Look at Lord Autumnbottom over there

Pies in the face are only funny is the sap has dignity, but this, on the other hand, is only funny because the sap doesn't have dignity:

The man desperately striving for dignity and failing to achieve it is an American archetype. Willy Loman fantasizes about Uncle Ben. Fredo Corleone insists, indignantly, that he is smart. And much like Fredo, this year Michigan State is being passed over for its even younger brother (WMU).

Going for two when you know you're going to lose is football's version of saying "I'm smart and I want respect. As
Spencer Hall said about the Illinois game, there's something uniquely sad about scoring 8 points in a blowout loss, about having a permanent record that you thought you had a chance. In art, the striver can be a tragic figure, a sign of wasted potential or of the agony of living with a fundamental misunderstanding of how the world works. Football rarely goes for the kind of existential tragedy. It's just funny instead.

Oh, the Speightmeter was delayed this week. Speight is John Navarre this week in honor of the classic Lloydball second half. The offense tried for about 70% of the game, so 7/10 on the Speightmeter seems about right. The extremely conservative fourth-quarter offense may have been strategically sound, but I wonder if there was a little more to it. Out here is civilian-land, saying you took your foot out the gas might be considered an act of mercy, but I can't escape the feeling that for Jim Harbaugh, easing up at the end is the most contemptuous act he could ever imagine inflicting on an enemy. Being considered worthy of the effort necessary to get your butt kicked 78-0 is more dignified than that.

Speight Meter Week 6: Win, with, spite

Normally, watching a football game involving Rutgers has a well-defined place on the priority list, and that place is at the bottom. So, upon hearing that Saturday's game would be at 4:00 PT and conflict with my arranged-far-in-advance dinner reservations, I expected that missing the late stages of a blowout would mean not missing anything important. Never again will I underestimate the Rutgers's ability to overwhelm with underperformance.

I stopped following the game to start dinner in that brief moment when it appeared Rutgers had more than zero points.

As for the offense: I reviewed the drive chart and realized I had almost forgotten that the first few drives...were not good. If we want to nitpick a 78-point performance (and Michigan Men always do), we can complain about using the wrong gloves and not needing a passing game.

But putting up the largest margin of victory since 1939 is a special occasion and should be noted accordingly.

Rutgers can't even stop our third string and walk-ons, but that's none of my business. It's not my job to stop trying to score.

Wis., Tot Helping

Watching Michigan play Wisconsin was like taking a three-year-old to Buffalo Wild Wings to watch the game, which is what I did. In the first quarter, everything seems OK. She gets her lunch, eats some fries and her fruit, plays with their game box, and everything is going slowly as planned. There are warning signs though - she doesn't want to eat her mac & cheese because BW3 has shells instead of elbows.

The second quarter starts out better. She gets out of her seat and lies on her side once for no real reason, but soon after she starts clapping along to The Victors like she knows what she's doing. But the mac & cheese slowly congeals into a single blob and she starts throwing her toy football everywhere except where it's supposed to go.

I buy her ice cream at halftime because these three and a half hours need ice cream to get through.

The third quarter has the inevitable accident that you always have to plan for but you're always surprised when it actually happens. Let's not speak of it further.

The fourth quarter starts with her finally deciding to eat a little bit of macaroni. Despite it all, she does do everything she's supposed. For the second Victors singalong she starts to get all the hand motions right.

She spends the second half of the fourth quarter watching Daniel Tiger's Neighborhood on the iPad, learning valuable lessons about anger management, and just riding out the string. As the game ends she starts yelling a little and demands to go home as quickly as possible. 

So if you want to know what parenthood is like, Saturday was the experience for you. Everything usually works out OK in the end, making the hours upon hours of aggravation worth it.

The Speight-meter gets a 2, as the difference in the game was Speight-to-Darboh whipping it longest.

Numbers go in the train formation now.