I'm one of the original beta testers. I'll continue my comments here rather than the original thread: The app crashes when I open this board topic, but not others.
Also, and this will probably be a biggie for Brian, the UFR tables display all wonky. I meant to address this last week but didn't get around to it.
Allowing Boise State into the national title game would destroy almost any hopes we have that programs will schedule more competitive nonconference games going forward. At the very least, removing strength of schedule as a factor definitely eliminates one of the major incentives to play games that will improve it.
EDIT: I agree that polls are pointless right now and I don't care where Boise State or anyone else is ranked. My post is only for the sake of conversation in case it's relevant in early December.
Yeah, my position is that all nicknames for rivalries are cheesy (the two that were vaguely cool--Florida/Georgia and Oklahoma/Texas--have officially changed) but I never thought to care about it until I realized that Michigan/OSU now has one. Still, you and bigmc6000 have persuaded me that it's not so bad.
And yes, I also realize that clucking about capitalization makes me a schoolmarm, and the gnrgoblue of 10 years ago hangs his head in shame. I promise my posts will be more relevant to, you know, football, in 11 days.
Good point. In retrospect, I shouldn't have mentioned the marketing part because that definitely muddles my position. Still, I definitely didn't mean to imply that it's done for greedy marketing purposes, just that it's kind of goofy.
This board is turning into the RCMB with all the snark, but I suppose I am being a bit "down in front." My defense is that it's the offseason and I can't take any more idle Freep/secondary/QB/hot-seat chatter. If this board can handle another post about Xbox/PS3 online dynasties, I figured I'd be on safe ground with this.
The Ivy League didn't want to stay relevant as football behemoths. Those schools chose their path.
Anyway, I get your point but I think, if nicknames are progress, so is corporate sponsorship, and I don't remember too many around here being fans of the proposed AT&T (?) sponsorship.
Your second option assumes that both Brandon and Gene Smith are willfully complicit in lessening the profile of the rivalry. Seems unlikely to me, so I'll go with the "good soldier" option.
Whether I'm "willing" to or not doesn't matter. I have no say. If it was my decision to make, I'd explain why it's a stupid move and veto it.
All I'm doing is trying to figure out what I might look forward to in what appears to be our new reality. Looking forward to Nebraska = OK, I guess. Looking forward to MSU = not.
And, just to be clear, I'll say again that I don't like this at all, and I also think it's a bad business decision.
I'm working my way up through the thread and you're the second person to blame Brandon for this. How did you get it in your head that he's masterminded this plot? I can't imagine it's something he wants.
I don't like this but could live with it ... as long as Michigan is matched up with PSU or Nebraska at the end of the season. Ending the year with MSU or another perpetual also-ran would be pretty anticlimactic.
Bill Martin was always very responsive to polite e-mails. Anyone know the best way to express the sentiment of the fan base here? I sincerely doubt Brandon has much sway in this matter, and it's extremely likely he's fighting this as much as he can, but it's still probably a good idea to pass along our polite, considered feedback.
And to follow up on ChasingRabbits' joke about Rodriguez being blamed for this, I also want to stress that it's extraordinarily unlikely that Brandon has much say here or that he hasn't used whatever influence he does have to attempt to block this. I'm worried about "OMG BRANDON NUKED THE RIVALRY" blossoming from isolated Internet idiocy to perceived fact, and that derailing his tenure as AD. I presume this is being passed down and he has to sell it.
So I tested out the app's ability to handle replies and it worked fine. When I viewed it on my PC, though, it appears as though there are display problems with the subject line and my MgoName:
Right now, the offending post is the sixth down. I checked in Chrome and IE8. Hope this info is useful.
Testing the MGoApp's worthiness in the reply space.
I don't know how I feel about not shoring up the secondary with someone from offense. I understand that you don't want to make both units worse because of an injury, but I think there's something to be said, at this point, for having warm bodies available (bodies with scholarships). but my guess is the coaches know more than I do.
How about including "Donate" and "MGoStore" links and/or functionality, as well? These would serve the proprietors more than the readers, but there's nothing wrong with that, I imagine.
