Wednesday, September 03, 2008
Again? Seriously.... AGAIN??
I was unhappy when this game started. The first time in five years I haven't been at the season opener... it was weird, OK? Weird and wrong-footing and seeing that full stadium but not being in it is just wrong. But life goes on, I thought. You grow up, you move away; at least you're not out there schvitzing to death in the heat and probably getting a horrific sunburn because you forgot to put on sunscreen again.
I expected things to improve, though. Oh, I knew full well that the team is young, it's the first game with a new coach and a new system after several eons of Carr-ship, we're starting a walk-on at QB and the backup is a red-shirt freshman. I knew all that. Intellectually. I still expected... I don't know. Not a blowout, but a victory of some sort.
I really, really need to stop having expectations about this team, unless they are expectations of SHAME and AGONY.
Nothing against Utah. I tip my cap to them while simultaneously cursing out every single one of their players, especially that friggin' kicker. This is a less embarrassing loss than last year's Appalachian State disaster; the Utes may be in the mostly imaginary Mountain West conference, but at least they're actually, you know, Division I.
We have no running game. Like... none. I have no idea how our receivers look after this one game, because the combined Sheridan/Threet QB situation was awful enough to make them a moot point. The offensive line was bad. The defense adjusted in the second half in a very encouraging way, but the atrocious first half can't be ignored. Special teams were pretty good? I guess?
The close score at the end of the game was pretty deceptive. Utah made some terrifically bad mistakes, but Michigan did not look like a Division I football team out there.
It's gonna be a long season, 'though I guess this is maybe the best way to ease me out of the habit of actually going to the games.
ETA: Tatum Bell, after being released by the Lions, stole the luggage of Rudi Johnson, who had been brought in to replace him.
The Lions keep finding new and exciting ways to remind everyone that they are 100% clown shoes.Labels: football, Lions, loss, NCAA, Tatum Bell, Utes, Wolverines
6:00 PM
Sunday, May 04, 2008
I first came to the University of Michigan in the fall of 2003.
Michigan 35, Ohio State 21. 2003.
Michigan 45, Michigan State 37, 3 overtimes. 2004.
Michigan 27, Penn State 25. 2005.
Michigan 14, Ohio State 3. 2006.
Michigan 31, Michigan State 13. 2006.
Michigan 17, Oakland University 0. 2007.
Michigan 5, Eastern Michigan 3, walkoff homerun. 2008.
Today, in May of 2008, I went to a baseball game.
Michigan 15, Ohio State 1. 2008.
Tomorrow I move out, with a BFA, a minor in Biology, and 5 years of memories.
Thanks, U of M. Thanks, Ann Arbor. I'll miss ya.Labels: baseball, football, NCAA, photoblog, University of Michigan, Wolverines
7:27 PM
Monday, March 31, 2008
Oh general baseball population Opening Day! Look at this schedule I'm working on here, kids:
8 am- 1 pm: class
1 pm: Tigers/Royals (RotT post up)
4 pm: Giants/Dodgers (expected mentions of Barry Bonds despite the fact that Barry Bonds is no longer on the team: 1,093)
somewhere in here: a bit of Cubs/Brewers (Gabe Kapler!)
7 pm: Angels/Twins (Torii Hunter returns to Minnesota OH THE DRAMA OH THE HUMANITY!)
10 pm: Astros/Padres (um... baseball!)
You know how when a dog finds something that smells really good to them they'll roll around in it? Just seriously go to town, rolling back and forth in a crazed canine ecstasy? That's basically what I'm doing with this Opening Day schedule. WALLOWING IN BASEBALL. If I could literally roll around in it, I would.
Also making me smile: I went to a bunch of Michigan baseball games this weekend, including a double header on Saturday with rain expected on Sunday. That means they put the tarp on the field after the game, and since it was a college baseball game, the team had to put the tarp on the field.
Kevin Cislo makes a friend.
Alan Oaks frolicks.
There are very, very few things in the world funnier than watching college baseball players do the groundskeeping.
A few more photographic highlights:
Kenny Fellows, fastfastfast.
I'm always excited when I manage to get an in-focus shot of the outfielders (Derek VanBuskirk, in this case) in action.
Zach Putnam makes a combination of the :D and :P faces.
The rest of the photos from the game are right here. Lotsa shots, since it was a double header and I was enjoying the heady feeling that comes from shooting a double header with a camera that (unlike the camera I had last year) does not make me worry about a) battery drain or b) how many photos are on my card.
Hope you lot are all enjoying the general baseball population Opening Day as thoroughly as I am.Labels: baseball, MLB, NCAA, opening day, photoblog, Wolverines
3:15 PM
Sunday, November 25, 2007
Mmmm, losing, how it has consumed my football.
I of course attended the Michigan/Ohio State game, which was a disaster. A total disaster. It was freezing cold out, but just warm enough to keep the rain rain and not snow. I don't know how it was possible for the air to be as cold as it was while we were still getting rained out, but apparently Ohio State bewitched the air to make us just that much more completely miserable. I was soaked through by the end of the game, and I had rain gear on. Some people were worse off. And of course there's no shelter in the Big House.
Part of the problem was that, while the game didn't ever really 'feel' close, and even though it definitely never seemed like Michigan (and more especially Chad Henne) was going to make a comeback, the score technically WAS close enough to keep most of us in our seats. Of course leaving a ballgame early is despicable behavior, but in this case it would have been perfectly justified by the soul-destroying nature of the loss and the potentially health-destroying nature of the weather, and if this had been a blowout I would've been out of there before you could say, "Jim Tressel eats babies."
ALAS, IT WAS NOT A BLOWOUT. The score at the end was only 14-3. That's a surmountable score even in the NFL, and it's easily surmountable by college football standards. Hell, I've seen Michigan overcome much bigger deficits in that very stadium. You can't leave a college game when the score's that close, you just CAN'T, because if the losing team makes a comeback and you aren't there for it you can NEVER FORGIVE YOURSELF.
