I had just moved to campus and read a sports editorial in The Daily.
Two words from the piece stuck with me all these years: "Football Fiefdom". Armed with only that recollection and knowing the year (Fall of 1982) i did a little research on a slow Tuesday, less than 2 weeks out from a pivotal season...and with us being (hopefully) post-COVID, after a year of no crowds on Football Saturdays.
Sometimes, a thing needs to disappear from your life for a while in order for you to properly appreciate it. Michigan Football is just such a thing.
From The Michigan Daily, September 11, 1982 (note the byline...our own Bob Wojnowski).
Off the Record
By BOB WOJNOWSKI
The cider, 'The Victors.
...it's called tradition
YOU WILL NOTICE first, if you are an infrequent visitor to Ann Arbor on
football Saturdays, the smell of hot cider in the air, perhaps. Or maybe
the whining chords of "The Victors" wafting throughout the slowly-changing
leaves.
If you are a frequent visitor to Ann Arbor on football Saturdays, you will
notice all that you have always noticed and then you will realize that it is all
the same. As last year and the year before. Indeed, very little changes in the
football fiefdom that is Michigan.
And that is called tradition.
The old stadium is still there. They've spruced it up a bit, a little paint
here, a little Tartan turf there. And the players, all decked out in their maize and blue regalia with the
distinctive wing-tipped helmets, will still charge out of the tunnel and smack
the "Go Blue, 'M' Club Supports You," banner. The band, the hot dogs, the street vendors . . . the coach. They never change.
And that is good for tradition.
Oh, they almost lost him. The hotshot Texans came in flashing their oily
bucks and tried to woo the man they call Bo to Aggieland. And all those fans,
even the ones that had booed him just last fall when the Wolverines went
down thrice, said hell no, don't go Bo. For though they have often yelled that
this Schembechler was set in his ways and maybe a change was necessary,
the shocking realization that such a change might occur hit them like a 240-
pound linebacker.
Bo shocked them though. While the Houston papers were reporting a 70
percent chance of the coach jumping ship, Bo was rehearsing his "some
things are more important than money" speech.
Take the money and run Jackie Sherrill, the erstwhile Pittsburgh coach, took the money and ran
you recall. He mulled it over about as long as it takes to say, "See you at the
bank."
In its simplest form, tradition is the absence of change and the ability to
withstand change. Michigan has withstood change to the tune of eight foot-
ball coaches since 1900 and just 13 in its 103-year history. Bo withstood
change to the tune of $2.25 million.
This tradition bit is nothing new you understand. You don't suddenly
stumble upon it in your 103rd year of existence. No, it has been around-
cultivated and enriched as each autumn turns to winter.
Tradition does not move from place to place at the drop of a coin. When it
is finished, tradition dies, as it did, in part, last October 26 when Bob Ufer
passed on. Ufer didn't take an oily ticket to Texas, but rather a deserved
pass to legendhood.
Michigan will probably win this football game this afternoon. And chances
are the next and next. That too is part of the never-changing tradition. A sort
of spiraling relationship develops between various aspects of the burgeoning
tradition that allows it to sustain itself. A school would most certainly not
have survived with only 13 coaches in 103 years if it was a consistent loser.
Conversely, as the victories mount, so too does the longevity and respect of
the coach.
Michigan has it, others don't.
So, you see, Michigan has tradition. Pittsburgh does not. Many others too
have tradition. Many more do not. Tradition, you understand, is relative.
There are 10-year traditions, 50-year traditions and 103-year traditions.
You can argue about who has it and who doesn't but the best measuring
stick is ambiguous as hell. You just know it when you feel, see, hear it. And it
is times as we have seen with the death of Ufer and the life of Bo that it is
reaffirmed here in Ann Arbor.
Tradition, be advised, is not a godly edict carved in stone that immunes all
that it encompasses to the evils of the world. No, long-standing traditions
have crumbled in a day from the impunities of a wayward man. One hundred
and three years of tradition could crumble at this very university under the
weight of a recruiting scandal. You know now that there is no longer a
basketball tradition at the University of San Francisco.
There will be no Wolverine mascot bouncing idiotically around the old
stadium today. No fancy lettering on the old football jerseys, no barrage of
60 passes by the Maize and Blue. And now you know, if you are an infrequent
visitor to Ann Arbor, that the smell of the cider and the wafting strains of
"The Victors" have always been there.
Indeed, very little changes in the football fiefdom that is Michigan.
And that is called tradition.
*********
Mr. Wojnowski...you seem pretty good at this writing thing. You might want to consider pursuing a career in it.
