• You Wear It Well

    Hail #47.  Hail Bennie Oosterbaan.  Thank you Jake Ryan:   Follow!  MVictors on Twitter  AFA Stuff: Air Force– (Pregame Photos) Oosterbaan Honored – Official Release Provisioning for Michigan Stadium 2012: Bridge is Closed version TWIMFbH: Bo Shows ‘The U’ How We Do Things (1984) Oosterbaan, Banners and Books Honoring Oosterbaan: An Interview with Ben McCready

  • Michigan-Air Force 2012 (Pregame Photos)

    Sights and sights from pre-game today.   Actually turned out to be a nice day: The fabulous Air Force chicken (is that unpatriotic of me?) mocking Denard’s Usain Bolt comments It was basically like a practice for Hoke in pregame – he was coaching up the D-line hard   Court’s moms and his pops with the custom gear – not available in stores     Custom made pylons Gardner still doing a few drills with the QB Gear note #1 and #2.  The helmet numbers are gone; blue socks with the maize ‘M’ are here Gear note #3:  Brendan Gibbons’ adidas soccer gear? Meet Ben McCready – Bennie Oosterbaan’s godson and namesake   Follow MVictors on Twitter   or   MVictors on Facebook  Related: Oosterbaan Honored – Official Release Provisioning for Michigan Stadium 2012: Bridge is Closed version TWIMFbH: Bo Shows ‘The U’ How We Do Things (1984) Oosterbaan, Banners and Books Honoring Oosterbaan: An Interview with Ben McCready

  • Provisioning for Michigan Stadium 2012: Bridge is Closed version

    A couple updates on my annual post of what to bring to Michigan Stadium.  This year local police have added a few other items to pack: “Bring a dose of patience, a sense of humor and some excitement for the game,” Check.  Check.  (Yes, we have those.  We were around from ‘08-‘10).  And Check.  Why?  The Stadium Bridge is still closed and I’m guessing there will be quite a few folks who traditionally rely on that route to get to the stadium coming from the north and east sides of the state.   AnnArbor.com posted a map, etc.   For those finding discovering this little issue today here’s your t-shirt: You should also bring your history tidbits and you can get all those here: TWIMFbH: Bo Shows ‘The U’ How We Do Things (1984) Oosterbaan, Banners and Books Honoring Oosterbaan: An Interview with Ben McCready This Week in Michigan Football History: The Incomparable Bennie Oosterbaan & September 25, 1948   Here’s what else to bring: 1. AM/FM Radio. Forget the latest incarnation of the radio that sticks on your ear, they are unreliable.  Bring in a radio you trust to listen to the play-by-play from Brandy and Beckmann. You’ll get injury reports, sideline observations, statistics and analysis of key plays that are under review (although Brandstatter always seems to think the replay…

  • TWIMFbH: Bo Shows ‘The U’ How We Do Things (1984)

    Feels so good to be back home again.  This Week in Michigan Football History returns to Ann Arbor and the Bud Light Victors Lounge at 1050AM WTKA on Saturday and here’s your bonus sneak listen. Miami FL comes to town (via Ticketmuseum.com) This time we take a trip back at the 1984 opener played on September 8 of that season, as Team 105 took on the #1 ranked and defending national champion Miami Hurricanes.   Jimmy Johnson’s ‘Canes actually had already played two games that season which must have drove Bo nuts.   When he found out I’m guessing some furniture was moved around. Clip: [display_podcast] How about some double bonus #TWIMFbH content?   A player who prefers to remain anonymous shared this about that game and in particular, the scene doing pregame warm-ups.  Awesome: “I can tell you one thing that I do recall from that game that really stuck out for me was the pre-game.  As you may imagine the pre-game ritual for Bo was rather intense.  We would come out in full gear and begin our warm ups with our individual position coaches.  You know the usual running, stretching, form up hitting.  Then we would move to the full team warm up where Bo would have us line up and hit, at full speed, against the first and second team…

  • Oosterbaan, Banners and Books

    So as we limp charge confidently into Saturday’s opener a few notes: Oosterbaan: You know the great Bennie O. will be honored Saturday and his #47 will be on the back of someone on the roster for the remainder of the year.  (Jeremy Jackson?  Not sure, but looking forward to finding out.)   But if you pick up a game program, I prepared a profile on Oosterbaan that attempted to get a feel for what the man was like off the field.  It includes a few stories from his family and one from my man ‘64 Jim Conley.  A sneak peak: “He had huge mitts,” Conley recalled. One day Oosterbaan was teaching the players about how they needed to be ready to catch the ball wherever it came—high, low or to the right or left. Bennie then asked a player throw errant balls in his direction. “We tossed him a low one and he leaned down, tipped the ball up with one hand and caught it in the other hand. Then he did the same thing with a high ball, and then with a ball over to the side, and so on. He didn’t drop anything. Keep in mind he was in his late 50s and wearing a suit. It was an exhibition–you just marveled at it.” The Banner:  Did you…

  • Honoring Oosterbaan: An Interview with Ben McCready

    Young Ben McCready with a gift from his godfather, namesake and then-U-M coach Bennie Oosterbaan.  It’s the gameball from the 1958 Minnesota Little Brown Jug game & was a Christmas gift. For Michigan historians Saturday’s game holds special significance.  Bennie Oosterbaan, arguably the greatest athlete in U-M history will be honored.  He was the first football man to have his jersey retired (#47) and against Air Force, he will be the first to have a Michigan jersey “unretired”. Oosterbaan’s exploits on the field are well known: a three time All-American in football, a two time All-American in basketball, and a Big Ten batting title champion in baseball. The Muskegon native turned down offers to play professionally and instead chose a different path: a life dedicated to coaching U-M students in each of the sports in which he dominated. He coached all three sports at one time another, the highlight being when he led Michigan to the 1948 football national championship. After his coaching days he remained an administrator with the athletic department until he retired in 1972. Over the past year I’ve gotten to know Ben McCready, the godson and namesake of the great Oosterbaan.   He’ll be there Saturday when his godfather is honored.  McCready was kind enough to share some insight on how the “unretirement” came to be, his…

  • Michigan AP Poll–Week 2

    I hate polls.  I love data.  Here’s the AP poll results for Michigan thanks to pollspeak.com’s coveted Poll Stalker tool.   Your boy Bob Asmussen, who had Michigan at #1 last week, dropped the Wolverines to #13.   AnnArbor.com’s columnist Kyle Meinke has M at 17.  Four writers dropped the maize and blue right out of the polls after reading the Spartan in-game tweets. Click here to see the full report