I mean, look at that MSU game in 2004. We were down by 17 with 8-some-odd minutes to go in the 4th quarter. As the game wore on, the mid-70s temperature of the daytime gave way to the mid-30s temperature of the night, meaning that we had all showed up wearing tshirts and were literally freezing. It seemed like the perfect time to leave, and Michigan ended up coming back and winning in triple overtime. It's one of the most epic games in recent memory and a classic in the UM/MSU rivalry.
Can you imagine being at that game and leaving early? Lots of people did. (I almost did, but my seatmate said we should wait for at least the 5-minute mark, and Michigan started the comeback around the 6-minute mark). I know some people who left. THEY HAVE STILL NOT FORGIVEN THEMSELVES.
So, with Michigan only down by 11 at the most, I just couldn't leave. Not even with the pervading air of hopelessness, not even with the weather that threatened to end both me and my camera. This time around, Michigan did not reward me with a win. The defense played well (witness the fact that OSU was held to 14 points), but the offense doesn't even rate mention. Suffice it to say that the offense was Bad, and the capital B is intentional.
Photos from the game are here. I went early to take a bunch of stadium shots, as it's my last game as an undergrad. Thankfully the rain did not start until the game did. I got some nice player shots from warmups too. Not so many good shots during the game, due to the aforementioned and much belabored weather. YOU CANNOT UNDERSTAND HOW TRULY MISERABLE IT WAS UNLESS YOU WERE THERE. The weather for that game: also Bad.
In happier news, I was also at the Thanksgiving Day Lions game! Oh wait, did I say 'happier'? I meant 'equally sad but less overtly miserable because at least the Lions play indoors'.
This was, by far, the highlight of the game. Dippin' Dots. In a miniature Lions helmet. I think you will agree with me that this is awesomeness made solid and incarnate, yes? Yes.
As for the game itself, whatever. I literally spent parts of it thinking to myself, "Hey, this isn't half as bad as the Michigan game! I'm inside! It's climate-controlled! I have a real seat instead of a small section of bleacher! The Lions are playing with some hope here at the end! I have Dippin' Dots! Altogether a superior losing experience!" And all that was TRUE. It made the Lions game just seem so whatever-esque. Brett Favre and the Packers are on a streak of vicious football prowess. The Lions have been winning, with the exception of the Denver game, by the skin of their pointy feline teeth. Whatever! At least it wasn't an absurdly bad blowout like the past two Thanksgivings. This game was close! So, whatever! See?
Photos from that game are here, in addition to some shots from before and after, as we trotted around the city.
At least it looks like the Patriots are going to win this game. If you listen carefully, you can hear my feeble, beaten-down cheer as I muster the little enthusiasm I have left for football right now.
Oh, and PS, check out this downtown Detroit bar:
Yes, it is called "Jacoby's". I had to take a photo of that. Who wouldn't?Labels: Buckeyes, football, Jacoby Ellsbury, Lions, loss, NCAA, NFL, OSU, rivalry, terrible, Wolverines
10:48 PM
Sunday, September 02, 2007
I'm hoping that writing about this will be sort of therapeutic. Or something.
By now you're probably all well aware of the historically horrific Michigan football game that took place on Saturday, when Appalachian State became the first 1-AA team in the history of ever to defeat an AP-ranked team. It was every bit as bad in the stadium as you probably imagine.
Usually the first game of the season is a time for fun and happy good times. The opposing team is always some non-conference school with a definite fluff factor, and while of course there's the Any Given Saturday factor and all that, it's still THE MICHIGAN WOLVERINES playing against SOME LOW-DIVISION SCHOOL, so the odds are not exactly squared up. If you're a Michigan fan, it's stress-free. All you have to worry about is how hot it's going to be in the stadium at gametime, and if you're watching at home, well, no worries at all.
This year already got off to a bad start, because most people who wanted to watch at home couldn't-- thank you, Big 10 Network. Bad karma for sure.
It was pretty warm out, but I've experienced worse in the Big House before. We also weren't sitting in the student section for the first time in my life, which meant that instead of balancing precariously on a narrow bench with a bunch of drunken frat boys swaying dangerously into me, I actually got to sit down for much of the game. That and the fact that there was a seat or two vacant in my row (so we weren't packed in like sardines) makes the heat shockingly easier to bear. I still managed to get sunburnt, but that's par for the course.
Still, it was a pleasant sunny day, with one of those "high skies" you hear about sometimes in baseball. You know the kind: that endless vault of blue without a scrap of cloud in it, bright enough to look perfectly collegiate against anyone wearing maize. It was hard to imagine that the game was going to have any outcome other than the expected one.
When Michigan first drove down the field and scored on a Mike Hart touchdown run, it seemed even more like things were going to progress in the usual manner. Mike Hart looked great, a force of sheer unstoppable Mike Hart-ness. Who does not love Mike Hart? Is this a thing which is possible? I think not.
Appalachian State scored soon after that, though. It was a little deflating, especially because it came on a great big 68-yard pass, the kind of thing that it would later seem impossible for Henne to throw. Chad Henne apparently prefers little dumpy passes that may travel 30 yards sideways, but only ACTUALLY go 2 yards up the field. We know Henne has the arm; when he does go long, part of his problem is actually going TOO long and overthrowing his receivers. So I'm not sure why the coaching staff sticks with this wee-pass scheme when it has failed to work so many times.
But the point is that even though the game had been quickly tied up, we weren't too upset yet. A little pissed off at the defense, sure. Grumbling a little, sure. But no one in the stands ACTUALLY believed that we were looking at a straight-up defeat. This kind of stuff has happened to Michigan before. We've had a TON of trouble with mobile quarterbacks the past few years, and Armanti Edwards is very, very mobile (or at least we sure made him look that way).
(Why yes, that IS a hole the size of Alaska that has obligingly opened up in the Michigan defense for Mr. Edwards to saunter right through.)
I guess this is a kind of arrogance, but honestly? We win these kinds of games. We may do so annoyingly according to the fans, especially in the Lloyd Carr era, where the win would likely be just enough and not a whit more, but we win. This isn't an arrogant statement; it's a statement of FACT.
