michigan replay

MAYBE

The dumbest thing in the world. We are all very fortunate that we experienced the overblown seriousness of NFL reporters for a solid month before ballghazi hit. Otherwise the sheer concentrated stupidity of it would be killing us all right now. People who have tested these things tell you that it's extremely hard to distinguish between 10 PSI and 12, and yet:

And that's from Peter King's site. King is the unofficial voice of the NFL, and even he's reduced to throwing a million different articles on his site about a nothing issue.

Elsewhere lunatic screechers have demanded the Pats' removal from the Super Bowl and the ejection of Bill Belichick from the Earth's gravity well. It's enough to turn yesterday's press conferences into bravura performance pieces by the Patriots even though they were the legal crap-speak version of "both teams played hard." I'm down with anyone expressing open contempt at the assembled NFL press corps.

When this happened in college football, the Pac-12 fined Lane Kiffin and we all rolled our eyes at him, then got on with our lives. The NFL has to be so damned serious about everything, though, so we get a solid week of questions like "what can you possibly say to the children about this travesty?"

And there but for the grace of Dave Brandon's uncontrollable urge to email go us.

Harbaugh in the Orange Bowl. I enjoy the bit where he tells Tyrod Taylor that he did indeed throw a spectacularly unlikely touchdown.

Interesting times in Knoxville. A day after Tennessee (and former Michigan DL coach Steve Stripling) cut loose defensive end Marques Ford for no reason whatsoever two weeks before signing day…

"It's an ugly business," LaRosa said. " … In the nasty business, they kept it sort of honest by at least saying that they had other commits and they were pulling his commitment."

…their offensive coordinator pulls up stakes and bolts for the NFL. Turnabout is fair play there. This would be going too far in penance, though:

Jones always has maintained a tight relationship with Mike DeBord, a longtime college and professional coaching veteran, whom NFL sources told VolQuest.com this week could depart an executive-level post in Michigan's athletics department for assistant coaching opportunities back in the NFL.

That would be bonkers. DeBord hasn't coached since 2012 and hasn't had a coordinator spot since 2007.

Ford immediately committed to Rutgers, FWIW.

Angelique on Drevno. Former players are fans:

"We were a team that was pretty beaten down," former Stanford offensive lineman Chris Marinelli said. "Their first order of business was getting us stronger and we pretty quickly became a pretty scary, forceful team. We mauled people. I think people (who follow Michigan) will see that pretty fast. He will get all those guys in tune very quickly. He's one of those people who gets people in line, especially the young guys in terms of breaking habits. It will be a pretty quick turnaround."

FO and SB Nation writer (and former All-Pac-12 OL) Ben Muth:

"Drevs is O-line through and through," Muth said. "He's going to impart toughness on that offensive line. Michigan's offensive line is going to be tough and play physical.

"The great thing about that staff -- they have an identity, and they're going to impart it on you. That's something we didn't have at Stanford, and when Harbaugh got there. He said, 'This is what we run, this is how run it, and other teams are going to have to adjust to us.'"

Having an identity is going to be a welcome change after years of turnover going back even to the Lloyd Carr days, when DeBord came in and went to an exclusively zone stretch system.

HAIR. Via Dr. Sap, here's Rick Leach and Kirk Gibson chatting with each other on a 1979 edition of Michigan Replay:

Another thing on Peppers to safety. Marcus Ray points out something I'd forgotten:

In fact, Ray got an early signal from Peppers in his true freshman season.
"During the season, he told me, 'Hey, I would have preferred to play safety, but I'm a team player,'" Ray recalled. "He said he made a lot of plays at safety in high school. He said he just feels more comfortable there. I think that's a great move.

He played the spot in high school. Ray also thinks he can be Michigan's best there since… 1997. But definitely no longer than that.

Etc.: Hockey scores a lot of goals. O'Bannon legal team now suing over UNC academic scandal. Dylan Larkin putting up a lot of points.

