College Parked

The Padres decided to go with Dylan Cease on three days rest. He had never pitched on short rest in his life, but it's the playoffs, the mustachioed righty was the best pitcher in the Padres' rotation, and they wanted to stick their boots on the necks of their bitter division-rival billion dollar superteam Dodgers up 2-1 at home with the backing of a braying mustard crowd. But Cease was not at his best.  He lasted less than two innings, gave up three runs, and the Dodgers were on their way to a devastating 8-0 win.  The result forced a winner-take-all Game 5 in Los Angeles but it had one more important consequence: the elimination game took up the slot on Fox television that was going to the Maryland-Northwestern game and moved it back to FS1.  If only the Padres had managed to hold on, the premier sporting event airing on network television that night would have been Northwestern unexpectedly mangling the hapless Terrapins; baseball superstars Shohei Ohtani and Fernando Tatis, Jr. could only watch as Maryland held onto the ball to no discernible end for quarters at a time and Northwestern crushed them in one of the strangest blowout wins I've ever seen.

Maryland, down only ten, had the ball for a large chunk of the second half.  During the third quarter, Northwestern's defense allowed Maryland a stately ten minute march down the field that yielded a Maryland field goal then the 'Cats got the ball back, punted, and immediately scored a touchdown on a fumble recovery before kicking the ball right back to the Maryland's offense to ineffectively gallumph around again.  Watching this game reminded me of the Simpsons episode where Homer discovers he has a layer of fluid around his brain that allows him to get pummeled in the head to no effect and he defeats a series of hobo boxers by allowing them to relentlessly punch him until they get tired and fall over.

I am still not sure what to make of Northwestern’s offense.  The 'Cats struggled running the ball, went three out of twelve on third down, and delegated the second half largely to the defense.  Taken in isolation, all of that looks like the recipe for offensive malaise that had plagued Northwestern this season except there was one play that was working and it was letting Jack Lausch launch bombs to Bryce Kirtz.  Lausch also chucked one to Kirtz in the Indiana game, and A.J. Henning came pretty close to another one in this game, and while I have no idea whether the Oops All Bombs playbook is going to be successful for the rest of the season, it is at least a different type of Northwestern offense than we are used to seeing which is usually a Chicago Bears-style offense that puts the scoring onus on linebackers. 

Taking a look at Zach Lujan's playbook

Maryland is a very funny opponent for Northwestern because, like many Big Ten teams, its fans assume they will always beat Northwestern because the Wildcats used to be very bad in the 1980s.  But the Terps joined the Big Ten in 2014; in ten years of conference play, they are 1-4 against Northwestern. Maryland joined the Big Ten, played Northwestern roughly every other year, and 80% of the time not only lost to them but got clobbered.  The cartoon villain Skeletor has a better success rate than that on his evil plans.  And yet every single time they lose to Northwestern it seems like a lot of their fans continue reacting with the sort of open-mouthed confusion and incredulity that Clayton Kershaw would display after serving up yet another massive playoff home run despite doing it regularly for the better part of a decade.

This is not the typical Maryland team that gets beaten by Northwestern.  For the past several years, Maryland has started strong and looked like they were actually going to compete in the Big Ten before suffering the fate of the Indiana Jones Sword Man against the powers of the Big Ten East.  The inevitable loss to Northwestern usually served as the death blow to whatever hopes they had of competing in the conference.  This year, Maryland just stinks.  They are winless in conference play.  Their remaining schedule is legitimately alarming. I don't know what this says about the trajectory of Maryland football, but then again I don't really know what Maryland's deal with football even is.  

What is Maryland football for? As a fan of the Big Ten West, I have an innate understanding of the purpose that mediocre Big Ten teams with no chance of winning a national championship serve in the greater college football ecosystem: fullbacks, punting, scoring as few points as possible, and in the case of the University of Iowa, Renaissance Italian city-state-style dynastic family politics.  The goal of Northwestern is to host an opportunity to visit the Chicago area in the fall and probably be mildly annoyed by the Wildcat Sound as your team wins or loses 17-10.  The purpose of Nebraska football is to wistfully cling to former glories.  Michigan football exists as a pretext for the writing of strong Letters to the Editor. Even Rutgers has a clear destiny which is to function as a cult dedicated to Greg Schiano; when he dies, the entire university will be buried with him in his funereal pyramid as specified in his writings.  But until Maryland finds a purpose in the Big Ten, they will be forced to wander the wastelands and ponder endure the hardship of having the worst record against Northwestern as a Big Ten team.

