Unverified Voracity Wonders If It's Happening
it might be happening
Unfortunately, a miss. ALSO JACK HUGHES?! Oliver Wahlstrom will play at BC next year. Michigan is still waiting on Jack Hughes, who everyone says will either play at the NTDP next year or accelerate like Zach Werenski. Mike Spath just said today on Inside the Huddle that Hughes hasn't made a decision yet, but: "there's a very strong likelihood" that he accelerates and that he's "in position to do so."
Per Spath, the potential catch is that if Quinn Hughes gets drafted and decides to sign, a major motivation for Jack to accelerate goes away. The upshot: "if Quinn and the family decide to come back for one more year at Michigan, look for Jack to join him."
Zach Shaw suggests you'd prefer the Rangers or Red Wings grab Hughes, then.
Who said Sundays are for football? Jack Hughes and the U17s don't think so! #SCtop10 #USAvsGB #NTDP pic.twitter.com/bRfwMK2VjR
— USA Hockey NTDP (@USAHockeyNTDP) October 22, 2017
Strongly prefer.
The Big Ten hockey schedule is bad again. Prepare for another year with the vast majority of Michigan hockey's home games in the fall semester, when everything is happening. The Big Ten schedule features just four home games after the break:
2018-19 Michigan B1G Schedule
Nov. 9-10 -- Notre Dame
Nov. 16-17 -- at Penn State
Nov. 23-24 -- Wisconsin
Nov. 30 -- at Michigan State
Dec. 1 -- Michigan State
Dec. 7-8 -- Minnesota
Jan. 4-5, 2019 -- at Notre Dame
Jan. 11-12 -- at Ohio State
Jan. 24 -- Penn State
Jan. 26 -- Penn State (Super Saturday, New York, N.Y.)
Feb. 1-2 -- at Minnesota
Feb. 8 -- Michigan State
Feb. 9 -- vs. Michigan State (site TBA)
Feb. 22-23 -- Ohio State
March 1-2 -- at Wisconsin
Notable bad things: two(!) bye weeks, the Notre Dame series are not home-and-homes, and Michigan is shipping a Penn State game to NYC. The latter is payback for PSU doing the same thing. While it's slightly annoying for season ticket holders at least 1) the AD didn't announce this after season tickets were due, 2) after asserting a price cut that moving the MSU game actually turned into a price increase, and 3) to play in front of nobody in an outdoor game in Chicago. Announced attendance at the first game was almost 14k.
Hopefully Michigan can fill in those blank spots with nonconference home dates, but even then those are more likely to be Arizona State-ish teams than actually compelling games.
Also of interest: the Michigan State game that is traditionally at the Joe is now listed as TBA. The new version of the JLA might be too crowded to accommodate them? If so they should probably just move those games back to campus. There's no other arena worth having an MSU-M game in.
An outdoor game that's a good idea! The January 5th game at Notre Dame is going to be outdoors:
According to WTKA’s Michael Spath, the Michigan hockey team will return its game to the great outdoors this winter, as the Wolverines are slated to face off against Notre Dame at the Fighting Irish’s football stadium as part of the festivities surrounding the 2019 NHL Winter Classic.
The main event, which will pit the Chicago Blackhawks against the Boston Bruins at Notre Dame Stadium for the 11th installment of the event, will take place Jan. 1, 2019. While official details for Michigan’s game have yet to be announced, a source indicated to WTKA’s Inside The Huddle that the game is set to take place Jan. 5, one week after the Wolverines’ annual participation in the Great Lakes Invitational in downtown Detroit.
My tolerance for outdoor games has about bottomed out but this one passes muster. It'll be jam-packed. Hopefully the appeal of that outdoor game is an incentive to return for Quinn and attend for Jack.
Matthews decision status. Charles Matthews spoke to the media after one of his draft workouts, and you can try to read between the lines:
“Really just trying to wear all my options out,” Matthews said while attending a workout with the Denver Nuggets this week. “Basically go through all of the workouts that I have scheduled and just reconcile with my family and do what we feel is best. …
“It has been really good, especially if I do come back to school,” Matthews said. “Get some good experience to know what this process is like. If I choose to stay in, raise my confidence overall.”
