Coach Rodriguez dialed up The Huge Show for a few minutes this afternoon.  Host Bill Simonson asked him some relatively tough questions (Huge “…the defense has been brutal”): Spring practice Demar Dorsey’s alternative plans Other freshman (Will Hagerup has the best shot to start) How the players are reacting to distractions (both positive (?) and negative) Dave Brandon and expectations The defensive struggles (and whether he had a heart-to-heart with Greg Robinson). I believe I caught this a minute or so into the interview, but grabbed the bulk of it: [display_podcast] .   Hey, follow MVictors on Twitter and be the first to “get it”

The media got a brief glimpse of practice late this afternoon.   It’s seriously about 15 minutes and it’s just drills.  I’m not knocking it (it’s nice to be out there for a few minutes) but it’s tough to learn much of anything.   A few notes: While Mike Martin isn’t participating in formal drills, he was seen today running inside the indoor facility and looked good.  And mean. I was trying to get a look at the kickers and punters, but each time we’ve been around practice they’ve been tucked away inside the indoor practice field as well. I watched about 5 minutes of the quarterbacks passing in a few different drills, Gardner struggled at times with accuracy but take that with a grain of salt that takes 5 (five) minutes to digest. more pics:   Ricky Leach:

I’ve been meaning to swap hosting companies for a while now, I’ve seen latency loading pages, got complaints from readers (one guy said he likes the site but couldn’t take it anymore) and this weekend the site pretty much died.  Anyway, I’ve moved to a new host aptly named Bluehost. I’m still working out a few kinks but I’d appreciate any feedback on site performance. Many thanks to those who posted or notified me directly of the problems this weekend.

For those (delightfully) scratching their head on how the story of the Michigan hockey run made it to Wall Street Journal, check this out.  WSJ writer Darren Everson penned that fine piece and hasn’t stopped dropping maize and blue nuggets as evidenced by this note in today’s column running down the Final Four coaches: Mr. Izzo’s sixth Final Four appearance in the past 12 years—a feat that only UCLA’s John Wooden and Duke’s Mr. Krzyzewski have ever accomplished—has triggered an outpouring of admiration for the Michigan State coach. One reporter this week quizzed him on whether he is the best coach in the history of the state. (Somewhere, Fielding Yost, Michigan’s football patriarch of the early 20th century, is wondering how six semifinal appearances trump the six national titles he is credited with.) Love it.   It looks like Mr. Everson was graduated from U-M in 1996 (B.A. English).  A few more M hockey and Fielding Yost references in the Journal and he’ll be coming back to pick up his honorary doctorate.

Maybe hit Carribou on Stadium then finish up with a cigar at Smokey’s? Support Michigan athletics and beat Cancer.   There are several auctions right now on my beloved eBay (HT: mgoblog), 100% of the proceeds of which go to fight cancer. The hottest?  How about a sit down with coach Lloyd Carr over coffee?   Get in there and bid.  The coffee with Carr auction is currently fetching north of $200 and it’ll certainly fetch more than that.  Maybe you can buy it and apologize to him. Other sweet stuff: Sideline passes for the Spring Game.  Hey, you might even meet your favorite bloggers?!  (Price drops suddenly). Jamie Morris signed football?  Nice.  Maybe James Walter will finally accept my Twitter follow? You can see all of the auctions here.

Join me in scouring the Ann Arbor memorabilia black market for the missing piece of Michigan Stadium turf.  It’ll surely lead right to the culprit. I noticed this mildly suspicious auction on eBay last night, but it has since been pulled: (I must say that shipping price was a steal!)

On Monday, May 11, 1959, the Midwest was hit with a raging windstorm and Ann Arbor was drilled.  One person in the Burns Park area was killed by a downed power line and at least two houses were set ablaze.  The city was declared a disaster area and the Red Cross was deployed to lend a hand. Yost Field House was nearly destroyed: