There was some High School basketball game ~ 10 years ago ........ SI or someone did a one sentence hit on the game ........ 10 different girls started the game. EIGHT of them were named Caitlin, and there were FIVE different spellings of the name.
I do find this all insane --- but perhaps for different reasons.
(1) On the COVID violations. OK, Matt Dudek reported Michigan. Kind of a dickhead thing to do, but he did it. And he apparently kept the receipts. What's insane to me is that everyone just didn't admit it. LSU & Air Force committed COVID impermissible contact violations too: their penalties were all Level-2. Take the Level-2 penalty, which admittedly isn't insignificant, and move on, you got caught. Harbaugh's alone, for whatever reason, in risking "leveling this up" to a potential Level-1 violation. That's insane to me.
(2) On signgate. I've said this before, but there's one particularly curious question at this point. That's "wait, was that Connor Stalions at the CMU @ MSU game?!?" At this point, I think it's still an open question. If it wasn't him, the proof likely would have made the news (his cell phone pinging off an AA tower, or him having a Chipotle receipt from that night, or his key card being used at Schembechler Hall, et cetera). And sure he could have been acting as a lone wolf by being in East Lansing, but it's not unfair to speculate as to various other ways he could have found his way to the CMU sideline. It's insane to me that "did any Michigan agents have a hand in getting Stalions there?" could even possibly be on the table. But I think it still is.
If this letter exists --- it would be a significant "trump card."
But if it exists, I'm also surprised Mars wouldn't have played that card back in October/November 2023, when the whole NCAA kerfuffle mattered 100000x more as regards the still-ongoing Michigan season.
The NCAA announcement this morning, eh, whatever. No major ramifications and it essentially closed the COVID part of things. Isn't it simply being over a win of sorts?
Or maybe Mars is just playing 11-dimensional chess ........
Honestly --- my read on Mars, he's just one of those guys who LIKES and RELISHES drama. For those familiar with him and his Walmart legal council days, he had a ton of drama there too (in that case, he was siding WITH the more powerful death star entity, as opposed to his current role opposing it).
Since you mentioned Robin Yount ..... this has nothing to do with Whitey Herzog, but I read just yesterday that Al Kaline played in MLB games against both Satchel Paige and Robin Yount.
Mr. Tiger .... one of the more remarkable baseball facts I've heard in a long time!
Even today, Rickey ranks 163rd all-time in MLB History for career HR (Anthony Rizzo will pass him by Memorial Day, but he may be the only player to pass in 2024 - Judge and Betts may come close).
Anyway, pretty impressive he's still that high: a remarkable speed/power combination.
I like that there's a recent resurgence in speed + power players. Ronald Acuna Jr. obviously. Corbin Carroll, and incredibly this gets overlooked a bit with him (because he's so great at nearly everything), but Mike Trout still has some great wheels.
It would be funny. But probably not, given the NCAA posts the penalties (12:03 PM ET), Angelique re-posts the news 7 minutes later (12:10 PM ET), and it only takes 20 minutes for her to post Tom Mars' response (12:30 PM ET).
In other words --- Tom has Angelique on speed dial.
Sure .... but I don't think it's incorrect to note that the NCAA views Harbaugh as much moreuncooperative (and less forthright) with them, vis-a-vis how other coaches have interacted with the NCAA over the years.
Now, fair enough, if Harbaugh wants to engage in a public fight with the NCAA, that's his right. But that's also a risk: it's simply human nature that authority figures and organizations will often bristle and fight back when they are challenged (particularly so when it's done in view of others).
I suppose an analogy would me getting pulled over and ticketed for my car having an inoperative tailght. This happened in my younger days.
I could have fought it, shown up in court and say my taillight was working, and the officer was lying and out to get me.
Instead, I went to traffic court and admitted it (in the hope my fine would get reduced). No dice, I still had to pay the full fine. Fair enough, after all, I did violate a traffic law. But at least it was over. Shit, they just had me. And Matt Dudek, well, he sort of "had" Michigan. Why spend overly much time hasseling over something when you're effectively cooked and it's minor anyway?
I mean - it's done now, but was this one really EVER that complicated? Ever really in doubt?
The NCAA instituted a no-contact COVID dead period. Now, it's debatable in retrospect whether that period should have been 15 months (!!!) in duration, but that's what it was. It was 15 months long because the NCAA didn't want some teams benefiting from different COVID rules based on different state politics (e.g., California banning in-person meetings for a much longer period of time than, say, Alabama).
I get it, some will continually argue "it was a cheeseburger", but this one always seemed very black-and-white to me. It was a no-contact dead period, no exceptions. The coaches 100% absolutely should have known that. No real excuses for that.
Attacking this question from a different approach, below are some stats from the 1995-2014 NFL Drafts. If we consider a "very successful NFL player" to be someone who was selected to 3+ Pro Bowls in their career (that's why the 2014 cut-off, guys who had a chance to play at least 10 years), this is where they were drafted:
43* were Top 5 draft picks. (in other words, 43% of Top 5 draft picks wound up making 3+ Pro Bowls).
21 were drafted from 6 to 10.
92 were drafted elsewhere in the 1st round.
47 were 2nd round draft picks, 34 in the 3rd round, 36 in the 4th-7th rounds.
Net: on average, 3.2 of your Top 10 draft picks will be "very successful NFL players." The standard deviation is 1.6, FWIW (nobody from 2009 qualified, while 6 picks from 2011 qualified, with JJ Watt as the 11th pick).
