• Maize Helmets (1927) & The Canary Disaster (1928)

    Given the buzz around the prospect of your beloved Wolverines opening the season in a maize alternate uniform, you should know it’s not the first time.  Readers of this site are aware of the canary disaster of 1928, but here’s a refresher: I first read about all this thanks a tip from Bruce Madej, the legendary U-M SID, who reviewed the Uniform Timeline sent over a ditty from his book, Champions of the West.  Within a section of the book talking about Fritz Crisler and the launch of the winged helmet at Michigan in 1938, it gets into a little uniform history— including this spicy meatball: The only change in the typical blue uniforms before 1949 came in 1928.  As Michigan planned to play Navy in Baltimore, the Midshipmen refused to wear any other color than their traditional blue.  Therefore, Michigan came out in bright yellow jerseys with blue numerals.  The team was said to look like canaries, and the uniforms were put away after the 6-6 tie. Here’s the description from the November 8, 1928 Michigan Daily: Fast forward to today, and we can see that Navy did indeed have a uniform that resembled the gear the Wolverines wore back in the 1920s.  (But note, FWIW, I think that happened a lot back then).   Anyway – Via eBay, here’s…

  • Cheap Tickets for the Ride (1950)

    Up on eBay right now, a couple items related to the 1950 season.  First, a nicely presented booklet promoting season tickets for the upcoming year, Bennie Oosterbaan’s third at the helm of the Wolverines: Unfortunately for those who shelled out a whopping $21.60 for season tickets, the 1950 campaign was most memorable for the games played away from Ann Arbor.  That started with the October 14 battle vs. #1 Army played at Yankee Stadium, then the Snow Bowl vs. #8 Ohio State in the regular season finale on November 25 in Columbus, and finally the Rose Bowl against #5 Cal in Pasadena.  Speaking of the Snow Bowl, another item up on eBay right now claims to be an original 4×5 photo negative from the game: I’m not sure why someone would forge the pic, but the shot of #49 looks almost cartoonish when viewed up close.  The auction of the photo starts at $9.99, and the 1950 season ticket info booklet is going for $8.00.   Related: While they’re going to be a tad more than they cost in 1950, you can get your 2013 Michigan hoops and football tickets here.   Follow MVictors on Twitter

  • Bucks Unlimited

    Via a piece on local tipping at area restaurants in AnnArbor.com, something good resulted the “unfortunate defeat” of Sucks Unlimited in 2007: “When Oregon football fans were here, another bartender and I waited on a group the whole weekend. They were over-tipping everyone ridiculously—buying a beer for $5, paying with a $50 bill and telling me to keep the change. The Friday before the game, one gentleman in particular wanted to buy us out of Jagermeister (which isn’t possible, I assure you). He bought 100 shots to pass out, which cost him roughly $500, then tipped $200 and gave me another $500 to let him stand on the bar while he passed them out. We split that $500 among our door staff and kitchen staff. “The next day, after the Wolverines’ unfortunate defeat, the same Oregon fans spent most of the rest of their evening at our bar. The same man from the night before ran up a rather large bar tab with me and tipped $1,000. That hasn’t happened to me since, but I don’t expect it to. If Oregon ever plays Michigan again though, no matter where I am, I will come out of retirement to wait on them.” Not to discredit the general generousness of the Duck faithful, but I’m guessing there were special circumstances in play. …

  • Smiling Jack Harbaugh

    You’ll be inundated with Harbaugh content over the next week and here’s some more, hopefully, a little unique. Thanks to the Dr. Sap archives, here is a brief interview with then U-M assistant coach Jack Harbaugh following Michigan’s 21-17 victory over Arizona on October 7, 1978: No, he doesn’t talk about his young sons John and Jim, but I thought it was worth sharing to get a sense of what the elder coach Harbaugh was like back in the day, and as a bonus, the backdrop of the Michigan Marching Band postgame routine :) The pic inset (via mgoblog) is from a profile of the 1978 U-M staff and shucks, Jack kind of looks what would happen if Jim and John had a dad. Related:  via John U Bacon:  The Harbaughs – and Their Godfather

  • Beilein joins Jim Rome (1-25 audio)

    Coach Beilein dialed into Rome this afternoon, audio (a tad faint but listenable): [display_podcast] Notes: * Praised Trey Burke for his ability to excel in both big and small spaces on the court.  Marveled how he gets to the rim in traffic or surrounded by defenders.  Does this in practice that make you go, “how did he do that?”. * Praised GRIII, said he has a chip on his shoulder for not being a highly touted recruit in Indiana early on.    Beilein talked about “what a pleasure” is to coach him and how quickly he adopts their coaching points. * Said this team has a chance to be one of the best he’s every coached. * On the Ohio State loss, “that was what we needed..” * On the potential of the #1 ranking, he downplayed it again, adding, “I wanna know where we’re going to be in March.”

  • The Uniform Timeline

    The latest mini-project:  A descending timeline of changes to the Michigan football team uniforms over the years.   I’m still pulling it together but you can check out what I have so far here.  This will also be a regular ‘page’ that you can access from the toolbar above. A huge thanks to Dr. Sap (Steve Sapardanis) for much of the detail especially during the Bo years.   As always, ping me with any inputs Follow MVictors on Twitter

  • The Jim Harbaugh Bio Plaque – Preserved

    Phenomenal, via John Kryk, NFL beat writer for the Toronto Sun: As a “fun thing” to do, San Francisco 49ers head coach Jim Harbaugh this week arranged for plaques to be hung above each player’s locker. Each plaque contained a photo and bio of  the player from during his high school recruitment. What about one for Harbaugh? “They didn’t have the internet back in 1982 that I’m aware of,” Harbaugh said. Fortunately, however, the John Kryk Football Archives go that far back. As an unofficial college and Michigan football historian of sorts, I possess far too many musty boxes in my basement, to my wife’s chagrin. One produced the accompanying goods. And here’s the goods: Full story on Kryk’s blog, Kryk Slants.

  • What If Denard had Decals?

    Guest post by Steve “Dr. Sap” Sapardanis Last year, we kept track of the helmet stickers every game for each player deserving these awards based on not only the individual but team accomplishments.  After the Ohio State game, Denard Robinson led all players with 42 award decals. Ever since then I wondered what would Denard’s helmet look like if it had decals on it?  With a little PhotoShop work, wonder no more. Below are a couple of possibilities – one with all 42 decals on one side, and another with half, or 21 on one side. In order to fit 42 decals on one side of the helmet, the decal size would need to be reduced, but you get the idea.  That’s what happens when you are made of Dilithium! Think there are a lot of decals on Denard’s helmet? Mike Hammerstein in 1985 and Desmond Howard in 1991 were two former UM players that had a ton of decals on their helmets.  #66 sported 47 decals on his helmet in the 1986 Fiesta Bowl against Nebraska: #21 in the 1992 Rose Bowl and against OSU in 1991: To me, there was nothing like seeing Michigan and Ohio State clash at the end of the season. Having both teams’ helmets filled with decals just added to the spectacle. So I…