Not a whole lot there, but the press conference did cause Andrew Kahn to reiterate the data he'd gathered about missing the combine. I'd been looking for since Matthews didn't get invited to the combine:
Should he keep his name in the draft, experts don't think his name will be called on June 21. ESPN's Jonathan Givony projects Matthews as a late first-round pick in next year's draft, as does NBAdraft.net. Givony does not list Matthews among his top 100 prospects at this time.
Last year, 137 college underclassmen declared for the draft, many without signing an agent. Eighty-four of them were not invited to the combine. Only four of the non-invitees kept their name in the draft; none were selected.
So you return unless you can't go back to school because of your academics or are staring down the prospect of getting 15 minutes a game because Tom Izzo's got his eye on a walk-on. I'd imagine Matthews returns for a final year, a la Moe.
LET'S GOOOOOOO. Our long national nightmare is finally, finally, finally over:
BREAKING: Jim Connor, who spent the past several years playing football fanatic Larry Culpepper in Dr. Pepper commercials, has told me that the company will not feature Culpepper in commercials going forward. Connor says the decision “Rocked my world” and was “An incredible gig.” pic.twitter.com/an0DJBKO0w
— Adam Carriker (@AdamCarriker94) May 21, 2018
Dr. Pepper. You had Pitbull under an overpass, and then saddled us with this epic doof for years and years. Choose light. Choose Pitbull again.
Etc.: Barstool, imo.
I really liked that Dr. Pepper did an entire ad campaign centered around college football.
Yeah it was annoying, but it was our annoying.
To show my appreciation, I drank Dr. Pepper whenever I could just for them doing that.
Sometimes at Taco Bell I would just let it pour into the drain for a while to increase their sales.
What's with the "Barstool" in the Etc. section at the end?
Deadspin took an unprovoked jab at Barstool in an article yesterday - your typical misguided misogyny and racism stuff - and capped it off by revealing PFT Commenter's real name, despite his wishes to work anonymously under his pseudonym. Barstool fans expectedly got mad and yelled at people on Twitter.
Ace, while either on too many or not enough drugs, flew off the handle for some reason and started berating and insulting anybody on the internet who isn't offended by Barstool.
I can't say I've been offended by Barstool, though I've also never visited their site...
Who/what is Barstool?
When you say totally unprovoked jab, do you not count numerous instances of Portnoy and his merry band harassing women writers, including the one who wrote the article?
Anyways, the deadspin article's point is that PFT Commenter originally started out as a caricature, of dumb everything-ism on PFT. When you move to an organization that seems to actually embody those views, is it still satire? Are you laughing with him, or at him?
Except PFT isn't satirizing Barstool. He's satirizing mainstream sports journalists and the way your Dad talks about sports (both online and in real life).
I mean yea, he is satrizing stupid opinions and stupid fans. But the core of his character is a misoginistic, racist, sexist and rather stupid sports fan. Barstool has a lot of fans that are straight up his character - just unironically. And some of the content that Barstool produces is really undeniably misognistic and sexist.
When he was writing for KSK/SBNation you didn't have the same obvious conflict of chracter vs content that was being produced alongside him. You don't get that at Barstool, and that's where I find the Stephen Colbert analogy pretty apt.
I love the guy though, think he's hilarious, and don't plan on stopping consuming his content. But my eyebrows raised when he went to Barstool, and I don't really see any issues with people who have such an issue about it they straight up call him out or stop listening to him.
PFT Commenter didn't satirize bloggers, he satirized message board posters. I know it's hard and you have to dig deep to see it, but that's why his name is...wait for it... PRO FOOTBALL TALK COMMENTER. He mocked the commenters. He still mocks the commenters. That's his whole shtick.
Your analogy is crap. It's not Colbert going to Fox. It's like if Stephen Colbert made a name for himself as a Daily Show correspondent parodying network news feature reporters. And then he was hired for his own show and he hosted it as the same character. That's a better comparison and that's what Colbert did. He was still the same smug news anchor guy, he just did it in a different role on a different show.
Barstool is not PFT's first job. He played the same character at SBNation and other stops prior. He and Big Cat poke fun at how seriously sports journalists take their jobs, but that's their collective view of sports journalism. That is not how PFT made his fame. Seems like you should have a better grasp of the topic if we're going to discuss this.