Anyway: let's assume 2024 is the average. Who will our 3.2 be? Nobody is a lock in the NFL, of course, but MHJ and Joe Alt seem like as close to a lock as can be. That's 2. Then figure 1-2 of the QBs.
But which one? Honestly, I don't know - depending on the day, I could make a case for any of them. I could also make a case for any of them being a bust. There's A LOT of potential variance with this group, more so than most college QB classes.
If it's me, I wouldn't take JJ Top 5. With a Top 5 pick, you really do need to hit - it's a hell of a resource. Give me more of that sure thing - any NFL team could use a MHJ or Joe Alt.
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*Technically 42, but I'm counting Sean Taylor (who only made 2 Pro Bowls).
The alligator was confused. One minute, he's just chilling and sleeping. The next, there's "prospective food" being delivered to him inside an impenetrable 2-ton metal box that also has very bright lights.
He wasn't intoxicated with that one ---- but it was still pretty bizarre.
He and his companion were literally found sleeping in a car that was partially submerged (and sinking further) in a pond (after someone else called 911).
The officers start knocking on the windows, his companion acknowledges the officers but then ignores them and falls BACK asleep. The officers finally have to remove her from the car by force, then woke Denard up and he left (willingly).
Ferris was, of course, national runner-up in 2012 ...... and in 2014, I was at this game, they played North Dakota in the Regional Final in Cincinnati. As I think you know, they outplayed UND, they were very unlucky to lose that game in double overtime.
That would have been 2 Frozen Fours in 3 years. But didn't happen, and it's really been downhill since.
You are right, Ferris is probably the premier D2 atheltic school in America right now. Unfortunately, they're also the school that has been hurt the most by B1G hockey starting up. They sorely miss the old CCHA and the greater visibility it provided them.
Yeah, that was terrible, a ridiculous way to announce the news to their coaches and student-athletes. Shame on them.
They're not going about things in a measured way. They announced they were moving from D-2 to D-1 (FCS football) in February 2022. Just one month later, they announced they were starting a D-1 hockey program. Overall, by December 2023, they were sponsoring THIRTY (!!!) sports ----- the NCAA minimum if you're a D-1 program without an FBS football program is 14. They sponsored over double the minimum! They sponsored more sports than Michigan (29)!!!! That's all insane!
I get it, they're trying to use sports as a way to increase the University's visibility (and increase enrollment). But they bit off WAY too much all at once. It takes time, and it takes money. For instance, they haven't even played a football "buy game" versus an FBS yet, a standard way for FCS teams to help with revenue. They play their 1st versus Kansas this fall.
Not that I want to get in a pissing match about this, and I'm not trying to be mean, but that's cherry-picking a couple statistics without considering context. And there's A LOT of missing context behind those 2 particular statistics:
The NCAA Hockey Championships first began in 1948: Michigan won 6 of the first 9. They were by far the dominant team of that era, I'm not taking that away from Michigan. But of note, EVERY Frozen Four from 1948-1957 was held in Colorado Springs. In the 1950s, the NCAA didn't move Championships around to nearly the degree they do in the present day (most of the NCAA basketball Final Fours in the 1940s/1950s were at either MSG or Kansas City, MO).
Denver didn't even have a college hockey team in 1948. They began in 1949-50, and gradually became better, but Michigan had 6 titles before Denver even qualified for their first NCAA tournament (the 1958 season). And as it is, that's right when the NCAA began moving the Frozen Four around (1958 was the 1st non-Colorado springs Frozen Four: it was in MSP and Denver won it).
Once we get to the 1958-2024 era (e.g., rotating Frozen Fours, Denver & Michigan both having well-established programs), there have been 5 Frozen Fours held in the state of Colorado. Denver has won 2* of them (1961 & 1969), Michigan won 1 of them (1964), and other schools (Minnesota/BC) won the other 2.
Take this FWIW --- it is dated by a few years (2018) --- but a statistical analysis that indicated that ALL of the Rockies, Broncos and Nuggets had the highest home-field advantage in their respective leagues. The Avalanche were very high up there as well.
Now: I suppose there are 2 possible explanations for that. (1) The road teams go to Denver and THEY aren't acclimated to the altitude, and play worse. Or, (2) Denver teams are disproportionately WORSE (on a relative basis, vis-a-vis other teams leaving their homes) when they go play on the road.
#2 really doesn't make sense to me. I think Denver teams' "altitude advantage" is mostly something experienced at home, it's experienced much less on the road.
Interesting --- thanks for that. That price is nuts! Vegas bought in for $500MM, Seattle $650MM! No wonder Bettman is doing this now, so quickly, he found his man: that's 2x Seattle!
(on a side note, I just love (sarcasm) the relocation fee - yeesh, it's like the NHL acting like a ticket re-seller and charging 30% in fees)
I'd guess that allows the Count to set the FLOOR for an expansion franchise at $1.5B.
Houston is coming --- I think Bettman wants Fertitta to cough up ~ $1B for an expansion franchise, as opposed to getting the Coyotes for relatively cheap (~ $600-700MM).
Eventually, I think Bettman's dream scenario is 36 teams:
2 out west: Houston, and ............
I truly think Bettman is going to make a run at Phoenix again (hoping this arena situation finally gets solved in the next few years).
2 east: Atlanta (third time is a charm!), and .....
either Quebec City, or if the Leafs somehow allow this, a team in Kitchener or Hamilton.
Hey! The Coyotes weren't always a failure, they made a Western Conference Finals once!