One important function for Maryland might be to pronounce the name of this baseball player in the Cubs minor league system

WISCONSIN WANTS TO TAKE THE LAKE

No group of people outside the Ryan family and their cohort of Northwestern money perverts enjoyed the destruction of Ryan Field more than Wisconsin fans.  For some reason that I have never been able to discern, the Badgers could not consistently win in Evanston.  It is more beguiling because there are few major conference football teams that consistently enjoy such an extraordinary advantage as Wisconsin fans who have routinely swarmed Ryan Field since time immemorial and can guarantee matching and in many cases overwhelming Northwestern fans in their own stadium. 

But now Ryan Field is gone. Wisconsin will have to see what is like to play the final game of this season at The Lake.  Here, I would expect Wisconsin fans to still manage to take over the stadium; there are so many of them in the Chicago area alone not to mention those willing to take the short drive down I-94 or arrive in a convoy of party boats.  Badger fans will be looking to see whether it is the city of Evanston and the overwhelming pressure of performing in front of their own fans or whether it was a quirk of Ryan Field and its intimidating dilapidation that caused the Badgers to routinely falter there.

The Badgers are still smarting and looking for revenge. Last year, a Northwestern team left for dead went up to Madison and destroyed Wisconsin to the point where fans sarcastically cheered a pointless last-second touchdown that saved the Badgers from tying an ignominious record for scoring futility at Camp Randall.  Wisconsin was in transition, in Luke Fickell's first year and in the process of installing a spread offense that is offensive to me and to be frank aesthetically disgusting when performed in a Wisconsin uniform.  Northwestern also started Luke Fickell's former Cincinnati quarterback, who did not follow his coach to Wisconsin and was therefore I believe fueled by Psychology to defeat him.  Whatever the reason, Badgers had no answer for Ben Bryant.  The shocking Northwestern loss was part of an uncharacteristically poor season that was jarring for Wisconsin fans used to metronomic consistency.  

I really appreciate the "ah, the hell with it" celebration from #6 up there after Wisconsin scores their last-second Touchdown of Futility

Wisconsin is coming off a rough early season where they had for some reason agreed to host Alabama and lost their starting quarterback to an injury in that game.  Usually getting utterly annihilated by Alabama is not anything that would discourage a team with a Big Ten West pedigree, but we have since learned that Alabama is capable of losing to Vanderbilt and wobbling against South Carolina ,and the entire nation of Alabama football fans is somehow calling into sports radio and making professional wrestling-style threats at new coach Kalen DeBoer, so the result is perhaps slightly more alarming to Badger fans.

Bama fans rationally explaining that they were betrayed by DeBoer and his flashy west-coast style football coaching and demand to challenge him and all of the DeBoer Boerniacs from coast to coast at the Rosemont Horizon

The Badgers also lost badly to USC but managed to right the ship last week and use the entire Rutgers football team as a squeegee to clean the field. Wisconsin fans certainly see Northwestern as another opportunity to get back into the Big Ten mix.  The Badgers are, as is custom, heavily favored.  But there is something strange that happens to the Wisconsin team when they cross the threshold of the Skokie Lagoons.  Perhaps they will manage to win easily, as everyone predicts. Or perhaps whatever force that causes Wisconsin to do the absolute stupidest things possible and throw away games to the Wildcats will rise again at the Lake, the 'Cats will get a bunch of turnovers, and Lausch will drop a 60 yard nuke to Bryce Kirtz that is so majestic that the demoralized Wisconsin team will leave the field and begin despondently rowing to Milwaukee.  There is one thing I know for certain about Wisconsin's consistent headaches trying to win at a stadium which their fans turn into virtual home games every time they play and it is that Northwestern's home record against Wisconsin is one of the funniest things that has ever happened in college football and no one knows about this but us.

