Maybe I’ll post a couple other clips later, but for now, I hope this clip will do. Notice that two defensive players let him run right by them.

#23 Carlos Brown Touchdown Run

Posted under Personnel

For, now, I’ll just post a couple of my notes from the spring practice. Videos will come later if I ever get around to cutting them up.

1. I never ever ever want to see Johnny Sears Jr. as the deep man on the punt return team. He is really fast, but he managed to fumble two punts and a kickoff in just about as many tries.
2. Brandon Harrison looks really good. He was really laying the wood to some guys. If he hits his teammates this hard, I can only wait to see how hard he’ll hit opponents. I hope this will be something that everyone on the defense starts to do.
3. LaTerryal Savoy also looks really good. He will probably be our tallest receiver, and he uses his body well. He made a great catch and lunge for the endzone on a pass from Jason Forcier during the scrimmage. It was a touchdown, but the ref didn’t call it one. The assistant coaches came over and gave him a (good-natured) hard time about it.
4. Carlos Brown actually might be as fast as they say. He played a little quarterback as well, running the option with Mister Simpson. Don’t buy the hype that he scored a legitimate long touchdown run – a couple linebackers let him get through so that fans would have something to cheer about.
5. Zoli Mesko might be my hero. The second biggest crowd reaction of the day came from a punt that he boomed for 60+ yards in the air (no wind). Kid has a huge leg, and I expect him to win 3-4 Heismen.
6. Alijah Bradley has got to be one of the hardest workers on the team. He laid out once for a beautiful reception that had the crowd going crazy. I anticipate he’ll be a little more involved in the offense this year.
7. Adrian Arrington looked pretty good. He’ll probably play the role of poessession receiver this year, though with a little more speed and a lot more height than Avant. I predict he’ll start opposite Manningham.
8. Carson Butler didn’t look so great. He dropped a couple easy passes, so he’ll have to develop those hands a little bit. He also almost took me out once as he got pushed out of bounds.
9. Garret Rivas did nothing to allay the fears of fans. He missed a chip-shot field goal, which I expect he’ll do a lot of this year, unless the offense is actually able to put the ball into the endzone.
10. The starters didn’t get a whole lot of reps, but Breaston did manage to drop a deep-ish ball from Henne. Awesome! He needs to be used as a receiver that is found in space, then creates something himself.
11. Mark Bihl’s right pant leg was covered in blood. I have no idea why.
12. Brandon Graham (who will arrive in the fall) is nowhere near 270 pounds, fear not.

Posted under Spring Coverage

Recently, there has been an uproar of sorts in the Michigan community about the proposed addition of skyboxes to Michigan Stadium. Why this has suddenly become a big deal now, rather than when renovations were announced, is beyond me. Regardless, here are links to a couple of articles explaining the new debate.

Michigan Daily
Daily editorial supporting letter
Ann Arbor News
AAN editorial supporting skyboxes

First things first, let me say that, in the beginning, I was adamantly opposed to skyboxes. The Michigan tradition, etc. and so on. However, my opinion on the matter changed (and fairly quickly). However, my reasons for supporting the new construction are not the same as those from the AAN editorial, but rather THE EXACT opposite of the reasons that the writers of the letter (and the idiots at the Daily) oppose it.

Lee Bollinger, I respect you for having a keg party after we beat Penn State while you were president of the University, but you are just dead wrong on this issue. For those of you too lazy to click on the link(s), the general argument raised by this group is that building pressboxes will essentially separate bourgeoisie from proletariat fans (yes, it’s all about the left-wing politics here).

Allow me to raise a counter-argument here. The two groups are already separated. The alumni and wealthy donators are the only ones who can afford to sit within the 25-yeard lines, much less right on the fifty. Aside from the student section, I’d be willing to wager that the seating arrangements throughout the bowl of Michigan Stadium are already pretty much arranged by wealth.

Since the alumni feel the need to have great seats, in addition to making sure that they are not contributing to the noise level in the stadium (one of my pet peeves, in case you haven’t noticed), we might as well get them the hell out of the main bowl, and give their seats to the next in line in class status, making more availability for the fans with less monetary means.

Ever the pragmatist, I support essentially any reasonable measure to increase the noise level in the stadium. Building skyboxes will help this situation in two ways, by getting the silent old rich people out of a spot where they could be helping the atmoshpere by making noise, as well as increasing the angle at which the stadium rises, trapping more sound (though I doubt this effect would be very significant).