(yes ..... that's actually true. I have no memory of it, apparently they played the Kings, but it happend once. Their one and only time they advanced beyond the conference QF.)
The Coyotes AHL affiliate was also nicknamed the Roadrunners. That fun Coyotes/Roadrunners link will likely go away.
they probably are greatly reducing the value, if not completely eliminating, the value of their NIL deal. Whatever $$$ they are getting - chop that by anywhere from 50% to 100% (most likely 100%).
they would also lose their scholarships. For a lot of these athletes, that also means leaving the school entirely.
there are undoubtedly tons of other 18-23 year old men and women who would gladly take the current deal. D-1 college athletes still get college scholarships --- admittedly, many of today's athletes don't value the scholarships anymore, but many people do. A LOT. Being able to graduate from college with both a degree and minimal debt? If you can do that, you're already ahead of 90%+ of other 23 year olds.
Net net: the current players would lose a lot, and the Universities would still be fielding teams anyway. Sure, the networks would probably pay considerably less to broadcast the games, as the players aren't quite as good, but I doubt any of them go out of business. There are 67,324 different TV channels these days as is --- even the ones who don't have many viewers still find a way to make a profit.
Yep. The conferences and Universities can be considered "middle men" --- but the $$$ TV pays to broadcast the games does, in an indirect and non-zero way, eventually make its way down to the athletes. For both pro and college.
The pros do have an advantage, in that they collectively bargain to make sure the "middle men" can't keep over a set % of that money.
If someone wants to argue college athletes don't benefit from TV, let's just consider this --- what if, beginning with the 2024 season, TV COMPLETELY ceased broadcasting college football games. The only way to see a college game would be to attend one. Wouldn't both (1) awareness of the college game and (2) interest in the college game drop considerably in the years to come? Wouldn't that effect attendance, the amount of people buying college gear, etc? Wouldn't that mean both coaches and athletes get eventually paid considerably less? Ditto for pros?
TV makes a heck a lot of $$$ off of broadcasting professional sports too.
It’s indirect versus direct, but the NIL dollars athletes get these days IS a result of the games being broadcast by for-profit media companies. No big TV contracts - which builds awareness of what the athletes are doing - much much much less NIL $$$
Yep. Way too many people view the NFL Draft as a zero-sum game*, where players are rated in terms of whether they over-/under-exceeded their projected draft position.
The NFL Draft should be a celebration of EVERYONE. From draft pick #1 to "Mr. Irrelevant", they've all accomplished something! But, inevitably, the pundits will peg some player a "loser" because they were projected to go #10 and instead went #25.
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*Mathematically, this being a "zero-sum game" is inevitable. If someone over-exceeds their projected position, someone else must under-exceed it.
Agree. I've lived a few places over the years, and out-of-town folk are MUCH more encouraging, positive and receptive toward Detroit than they were, say, 20 years ago.
Detroit isn't perfect, but it has a good deal to be proud of.
The only modern-day comparisons, I think, would be the Rock or Tiger.
Tiger --- shoot, his sexcapades, which obviously weren't a great thing for his marriage but neither were they a crime --- that was front-page news for months!
It’s like that Hersheys ad (the one with the musical chimes and the jumping chocolate kisses) that has been playing seemingly EVERY Christmas season since Jesus himself was born.
Freeways are faster, but I often prefer the 2-lane state highways. It's a different way to experience our very diverse and beautiful (even Ohio in spots) country.
Also --- I swear --- EVERY single small town in America (or at least Ohio and Indiana) has a Dollar General as either the first (or last, depending on direction of travel) store in town.
Left Detroit at 6:15 AM. Made it to Muncie, Indiana by 10:45 AM. No traffic issues.
I chose there because it would give me some east-west flexibility, based on weather trends. There were high clouds in Muncie at 11 AM, but they weren't many and the weather wouldn't be better anywhere else. So I stayed there.
Pretty cool event: saw it from the Delaware County fairgrounds. Good sized crowd, party atmosphere, A LOT of Michiganders (mainly from the West side of the state).
I saw the 2017 eclipse from Nebraska, so the covered sun, everything in town appearing as though it's dusk, and the 360 degree "sunset" wasn't new to me. But it's STILL a very remarkable experience.
What had been a sunny and 75 degree day --- it must have dropped 10-15 degrees in the 30 minutes prior! I didn't throw my windbreaker on, but many were ....
Left town fairly soon after. I should have just taken state highways up to the Coldwater, MI area. Instead, I took state highways to the Findlay area, hopping on I-75 there. Went 55 MPH the whole time from Muncie to Findlay. But THEN .... OMG. I-75, I-475 and US-23 were disasters from Bowling Green to Ann Arbor. On the bright side, I-75 in Monroe County was 5x worse. Monroe County was simply a massive traffic choke-point due to limited north-south options. Got back to Sterling Heights around 10 PM.
This strikes me as a win-win-win all the way around:
Arkansas basketball - sure they won a National Title back in the mid-90s, and have had a bit of a revival over the last 10 years, but they're really not a high-top-of-mind program. They WANT to be one though. And this helps with that, a lot.
Calipari - he desperately needs a change of scenery. That's obvious. And he's still 65, so he could have 5-10 more years in him, one more coaching run.
Kentucky's AD and their fans - well, now they won't owe Calipari a metric ton of $$$. And they were honstly tired of Cal too. They can move on to their next chapter.