RIP, Bobby Womack. The man who provided the Michigan Replay theme, and eventually our podcast's, has died.

via

The whole thing is here; Womack was far more famous for doing a bunch of other things, but around here he's my ringtone. May the program once again live up to the awesomeness of the horns.

NHL draft stuff. Incoming F Dylan Larkin may have even gone a little higher than expected when he was drafted by (possibly) YOUR Detroit Red Wings at 15th overall. That's good for Michigan, as Detroit is generally patient with their prospects—so patient that it drives their fans nuts—and the friendship between Red and Mike Babcock should prevent Larkin from departing until he's good and ready.

The only other Michigan player to get drafted was Zach Nagelvoort, who went to the Oilers in the middle rounds. Quite a rise for him to go from "guy who had to leave his NAHL team to get playing time" to draft pick.

With the rest of Michigan's class kind of a patchwork of overagers, it's not a huge surprise that the rest of the guys got passed over. Dexter Dancs had a shot, but no one else was even first-time eligible IIRC.

Michigan could have a big 2015, with three incoming players under consideration for first-round picks. Kyle Connor was the second-leading scorer in the USHL; U17 D Zach Werenski is good enough that Michigan is trying to bring him in right now; NTDP defenseman Nick Boka was one of the first invites to that program in his year. Chris Dilks has all three on his "A" list of guys he's seen who have a shot at the first round.

With Cooper Marody and Brendan Warren also coming off good years, Michigan should have five current and future players called around this time next year.

That explains that. I'm pretty sure we are all already aware that the reason Michigan backed off of top 100 MN RB Jeff Jones was questions about his eligibility, but if there were any questions about those questions they should no longer be in question:

The highest-rated recruit to commit to Minnesota during the Internet recruiting era has reportedly failed to register an ACT score high enough for enrollment this fall, according to a report from the Star Tribune.

Running back Jeff Jones needed to improve his ACT score in order to offset a rough year academically as a sophomore at Minneapolis Washburn; the NCAA determines eligibility through a process that combines report card grade-point averages as well as standardized test scores. As the Star Tribune's Joe Christensen previously reported, Jones improved his ACT score with an April test, but needed to do so again on June 14.

He's trying some late hijinks with online classes and such that Michigan's admissions would almost certainly reject, so… yeah. Michigan accurately projected that he had very little chance of suiting up this fall.

O'Bannon's over. The trial is over after three weeks, and despite the presence of Mary Sue Coleman and Dave Brandon on the NCAA's witness list neither appeared. No doubt whatever testimony they had would have been redundant with various other president/AD types who took the stand to explain that the NCAA was good and college was good, but I was looking forward to this Claudia Wilken person giving Brandon the stink-eye for assertions that, to be fair, would have been no less ridiculous than a bunch of things we already heard.

To me, nothing sums up the NCAA's argument better than Mark Emmert responding to a question about his 1.6 million dollar salary:

Emmert: "My salary is set by the executive committee who hires compensation experts that establish benchmarks."

— Andy Staples (@Andy_Staples) June 19, 2014

You can justify anything if you hire a consultant to do so, and will try to if you are the kind of person who can thrive in an organization as orthogonal to reality as the NCAA. I have no doubt the parade of ludicrously-compensated suits the NCAA paraded in front of the court genuinely believes themselves to be agents for good in a corrupt world. You cannot get a man to understand something his job prohibits him from understanding, after all.

I have real problems with the executive class of the NCAA acting like they're running a hedge fund in everything they do and then expecting us to believe the things that come out of their mouths, and eagerly await whatever comeuppance the legal system can contrive. It won't be enough, but whatever.

Speaking of that. Delany is "driven" to have the Big Ten Basketball championship in MSG despite the fact that it is booked during championship week.

Greatest comment ever. Great satire can be mistaken for genuine sentiment… and I think this comment left on an O'Bannon wrap-up post on CBS is satire.

