Michigan: Days of Futures Past

Then add some context. What the hell are we reading? Where is it from? If you quote somthing, cite it. 

Is this someone else's work?

Maybe this rough patch isn’t over and maybe it is, but by God we made it through the last seven years as Michigan fans and come hell and high water we still will be at the end.

Why do I have the terrible feeling that the Glove will have to reissue this post next season with "seven years" being updated to "eight years"? But not because we lost to App State again, those guys are getting completely annihilated this Saturday.

As for the rest of the season, please let me be wrong...

trying to read that.

there will be two words that will be echoing in my mind. Hope and appreciation.

I will be thinking of other things such as (in no particular order): The Band, the weather, MGrowOld's avatar, my new seat cushions, the 2014 freshmen, and the new offense. I get the appreciation part, but I'm not dwelling on the Hope part. Hope is NEVER a strategy.

Is this about X-Men?

How does one accidentally blockquote something?

for the 1000th reply along the lines of "Holy crap, football can't come soon enough." 

I'm guessing that this wasn't a reference to the classic album of a different name by the MoodyGoBlues.

I'm not sure if this has anything to do with the X-Men film of an almost identical title

Does this have something to do with trading orange juice futures?

The beauty of up/down votes.  They're a time-saver.

Negged for no paragraphs and a lack of Magneto reference

I'm not going to downvote this because I'm a nice guy, but rule of thumb, if one has to scroll down before a paragraph break then it's probably to wordy for the board. 

Now, if one has to scroll and scroll.....and scroll again and there is NO paragraph break, well then the person who posted it better put on a helmet. 

But I respect your passion. Go Blue. 

I'm hoping the two App State games are book ends to this low period in our football history.

*I trust this is your work, otherwise I take back my upvote.

our lowest times during the RR years when you'd show up at the game fully expecting a beatdown from our opponent.  That was just depressing.  I think the worst game of all was the home game against Northwestern when it was sleeting and Michigan couldn't score at all despite not being far behind.  At least in the last few years, we've been pretty competitive for the most part.  This year will be better yet

Decades ago I studied Akido. It like other martial arts is more than just a type of self defense, but in my experience is more of a lifestyle changer than most of the others. To learn akido you must learn to roll forward and backward over an upraised hand head over heals to a standing defensive position. Eventually you do it at a dead run. Your first day in the dojo you start on your knees like every child probably did when they were 2 years old and learn how to roll.  

In Japan you learn nothing else until you can roll acceptably, because rolling is central to controling your center. It is not uncommon for a new student to do nothing but practice rolling every class for six months, before the are judged readly to move on. 

In the US you are shown how to roll in your first class and every class everyone practices rolling for the first five or so minutes. It takes a long time to learn to roll correctly and most of the time US students are not as proficient as their Japanese trained counter parts, nor can most American students of akido execute perfect forms into their 80s if they live that long. Trainers here know that the Japanese method produces a superior result, but few Americans are willing to spend six months doing nothing but learning to roll. As a result while there are many Americans who are very capable at Akido few ever reach the top level of proficiency. 

We expect Michigan to field great football teams. Not good, not very good, but great. Most of us understand that won't happen every year, but greatness is the bar against which every team is measured every year. If the stars are right and the fates kind any program can put a great team on the field for a season. Only a great program can do that on a regular basis.

Perfecting anything is hard and takes time. Greatness is harder and usually takes longer, but like Akido once if you can get there and you consistently follow the practices that got you there, you can stay there a very long time. There are no shortcuts to greatness. 

Restoring Michigan football is proving to be a long road, admittedly somewhat longer than I expected,  but I see the process of perfecting the program and the team proceeding. It's not there yet, but when it gets there it will have in place everything it needs to stay there. 

Hopefully this will be a better season. Less angst would truly be a bessing.

Go Blue!

I get it that UM was expected to easily beat a then-FCS opponent.  But the degree of horror in the loss tuned out to be based on a big misperception. 

IN 2007, the national Sagarin ranking for B1G schools was 53.5; and the App State ranking was 44.  That's nearly 10 spots better than the average B1G team.

About the rivalry games this year, MSU and Ohio.  I have so much more hope than I have had in so many years we are going to grind both of these guys to close contests....and that we stand to win both with good hard, smart football.

Last year's Ohio game impressed me about the will of this team.  Despite an unabashedly terrible year (with respect to high standards) as an unranked team, we took on what was previously the #2 team in the nation and pretty much exposed them for the fraud they were in front of the country.  Better teams would go on to clean up the mess we started making.

I think the experience the team has, the energy that Nuss puts ON the field, are some of the missing ingredients.  I think every player wants to be here, to put his all into the game, and to have his position group buddies right behind him, should the starter lose a step, literally all over the field.

Hoke, in his very subtle way, to my senses, seems more confident this year.  Last year I think he knew he had a work in progress and there was no way to hyperspace a year ahead.  I would so love for all the questions to be answered, for the fanbase to quiet down and unify, for the Athletic Dept to wipe some of the green cash juice from its fangs and continue what I see as the start of being very slightly benevolent.

As said, its been a long hard road.  And will continue to be a hard road.  But I'm interested in hanging a few more successes on the wall.  I have high hopes for that starting Saturday.

I appreciate your hope.  Not trying to be funny, I really do.  I kind of feel like this season we could really make some noise, but I'm trying not to get too high expectations.