they took pictures of the answer key while every other student just wrote the answers down.

As someone who lives in a suburb of Columbus with a lot of friends and family that are not college sports fans I have tried but have not been able to in under 30 minutes. I feel like Sam talking to Devin and Al when I start ranting about it.

Unfriend/disown them.

Anything written by Brian Cook should suffice. 

Just tell them if they truly think it's a big deal then you don't think they're bright enough to understand the situation. It's the "convincing by embarrassment" method of changing minds and it's not very effective, but it feels good.

Its easy, Michigan started playing well and started doing 20% of the "illegal" stuff that OSE has been doing for years. Ryand Day got beat twice and now hes crying to daddy that he cant win becase of "cheating".

God I hope Michigan lets all the skeletons of OSU out of the closet. I can only imagine.

No.  Just make fun of them.  A sideline ban???  Bahahaha!  That is the dumbest and most ineffectual penalty of all time.  
 

What did Penn State do wrong?  That is the only team penalized by this.

If this comes up at Thanksgiving with my Sparty family, I'm changing the subject. There's no convincing anyone of anything if they're already inclined to believe this is the worst scandal in the history of competitive sport. Save your breath.

I'd suggest any of Brian's Signgate posts. Obviously we are up to nine, but it's a big situation with many angles.

I will also say it depends on how closely they have been following it. I was talking with someone this week who asked about it when he found out I went to Michigan. All he knew was that "one of our coaches illegally stole signs and gave them to Jim." Once I explained what we knew of Stallions, how low level he was, and how articles were already saying Jim knew nothing, he was like "oh what is the big deal, that's it? That's nothing." So different people will need different responses based on how closely they followed it.

Ask them if we normally convict and impose penalties based on internet memes and hot takes? Right now that’s all there is

You can't, that was the whole purpose of this orchestrated PR campaign. They've entered the realm of toxic politics and thrown truth at the bottom of the pit while piling as many false truths and blatant lies as they can to fill that pit. The only way the public perception changes is if Michigan opens up pandoras box with the dirt they have on the rest of the conference, while leaving/ or threatening to leave the conference.

a bunch of weak teams in the conference trumped up some lawyer ball shit because they couldn't compete on the field.

Hutch explained it just fine

https://twitter.com/HutchSevenSix/status/1723081837386269046?t=WggBM-zWh4ZQ6Zzvy1ew5A&s=19

It's called irreparable damage in a court of law something petite dick the big 10 and the other 9 big programs that were sign stealing Michigan will learn about in the future

A big middle finger will suffice 

I just spent 15 minutes explaining it to Mrs. Attack.

She had only heard the "big" news. I told her that Harbaugh was suspended for the next 3 games.

Her response:"I thought they didn't find anything on him."

/start rant

Santa's naughty list is growing exponentially.

DIVORCE! Kidding but I think if I can sum it up: 

1) No investigation completed by B1G

2) NCAA found no connection 

3) Why the rush on a penalty?  (We all know the answer) 

Or, simply tell them to fuck off and "get a better team".

Found Tiny Petittys dads burner account.

CS did NOT break any rules, he found a loop hole and took advantage of it. He broke the spirit of the rule.  He did in a stupid and obvious and easy to track way. 

AND...everyone does ot to a point, just not to the extent of CS.

Simplest explanation... everyone speeds, rest of BIG going 75 in a 65 zone. Michigan was doing 90.

(a) the rule is dumb. It was implemented in 1994 for cost savings. It is not about "the integrity of the game"

(b) even if the rule isn't dumb, violating it provides minimal advantage per NCAA's own admission

(c) teams also had our signals. See (b).

(d) teams knew we had their signals and changed them per public statements. See (b).

(e) there was no due process before the suspension.

(f) harbaugh didn't know. Stalions is a crazy rogue actor by all accounts

Wetzel's article, noted in the comments above mine. It's excellent.

Share the money quote in the Big Ten document about how they don't have any evidence linking Harbaugh to what allegedly happened but they suspended him anyway. 

Just throw out the whole family and get a new one.

if they truly think it’s a big deal and it’s about player safety, then why has there been no serious talk about actual solutions to remedy this? Why are there no initiatives to institute wrist bands or helmet comms? You could fix this problem NEXT WEEK if you wanted to. This is not an astronomical cost, especially in this day and age, where lesser programs like Rutgers are raking in millions every year off the back of Michigan’s labors.

if it’s truly about player safety, then when it got reported that other teams had Michigan’s signs and had reported them to other teams, was Michigan given the opportunity to back out of those games, due to their player’s safety? No, they weren’t.

State the facts then don't argue with people that can't comprehend logic. 

Give them this from the bucknuts.  Even the Ohio state board knows this is not illegal. 
 

https://247sports.com/college/ohio-state/board/120/Contents/ttuns-potential-infractions-explained-219156809/

Family you might be stuck with, but why are you friends with lunatics? Get some new friends.

Just remind them they don’t actually know anything about football if they think this gave a real advantage 

Tell them it’s a witch hunt but you don’t care and you’re proud of coach, football team, and president for standing up for themselves. Be proud. Be defiant

The BigTen is arguing that knowing what play the team is going to run and where players will be running is unsafe for the players.  Trying to figure out what play the opposing team will run is something the defense does literally on every play and does so successfully at many points in the game. Sometimes it's by lucky guess, formation tendencies, legal sign stealing, or situationally obvious, etc. Furthermore, the offense always knows where it's going to go so . . . is playing defense especially hazardous relative to playing offense? So either the game is inherently unsafe in a way that's unacceptably dangerous OR the act of video taping an opponent before you play them in order to decipher signs adds a level of danger that the other methods do not, despite the intent being identical.  Also, someone engaging in this activity unknown to the coach warrants a suspension of that coach as apparently a penalty for the institution according to the BigTen. The argument against injunction would be that Michigan would be fine and wouldn't be irreparably harmed by a Harbaugh suspension, but if that were true, then it's not an institution penalty, it's aimed at Harbaugh personally which the BigTen can't do per it's own rules.

Tell them to fuck off. MGoBlog is the only family you need.

It's quite simple.  There is a coach at one of the football factories in the conference.  He is having trouble beating us and doesn't like it when Harbaugh teases him.  So he has his brother the PI go and dig up dirt on us.  Although the football factory is built on a pile of manure all they can find on us is a cheeseburger and a few grains of sand.

They report the sand and get the other haters to gang up on us and impose a harsh penalty for a minor offense even before completing the investigation on the minor offense.

Think of the Duke Lacrosse players and what if they had been given a 25 year prison sentence before they were exonerated.