Two words from the piece stuck with me all these years: "Football Fiefdom". Armed with only that recollection and knowing the year (Fall of 1982) i did a little research on a slow Tuesday, less than 2 weeks out from a pivotal season...and with us being (hopefully) post-COVID, after a year of no crowds on Football Saturdays.
Sometimes, a thing needs to disappear from your life for a while in order for you to properly appreciate it. Michigan Football is just such a thing.
From The Michigan Daily, September 11, 1982 (note the byline...our own Bob Wojnowski).
Off the Record
By BOB WOJNOWSKI
The cider, 'The Victors.
...it's called tradition
YOU WILL NOTICE first, if you are an infrequent visitor to Ann Arbor on
football Saturdays, the smell of hot cider in the air, perhaps. Or maybe
the whining chords of "The Victors" wafting throughout the slowly-changing
leaves.
If you are a frequent visitor to Ann Arbor on football Saturdays, you will
notice all that you have always noticed and then you will realize that it is all
the same. As last year and the year before. Indeed, very little changes in the
football fiefdom that is Michigan.
And that is called tradition.
The old stadium is still there. They've spruced it up a bit, a little paint
here, a little Tartan turf there. And the players, all decked out in their maize and blue regalia with the
distinctive wing-tipped helmets, will still charge out of the tunnel and smack
the "Go Blue, 'M' Club Supports You," banner. The band, the hot dogs, the street vendors . . . the coach. They never change.
And that is good for tradition.
Oh, they almost lost him. The hotshot Texans came in flashing their oily
bucks and tried to woo the man they call Bo to Aggieland. And all those fans,
even the ones that had booed him just last fall when the Wolverines went
down thrice, said hell no, don't go Bo. For though they have often yelled that
this Schembechler was set in his ways and maybe a change was necessary,
the shocking realization that such a change might occur hit them like a 240-
pound linebacker.
Bo shocked them though. While the Houston papers were reporting a 70
percent chance of the coach jumping ship, Bo was rehearsing his "some
things are more important than money" speech.
Take the money and run Jackie Sherrill, the erstwhile Pittsburgh coach, took the money and ran
you recall. He mulled it over about as long as it takes to say, "See you at the
bank."
In its simplest form, tradition is the absence of change and the ability to
withstand change. Michigan has withstood change to the tune of eight foot-
ball coaches since 1900 and just 13 in its 103-year history. Bo withstood
change to the tune of $2.25 million.
This tradition bit is nothing new you understand. You don't suddenly
stumble upon it in your 103rd year of existence. No, it has been around-
cultivated and enriched as each autumn turns to winter.
Tradition does not move from place to place at the drop of a coin. When it
is finished, tradition dies, as it did, in part, last October 26 when Bob Ufer
passed on. Ufer didn't take an oily ticket to Texas, but rather a deserved
pass to legendhood.
Michigan will probably win this football game this afternoon. And chances
are the next and next. That too is part of the never-changing tradition. A sort
of spiraling relationship develops between various aspects of the burgeoning
tradition that allows it to sustain itself. A school would most certainly not
have survived with only 13 coaches in 103 years if it was a consistent loser.
Conversely, as the victories mount, so too does the longevity and respect of
the coach.
Michigan has it, others don't.
So, you see, Michigan has tradition. Pittsburgh does not. Many others too
have tradition. Many more do not. Tradition, you understand, is relative.
There are 10-year traditions, 50-year traditions and 103-year traditions.
You can argue about who has it and who doesn't but the best measuring
stick is ambiguous as hell. You just know it when you feel, see, hear it. And it
is times as we have seen with the death of Ufer and the life of Bo that it is
reaffirmed here in Ann Arbor.
Tradition, be advised, is not a godly edict carved in stone that immunes all
that it encompasses to the evils of the world. No, long-standing traditions
have crumbled in a day from the impunities of a wayward man. One hundred
and three years of tradition could crumble at this very university under the
weight of a recruiting scandal. You know now that there is no longer a
basketball tradition at the University of San Francisco.
There will be no Wolverine mascot bouncing idiotically around the old
stadium today. No fancy lettering on the old football jerseys, no barrage of
60 passes by the Maize and Blue. And now you know, if you are an infrequent
visitor to Ann Arbor, that the smell of the cider and the wafting strains of
"The Victors" have always been there.
Indeed, very little changes in the football fiefdom that is Michigan.
And that is called tradition.
*********
Mr. Wojnowski...you seem pretty good at this writing thing. You might want to consider pursuing a career in it.
Last edited:
