So, about that game against that school: does anyone else feel a little bit like Marge Gunderson right now?

As the rest of the world laughs at Dave Brandon's decision to dredge up a not very nice thing that happened a while back I keep thinking of the scene at the end of Fargo where Grimsrud is in the back of the squad car, mute, as Marge tries to figure out what's in his head:

				MARGE
		...  So that was Mrs. Lundegaard
		in there?

	She glances up in the rear-view mirror.

	Grimsrud, cheeks sunk, eyes hollow, looks sourly out at the
	road.

	Marge shakes her head.

	At length:

				MARGE
		...  I guess that was your
		accomplice in the wood chipper.

	Grimsrud's head bobs with bumps on the road; otherwise he is
	motionless, reactionless, scowling and gazing out.

				MARGE
		...  And those three people in
		Brainerd.

	No response.

	Marge, gazing forward, seems to be talking to herself.

				MARGE
		...  And for what?  For a little
		bit of money.

	We hear distant sirens.

				MARGE
		...  There's more to life than money,
		you know.

	She glances up in the rear-view mirror.

				MARGE
		...  Don't you know that?...  And
		here ya are, and it's a beautiful
		day...

Marge is trying to comprehend an alien intelligence's decisions. That's where I find myself today. I can't begin to fathom the kind of thinking that would go into scheduling Appalachian State again. I get there are reasons, just like Grimsrud had reasons, but for the reasons to win out over the costs the kind of value judgments that are going on in the decision-maker's head must be frightening.

Meanwhile, instead of being mute Brandon is reminding us not to shoot anyone. Thanks, Dave Brandon. I'll try to remember not to shoot anyone this fall. Then there's this:

Oh, each team wanted to win. Players mentioned how their nerves came into play. There were sweaty palms, and probably a few "yips" on the green. And when the match was over, there was some fun "trash talk," but there were more laughs and hugs -- and respect for each other.

Not being mute is only exacerbating this divide.

We've had hints of this for a while now, but this is the last straw: Dave Brandon is not a Michigan fan. He may want Michigan to win but he has no concept of what the fanbase thinks is important. In the last year he's suggested or executed the following:

• moving the Ohio State game to midseason
• putting Michigan in a different division than Ohio State
• curly fries in Michigan Stadium
• a sponsored spring game
• a mascot
• scheduling The Horror: The Squeakuel

He has failed to:

• summarily execute Special K on the diag

In the aftermath of people blowing up about these things, he wrote jerky emails and said he "can't see how it would be a negative" to dig up the most infamous upset in NCAA history. These are not good signs. Dave Brandon is going to create the future whether you like being put in a wood chipper or not.

ALIEN VERSUS HORROR NEUTRAL BLOGGER REACT ROUNDUP

Jerry Hinnen:

this is the single dumbest scheduling decision we can remember, and the most craven once since Indiana sold out one of their own Big Ten home games to play at a "neutral site" full of Penn State fans.

Spencer Hall:

No matter what happens, greater glory is paid the lowest point in the history of the Michigan football program in exchange for national television exposure. This is Michigan football becoming a celebrity rehab patient. This is Michigan's amateur sex tape that no one wants to buy. We're beginning to think Dave Brandon is not a very smart person. We're beginning to also think this will all end with this Michigan team losing this game in 2014, and then beating Florida in the 2015 Outback Bowl.

Holly Anderson:

the athletic department has scheduled what it’s going to have to call a revenge match with Appalachian State, a concept too hysterical to even contemplate.

Doctor Saturday:

Aug. 30, 2014, is two days shy of the seventh anniversary of the most stunning upset in college football history, long enough for everyone involved in Appalachian State's 34-32 miracle in the Big House to have graduated, retired or otherwise moved on from the respective programs, but not nearly long enough for Michigan fans to get over the festering humiliation that sent the program into a four-year spiral from which it's only beginning to emerge.