The whole game slowly became a series of unbelievable occurrences. Surely we wouldn't be down this much by halftime. Surely we wouldn't be down in the second half. Surely we wouldn't be down so close to the end of the game.
When we came back in the last minutes of the game to squeak ahead, it was like everyone in the crowd said, "Ah ha!, so THIS is how it will go!" We would sneak ahead of the Mountaineers and it would be an ugly, ugly game that would get the attention of the team, so they would hopefully be extremely motivated to learn from their mistakes... but we would still WIN. It seemed impossible that we wouldn't. And then when we came back AGAIN, with that great pass from Henne and the great catch from Mario Manningham... when we got into field goal range...
That was ugly. That was an ugly, ugly blocked kick, but holy freakin' cats, it should not have even come down to that. Is it inexcusable for Gingell to be kicking the ball that low? Yes. Of course. What the hell. But it is MORE inexcusable to be depending on a field goal with the clock ticking down to prevent a defeat at the hands of a 1-AA team, even if that 1-AA team is the best 1-AA team to ever put on its little 1-AA pants.
I am not sure that I can accurately describe the feeling in the stadium after the Mountaineers ran that blocked kick back and dogpiled on the Michigan sideline.
It may best be summed up by the older guy sitting in front of me, who, as soon as the game ended, sat down heavily on his bit of bleacher and immediately pulled out and lit up a cigarette. This is a clear violation of probably 50 different and equally strident Big House rules and regulations. You'll see people sneaking alcohol into Michigan games all the time, but I had never seen someone smoking; that always seemed to be a much worse offense.
This guy was so obviously stunned and traumatized that he did not, in that moment, care. At all. He stared into space, motionless except for the little motions needed to smoke his cigarette. He looked so utterly lost that people coming up the stairs past him kept patting him consolingly on the back. It's possible that he didn't decide to ignore the rules; it looked like he might have just forgot where he was altogether.
Were there any good moments? Sure. Of course.
One of the best moments was after the bands had come off the field at halftime and the kickers were warming up. Jason Vitaris, the Appalachian State place kicker, was kicking down at my end of the field. They had only managed/bothered to get the net about halfway up, so when he boomed a kick way high, it ended up in the crowd, maybe 10 or 15 rows up.
Vitaris gazed patiently into the crowd, waiting for the ball to get thrown back. The Michigan fans of course immediately started passing the ball backwards, farther and farther up into the stadium, yelling at people who didn't understand what was going on. This took a while, since the ball had a long way to go and its passage was pretty erratic. The whole time this was going on Vitaris was just staring at the crowd, like he couldn't quite believe that he wasn't getting the ball back.
This continued until the crowd collectively managed to get the ball all way to the top row, where it was ceremoniously hurled out of the stadium entire. Vitaris kind of looked around furtively, like he still could not believe that the whole thing wasn't some sort of colossal joke and he would be getting his ball back shortly, before he finally had to give up on it.
The other best moment was when we were walking back from the stadium and one of the kids hanging out of a window along the way was screaming to everyone, "Drink the loss away! Drink the loss away! It's the only way!" in a truly brave and heroic manner. That's the good ol' collegiate spirit right there, that is.
The rest of the photos from the game are right here, if for some sick masochist reason you want to look at them all.
(Watching Sportscenter. They're talking about BASEBALL. The Yankees/Devil Rays game, to be exact. The Sportscenter announcer says something along the lines of, "Nobody expected much out of the Devil Rays here, but they're at least as good as Appalachian State". Of course the D'Rays went on to win. Yuk yuk yuk. We're a catdamned joke now. People will for years talk about some rinkydink team upsetting a powerhouse and they'll use Michigan and Appalachian State as a metaphor. This may never die and I hate that fact just as much as I hate the game outcome itself.)Labels: Appalachian State, football, history, in attendance, loss, Michigan, NCAA, photoblog, record, terrible, Wolverines
5:39 PM
Sunday, June 10, 2007
Stupid freaking tree-gnawing paddle-tail-having brown scruffy hideously-pinstriped cheap-hit-getting Beavers.
Let me tell you something: Zach Putnam pitched the game of his life. The game. Of his life. His fastball had sink on it like you would not believe if you didn't see it yourself. It seemed to fall out of the sky in a way you almost never see with a fastball; it almost looked like a curveball, except that I don't think it was. He was almost short-arming his pitches, which I guess is his way of keeping that sink on it (really 'sinky' pitchers are often sidearmers... see this kickass Hardball Times article for more on that).
It was like watching Derek Lowe when he threw his perfect game. I know how whacked-out that sounds, but I'm not kidding. It was the same. kind. of sink. I mean, pitchers get in trouble when they leave the ball up in the zone. Putnam hardly seemed to scrape the upper parts of the strikezone. It was MASTERFUL.
OK, obviously it wasn't a perfect game. Zach Putnam is not Derek Lowe (this makes it a lot easier to wholeheartedly root for Zach Putnam). There were a few walks, and in the end there was one hit. That was all it took. If you didn't see the game I can't impress on you how suddenly it was all over. A guy walked. There was a sac bunt to move him up to second. Putnam got another out, I think it was a strikeout. Then Joey Wong stepped up, dumped a single into left that was weakly thrown home by Derek VanBuskirk, not nearly fast enough to catch the runner, and that was that.
Maybe VanBuskirk thought it would come back to him quicker than it actually did on that weird carpet turf they have in Oregon, and his throw was off because of that. Maybe he just couldn't set himself properly. Maybe he never got a good grip on the ball. Maybe the animal spirit of a beaver rose from the ground beneath the turf and bit his ankles with its unnatural giant ghostly beaver teeth, surprising him enough to slow down the throw. Who knows?
That one hit, that was it for the Beavers. I mean that was IT. Zach Putnam threw 8.2 innings of HITLESS BASEBALL. He threw 129 pitches. It was.... I can't describe how amazing it was to watch him pitch this game. Maybe it's just that his delivery looks different when I'm not watching it through the back end of a camera, but he seemed to be pitching with a greater clarity of pitching than he has before. I guess that doesn't make sense. I can't really think of any other way to put it.