Last night was the first opportunity I had to get to it; I'll play with it more this evening. My initial impressions are favorable. It's stabler than I was expecting and has a nice, clean interface.
Some areas to consider tweaking:
I seem to get signed out every time I close the app.
I'd like a "my account" page at the highest menu level.
I love me some maize, but this is an awful lot of it.
These are just my reactions to the 10 minutes I've spent playing with it. I'll post more when I've spent more tie with it.
Biggest request: A mobile version of the site. I e-mailed Brian about it in like October and he said he'd have it up and running during the offseason. I'm expecting it any day now ...
Also: This is meant to be both snarky and legit, but I think the site and its community would have been much better served in the past few months with much more conference-realignment coverage and analysis and much less soccer stuff. I think the proprietor missed a major opportunity for a one-time reprieve of the dreaded offseason traffic dip. Brian has the 'net cred, readership base, and resulting network of sources to have been right there with Frank the Tank and Chip Brown at the center of the insight/reaction loop, which would have done a much better job of picking up new regulars than just about anything else that's been printed here since the offseason began. I was surprised at how little attention the topic has received here in the last few months, especially considering there was nearly nothing even nearly as relevant happening and I suspect Brian was, as usual, being fed insider info. Even if he wasn't, I'd have loved vastly expanded versions of his own views on established facts and widely circulated rumors.
Brian's mentioned over the years that much of his time is dedicated to nuts 'n' bolts during the offseason, so I assume that's what kept things so quiet around here. Still, as a reader, I'd have voted for more conference-realignment chatter over just about anything else.
Before anyone leaps to his defense, this is not a criticism of Brian's work or of the blog. It's my favorite place on the Internet, I've been a daily visitor literally since the first week it was live, and Brian does an awesome job. I'm only answering a specific question about what could be changed.
I agree that I probably should have. But it was a combination of factors. For one, I kept assuming his party would get him under control; he'd scream for awhile and then quiet down, and I'd think it was all over. It was probably 45 minutes or an hour in before I realized he was just a nut and he was only stopping to catch his breath. For another, this guy didn't give the impression of someone interested in listening to constructive feedback and modifying his behavior accordingly. To the contrary, it seemed to me that anyone who said anything would be treated to a punch to the face (the fact that his family/friends didn't say anything makes me pretty sure about this). I wasn't sure what would have been more destructive to the atmosphere in the area: letting this deranged fan scream himself hoarse or getting into a brawl (because everyone in my party would have piled on, and, it seems reasonable to expect, so would his). Also, though my party was camped there for the duration, I took off a few times for long walks around the stadium (I'd not been inside since the 2003 OSU game, and a lot's changed since then).
I suppose I could have, as you suggested, found a staffer. Honestly, it didn't even cross my mind.
Can't you guys read? I said the psycho was AT the event. It was years ago that Drew Sharp stopped attending sporting events he covers (true).
So we can eliminate Sharp. As for Boren, I kind of doubt it. This guy (obviously) had way too much interest in offseason training and conditioning. Still, both Boren and our mystery person have shared attributes (I don't know them, I don't like them, they hate Michigan football, they're both carbon-based lifeforms), so it's possible they're one and the same.
Oh, it was quite a scene. A complete meltdown, the likes of which would have been worthy of Youtube had they taken place during a real game. During a spring practice? Surreal. Full-on purple-faced, spittle-spraying rage.
I was. By God, that was the best damn sports message board in the land. I didn't post often, but I do remember an epic throwdown with someone who wanted Carr fired for losing so often. Of course, I didn't make friends when I said, between the 2003-04 seasons, Braylon Edwards was very overrated.
It's not that I want new bowl games for mediocre teams and new tournament slots for 10th-place ACC teams, it's that I just don't care. Once it gets to the round of 64, the field will very closely resemble what it would have been, anyway. This is extraordinarily unlikely to alter the champion so the games are simply there for entertainment purposes.