It makes sense to me. It's not completely unlike Bill Curry in 1989: a fairly successful Alabama Head football Coach leaving to go to Kentucky (?!?!). Alabama won the SEC in 1989 and finished in the Top 10, but they were sick of each other, so off he went to a substantially less blue-blood SEC football school (then Alabama hired Gene Stallings and won a National Title 3 years later).
Crazy stat: Arkansas has made multiple Elite 8s since Kentucky last made ONE Sweet 16.
The tourney auto-bid is always there .... but next week's U-M/PSU match is effectively an elimination game (for both teams) as regards serious at-large consideration.
I was there. It was chilly --- felt like your typical weather for a Michigan (or MSU) late-November football home finale.
The new video board --- not a fan. Whoever was running the scoreboard today, they were getting used to it themselves, it was either blank or screwed up a good 10% of the time.
Walking around downtown, looks like a fun set-up for the Draft in a few weeks!
The full 2 paragraphs from the 11Warriors article below the fold, if anyone is interested.
Honestly, I don't think it had anything to do with Harbaugh, as Locklyn legimately DOES have a somewhat unique path to the CFB coaching world. But I may be wrong, that's just how I read it.
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A former running back at Chattanooga, Locklyn has climbed the coaching ladder at an impressive pace. He began coaching in 2009 as a volunteer for high schools in Tennesee while he worked as a corrections and police officer. Locklyn later referred to himself as a “walk-on” coach during those years, and the name of his account on X still reflects that perspective.
“I love that about him,” Day said. “Like some of us in this profession, he came up not in a football family but grew up and kind of had to figure it out on their own. He’s one of those people. When you listen to how he came up in this thing, he’s very appreciative of all the opportunities he’s gotten. But he’s earned them all, and he deserved them all. He really earned and deserved this opportunity.”
I probably should avoid the bait, but what's with the fucking snark? Because I simply provided an empirical data point for Sark being ranked above 12 other SEC coaches?
As for Lanning, yes, I agree - he's ranked well too high on the B1G side. He hasn't really won big games (yet).
Nobody below Sark has won a conference title (Only Lane won even a division title) in a power conference. Sark has.
As for Fisch and Smith, Smiths coaching career IS literally double the length of Jedd’s. Staying power appears to matter in these rankings, so I’m fine with Smith being higher ranked.
The DFW metroplex has 14-lane-freeways, many of them tolled, ALL over the place.
That means traffic is nearly always flowing. But man, there's a lot of concrete there.
LA's traffic usually is NOT flowing - but LA's problem is more in not having enough lanes and freeways (usually because of topography). There's only one freeway between the Valley and the Westside. There's only one freeway between the IE and Orange County. Downtown to Pasadena, I guess there is one freeway in the 110, but yikes is it outdated. Et cetera .....
I know that FGCU Dunk City feels like it was the other day, but Enfield was actually at USC for 11 years. That's a good chunk of time.
The USC/LA thing may just be played out for him and his family.
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* I'm in my 40s, and I've been doing the LA thing for 2 years now. It's fun, but I already know that I probably won't be in SoCal forever. What you say - it hits a bit.
He was a multi-millionaire well before starting to coach college hoops (jn his 5-years between being a Celtics assistant and FGCU assistant, he was the co-founder of a successful healthcare start-up), he's been alright but not great at USC so the seat may have been getting warm, SMU boosters have crazy $$$ to invest if they want to, and his former swimsuit model wife is originally from OKC (e.g., fairly close to Dallas).
He's a little bit different, beats to a bit of a different drummer, than most college hoops coaches. So view it in that context, perhaps ....
The best April Fools' message board posts have (1) a degree of plausibility and (2) legitimately make one go "oh shit!" for a minute, before the realization hits in.
I'm not making excuses for McLain, as he was a troubled and often-crooked soul well before the whole embezzling crimes. But that happened just a couple years after his daughter died, killed by a drunk-driver, 3 days after she got married. That was a monster bump for him in life - he got wildly off-track.
A lot of people liked him. He was very good at multiple different things in his life. But he also hurt way way way too many people.
Not counting 8-9 games (where the difference between teams is truly marginal: 9 seeds are actually 81-75 all-time against 8s), yesterday was only Illinois' 2nd win as a worse or equivalent seed EVER, since the NCAA started explicitly seeding teams.*
Connecticut is still the better team, but I wouldn't discount Illinois at all tomorrow. It feels like that's a BIG monkey they got off their back yesterday. Less folks (outside of us older folk) remember 1989, but more folks DO remember their struggles this century.
Shannon is playing well and momentum is a thing. I know they don't play a ton of defense, but I'm going to take them on the money line tomorrow as a value bet.
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* I will count a 3 over a 2 and a 5 over a 4 as an underdog winning: only a 1-seed difference but there tends to be more spread among the Top 20 teams. FWIW, Illinois' previous win as a worse seed was as a #5 beating #4 Cincinnati in 2004 (then they lost to #1 Duke in the next round).
Los Angeles Traffic was the best I've EVER seen it on a workday this morning (I came into the office, but only because I have a hair-cut appointment next door this afternoon).
So Good Friday and holiday traffic --- that's worth a +1!
I also fly back to Michigan tonite (on a red-eye) to spend 10 days there.
I get it - the MHSAA doesn't sponsor girls ice hockey ---- yet ---- but::
(1) there's a lot of young Michigan resident women who do play the sport,
(2) Michigan's a pretty big hockey state,
(3) as of the moment, no Michigan University sponsors the sport at the NCAA level, and
(4) 4 of Michigan's 5 other "hockey school" conference-mates sponsor the sport.
