Whoa. What happened? Based on my straw poll of the press box, most media folks had BYU winning this one. So call BYU a good, at least a decent, team. That was a mercy kill. Offhand, that was probably the biggest beatdown of a good team since, what? 38-0 Vol. I over Notre Dame in 2003? Rudock made good decisions with the pigskin. Smith missed a couple of holes but it didn’t matter because he’s a beast. The defense was relentless and finished tackles. Special teams were sound. The playcalling was straight money and clearly, the playbook is being cracked open to the later chapters. Maybe there is magical khaki dust after all. Assuming we handle Maryland on the road, heading back home to face Northwestern will be fun to watch. It feels good man. To the sights and sounds: DER-EK JEET-AHH. The Pope could have visited Michigan Stadium today and no one would have noticed – here’s Derek Jeter: Above there’s Derek Jeter killing it in his Michigan hoodie, with suite ticket in pocket (does he really need a ticket? to anything?) with Sarah Harbaugh on the left. Any fool who tried to get too close to #2 had to deal with Big Tony, aka The Captain’s Cleaner: Coach Edwards. I strolled over to the opposing team suite (it’s…
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Do you have Anything in Light Bright Maize?
Mgo-reader J.P. sent over this question into mgoblog. Brian forwarded it my way for some level 2 support: Is it just me or is the ‘maize’ portion of Michigan’s uniforms–in all sports except Hockey–getting lighter? I see old games on BTN and remember from watching Michigan for the past 30 years that the maize used to be a deep, rich, gold/yellow. Over the past 10 years, the maize has gotten lighter and lighter to the point where it looks pastel now. This drives me nuts. I can’t stand the winged helmet that’s highlighter yellow instead of the richer maize. The pants look canary in color! This seemed to have started at the end of the Nike era and carried over to the Adidas unis. I’ve attached some pics. So, is it just me and the color remained the same? Is my eyesight getting worse? Is it the setting on my tv’s over the years? After a quick read I escalated this to a Severity One ticket and dispatched Michigan uniform guru Steve Sapardanis to resolve this. Take it away, Mr. Dr. Sapardanis: Disclaimer Let’s get this out of the way first: never, ever, ever go by the color you see of pics online, in mags/programs or even in photos – see these Harbaugh photos as reference: These two pics are…
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The Uniform Changes Since Bo Era
The “All Whites” bring good luck as you can see (via Sports Illustrated) [Ed. See the full Uniform Timeline for more detail. This post inspired the idea.] A little history on the the subtle (and a few not-so-subtle) tweaks to the Michigan uniform in the past four decades via historian and Wolverine uniform expert Steve Sapardanis. This was basically off the top of his head (!) – so feel free to review and comment: 1969 – Bo removes the numbers from the SIDES of the helmets and adds award stickers (solid yellow football-shaped decals) 1974-1975 – White pants for road games. Road unis changed to all white with thin blue and yellow stripes on the end of the jersey sleeves, and matched in same stripes down the outsides of the pants. (Check out all whites in action in the ‘76 Orange Bowl). 1975 – UM changes the facemask color from gray to blue. Decals get a little facelift – a snarling Wolverine head with laces is added 1976 – UM goes with YELLOW pants for both home AND away games. M switches to BIKE helmets for the entire team (90% of the players make the switch – a few still wear MacGregor, Rawlings, or Riddell helmets). A slight change to the helmet design – the middle-strip “tail” is removed and…