ONLY one man can save colleges..  save sports and  save the country

and that man is NICK SABAN

jealous sports nuts as host of sports talk in knoxville... saying that nick saban hated women and is a bully

usually GREED MONSTER  guys  after they get rich and  popular dumps their wives for a younger

and more pretty woman.. NOT saban  still married to the same one  since 21 ...  and  not only  rich and popular  but also good looking for women...... THAT is  proof that saban is not  what  these insane jealous;nuts try to make him out to be..

the best thing for america is  to make saban the dictator of the country  just like he has done with  bama  football and the same great success  for the country will  come .... all people  ,must obey saban  for  all  peoples  success... just like all bama players obeys and they get the  greatest success

saban as dictator  sets up  the  best system  and places everyone himself in the right position... like he does with football

lets hear it...... HIP HIP  HOORAY.......  HIP HIP  HOORAY .NICK SABAN FOR DICTATOR of AMERICA!

But I'm not entirely sure.

Hello. The USA is playing a knockout-round game in the World Cup today, so nothing is going to knock off my shine. But I should mention that Rutgers and Maryland are now officially part of the Big Ten. The Big Ten has celebrated this by taking pictures of their mascots in Washington DC. That is all.

Etc.: Stop reading about my early opinion of Tate Forcier and read my early opinion on Nik Stauskas.

Bob Lipson, the most interesting man on a blue planet

Through various iterations of music players I have had a Game Day mix that I play on the drive from metro-Detroit to Ann Arbor. It's organized in a specific order to mimic the Michigan experience, beginning with a track imploring that the band take the field, and the whole pre-game concert, plus a bunch of Victors trios, Let's Go Blues, a halftime show, the hospital's string instrumental, and Temptation/Hawaiian WC. It concludes as any rightful Michigan weekend must, with Across 110th Street.

Michigan Replay ran from 1975 through 2008, beginning on Channel 7, moving to 4, and then back to 7 before ending up at Fox. The Sunday show spanned three coaches, two hosts, and six athletic directors. In some ways it was the spiritual predecessor to MGoBlog, in that its calling card was picking apart the plays from a wide angle, and using the latest available medium—television—to bring fans closer to the program than they'd ever been before.

Many people made the show what it was—from the coaches who finished their game days with after-midnight taping sessions an hour's drive away from their wives and beds, to the humble Jim Brandstatter, to the camera guys and crew like Pierre Woods and MGoReader Mike Berens.

But if you narrow Michigan Replay down to one guy, that guy is producer Bob Lipson. I recently had the great pleasure to sit down with Bob and ask him to tell the story of the show that for 33 years became part of the fabric of Michigan football. What follows are Bob's recollections of three wonderful decades, as recreated from notes written by a poor blogger trying to scribble while listening to one of the most fascinating stories in Michigan football, much of it not at all the way you imagined it happened. I know some people will remember things differently. What I have tried to present is the tale as Bob told it to me.

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Live from WXYZ Channel 7: 1975-1979

In 1975 there were basically three networks. Michigan was as big as any team but still had its games broadcast about four times a year—when it was the ABC Game of the Week. At this time Bo was doing a Sunday TV show on Channel 4 that the people at Michigan weren't very happy with. Bob Lipson was working for Channel 7, under a general manager who was also head of Michigan State's alumni association (Bob refers to them only as "Sparty").

Lipson, a Michigan fan though not an alum—he's a Wayne State grad—had an idea to take over the program with a better format, and got the principals, including Bo and, somewhat reluctantly, athletic director Don Canham, to agree (Lipson spoke with great respect of Canham, even though they butted heads, and later listed him along with Jerry Hanlon and Elvis Grbac as the three people who left the strongest impression on him of all his years with the show). As payment Bo got whatever sponsorships they could sell in the credits scroll. The first host was Larry Adderley, another Sparty, who got the gig by nature of being WXYZ's main sports broadcaster (Larry later became the Tigers' play-by-play man).

The theme from a Blaxploitation flick and its now iconic percussion/horn funk melody was chosen mostly by happenstance: "I was frantic to find a theme song right up to the last minute of the first show back in '75," Bob recalled. "I just stumbled upon it while trying everything in the channel 7 library and settled on it the night before the first show."