The entire sum of sports stories can be defined as "not important stories". That's an arbitrary goal you've set up there. Is posting about ESPN internal turmoil an important story? What about Chris Berman's leather story, Brett Favre and Jenn Sterger, the list can go on!
The WaPo is a way more prestigious place than Deadspin, and they just had a puff piece on PFT. By your definition that's also not an important story either, and yet, I bet you didn't harrumph and complain that the WaPo is wasting everyone's time.
Your main objection seems to be that she wrote an unfavorable piece about a website you like. Which, i dunno man, a website isn't an identity. Barstool cultivates a certain type of fan (I think the UM barstool account is particularly cringey) and that's fine. Other people dislike barstool for various reasons, that's fine as well! It's just weird to me that barstool fans get VERY DEFENSIVE whenever that website gets called out on its shit.
Unless of course, you're Dave Portnoy. In that case, I'd advise you that punching down is a bad look and you should just laugh, count your money, and not care what the cool kids think about you.
Last one first. No, I am not Dave Portnoy. He's doing exactly that - counting his money while I sit in my office and waste my life on this inconsequential nonsense.
Back to the top: You can *chef's kiss* all you want over "white knighting", but that's what Ace does. He tweets Jordan Poole gifs, overshares about his ailments and medication, and tries to rid the world of misogyny. (shrug) There are gainfully employed women working at Barstool. There are thousands of women who enjoy the brand. Ace is trying to shut Barstool down on their behalf because I guess he feels those women don't know any better. If you have a better term than white-knighting, I'm happy to edit. But what he does is pretty much the very definition.
"Not important stories". My challenge to you is find a less relevant phrase from one of my posts. I don't think you can do it. There's an entire forest here, buddy. Focus.
If WaPo wrote no less than 4 features about PFT Commenter in the span of a year, then yeah, I think their entire audience would harrumph and complain that they're wasting everyone's time. So yes. Good try though.
My objection is not that she wrote an unfavorable piece. I don't care that you, Ace or anybody else doesn't like Barstool. You do you. Just get off my back. If Ace didn't go full "Simple Jack" and attack half his readers, I wouldn't have had a word to say about it. What I don't like is that I can't just be an MGoBlog user without Ace Anbender calling me a piece of shit for my completely unrelated likes and dislikes. You don't like the Barstool Michigan account? Fuckin' great, man. Neither do I.
-----------
I've aged out of Barstool's core demographic. I have a family and it includes multiple women. I've got way more skin in this game than Anbender. I am not some dipshit frat bro as Ace and Laura will lead you to believe. I can make my own decisions and determine for myself what is and is not acceptable. He's not my hero. Not my wife's, not my daughter's. I don't agree with him at all. He's either entirely too tender for today's world or he's buying way too much of what the Laura Wagner's of the world are selling him. And again, do whatever you want. Just leave me and what I choose to do with my time out of it.
Ace referred to those who don't share his doomsday view of Barstool as an "idiot horde". Should I take offense to that? Would you become defensive? Maybe. Maybe not.
On the other hand, I didn't say anything close to that about you. Why are you here? Did you not become very defensive when I called out Deadspin for their shit? Why are you so defensive of Deadspin? Are you Laura Wagner? That's "just weird to me".
also one of the most judgmental moralists I've come across online, and that's saying something. He combines a virtuous worldview with complete contempt for people who don't share that worldview.
I'm late to this party so whatever, but you do understand that the Washington Post just released a glowing, weirdly-anonymous profile on PFT Monday, and Wagner wrote her story the next day. "Barstool didn't do anything yesterday" wasn't the point; their most prominent employee, who trades on the reach of Barstool but tries to separate himself from its toxicity when it suits him was in the news. The Post story didn't delve much into his employer's numerous issues with sexism, racism, homophobia, etc., even though it certianly wouldn't have been beyond the pale to ask PFT about it, at least how how handles his public distance, at times, from the guys who sign his checks.
Also, the world has known PFT's name for a long time. It took me a couple of minutes on Twitter and Google to find it from posts well before Wagner's article. Why so many people keep up the lie, seemingly for PFT's benefit alone, that his real name should be unknown is silly and seemingly only designed so he can retain a veil of protection between himself and his online persona and the connection to his employer. We can get into a debate about vs IRL privacy if you want, but I doubt that's your point.