Now, yes, there's the issues of $$$ and facilities. The latter being the more serious (Michigan can very likely find the $$$ if they want to).
But Michigan (or MSU, or somebody) should really try to sponsor women's hockey. It's a lot like men's lacrosse 10 years ago. It's a sport that should be sponsored by a Michigan school, simply from the POV of serving the residents of a state. A potential place for them to play the sport in their college years.
I'm not trying to knock Colgate & Clarkson - and their accomplishment in reaching the Women's Frozen Four - but women's ice hockey now is a bit like women's basketball in the 1980s and 1990s. There's a handful of programs (OSU, Wisc, Minnesota, Clarkson for hockey --- Tennessee, UConn, USC and Louisiana Tech for basketball) that win basically ALL the titles.
The sport will mature. If schools like Michigan (and ND, both of them) start programs, and if already existant programs like PSU (and BC and BU, among others) work at it more - the sport will get there.
But for now, Clarkson can be like Louisiana Tech women's hoops once was. A consistent Final Four team despite being a considerably smaller insitution.
I get it, you have your narrative (and I suppose I have mine) ---- but Pittsburgh's a credible program regardless. They won the ACC very recently (2021), and that's despite not having a win over PSU in that season or any of the 4 prior.
PSU will play Pittsburgh again at some point, just like the did in the late 2010s. PSU does GAIN from playing them (it's always good to connect with the western PA fanbase directly). They just aren't going to do it annually.
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I mean .......... not everyone is going to be a believer in every former Wolverine being an NFL success. And who cares regardless?
Let's say JJ McCarthy is absolutely terrible in the NFL. Let's say he makes Ryan Leaf look like a Hall of Fame candidate.
What does that matter as regards his legacy and impact at Michigan?
There was some High School basketball game ~ 10 years ago ........ SI or someone did a one sentence hit on the game ........ 10 different girls started the game. EIGHT of them were named Caitlin, and there were FIVE different spellings of the name.
Your worst nightmare!
I do find this all insane --- but perhaps for different reasons.
(1) On the COVID violations. OK, Matt Dudek reported Michigan. Kind of a dickhead thing to do, but he did it. And he apparently kept the receipts. What's insane to me is that everyone just didn't admit it. LSU & Air Force committed COVID impermissible contact violations too: their penalties were all Level-2. Take the Level-2 penalty, which admittedly isn't insignificant, and move on, you got caught. Harbaugh's alone, for whatever reason, in risking "leveling this up" to a potential Level-1 violation. That's insane to me.
(2) On signgate. I've said this before, but there's one particularly curious question at this point. That's "wait, was that Connor Stalions at the CMU @ MSU game?!?" At this point, I think it's still an open question. If it wasn't him, the proof likely would have made the news (his cell phone pinging off an AA tower, or him having a Chipotle receipt from that night, or his key card being used at Schembechler Hall, et cetera). And sure he could have been acting as a lone wolf by being in East Lansing, but it's not unfair to speculate as to various other ways he could have found his way to the CMU sideline. It's insane to me that "did any Michigan agents have a hand in getting Stalions there?" could even possibly be on the table. But I think it still is.
If this letter exists --- it would be a significant "trump card."
But if it exists, I'm also surprised Mars wouldn't have played that card back in October/November 2023, when the whole NCAA kerfuffle mattered 100000x more as regards the still-ongoing Michigan season.
The NCAA announcement this morning, eh, whatever. No major ramifications and it essentially closed the COVID part of things. Isn't it simply being over a win of sorts?
Or maybe Mars is just playing 11-dimensional chess ........
Honestly --- my read on Mars, he's just one of those guys who LIKES and RELISHES drama. For those familiar with him and his Walmart legal council days, he had a ton of drama there too (in that case, he was siding WITH the more powerful death star entity, as opposed to his current role opposing it).
Since you mentioned Robin Yount ..... this has nothing to do with Whitey Herzog, but I read just yesterday that Al Kaline played in MLB games against both Satchel Paige and Robin Yount.
Mr. Tiger .... one of the more remarkable baseball facts I've heard in a long time!
Even today, Rickey ranks 163rd all-time in MLB History for career HR (Anthony Rizzo will pass him by Memorial Day, but he may be the only player to pass in 2024 - Judge and Betts may come close).
Anyway, pretty impressive he's still that high: a remarkable speed/power combination.
I like that there's a recent resurgence in speed + power players. Ronald Acuna Jr. obviously. Corbin Carroll, and incredibly this gets overlooked a bit with him (because he's so great at nearly everything), but Mike Trout still has some great wheels.
It would be funny. But probably not, given the NCAA posts the penalties (12:03 PM ET), Angelique re-posts the news 7 minutes later (12:10 PM ET), and it only takes 20 minutes for her to post Tom Mars' response (12:30 PM ET).
In other words --- Tom has Angelique on speed dial.
Sure .... but I don't think it's incorrect to note that the NCAA views Harbaugh as much more uncooperative (and less forthright) with them, vis-a-vis how other coaches have interacted with the NCAA over the years.
Now, fair enough, if Harbaugh wants to engage in a public fight with the NCAA, that's his right. But that's also a risk: it's simply human nature that authority figures and organizations will often bristle and fight back when they are challenged (particularly so when it's done in view of others).
I suppose an analogy would me getting pulled over and ticketed for my car having an inoperative tailght. This happened in my younger days.
I could have fought it, shown up in court and say my taillight was working, and the officer was lying and out to get me.
