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And Your Winner Is…

Thanks to all the entries.  It’s nice to see some excitement around the team even around a game that’s not on campus against a small OOC opponent.  Pat definitely wins for funniest response; I actually laughed when I read that.

The winner is frequent commentor I Know Nothing.  He has to get another chance to introduce his kid to a Michigan sporting event after the unfortunate Appalachian State game.

Congratulations to I Know Nothing. You better represent Michigan fans well at the game.

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Oakland Tickets Contest

I got a couple tickets to the Oakland game at the Palace this Saturday, but due to a unfortunate sequence of events, I can’t go to the game.  This should be a really interesting game to go see as it’s Laval Lucas-Perry’s first game, and since it’s not at an NCAA they may serve alcohol (although not as important with Michigan’s newly found competance!).

Unfortunately, up until a little bit ago, I thought I was going to the game, so this is a bit last minute.  You’ll have to be able to pick up the tickets in Ann Arbor.

To enter just leave a comment on why you should be given a pair of tickets to the Michigan/Oakland basketball game.

Winner will be announced and contacted sometime Friday, so if you enter, check your e-mail.

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New Recruiting Class of 2009 HQ

The new site has given us a lot of new options that we didn’t have on Blogger. The ablity to do something like this easily and locally is probably the biggest.

We have put together a page on each current 2009 commit and pulled information from the recruiting board, recruiting updates and Friday Night Lights posts.  Now almost all the information Varsity Blue has on a particular commit is in one place where readers can comment and discuss (and share video highlights, news stories, etc).

The page can be found here as well as in the Quick Links box at the top of the page.

Posted under Blog News, Recruiting

Michigan Workers’ Congress

Tonight at 8pm, the fine gentlemen of Wolverine Liberation Army are hosting a Cover-it-Live chat event featuring the proprietors of many of the prominent Michigan blogs across the great internet. Please stop by and contribute, or just watch us talk to each other.

Official Release from WLA:

Tonight, starting at 8pm ET, we will be hosting the Michigan Worker’s Congress with Brian from MGoBlog, Tim and Paul from Varsity Blue, Beauford Bixel from Maize n’ Brew, Johnny from Ronald Bellamy’s Under-Achieving All-Stars, and Coach Gsimms from Three and Out. Some special guests may show up as the night rolls on.

Be there or be square.

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Welcome to the New Varsity Blue

Welcome to our new place.  Make sure to take your shoes off before you come in.

A couple things to point out:

  1. Links to the recruiting boards and personnel info are on the top left.  Check out the boards if you haven’t; we’re constantly adding video and notes about the recruits.
  2. In addition to tags, we’ve added categories.  For example,  all the recruiting updates and commitment announcements are under Recruiting. Podcasts/photo libraries are under Media.

We’ve had this up and running for a while, but both Tim and I are a bit close to the project and, more specifically, run OSX, so if anyone notices something off or not working with IE6 or any other paleolithic browser, leave a comment on this post.  Beyond that, let us know what you think and of any new features you might want to see on the site.  It’s obviously still evolving and we have a lot more freedom on this site.

Hope you all enjoy the new digs.

UPDATE: I think I solved the issue the right sidebar in Safari. Can someone with IE5/6 chime in and let me know how it looks? Also, if someone wants to let me know how it looks on a mobile device, that’d be great.

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Programming Update: Dead Weekend

We will not be posting this weekend, for several reasons:

  • Varsity Blue may or may not be moving venues starting on Monday. I’ll let Paul fill in the gruesome details, since he’s far more knowledgeable on the matter.
  • I currently believe that I am going to be unavailable most of the time (as I was last weekend, hence the inconsistency in posting).
  • With the season over, there is little to post about, and I think it’s time to take a little break from scraping together content.

That said, the Big Ten Recruiting Class Rankings that are typically posted on Saturdays will make their tomorrow afternoon. Friday Night Lights (the final substantive update of the year) will appear on Monday. There may be a post or two shuffled in today or tomorrow as well, but no guarantees.

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Programming Update

No podcast this week, because the Sports Editor of [STUDENT MEDIA OUTLET REDACTED] is too important to answer his e-mail. This is unfortunate, because I’ve really been enjoying the podcasts, as well as the process of making them. Such is life, however, and we will move on.

Inside The Play for this week will be published this afternoon. It will focus on the Kevin Koger touchdown that helped spark the Michigan comeback against Wisconsin.
I hadn’t been planning on posting the 201o recruiting board until after the season, and even when Ricardo Miller committed, I had hoped I would be able to delay. I figured the next commitment would come over the MSU recruiting weekend (a biggie, where I also originally expected Ricardo Miller to drop), and I would still be fairly timely by waiting until December. However, with two commits already in the class, I would be remiss to not publish what I’ve already been working on. I’ll finish polishing it up this week and over the weekend, and you can expect to see the 2010 recruiting board sometime early next week. If you’re dying for info before that, head over to Genuinely Sarcastic, whom I helped a bit with adding prospects to their board.
That said, don’t expect to see 2010 recruiting updates with any frequency until after the 2008 football season ends. Once the 2009 class is signed, the assumptions (scholarship numbers, needs, etc.) for the 2010 class will be much more concrete, and the updates will come fast and furious (though at this pace, the 2010 class might be full by then).

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Varsity Maize

In honor of this weekend’s Maize Out game against the Wisconsin Badgers, Varsity Blue shall be known as “Varsity Maize” for this entire week. You may have noticed our RAD NEW BANNER at the top of your screen.

We here at Varsity Maize encourage everyone who is attending Saturday’s game against the Badgers to wear maize clothing, and be loud in support of the Michigan Wolverines in their Big Ten kickoff.

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Programming Update

The “Inside the Play” feature for this week will be slightly delayed because we’re having trouble getting the video together. It will probably make its grand appearance on Saturday (or even Sunday). Sorry about that, and I’ll try to avoid a situation like that happening in future weeks.

This afternoon, Paul will post the podcast, in which I talked to Dan Kukla of The Miami Student. Maybe it will assuage a few fears about this weekend’s games.

Also, Coach Rodriguez announced at his press conference yesterday afternoon that the Taylor Hill transfer is indeed going to happen. Also reported is that Marcus Witherspoon will not join the team this year (or ever). Eligibility Chart updated accordingly.

Ed. Note: I think there are only 19 scholarships available so far, but math tells me 20. Am I missing on somewhere (nested note: I’m not counting Sheridan or Lopata, et al, who will have renewal on a by-year basis).

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Become a Fan of Varsity Blue

Not that you aren’t already, but it’s time to make it official, since we all know that Facebook is more real than real life.

Become a fan of Varsity Blue on Facebook.

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