The first episode aired after the first game of the '75 season, at snackycake Wisconsin (two traditions we all miss: early season conference games, and Wisconsin being a pushover). From the start it was a ratings success; it helped that Michigan was No. 2 in the country. The myriad Sparties around the network—specifically Jim Osborn who was president of the MSU Alumni Association—wanted, and created, their own show to run after Michigan Replay, however Sparty wasn't much to look at in the '70s so the network was essentially taking a loss to make sure everything stayed square.

Doing the show live had its funky moments. Back then Bob would pick out cuts directly from the coaches' (all-22) film on Saturday nights and have them ready to go for the Sunday filming. One time a crew member put the double-perf (meaning it has holes on both sides, people born after 1990) film into the machine backwards while playing it back during the taping, with the effect that everything was flipped horizontally. As Adderley professionally acted as if nothing was amiss, while breaking down a play Bo decided to point out that despite appearances, quarterback Rick Leach is indeed left-handed.

Here I'd like to mention that Bob shares our distaste for EXTREME CLOSE-UP footage whose analytic value is limited to ENT doctors.

Bob's Show, Bo, Budweiser, and Brandy: The 1980s

What's a Valhalla?

After five years of producing the show for WXYZ, Lipson knew he had a success and wanted to leave Channel 7 and own the show himself. He found a new home at Channel 4, the NBC affiliate. Since Adderley was Channel 7's guy Bob got a new host from Channel 4, that station's number 2 sports guy behind Al Ackerman (and a former player for Bo) Jim Brandstatter. Brandy got the call that he'd be coming on board for Michigan Replay while he was on his honeymoon, and canceled the trip to come back immediately. As you can see above from the early Brandy episodes, the rapport with Bo was an instant fit, as Jim, more so even than Adderley, had the humility to let the coach and the game be the story each week.

Former Eastern Michigan athletic director, Alex Agase, who holds the interesting distinction of being an All-American at two Big Ten schools (Illinois, then Purdue while training for WWII), was by this time a volunteer assistant for Bo. Among his duties were driving the head coach of Michigan to Detroit and back to do the shows. In true Schembechlerian fashion, after spending all day Saturday coaching football, and the hours after each game on Saturday night breaking down football film with his coaches, and the half hour talking about football on TV, what Bo wanted to talk about most on those hour-long rides was, of course, football.

The sponsors that Lipson drew were mostly clients from (I'm going to spell this wrong) PR firm Darcy, McManus, & Bowles, who, as was standard practice in advertising for the day, got a few Michigan perks (like Bob's seats) with their deals. In return Bob got three main sponsors: Pontiac, Cadillac, and Budweiser. Bo didn't mind the cars; he hated Bud. Hated it. Hated the very idea of alcohol mixing with his clean-cut Michigan show. Finally Lipson jokingly promised Bo if he could get the Michigan Milk Producers to come on board he'd drop Bud.

In 1984, Lipson moved again, this time back to Channel 7 but with the ability to reach a far greater audience through their network affiliates. Meanwhile the network was pressuring Channel 4 to get rid of Brandstatter, who didn't fit the hip '80s ideal of a program host. It was unrelated but perfect timing that when NBC pulled the plug on Brandstatter, Lipson was packing for Channel 7, and could thus bring his host with him.

Michigan Replay already reached homes across the state and into Toledo (and trebled Sparty's show's viewership in East Lansing) but this got Bob's little show all over the region, perhaps an understated part of how Michigan became one of the first truly national collegiate brands. People were tuning in every Sunday as far away as Tennessee to have Bo break down the latest game. The show was now an integral part of the Michigan football experience, a weekly tradition for more people in the state even than going to the football game, a perfect match for its era. But then came 1989.

End of Part I. Sorry to break this up, but Hail to the Victors is shipping at the end of this week and I have to get back to it. Coming up next week: how Fox changed everything and nothing, tapings at 2 a.m., Mo, Lloyd, the studio in Crisler, what do you do with 10,000 square yards of used stadium turf, and what really happened in 2008.