"DEAR BRADY HOKE" - - - FROM C Mann 1979 (part two)

Turns out the impact of Brady Hoke on our friend "C Mann 1979" was too much for just one letter. Here is a second letter to Commander Clapper:

Dear Coach Hoke,

Since you have been telling your recruited players that it doesn't matter that much who coaches the blue boys, I have a suggestion for you on your impending replacement. Perhaps you can put in a good word on behalf of my recommended candidate for your (old) job.

I am wondering if the new athletic director in Ann Arbor will look for another Michigan Man (in name only like you) or try to find a head coach who can take a storied football program and return it to glory.

I suggest a well known candidate that has been mentioned as a candidate to replace you. But he has a strong SEC background and I know the alumni do not take kindly to the better-than-you attitude from that conference. Also, he followed a former Michigan State head coach both in college and into the pros so he has to have some knowledge of what winning is like especially since that head coach has won two national championships and is in the running every year.

His four year head coaching career in the SEC started slowly with a 7-6 record but that year he won his bowl game against the team you call Ohio. Something that only happens once a decade these days in Ann Arbor. This guy is 1-0 against the Buckeyes.

His second year he finished 11-2 and in the top ten rankings. Sounds familiar for a new head coach.

Then things went south for this once dominant program. They finished 2013 with seven straight losses and a sorry 4-8 record. But the school decided to give the coach and his full bevy of recruits one more chance. Boy, that sounds familiar too.

And this year didn't meet the usual standards even though they are bowl eligible and should finish the regular season 6-5 that including an upset of a top ten team that allowed them to qualify for a bowl game. Something you had trouble doing in all four years at Ann Arbor. Unless of course you win your final regular season game today. Which is about as likely as Appalachian State winning two in a row in front of 100,000+.

Will Muschamp has all ready been released from the University of Florida so he could help with recruiting right away. It's a perfect fit if your future former employers could only accept logic over arrogance.

Most Sincerely Yours,

C Mann 1979

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"DEAR BRADY HOKE" - - - FROM C Mann 1979 (part one)

Our next love letter to Brady Hoke comes from "C Mann 1979", a dedicated Spartan and lifelong Wolverine Hunter if we ever saw one. He offers these farewell wishes to the Merry Michigan Man:

Dear Coach Hoke,

Thank you for your devotion the Michigan football program. You have helped my alma mater more than you will ever realize. I truly look forward to your success in your next head coaching job. I want you to succeed as much as your predecessor has at Arizona. Let the UM Athletic Department continue to think it is their coaching hires that have been the problem.

There are many things I will follow when you get that new head coaching job. Will you recruit four and five star high school athletes and try to be their father by letting them run the show, or will you begin to recruit lesser athletes and mold them into a team like the current B1G coach up the road?

When a student athlete on your team gets in trouble with the law, and they will, do you take decisive action to send a message to your team or continue wait and let the legal system run its course before making a decision?

When you are invited to attend a local high school football camp will you send an assistant and have him turn it into a recruiting trip or would you like him to treat it as a training camp as it was meant to be?

And finally, I will be interested to see if you take your new team to an 11-2 record and a bowl win in your first year without any of your personal recruits.

All the best to you and your future endeavors.

Yours Truly,

C-MANN1979

P.S.  One more thing I'll look for once you land your new head coaching job with another team. I wonder if you will look unkindly toward offered recruits who desire to visit other college programs before making a final decision on their college career. Or will that be an attitude reserved only for the Ann Arbor program?

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FIRST-PERSON REPORT FROM C-Mann1979 AT THE B1G CONFERENCE CHAMPIONSHIP GAME

(Were you at the game? Please write your comment below.)

We have just received our first eye-witness report from the B1G Championship game at Lucas Oil Stadium last weekend. It's our own "C-Mann1979" who made the long drive to make the big scene.

C-Mann tells us that two Michigan players were on hand, Taylor Lewan and Devin Funchess, for some pre-game ceremony. Those two received a cascade of booing from the Spartan/Buckeye crowd.

He also says most Buckeye fans were questioning MSU's chances of actually winning the game:

"Ohio State fans kept asking me before the game what I truly thought State's chances were for the upset. I told them all that I truly thought the wrong team was favored and that they should be very worried. In the end, it looked like the wrong team was favored. Sparty won the game, the Bucks did not lose it. Though those same Buckeye fans see things differently, blaming the loss on their own play-calling. I guess they were planning to give up 34 points. BTW, I told those same fans that I believed the first team to score 29 points would win. And my predicted score was Sparty wins, 34-28. Not too shabby on the prediction parade."

One of our editors noticed the confetti falling on the field seemed to be an odd mixture of blue and yellow, and that question appeared in the Front Burner this week. But C-Mann was there, and he didn't see it that way:

"I haven't seen the replay of the post-game festivities but the confetti that fell in my section were all pastels and could in no way be linked to any Big Ten school colors. I brought some home to fill a box with Spartan gear from the weekend for my son's Christmas. I find it hard to believe that only blue and yellow fell near the podium but I'll look for it."

We'll wait for the update from C-Mann79 on the american confetti. But he noticed we didn't talk about the #4 ranking for the football team anywhere in our various monologues. He's thinking that the fans of some team MSU plays every year have seen it:

"How about a comment on our fourth place ranking? It just shows what a farce rankings are. It's the luck of the draw as to when you lose your only game of the season. But now that we're there, a Rose Bowl win could possibly allow Sparty to finish #3 in the year-end polls. Boy, would that upset a few chUMps (and the M4) out there."

He makes a good point. A loss could drop MSU out of the Top Ten, but a win will most certainly hold position or move up. But I think those who notice us now at #4 will still notice us in about the same way around #10 (if we lose), so I think they're already starting to get the point.

Were you at the game?
Please leave us a COMMENT below,

we'd like to hear a few words from you
about your experience.

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Remembering Andre Rison

    This will be the third time that the Spartans meet the Bulldogs from Georgia.  I was at the first meeting on New Year’s Day in 1989 at the Gator Bowl in Jacksonville.  We lost that first meeting but I still remember the show that Andre Rison put on that day.  Down 17-0, Sparty had to air it out.  Before it was over, #1 had nine catches for 252 yards and three touchdowns in the 34-27 loss. 

    If anyone wants to see some Andre Highlights check out

Let's Remember Who's Not Playing in the B1G Championship

With the addition of perennial football powerhouse, Nebraska Cornhuskers, to the Big Ten the only question over the summer in the Legends division was who would finish second. The chUMps are always a preseason favorite and then there was Iowa who made a statement last year. Michigan State’s schedule was just too brutal to consider finishing even second in the division.

Then we played the games.

Nebraska proved they were real good in that sea of red west of the Mississippi River. They handed the Spartans their only Big Ten loss in what was apparently an emotional game for them. Big Red failed to realize that this is