An interesting fact about Detroit pro sports teams/Trivia question (It is on topic).
As I was talking about the NBA draft and the hopes the Pistons would keep Trey Burke in state, the person I was talking to said "You know, I don't think there are any Wolverines on any of the Detroit pro sports teams." As I got to thinking about it, I think he may be right. I believe Jeff Backus was the last holdout with the Lions. I don't think the Red Wings have had anyone since Aaron Ward. Can't remember the last time the Pistons had a Wolverine (not that there were that many in the league for the last 15 or so years). Obviously no Tigers as I think there are rarely more than three or four M baseball players in the majors at a given time.
Can anyone prove the hypothesis wrong? Anyone know the last M player to play for the Pistons or Tigers (was it Bill Freehan?).
Rick Leach played for the Tigers.
...was with the Pistons for a short while. Terry Mills also springs to mind.
Jimmy King had a cameo with the Pistons.
King never played for the Pistons. He played for Toronto and Denver, each one season.
Besides Webber and Mills, Mark Hughes was briefly a Piston (although he never got into a game).
I believe the OP is looking for current Detroit athletes from UM...
I couldn't find any.
The closest one I can think of is Luke Glendening, who is currently in Grand Rapids and apparently has a shot at being called up to the Red Wings sometime next year or in the future.
He also asked if anyone knew the last UM athletes to play for the Tigers and Pistons. I don't know the answer to that question
For the Pistons, it's definitely Webber. For Tigers, maybe Rick Leach?
edited after my post. Wasn't part of the original post.
I'm 53 and if somebody told me that part of the MSU Athletic Director's job duties was to secretly act as General Manager for every Detroit sports team I think I might believe it. Time and time again Michigan athletes are available for selection, fit the profile of what the team seems to need, and they are passed over for a more obscure player from another school or even country.
I wish I knew why all and I mean all Detroit teams avoid Michigan players like the plague when drafting but they sure do. And they have for many, many years.
So that's why the Lions took Stanton over David Harris when they needed LB help and moved up in the second round a few years back. It all makes sense to me know.
But I agree with your point 100%. Nothing the Lions have ever done should be used to prove any sort of point ever.
Also took Stanton over Woodley I believe.
one of my favorite wolverine basketball players
Antoine Joubert!
Eric Turner as well
But that was a throwaway pick. Joubert went in the 6th round. Guys drafted that low never made the team, and eventually the NBA got rid of those late rounds.
I don't buy it. Cleave's had limitations, Burke didn't. Seems to me that joe likes thinking he can find needles in the hay stack down south. The older he has gotten the worse his drafting has become. Outsmarting himself on basketball side and shooting himself in foot on business and fan base side. Wouldn't mind if he picked up payer like McLemore, but he truly thinks this sec guy is Reggie Miller and Selecting Burke is tantamount to taking Alford. That is high praise for his own judgment and should imo be his dismissal if this guy is not any good.
Terry Barr, Rich Strenger, Garland Rivers, Jeff Backus.
In 2007, the Lions drafted Drew Stanton in the second round, securing their QB future with the MSU great. They passed up Lamarr Woodley and David Harris.
in the first four rounds, including Rogers, who they selected instead of Andre Johnson, who has been a 6-time Pro Bowler with Houston.
The Lions also like MSU guys as coaches for some reason (Darryl Rogers, Wayne Fontes).
The only U-M guy (Moeller) they've had as coach is also the only one to post a winning record in the last 50 years. Naturally, they fired him after half a season.
Rogers was considered an etie talent with his size and speed.
Thats true but the Lions should be least faulted as they have brought in several Wolverines as free agents including in relatively recent years Larry Foote, Ron Bellamy, Jon Jansen, James Hall, Desmond and I believe we also had Drew Henson for a second didn't we.
as far as the Lions are concerned is Russ Thomas was an Ohio alumnus. He avoided Michigan talent like the plague during his years with the draft. He would catch them on the downslope of their careers so that he could get them for cheaper and it would get Michigan fans to buy more tix to see their favorit players. Witness: Bubba Paris, Desmond, Anthony Carter, Butch Woolfolk (a bunch of others that I can't think of right now). They all closed out their careers in Detroit.
