Michigan Wolverines

Stripping to the Truth of College Coaches

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By Clay Travis 1/23/2010 2:00 PM ET

In the past decade, college coaches have become strippers. Words like loyalty, commitment, and honor are out the door. Nope, major college athletics has become nothing if not a strip club. Coaches work the floor like colorfully clad dancers late at night, waiting for a welcoming glance of interest before sashaying over and plopping themselves down at your table.

"Wanna dance, baby?" coo strippers in clear heels and thongs. "Wanna coach, baby?" coo college coaches in pinstripe suits and Italian loafers.

Perpetual free agents, once seated, these stripper coaches whisper sweet words of endearment to a willing fan base. "My family loves it here. I don't want to be anywhere else," is coach speech for "Wanna buy me a drink? Don't you want to get somewhere more private?" Past championships are the coaches' cleavage, the glittering, powdered flesh that fans can't look away from.

Just like in a strip club, the coaching intimacy is false, every word a calculated attempt to make you open your wallet one more time. Have a stripper coach sitting with your program, reveling in fun, swimming eye-deep in wins? All it takes is a nod from another table and your coach or stripper is up and gone, off to the next willing participant.

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By Clay Travis 12/26/2009 4:00 PM ET

Over the remainder of the year, FanHouse will be covering the top sports stories of the decade. In this installment, Clay Travis looks at the most memorable college football game of the decade.

On September 1, 2007, opening day of the college football season, Appalachian State beat No. 5 Michigan, 34-32, in front of 109,218 in the Big House. It was an upset so profound most sporting books didn't even carry a line on the game.

I was in San Francisco on that day, gearing up for the Tennessee-California opener, when I began to see football fans cheering in front of tiny televisions in large sports bars. Because, you see, the Appalachian State-Michigan game was so far down the food chain of major college sports that most sports bars outside of the Midwest didn't even have the game featured. As the game progressed and Appalachian State continued to hang around, slowly, amazingly, we all became Appalachian State fans.

In fact, aren't games like these the reason we all became sports fans? We watch, on some fundamental level, because we hope that we might see something we've never seen before. Like a lower-division team that was paid $400,000 to travel to the Big House, the nation's largest football cathedral, to accept a paid pummeling. Only that didn't happen. And all sports are better for it. Come along down memory lane and let's recount the game of the decade in college football.

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By Clay Travis 11/24/2009 8:00 AM ET

For the second consecutive season under coach Rich Rodriguez, Michigan will not be going to a bowl game.

In two seasons, Rich Rod has racked up a 8-16 overall record, beaten down the Michigan fan base to such a degree that Ohio State scarlet and gray filled up many of the best seats in the Big House this past Saturday, and left my wife, a Michigan alum, refusing to watch their games on television. "I'm already over Rich Rod," she's said on many occasions.

Now as Michigan enters the long, difficult winter of Wolverine discontent, there's a real issue that has to be decided. If you don't think Rich Rod is going to get it done at the school, you need to fire him now, before the next season commences.

Why?

Because you have a legal hook that can significantly lessen the blow of the firing -- you can argue that Rich Rodriguez breached the terms of his contract by violating NCAA rules. Bang. Meet Michigan's own stimulus plan for the athletic department, firing Rich Rod for cause.

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By Mark Hasty 11/21/2009 4:00 PM ET

"For of all sad words of tongue or pen, the saddest are these: 'It might have been!'" -- John Greenleaf Whittier

For Michigan it really might have been, if not for a dreadful game by Tate Forcier and the Wolverine offense. Rich Rodriguez's squad fell to Ohio State 21-10 today, keeping Michigan out of the postseason for the second year in a row.

Forcier threw four interceptions. He also fumbled in Michigan's end zone on the Wolverines' opening drive, which OSU recovered for a touchdown.

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By Clay Travis 11/21/2009 12:30 PM ET

Last week I wrote about the controversy over The South Will Rise Again chant at Ole Miss. In that piece I noted that Ole Miss was the only SEC school that couldn't escape the South's past. Now a new controversy is here, the Klu Klux Klan is protesting for this week's game against LSU. Seriously.

Faulkner memorably said, "The past is never dead. It's not even past."

And when it comes to Ole Miss that's certainly the case.

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By Michael David Smith 11/21/2009 12:05 PM ET

The Ohio State-Michigan game has always been my personal favorite college football rivalry, dating back to my days as a 5-year-old living near Ann Arbor and worshiping Bo Schembechler. OSU vs. Michigan 2009 doesn't figure to be one of the legendary games -- it might not even be a very good game -- but I'll be watching, and I'll be tweeting my observations while I watch.

And since I'm a sucker for rivalry games, I'll also be tweeting about lesser rivalries like the Harvard-Yale game as well. Follow along below or follow me on Twitter @MichaelDavSmith.

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By Mark Hasty 11/19/2009 4:30 PM ET

Every Thursday, Pickin' on the Big Ten previews the upcoming weekend's games and ponders the meaning of it all, staring into the yawning existential void and calling a fullback dive on third-and-seven.

With one more loss, Michigan will become ineligible for a bowl game for the second season in a row. This has not happened since W.A. "Brad" Thornwhistle's disastrous first two seasons in 1847 and 1848. To avoid this horrible dishonor, all the Wolverines have to do is to beat Ohio State on Saturday. That will keep them alive for the Little Caesar's Pizza! Pizza! Bowl Bowl.

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By Mark Hasty 11/12/2009 4:30 PM ET

Every Thursday, Pickin' on the Big Ten previews the upcoming weekend's games and issues random taunts to overconfident fan bases.

Be careful what you ask for, college football fan. The very same Iowa team that so many of you desperately wanted to see lose lest the Big Ten get another team into the title game is now the only thing standing between Ohio State and the BCS. If the Hawkeyes can't pull off a ginormous upset in Columbus behind a quarterback making his first college start, you're going to get the Scarlet and Grey facing some honked-off Pac 10 team.

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By Mark Hasty 11/11/2009 12:00 PM ET

One little loss to Northwestern can change everything. Iowa looked like the team to beat in the Big Ten title race, but now that it has fallen to the Wildcats and Ohio State has beaten Penn State, all the momentum has moved back to Columbus. Technically, both the Hawkeyes and Buckeyes control their own destiny. Whichever team wins Saturday's game is the presumptive conference champion.

Now go try to figure the odds that Iowa can win in the Horseshoe with a redshirt freshman quarterback making his first career start with no run support to speak of.

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By Clay Travis 11/10/2009 10:30 AM ET

As the fourth quarter of CBS's coverage of Alabama-LSU went to commercial break, the cameras caught something extraordinary, an Alabama fan giving the cliched and overused four finger slogan. Okay, nothing extraordinary about that, but, this is when a bit of the Southern Gothic came into your living room, the man only had four fingers, he was missing a pinkie! So he gave the four finger sign utilizing his thumb.

My jaw literally dropped. Judging by everyone's reaction on Twitter, I wasn't the only one. The most shocking thing, of course, is that the fan gave up the pinkie to Nick Saban, wielding a machete, as part of the pregame speech. Good to see they got the bleeding stopped.

But, of course, this moment of four-finger jubilation wasn't the only thing that caught my attention. We've got Alabama, LSU, Notre Dame, Oregon, Cincinnati, and a groom who made it rain at this wedding reception and caused a 40-person brawl. Plus, we learn that 5 yards in Alabama math actually means 5.5 yards.

Dive in and enjoy.

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