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A few of the sights and sounds from the pregame Saturday. 

Beastly Jake Long returns to the Big House for the game:

CNN Chief medical correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta represented.  He was only asked 39 times if he had a prescription for the Wolverines’ woes:

A look at the Ohio State throwback uniform and the Buckeye stare drill:

This Buckeye band member got tuckered out in the middle of the script Ohio and decided to take a knee on the Michigan sideline:

1969 team take the field, you can also see a video here:

Zoltan and parents:

Team getting ready to come out, check out Brandon Minor in streets on the left (with towel covering some type of brace on his shoulder):

Sweetness Melanie Collins of the Big Ten Network swung by our tailgate (hosted by Kristen and Todd Mitchell) to get some footage for their Big Ten Cookout show:

You’ve no doubt seen quite a few pics and videos of the M Club banner.  Here’s kind of a unique perspective from right past the banner.  I actually felt a strong breeze as they rushed by:

Recent Posts

• Ohio State Game Notes
• Hit CTRL-Z
• Ohio State – Pregame (Photos)
• 1969 Wolverines Take the field
• Fare Thee Well

Photo: Detroit News photo services.

Thanks to BiggieMunn for sending this over. The photo above was set alongside of Angelique Chengelis’s fine piece on a few of those involved with the 1969 Wolverine victory over Ohio State.

Question: Anyone know the significance (if any) of the 26 on Bo’s sleeve?

On the extended team roster, #26 belonged to a sophomore quarterback named William Ross of Beaver Falls, PA.

Answer this question definitively and we win Saturday.

Related: Jim Mandich of ‘69 on WTKA (audio) <—You’ll enjoy this

Bo and Mandich, looking ahead to Ohio State in ‘69

Excellent interview this morning on WTKA 1050AM, as Michigan legend and current Miami, FL radio personality Jim Mandich dialed up Ira Weintraub to discuss Ohio State, 1969, the current team, Bo, Chad Henne and Jake Long on his Dolphins and much more.

Gotta love that he’s flying up to the big game on Steve Ross’s luxuriously private jet.

Definitely worth a listen:

 

 Mandich 11-19: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

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You can hear all of the WTKA podcasts here, anytime.

Coach Gary Moeller was at Schembechler Hall this afternoon.  Don’t know the circumstances for the visit, but the no doubt the he had a few words for the coaches and team about Ohio State.  Moeller is a Buckeye grad and captained Woody Hayes’s squad in 1963. 

Moeller went 3-1-1 against Ohio State.

Looks pretty good, don’t you think?

Regular readers of this site know one of my favorite decades of Michigan football is the 1930s, having covered different seasons and events in eBay Watch and in the Little Brown Jug Lore series from those years.

If I had to pick one year as my favorite during the stretch it’s definitely 1934 which is ironic, as it’s arguably the worst season in Michigan football history.   I argued this point here and here, but in a nutshell consider that Harry Kipke’s team, coming off back-to-back national championships, finished 1-7, was shut out in five of the eight games, and scored a mere 21 points.  Fugly.

Despite the futility on the gridiron, the season is packed of historical treasures of major significance both on and off the field.  The next edition of eBay Watch features the auction of a program from the Ohio State-Michigan held on November 17, 1934, exactly 75 years ago today in Columbus:

The program features several photos of players, including a collage of the Michigan team including team MVP Gerald Ford:

The top of the photo features Willis Ward, the African American end who was at the center of a fierce controversy that played out before the Georgia Tech game a few weeks earlier that season.  For those not familiar, The Jackets made it known well before the game that they wouldn’t take the field in Ann Arbor if Ward played, spawning intense protests on campus in Ann Arbor. 

Eventually Michigan caved, sitting Ward after a deal was struck with Tech that required the Jackets to sit a player as well.  (It’s not lost on me that the 1934 OSU program features two white dudes shaking hands.)  The 9-2 game was the Wolverines’ lone win of the miserable season but came with a historical price.   These incidents resonated with would-be President Ford, a friend of Ward’s, who wrote a 1999 New York Times Op-Ed piece defending Michigan’s affirmative action policies:

“Do we really want to risk turning back the clock to an ear when the Willis Wards were isolated and penalized for the color of their skin, their economic standing or national ancestry?”

President George W. Bush also mentioned the Ward incident in Ford’s eulogy. 

The 1934 Program also features a photo of one of the most famous athletes in the world, a burgeoning freshman track star at Ohio State named Jesse Owens:

Owens of course knows a little something about race and discrimination.  He’ll forever be remembered for kicking Hitler squarely in the bucknuts at the Berlin Olympics a couple years later.  While certainly on a smaller stage, Owens did some serious damage in Ann Arbor on Ferry Field in 1935 and the Bentley Library details his exploits:

Ferry Field has been the site of many great individual performances in Big Ten track championships, none more remarkable than Jesse Owens’ efforts in 1935. Within a period of two hours, the Ohio State sophomore set world records in the 220 yard dash – :20.2, the broad jump – 26 ft. 8 1/4 in., the 220 yard low hurdles – :22.6 and tied the world record in the 100 yard dash – :09.4 seconds. A plaque at the southeast corner of Ferry Field commemorates Owens’ incomparable performance.

