Live animals, Willy the Wolverine, Rich Eisen, Groupon, and DB's mascot hopes

Note the similarity in the marketing between the Big Chill (a great event and I actually like the bizarre sweaters) and the upcoming ND game.  The tight "branding" is painfully obvious and is trending toward the exact manufactured "tradition" that we escaped when Willy was sent to the hinterlands.  What Tiger Stadium had was real.  If Illitch wanted a ferris wheel or tap room on site he could easily have done it.  It wasn't in the right neighborhood, however, so he build Comerica.  Not a bad stadium, but the pewabic tiles, merry go round, plate shaped dirt around home, and teak chairs behind the plate are all more kitch than tradition.  Overall the place as all the "feel" of a waiting area at the Secretary of State's (beer helps).  It all reminds me that I can't take my son and daugher to the place where my folks took me.  Fortunately or unfortunately Comerica works for its owner.  I see very little that DB would prevent if money for HIS athletic department were at stake (I'm dissapointed that we get to look forward to still more Journey pumped through the loudspeakers).  Go Blue!

Check out "The Wolverine Way" by Doug Chadwick.  It's a good and quick read and it documents what we all inherently suspected- Wolverines are about as cool as critters get.

"It was obvious that the Michigan mascots had designs on the Michigan men toting them, and those designs were by no means friendly "
I look forward to seeing our players have this attitude on the field again especially on defense.

...NO MASCOTS!!!!

"Our history and our tradition is great for those of who were there to experience it, or remember it," Brandon said, "but there's a generation coming up and you've got to connect with them and keep them excited."

and just have hugh jackman show up to games?

Lets turn his avatar into the mascot....scare the crap out of the children.

It's strange, we've had generations of kids, millions of them, who have successfully been turned into Michigan fans without having to exploit a mascot for the "revenue stream."

Does Dave Brandon not know how to leave things alone?

There's probably something to be said for Brandon's quote about kids.  My daughter loves Paws at the Tigers games.  She's almost four and is starting to get some comprehension of baseball, but she loves to see Paws and she loves to ride the merry go round and ferris wheel and I'm fine with that.  She like Austin Jackson because she got a bobblehead of his at a game.  A lot of us that use this site are hardcore types that would be into a team anyway, but the fact that I can get my daughter to break away from her princesses to watch the Tigers with me for 20 or 30 minutes at this age is nice, and I think those marketing type things make a difference. 

or so it seems. Indiana University expanded its stadium and the area around it to make it more family friendly. Kids can play football on turf and have other games to occupy them while the adults talk about how awesome it will be to beat Purdue later in the season.

Even Purdue tried to change its mascot to make it more appealing to kids. The nicer-looking mascot was voted back to the original, but Purdue still showed a willingness to cater to the family.

The fact is, if DB wants more butts in the seats, maybe families are the way to go. You sign up an alumnus, you get one person on the list. You sign up a Michigan family, you get them, their kids, their fellow alumni, etc.

I'm not an economist, I'm a law student, but this seems to make sense. If you make it fun for the whole family, a whole family would be more likely to go.

If we do get a mascot, though, I just hope it doesn't wear a skirt (I'm looking at you, Sparty)

How about: 

Dave Brandon really leaves me with a cold, icy feeling in my bones.  I am not fond of the man.

I don't really care either way about a mascot.  I do agree with the aspect about little kids liking it and making it family friendly.

All the DB hate on this board is getting pretty damn annoying.  The man understands tradition--he does but he also realizes there is another big part of the fan base. 

"I'm struck by the fact that when opposing teams come to our stadium, and they bring a mascot, all of our young fans are lined up to see if they can get a picture taken with it, whether it's the Penn State Nittany Lion or Sparty," Brandon told Michigan Today. "That's a little annoying to me.

WOW! What an asshole this guy is.  What say we storm Schembechler Hall with a with pitchforks?

If DB brings a mascot into the big house. I'm going to have an aneurism.

Given our choice seems to be a walking box of curly fries or a mascot, I guess we have to bite the bullet on the mascot.  Although watching the curly fries flee in terror from a real wolverine would also be acceptable.  

On the topic of wolverines rage issues.  A friend of mine was working a project to tag and track wolverines.  He went to take one out of a humane trap, it twisted free and got a piece of him.  Long story short they had to air lift him back to an ER room for three digits worth of stitches.  Wolverines are fur, pointy ends and anger issues basically.  

I wouldn't be opposed if it's done right.

Of course, any time you go to change/add anything there's going to be a collective group of people grumbling "This is MICHIGAN.  We are better than X."  Where X, of course, is whatever change is being considered.

At some point you guys are going to realize that a mascots target demographic isn't guys over 20 without kids who post on mgoblog all day.  Little kids love mascots, parents like when their kids are happy, the school likes it when parents by shit to make their kid happy.  A mascot makes sense, it doesn't actually hurt you at all and makes kids happy, not really all that hard to see why it makes more sense than not to have a mascot.

If we do get a (costume) mascot, it better look a hell of alot better than that maize and blue, tiger/bear looking paper mache thing that MSU students made in 2003....right before we beat them. 

I'm not a fan of the mascot idea but if Brandon is hell-bent on doing it, he should make a costume version of the 1920's or 30's era wolverine with the sailor hat.

the only acceptable mascot at this point is a giant shoelace with wings.

Why doesn't Dave Brandon stop messing with the tradition.  When the team starts winning again, all of this crap about revenue streams, expanding demographics will all get flushed down the crapper.  winning sells jerseys.  Winning sells tickets at higher prices.  Winning sends the team to bowl games outside of the state of Florida.