While the counterargument of funding is indeed a great point supporting the skyboxes, it is certainly not the only one. However, if that argument is what it takes to get this project approved, theen I’m all for it. (But why does the second most profitable athletic department in the country need more monetary assistance?)

Posted under Misc.

The video on the website for The Braylon Edwards Foundation is really cool. It’s a bunch of Braylon clips playing mirrored with Anthony Carter clips that are super similar. Tim approves, even if it takes about 7 months for the video to load.

Posted under Misc.

Since the open spring practice is still a long three weeks away, I’m going to continue to make posts that are related to football only in the vague sense that they have something to do with the gameday atmosphere. My topic of the day? Fan attire.

Last year, the official student t-shirt was blue. This was a terrible idea. Bright colored student sections look infinitely better, and since Michigan has only one bright color (as opposed to say a Texas, who has both orange and white), the choice should obviously be maize every single time. I’ve already covered this in the past, so I won’t get into it too deeply.

I’d now like to extend that ideal, and say that the fans not in the student section should wear yellow as well. The Athletic Department seems to be getting into this a little bit as well, as the slogan on the student shirts is “Go Blue, Wear Maize.” Nothing bothers me more than the fans who come in their grey or white sweatshirts. Wearing blue is acceptable, wearing neither yellow nor blue shouldn’t be.

Also, I have a great idea that has blatantly ripped from Penn State (in case you haven’t noticed, I have some sort of weird thing for PSU). In the section of the stands where the ‘M’ is, the fans should wear the color corresponding to their seat so that the figure comes out on TV. It looked really cool during the PSU/OSU game, and I think it’s something that we should try as well.

Obviously, however, it is difficult to get fans to all wear the same color, it will be exceptionally difficult to get them to figure out where they’re sitting, and dress accordingly. The solution? Give away the T-shirts. Not only could the athletic department manage to do this for free (corporate sponsors would pay for it, much like the towels from last year’s OSU game), but it would be essentially the only way to guarantee that this cool visual imagery could take place.

The athletic department would know exactly how many of each shirt they would need to buy (allow me to suggest that blue shirts be given to those on blue seats inside the yellow box, and yellow shirts be provided for those sitting in yellow seats), and could give people the shirts as they enter the stadium in that section (although this would slow down the entry through those couple gates for a while, it would be well worth it).

For lack of information, I’m going to end this post here, but I certainly plan to follow up on it in the near future (i.e. when I take the time to figure out the numbers of shirts, etc.)

Posted under Analysis

Enjoy this highlight

Posted under Misc.

Lloyd Carr had his pre-spring press conference, at which he shed a little bit more light on the Antonio Bass situation.

The knee was actually injured during a conditioning drill. Bass is probably not going to practice in the spring.

Interestingly, Lloyd also said that Bass was going to play both WR and QB in the spring practices. It was unclear whether the QB was scout team (i.e. practicing for Ohio State et al), or if he was actually going to see significant time at the position this year (other than the occasional gadget play).

Maybe, based on the lack of QB depth that we will have this year, it was actually going to be a position he would think about playing. I think that would also represent a big step forward in UM’s coaching staff getting with the times of the current football climate in the NCAA as well. This is all speculation at this point, however, so I guess we’ll never know.

Other pertinent information from the press conference will be divulged when I have the time to review the tape (have to get ready for the NIT, of course).

Posted under Personnel

I’ve heard that Antonio Bass hurt himself playing basketball, and the injury is supposedly somewhat severe. I don’t have a whole lot of details, but at this point it’s pretty clear that he will likely be out for spring practice. I’ll do some more detective work and see what I can come up with.

A posting on his facebook wall from his girlfriend makes it sould as though there may be some truth to the rumor.

Posted under Personnel

I know I rarely post about basketball, but I think this is relevant to this year’s football season as well.

It is easy to be a fan when a team is doing well. The true fans come out when their team isn’t doing so hot. It was despicable when Indiana “fans” were cheering against their own team, just so Mike Davis would get fired (or resign, as he eventually did). It is no less despicable for Michigan fans to do the same thing to try to get rid of Amaker.

Amaker isn’t going anywhere for a long time. Deal with it. You don’t have to agree with how he coaches, or the effort he seems to get from his players sometimes, but that should by no means mean that you support the team any less.

Yes, I wanted the team to go to the NCAA tournament, and no, it didn’t happen. Well, they’re still playing basketball folks. If you forget about them now, then maybe you aren’t the true fan you thought you were to begin with.

Posted under Misc.

The votes are in. Barring a recount, the winner is option #2. Along with the back, the shirt will look like this:

Posted under Misc.