And you know what, there were a lot of dubious calls in this game-- A LOT, and some of them were SERIOUSLY off-- but I will give the homeplate umpire credit for one thing. He called balls and strikes based on where the ball was when it crossed the plate, not when it ended up in the catcher's glove. This is, of course, what they're supposed to do, but it doesn't always work out that way and can sometimes hurt a pitcher like Putnam, whose pitches often end up dragging dirt as they cross into Pickens' glove because they've dropped so far AFTER they've crossed the plate. The homeplate ump correctly called a lot of these strikes, and infuriating as some of his (and his crew's) miscues were*, I have to give him props for that.
The problem is that while Putnam was busy throwing this beautiful, miraculous game, the opposing pitcher was busy doing the exact same thing, and every time Michigan got men on they were unable to bring them home. Frustration? Yes.
I waited a long time after the game had ended to write this post, in the hopes of allowing myself to calm down a little, but I find that I'm beginning to get riled up again, so bollocks to that, I need to ask a vital question about the Oregon State uniforms, that question being: WTF?!
Gray. With dark pinstripes (I couldn't tell if they were black or dark brown or navy or what). With orange piping around the jersey front closure and collar that COMPLETELY failed to work in any way, shape, or form with the pinstripes. That would be a visual mess by itself, but the numbers were orange satin and were unreasonably large, on the front and the back, and they ALSO did not really work with the pinstripes... pinstripes and shiny satin, I think, is too many textures. THAT would have been horrible enough, but they ALSO had the letters "OSU" across the front, ABOVE the overly large and shiny numbers, in UNBORDERED WHITE, which failed to work with the pinstriping, the piping, and every color/texture already on the jerseys.
Their socks might have been black, but looked navy blue. Their hats might have been black, but looked a kind of dark faded brown. Neither shade of possible-black referred back to any color on the jerseys.
It's possible that the Michigan hitters were rendered so speechless by this sartorial horror that they were unable to muster up more than a few hits today. I would believe it. They also might have been hypnotized by the dancing layers of stripes and piping, or maybe by the shiny, shiny orange. Or maybe they were just terrified of the Oregon State people who designed these uniforms. Who knows what goes on in the sick minds of people who think this combination is a good idea?
I would believe almost anything after a game like that. Ugh. What a frustrating loss, what a frustrating waste of a pitching performance.
If you desire mental relief from this agony, I recommend bathing yourself in the fetid waters of yesterday's baseball mascot rant.
*Major miscue the first: Early-ish in the game, Joey Wong watched a pitch go by, too low to be a strike. The umpire(s?) called it a strike, saying he had gone around. Replays showed that he had barely flinched. Nobody seemed to know what the umpire(s?) had been looking at.
Major miscue the second: The leadoff Beaver in the 7th inning bunted inside the first base line. Putnam picked it up, threw it to first. Out. Only... not. The homeplate ump called the batter back, saying that the ball was foul because it had hit him (the batter) before he left the box. Replays clearly showed him bunting the ball a good foot or two in front of himself, well away from his body before it made its first bounce. The ball remained inside the baseline and Putnam picked it up inside the baseline and long before it reached first so... fair in every particular. Should've been an out. The kid ended up working a walk, so this could have been disasterous, but Mitch Canham grounded into a lovely double play for us to clear him off the bases.Labels: baseball, Beavers, college baseball, loss, Michigan, NCAA, Oregon State, Wolverines
11:22 PM
Monday, June 04, 2007
They won!!
Michigan baseball! They won Regionals!
I know nobody who reads this cares, but eeeeeeee! First time since 1989! They had to beat NUMBER ONE RANKED Vanderbilt.... twice! And, goodness, they did! They lost the middle game, but it was unlikely that they were going to make it out of this round, because, you know... Vanderbilt! Ranked number one in the country! And Michigan DID make it out of the round, they're on to the Super Regionals, and Vanderbilt... now they've fallen to THE WOLVERINES!
I saw that the game was tied 3-3 in the 9th, but I couldn't watch the little online stat-tracker thing because I was a) too nervous and b) afraid of jinxing it. I know, I KNOW how irrational that is, but the one game I tried to follow on the stat tracker was the one they lost, so. No more checking. It was all I could do to restrict myself to that small glance in the 9th. And just now I thought that surely the game must be over, it should be safe to check again, and it was over, and we'd won!
For those of you who don't follow NCAA baseball, Michigan "won" the Big 10 regular season, coming out of it with the best record. They lost the Big 10 Championship to Ohio State, though, and thus were not assured a spot in the NCAA tourney. They received an at-large bid, though, which was right and proper because they had been the highest-ranked Big 10 team on the national boards throughout the year (in fact, they might have been the only Big 10 team to be nationally ranked... but don't quote me on that, I think Minnesota might have been on there too).
Michigan fans were grateful to see them in the tourney at all. Anything beyond that was assumed to be gravy.
They were matched up against Memphis first, which seemed a tough battle because the tourney is in Tennessee and Memphis then should have a home field advantage. No such luck, though, and Michigan beat them only to suddenly find themselves scheduled to face an even more fearsome opponent in Vanderbilt.
Whom they defeated! The middle game, which Michigan lost, even that wasn't some kind of insane Vandy blowout, like one would maybe expect from the nominally best team in the nation. It was a 10-7 score, and Michigan had come back from a 6-2 deficit, I believe. But the Wolverines won the first game, and they just now won the last game in extra innings, sending me into a series of overwhelmingly happy squees.
SQUEE!
Opponents to be announced for the Super Regionals... I guess we have to wait to see who wins the other games and whatnot before we know who Michigan plays next. In any event, the team's already done more than most people expected them to do, and it is nothing short of painfully exciting.Labels: baseball, college baseball, NCAA, win, Wolverines
10:53 PM
Sunday, May 27, 2007
Obviously, I never should have left Ann Arbor.
