2016 Nov 28^th

Those of you who are football fans have surely noticed last Saturday’s terrible, awful, loss by the University of Michigan football team to THE Ohio State football team. This loss upset a lot of people. Naturally, many Michigan fans blamed the officiating. One fan in particular was very upset by the officiating and that was the University of Michigan’s coach Jim Harbaugh.

Coach Harbaugh (Note that “Coach” has now become an honorific, a title.) was very upset by an offside call by officials late in the third quarter when Michigan led by a score of 17 to 7. Ohio State had the ball and was on Michigan’s 13-yard line when a Michigan player jumped the gun and a five-yard penalty was called. This moved the ball to Michigan’s 8-yard line.

This call so infuriated Coach Harbaugh that he exploded in rage. (Later imaging showed the call was correct.) He tore off his headphones and threw them on the ground breaking them. He screamed at the officials and we had the spectacle of this man, paid seven million dollars a year, by an order of magnitude paid more than any other state official (Except for other coaches of course.) acting like a seven-year-old throwing a temper tantrum.( Of course Coach Harbaugh remained vertical.)

The result of Harbaugh’s tantrum was an unsportsmanlike conduct penalty called on the Michigan Bench. This penalty moved the ball from the Michigan 8-yard line to the 4-yard line and two plays later Ohio State scored, making the score 17 to 14. Ohio State ultimately won the game in double overtime.

Michigan football teams have an interesting history of “sportsmanship” under their seven million dollar man. Consider the teams Harbaugh’s players have competed against: They began their season hosting The University of Hawaii football team. The score was 56 to nothing at the end of the third quarter and finished with a 63 to 3 win for Michigan. Then we have the contest against Maryland where Michigan won 58 to 3. Then they played Rutgers and managed a 78 to nothing win. This time they were ahead 57 nothing at the end of the third quarter and still ran up another 21 points in the fourth quarter; no sense taking a chance on a Rutgers comeback.  Harbaugh wants not just to win games but also to humiliate his opponents.

The Michigan trustees wanted a coach that could win football games and regain the university’s glorious football reputation. At least they got the first part of what they wanted.