1VaBlue1

January 9th, 2024 at 8:10 PM ^

Negged for putting nothing but a link in your OP.  Stop being lazy!

The Final scored >25M viewers, while the Rose Bowl drew 27M, and the OSU game pulled in 19M.  Michigan seems to be a pretty big draw...

Perhaps Petitee owes an apology for a short-sighted gaff earlier this season?

Joined: 01/31/2016

MGoPoints: 127087

Harball sized HAIL

January 9th, 2024 at 9:19 PM ^

All while getting pissed on by the NCsAbAn and the B1G brass ball lickers.  

Straight statistical proof of just how fucked of an org the NCAA is.

ESPN isn't much better.  TWO of their biggest CFB voices were throwing as much shade as they could for the last 24hrs.  Way to go all you assclowns.  America - you know, your customer base, obviously doesn't agree with any of your bullshit.

Joined: 10/05/2018

MGoPoints: 11757

uminks

January 9th, 2024 at 11:35 PM ^

That bastard is probably petitioning the NCAA to vacate our national championship. The most the NCAA could do is vacate our wins before the MSU game. I hope they don't but if we can keep our wins against PSU, OSU, Iowa, Alabama and Washington, I could careless about the other games.

Joined: 11/10/2009

MGoPoints: 32040

the Glove

January 9th, 2024 at 8:21 PM ^

You're not the only person saying this, but this is a terrible take. I'm sorry if I have no interest in traveling to the southeast for all of Michigan's away games. Fuck all the Big Ten teams and I rooted against them in every bowl game this year, but going to the SEC or being independent is not a good answer for fans. Also, Notre Dame's only going to be pulling in about $10 million a year more than a Big 12 team with their TV deal.

Joined: 07/01/2008

MGoPoints: 10439

RAH

January 9th, 2024 at 9:20 PM ^

Don't forget that there are now 4 West Coast teams in the BIG.

The ACC would be a reasonable possibility. If Notre Dame stayed in there would be the 2 biggest national brands in the country and 4 elite level football teams, as well as several schools that sometimes have good teams. It would be at least as highly regarded academically as the BIG (very possibly higher), be associated with large and growing. population base, and give us a foot in the door of the biggest concentration of elite level recruits. 

Joined: 02/23/2018

MGoPoints: 7584

San Diego Mick

January 9th, 2024 at 11:28 PM ^

Great takes, I've mentioned before that the ACC would be a great option because away games would mostly be in decent to good weather while the opposition would be playing in tough weather in Ann Arbor in the 2nd half of the season. Advantage Michigan in both cases. 

We would instantly make that conference worth more and garner more TV money.

We could play ND every year to make that our new biggest rival because I really don't give a fuck about osu like I used to, they're more SEC-like than B1G anymore.

We could also build new rivalries with Clemson, UNC, Miami  and FSU  wouldn't want to leave if we joined. 

Joined: 05/11/2011

MGoPoints: 50644

JMo

January 9th, 2024 at 10:52 PM ^

This is a WEIRD take. Your reasoning for not going independent or changing conferences is some kind of travel logistics issue for away games???

How many away games do you go to in a season now?

Grabbing out a quick map ... Lexington, Nashville and Knoxville are WAY closer to Ann Arbor than places like Minneapolis or Lincoln Nebraska.

In fact, it's basically the same distance to Lincoln that it is to Tuscaloosa, Athens and Columbia, SC.

And oh hey btw... I don't want to alarm you, but the Big Ten added four teams this year, you might want to look where they're located.

You want to know whats not a good answer for fans?  Our team/school being in a conference that is run by mob rule and apparently doesn't care to have any semblance of due process. A conference where basically every other school but one is a taker and benefits from the national profile and ratings that two schools bring to the rest. Honestly, who gives a shit whether once a year you go to Bloomington, IN or New Brunswick, NJ?

Joined: 12/14/2011

MGoPoints: 21008

rice4114

January 9th, 2024 at 8:25 PM ^

I was thinking about this. In all the dominance OSU has done the last twenty years have they gone 3 seasons with only one loss? Im not sure why we would leave this gold mine of 10 gimme wins a year. Even the BIG Ten had to add the Pac12 all stars to our schedule to give us a challenge. Keep stealing their lunch. 