The Wolverines won nearly every game I saw in person. I head home for the summer, and they come out on top of the Big 10, but are knocked out of the Big 10 Tournament in the minimum two games. Too bad. They won it all last year, of course, and it would have been nice to see them do so again, especially with a relatively young team.
If they had won the Big 10 tourney they would have an automatic bid into the NCAA Tournament... now we don't know. I think the selection is tomorrow (Monday), so I guess we'll find out then. Michigan was nationally ranked for much of the season so our chances of getting in are still OK, but we suffer the permanent baseball-in-the-midwest bias. It's hard to give an at-large bid to a midwestern school when you have schools in the south who live and die by their baseball teams, but who don't win their conference championships simply because every other school in their conference is the same way.
We definitely still deserve it. Uh, not that I'm inclined to lean one way or the other. But really, we WERE nationally ranked (respectably so! I think we were up to 16th in the nation at one point), which is a BIG HONKIN' DEAL for a Big 10 school known infinitely more for football, basketball (even if our basketball team sucks of late), and hockey.
I don't like the double-elimination format of the Big 10 Tournament. It's just not suited to baseball. It's more a football kind of thing... even the AL/NLDS gives teams 3 games before minimum elimination. Baseball games can be so quirky that you need a lot of them to really get at the true skill of a team; this is why baseball seasons are so long and why so many games are played over the course of that season, especially compared to other major sports. To give a team only two games before they get sent home is cruel and unbaseball-like.
In both games Michigan kept it close. The first loss, to OSU, was only by two runs, and the second loss, to PSU, was only by one, in the 10th inning. It's not like Michigan got blown out by vastly superior teams. I know that this is a good baseball team. If they'd been given more games, it would've been completely unsurprising to see them win it all.
Now, I'm not crazy. I know it WOULD be a huge upset if they did well in the NCAA tournament. But I'd like to see them get a shot at it.
Ah well. We'll find out tomorrow.
Relive happier Wolverine baseball times with some photos!
The home opener, which Michigan won over Oakland University 9-2.
A Michigan/OU doubleheader, both of which Michigan won, 4-1 and 4-3.
A Michigan/OU blowout, 17-0 in Michigan's favor.
A Michigan/Eastern Michigan doubleheader. Michigan lost the first game 10-2, but won the second game 10-7.
A Michigan/Purdue doubleheader. Michigan won both, 6-5 and 7-2.
The last game I went to this season, Michigan/Purdue. Michigan won big, 10-1.
Alright. I'll be at the Sox/Indians game tomorrow, assuming it doesn't get rained out and assuming the ticket thing works out (it's complicated). So that'll be Trotter's return, and should be interesting. Hopefully Michigan will get into the NCAA tourney and I'll be in a good mood heading down to Fenway.Labels: baseball, Big 10, college baseball, Michigan, NCAA, Wolverines
10:07 PM
Tuesday, January 09, 2007
Man, I know it's been a while here. But I kind of wanted to wait for all of college football to be done so I could have some closure on the season before writing about it.
SUCK A DEAD DOG, OHIO STATE!
There are many opinions around here, the two most obvious camps being the "I feel incredibly filthy but was rooting for Ohio State because it makes Michigan and the Big 10 look better" people, and the "I don't give a flying fruitbat now that Michigan's out of it, and under no circumstances can I make myself root for those foul Ohioan cretins" people. I am one of the latter group. I spared it a thought, before the game, but really? The thought of Buckeyes celebrating wildly in confetti makes me sick to my stomach, almost literally. I did not care how weak an OSU loss would make the Big 10 look; I did not want to see happy Buckeyes. Not ever.
I've suffered enough of that.
So, yeah, the Rose Bowl stunk. A lot. I am really growing to loathe USC in new and gloriously passionate ways. Also, the Trojan is too close to the Spartan for mental comfort (team hate by mascot association? It's the new black!). But today I am relatively happy, because the Buckeyes were horribly embarrassed in front of a national audience, God, and Tostitos. And that's A-OK.
As an odd side effect of this, the amount of Florida pride showing up around campus today is unusually high. Not many people have actual Florida apparel, but even at this relatively early hour I have already seen a ton of Miami Dolphins gear out and about. Hilarious, and definitely not coincidental. My friend Travis showed up (to the art school!) today wearing a truly amazing Dolphins jacket from the early '90s.
I don't want to talk about the Lions. Talk about a pointless win. Talk about not mattering where they are in the draft because they're going to screw it up regardless. Talk about a bloody hopeless mess of an organization.Labels: BCS, Buckeyes, football, Michigan, NCAA, OSU, Wolverines
9:55 AM
Saturday, November 18, 2006
Hour and a half 'til we get going. Damn. What do you even say? The entire state's kind of stunned right now; the campus is simultaneously boisterous and subdued. There were loud drunken choruses of Hail to the Victors all up and down my street around 2 am last night, but it's silent right now.
Someone put some yellow flowers on top of the little University sign in front of Schembechler Hall.
You want to say that if we lose now it doesn't matter any more than if we had lost before this happened, but of course that's not true. We'll feel worse. Because it's already hard to feel great going into a game when something like this has just happened. There's a reason Ohio State is ranked number 1 and we're ranked number 2. The game's in Columbus. I don't feel great about it. I was OK with that, was just hoping we could keep it close enough to make a case for getting another shot at them in the BCS title game. Now? It's going to be hard to take any kind of loss with such equanimity.
I don't know. Heading over to my tailgate soon. It's at the same house we've been going to all season.... right across from the Stadium. I wonder if they have something up on the big signs. Probably do. If there's some kind of memorium, we can probably see it from the back porch.
I'm sure there'll be more to say after the game.
Go Maize. Go Blue. Win.Labels: Bo Schembechler, Buckeyes, football, in memory, Michigan, NCAA, OSU, rivalry, Wolverines
2:02 PM
Monday, November 13, 2006
OK, this is priceless.
The University just sent us all an email about the Michigan/OSU game this weekend and how you can go to their big sponsored tailgate if you're in Columbus for the game and whatnot. That was just the very beginning of the email, though. The rest of it was a list of things to do and not do if you are a Wolverine going to watch the game in Ohio.