I read Brian's post on the matter. Obviously I disagree with his position. I've always been mystified when people complain about crappy new bowl games when it's much easier to ignore them and I'm wondering if there's something intrinsic about a tournament that makes the comparison invalid. If so, I'll join the opposition. If not, I'll watch or ignore the new games depending on how bored I am when they're being played.
I think you're 100 percent right that none of the 31 new teams will ever win the title, but that's true of any tournament more than around 20 teams. Maybe as many as 32. So why is 64 what's considered acceptable? If you want the field trimmed by half, I guess I can respect that.
Anyway, for me and a lot of others, I expect, the tournament is only partially about determining the champion. The games themselves have a lot of entertainment value.
I agree Michigan needs to win a bare minimum of eight of its remaining 13 games to even qualify as "on the bubble" and entertain hopes of squeaking in as a 11, 12 or 13 seed.
I think hope dies for good if they lose any of the following: Iowa, at Northwestern, at Iowa, Penn State. If they sweep those four, we have a 14-7 team looking for four wins in the other nine games. I can't find those wins. I expect a sweep by MSU, so we're looking for four wins in seven games. Purdue is having trouble, so maybe that's one. Maybe they get a win or two out of their home games against Wisconsin, Illinois and Minnesota. But I'm having a hard time seeing it.
EDIT: I meant to conclude by saying that the good news is that, if they make it, there's no question in my mind that they'll have earned it. This schedule is rough going the rest of the way.
Cosigned. I cringe to think this community will divide, like the RCMB in its heyday, into camps of "sunshine blowers" and "demand excellencers," but there does appear to be a frustrating acceptance of crummy performance. See above where I was negged and criticized for characterizing last year's 9-9 Big Ten team as "decent."
Maybe I'm wrong to think U-M has a high top end as a basketball program, but I've always thought it has nearly every advantage the football program enjoys and even some it doesn't (an elite in-state recruiting base, for example).
Beilein does a lot of things well and should feel a lot of job security, but everyone is eventually evaluated on their performance and not on their background or ethics. Three years in, Beilein is accumulating a lot of data points on the wrong side of the ledger. With Harris and Sims gone next year and a postseason berth extraordinarily unlikely as a result, we're suddenly talking about year FIVE of the Beilein regime without any sense that he's re-established Michigan as even a league power, let alone a national one.
He seems like a really great guy and I hope he works out. Either way, I'll follow and support the team. I'm just much less convinced of his greatness than many on here and don't believe that lowering my expectations to match his output is a reasonable resolution to the current disconnect.
Fair enough. I do tend toward hyperbole from time to time and probably selected my words poorly when I wrote "unmitigated disaster." Something like "extreme disappointment" would have been more appropriate.
Any Michigan fan has heard about Beilein's reputation as a superb tactician and his track record of taking all his previous schools (five, right?) to the tournament. So I'm with you when you say there's reason for optimism. My only issues are with what's happened this season (because, during the season, I care more about the present than I do potential future scenarios) and because, when we talk about what he'll be able to do with Zeigler and Smotrycz, it's worth evaluating what he's done with Harris and Sims (good and bad).
Also, just to be clear, none of my criticism should be read as a verdict and I'm years of sub-.500 records away from suggesting he should be fired (I think, for example, Rodriguez should at least get through 2011 regardless of how 2010 shakes out [barring off-the-field stuff intervening]). This is just me complaining about losses produced by a coach we all agree is much better than this. And complaining about the ways your favorite sports teams disappoint you is, of course, the very reason God invented the Internet.
My opinion of this year's team doesn't weigh the preseason ranking and it's not missing the NCAAs that bugs me (there are a lot of reasons teams qualify and many are outside your control). What's disconcerting is the team being so much worse against solid opposition. I thought, before the season, they were significantly overrated, but I thought the team was good for around 9-3 out of conference and maybe 10-8 in the Big 10, which would make Michigan a very safe bet to make the NCAAs. With even the NIT unlikely at this point (I believe they need eight more wins to qualify and can't find eight wins remaining on the schedule), you have to at least understand my disappointment. If your issue is with my expectations, I really did think they were reasonable, but I definitely acknowledge that I was entirely wrong with most of my assumptions.
