OTish - Halloween HOT Takes
Ahh, Halloween. On a Tuesday! The annual celebration of ........ ???? Spook? Mini-Almond Joys? Whatever. It's that night a year when parents take their kidoos, every single one suffering from some kind of seasonal viral infection with a low grade fever, strolling through the rain soaked 37 degree neighborhood in a costume missing half of its peices from the classroom celebration cluster-F only hours earlier, collecting chocolate goods that will see roughly 30% of them spontaneously throw up in a near stupor before bed and stay home tomorrow because good god that kid can't go to school. Because it's Halloween! And that's what we do around here.
Anyway, I think it is a good morning for some hot takes. In a week that has seen (thankfully) far less hot takey OPs, maybe we can get them all off of our chest here. College football related or otherwise. (Perhaps we can avoid rabbit hole topics, like if you get ready to type Manafort or Obama you are going in the wrong direction). If you don't want to join in, fine, just try to avoid venomous snark for no reason other than to ensure discord.
Hot Take - Alabama or Ohio State is going to lose this weekend.
Ohio State, coming off a miraculous comeback win against Penn State, one week before hosting Michigan State in a game with division stakes and payback feels from two years ago, heads to the exact worst possible place I would want to be taking that team this week, cozy Kinnick Stadium (you may recall that stuff like this tends to happen there). Iowa, stingy as ever, losing three close games this year and ready to pounce on their Florida-Meh-Bowl securing win. I think this one looks tricky.
Alabama has been murdering everybody they play. Seriously, this team has not had a close game in the second quarter since FSU. They are due for a complication. And after an ugly start, LSU has strung together a few nice wins including including a win over a pretty good Auburn team a couple of weeks ago. I'm not saying Alabama is sleeping on this game, but I am saying that LSU is going to bring it this week. I think this could be a sneaky game this weekend for the Tide.
Happy Halloween and let's hear your takes.
October 31st, 2017 at 9:49 AM ^
October 31st, 2017 at 9:54 AM ^
Dont forget WD wearing the same Michigan Football costume that he has worn for the last ten years
October 31st, 2017 at 10:08 AM ^
You mean the one where WD dresses up like a girl?
October 31st, 2017 at 10:32 AM ^
+1'd for awesome!
October 31st, 2017 at 10:48 AM ^
no?
and as for hot takes, no trick or treating until the snow plows have been through the neighborhoods. snow on halloween is a northern michigan tradition.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:48 AM ^
I will be eating one of the smaller kids.
October 31st, 2017 at 9:51 AM ^
We live on a street with a lot of older couples and retirees who can't really be bothered to open the door much past 6 PM on a normal day, because that seems to be the way it goes in some parts of the downriver communities here in Metro Detroit, so we actually take the kids out to my brother-in-law's subdivision in Dundee to trick-or-treat, and unlike when I was a kid, the entire affair is neatly organized right down to the presence of auxillary police and people wandering around trying to spot trouble.....in Dundee.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:37 AM ^
October 31st, 2017 at 9:52 AM ^
Couples who spend months planning their matching costumes are stupid. There, I said it.
October 31st, 2017 at 9:55 AM ^
may be a downer, but I have no interest (and have not for my entire adult life) in wearing a costume for Halloween. I have been to a couple of Halloween parties but just went in regular clothes. I don't know, adult costumes are kind of weird to me.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:12 AM ^
...ahh, never mind
October 31st, 2017 at 10:53 AM ^
October 31st, 2017 at 9:52 AM ^
October 31st, 2017 at 9:54 AM ^
October 31st, 2017 at 10:27 AM ^
with tons of kids. I fully expect to see 100 kids tonight. Just glad my wife enjoys handing out the candy. I will hide in the basement and watch TV....
October 31st, 2017 at 9:53 AM ^
than a Snickers.
October 31st, 2017 at 9:55 AM ^
October 31st, 2017 at 10:18 AM ^
October 31st, 2017 at 11:19 AM ^
Or Snickers. 1A, 1B.
And those cheap-ass black and orange wax wrapped pieces of plastic can rot in hell.
