The MMQ : May 2014

Friday, May 30, 2014

Michigan Season Renewals Down For Football...But STUDENT Season Renewals REALLY SUCK!!!

In what can only be described as an "THE MMQ TOLD YOU SO!" moment, it seems the "backward bending for anyone but his own fans" Brandon has finally seen what the students and general fans think of a season where you don't have at least one of the following at home in the regular season:

Domers
Sparty
ohio

19,000 Student tix last year down to 13,000 - 14,000 in 2014? That's a serious problem. These are tomorrow's fans that are attending the university. And moreover, they're tomorrow's big donors, too. You are NOT LISTENING to the students or today's fans and making the game day experience worth what we have to shell out for it. Expect to see a lot of "Marketing" of Michigan in the near future with "Family Ticket Packages" to cover that 5K-6K gap that students have left open. And those packages will probably include a hot dog and a "Small Beverage", but not a Big House Souveneir Cup (which would be the thing you SHOULD give away to the casual fan to improve their experience). And no parking. That you will need to figure out on your own....

How did this Home Schedule get so bad? I'm not saying there's anything that could have been done about the Domers. That one was out of his control and it's obvious to anyone that's been paying attention that the domers had been looking for the first exit door that they could find that would get them out of the Michigan game. And they took it.

But why did Brandon "fold" to the AD at Sparty and give in to their "schedule" needs and ignore his own fans? That part I just don't get.....It's not that hard. You're Michigan and you should be able to throw your weight around with the B1G to a certain extent and simply say, "Hey, we need one of you clowns in the even years to be our HOME GAME."

There, was that so hard?

I did a little digging when to figure out why this happened and as I recalled it had more to do with Sparty than ohio. ohio didn't change anything, but we somehow ended up with two straight up in East Lansing and now everything is out of sync...and will be for the foreseeable future.

Recalling the "Puke Factor" that I sometimes use to rate the Bowl Games on a scale of 1 to 5, please see the attached chart to help understand why if you were a student looking for an 3 extra C-Notes a semester to spend on books, partying, whatever, you could see where it would be justifiable to cross "Student Football Tickets" off the list....The "PF" Average alone is really all you need....

1.8 Road Schedule is actually pretty good with the only unsatisfying game at Rutgers. However, when the overstated PF of App State is added to the home schedule, the Home PF drops to a miserable 4. And with three 4's on thie list in Utah, Miami and Maryland...Well, it's not a good thing to be raising ticket prices and PSL's. People will find another way to enjoy the game. Namely, at home in front of a new 60" or 70" HD broadcast and a party they can throw with the money they saved on the tickets!!!

Sadly, I'm not sure the Athletic Department gets it or even cares. Brandon will just use this as an excuse to add to his "Marketing Budget" because people don't know "How much fun it is to spend an entire day in Ann Arbor fighting traffic and watching a poor product on the field."

But this is what it means to be a fan of the Wolverines, lately.

This Can't Go Under the Category, "Once a Sparty...Always a Sparty", 'Cause He's Not One Yet....

I hate to report news on our rivals that makes them look bad (Well, technically...NOT!), but I would be re-miss if I didn't share this tidbit of news with you:

Jayru Campbell Sentenced to 60 Days in Jail For Body Slamming School Security Guard.

I get that sometimes stuff gets out of hand...but Sparty has too good of an image at this point to tarnish with a 3-star with attitude and anger management issues.

A word of advice from the MMQ: Dump this guy faster than a goose craps green grass on a fertilized lawn and be happy you did it.

It's time to move on from this image issue, Sparty. And this is the perfect time.

Of course, it may have already happened...

Monday, May 19, 2014

Michigan, Minnesota and Nebraska Make the NCAA Softball Super Regionals!

Over the weekend, Michigan in dramatic fashion, beat ASU in a win or lose 2 game series with two come from behind wins that include last inning heroics by Sierra Lawrence and Taylor Hasselbach (from Clarkston, MI!).

