B1G 2021 // Pure Michigan Beer, Pure Michigan Scheduling

It almost feels like a shame to follow up two scorching hate pieces with...well, this.

As a throwback to my college days and my approximate diet right now, we’re making our potlucks for Michigan Week my two staples: cornflakes and beer.

Also I’m turning in this Potluck three days late, is there any way I can still get an A in the class? I really need one for the summer internship I’m hoping to secure.

My yearly academic conference is in Grand Rapids, which means I go for approximately 4-5 panels that I’m not speaking in, listen to old people argue about where the Midwest is, and begin making reservations at the various breweries in Grand Rapids: Vivant for starters, of course, with a trip to Knickerbocker for all New Holland’s high-gravity stuff, up to Mitten and City Built for whatever they’ve got on, and—in the past, at least—finishing the night arguing with those same old people (who are now drunk) about how the Midwest doesn’t include Missouri, and fuck you for even suggesting it does.

We’re very cool people.

This year, while we were still remote, I managed to get in on the action again, having a Bell’s by the lake while live-tweeting the conference.

With all this in mind, it’s still Old Nation’s M-43 that comes to mind when I think “Michigan Beer”.

Perhaps it’s good branding, perhaps it’s some weird beer-related object permanence, perhaps I just haven’t broadened my horizons enough.

But enlighten me, writers:
1. What beer, for you, embodies “Michigan”?
2. Give me a Michigan brewery I haven’t mentioned that I should talk about OR that you’ve been jonesing to try, and
3. Is there an iconic beer for your state, school, or hometown that we should know about?

WSR: 1) Bells Two Hearted, right? They never shut the hell up about it.

2) I could go for a Founders Rubaeus right about now. They’re really good.

3) Minnesota has an amazing beer scene and I have a difficult time narrowing it down to just one. In fact, I’m even going to offer a hearty “Fuck you” to old favorite Surly (Y’all still looking to hire for the restaurant at your brewery? Why is that again?) and skip over Schell’s (Home of both Grain Belt and the outstanding variety of Schell’s beers) and give a quick attaboy to Nordic Brewing in Monticello. There’s nothing special about it, but it makes a variety of good beers. Keep up the great work, and I’ll stop in to decompress after every time I visit family up there.

LPW:

1. It’s definitely Bells Two Hearted
2. You should try going to Beer Church Brewing in New Buffalo. My wife and I drove from Chicago to New Buffalo for our wedding anniversary last October, and we had a nice time walking around New Buffalo off peak. I liked the beers I had at Beer Church Brewing. Yes, it’s a brewery inside of an old church.
3. There’s a great beer scene here in Chicago. Today, my family and I went to Half Acre Brewery on the far north side and enjoyed a nice meal and a few beers. One of my go-to beers is Daisy Cutter, a nice Pale Ale. I also am quite fond of drinking anything from Revolution Brewing.

Green Akers: I’d narrowly give it to Oberon, also by Bell’s, over Two Hearted, but that’s mostly because I think the IPA is a foul concept generally such that I don’t even enjoy good ones like Two Hearted and Pseudo Sue.

I would guess those outside metro Detroit probably aren’t hip to Eastern Market BC, located a couple blocks over from the venerable farmers market of the same name. They’ve stayed busy through ‘rona, and came up with a fantastic new sour, the Quarantine Dream, and at 5.0 ABV it’s even possible to avoid a hangover after pounding them all day.

Saginaw got in on the brewery game a few years ago with Oracle BC. It’s a pretty modest offering list and distribution area for now, but I thought the Shinn Ale was a pretty solid Scottish. Haven’t been in the taproom for a bit now for, well, The Reasons.

MNW: Well this is a lot less fun if everyone hits Bell’s, though I would think that, outside of the possibly-problematic Founders, is likely the best-known national brand out of Michigan. I actually think the first beer I knew of from Michigan, though, was New Holland’s Dragon’s Milk, and I’ll put that as a low-key contender here for the nomination.

But since Thump isn’t here right now, I’ll give love to Short’s Soft Parade. Fruit ale. Amazing.

Nordic Brewing, WSR? Huh. Wanna go tomorrow?

In terms of the actual “school-specific” beers, I know Roseville’s Bent Brewstillery does a “Maroon and Bold” IIPA that’s decent and dank, but has been pretty inconsistent, by my mark. We of course have to mention People’s Boiler Gold for Purdue, too.