October 31st, 2017 at 12:56 PM ^
Twix is the only candy bar with the cookie crunch!
October 31st, 2017 at 2:07 PM ^
Not so sure about that. We need a candy bar lineup.
October 31st, 2017 at 9:58 AM ^
Halloween should be on the last Friday of October every year. Enough with this weeknight nonsense.
October 31st, 2017 at 2:20 PM ^
Easter Sunday & Thanksgiving seem to have this holiday shit figured out just fine.
On a personal note, we moved to the woods in Brighton 4 years ago and I really miss handing out halloween candy and terrifying small children with my overly-graphic pumpkin carvings.
Now we haul our young kids to a random/friends neighborhood and walk a marathon between houses to get them a decent amount of candy.
1st world problems.
October 31st, 2017 at 3:42 PM ^
I've given this some thought through the years. One option I like is to make every month be 30 days and then have a five day mini-month at the end of the year that would serve as a giant new year's week party. Everybody gets to take those 5 days off.
Option 2 is to have 13 months of 28 days with an extra vacation day at the end of the year that is not a Sunday through Saturday day. It's just an extra day. That way, Valentine's, Halloween, the 4th of July and other date-specific holidays would always fall on the same day of the week each year. On Leap Year's, you get an extra day at the end of the year. Right now, Feb. 29 is really lame. If that Leap Day gave you an extra day of vacation, people would really look forward to it and celebrate it.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:15 AM ^
Football take: This season is PSU's last chance for a while. Next offseason, Barkley goes pro. Moorhead is a head coach somewhere else. Blacknall, Hamilton, and Gesicki all graduate so McSorley has no one to throw to behind an OL that won't improve enough. The DTs, Cabinda and his backup, and their entire starting secondary graduate. The coaching isn't good enough to make up the difference, and they come back to earth hard with a challenging schedule in 2018. The recovery beyond next year is slow.
Halloween take: It is the best day for parties, which I am too old for. Thanksgiving is for eating. Christmas is for family. New Year's Eve is cold and not really that special. Everyone leaves at halftime of the Super Bowl because they have to work the next day (hey NFL, put the Super Bowl on Saturday night and watch your ad revenue double). But you put a bunch of people in weird costumes into a room with booze and you got yourself a good time.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:22 AM ^
don't really agree about the Superbowl. If you did put it on a Saturday, everybody would watch it at the same locations, the parties would be huge. More people would watch, but fewer TVs or devices would have it on. As it stands, they get party viewership and viewership from people like me who simply do not party on Sunday and just watch it quietly like any other game. Additionally, everybody who leaves the parties early turns it on when they get home so again, individual viewership goes up again.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:48 AM ^
"Double" might have been a bit of hyperbole, but I think there would be more eyeballs for the duration, so the second half ads would be more valuable.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:42 AM ^
Ooooo I like this one. Mostly because I think Franklin is part idiot.
How do you go up 14-0, 21-3, 28-10, and 35-20, and STILL LOSE?!?!?
The win over OSU last year (kind of fluky) and the win over Michigan this year (whoopie?) seemed to alleviate all of the bad coaching talk that surrounded him for the last 2 seasons. After that OSU game I go back to what I thought previously...
He's not that good of a coach. Good recruiter, good motivator, not a good coach.
October 31st, 2017 at 11:45 AM ^
The coordinators run the team, Franklin recruits. That's a plausible system if you can keep two great coordinators forever, but everyone knows you can't. Moorhead and the older talent will leave and the offense will plummet. God forbid Franklin loses Pry too - they would become a 7-5 unit over night.
October 31st, 2017 at 11:58 AM ^
Such a development would be glorious!
October 31st, 2017 at 11:19 AM ^
October 31st, 2017 at 10:22 AM ^
before nightfall is guilty of child abuse and should be immediately horsewhipped. Anybody who knocks on our door during daylight is ignored. If they persist, I sneak around from the back door and give them bags of shit my dog has thoughtfully laid for them.
