Thanks to Craig Ross (the author of The Obscene Diaries of a Michigan fan) for pointing this out. Earlier this week Colin Cowherd was talking about the necessary separation of communication between fans and folks like owners and the media. The ESPN radio host discussed his own experience and loosely mentions the incident years back between he and the now defunct M Zone. He tells his listeners, “that guy, at the M Zone, is the reason you guys can send me emails all day and I can’t send them back.” Here’s a snippet of the audio (from ESPN’s free podcasts): [display_podcast] . Of course he didn’t really explain the story or why he was peppered with email. Cowherd says, “I don’t even know what happened”. Right. His show completely ripped off a post on M Zone back in 2006 and provided no attribution for the source. M Zone and Cowherd eventually smoked peace pipe after Cowherd took responsibility for borrowing the content. Maybe the feud’s back on!? I’ll stop there. This may be old news but I got a kick out of it. I’m going to shoot an email over to the excellent offspring of the M Zone to see if they want to break this down and get some takes from those directly involved. Update 1/18: Andy at Spawn…
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Buckeye B.J. Mullens is Duncish and Gaumless (YouTube)
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”. The best I can tell Raj was in the homecoming class and his…
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The Vague Anxiety and Bill Frieder
That's that alpha and omega of my recollection, so thankfully I have a copy Craig Ross's tome, Obscene Diaries of a Michigan Fan, published in 2006. If you enjoy the tone, feel and prose of blogs like mgoblog and even this site, I suggest you get a copy of this book. I had a chance to meet Ross, a local attorney, author and raconteur, for lunch in December. I'm a good way through it and it's fabulous. Ross takes a good portion of chapter four in discussing cheating in college hoops in general, and takes a look at Johnny Orr, Bill Frieder, Ed Martin and Steve Fisher through this lens.
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Interview: Pete Tiernan of bracketscience.com
This week I sat down with Pete Tiernan, founder of bracketscience.com, a website with a comprehensive database that allows subscribers to slice and dice historical NCAA tournament data. Tiernan also provides statistical trends, charts, tips and strategies for busting up your pools. Over the past several years he’s contributed a column to ESPN.com insider$ and in 2009 will be featured at CBSSports.com. Tiernan holds two degrees from Michigan and taught for a while within the English department. His ties to the M basketball program run deep as his dad, ‘Boom Boom’ Tom Tiernan, laced them up for the Maize & Blue back when they played at Yost Field House in the early 1950s. We met in downtown Saline at the excellent Brecon Grille and over a few pints, he was kind enough to answer questions about Beilein, Michigan, tourney trends, the selection committee and more. We close with a cool story about his son who played for the Grand Valley State team that shocked Michigan State at Breslin last year. Enjoy: MVictors: Michigan basketball is becoming relevant again thanks to John Beilein. Let’s cut right to it, how does Beilein’s tournament coaching record stack up? Tiernan: Michigan made a very good choice. John Beilein is the top overperforming active coach of the modern tournament era. There’s a statistic that I have…
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Robinson spills the beans
Come on Rumeal! The star guard on Steve Fisher’s 1989 NCAA champions basically confirms that guys on the team were paid, from Mark Snyder’s post (with a surprisingly tame headline!): “You got nine pros and none of them left school early? If you’re taking care of players the right way, you understand the process to make it work. Otherwise, a player’s got to go out and look for help, it’s going to happen…” like with the Martin scandal. OK – so he doesn’t specifically say what that means but [cough, clear throat] maybe by “taking care of players the right way” he means furnishing them with Cottage Inn vouchers. Later he added, “Coaches have a lot of pressure to recruit the best players, and they have to turn to alumni for help. Alumni can’t help their school? I guess you’ve got to draw the line somewhere.” Robinson said he thinks they should call his team, with nine players that went to the pros, the Fab Nine.
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LaMarr Woodley on Tirico (ESPN audio 1/13)
A quick interview with former Michigan badass LaMarr Woodley on contributor Lew’s favorite show, ESPN Radio’s Tirico and Van Pelt. As expected Tirico dropped a few Michigan references in there. A few things they covered: * On the upcoming battle with the Ravens, and what he’s expecting to see out there. * On Joe Flacco’s progress. (He’s getting better, he’s making big time plays). * On the legacy of the Pittsburgh defense and how the veteran players continue the tradition. * Van Pelt asked him if he felt a link and responsibility to the former Steeler teams. Woodley says yes, you represent the guys that used to be because he’s thinks the Steelers lose, the former players feel they lost too. Woodley illustrates this by saying, “We acted that way when Michigan was playing this year. They go out there and lose a game I felt like I lost, because you were a part of that.” * Then he almost gets killed by another car or something, and they end the interview. Seriously. [display_podcast] . .
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Albom’s Spartan Omission
If you haven’t, give Mitch Albom’s essay titled ‘The Courage Of Detroit’ a read. It was published in this week’s Sports Illustrated and putting aside what you think of Albom, if you are from this area it’s a must read. One paragraph caught my eye, and I don’t want to take away from the message of the story. Albom was taking about the Detroit jokes about rioting, etc., and spun up this: Same goes for the favorite Detroit cliché of so many pundits: the image of a burning police car in 1984, after the Tigers won the World Series. Yes, some folks went stupid that night, and an eighth-grade dropout nicknamed Bubba held up a Tigers pennant in front of that burning vehicle, and — snap-snap — that was the only photo anyone seemed to need. Never mind that in the years since, many cities have done as badly or worse after championships — Boston and Chicago come to mind — and weren’t labeled for it. Never mind that through three NBA titles, four Stanley Cups, Michigan’s national championships in college basketball and football, and even another World Series, nothing of that nature has occurred again in Detroit. You might notice that while he mentioned Michigan’s 1989 hoops and 1997 football championships, he neglected to mention Michigan State’s…
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Michigan Basketball: 1,000 to 1
Another great win this weekend for Beilein and crew, and if things keep falling as expected it’s very likely the Wolverines will find themselves somewhere inside the bracket this March. ESPN bracket guru Joe Lunardi projects Michigan as a 9th seed right now with obviously a lot of schedule to be played. I checked out a couple of sports betting sites to see if any future odds were posted on the tournament. Sure enough, they’ve released the futures on the 2009 NCAA tournament here. I can’t tell when it was last updated, at the top, it reads January 31, 2009 – so I’m not sure what that means. Michigan is a +10,000 moneyline longshot to cut down the nets in Detroit, meaning your $100 college basketball bet would win you $10,000. So you’re saying there’s a chance. Let’s say the team improves and they end up a 6 or 7 seed who is to say they can get hot and get through? They’ll then be playing practically at home at Ford Field. If you’ve got a few bucks and a few stones, you could be laughing all the way to the bank in these hard times. Other odds of interest:+250 – North Carolina+1600 – Duke+1800 – UCLA+2500 – Michigan State, Purdue+5000 – Ohio State