I don't exactly like being called "ridiculous" for criticizing Beilein's work at Michigan--especially when your counterpoint is Beilein's work at schools other than Michigan--but I actually do appreciate your perspective. Your first paragraph has me wondering whether I'm wrong about Michigan being a program with a very high ceiling.
To be clear, there's no debate that last season was Michigan's best in a decade. But squeaking into the tournament in the last two games of the season and getting flushed in the first weekend--that's merely a decent year. Exciting at the time, naturally, and encouraging because we all thought it meant Michigan was "back." As I said in my previous message, it felt, at the time, how I'd expect to feel about a 7-5 season from the football team in 2010. There'd be some exciting moments and I thing it'd bode well for the future so I'd remember it fondly. But only someone with utterly shattered expectations could objectively call it an extraordinary success especially when, in retrospect, it foretold precisely nothing about Michigan's future under Beilein.
So the last decade of U-M hoops has lowered my standards for what I'll consider entertainment but not what I'll consider accomplishment. The only difference between last year and Amaker's better years (the ones where Michigan was among the first two or three out) was how the chips fell; one more upset in a mid-major tourney last year and Michigan was sleepwalking through another NIT. One less upset in a mid-major tourney in one of Amaker's years, and the NCAA-absence streak would have ended earlier and he'd probably still be Michigan's coach.
If you think last year's basketball season was more impressive than a 7-5 record from the football team or you think 7-5 sandwiched by a pair of unmitigated disasters is worthy of a contract extension, that explains the difference in our perspectives.
The jury is still out on Beilein as far as I'm concerned. He's overseen two catastrophic seasons and one decent year.
Strangely, I have more doubts about Beilein's long-term viability than Rodriguez's. Should the football team go something like 7-5 this coming year (I'm guessing seven to nine wins is likely), Rodriguez and Beilein will have roughly equal accomplishments in their time at Michigan. Rodriguez will have improved his record for three consecutive seasons and will have a very exciting and very young team entering the next couple of years. Beilein, meanwhile, is very unlikely, for the remainder of his time at U-M, to have a team with this year's combination of talent and experience. He's turned it into a full season of Yakity Sax.
Anyway, Beilein's first two years were obviously better than Rodriguez's, but I'm not projecting the next several years to play out the same way.
That was very much my reaction after I came down from my jubilation following Michigan's win over Florida at the end of the 2007 football season. Of course, it took a couple of weeks for that particular buzz to fade.
I'd like to observe that Michigan is 1-0 on days when I argue that the Wolverines are crummy. Let's make this a regular thing. Who's up for a lighthearted debate Thursday?
Yeah, I think the rest of the gang here is correct. Martin won't have a say in it at all after he steps down, and it behooves him (and us) to talk up Rodriguez's job security.
That said, Michigan has never operated as a bloodthirsty, win-at-all-costs organization and I don't see them starting that now. Barring NCAA trouble or an absolute catastrophe of a season (two or three wins, for example), I think he'll definitely get a fourth year.
Am I really being negged for my comment? I think it was a reasonable response to a reasonable question. As for those other crummy years, those W/L records are pretty much where this team is likely to finish. If you want to argue that this one is still better, I'm OK with that.
You do make a valid point that 12-6 in-conference might do the trick (though I believe that'd make them 18-13 overall, right?). We're coming up on the halfway point in this season, though, and this team has provided absolutely no evidence of any kind that it has the capability to finish among the top eight or nine in the conference, let alone challenge for the league title (which they would do at 12-6), so I'm not holding my breath.
Like I said, I don't intend for any of this to come across as excessively negative. I'm not calling for any firings or criticizing any players, merely observing that this team has a dug itself into a hole so deep it's extremely unlikely it can emerge. Go blue and all that. I'll continue watching and hoping for the best. If they continue to tank, I'll tune in and hope for a miracle during the BTT. For everyone who's optimistic, I take heart in that; gives me reason to hope I'm wrong.
