Anti-Climacus

LINK: I have a lot of love for my alma mater, its occasional crazinesses aside, and since it's hard to get back to Ann Arbor (I haven't been in... 3 years now?), that love is most often expressed through an unhealthy devotion to Michigan football. I'm comfortable with this as a part of who I am. I do not, for example, bring up the topic unless asked, though I did have two long-ish conversations with alumni friends this past week on the Wisconsin game. Another part of this love is the firm conviction that the Michigan football blogosphere is the best college football has to offer: I've learned how to correctly use phrases like "flows along the line of scrimmage" or "keep contain" from mgoblog, and I have at least one of Wolverine Liberation Army's Soviet propaganda images posted to my desk in the office. And then there's Johnny from Ron Bellamy's Underachieving All-Stars, who writes things like this:

In the second quarter Morgan Trent fumbled a kickoff on Michigan’s 27 yard line, after the defense had just been on the field for almost eight minutes the previous drive. I saw Terrance walk onto the field immediately after, in front of everyone else, swinging his arms dramatically as if to say “Is this the best you’ve got?” He was obviously frustrated with the offense’s incompetence, as we’d find out after the game, but in this moment he almost craved the chance to keep playing. He was undaunted, undeterred; the voice on a cold night telling you everything’s going to be alright, even if deep inside the voice doesn’t believe so itself. You tell me sports are insignificant, and I’ll tell you how I watched them turn a boy into a man before my own eyes.

If I were inclined to be critical of his style, I'm certain I could--but this comes much closer to the exhilaration that games like last Saturday's bring (the only game better was the 2003 Ohio State game): it overwhelms you at a certain level and you can only respondyes.