I’ll be sitting in with Ira Weintraub on WTKA 1050AM’s Key Bank Countdown to Kick-off show from 4-7:30ish tomorrow.  You can listen live via the stream on WTKA.com, email the show at studio@wtka.com or call 734-998-1050.  Ira will be taking a lot of calls, emails and the like. I may have my laptop with me so follow on Twitter. I will be covering some Little Brown Jug history if your interested, along with some talk about the Michigan State game, the Big Ten, Florida/LSU and of course a lot of looking ahead to tomorrow night’s game against Iowa. P.S. If I mention that Iowa’s defense is solid, here’s why – from Iowa’s official pregame press release:

Brandon Graham’s hit on Glenn Winston that got me out of my seat at Spartan Stadium:

  Yikes.  While don’t think Jeff ‘SuperFan’ Holzhausen is going to abandon his uniform or cowbell anytime soon, the Michigan State loss caused SuperFan to blow a gasket that may be beyond repair: I’m sick.  I’m disgusted.  I’m nasty and pissed off. The honeymoon is over for me ladies and gentlemen.  Every coach compiles what I see as UNFORGIVABLE losses…and I will never…NEVER…forgive Rich Rodriguez or his staff for that absolute horsecrap game plan and team motivation…and team focus…and team execution.  Pathetic.  Rich Rod got a free pass in 2008 no matter how much that season killed me…SO COULD SOMEBODY PLEASE FREAKIN EXPLAIN TO ME WHY WE GET DOMINATED FOR MOST OF THE GAME BY A WEAK STATE DEFENSE AND WE SCORE MORE POINTS LAST YEAR WITH THREET AT THE HELM???  Fee pass over.  Honeymoon over.  I’m a TNT Popeye explodin’ motha right now folks…I takes all I’s can stands till I can’t stands no more. I’m shifting SF from ‘All In’ to ‘Barely In’ on my fan tracker.  Hang in there SF!

I took my 5-year-old daughter to the M hockey exhibition against the University of Windsor on Sunday evening so excuse me if I missed this, as the only War Chant I recall is the one for Twizzlers and popcorn.  Brian at mgoblog: Major plus points for playing Temptation—all of Temptation—and Hawaiian War Chant in the first intermission. The You Can’t Have One Without The Other duo is criminally underused across all Michigan sports and should be implemented whenever and wherever possible. Hopefully they continue that all season. And props to Cook for employing the tag, “yost is not nam there are rules” on the post. This note offers a good time to answer a recent question posed to me, just after the Indiana game.  Reader Doug Dewitt tossed in this question: How did Temptation and Hawaiian War Chant become part of Michigan tradition? After a fruitless Google search, I went to the authorities over at the Hoover Street Rag.   Thanks to Craig, Geoff, Jeremy and Gary, they posed the question to band historian Joseph Dobos who dropped some knowledge: Jerry Bilik’s “Temptation” and “War Chant” were performed first as part of two different half time shows in the mid 1950s.  As is done now, highlights of half time shows were performed at postgame shows.  Both feature the percussion section and…

Since I’ve pounded the rugby punt thing to a pulp, a few more notes and observations from Saturday from my cherry seats on the 45 yard line. “Get Yer Programs, losers” – This guy was schlepping game programs in Spartan Stadium right in the heart of the MSU elite.  Yes, where the likes of Tom Izzos of the world sit, check out his gear: On the 2:  Great discussion on when to go for two in these comeback situation on mgoblog- check it out.   The net?  Percentages yield that Michigan should have looked for the deuce after Stonum’s score.  As Brian pointed out on WTKA on Monday, I think coaches know the fans would crucify them if this strategy failed so me and my fellow nerds will need a few brave souls to try this before it becomes a fan-friendly strategy.  Funny – I see that Dantonio was down 21 to Wisconsin and went for two after their first comeback score but missed it.  Per my MSU insider, he didn’t have a logical explanation for this at the presser.  And showing that he probably wasn’t aware of the strategy, State kicked an extra point when they cut the lead to 9 on their next, very late, touchdown. As far as these strategies, the percentages are great (a 44% chance!!) but…

Audio from the Monday press conference, Rich Rodriguez discussing the fake punt from Saturday: [display_podcast] Hate to beat this to death, but hearing Rodriguez go through this Monday didn’t make me feel any better.  Rodriguez confirmed he called the roll punt and that it was an option, and there is a call where they simply roll out and punt (with no option to try to run for the first down): Normally when we roll punt it’s just a true roll punt, it’s not a read like it was in the game. Just to be clear, this isn’t a revelation to me—it’s just that I’ve heard some folks speculate that the coaches never called for an option.  Not true. You’ll rarely see me argue play calling on these pages but I’m obviously struggling with this one.  I understand the reasons to try to the roll out punt (even a little better now after hearing RR talk about it) but I don’t understand including the option in this case.  Rodriguez’s system is heavily based on reads but to do this for the first time this season, in the shadows of the goalpost, in the third quarter of a tight game, on your first game on the road, in East Lansing…I don’t get it.   But whatever, it’s done and we move on. But…

I understand one of the most sought-after classes for undergrads at U-M is John U. Bacon’s sports journalism class.   Surely that is in part due to the course materials (you mean there’s a class about sports?) and in part due to Bacon himself, recipient of last year’s Golden Apple Award.   Last fall I had the pleasure of visiting the class along with Brian Cook of mgoblog to talk a little bit about blogging. I’m guessing a few folks in the 1920s lined up for this class. The next edition of eBay Watch takes a look at a notebook from a lecture on football apparently taught by Fielding Yost himself in the summer of 1925.  I don’t know if it was a University-sponsored class or just a clinic-like course open to coaches and the like. Here’s the only photo from inside the notebook showing some of the knowledge dropped by ol’ Yost. Looks like a strategy on crushing the weak side with a jailbreak of blockers: The book also contains notes from lectures in 1926 by Milton Orlander (an assistant under Robert Zuppke at the University of Illinois), and Gilmore Dobie of Cornell University.  The lucky chap who took these detailed notes?  The seller isn’t sure – perhaps closer inspection will reveal that. The auction of the notebook ends October 6…