Michigan Recap

1. Before I get into The Game itself, I'd like to spend a few minutes talking about The Rivalry. Ohio State has now played Michigan 112 times since 1897. It is a long rivalry. It is a storied rivalry. It has often been a painful rivalry. Along the way, legends have been made, glory has been earned, perfect seasons have been dashed, championship hopes have been crushed. We have seen massive upsets, miraculous comebacks, record-setting performances, ten year wars, snow bowls, shanked field goals, banners torn down, double birds flipped, and so many other memorable moments. But that's all in the past now. It's time to move on.

I have heard so many Buckeye fans say that they want Michigan to be good again, "for the sake of The Rivalry." They say it with longing in their voices. Reverence even. Maybe a touch of pain, as if it really does hurt them that Michigan just isn't quite good enough to beat Ohio State. Quite frankly, I say that it's the stupidest thing I've ever heard, wanting your rival to be good.

In the real world, do you really think that businesses and organizations want their competitors to be good? Does the Board of Directors of McDonalds get together and pray that Burger King will produce better burgers? Does Ford secretly hope that GM will produce better cars? Does Coke want Pepsi to win a few taste tests now and then? Will Hillary Clinton's team be upset if the Republicans nominate an unelectable candidate? Of course not!

Even in the world of sports, this love of your team's rivalry, as opposed to love of your team, seems to be unique to Ohio State fans. I have never heard a Pittsburgh Steelers fan wish that the Cleveland Browns would be good again for the sake of the rivalry. Same thing with Auburn-Alabama, Packers-Bears, Yankees-Red Sox, Harvard-Yale, and every other heated rivalry you can think of. Army-Navy might be the only exception, but those guys will eventually shed blood for each other, they're all part of the same team in the end.

I think that this perverse love of The Rivalry is some lingering mental disorder from the Cooper Era, a sort of Stockholm Syndrome response from some of us who survived those dismal years. Back then, when we could never beat Michigan, we at least had comfort in the fact that we were part of the greatest rivalry in sports - we could still share in the greatness of The Rivalry even if it wasn't great because of us. We were like France: "Yes we lost the War, but it was the greatest War of all time."

We don't need The Rivalry any more. We are great because we are great. Let Michigan fans bask in the glory of The Rivalry, hoping that some of our greatness will rub off on them. Get over your love for The Rivalry, and don't ever let it cloud your hate for Michigan.

2. Here's a breakdown of each team's performance in three segments:

Team	Years Analyzed	Overall Record	-Win Percent-	Record in Game	Big Ten Titles	Nat'l Champs
Michigan Wolverines	1879 to 1950	416-115-24	.771	29-12-4	20	8
Ohio State Buckeyes	1890 to 1950	328-157-38	.663	12-29-4	8	1

Team	Years Analyzed	Overall Record	-Win Percent-	Record in Game	Big Ten Titles	Nat'l Champs
Michigan Wolverines	1951 to 2000	389-147-12	.721	27-23-2	20	1
Ohio State Buckeyes	1951 to 2000	397-130-15	.746	23-27-2	20	5

Team	Years Analyzed	Overall Record	-Win Percent-	Record in Game	Big Ten Titles	Nat'l Champs
Michigan Wolverines	2001 to 2015	119-69-0	.633	2-13-0	2	0
Ohio State Buckeyes	2001 to 2015	161-33-0	.830	13-2-0	8	2

Michigan was clearly the better team back in the leather helmet days. During the latter half of the 20th Century, the two teams were fairly even. Since the dawn of the 21st Century, Ohio State is clearly the better team. Let Michigan fans live in the past, recalling faded glory that they never knew. I prefer to live in the present.

3. Ezekiel Elliott reached some milestones yesterday. Zeke had 30 carries for 214 yards and 2 touchdowns, his 21st career 100-yard game (passing Eddie George for second place at OSU) and 5th career 200-yard game (tied with Eddie George for first place at OSU).

4. Zeke (3,812 yards) also moved past Eddie (3,768 yards) and into second place on the Buckeyes' list of career rushing leaders. With 39 career rushing touchdowns, Elliott is now in sole possession of 4th place at Ohio State.

5. For the season, Elliott has 1,672 yards rushing, which is already the 5th best single season in Ohio State history trailing only Archie Griffin (1,695 yards in 1974); Keith Byars (1,764 yards in 1984); himself (1,878 yards in 2014); and Eddie George (1,927 yards in 1995).

6. With one sack yesterday, Joey Bosa now has 26.0 for his Buckeye career. He is in third place at Ohio State, trailing only Jason Simmons (27.5 sacks) and Mike Vrabel (36.0 sacks). Bosa also had his first career interception in the game.

7. Urban Meyer becomes only the second Buckeye head coach to win his first four games against Michigan. The other was Francis Schmidt (1934 to 1937), who won all four games by shutout. Schmidt then lost three in a row (1938 to 1940) and was replaced by Paul Brown for the 1941 season.

8. It looks like The Agony in Ann Arbor will keep the Buckeyes out of the Big Ten Conference Championship Game. I don't care - I still love that play. There will always be other CCGs, but there will never be a fail quite so epic as that one.

 

M*ch*g*n only "gets good" by taking from us. That's the only way they've ever been good. 21 players from Ohio up there right now iirc. When M*ch*g*n "gets good", it is because they're doing well in turning young impressionable Ohio boys against their own "countrymen". They teach treason and treachery and dishonor. Why would anyone want to see them succeed at that? They are evil. Fuck them.

There is nothing entertaining about losing to those cockholes. NOTHING!

A-FUCKING-MEN. If those blue assholes stood on their own and it was truly M*ch*gan vs Ohio State, then I can see it. But they HAVE to steal Ohioans in order to be worth a damn. And to that I say "NO!"

fuck scUM

 

So Michigan has 14 peers with a single NCAA-listed National Championship since 1950. The list of 15 programs with more than Michigan's 1/2 a title

FIXED

 

M*ch*g*n only "gets good" by taking from us. That's the only way they've ever been good. 21 players from Ohio up there right now iirc. When M*ch*g*n "gets good", it is because they're doing well in turning young impressionable Ohio boys against their own "countrymen". They teach treason and treachery and dishonor. Why would anyone want to see them succeed at that? They are evil. Fuck them.

There is nothing entertaining about losing to those cockholes. NOTHING!

Nobody said anything about losing to them, for the second time. Ohio State can also only take so many players. Michigan is the test for those young, impressionable men- if they end up going to Michigan they were not true men of honor anyways and the state is better off without them!

Right? lol.

 

For The Rivalry to mean anything, Michigan has to beat Ohio State approximately half the time. Otherwise, they become a "scrub opponent" like Indiana or Purdue or Maryland or Rutgers, a guaranteed win. I want Michigan to be a scrub opponent. I want Ohio State to beat Michigan every single year. I want The Rivalry to be rendered meaningless.


College football teams are gigantic businesses (albeit not organized as corporations) that are part of the massive sports entertainment industry, which is itself part of the much larger overall entertainment industry. Naturally, a college football program, just like every other business entity, wants their opponents to suck so that it can profit at the expense of those opponents.

If Ohio State ultimately needs a "foil" in order to provide entertainment; in other words, if there must be other successful college football programs in order to the college football industry itself to survive; then let that foil be someone other than Michigan.


If you're entertained by watching a good Michigan team, then it would seem that your loyalties are divided. A good Michigan team will eventually beat Ohio State. I'm not okay with that.

You're a fan of The Rivalry. That's fine, but just realize what that means.


I never grin at an enemy.

You misinterpreted my point if you think I said I am entertained by watching a good Michigan team. I'm entertained more by watching Ohio State defeat a good Michigan team, than a bad one, would be the right way to frame it in that sense.

Different strokes, I guess. I know some of the candor here is meant to be humorous but in all seriousness, the above is really all I am saying. Does Michigan becoming good mean they will eventually beat Ohio State? Hmm, perhaps- but it'd be pretty lame for me to say I wish they'd stay bad because I'm afraid of them ever beating Ohio State.

Now if your argument is that Ohio State will be in the playoff each year if they go undefeated, regardless of how good the Michigan win is at the end of each season, I will listen to that AND I think it's probably true. But I talk a lot of CFB, so naturally I'd like to be able to trumpet that win for once when debating with people, lol.

 

You misinterpreted my point if you think I said I am entertained by watching a good Michigan team. I'm entertained more by watching Ohio State defeat a good Michigan team, than a bad one, would be the right way to frame it in that sense.

Different strokes, I guess. I know some of the candor here is meant to be humorous but in all seriousness, the above is really all I am saying. Does Michigan becoming good mean they will eventually beat Ohio State? Hmm, perhaps- but it'd be pretty lame for me to say I wish they'd stay bad because I'm afraid of them ever beating Ohio State.

Now if your argument is that Ohio State will be in the playoff each year if they go undefeated, regardless of how good the Michigan win is at the end of each season, I will listen to that AND I think it's probably true. But I talk a lot of CFB, so naturally I'd like to be able to trumpet that win for once when debating with people, lol.

Sometimes accidents happen and, for one,, I do not want to see one.

 

The only acceptable preferred outcome - they never win another game in any sport, disband the entire athletic department, tear down all stadiums and buildings on campus, shut down the university, and salt the ground. Total destruction of tsun.

 

The only acceptable preferred outcome - they never win another game in any sport, disband the entire athletic department, tear down all stadiums and buildings on campus, shut down the university, and salt the ground. Total destruction of tsun.

Fuckin A my man

Fuckin A

 

Don't agree with the people who are saying that failed punt is what's keeping the Bucks out of the playoffs. Besides the obvious point that what's really keeping them out is losing to Sparty, there's also the point that if Sparty had lost that game it changes the direction of their season. I'm sure they would have come into Lincoln much more focused and I really doubt they lose that game if they already had 1 conference loss and were close to desperation mode. You could say the same thing about us in the tsun game---if we don't lose to Sparty (especially in the fashion we did) ---we probably roll into Ann Arbor with a different mindset and who knows the outcome could have been different.