CAMP RANDALL STADIUM, MADISON WISCONSIN

This season has been all about stadiums, so this year's fiction section is investigating the history of opponent stadiums.  This week, everyone knows that the University of Wisconsin has never considered naming rights for Camp Randall Stadium, but what these two letters that I have completely made up presupposes: what if they did?

In 1895, the Wisconsin Badgers began play at Camp Randall, a Civil War-era Union training camp located on the grounds of the University of Wisconsin.  In early 1894, the university sifted through competing offers to change the name of the stadium.  Neither was adopted. Here, reproduced for the first time through university archives, are these letters reproduced below:

Gentlemen,

I have recently learned that the State plans to use the former site of Camp Randall as a grounds for the University Foot-Ball team. I expect that the Grounds will attract much attention and excitement from the way the great public embrace of this new exhibition of vigorous Man-Sport as these youths smash and bash each other into smithered-reens on the muddy fields and pits of this former Wartime Trainings Ground.

I would like to propose a Lucrative and Satisfactory business arrangement that would both bring prosperity to the good State of Wisconsin and University. I am offering a large Sum that you could consider a donation and symbol of my Investment in the state of Wisconsin and in the boys you have trying to vigorously ram their Limbs and Skulls into each other’s spinal-columns. This can be used to spruce up the field and clear it of the thorns and animal droppings that often cover it and cause Injury and Pestilence to befall the athletes and spectators. Or it could be used to furnish equipments that would allow the lads to train their neck muscles against the Twistings and Wobblings inflicted by the most bludgeonous Opponents of the middle-west.

All I ask in return is some acknowledgement of the monies I have donated by allowing me to inform the intelligent and discerning Public who attend these spectacles of Health and Vigor of some Products that I offer. It would be a rather simple matter to change the name of the Field from Camp Randall to Dr. Manoxko’s Re-Vitalizing Elixir for the Conditions of Stupor, Lethargy, Reduction of Hair, Dyspepsia, Repepsia, Snoring, Excess of Mucous, Paucity of Mucuous, Bile, Mange, and Re-Invigoriation of Manful Activities, an Elixir suppressed by the Medical Authorities in order to continue to subject the Public to their various Surgeries and Medicines for their own Profit Field.

This is a winning Deal for all involved: the State and University, which receives a healthy sum to replace money that would be otherwise taken by from hard-working Tax-Payers of Wisconsin to carry the burden of the expense for the Foot-Ball squad’s bludgeoning sleds and bone-saws and surgical laudanum, and the people of Wisconsin who will have an opportunity to learn about an important and healthful Product that will ease their Ailments.

I am prepared to-day to ignore my complex business transaction appointments and travel to Madison at a moment’s notice to deliver a large and cumbersome display-sized Cheque that requires two or three strong men to hold it aloft and deliver it directly to the Bursar to deposit into the University’s coffers. I would also pay for the Signs and Banners informing people about my products and even be willing to stand upon an Apple Box or other sturdy platform and shout about the many benefits and improvements offered by my world-famous Elixir which I have given by the way as a gift to numerous Princes, Sheiks, Nizams, and other Royalty around the Globe who have sought out my aid with their medical problems as their quotations in my Pamphlets will attest. I expect I will be granted a warmer welcome than when I was a humbler peddler of Blood Serums and Wolf Urines and was man-handled and thrown from the Capitol steps by a gang of toughs hired no doubt by the Medical Doctors scheming with Legislators to prevent the public from getting my miraculous cure-alls.

I look forward to the grand opening of Dr. Manoxko’s Re-Vitalizing Elixir for the Conditions of Stupor, Lethargy, Reduction of Hair, Dyspepsia, Repepsia, Snoring, Excess of Mucous, Paucity of Mucuous, Bile, Mange, and Re-Invigoriation of Manful Activities, an Elixir suppressed by  the Medical Authorities in order to continue to subject the Public to their various Surgeries and Medicines for their own Profit Field.

Sincerely,

Dr. L.P.X. Manoxko, Surgeon, Esq.

-----------------------

To the Gentlemen of the University and the State Legislature.