Halloween is for the night, goddammit. It's All Hallow's Eve, for fuck's sake. Evening. Darkness. Nightime. Anything else is completely un-American.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:28 AM ^
October 31st, 2017 at 10:35 AM ^
Some cities have designated trick or treat times, and they start when the sun is still out. It's not like when we were kids.
I used to leave when the sun went down and I'd stay out until at least 930-10. Two pillow cases full of candy.
October 31st, 2017 at 11:59 AM ^
think that the Holiday is more or less ruined by how long the "Halloween season" is. I feel like Halloween has been unofficially happening for at least 21 days.
But I don't really mind the designated times. Trick or treating is supposed to be for real kids, like 2-10 years old. When 15 year olds are "trick or treating" they are engaging in debauchery and they can do that any other day of the year. I remember going out for Halloween when I was in early high school and it involved far more Old English than it did Snickers or Kit Kats. I like that the day is kind of reserved for young kids now. You don't hear as much about Devil's Night and that kind of shit either now.
And the days of young kids going out at sundown and coming home late solo or with friends at 9 or 10 years old is long gone. I don't think that adults "have ruined" it by imposing certain restrictions on the activity itself. Now in the sense that adults have "ruined it" by essentially turning young children into red-eyed sleep-deprived math-fact zombies who can't really even enjoy the holiday, yeah, there is that.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:36 AM ^
So says the guy with the skull avatar...
October 31st, 2017 at 10:21 AM ^
--other than that crazy franchise of which the original is still the best-- is a non-horror film, Silver Linings Playbook. it combines both football and oddball humor with Halloween as the initial backdrop. Good story and funny scenes.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:31 AM ^
Linings Playbook is a great movie. I can't consider it a Halloween movie but it has a couple of the most memorable scenes of the last ten years of American films, and features ridiculously good acting across the board. I think it is O'Russel's best and despite accolades, it has disappeared from movie consciousness way too soon.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:21 AM ^
Crazy shit always happens at Kinnick, so I will definitely give Iowa a puncher's chance. Especially with OSU coming off an emotional, potentially draining win against PSU. But I think it's more likely that OSU just steps on Iowa's throat from the first whistle and never looks back.
My first hot take is that Wisconsin, much like Michigan last year, loses three of its last four games. While it's not their fault that their opponents are awful, they've been the beneficiaries of a very easy schedule so far. Peters will be comfortable enough with the offense by the 18th to keep Wisconsin's defense honest, and he'll make enough plays to propel the team to a 21-14 win. Wisconsin will rebound by beating Minnesota, but will then get blasted by OSU in the conference title game. They'll meet up with a very, very mad Georgia team that lost a close game to Alabama and feels like it got snubbed by being left out of the playoff after finishing the regular season 12-0. Georgia blows Wisconsin's doors off 42-14, Wisconsin finishes the year 11-3, probably ranked somewhere around 18-20.
My second hot take is that the Big 12 gets left out ot the playoff. Again. I think Oklahoma and TCU are both good for one more loss. My final four are:
Alabama
OSU
Oklahoma
Clemson
OSU exacts revenge on Oklahoma, Alabama beats Clemson, and the committee gets the Saban-Meyer national title matchup they're dying to see.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:24 AM ^
Oklahoma will be very busy both making and not making the playoff.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:26 AM ^
Trader Joe's Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Cups>Reese's. Skittles are garbage since they took out lime and added apple. Clowns aren't scary.
October 31st, 2017 at 10:33 AM ^
October 31st, 2017 at 10:43 AM ^
Here's my hot take, the MSU / Penn State rivalry is the dumbest manufactured "rivalry" other than the Civil ConFLiCT. At least with Civil ConFLiCT everyone realized how embarrassing it was and put it out to pasture. The hideous Land Grant Trophy is so large and unwieldy that it's amazing it hasn't fallen over and injured someone.
October 31st, 2017 at 2:28 PM ^
"Hold my beer."
October 31st, 2017 at 10:46 AM ^
Rashan returns a fumble for a td Saturday.
No BIG team makes the playoff
I love cheesy poofs
October 31st, 2017 at 11:10 AM ^
October 31st, 2017 at 11:03 AM ^
Why is it *just* west Michigan?