Kinda the same way it's always bugged me in baseball when, for example, a guy will get caught stealing second, and the next guy gets a double and the announcer will say, "It would be 1-0 nothing right now if not for that caught stealing." Well, I doubt the pitcher would have thrown that same pitch with a guy on second. Etc.

 

I don't give a damn for the whole state of Michigan.

But I don't hate the state of Michigan, or the University of Michigan, or Michigan State University.

Do I want the buckeyes to win each game they play against Michigan - football to tiddly winks - you bet.

At the same time I understand that The Game, The Rivalry, will last only as long as it's a somewhat equal give and take.

If what you want is for Michigan to begin to play at the .300 level and to win The Game about once every third decade; that's fine. But if that happens, if history reduces Michigan to the level of Indiana, then you no longer have a rivalry, you only have the deep satisfaction of long winning streaks against a team that no else gives two shits about. Then what?

 

The you know the war is over. Fuck them. If Ohio State kills Michigan, so be it.

 

I don't give a damn for the whole state of Michigan.

But I don't hate the state of Michigan, or the University of Michigan, or Michigan State University.

Do I want the buckeyes to win each game they play against Michigan - football to tiddly winks - you bet.

At the same time I understand that The Game, The Rivalry, will last only as long as it's a somewhat equal give and take.

If what you want is for Michigan to begin to play at the .300 level and to win The Game about once every third decade; that's fine. But if that happens, if history reduces Michigan to the level of Indiana, then you no longer have a rivalry, you only have the deep satisfaction of long winning streaks against a team that no else gives two [Mark May]s about. Then what?

Some people think this is a "war" and people are dying/being maimed and actually harbor legitimate hatred for Michigan. I've had people tell me they hope a bomb blows up in The Big House. That just isn't me...I "hate" Michigan in the sports sense that they are our rival and I love to beat them and talk crap to their annoying fans, but nothing beyond that. I assume you are in the same boat. Unfortunately, lots of Buckeye fans have a different outlook and I'm not pointing any fingers, but I'm guessing it's what gives the fan base a bad name at times.

 

I haven't ever heard anybody say they want Michigan to beat Ohio State. Have not heard a single Buckeye fan with this take. I have heard the take, and definitely understand the take, that they want Michigan to cease being an absolute dumpster fire so that when Ohio State does defeat them in The Game each year, that win is not rendered meaningless and against a "scrub" opponent in the eyes of SOS pundits and the national audience/media.

Secondly, football really is entertainment at its core, whereas gigantic corporations are in business to make money. Naturally, in the latter scenario, you don't want your opponent to be be good and the more they suck the more you profit. Unfortunately, in this specific situation regarding the rivalry and The Game, the Wolverines are offering diminishing returns- and those returns have long since diminished entirely (until this year, with Harbaugh seemingly reviving things and Michigan once again, allegedly, on the "up and up" or so the media says). People want to be entertained, and while I would argue that beating Michigan no matter what is entertaining in my eyes, I don't think comparing two football teams in a rivalry that play for the entertainment of its fans to corporations competing for profit is the greatest analogy.

I personally wanted Harbaugh to go to Michigan. Urban vs Harbaugh is going to be hugely entertaining. It means Michigan will likely get much better over the next few years...and I am okay with that, not because I don't dislike them- I do- but rather because The Game is going to be much more meaningful and entertaining for me. And the wins that much sweeter.

Don't tell me you didn't grin each time they showed a distraught Harbaugh during Saturday's massacre. You did and I did too.

Person should self ban for posting this. We don't need TTUN to be good in order for us to be great. As others have eloquently noted, TTUN has never been good without stealing from us. We can just as easily have Nebby, MSU or some other team be decent and that is sufficient. Those of us born in 60s have lived through enough of these arrogant bastards stealing from us. And smiling while they do it. Screw them.

 

Person should self ban for posting this. We don't need TTUN to be good in order for us to be great. As others have eloquently noted, TTUN has never been good without stealing from us. We can just as easily have Nebby, MSU or some other team be decent and that is sufficient. Those of us born in 60s have lived through enough of these arrogant bastards stealing from us. And smiling while they do it. Screw them.

The more good teams you beat, the better your resume. It's not even really that complicated. They aren't "stealing" anything from you. Sheesh, it's not a war, it's a football game. Ohio State can't take every single Ohio football player for crying out loud. I don't foam at the mouth and start convulsing at the mere mention of Michigan, nor do I think my life is at stake when these football teams match up each November. I won't apologize for that, nor will I "self ban."

 

So soon we forget March 31, 1835 when the northern horde sent 1000 of their bastard sons into Toledo to rape and pillage our fellow Ohioans. Have we already forgotten The Battle of Phillips Corner and our 9 martyrs taken captive by those swine? If not for Andrew Jackson, the Ohio Militia would have marched on Lansing and deposed the terrorist regime of Territorial Governor Mason and his whores in Ann Arbor. Those fucking criminals were never tried for their crimes.

Andrew Jackson's political miscalculations and cowardice have left the midwest unstable to this day.

No Peace Without Justice!!!! Remember the Nine!!!!!

 

Damn!!