Joined: 08/26/2010

MGoPoints: 47270

DennisFranklinDaMan

January 9th, 2024 at 9:00 PM ^

I still don't get this. There's little actual debate that Connor Stallions deliberately broke the rules and recorded other teams' signals in an attempt to gain an advantage (again — he knew he was breaking the rules when he did so). 

I agree, it didn't, at the end of the day, matter much, and didn't have anything to do with how damned good Michigan was. No doubt about it. We were dominant before it, we were dominant after it, and there should be no debate on that question.

Still. An employee of the (dominant) Michigan football program deliberately tried to get an illegal advantage against other schools. And you think ... the other teams should have ... supported us? 

They hate us! They want to see us struggle! And I don't blame them! I want to see OSU struggle, and I would certainly not encourage Michigan to form a "brotherhood" with other teams to support them if the commissioner was considering a penalty!

What's more ... you think, somehow, SEC schools would ... what? Celebrate us trying to illegally record their practices? Form a group begging the SEC commissioner not to punish us?

I dunno. I think we're a bunch of whiners. Stallions cheated — he knew he was cheating, and he did it anyway — and other schools have every right to be pissed about it. But who cares? You think they should want us to keep beating them?

Meanwhile, the suggestion that we would rally behind OSU if they were caught cheating, and demand that no punishment be assigned to them, is out-and-out bullshit.

I don't get it. You want to be pissed about the suspension, go ahead. (I'm not — I'm just really glad it wasn't worse). But blaming the other Big Ten schools for wanting to see the most dominant program in the Big Ten penalized seems ... silly, to me.

Joined: 01/23/2021

MGoPoints: 14418

wildbackdunesman

January 9th, 2024 at 9:21 PM ^

The BigTen and the other teams were duplicitous.

1, Purdue's coach was shrieking that knowing signs causes injuries...then it turns out that he had UofM's signs last year as Illinois' DC and Purdue also got UofM's signs before the BigTen championship.

2, The BigTen teams easily steal signs and trade them to each other to get their next opponent's signs in advance. Anything CS did was of minimal advantage and possibly ZERO competitive advantage. To crap their pants over this to this extreme was disingenuous.

3, The NCAA in 2021 literally stated that in person scouting was of "minimal competitive advantage" due to it being very easy in the modern era to steal signs and trade signs.

4, Based on Marquette Law's study where the vast majority of college coaches anonymously admitted to stealing signs. So the BigTen coaches who acted like it was some shockwave let the media run a wild inaccurate narrative.

5, Multiple SEC coaches have now said what CS did was small potatoes to what other things are happening out there.

Joined: 07/16/2008

MGoPoints: 30273

Blue In NC

January 9th, 2024 at 9:46 PM ^

I am sorry.  I know there was a ton of information swirling before.  You say "again — he knew he was breaking the rules when he did so."

1.  Did we ever establish definitively that he did break rules (put CMU game aside for now)?  Or just the spirit of the rules (and hence the B1G's vague "sportsmanship" reach)?

2.  Even if he did in fact break a rule, when was it established that CS knew what he was doing was breaking rules as opposed to him mistakenly thinking he found a loophole around the rules?  And trying to cover it up after the fact?  

Sorry if I missed those definitive findings that you indicate are final and established.

Joined: 06/30/2008

MGoPoints: 8576

Romeo50

January 9th, 2024 at 10:37 PM ^

Written rules say "in person advance scouting" which he, evidentially to date, did not. Was he at CMU start of the year against Sparty, maybe, oddly still not established. Having a side hustle for the CMU team where he may have been helping them identify signs and not doing anything related to Michigan on a day off is possible and did anybody really need signs to put out that teams' tire fire?

My understanding of CP firing was for instructing players, on being NCAA interviewed, by coaching. Like, don't over answer a question and ramble into what wasn't asked. Weird that an East Coast guy would be so disposed? He stated in his farewell letter it wasn't about knowledge of advance scouting.