Thomas died in 1991.Desmond didn't come to Detroit until 1999.
Truthfully though, there was that guy with somewhat UofM ties that actually was in the front office of one of Detroit’s sport teams, the Tigers I think, some guy named Bo-something. /s
This was after some injuries hampered his career.
Only 6 of the big ten teams have 1 or more. Michigan has the 2nd most behind Nebraska.
/shameless NU plug
Hal Morris played for the Tigers for part of a season if I recall correctly.
And James Hall played several years for the Lions, but as the OP suggests, I don't think anyone from Michigan currently plays on any of the four pro teams in Detroit. Definitely frustrating.
Wow. This list is pathetic.
Does Bo being president of the Tigers count?
Desmond had a stint with the Lions.
Anthony Carter
count? didn't they have AC during their glory years?
Can't really fault the Tigers or Wings because baseball and hockey aren't major college sports and there are tons of guys taken from other avenues. Can't really blame the PIstons either until last night, because they were too GOOD back in the 80's and early 90's to take guys like Rice, Webber, Rose or Howard. Those guys were long gone when the Pistons turn to draft came up. And Michigan hasn't exactly put out much NBA talent since then.
The only team that has routinely passed on good Michigan guys to draft junk has been the Lions, and well, THEY'RE THE LIONS. They've been a burning tire fire for over 40 years now, so what do you expect?
You're so right about the Lions They can't find their rear end with both hands.
There was a joke in Detroit legal circles that the definition of an expert witness was "any person living more than 250 miles from Detroit."
I think that the Lions must've adopted that definition for where talent they draft played in college. I can't explain the Lansing conenction, though. Maybe the front office thinks Lansing is 250 miles from Detroit.
produced a bunch of great NFL players. Brady, Woodson, Hutch, and who? Most of them are average to below average NFL players. Bashing the Lions for taking less than All Pro talent does not seem like a good argument.
I could be wrong, and this isn't exactly recent, but didn't Mike Knuble (played for Michigan hockey in the early 90s) play for the Red Wings at the start of his NHL career? I believe he might have been chosen by the Wings in an Early Entry draft back around 1991 or 1992. I think his debut game might have even been "Fight Night At The Joe".
The '91 Entry Draft. He did debut in Fight Night, but only played 9 games that season and no playoffs. He played 53 games the next year, with 3 playoff games, which was enough to get his name engraved on the Cup (although he's in the Championship Pictures for both seasons). The Wings traded him to New York after that for a draft pick that turned out to be Tomas Kopecky
Are some of these decisions wrong? Sure. But it's not like the Lions and the Pistons have good track records with non-Michigan personnel. This is a situation where it is wise not to assume malice when incompetence is a likely cause.
by the lions than any wolverine. That is not surprising, however. They have all been taken in late rounds and the only one I can really think of Detroit blowing big time, i.e., having chance and bypassing it was Tom Brady, of course. But that might not even hold water when you consider how many other teams did the same thing. Fact is the wolverines they could have taken were taken much earlier than Wolverines at similar positions. ^This is just ironoic and as the OP stated it's trivial. There is nothing indicated herein except for the irony. No matter who the wolverines had running for them the years Barry and Billy were running, the draft picks would have come down the same. The really, really, very, almost inexcusable, dumb, mind-defying pick was that of Andre Ware, nothwithstanding the Heisman. When the perennially top ten teams in cfb have a very difficult time putting two outstanding corners on their team at the same time, it was not surprising that Andre put up the numbers he did, not unlike Pat White and Denard's throwing completing when running the spread and shred. Plus they - Houston - ran an offense similar to Portland State's called the Run and Gun, very similar in fact that it placed defenses in awkward situations and always produces artificially inflated numbers for the qbs. But, alas, I was not surprised when they went ahead and pulled the trigger anyway on this untested qb. How did his pro career go anyway?????