I shall reprint the list here, for your amusement.
We know that it can be uncomfortable being in an opposing team's environment, especially when the stakes are so high. We would like to offer a few suggestions in order to help you stay safe and have a positive experience this weekend:
--Try carpooling to the game; if possible, drive a car with non- Michigan license plates.
--Keep your Michigan gear to a minimum, or wait until you are inside the stadium to display it.
--Stay with a group.
--Know and obey the laws regarding alcohol use.
--If you are of legal age to drink, use alcohol in moderation. Stay in the blue.
--Stay low-key; don't draw unnecessary attention to yourself.
--If verbally harrassed by opposing fans, don't take the bait.
--Avoid High Street in Columbus.
If at any time you feel unsafe, you should call 9-1-1 for assistance. U-M campus police also will be available in Columbus to support our fans. You may call them with non-emergency concerns at (734) 216-9159.
I think this mostly speaks for itself, but still.
Now, I won't say that if the roles were reversed, the game was this big and it was in Ann Arbor, some of these things being warned against wouldn't happen to OSU fans. It's a college campus, there are ALWAYS going to be at least a few kids acting like wankers. A car with Ohio plates might get keyed, a guy wandering around near the frats wearing red and gray might get a beer tossed on him-- ESPECIALLY if the Buckeyes were representing after the game and Michigan had just lost.
But this list... man, I just could not help it. I cracked up. Try to blend in!! Don't wear attention-getting colors!!!! Stay with a group!!!!!! DO NOT STRAY ALONE! OHIO STATE FANS, MUCH LIKE THE BLOODTHIRSTY LION, PREY UPON THE WEAK AND THE ALONE!
My friend Meg called me earlier to bitch about the art school (an activity we have occasion to indulge in all too often out here) and asked if I'd read the email. "Can you believe that?" she asked. "What the hell is all that about?"
"They're Ohio State fans, Meg. They're animals."
We laughed, but dude, reading this list? Seeing the fear for their students (and alums) stamped across the faces of University officials? I'm not so sure I can call that a joke.
Also, the injunction to simply AVOID AN ENTIRE STREET? Freaky. I've never been to Ohio; what's this mysterious "High Street"? Is it like a warzone? Is there some red-and-gray-clad gang that's claimed that street for their own, ruling the black market organ trade, drug flow, and prostitution rings based there with a meaty, cabbage-scented fist? I am frightened, but intrigued.
Oh, and that image up at the top there is something I drew for a Chanukah card one year. I just use it here because, well, it's a Wolverine, and festive, if inappropriately so. I'll try to whip up some UM vs. OSU kind of drawing soon, if the work I have to do doesn't destroy my soul beforehand.Labels: Buckeyes, football, humor, list, Michigan, NCAA, OSU, rivalry, Wolverines
10:12 PM
Thursday, November 09, 2006
Ah ha, I nearly forgot-- the last home game of the season was this past Saturday (all the photos from it are right here), and many disturbing things happened, like Mike Hart fumbling for a safety, and Michigan struggling inexplicably against Ball freakin' State, and a hilarious fight in our section.
But none of those things are the best bit.
The best bit is who was on the field, schmoozing with the band director before the game, and then up on a ladder conducting the band at halftime.
PATRICK FREAKIN' STEWART!
The Royal Shakespeare Company was in town, putting on a series of shows at the Power Center. I didn't get tickets to any of the plays (sold out like woah), but I did get to see a lecture from their design team. And then suddenly at the football game, THERE WAS PATRICK STEWART! On the field! In my stadium! Saying, "Beat Ohio State! Make it so, Number One!" to delirious cheers from the student section.
My joy was dorktastically unbounded.Labels: football, Michigan, NCAA, Patrick Stewart, Wolverines
8:42 AM
Sunday, October 01, 2006
The jug is ours! The jug is ours!
You know, it's funny. I don't actually care much about Minnesota one way or the other. I mean I don't have any particular burning hatred for the state or the school. Certainly it's nothing like what I feel for Notre Dame or Michigan State or Ohio State.
But I REALLY want that jug. The team, eh, whatever, not a huge rivalry, but I WANT THAT LITTLE BROWN JUG. It was OURS to start with and it should REMAIN OURS. It was bad when we lost it last year in Ann Arbor and Laurence Maroney (now of the Patriots) planted their flag at our midfield. That was a bitter, bitter feeling. But worse yet was the loss of the Little Brown Jug, seeing the filthy Golden Gophers carting it away.
It's back in the hands of its rightful owners today.
And did Mike Timlin seriously blow a good game by Wake today? I can't even. Dude. WHY WON'T THIS SEASON END ALREADY? The agony is getting harsh.Labels: football, little brown jug, Michigan, NCAA, Wolverines
5:59 AM
Monday, September 25, 2006
So the Red Sox are done.
Well. You know what they say. When one door closes, another one opens...
It's hard to be too upset about the Sox. Even before the actual, mathematical elimination came through, we knew it was over. When your team has Julian Tavarez holding the dual roles of team ace and official Manny babysitter, you simply aren't going anywhere, or at least nowhere that ends in trophies. That's just a fact of baseball and life, and I think we've all been so used to it for a while now that we just weren't too sorely wounded by the last feeble eepings of the dying sea slug that was the 2006 Red Sox.
I know Patriots fans are upset. To them I say, look upon the works of ye mighty Detroit Lions, and cherish thy freedom from true despair.
Losing to the modern-day Green Bay Packers. How utterly mortifying. My roommate, who has only the vaguest understanding of sports in general, asked me who the Lions were playing. I told her. She said, and this is 100% of Fact, "Oh, that's the pretty-boy team, isn't it?"
"What?"
"Brett Favre, isn't he a pretty boy or something?"
Oh holy freakin' cats.
"Not for, uh, at least 10 years, he hasn't been."
That was probably the highlight of the Lions game for me.