So if the NCAA has phones and computers and indication is this didn't trickle up and Harbaugh plainly says "we're" innocent than other than that is this a witch hunt to "gain competitive advantage" non-revenue sharing-wise, against the poor indentured student athletes by a non-accountable governing body? Written or not the spirit of the NCAA's endeavor, ultimately against students, should be investigated. Maybe Jim should hire a PI Firm? It's trendy.

Joined: 03/09/2013

MGoPoints: 16579

NittanyFan

January 9th, 2024 at 9:03 PM ^

That's not Saban or Alabama - that's a macro trend. 

Throw those numbers in a simple linear regression and it's a statistically significant trend downward.

And going further - the average viewership of a CFP Final in the 2014-2023 era was 7% lower than the aveage viewership of the BCS Championship game in the 1998-2013 era (24.8MM vs 26.7MM).

College football as a whole gets good viewership numbers but I'm far from convinced the numbers are going to go upward in the next decade.

Joined: 12/04/2012

MGoPoints: 43109

JMo

January 10th, 2024 at 1:11 AM ^

If you get a minute check out Klatt on Cowherd from today. He does a good little bit on the ineptitude of the NCAA, a leaderless inept organization, that is basically leaving good money on the table. Vacating December of meaningful games, playing the championship game on a Monday night on cable, etc. etc.  He makes a great comparison "It's like professional boxing in the early 90s." 

I've yet to see someone make the points he was making. I'm rarely surprised when it comes to this type of thing, but it was a interesting little part of a solid segment.

Joined: 12/14/2011

MGoPoints: 21008

WolverineHistorian

January 9th, 2024 at 8:21 PM ^

8 million more viewers than last year's title game.  Didn't know this.  Georgia/TCU was the lowest rated title game going back to 1999, the first BCS title game.  

Not surprised that the numbers were way down for the covid year.  People were already burned out on Alabama and the rules were changed to make sure Ohio State would play in the championship game.  

Joined: 08/10/2009

MGoPoints: 55466

ButlerGoBlue

January 9th, 2024 at 8:24 PM ^

But yeah, let's run Harbaugh out of the NCAA for a hamburger and wanting players to get paid while 17 year old kids pull up to their signing day in a Lamborghini. Solid choice NCAA

Joined: 05/07/2011

MGoPoints: 1089

Cam

January 9th, 2024 at 8:35 PM ^

Pretty impressive considering it competed with "Maine Cabin Masters" AND "Going to Mars: The Nikki Giovanni Project."

Joined: 07/23/2018

MGoPoints: 24093

NittanyFan

January 9th, 2024 at 8:53 PM ^

Take this FWIW:

  • The first 6 years of the 4-team CFP, the Final had more viewers than both Semifinals.
  • In 3 of the last 4 years, the Final had less viewers than at least one of the Semifinals (in 2020, it did worse than both Semifinals).  This includes this year.

Is that a macro trend?  That's an interesting question to me. 

One could argue that some of the ratings power of recent Semis was in the brand names (eg Alabama/Michigan in 2023 or Georgia/Ohio State in 2022). 

But then again, we've had other brand-name Semis like Alabama/Ohio State in 2014, Alabama/Oklahoma in 2018, and Clemson/Ohio State in both 2016 & 2019 that were significantly over-rated by the Final.

One thing I definitely believe - while New Year's Day is an EVENT, a Final on a work-night Monday, or a Semifinal on a work-night Thursday or Friday (which is what they will be going forward) - those are NOT events. 

I think we're going to miss the New Year's Day Semifinals (or close to New Year's Day Semifinals). The Quarterfinals will be fine, but the Semifinals will lose their charm/appeal.

Joined: 12/04/2012

MGoPoints: 43109

los barcos

January 9th, 2024 at 9:00 PM ^

100% agree with the event comment. CFP lost a little luster when their final was a week after NY Day. Yesterday felt less anticlimactic than the rose bowl - I had to wake up and go to work, which was just a normal Monday up until the game. 
 

they really need to market the game like the Super Bowl, have it be on a weekend. Make it an all day affair. For a league that squeezes out every cent of revenue, having your championship game on a work night is leaving money on the table right?

Joined: 03/27/2009

MGoPoints: 10842