Instead, I went to traffic court and admitted it (in the hope my fine would get reduced). No dice, I still had to pay the full fine. Fair enough, after all, I did violate a traffic law. But at least it was over. Shit, they just had me. And Matt Dudek, well, he sort of "had" Michigan. Why spend overly much time hasseling over something when you're effectively cooked and it's minor anyway?
I mean - it's done now, but was this one really EVER that complicated? Ever really in doubt?
The NCAA instituted a no-contact COVID dead period. Now, it's debatable in retrospect whether that period should have been 15 months (!!!) in duration, but that's what it was. It was 15 months long because the NCAA didn't want some teams benefiting from different COVID rules based on different state politics (e.g., California banning in-person meetings for a much longer period of time than, say, Alabama).
I get it, some will continually argue "it was a cheeseburger", but this one always seemed very black-and-white to me. It was a no-contact dead period, no exceptions. The coaches 100% absolutely should have known that. No real excuses for that.
Attacking this question from a different approach, below are some stats from the 1995-2014 NFL Drafts. If we consider a "very successful NFL player" to be someone who was selected to 3+ Pro Bowls in their career (that's why the 2014 cut-off, guys who had a chance to play at least 10 years), this is where they were drafted:
Net: on average, 3.2 of your Top 10 draft picks will be "very successful NFL players." The standard deviation is 1.6, FWIW (nobody from 2009 qualified, while 6 picks from 2011 qualified, with JJ Watt as the 11th pick).
Anyway: let's assume 2024 is the average. Who will our 3.2 be? Nobody is a lock in the NFL, of course, but MHJ and Joe Alt seem like as close to a lock as can be. That's 2. Then figure 1-2 of the QBs.
But which one? Honestly, I don't know - depending on the day, I could make a case for any of them. I could also make a case for any of them being a bust. There's A LOT of potential variance with this group, more so than most college QB classes.
If it's me, I wouldn't take JJ Top 5. With a Top 5 pick, you really do need to hit - it's a hell of a resource. Give me more of that sure thing - any NFL team could use a MHJ or Joe Alt.
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*Technically 42, but I'm counting Sean Taylor (who only made 2 Pro Bowls).
The alligator was confused. One minute, he's just chilling and sleeping. The next, there's "prospective food" being delivered to him inside an impenetrable 2-ton metal box that also has very bright lights.
He wasn't intoxicated with that one ---- but it was still pretty bizarre.
He and his companion were literally found sleeping in a car that was partially submerged (and sinking further) in a pond (after someone else called 911).
The officers start knocking on the windows, his companion acknowledges the officers but then ignores them and falls BACK asleep. The officers finally have to remove her from the car by force, then woke Denard up and he left (willingly).
Ferris was, of course, national runner-up in 2012 ...... and in 2014, I was at this game, they played North Dakota in the Regional Final in Cincinnati. As I think you know, they outplayed UND, they were very unlucky to lose that game in double overtime.
That would have been 2 Frozen Fours in 3 years. But didn't happen, and it's really been downhill since.
You are right, Ferris is probably the premier D2 atheltic school in America right now. Unfortunately, they're also the school that has been hurt the most by B1G hockey starting up. They sorely miss the old CCHA and the greater visibility it provided them.
Verne was ALWAYS a minimalist as regards the number of words he used.
His two most famous calls at Augusta (which may be the two most famous calls made by anyone at Augusta) - he used 20 words and 23 syllables.
Yeah, that was terrible, a ridiculous way to announce the news to their coaches and student-athletes. Shame on them.
They're not going about things in a measured way. They announced they were moving from D-2 to D-1 (FCS football) in February 2022. Just one month later, they announced they were starting a D-1 hockey program. Overall, by December 2023, they were sponsoring THIRTY (!!!) sports ----- the NCAA minimum if you're a D-1 program without an FBS football program is 14. They sponsored over double the minimum! They sponsored more sports than Michigan (29)!!!! That's all insane!
I get it, they're trying to use sports as a way to increase the University's visibility (and increase enrollment). But they bit off WAY too much all at once. It takes time, and it takes money. For instance, they haven't even played a football "buy game" versus an FBS yet, a standard way for FCS teams to help with revenue. They play their 1st versus Kansas this fall.
+1. Gotcha, my bad, I misread your post, I thought you were arguing for U-M having advantage at altitude. Have a great day!
Not that I want to get in a pissing match about this, and I'm not trying to be mean, but that's cherry-picking a couple statistics without considering context. And there's A LOT of missing context behind those 2 particular statistics:
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*Your "1 of 10" stat should really be "2 of 10."
Take this FWIW --- it is dated by a few years (2018) --- but a statistical analysis that indicated that ALL of the Rockies, Broncos and Nuggets had the highest home-field advantage in their respective leagues. The Avalanche were very high up there as well.
https://www.westword.com/news/denver-dominates-home-field-advantage-in-major-sports-leagues-10765214
Now: I suppose there are 2 possible explanations for that. (1) The road teams go to Denver and THEY aren't acclimated to the altitude, and play worse. Or, (2) Denver teams are disproportionately WORSE (on a relative basis, vis-a-vis other teams leaving their homes) when they go play on the road.
#2 really doesn't make sense to me. I think Denver teams' "altitude advantage" is mostly something experienced at home, it's experienced much less on the road.
Interesting --- thanks for that. That price is nuts! Vegas bought in for $500MM, Seattle $650MM! No wonder Bettman is doing this now, so quickly, he found his man: that's 2x Seattle!