I am refusing to think about them. I am REFUSING. To think about them. Except to say that if Roy Williams guarantees another win this season, I am going to march down to Ford Field myself and duct tape him to the Joe Louis fist. You hear me, Roy? You can mouth off all you want when you're strapped down under silver belts of sticky goodness on the business end of a giant hovering black forearm. That sounds so dirty. I am not editing it out.
Actually, I couldn't even watch all of the Patriots game last night, because the sound on that station cut out just before halftime. Only on that channel. I switched over to the Cardinals/Astros game for a little bit before the pressure of the work I had yet to do and the fact that I really have had enough of Roger Clemens, thank you very much ESPN, conspired to make me give up on televised sports for the night.
Eh. The Tigers had already clinched a playoff berth for the first time in 19 years. That was all the TV I needed to see.
Of course I am also officially Not Upset about Michigan, as we beat Wisconsin to start off our Big 10 season right. Still, I've been doing this with every win so far... I say to myself (and everyone around me), "OK, good, another win... now let's see what we can do next week." They've beaten Notre Dame and Wisconsin, very not shit teams, and Vanderbilt, which is, uh, well, it's not Central Michigan, anyhow. And I still have very lukewarm feelings about each upcoming game. Last season was more scarring than I thought it was, clearly.
Good game, in the sense that we didn't get rained on this time, but unfortunate because the first in-conference home game of the season brought the sorority girls out in droves. Our favorites were the large group who showed up in the second half, crammed the benches so people had to stand sideways, and then turned, backs to the field, and talked to each other for the rest of the game. Dear These Girls-- I hate you. My seatmate hates you. Every single person in every row you infested hates you. You can talk at home on your bloody porch couches as well as you can here. Never come to another game again. With much rage, actual football fans.
The Z for Zoltan gestures are spreading like wildfire. At the last home game I saw just a few of them in the stands, and a few in the band. At this game, they were all over the student section. Zoltan! Zoltan! ZOLTAN! We're only obsessed with kickers a little bit at Michigan, honest.
The rest of the photos are right here, for those of you who are interested.
Wolverines, Tigers, pro football. Right now we just need that sea slug of a Red Sox team to quietly expire without breaking any more of its squishy little parts along the way. I've reached the point of begging the baseball overlords to let the season end, please, with no more casualties. Give this slug a watery grave and wait for its eggs to hatch next spring.Labels: baseball, football, Lions, loss, Michigan, MLB, NCAA, NFL, random, Red Sox, Wolverines
7:41 PM
Saturday, September 16, 2006
Hail! to the Victors Valiant!
Hail! to the conqu'ring heroes!
Hail! Hail! to Michigan, the leaders and best!
Hail! to the Victors Valiant!
Hail! to the conqu'ring heroes!
Hail! Hail! to Michigan, the Champions of the West!
GO BLUE!
Mario Manningham! MARIO FREAKIN' MANNINGHAM. <3 Mike Hart! Chad Henne! The defense, O, the defense!
I was watching Big Ten Ticket before the game, and they had Bo Schembechler on. He said many things; I wish I'd been taking notes because damn does that dude still give a great quote. But one of the things he said that I did remember was that he thought the offenses were comparable, and it was the team with the best defense that was going to win the game today.
So Bo said, and so it was.
Brady Quinn with the ball squirting out of his hand for no readily discernible reason. LaMarr Woodley chugging downfield with that fumble recovery, looking like he was about to have a heart attack and fall over. Mike Hart with his arms wrapped securely around the ball, chewing up the minutes. Shawn Crable HOLDING LLOYD CARR'S HAND to keep him in place while the celebratory water bucket was readied. MARIO FREAKIN' MANNINGHAM.
So, so many "Fuck-the-I-rish" and "O-ver-rated" chants going on outside right now. And we're here in Ann Arbor, not even out in South Bend.
And the Red Sox, against all odds and reason, won their morning game. Everything that I was dreading about this weekend, turned around and turned to wins. (Of course I still have obscene amounts of work to do, the Red Sox have three more [!!] games this weekend, the Tigers still need to win badly, and there are the Lions tomorrow. BUT WE'VE MADE A DENT IN IT.)Labels: Bo Schembechler, football, Mario Manningham, Michigan, NCAA, Notre Dame, win, Wolverines
7:52 PM
Sunday, September 03, 2006
I'm back in Ann Arbor, and things like "move in" and "people demanding to spend time with me not on the internet" and "my roommate being a hippy and not having either TV or internet hooked up" have prevented me from seeing any baseball or following it at all. So imagine my JOY when I trot down to Espresso Royale to upload all my photos from the Michigan/Vanderbilt game and I discover that Jon Lester has CANCER, and Schilling did something to his arm, and so did Papelbon and, as Amy says, basically the only healthy member of the team right now is Alex Cora.
Needless to say, we will be talking about football right now.
Wolverines! Football! It was fun. Loud. Everything a college football game should be. Except not quite as dominant as we would've liked. But first things first. (And all photos clickable, as usual)
The crowd getting in, at least at our gate, was terrible. In previous years they've just torn off the bottom half of your ticket and let you in, but this year apparently they've decided to scan the barcodes on the tickets. You would think that this would be easier but you would be wrong. I have never seen the Michigan gates this inefficient. We were literally standing in the crowd, waiting to get in, for about 25 minutes. If it wasn't a crappy nonconference game I would've been furious. I mean, holy cats, what if we'd missed the kickoff of the Michigan State game because of this? They had better get their act together before the season gets going in earnest.
This year they moved the band from where they used to spend all game, in the bleachers on the opposing team's sideline and in the corner across from the student section, to the actual stands, in the middle of the student section. I guess they expanded the student section to the sides, because they take up rather a lot of seats. But it was very cool being able to shoot them from that close up. Expect a lot of painfully artsy shots of the band this season.
Part of the reason the game wasn't as dominating as it should've been was Chris Nickson, the Vanderbilt quarterback. The little fucker could run. And last year we had NO END of trouble with mobile quarterbacks. I was hoping that this season would be different, but judging from yesterday, apparently not.
One of the reasons we did win was Mike Hart. Beautiful, lovely Mike Hart. If he can stay healthy this season... and if we use Kevin Grady and the passing game enough to keep opposing defenses from concentrating solely on him... oh the marvels that might result. Who among us does not love Mike Hart? Everyone loves Mike Hart.
ZOLTAN MESKO'S FIRST PUNT. Let the world tremble at the mighty foot of Space Emperor (thank you MGoBlog) Zoltan Mesko.
Many, many more photos can and should be found here. As you can see, we're much closer than we were last year... row 11! Unfortunately we're still deep in the corner, which isn't the greatest, and we were surrounded by like the entire population of every sorority on campus, at least for this game. They were priceless. Squabbling over seats, and then not even watching the game.
Hopefully I'll be able to watch baseball soon (I know I'm not alone; a lot of kids who moved into apartments this year don't have cable or internet yet). Classes start Tuesday and, assuming it doesn't rain, I'll be at the Tigers game that night. So, you know, will the rain clouds away, lovely BCRS readers. After dealing with the evilness of the art school, I'm REALLY gonna need some baseball.Labels: football, Michigan, NCAA, photoblog, Wolverines
3:56 PM
Friday, June 09, 2006
OK, I saw Curt taking notes on this outing. I fully expect that Beckett is going to get locked in a room with these notes for three days and three nights, or until he's learnt them by heart. Whichever comes first. I hope his powers of memorization are strong, because all he's getting fed for those three days are the leftovers from David Wells' breakfast spread, and living on that and nothing else is, I'd bet, enough to send a man into cardiac arrest after half a day.
Awfully good of Tek to give us a homerun that was so far from being in doubt at any point in its existence that even the blind mole living three feet under the field saw it and was like, "Hot diggety, that orb be gone."
And of course it's always enjoyable to see ARod fulfulling his ultimate destiny by, naturally, making errors.
But, O HAPPY DAY.
Jeff Kunkel signed!
He signed, and and and! He's a Tiger!
I'm so happy. He was drafted last year, so all he had to do was either choose to sign before the draft, or re-enter and see what came of it. The night before the draft he decided that the Tigers were good enough for him, and the deal was done, and YAY.
They also drafted Paul Hammond, a Michigan pitcher. The Red Sox did not make any glorious Wolverine signings. In fact, they didn't draft anyone out of the Big 10. Way to underscout the midwest, Sox, jeez. They didn't even touch Notre Damn.
I'm infinitely glad Kunkel came back to Michigan for his (5th) senior year, because otherwise I wouldn't have had a chance to see him play there (or to take these photos... let me hug my camera some more), and he would have missed out on the SEASON OF AWESOME that ended up in WINNING THE BIG 10 CONFERENCE TITLE and then going on to WIN THE BIG 10 TOURNAMENT and was filled with things like SWEEPING OHIO STATE IN FOUR GAMES AT HOME and other such joyous events. And in the end he signed with the Tigers anyways. There's still time for him to glom on with low-A Oneonta maybe, as their season hasn't started yet.
Leave me be. I'm gonna be squeeing over this for days.Labels: baseball, draft, Jeff Kunkel, Michigan, MLB, NCAA, Red Sox, Wolverines
4:38 AM
Saturday, April 15, 2006
You can't defeat me and my baseball photos, University internet! The problem, thankfully, was not my machine, nor was it Flickr. It was the University internet. The problem was apparently this and it took almost 20 hours to correct. I'm still not entirely clear on what it was, exactly, or what kind of 'outage' could leave some internet working just fine and make some completely random sites like flickr, MGoBlue.com, any Gawker sites, and any Typepad sites inaccessible. Seriously, what the hell does that? How does that even happen?
Anyways, it's fixed now, and the photos from the Michigan/Ohio State baseball game can be found here. That's all of 'em, here are some highlights for you lazy sods, which I know many of you are. Click for big as per usual.
AJ Scheidt is our third base man. I'm sure the casual observer viewing my Flickr photostream would think I was stalking the kid or something, but I can't help the fact that the home dugout is on the third base side, and leaning on the back of the home dugout roof is probably my favorite place in the park to watch the game and, therefore, take photos.
Dan DeLucia was OSU's starting pitcher. Despite the fact that he is a HATED BUCKEYE, you've got to give him credit for the high stirrup socks.
Yay a Wolverine run. There were many of these. 14, in fact. In this case you've got Mike Schmidt crossing the plate, with AJ Scheidt waiting to greet him.
Sunset over the Fish. As soon as the sun went down I started cursing, because it's hard to get good action shots under the lights with my camera... it has a 'sport' mode that I use to get the shutter fast enough, but this sends the ISO all to bollocks and everything gets dark and grainy.
Second base man Doug Pickens spinning his batting helmet on his fingertip while waiting during a break in the action at third. I had to take like 5 or 6 shots to get this one, but every time he let the helmet drop he would shove it up and spin it some more, so I had chances. Incidentally, it seems like everyone I talk to somehow or other knows Doug Pickens. One of my friends (with whom I went to opening day) went to his high school. My cousin plays baseball with one of his younger brothers. He's just one of those ubiquitously knowable guys.
Dave Mika and Jeff Kunkel. Um. Our catchers are, apparently, good friends.
I love how they just wander out into the crowd after the game. This is the backup catcher, Dave Mika.
Dan Lentz didn't get into the game, but he was on the dugout rail for almost all of it, so I have a few shots of him. I took about 10 or 15 shots of him playing with this baseball, trying to get a good one. None of them are spectacular, but this was the best of the batch.
Go check out the rest of them though, because there are some good ones up there that I won't post here just due to space constraints and no particular desire to make your computer explode, and because I'm going to the Sunday afternoon game so you know there'll be more up in short order.
And thanks again to Brian and Ian for meeting up, because it was jolly good times and if you guys are that much good luck for the team, you may have to show up at every home game for the rest of the season. I'm just sayin'.
edit: FUCK. Carlos Pena is a (minor league) Yankee.Labels: baseball, in attendance, Michigan, NCAA, photoblog, Wolverines
8:37 PM
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