Ramzy on M-OSU rivalry gave me some satisfaction
Ramzy's latest The Situational on Eleven Warriors is the only site in the last week that has given me satisfaction about this year's The Game. Not happiness mind you. That won't come till we beat them. But Ramzy really laid out WHY this happened. And WHY OSU cares more about the game than we do.
It's a great read. Here are a couple of quotes:
"On Meyer putting the M rivalry on a pedestal:
- it elevates the importance of winning that game and makes doing so a pillar of the program.
- it shares a recipe for rivalry management institutionally impossible for Michigan to copy."
"There are winged helmets displayed all over the Ohio State practice facility, year-round. They don't call Michigan disparaging names - or any name at all. Fans can say or do whatever they want, but as an institution and a football program Ohio State reveres and respects its rival. Michigan reveres and respects Michigan."
"The Buckeyes' rivalry management system post-Cooper works quite well, is indefinitely sustainable and doesn't rely on unsolicited contributions from a rival for energy. If they drop one or three to the Wolverines, they'll keep the Ohio State-Michigan game on the same pedestal."
Ramzy in the NYT:
“Every year is its own chapter, but the story doesn’t really change,” said Ramzy Nasrallah, executive editor of the Ohio State site Eleven Warriors. “The story is that Ohio State’s aspiration is to be Michigan.”
“Michigan does not want to be Ohio State,” Nasrallah, the Eleven Warriors editor, said, “because Michigan wants to be Michigan and still beat Ohio State.”
That's bold. And honest. And true.
As long as Harbaugh insists that every game is equal, nothing will change for the next 7 years...
p.s. the other read that gave me some satisfaction was Space Coyote on the x's and o's
November 28th, 2018 at 6:51 PM ^
I am not an economics expert by any stretch, but the phrase "opportunity cost" keeps popping into my mind. It is easy to say, in the abstract, that an adjusted amount of focus on the Ohio State game at the cost of losing a different Big Ten game (let's say, for the sake of argument, Wisconsin, so it's an out of division game, equaling what Purdue did to OSU) until it actually happened. While that sequence of events would have ended better for Michigan (they would be playing this weekend, they'd still have an outside chance at the CFP) there are no guarantees that devoting more time, energy, focus, psychic energy to the OSU would produce improved results. I realize there are no guarantees in life, but the presumption that doing more to beat OSU would likely beat OSU seems specious to me at best.
November 28th, 2018 at 7:01 PM ^
OSU's opportunity cost to beat Michigan and drop an ugly midseason game is higher than our willingness to beat OSU and drop an ugly game midseason. The buckeyes have lost to MSU, PSU, Iowa, and Purdue in upsets no one saw coming or expected. It may have cost them a good shot at the playoff, but if it meant winning the Big Ten and beating Michigan it's worth it.
Michigan has the mentality that each game on the schedule is important, and no one more important than the one you're about to play. That's the difference, and I feel like UM is getting closer to OSU's level despite the score saturday.
November 28th, 2018 at 10:09 PM ^
Apparently they also don't mind getting jail-sexed on a national stage, if at that point they've already beaten Michigan. Zero points in a bowl game.
November 29th, 2018 at 6:39 PM ^
well, yeah. I mean we're a bunch of fans with no insight into the actual team.
EVERYTHING on this board is specious. lol. we're all just spitballin' here. hahahaha
But yeah, who knows if it would work or not. But OSU has a passion about us that I don't see matched on our side. And that's just my single person's observation.
November 28th, 2018 at 7:01 PM ^
Those in the “we need to recruit better players” camp. Good luck.
Ohio st will always have a talent advantage. Even in those rare times when M’s “1’s” are as good or better than OSU’s, our “2’s” won’t be.
We need an intense, all consuming, lazer like focus on the game in order to best them. Bo understood this. His rose bowl record demonstrates this as much as anything.
Our coaching staff failed us in this aspect. The question is what will they learn from it? Will they spend 4hrs every sunday night next season watching OSU’s game tape? Will they go thru the if/than exercise until they know them better than they know themselves? This is the cross they must bear. It’s the one they are handsomely paid to bear.