Incidentally, when ESPN ran a poll of Michigan's all-decade team at halftime of the Indiana game, how is it possible Courtney Sims was an option but Daniel Horton wasn't? If they insisted on having a 5, shouldn't they have reconsidered that restriction when they saw that it removed Horton and included Sims? Also, so many college teams play a G/G/G/F/F or G/G/F/F/F lineup as their base that it seems a little silly to artificially force a C into the discussion.
Just a thought.
Good Lord, you're right. I totally forgot about Beilein's first team. That one takes the no. 1 spot, moving 1998-99 to no. 2 and Beilein's third team to no. 3.
Because this season is effectively over. Even if they do improve right now and become the team we expected to have and find a way to win the 10 or 11 Big Ten games optimists like me predicted in the offseason, that's still only an NIT team at best. Michigan has zero quality wins and a growing quantity of bad losses. To even be in the discussion for an NCAA berth in March, Michigan will need to go around 14-3, 15-2 the rest of the way in the Big Ten, and that's not happening when they're either the worst or the second-worst team in the league (they'll fight it out with Iowa for that distinction).
I stuck with the hoops program for the last decade and I'll stick with them now, including by tuning in today for more punishment, but I know bad Michigan basketball teams when I see them. This is the worst U-M team since the post-Traylor team of 1998-99.
So to go back to your original question, why are people bailing? I think there's a lot of understandable frustration that Michigan has two of the five best players in the league on its team yet is so comprehensively awful. I know enough about basketball to trust Beilein, but I'd love for someone who really knows their hoops to explain to me how this mess isn't entirely a failing on the part of the coaches.
I am shocked and disappointed that my thesis about Transformers: The Movie was excluded.
Still, I think this will turn into a great late-Friday regular feature.
Absurd! After Astrotrain had reached cruising speed, he'd have no need for further propulsion, as there'd be no resistance. Simple physics dictate he'd be able to conserve his remaining energon for the landing. If he was continuing to burn fuel, he was an inadequate pilot.
Now, this explanation is just silly. First of all, no efforts were made by the healthy Decepticons to surgically repair their wounded friends, so, if Astrotrain had the functionality you suggest, he most certainly would have deactivated it when the passage through space became cumbersome. Secondly, unless you cite any studies, I'm going to have a hard time believing that a lack of gravity would be an impediment to cyber-surgery, calling into question the very premise of your argument.
Just admit it: You're grasping at straws.
Didn't you see the "OT" in the thread title? Clearly I'd not have typed it if my intention had been to talk about the major plot points in Transformers: The Movie.
Since you bring it up, my initial reaction was that Hot Rod lacked Optimus' natural leadership qualities and that the resulting culture change might unravel the entire Autobot program, which, we all know, is the most consistently successful program in Cybertronian culture. However, given his evolution into Rodimus Prime, the injection of excitement he provided and some time to remake the whole operation to be competitive in a new era, I think there's a good chance Hot Rod/Rodimus Prime could be every bit the leader Optimus was.
I think Wisconsin will have more points at halftime than Michigan will score the rest of the season. So, no, I don't think Michigan has a chance. But I'll still tune in for my punishment just like I stuck with the hoops team throughout the dark years.
I'd like to argue the "point" that Wisconsin isn't built to blow a team like Michigan out, and maybe it isn't, but neither are Illinois or Purdue and that didn't prevent them from rolling U-M. Also, the 2007 decimation is still fresh in my mind; that Badger team seemed to find gobs of points easy to come by in 60 minutes.
To be clear, I'm not in panic mode about the big-picture stuff (though disappointed, along with everyone else). I'm comfortable giving Rodriguez four full years. I'm just not kidding myself about this ruined team's chances on Saturday.
I expected this team to be significantly better than last year's team and, abandoning "significantly," it's debatable whether this team is better at all. In September it clearly was, but this year's team will finish with a worse record in the Big 10 and the on-field product has looked pretty much like 2008 since the Indiana game.
I expected seven wins minimum and considered eight or nine to be decent possibilities. The Utah/DSU swap and the retrospectively incomprehensible Notre Dame win are the only reasons this year is even a superficial improvement over last year.
He gets four or five years blah blah blah but Rodriguez has been a comprehensive failure thus far. Interviewees for the Athletics Director position should be tactfully asked what their plan would be for conducting a coaching search in the next couple of years because any rational observer would consider it at least a 50/50 shot at this point. I think it's much likelier.
Message-board posting has evolved, MichFan1997, and you have to evolve with it. You brought me my first reply, and I am grateful for that, but you have to get with the times and understand that Furrah is just a young kid doing his best.
MichFan1997, you no longer have my respect. I have a Michigan hoodie. I am WEARING my Michigan hoodie. Can you say the same thing? I'd guess not. Either get your s#it together or I will PERSONALLY drive down to your office and pack your boxes myself.
I see your point, but you said there was also an irrelevant and unfair dig at Rodriguez, so it's not like he turned over a new leaf. Plus, are we really to reward the Freep and Sharp for saying something non-negative about Beilein? That's all we ask of them at this point? If Beilein is so stand-up and so successful that he's impervious to even Sharp's standard, half-baked, ham-fisted, poorly articulated trolling, let's reward the athletics department by selling out Crisler or clicking some of the ads at Mgoblue.com. Visiting the Freep will simply reinforce their editorial strategy of mixing 100 parts of comically overwrought negativity with the occasional token scrap of fair or positive insight.
Someone on their digital marketing team is scrutinizing their Web analytics data right now and cackling with knowing glee at several thousand visitors that came from your link at Mgoblog.
Isn't there a house rule prohibiting Freep links? And especially to anything penned by Drew Sharp? If there's one thing the people here and the RCMB can agree on, it's that we shouldn't be giving that imbecile our business.
I'd prefer we avoid even discussing the Freep, but, if you must, can't you take the time to summarize the content in greater detail rather than link to it?
Congrats! Get yourself an xbox 360 and relax until things turn around.
Edit: Unless you have kids, in which case you have my sympathies and well-wishes.
Recent Comments
I'm one of the original beta testers. I'll continue my comments here rather than the original thread: The app crashes when I open this board topic, but not others.
Also, and this will probably be a biggie for Brian, the UFR tables display all wonky. I meant to address this last week but didn't get around to it.
Allowing Boise State into the national title game would destroy almost any hopes we have that programs will schedule more competitive nonconference games going forward. At the very least, removing strength of schedule as a factor definitely eliminates one of the major incentives to play games that will improve it.
EDIT: I agree that polls are pointless right now and I don't care where Boise State or anyone else is ranked. My post is only for the sake of conversation in case it's relevant in early December.
Yeah, my position is that all nicknames for rivalries are cheesy (the two that were vaguely cool--Florida/Georgia and Oklahoma/Texas--have officially changed) but I never thought to care about it until I realized that Michigan/OSU now has one. Still, you and bigmc6000 have persuaded me that it's not so bad.
And yes, I also realize that clucking about capitalization makes me a schoolmarm, and the gnrgoblue of 10 years ago hangs his head in shame. I promise my posts will be more relevant to, you know, football, in 11 days.
Good point. In retrospect, I shouldn't have mentioned the marketing part because that definitely muddles my position. Still, I definitely didn't mean to imply that it's done for greedy marketing purposes, just that it's kind of goofy.
This board is turning into the RCMB with all the snark, but I suppose I am being a bit "down in front." My defense is that it's the offseason and I can't take any more idle Freep/secondary/QB/hot-seat chatter. If this board can handle another post about Xbox/PS3 online dynasties, I figured I'd be on safe ground with this.
I'm glad someone noticed, actually.
The Ivy League didn't want to stay relevant as football behemoths. Those schools chose their path.
Anyway, I get your point but I think, if nicknames are progress, so is corporate sponsorship, and I don't remember too many around here being fans of the proposed AT&T (?) sponsorship.
No, I don' t think I did.