Down 1 run with two outs in the top of the 7th, Sierra jacked one out to tie the game! On the very next pitch, Taylor jacked one out of the park that allowed the Wolverines to take a 1 run lead into the bottom of the 7th. Back to back homers when they absolutely had to have them....

As I tell my daughters..."If there was ever a time for something good to happen, this would be it!!"

But it wasn't over. The ASU Sundevils tried rallying themselves and with two outs, they had the tying run on base with the go ahead run at the plate. The ASU batter Freeman jacked a long fly ball to center fielder senior Lyndsday Doyle, who climbed the wall and with a long reach, stole what would have been the game winning homer and clinched the region for the Wolverines!!!

With the win, Michigan advances to the Super Regionals (The Sweet 16) in Florida for a best of three games battle with FSU and a chance to appear in the College Softball World Series.

Congrats to the Women's Softball Team!!!

In addition, Minnesota made it our of their regional and into the Super Regional but in a bit of a surprise, the Nebraska Cornhuskers upset the higher ranked Mizzou to advance as well!

Go Blue!

Go Gophers!

Go Big Red!

Friday, May 16, 2014

The Game Is About To Change - III

Sophistry: the use of fallacious arguments, especially with the intention of deceiving.

I love each and every opportunity that presents itself to expand my lexicon of the English language. I heard this word used the other day in a discussion about the Federal Reserve and I had to look it up.

What a great word…and is there a better situation to apply that word to than the term “Amateurism” and how the NCAA wants to portray it to the common masses?

I think not.

In fact, I think Mark Emmert could be described as a “Sophist Extraordinaire”. He (and others - College AD’s, etc.) wants everyone to believe that each of the 420,000 athletes that plays at any level in a college setting is of amateur status. And while I believe that’s the case for 95% to 99% of the athletes that compete at the college level, it certainly CANNOT be applied to every athlete out there competing. Not when there is over $10.6 Billion (that’s with a “B”) of revenue generated by collegiate sports annually (There was $1Billion in ad revenue from the NCAA tournament alone!) that everyone in the pipeline, Television execs, University AD’s, coaches, etc. gets to enjoy and profit from…with the exception of the actual revenue generators. Want Proof? Here’s a Great link to Statistic Brain that runs it all down…

As I watched the NFL draft unfold this year, I was wondering exactly WHEN does a player, in the NCAA’s eyes, lose their “Amateur” status and become a “Professional”? Clearly, it’s when there is an exchange of money or value for a given performance. Again, I had to look up “professional” just to be sure of the definition:

“Professional - engaged in a specified activity as one's main paid occupation rather than as a pastime.”

Huh….That sounds a LOT LIKE what some (but not all) Division I and II college football players are doing on fall Saturdays and college basketball players spend the winter doing…And if you don’t believe that, what do you call a scholarship??? Is that or can it be defined as payment in exchange for services rendered or in this case, a future occupation?

The NCAA is in trouble and they know it when it comes to getting this under control. They are too slow to react and are not nearly as pro-active as they need to be as the college ahtletics landscape changes around them. Now it’s just a matter of time to figure out how to make it all work and the NCAA is lagging in that regard as well. And even though the NCAA is an organization “By the People, For the People”, I’m beginning to think that the “People”, the large D1 schools, are probably going to thumb their collective noses at the organization that was created as an oversight institution and more or less agree to self-govern with respect to College Football and Basketball. And that will include looking at collegiate athletes generating their own revenue in the form of endorsement deals or other endeavors.

And that will be a good thing.

In yet another front the NCAA is fighting:

The plaintiffs in the O’Bannon lawsuit at the last minutehave chosen to forego individual damages/claims against the NCAA and agreed togo together as a class. Why is this important? It would remove the jury from the equation and allow a judge to rule on the anti-trust portion of the case.

And the NCAA is filing a motion against the plaintiffs forming a class because they know they’ll lose.

Again, why doesn’t the NCAA just recognize that they are in a losing fight? They’ve already made the fatal mistake of separating from EA sports. They have admitted (unofficially) that they MADE MONEY off of former athletes by receiving money from EA. Why fight it? What can possibly come of this but a ruling against the NCAA?