That’s rubbing it in, man.

The year 1934 also marked the start of a Buckeye tradition that lingers today like a foul odor: the issuing of gold pants charms to players.   Their timing was impeccable.  The Sweatervest’s website explains the deal:

Schmidt founded the "Pants Club", which still exists today as reward for a win over the Wolverines. Since 1934, each player and coach receives a miniature pair of gold pants for each victory over Michigan. The charms contain the recipient’s initials as well as the year and score of "The Game".

Not only can you pick up a copy of this historic program, you can even own your own pair of Buckeye gold pants, which some OSU alum decided to hock on eBay right now:

This prize commemorate OSU’s 2007 and the seller even gives the initials of the original owner (D.H.) which are placed on each pair.   That’d narrow things down to ‘07 senior De’Angelo Haslam, freshman Dan Herron or yikes, assistant coach Darrell Hazell.   Didn’t mean that much, obviously.

The auction of the 1934 OSU-Michigan program ends November 19 and the auction of the gold pants closes November 20th.

Related:
* Follow eBayWatch on Twitter  A new tool.  I’ll blast about quick links to notable auctions.
* Harry Kipke and the Fall of 1934
* The Willis Ward Protests

Another vintage Michigan football item showed up this week on eBay, this time a post card celebrating Fielding Yost and his fine 1905 squad. The team is assembled in a line with Yost in the middle, standing on a large sign in the shape of a football that reads ‘Western Championship’. Atop the photo is a block letter title, ‘A HARD COMBINATION TO BEAT’.

The copyright of the postcard is 1905, so I’m guessing this was produced before the season as a souvenir to students and fans. The mention of the Western Championship refers to the undefeated 1904 campaign when the great Willie Heston and the Wolverines ran the table 10-0 and outscored opponents 567-22.

More evidence that this was produced prior to the season, someone wrote on the card “We defeated Wisconsin 12 to 0, as ever.”    The Wolverines indeed defeated the Badgers by that margin on homecoming that season, on November 18, 1905 specifically.   The “as ever” zinger was a 1905 version of smack talk if you’re keeping track; probably about as harsh as it got it those days.

The 1905 crew was a well photographed group. Yost and his teams hadn’t been defeated since he stepped on campus four years prior so it makes sense that folks were eager to get a good look at the machine that was tearing up the football world. Thankfully the Bentley Library has republished a few bonus photos of this team online and they include the shot that was used for the postcard in the eBay auction.  Closer inspection reveals that the “Western Championship” oval on the postcard was likely dubbed-in later (1905 version of photoshopping) as Yost is standing on a small stool:

Bentley Library

Other photos of the 1905 squad that can be found (and can be blown up into incredible detail) on the Bentley Library site:

In a very cool huddle around Yost – Bentley Library

Line up for good measure – Bentley Library

At the Whitmore Lake Hotel – 1905 – Bentley Library*

*[Ed 10/1/09: Thanks to reader Michael F., who correctly identified the correct whereabouts of the photo above.   It is from Walter Graham's photo album at the Bentley Library, a 1905 shot on the front porch of The Whitmore Lake Hotel.  The team used to train at Whitmore Lake before the season.  Very cool.  Here's a link to the photo.]

The author of that smack talk was justified in dropping some postcard pomposity, as to that point the 1905 crew were rolling.   Through the shot-out of Wisconsin and onto the next week when they added a 75-0 defeat of Oberlin, Yost’s men were undefeated with 12 wins, outscoring opponents 495-0. The smack would end there unfortunately, as a few days later Michigan traveled to the Windy City and experience something that hadn’t happened in Yost’s five seasons: they lost.  Barely.  Their old rivals Chicago sent The Victors back on the train to Ann Arbor with a 2-0 defeat, the streak broken.

A Bonus eBay Watch:
A member of the 1967 Ohio State football squad is selling the sacred gold pants they receive if they defeat Michigan. It’s not the first time one of these beauties has come up for auction; it won’t be the last.

Coaches and players receive the award which has its roots during Michigan’s brutal season of 1934 when new OSU coach Francis Schmidt sized up Gerald Ford & the two-time defending national champions and observed, “They put their pants on one leg at a time just like everybody else.”

I’ve seen these fetch around $1,000 in the past, we’ll see how this auction goes, here’s a pic:

Related:

• eBay Watch: 1904 and the Mountaineer Romp
• eBay Watch: Making the Buckeyes Sick (1907)

Just posted on YouTube, a quick interview with Ohio State center B.J. Mullens this week on the upcoming Michigan game.