(on a side note, I just love (sarcasm) the relocation fee - yeesh, it's like the NHL acting like a ticket re-seller and charging 30% in fees)
I'd guess that allows the Count to set the FLOOR for an expansion franchise at $1.5B.
Houston is coming --- I think Bettman wants Fertitta to cough up ~ $1B for an expansion franchise, as opposed to getting the Coyotes for relatively cheap (~ $600-700MM).
Eventually, I think Bettman's dream scenario is 36 teams:
Hey! The Coyotes weren't always a failure, they made a Western Conference Finals once!
(yes ..... that's actually true. I have no memory of it, apparently they played the Kings, but it happend once. Their one and only time they advanced beyond the conference QF.)
The Coyotes AHL affiliate was also nicknamed the Roadrunners. That fun Coyotes/Roadrunners link will likely go away.
Yep, you're right. The players can stop playing.
But let's consider what happens then:
Net net: the current players would lose a lot, and the Universities would still be fielding teams anyway. Sure, the networks would probably pay considerably less to broadcast the games, as the players aren't quite as good, but I doubt any of them go out of business. There are 67,324 different TV channels these days as is --- even the ones who don't have many viewers still find a way to make a profit.
Yep. The conferences and Universities can be considered "middle men" --- but the $$$ TV pays to broadcast the games does, in an indirect and non-zero way, eventually make its way down to the athletes. For both pro and college.
The pros do have an advantage, in that they collectively bargain to make sure the "middle men" can't keep over a set % of that money.
If someone wants to argue college athletes don't benefit from TV, let's just consider this --- what if, beginning with the 2024 season, TV COMPLETELY ceased broadcasting college football games. The only way to see a college game would be to attend one. Wouldn't both (1) awareness of the college game and (2) interest in the college game drop considerably in the years to come? Wouldn't that effect attendance, the amount of people buying college gear, etc? Wouldn't that mean both coaches and athletes get eventually paid considerably less? Ditto for pros?
TV makes a heck a lot of $$$ off of broadcasting professional sports too.
It’s indirect versus direct, but the NIL dollars athletes get these days IS a result of the games being broadcast by for-profit media companies. No big TV contracts - which builds awareness of what the athletes are doing - much much much less NIL $$$
Yep. Way too many people view the NFL Draft as a zero-sum game*, where players are rated in terms of whether they over-/under-exceeded their projected draft position.
The NFL Draft should be a celebration of EVERYONE. From draft pick #1 to "Mr. Irrelevant", they've all accomplished something! But, inevitably, the pundits will peg some player a "loser" because they were projected to go #10 and instead went #25.
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*Mathematically, this being a "zero-sum game" is inevitable. If someone over-exceeds their projected position, someone else must under-exceed it.
Agree. I've lived a few places over the years, and out-of-town folk are MUCH more encouraging, positive and receptive toward Detroit than they were, say, 20 years ago.
Detroit isn't perfect, but it has a good deal to be proud of.
The only modern-day comparisons, I think, would be the Rock or Tiger.
Tiger --- shoot, his sexcapades, which obviously weren't a great thing for his marriage but neither were they a crime --- that was front-page news for months!
FWIW - this will only be some NU home games, not ALL of them.
I'd be very surprised if they don't play the Michigan game at a larger stadium (like Wrigley or Solider Field). $$$ talks.
It’s like that Hersheys ad (the one with the musical chimes and the jumping chocolate kisses) that has been playing seemingly EVERY Christmas season since Jesus himself was born.
If it works and if it sticks … keep at it.
Freeways are faster, but I often prefer the 2-lane state highways. It's a different way to experience our very diverse and beautiful (even Ohio in spots) country.
Also --- I swear --- EVERY single small town in America (or at least Ohio and Indiana) has a Dollar General as either the first (or last, depending on direction of travel) store in town.
This strikes me as a win-win-win all the way around:
It makes sense to me. It's not completely unlike Bill Curry in 1989: a fairly successful Alabama Head football Coach leaving to go to Kentucky (?!?!). Alabama won the SEC in 1989 and finished in the Top 10, but they were sick of each other, so off he went to a substantially less blue-blood SEC football school (then Alabama hired Gene Stallings and won a National Title 3 years later).
Crazy stat: Arkansas has made multiple Elite 8s since Kentucky last made ONE Sweet 16.
The tourney auto-bid is always there .... but next week's U-M/PSU match is effectively an elimination game (for both teams) as regards serious at-large consideration.
We are getting very lucky with the weather —- considering it’s early April.
Should be good and it’s worth going - I saw the 2017 eclipse from Beatrice, Nebraska - even with clouds it was cool.
I was there. It was chilly --- felt like your typical weather for a Michigan (or MSU) late-November football home finale.
The new video board --- not a fan. Whoever was running the scoreboard today, they were getting used to it themselves, it was either blank or screwed up a good 10% of the time.
Walking around downtown, looks like a fun set-up for the Draft in a few weeks!
The full 2 paragraphs from the 11Warriors article below the fold, if anyone is interested.
Honestly, I don't think it had anything to do with Harbaugh, as Locklyn legimately DOES have a somewhat unique path to the CFB coaching world. But I may be wrong, that's just how I read it.
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A former running back at Chattanooga, Locklyn has climbed the coaching ladder at an impressive pace. He began coaching in 2009 as a volunteer for high schools in Tennesee while he worked as a corrections and police officer. Locklyn later referred to himself as a “walk-on” coach during those years, and the name of his account on X still reflects that perspective.