Id like to cast a family of chains similar to Miami’s turnover chain only the pendant is simply a “62”. Our entire staff should wear those 24/7 as a reminder of what happens when you forget Bo’s lasting lesson. “We ain’t gonna our recruit them so we have to out work em.”
November 28th, 2018 at 7:08 PM ^
A few things...
- Haskins in an interview stated he watches Michigan for 10-15 minutes every week through the season.
- Meyer in an interview pre-game stated that they prep for The Game through summer conditioning, workouts, fall camp, spring camp, through the season...every single day, they prep a bit for Michigan. Harbaugh, meanwhile, stated that we take one game at time and that's the approach. Every game is a championship game.
- Shea and other players on the team echoed this approach.
- Dre'Mont Jones, OSU DL, stated that if they won every game and won the Big Ten and National Championship, but lost the Michigan game, they would consider the season a failure. Do you think our team has the same mentality?
- They're OBSESSED with beating Michigan. It's a year-round goal. That's why even though they've struggled tremendously this season, we got every single Buckeye's A-Game on Saturday. Do I think we have the same laser focus on beating OSU throughout conditioning, camp and the season? I'd say no.
November 28th, 2018 at 8:52 PM ^
Even if this is all true, it only makes sense to make that a point of focus when you have a reasonable (50% or better) chance of winning that game, to make all the hard work pay off. Otherwise, you are just setting your players up for demoralization. Recruit better, and perform better in that game especially, and all will take care of itself.
November 28th, 2018 at 8:57 PM ^
Exactly!!!!
November 28th, 2018 at 7:16 PM ^
We lost because we did not have an answer to their crossing routes and we finished drives too many drives with field goals. Also, their QB wasn't broken like so many of our previous opponent QBs. All this extra blah-blah about not caring about the rivalry is nonsense.
November 28th, 2018 at 7:20 PM ^
Where's Michigan Monday?
November 28th, 2018 at 7:37 PM ^
yeah no
November 28th, 2018 at 8:05 PM ^
Why isn't Ohio U in the Big Ten? Serious question...Large public university located right in the middle of the conference's footprint?
November 28th, 2018 at 8:09 PM ^
IMHO, all this OSU bullshit is being vastly over complicated and over explained.
To me, going back through the Cooper years all the way to today, the team with the better QB has pretty much won for 30 consecutive years.
You can maybe make an argument for 1998 and Tom Brady being slightly better than OSUs QB - but other than that, who has lost with the better QB in the rivalry?
November 28th, 2018 at 8:45 PM ^
"Harbaugh insists that every game is equal"
That's only to the press, and what the coaches tell the players on other game weeks to keep the players focused on what is in front of them. I seriously doubt Jim Harbaugh lacks an understanding of the prime importance of The Game.
November 29th, 2018 at 9:34 AM ^
He was straight up asked last week if this was "just another game" and he said "of course not."
While I don't doubt OSU does everything mentioned, the idea that Harbaugh treats OSU as "just another game" is absurd.
November 28th, 2018 at 8:51 PM ^
Ramzy is an ass.
November 28th, 2018 at 9:14 PM ^
I fucking am sick of all this talk, and we have to wait another damn year to even have a chance again.
November 28th, 2018 at 9:18 PM ^
They lost because the game plan on both sides of the ball sucked. Can we stop these now?
November 29th, 2018 at 6:48 PM ^
Post mortem, man. That's what fan sites are for. If you don't like it, check out Reader's Digest
November 28th, 2018 at 9:20 PM ^
Bullshit. Michigan had this game circled and even had a fucking revenge tour. We prepped for a team that was "mediocre" all year and should have lost to MD.
November 28th, 2018 at 9:27 PM ^
Meyer is simply one of the three great coaches of this generation: Belichick, Saban and him. It was kind of obvious, too. I wanted us to hire him back in the day, but we got the dime store version in Rich Rod. I know Meyer to Michigan was never a serious play, and I *think* I'm now glad we didn't hire him, but if we had we'd probably have won a national title or two in the last decade.
