Hail To The Victors 2009 Comment Count

Brian

It is out:

httv 2009

A dossier of what's inside:

The usual team preview by yours truly, except swankier with more stats and highlights and pictures of Jamar Adams because the safety situation is so scary that no one actually scheduled to play the position has available photos. Also: special teams!

Opponent previews by a cast of characters. As per usual, we break out the Notre Dame and Ohio State previews and offer them to partisans of those schools. This year it's Vico from Our Honor Defend taking up the Ohio State banner; Brian Stouffer of The House Rock Built returns to preview ND. The rest of the schedule is tackled by Jerry Hinnen from the Joe Cribbs Car Wash, continuing HTTV's burgeoning tradition of forcing some guy from the South to learn all about the Big Ten.

Research and and analysis in spades. The research and wonkery section of this year's book includes:

  • Yours truly on hybrids and spinners and quicks and deathbackers and what it all means. What, exactly, Michigan's defense will be this fall has been a hot topic of conversation. I figured it out, probably. Complete with picture of Greg Robinson and Pete Carroll as chums. Also: diagrams.
  • Chris Brown of Smart Football on what went wrong last year, other than everything. The smartest college football blog in the universe—it's in the title—has been flagged down to explain just what the hell happened last year, other than all those obvious things. More diagrams herein. My favorite: 

    scrape-3
  • Matt Hinton on how freshman quarterbacks generally do. In sum: "not well, but significantly better on average that what Michigan threw out there last year." Hinton, of course, runs Dr. Saturday and is awesome.
  • Michael Elkon on demographic shifts, recruiting styles, talent, and Michigan. Elkon's contributed to HTTV every year it's existed; this year's bit is a piece on how Michigan finds itself  behind a talent eight-ball relative to national powers fortunate enough to be situated amongst oodles of talent, and why a coach like Rodriguez is the right fit for a team like Michigan that figures to face those national powers on a regular basis.

Talking with and observing this year's team in detail.

  • Tim Sullivan of Varsity Blue and Tom Van Haaren talk to Tate Forcier, who you may have heard of.
  • Johnny of RBUAS is unearthed and directed to expound on Brandon Graham as star player. I am possibly the one internet-aware Michigan fan for whom Johnny's decreased output over the past year has a silver lining: now folks will have a powerful motivation to buy this book.
  • S. Mastin Jones of Maize 'n' Brew revisits the Barwis meme in year two. There are quotes about vomiting. Of course there are.

Going back in the day. Michigan history features heavily:

  • Greg Dooley of MVictors reminds us all of what a batty year 1909 was. Stuff went down. Let me tell you.
  • Jamie MacMillian revisits Bo's last team, 20 years on. Remember when we had awesome safeties? I don't, I was ten. Jamie does, and catches up with Vada Murray in the course of his remembrance. (MGoReaders will know Jamie as frequent diarist Jamiemac, BTW.)
  • Dan Feldman, formerly of the Daily and now behind Piston Powered, talks to members of the 1984 team about their bounce-back season. We can rebuild it. We have the technology.
  • John U Bacon, who does everything, compares Rodriguez's start to those of Michigan legends past. It's not precisely as good as a few others. (Some of the everything Bacon does includes write Bo's Lasting Lessons, host on WTKA, and produce an epic quantity of articles for publications diverse and sundry.)
  • And I swear I'm not making this up but Craig Ross details how he somehow found himself deputized to take Bo's last or second-to-last autograph to Warren Buffett, of all people. Craig isn't making this up, either: there are pictures. It's an incredible, preposterous story.

It's twelve pages longer than last year's book and zero dollars more expensive. If you do not buy it, you are probably brain damaged. So avoid brain damage: buy the book. If you do not buy the book, people will question the functioning of your mind. Do it for the economy.

CONSUME.

Comments

tomhagan

July 6th, 2009 at 4:38 PM ^

for putting this all together with the links etc... you just screwed up my schedule for today with all this reading to do lol.

Wolv54

July 6th, 2009 at 7:59 PM ^

and I just completed my purchase this year. I highly recommend for those fans who are not scared of things like S&H scams, or other nefarious things.

UMFootballCrazy

July 7th, 2009 at 10:34 AM ^

I am now relieved that I am no longer in danger of suffering brain dammage [I hear it is bad enough to make your head explode...this is no joke], that no one will question how my brain works [although, you might not want to let me off the hook this easily] and doing my single handed best to turn the economy around...my copy of Hail to the Victors 2009 is on its way. Go Blue! So when do I get my 1000 MGo "suck up" Points?

prmatz

July 7th, 2009 at 10:46 AM ^

The book may be out but it is also DELAYED. Just got this e-mail from Maple Street: Paul, We had a delay in the delivery of our stock of books from the printer that has caused fulfillment to be backed up by a couple of days. You will be notified via e-mail when your magazine has shipped. We apologize for the inconvenience and thank you for your interest in Maple Street Press titles. Maple Street Press CS I'm especially bummed out because I am vacationing next week and really wanted my copy. I ordered way back on June 10! Brian, do you know if it should be in stores now? Might see if I can cancel my online purchase and go that route instead.

jamiemac

July 7th, 2009 at 11:53 AM ^

Quit delaying. Buy this now. Do it. I'll wait. Personally, I had a blast writing my story and can not wait to read the rest of the book. Not to mention being honored to be in the same book as Brian, Smart Football, Doc Saturday and Jerry at the JCCW, among others. I dont even care if my name is spelled wrong (last name ends with an, not ian), but whatever, the book and being in it still rocks. Of course, since the name is wrong, I'll use this space to pimp my new e-blog, http://www.justcoverblog.com Spotty posting for now, but by the end of the month there will be daily posts. First and foremost, though, are you done buying the book yet? Are you sure you only want one copy? They make awesome gifts, you know!!!