Forever Saturday

You know what this is about: Let's talk some shit after another dog-walking of Ohio State, revel in Michigan flipping this rivalry on its head, enjoy some Ohio State fan schadenfreude, maybe talk about the actual game and its three distinct parts (defense hanging on, J.J. taking over, run game putting it away), and then take a moment to appreciate where this program is at right now.

Serena and Matt say their prayers for Blake Corum, briefly look back at an Illinois game that really didn't matter (and was treated accordingly, for better or worse), and then turn to The Game: We know what these teams are philosophically, so what do we feel good about, what do we feel much less good about, and what's in front of Michigan as Football Armageddon 2.0 looms.

Serena and Matt reflect on the significance of Michigan's 10-0 start before getting into the boring-but-thorough beatdown of Nebraska, allocation of blame for the passing game's lingering issues, another Heisman-worthy day from Blake Corum, the defense's continued ascendance, and what we can expect/learn against Illinois, aka "Man Coverage Iowa."

Serena and Matt talk through a weird but somewhat familiar Rutgers game, Michigan's apparent 2022 m.o., the defense's takeover in an absolutely dominant second half, what makes the ground game so good (besides the obvious), the lingering question at receiver, and some special-teams nonsense, then pivot to the, uh, "uninspired" performances elsewhere in the Big Ten and the implications of the updat...

Serena and Matt react to the, uh, questionable" logic behind the College Football Playoff rankings and what (if anything) an initial #5 ranking means for Michigan, then turn to Rutgers and what we can expect/learn against a team that's basically Worse Iowa but will definitely do some things on defense that are much different from what Michigan's been seeing for most of the last month.

Serena and Matt address The Tunnel Nonsense and what happens next from a legal standpoint (with an actual lawyer!), put Michigan State in its place, then move on to the on-field ass-kicking Michigan delivered, including an all-around dominant defensive performance, a "take what you're given game" from the offense, another Heisman-caliber outing for Blake Corum, a lot of Money Moody, and the one th...

Serena and Matt designate a new Five-Star Iowa and declare Penn State not actually bad (but definitely worthy of Jim Harbaugh's dismissiveness), then turn to Michigan-Michigan State to discuss the unbearable discourse, the reality of good Michigan vs. bad Michigan State, fear levels, whether Michigan State has a realistic path to victory, and the genius of Mike Hart.

Serena and Matt look back at a thorough ass-kicking of Penn State for which no caveats are needed, give the run game its due credit, talk #CorumForHeisman, find a few nits to pick in the red zone, point out the defense's equally dominant performance against a pretty good skill-position group, and then turn to the month ahead and the potential for Football Armageddon 2.0.

Serena and Matt unpack an eventful Michigan-Indiana game, rant about the lopsided officiating, give some credit to the defense (and an adjustment), call out a potentially problematic schematic issue on offense, gush over Blake Corum yet again, dissect a pretty good J.J. McCarthy performance, and then spend too much time on Michigan State, dignity, and the Iowa-Illinois rockfight.

Serena and Matt celebrate the end of Kinnick juju, marvel at the beauty of Blake Corum and the (much larger) guys doing serious work on the offensive line, share their thoughts on J.J.'s efficient/Cade-like day, complain a little about the mostly-fine-but-occasionally-shaky defense, then revel in some Sparty schadenfreude and look ahead to an Indiana team that is, uh, not good.

Serena and Matt discuss Michigan's somewhat-uncomfortable-but-kinda-decisive win over Maryland, marvel at Blake Corum, debate J.J. McCarthy's performance, identify the couple of lingering issues that keep popping up on each side of the ball, and look ahead to Iowa to determine whether Kinnick juju actually exists and how much it matters against a team that has apparently opted not to field an offe...

Serena and Matt discuss the few relevant things that happened against UConn (including some additional data points from J.J. McCarthy), step back for a post-cupcake-season review of what we feel good about and what lingering concerns/questions exist, look ahead to a real(-ish?) opponent in Maryland, and then take a spin around the Big Ten (Penn State stock up, NFTuck value plummeting).