Interviewer: Let’s be honest, give me your thoughts on the University of Michigan.
Mullens: They suck. I mean come on. We’re going to go up there and beat them pretty bad. That’s a rival and that’s how it’s going to be.
Interviewer: Do you give a damn for that whole state?
Mullens: No. Not at all.

So that’s fine, I don’t have an issue with a Buckeye trashing Michigan or vice versa, even dropping a “sucks” here and there. But the final question inadvertently produces a great moment in the history of this rivalry:

Interviewer: In as many S.A.T vocabulary words as you can, your opinion of Michigan.
Mullens: Boo.

Isn’t that grounds for an NCAA investigation? A cow could have scored as well on that question. I love it because you know the interviewer is a Buckeye grad, yet he inadvertently delivers a perfect Stuttering John question.

Update 1/17: Good question from Biggie Munn, ‘what in the hell sport did this raj cat play that he did not lose to um in 4 years?‘. Midway through the interview Raj offers that he “went four years and never lost to Michigan”.

Best I can tell Raj was in the homecoming class and his bio reveals he’s a super huge Buckeye fan. Beyond that, I doubt Raj was raining down threes or delivering touchdown dances on old Mich during his time in Columbus.

As for BJM, I consulted some folks at the Princeton Review and they confirmed that the S.A.T would give zero points for that answer. Had the question been, “What do ghosts say?” or “Who’s your favorite golfer?” or, “Name a key character in To Kill a Mockingbird?” or even, “What’s a common urban term for one’s ladyfriend?”, BJ would have been offered some credit.

Glad to hear that HBO’s documentary on the Michigan-Ohio State rivalry is now available on DVD. You can get a copy here from Amazon.com or head over to your local Borders.

I really enjoyed it; here’s my review from last November (with a few tweaks):

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With the hype building for Saturday it was a great night to watch the premiere of HBO’s first documentary dedicated to sports: The Rivalry. Initial review by those that at pre-screening event was that it was slanted toward the Buckeyes and didn’t mention Lloyd Carr. I went in with an open mind:

- The content definitely slanted toward the Buckeye side of the house. I’d say the last half of the piece was 80% focused on Ohio State fans and Woody Hayes.
- Overall it was well done. While they didn’t have any mention/picture/video of Lloyd Carr, they didn’t exactly spend a lot of time on Tressel. But the Carr omission was a little weird. I mean, they showed footage of John Cooper and a lot of Earle Bruce, but and didn’t mention Carr?

- The quotes from Bo were great. They talked about the gold pants that each OSU coaches and players gets if they beat Michigan (and later show up on eBay). One thing that never occurred to me is that Bo himself owns some of those pants due to his time coaching under Hayes in Columbus. As he looked behind him to make sure know one was listening Schembechler whispered, “I have several of those pants myself, I don’t mention that around here.”
- Along with snubbing Carr, they snubbed the 1964 Michigan Rose Bowl team, Bump Elliott, Jim Conley and Chuck ‘Barry’ Dehlin’s great team.
- The footage from the 1950 ’snow bowl’ game in Columbus was outstanding. Definitely check it out. The teams punted 45 times.
- It turns out ‘Muck Fichigan’ has been with us quite a while. They showed some sort of parade following the 1968 game in Columbus that featured a wooden sign spray painted with those famous words. It showed up later in the 70s and right up to last year on hats, shirts and signs that were seen throughout the documentary.
- Speaking of F-words, that Bo Biafra from the Dead Schembechlers was awful. He added an ‘F Michigan’ except he actually said it. Way to go buddy – on film forever dropping f-bombs about Michigan. [Ed: And Yes, Desmond dropped F-bombs too. This was played out on my original post. I said this and still feel this way: "yes Desmond dropped 2 f’s describing his famous punt return. While I would have preferred a different choice of words desmond gets a pass. Why? He’s a player, he was describing a particular incident (in the game, mind you!) and a member of the media (last point can be debated)."]
- They showed a strip of film showing the real ‘Those Who Stay Will be Champions” sign, which I’ve never actually seen. It’s unspectacular but still pretty cool. Just a plain old sign. Here’s what they showed:

- Just a general question: Is there anyone famous from Ohio State? They had interviews some comedian, that loser from the Dead Schembechlers, a writer from the Dispatch…then all coaches and players.
- I laughed a few times. They did point out that Michigan fans think of Buckeyes as author John Bacon explained, “slightly redneckish” and didn’t do much to defend that characterization of the Ohio fans. As Bacon uttered that legendary description the HBO producers panned to a BuckNut walking by with a mullet and a Daniel Boone fur cap. Great stuff.
- The piece closed with a nice (but brief) tribute to Bo and Woody, and included some superb pictures inside Michigan stadium.

Overall, I’d have to say well done but the criticism you’ve heard already is valid. They could have killed two birds by including a segment on Lloyd Carr and the past 10 years or so. I look forward to the next installment from HBO – The Notre Dame vs. Michigan rivalry.