It has come to my attention that you have received a most provocative communiqué from the so-called Dr. Minoxko offering a large payment in exchange for renaming the historic and hallowed university ball fields after his useless elixir. I urge you to reconsider this deal as I and anyone who has done business with this Minoxko fellow knows that his medical expertise is in fact the lowest form of quackery.

I have had many encounters with this ruffian, and I assure you he is no more a doctor than I am a cudgel-back for the university foot-ball team (I have enclosed an accurate portrait showing my feeble frame and hunched posture that would allow even the weakest foot-ball player to rearrange my skeleton on a basic scrimmage-brawl in order to illustrate my point). Instead he is a shameless scoundrel, an invidious swindler of the meanest type whose elixirs are actually concoctions of whatever substances he encounters in the wild including poisonous herbs, mill water, skunk spray, and even the various dungs of the animal kingdom that he and his assistants whom he recruits from the darkest realms of the criminal underworld mash up into a paste and stir into his swill.

Normally, one would offer a person who allows himself to be persuaded to buy and drink a concoction of axle grease and possum’s offal a hearty “caveat emptor,” but Minoxko is causing grievous injury to his gullible customers. In my travels, I have seen persons who have consumed his slop suffering from Draughtsman’s Bowels, Railroad Vision, the Spills, the Wobbles, Cattle Polyps, Reverse Gouts, and too many varieties of Diarrheas to mention in a letter that is being sent to the government. Mr. Minoxko represents a singular menace to the state of Wisconsin whose only business at the foot-ball field should be as a dummy for the players’ thrashing exercises.

I have reason to suspect that the man who claims to be “Dr. Minoxko” is actually the notorious swindler who has also gone by the names Ralph October, the Rev. Laurence Mint, Zubuz The Formidable, and many other aliases as he has traveled from territory to territory always one step ahead of the law with his various schemes including as a dealer of occult artifacts, a peddler of the most obscene types of pornographies, and as the proprietor as a bear circus whose cavalier restraint of the beasts nearly led to numerous maulings if the brave citizens did not possess a ceremonial cannon used for the purpose of solemn memorials. I assure you that the University of Wisconsin does not want to do business with this type of slippery reptile.

It is absurd to allow this man now going as “Dr. Minoxko” to purchase any right to name the stadium after his fraudulent skunk-mixtures. If anything, the stadium should be named for something wholesome. This is why I propose that the University should accept a large sum from me in order to name it Dr Jaed Jerenchki’s Full Body Health Serum: one sip of this Invigorating Serum will clear you of Vicious Bowels, eliminate pain from Joints, Muscles, and Organs, and give you the energy of a Bull Elephant in his Uncontrollable Musth Rage Stadium at Camp Randall.

Gentlemen, unlike Dr. Minoxko’s poisonous and foul-smelling concoction, my health serum has been proven by rigorous scientific experimentation on rodents and simians, with satisfied customers willing to trumpet its benefits to all who will listen. Many have written me personally to tell me they have been thrown out of dinners, pancake breakfasts, and other social events by people tired of hearing them once again expound upon the wonders of my health-ful serum. Moreover, my proposal, unlike the grotesque one made by Dr. Minoxko, preserves the historic and popular name of Camp Randall; the minor detail of my generous sponsorship would be noticed only by particularly sharp-eyed and discerning foot-ball patrons.

Dr. Minoxko says he will present the University with an enormous decorative cheque, but I would suggest researching the price of card-board beforehand as that will be the sum total of monies that you would ever be able to wring out of this slimy charlatan. I, on the other hand, am willing to make a payment purely in specie in coins or in ingots that could be delivered to the University accompanied by guards trained in the arts of horse, town, and train-combat.

Consider this a warning that any attempt to do business with the larcenous Dr. Minoxko who is a known criminal who has left a trail of ruined lives everywhere he travels will do nothing other than drag this august university into scandal and ill repute. That is why I consider my own suggested deal not only a sound investment for the future of foot-ball at this university but a demonstration that the underhanded tactics and disgusting thievesman-ship of the type practiced by this reptile Minoxko are unwelcome in the state of Wisconsin.

Gentlemen let us promote two important aspects of health and vigor together as we combine my whole-some serums with the brave and delightful displays of manful skull crushings that are synonymous with foot-ball in this great state.

Yours,

Dr. Jaed Jerenchki