Whenever Barstool gets mentioned around here in a negative light there are a couple of people who adamantly defend it, which is fine. And I get that Deadspin is a shitty place too at times, and they write shitty stuff about people as well. And I like Deadspin and profundly dislike Barstool, and I'll cop to having shitty preferences for my junk reading. But people seem profoundly intent on dying on a hill for Barstool and its characters that seems way too personal for a mediocre site that peddles in coed pictures and sophomoric "comedy" bits.
Ya know, I find it so odd that a guy like you will jump right in and take up for the anti-Barstool gang and at the same time criticize somebody like me for being on the other side of the fence. I'm not dying on a hill any more than you are. I like Barstool and I've got the time and availability to write a billion words about it. Roll through my post history. I've gone off on a lot dumber subjects than this.
You have junk reading. I have junk reading. I don't judge you if you like Deadspin, even if your extremely moral authors like Laura Wagner close their hard-hitting imporant journalistic Barstool think pieces with lines like, "So that's the latest on these fucking morons." (as if that isn't a clear sign of an agenda).
PFT Commenter is not Dave Portnoy. He's not responsible for what comes out of Portnoy's mouth. I have no idea what value you'd get about asking PFT Commenter:
"What do you think about the bad stuff that happened at your company in the past?"
"I think it's bad."
And in fact, that's pretty much what they did in the Post piece. There's two paragraphs about how he feels about the Barstool reputation. I won't spoil it for you.
And give me a break about granting him his alias. Are you pissed off that Dan Patrick's name isn't Dan Patrick? Or Natalie Portman? Or Mark Twain? Who gives a shit what he wants to be called? Is your real name BronxBlue? Is that a veil to protect your online persona and insulate you from whatever terrible shit your boss does?
When Barstool gets mentioned around here, only a couple people take up their defense probably because Brian and Ace are vocally anti-Barstool and most people will avoid taking a crap on the blog owners' front porch. But look at the votes on my posts in this thread. There are a whole bunch of Barstool fans that sit quietly and let you guys echo-chamber yourselves into moral nirvana. You're not superior, you're just agressive in your anti-Barstool rhetoric to the point that it makes people uneasy to admit they enjoy the brand.
------------------
Last word on this and then I have to shut this conversation down and actually do something with my life:
I don't find anything wrong with Barstool Sports. I know they've made mistakes. There's a handful of them and every anti-Barstool piece cites the same 5-10 stories spanning at least the last 8 years. If you're a Barstool fan, you pretty much know them by heart because everybody brings up the same tired crap: The Blackout Parties, the Smokeshows, Portnoy commenting on Brady's son's manhood, the Sam Ponder stuff, etc. That's all I can think of and there's really not much more without moving into 'full-reach' mode.
So if the company churns out a few dozen blogs, videos, radio shows and podcasts PER DAY, not to mention hundreds of tweets, that's actually pretty damn reasonable over such a period of time. Consider that they're a comedy site largely employing unpolished 20-somethings living off of jokes and satire in the can't-wait-to-be-offended golden age of 2018, that's borderline incredible.
It's not anywhere near the offend-o-meter hit rate that your anti-Barstool author of choice would lead you to believe. But I wouldn't expect you to understand that. Deadspin told you they're bad.
I like about five people at Barstool (Big Cat, PFT, Chaps, Rone, and sometimes Caleb). They also have an entertaining instagram account.
A lot/most of their stuff isn't that funny. Do some of their fans not embody the best of the internet? Yes. Is that true for basically every internet community? Yes. Barstool probably has a slightly worse ratio than most bc of their demographic (young males).
Yes, Barstool objectifies women with their Smokeshows. Yes, they occassionally will post/say something unsavory. But spare me the moral outrage of shaming me for liking a few of their personalities. I don't use them as a reliable source of news or a bastion of society. They are purely entertainment. If they don't entertain you, I totally get it. But I don't get why people feel the need to rip on anybody who enjoys anything about Barstool.
