While I was with Dr. Sap visiting Capitol Varsity Sports last month we stubbed our collective toe on something. After we witnessed Russ Hawkins execute the helmet painting process A to Z, our hosts mentioned a unique twist to the U-M helmet they made in 2012. As prescribed by the athletic department, they added gold flakes into the maize paint…and showed us an example: Say what? So then there was the question: Did the team wear helmets with gold flakes nestled in the maize last season? Before checking with #1000SSS, I asked around and couldn’t find anyone aware of the change or a release talking about the flakes.* I checked out some close-ups of photos and didn’t really notice anything. Sap found one U-M collector, Dan Oles, who got his hands on a 2012 helmet that indeed had the flakes. Oles wrote to Sap, “I contacted a few players via twitter asking if the regular season helmets had maize glitter paint. They all confirmed that they did.” Oles even shot a note to Jon Falk who confirmed the change. Fast forward to today. I verified with media relations & with Falk that indeed the team had the bedazzled headgear in 2012. The change to the paint was announced as part of the Cowboy Classic uniform reveal…but the news release didn’t…
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With A Bit of Practice (Photos!)
Love the first practice and first game photos – always fun to post. From 20 minutes of practice today, enjoy: Gardner and Funchess and share a laugh Eight pack of Faygo Orange pop Jake Ryan . . . with a game jersey including the Bennie Oosterbaan Legend Patch! The big man putting on his clownish shoes Coach working on a beard? Reminder of a major goal on the South field wall Gibby arming himself for battle, still rocking the golden adidas cleats (why would he change?) Matt Wile with a special kicking shoe; a few guys had the all maize variety like that cat in the background. [According to this tweet, that cat with the maize kicks is Kenny Allen] FBs Joe Kerridge and Sione Houma (hair) stroll out of the Glick Shane Morris snapping a Slim Jim Mommmm! Ball’s stuck on the Oosterbaan roof again! Johnny ‘frickin’ Wangler, people Follow MVictors on Twitter – those who do saw many of these hours ago!
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Stuff Like This…Elsewhere (2013)
A quick round-up of stuff to check out beyond this pages now and this fall: This Week in Michigan Football History…yes! – It’s back for the 2013 season so Go Blue. For the fourth season I’ll cut an audio segment on the history of your beloved Wolverines for the WTKA 1050AM Countdown to Kickoff for each game this season. Once again, to Angelique’s delight, I’ll bring it with #toughness. Ira and I are looking at the dates and working through the lineup. Check out the archive here. I’ll also continue to give you sneak peek Friday afternoons for your tailgate mixtapes, etc. Hail to the Victors 2013 – You don’t have it yet? And you call yourself a fan? Get it here and read my full interview with Bob Bergeron, five myths about the Little Brown Jug and finally, a little bit of Ron Kramer uncensored. That’s right, I said Kramer uncensored! So get some! Kramer says, “M fans, I salute you!” photo courtesy Peg Canham-Keeley Lindy’s – I’d like to say that 3 times followed by “.get your adverbs here” but only a handful of you would have any idea what I’m talking about it. In this year of the 110th anniversary of the founding days of the Little Brown Jug rivalry and the 100th meeting between Michigan and the…
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Bruce Madej to Retire June 2014
This announcement came through last night and I’m sad to see it. Like Jon Falk, U-M is losing another legend who’s not only been great to me personally, but also a legacy to a bygone era. Here’s to hoping Bruce puts together a memoir of his days at #1000SSS sometime soon. But as Bruce posted on Twitter, “it is not over yet! #GOBLUE.” Cheers to that, and cheers to Bruce. Full release via media relations: Long Time U-M PR Man Bruce Madej To Retire In 2014 ANN ARBOR, Mich. –Bruce Madej, the longest serving Sports Information Director in the history of the University of Michigan Athletic Department (1982-2010) and now U-M’s Associate Athletic Director for Special Projects, announced (Wednesday, August 7) his retirement effective June 30, 2014. At that time, Madej will complete 34 years of service to Michigan Athletics. “I have had the privilege to be an integral part of many of the greatest moments in Michigan Athletic history, yet those achievements rank a distant second to the friendships and the relationships I have been able to build and maintain with student-athletes, coaches, department team members, ‘M’ letter winners, alums, supporters, fans and the media through the years,” said Madej. “I have been especially blessed with those who have been close to me on a daily basis—my family and…