November 28th, 2018 at 9:41 PM ^
Another thing to consider. Let's, for arguement's sake assume that OSU cares more about this game than us. At this point, they are an elite program that doesn't have other demons to exorcise. They don't need to worry about programs that they are trying to elevate themselves over, because they are at the top. We can't afford that luxury, and have to be more week to week.
Until we can start looking past those opponents, to an extent, we can't afford to sell out for OSU. For us that could mean 2-4 losses if we do so. For OSU it maybe turns into 1 loss.
November 29th, 2018 at 6:50 PM ^
I agree, but then what you're saying is: This game isn't as important to us as it is to them.
Because I think they would totally make that bargain every year.
November 28th, 2018 at 10:41 PM ^
Oh look, more pseudo intellectual bullshit from Ramzy Nasrallah.
Nah, I'm good.
November 29th, 2018 at 12:35 AM ^
This is the kind of take that sounds good because humans like stories and narratives, but it doesn’t stand up to scrutiny. Michigan nearly won in 2016 and could have won in 2017. OSU won the former on a coin toss call and the latter on the arm of a garbage Michigan QB. The other two years the DC laid an egg, kind of like Meyer laid an egg against Clemson in 2016. One of these years Michigan is going to win this game and the narrative will change again and everyone will rationalize why it had to happen that way.
November 29th, 2018 at 1:24 AM ^
Refusing to use the letter M (albeit usually hilariously unsuccessfully), singing that stupid song about us, and wearing "fuck Michigan" shirts every week (seriously, I see their fans wear them every OSU game) may show that they hate us more than we hate them, but it's certainly not "respectful."
November 29th, 2018 at 2:28 AM ^
Ohio State wants to be us? Why would they want to be us? Because we’re a better school that used to be unstoppable in football? Princeton is a better school than us that used to be unstoppable - do we want to be them? Hell, ND’s a higher ranked school with a football history (and present) arguably better than ours - do you want to be ND?
Give the conceit a rest. I’m quite sure OSU is fully happy doing what they’re doing, and wouldn’t trade places with us. Why would they? If their coaches sell their players an inflated idea of some superior 1940s Michigan powerhouse that they have to overcome, in order to have their players buy in for the rivalry, then that’s purely a matter of practicality - to win games.
Besides, read the whole article - the quote from the Eleven Warriors guy “admitting” OSU wants to be Michigan was taken out of context.
November 29th, 2018 at 11:21 AM ^
This is correct, and all you have to do is look at how OSU looks against Michigan versus how they look against everyone else. They're willing to give up some time to beating Wisconsin or MSU by 3 tds instead of 5 so that they can focus on Michigan. OSU looks strong at the beginning of the season because they prep for their non conference. Then they look decent as they go through the Big Ten, then they look strong again because they're playing the team they prep all year for.
November 29th, 2018 at 11:35 PM ^
That article is a rambling mess.
But it did make this key point:
all anyone has to do to exploit that (OSU) back seven is spread the defense out a little and make those linebackers think too much. Michigan chose a more challenging path of fighting in the trunk of a car
The Wolverines' strategy took the Buckeyes' extremely vulnerable and leaning IKEA furniture back seven and graciously reduced it to four. The defensive backs were torched again, the team committed a dozen damn penalties for over 100 damn yards - but linebackers weren't even given the opportunity to erase themselves on Saturday.
The Ohio State defense wanted to be bad, but our tepid offensive play calling wouldn't let it.
December 15th, 2018 at 6:25 PM ^
I told my wife when Chase said " sometimes your little brother gets out of line and you have to put them in their place" We are going to lose to Ohio State. I got so sick of hearing about the revenge tour and felt the players got more wrapped up in the media notoriety of that than actually worrying about beating them. Like it was this whole " we are on a revenge tour so teams will cower to us" Bull shit that gave them more fuel to beat us. I can't tell you how f'ing pissed I was watching our team walk into their stadium and f'ing Chase had a hat on that was promoting his twitter account. My litmus test is and always will be "Would Bo allow this to happen and the revenge tour and the twitter BS was a resounding NO".