Real shoutout, of course, to the official beer of Iowa: Busch Light.

Predicting Michigan’s record in 2021

Is this article just a flimsy “Hey, we like beer,” and “Hey, we have to pick Michigan’s record for 2021?” concept? You bet your sweet ass it is.

If you’re looking for some truly unoriginal scheduling, look no further. Even the logos—dear God, three Ws in the first five games, and “Huskies” back-to-back—are bland. (And holy shit, I never noticed how awful the Washington “W” is. What’s happening there?)

Setting up their September Heisman candidacy—whoever it may be—nicely, the Wolverines don’t leave the Mitten for the entire month of September, then march right into a full crossover slate of, well...it’s not murderer’s row, but is the West ever murderer’s row?

I don’t envy back-to-back weeks at wisconsin and Nebraska, but it’s the Wolverines’ bruising finish (after a cakewalk over Northwestern because lol we’re a trainwreck in Ann Arbor)—away to Michigan State and Penn State, with a frisky Indiana squad at home in the middle, and then the annual pasting by Ohio State. Woof.

Here you go, writers:
1. What should be the consequences for scheduling two MAC teams in one season?
2. Tell us how the Wolverines fare in 2021.
3. How are you?

HWAHSQB: By scheduling three W teams, michigan is guaranteed one more “W” in its first five games than they got all last season. “rimshot”

Look, I’m not going to throw stones about scheduling MAC teams. I wish Illinois has done it a lot more in the past 25 years. Go for it, you victors valiant, but if you schedule MAC teams, you better win. If you’re going to go around telling everyone you’re a blue blood, don’t dicktrip against a MAC team or you’ll never live it down.

cough, Appalachian State, cough cough.

I think michigan wins 7-8 games, sweeping the non-con and both NUs, losing badly to wisco, osu, and psu, and finding a hilariously stupid way to lose 1-2 of the other games.

WSR: 1) Your punishment for scheduling two MAC teams in one season should be that you lose all B1G logos in your stadium and on your uniforms for a year.

2) Let’s go with 8-4. Lose to the Huskies (Feel free to pick whichever one brings you more joy), Indiana, Penn State, and obviously the Buckeyes.

3) Eh, I’m surviving.

MNW: The MACDouble (come on, guys, I softballed that in) should result in your being forced to play a game against Eastern Michigan at Ford Field. As punishment for pulling the MACDouble in 2006, Northwestern playing their EMU game in 2007. Wikipedia claims 10,000 people—exactly!—attended that nonsense.

The Wolverines should be good enough to manage 2-1 on the crossovers, but...man, I have a tough time giving them more than 3 out of the East games. 8-4 (5-4) seems reasonable to me, given that they get Washington at home and hot shit is that game gonna be unwatchable.

I’m present.

MaximumSam: 1) I went to a MAC school for undergrad, so I think there ought to be a prize for scheduling MAC teams. This is more of a contender question - at the end of the year, if a team with a sterling record has beaten up some pansies (ahem, Clemson), then what do we think of them? Michigan is not that team. Michigan is the team that needs to schedule a few wins so they get bowl eligible.

2) It’s a big mystery, and all signs point to poorly. For one, they open with Western Michigan, which happens to be the top rated Michigan based team on the F+ last year. Then they get a pretty solid Washington team, and their B1G schedule is tough. There are exceedingly few easy outs for them if they trot out a similar team to last year. If they don’t really improve, they are staring at a 6-6 type of season.

3) Things ain’t bad. We hit the mall today and got some milkshakes at Shake Shack. While paying 25 bucks for four milkshakes is a pretty good racket, I must say the shakes were pretty danged good. Hitting the mall and buying milkshakes is a pleasure I appreciate, given well, you know.

Green Akers: Oh, the punishment for that crime is well-documented. You get over-slotted for your bowl and play a team markedly better than you, throwing a jug of kerosene on the offseason discussion of whether Coach X is ever going to do The Thing Your Program Is Aiming For, which of course varies depending on who you are.

If they do better than 8-4, get ready for the dumber-than-fiction Harbaugh 4 BTCOTY argument, because somebody at either the DetNews or Freep will make it. Washington’s receded from their late Petersen high-water, but that’s not a gimme by any means, and I still think going to Camp Randall that early could be a spirit-breaker.

As to #3, what? Me complain? I’m back in DCFC games, I’ve seen some of my friends this calendar year...everything’s coming up Akers!