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The Yost Gap Widens (even more)
The Big Ten released its annual media guide today, including the all-time coaching records. Thanks to scandals at Ohio State (and now Penn State) we know that the recognized W-records of a couple of the big name coaches have been in flux. Some history for context: In 2010 I lobbied the Big Ten to change Yost’s all-time conference record wrong because they had included the years 1907-1916…when Michigan was not a member of the conference. The B1G media brass conferred and then agreed. They made the change and thus bumped Yost’s #1 overall conference record from an .833 winning percentage to .888 (to #2 Tressel’s .828). In 2011, after the Ohio State scandal sent Tressel packing and vacated the entire 2010 season, I put the question out there of how the conference would treat Tressel’s all-time record on the official books given the scandal. I suggested five potential scenarios: Based on today’s media guide (and if they published this previously I haven’t seen it)…we know that they went with option #2 above. Tressel drops to .810: So they simply removed the 2010 wins, kept the Wisconsin loss, dropped the win % to .810 and kept Tressel on the list saying he met the 10-year minimum threshold. Sure, it would have been nice to see him drop off behind Bo or…
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The Winged Wizard: Russ Hawkins and Capitol Varsity Sports
It was a road trip years in the making. Finally last month Dr. Sap and I headed down to Capitol Varsity Sports in Oxford, OH to visit shop owner Bob Fawley and winged helmet artist Russ Hawkins. Uniform gurus probably know that it is Capitol Varsity that has done the bulk of Michigan helmet reconditioning over the past four decades, and it is Hawkins who’s personally created the winged design that you see on many of the helmets each Saturday. Of course, Bo and equipment manager Jon Falk came from Oxford-based Miami, OH and that’s how the bond between the company and U-M was formed & maintained over the years. The Wolverine tie is clearly important to the Ohio company–winged helmets, schedule posters and photos of U-M dignitaries are found around the facility. (And no, despite being an hour from Columbus they don’t do any work for the Buckeyes. Without saying as much, you can tell there’s some bitterness in the air about that.) They even have a shrine to U-M and Jon Falk in their offices: A couple of notes: As implied above Capitol Varsity isn’t the only firm that handles the reconditioning of the helmets for Michigan as the Riddell helmets are handled by Riddell in Elyria, OH. On a disappointing note for me, Capitol Varsity did not…
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Air Cover Needed!
GOOOAAAL! Over $1500 raised and it’s walk day – thank you!: Champions: ‘Go Blue!’, Craig Barker of The Hoover Street Rag, DaBangStick, Brad Muckenthaler, Art Balourdos, Andrew Rosenstein, Jack Everett, Ben McCready, The Kool Breeze, Mark Snyder, James Lewis, Greg LePore, Jen Mahan, Shashi Mara, <your name here>. .thank you!
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The Tinseltown Victors
Readers of this site might be familiar with this collectible poster for the 1941 Columbia film ‘Harmon of Michigan’: So you may know the poster, but I finally had a chance to watch the film. More on that later but I thought I’d pass this along—the intro to the film contains a Hollywood-style rendition of The Victors, a mandatory addition to your Rose Bowl roadtrip mixtapes: [display_podcast] While we’re on Harmon, one other nugget from the archives. Not too long before he made this film, The Hoosier Hammer played in the 1941 East-West Shrine Game. His equipment order for that game: Helmet size 7 3/8 Pants 32 Shoes 9 1/2 D Jersey size 42 Jersey number 98 (naturally) Follow MVictors on Twitter