Your second option assumes that both Brandon and Gene Smith are willfully complicit in lessening the profile of the rivalry. Seems unlikely to me, so I'll go with the "good soldier" option.
Whether I'm "willing" to or not doesn't matter. I have no say. If it was my decision to make, I'd explain why it's a stupid move and veto it.
All I'm doing is trying to figure out what I might look forward to in what appears to be our new reality. Looking forward to Nebraska = OK, I guess. Looking forward to MSU = not.
And, just to be clear, I'll say again that I don't like this at all, and I also think it's a bad business decision.
I'm working my way up through the thread and you're the second person to blame Brandon for this. How did you get it in your head that he's masterminded this plot? I can't imagine it's something he wants.
What possessed you to think this is Brandon's doing?
I don't like this but could live with it ... as long as Michigan is matched up with PSU or Nebraska at the end of the season. Ending the year with MSU or another perpetual also-ran would be pretty anticlimactic.
Bill Martin was always very responsive to polite e-mails. Anyone know the best way to express the sentiment of the fan base here? I sincerely doubt Brandon has much sway in this matter, and it's extremely likely he's fighting this as much as he can, but it's still probably a good idea to pass along our polite, considered feedback.
And to follow up on ChasingRabbits' joke about Rodriguez being blamed for this, I also want to stress that it's extraordinarily unlikely that Brandon has much say here or that he hasn't used whatever influence he does have to attempt to block this. I'm worried about "OMG BRANDON NUKED THE RIVALRY" blossoming from isolated Internet idiocy to perceived fact, and that derailing his tenure as AD. I presume this is being passed down and he has to sell it.
So I tested out the app's ability to handle replies and it worked fine. When I viewed it on my PC, though, it appears as though there are display problems with the subject line and my MgoName:
http://mgoblog.com/content/rich-rodriguez-presser-notes-8-19-10
Right now, the offending post is the sixth down. I checked in Chrome and IE8. Hope this info is useful.
Testing the MGoApp's worthiness in the reply space.
I don't know how I feel about not shoring up the secondary with someone from offense. I understand that you don't want to make both units worse because of an injury, but I think there's something to be said, at this point, for having warm bodies available (bodies with scholarships). but my guess is the coaches know more than I do.
How about including "Donate" and "MGoStore" links and/or functionality, as well? These would serve the proprietors more than the readers, but there's nothing wrong with that, I imagine.
Last night was the first opportunity I had to get to it; I'll play with it more this evening. My initial impressions are favorable. It's stabler than I was expecting and has a nice, clean interface.
Some areas to consider tweaking:
These are just my reactions to the 10 minutes I've spent playing with it. I'll post more when I've spent more tie with it.
Biggest request: A mobile version of the site. I e-mailed Brian about it in like October and he said he'd have it up and running during the offseason. I'm expecting it any day now ...
Also: This is meant to be both snarky and legit, but I think the site and its community would have been much better served in the past few months with much more conference-realignment coverage and analysis and much less soccer stuff. I think the proprietor missed a major opportunity for a one-time reprieve of the dreaded offseason traffic dip. Brian has the 'net cred, readership base, and resulting network of sources to have been right there with Frank the Tank and Chip Brown at the center of the insight/reaction loop, which would have done a much better job of picking up new regulars than just about anything else that's been printed here since the offseason began. I was surprised at how little attention the topic has received here in the last few months, especially considering there was nearly nothing even nearly as relevant happening and I suspect Brian was, as usual, being fed insider info. Even if he wasn't, I'd have loved vastly expanded versions of his own views on established facts and widely circulated rumors.
Brian's mentioned over the years that much of his time is dedicated to nuts 'n' bolts during the offseason, so I assume that's what kept things so quiet around here. Still, as a reader, I'd have voted for more conference-realignment chatter over just about anything else.
Before anyone leaps to his defense, this is not a criticism of Brian's work or of the blog. It's my favorite place on the Internet, I've been a daily visitor literally since the first week it was live, and Brian does an awesome job. I'm only answering a specific question about what could be changed.
NCAA
NCAA Expands March Madness To Include 4,096 Teams