“I love that about him,” Day said. “Like some of us in this profession, he came up not in a football family but grew up and kind of had to figure it out on their own. He’s one of those people. When you listen to how he came up in this thing, he’s very appreciative of all the opportunities he’s gotten. But he’s earned them all, and he deserved them all. He really earned and deserved this opportunity.”
I probably should avoid the bait, but what's with the fucking snark? Because I simply provided an empirical data point for Sark being ranked above 12 other SEC coaches?
As for Lanning, yes, I agree - he's ranked well too high on the B1G side. He hasn't really won big games (yet).
Nobody below Sark has won a conference title (Only Lane won even a division title) in a power conference. Sark has.
As for Fisch and Smith, Smiths coaching career IS literally double the length of Jedd’s. Staying power appears to matter in these rankings, so I’m fine with Smith being higher ranked.
The DFW metroplex has 14-lane-freeways, many of them tolled, ALL over the place.
That means traffic is nearly always flowing. But man, there's a lot of concrete there.
LA's traffic usually is NOT flowing - but LA's problem is more in not having enough lanes and freeways (usually because of topography). There's only one freeway between the Valley and the Westside. There's only one freeway between the IE and Orange County. Downtown to Pasadena, I guess there is one freeway in the 110, but yikes is it outdated. Et cetera .....
I know like FGCU Dunk…
Yep*.
I know that FGCU Dunk City feels like it was the other day, but Enfield was actually at USC for 11 years. That's a good chunk of time.
The USC/LA thing may just be played out for him and his family.
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* I'm in my 40s, and I've been doing the LA thing for 2 years now. It's fun, but I already know that I probably won't be in SoCal forever. What you say - it hits a bit.
He was a multi-millionaire well before starting to coach college hoops (jn his 5-years between being a Celtics assistant and FGCU assistant, he was the co-founder of a successful healthcare start-up), he's been alright but not great at USC so the seat may have been getting warm, SMU boosters have crazy $$$ to invest if they want to, and his former swimsuit model wife is originally from OKC (e.g., fairly close to Dallas).
He's a little bit different, beats to a bit of a different drummer, than most college hoops coaches. So view it in that context, perhaps ....
The best April Fools' message board posts have (1) a degree of plausibility and (2) legitimately make one go "oh shit!" for a minute, before the realization hits in.
That post definitely worked.
NFL Draft Silly Season ---- where "news" is literally created out of thin air, on a daily basis.
I'm…
Good last paragraph.
I'm not making excuses for McLain, as he was a troubled and often-crooked soul well before the whole embezzling crimes. But that happened just a couple years after his daughter died, killed by a drunk-driver, 3 days after she got married. That was a monster bump for him in life - he got wildly off-track.
A lot of people liked him. He was very good at multiple different things in his life. But he also hurt way way way too many people.
Not counting 8-9 games (where the difference between teams is truly marginal: 9 seeds are actually 81-75 all-time against 8s), yesterday was only Illinois' 2nd win as a worse or equivalent seed EVER, since the NCAA started explicitly seeding teams.*
Connecticut is still the better team, but I wouldn't discount Illinois at all tomorrow. It feels like that's a BIG monkey they got off their back yesterday. Less folks (outside of us older folk) remember 1989, but more folks DO remember their struggles this century.
Shannon is playing well and momentum is a thing. I know they don't play a ton of defense, but I'm going to take them on the money line tomorrow as a value bet.
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* I will count a 3 over a 2 and a 5 over a 4 as an underdog winning: only a 1-seed difference but there tends to be more spread among the Top 20 teams. FWIW, Illinois' previous win as a worse seed was as a #5 beating #4 Cincinnati in 2004 (then they lost to #1 Duke in the next round).
Los Angeles Traffic was the best I've EVER seen it on a workday this morning (I came into the office, but only because I have a hair-cut appointment next door this afternoon).
So Good Friday and holiday traffic --- that's worth a +1!
I also fly back to Michigan tonite (on a red-eye) to spend 10 days there.
Ah --- yes, I forgot about them at D3. You are right. +1.
I get it - the MHSAA doesn't sponsor girls ice hockey ---- yet ---- but::
Now, yes, there's the issues of $$$ and facilities. The latter being the more serious (Michigan can very likely find the $$$ if they want to).
But Michigan (or MSU, or somebody) should really try to sponsor women's hockey. It's a lot like men's lacrosse 10 years ago. It's a sport that should be sponsored by a Michigan school, simply from the POV of serving the residents of a state. A potential place for them to play the sport in their college years.
I'm not trying to knock Colgate & Clarkson - and their accomplishment in reaching the Women's Frozen Four - but women's ice hockey now is a bit like women's basketball in the 1980s and 1990s. There's a handful of programs (OSU, Wisc, Minnesota, Clarkson for hockey --- Tennessee, UConn, USC and Louisiana Tech for basketball) that win basically ALL the titles.
The sport will mature. If schools like Michigan (and ND, both of them) start programs, and if already existant programs like PSU (and BC and BU, among others) work at it more - the sport will get there.
But for now, Clarkson can be like Louisiana Tech women's hoops once was. A consistent Final Four team despite being a considerably smaller insitution.
I get it, you have your narrative (and I suppose I have mine) ---- but Pittsburgh's a credible program regardless. They won the ACC very recently (2021), and that's despite not having a win over PSU in that season or any of the 4 prior.
PSU will play Pittsburgh again at some point, just like the did in the late 2010s. PSU does GAIN from playing them (it's always good to connect with the western PA fanbase directly). They just aren't going to do it annually.