Do you still use Facebook even though they've done way worse shit? Do you still watch the NFL? Hell, it's not like anybody here is going to bat for the morals of the NCAA.
here and other places in media and online. If anyone is old enough to remember or read about Jerry Falwell and the "Moral Majority," they were a movement in the 80's that passed judgement on everyone in society that disagreed with their Christian based ethics and public policy stances. They were quite rightly criticized by people for taking their religious choices into public policy and passing judgement on those that didn't share those beliefs.
They have been replaced in society today by a group of like minded people that have replaced religious judgement with politicaland social judgement. If you don't share their opinions and express them in public/online, you aren't simply wrong, you are either (and there are only these 2 choices) A- an evil person with bad ideas, or B- too dumb and witless to understand the argument.
This is not an overstatment. There is literally no difference between their critiques today and those of Falwell in the 80's except they don't justify them from the bible. They do justify them morally, and judge morally. They are moral scolds just like those old adult characters in Animal house or comedies from the 80's.
I would be an internet millionare selling fainting couches based on people having "feels" about someone elses' comments on the internet. Unfortunatley, I lacked foresight.
a number of people, including at least one who writes for this site, believe that enjoying a particular podcast produced through Barstool makes you complicit in the rest of Barstool's far less enjoyable activities, like the rampant sexism, the mob mentality of Stoolies, etc.
also MGoBlog broadly has gotten into it with Dave Portnoy so don't expect a nuanced opinion.
barstool does not equal "sports"
I'm not so up on "Joy of Cooking' so the analogy falls flat with me. (Which perhaps crushes another stereotype?)
I love sports. I don't visit barstool to read about them or otherwise experience them. Because, woman. And I don't need that shit in my life. So, it may be pedantics to you. It's not to me.
If you don't visit Barstool because woman and you don't need that shit in your life, how would you have any idea whether Barstool is or is not sports? And why would you try to weigh in on the topic?
You don't know shit about "Joy of Cooking", admitted as much and declined to comment. Meanwhile, you have an obvious axe to grind when it comes to Barstool and immediately toss in your two cents. Why is that?
Fair enough, I will clarify. I have been to barstool, though I no longer go there voluntarily (ie, unless I don't pay enough attention to a link I see on some other sports site that I do frequent) because I find it to be a rather unfriendly-to-female-sports-fans environment, in ways both overt and covert (and while you may want me to provide examples, I will concede here that I won't be going back over to find them; so it may have changed, and/or I may have a bias that's unfair, so be it).
I still get plenty of sports without including barstool in my universe. I don't mean to come across as having an axe to grind against them, of my free will I've decided I don't need what they offer. Sports & my love thereof are a big part of my life, however, so in my world, barstool is not equal to sports.
reading this now, I wonder if it's meant to say, as I first took it:
...men care more about sports than women [care about sports]...
or if it was intended as:
...men care more about sports than [men care about] women...
hmmmmm.
thanks for clarifying.
Ace has become, for lack of a better word, a big jerk on twitter recently. Very condesending for anybody who has a differing opionion than him, even if its articulate, well thought out, and understandable. I used to like some of the content that he put up, but I recently un-followed him on twitter due how he treats people.
It's actually really soured me to MGoBlog in general, unfortunately. Poor representation of the welcoming community, which is what I loved about this blog.
Funny you should say that - during the Mgopodcasts I've always wondered how Ace puts up with Brian. But it seems Ace has taken on the jerk role on twitter?
Brian does seem a bit condescending/jerky on the podcasts. When he goes on the WTKA roundtable, he's balanced out nicely with others, and they can call him out on his personality quirks. It works well, and I think it's funny.
When he's with just Ace, they almost feed off each other in a bad way. I enjoy those substantially less, until Seth comes on.
Too often, the podcast comes off as an unequal partnership, where Brian makes his opinions known and then Ace is compelled to agree with them. I'd like them to debate things a little more.
When they first started it was this to the extreme. I stopped listening for a while and now listen every now and then. To Ace's credit, he's gotten a little better at this, but the general dynamic definitely still exists.
I would agree with this and unfollowed as well. I originally followed for sports reasons, not interested in political or social opinions. He's entitled to them and to post whatever he wants so don't get it twisted. I just have no need to see the vitriol in my feed.
Comments