Serena and Matt discuss the decisive end of the Michigan quarterback competition, the most impressive/fun/meaningful aspects of J.J. McCarthy's "near-flawless" performance, what happened to Cade McNamara, what it means for the offense going forward, other takeaways from an obliteration of a terrible team, and the state of the Big Ten West (spoiler: it's real bad!).

Serena and Matt discuss Michigan's season-opening win over Colorado State, including an unexpectedly dominant defensive effort (complete with many sacks!) and a suboptimal Cade McNamara performance that left the door verrry open for J.J. McCarthy, then spend the appropriate amount of time on Week 2 and what appears to be a god-awful Hawaii team.

Matt and Serena discuss Harbaugh's plan for the quarterbacks (and other tidbits from the Jansen podcast), what it would take to deem this season a successful one, predicting overall records, and previewing Colorado State.  Forever Sat Pod is recorded from the Balkans!  Harbaugh announces his plan to start Cade week one and JJ week two.  Does this mean Cade has lost the job?  There are too many sta...

Serena and Matt consider the most interesting/funny/dumb possible storylines for the upcoming season, make their not-very-interesting national title picks, share a couple hot-take predictions, and then break down Week 0 with a discussion of whether there is anything at all to be learned from Nebraska-Northwestern in Dublin.

Serena and Matt break down the Michigan defense, discuss the lingering question around how to replace two irreplaceable edges (and the organic pass rush they provided), assess what's realistic given the personnel losses and D-coordinator transition, and briefly touch on a special-teams unit that should be among the best in the country.

Serena and Matt preview the Michigan offense (mostly excluding the quarterbacks, who already got their own episode) with a position-by-position breakdown and three overarching questions about the unit as a whole, including the big one: after seven straight Harbaugh seasons in which the defense carried a majority of the weight, is this the year the offense finally ascends into the "elite" conversat...

It's time for the Michigan quarterback discussion: Serena and Matt pick their sides in the Cade-vs.-J.J. debate and make their best arguments, then take a few minutes to discuss what they think Jim Harbaugh will *actually* do in terms of QB playing time throughout the first week/month/whatever of the season.

Serena and Matt talk through the narratives/superlatives heading into the season for each team in the Big Ten East: who "won the offseason," who's got the most to prove, who's most likely to take a step back, who's dealing with the saddest state of affairs, and more.

Serena and Matt briefly discuss what's next for the Big Ten (Notre Dame? Oregon?) and the remnants of the Pac-12 in Expansion Times, then dive into the Big Ten West preview to talk through who we're highest on, who we're most down on, who's being slept on, who's truly the most unwatchable (in a division of unwatchables), and more.

Serena and Matt react to the Big Ten's apparently impending addition of USC and UCLA and talk about what it means for the Big Ten (from alignment to scheduling to exposure to recruiting), whether the Pac-12 has any path to viability, and whether megaconferences are coming (or are already here)

In a grab-bag/mailbag episode, Serena and Matt discuss the Big Ten's likely move to a division-less structure, assess the options for TV partners (what would it mean to cut off ESPN? what about some streaming-only games?), briefly touch on Michigan's kind-of-fake budget, and share their thoughts on what Michigan should do about Bo and the continued embarrassing remarks from within the athletic dep...

For the numbers nerds, Matt and Serena run through an attempted calculation of how much Michigan's roster is worth in "NIL" money given Ryan Day's comments and James Franklin's response, then briefly touch on Michigan's announced NIL collective and the C.J. Carr commitment fallout. Ryan Day says it will cost $13M to keep Ohio State's roster intact  Day also says that the going rate for QBs is arou...

Serena and Matt do the Fox/ESPN thing and draft the best Big Ten games of 2022 to see who can come up with a more watchable schedule for the season overall, then discuss the implications of the Big Ten apparently taking down its schedules for 2023 and beyond. Ground rules:  We flip a coin -- winner gets to draft first and they select a week ( i.e . - Week 13, the week of Michigan/OSU) to get the f...