First, some updates on the story. Because some more bombshells dropped today, and it just gets worse and worse.

Apparently, the person who first blew the whistle on this whole thing was NOT Ryan Day, or Greg Schiano, or Mel Tucker, or name your Big Ten coach with an axe to grind against Jim Harbaugh.

It looks like it was a powerful Michigan alum by the name of Jim Stapleton, at least that’s what prominent Michigan reporter John U. Bacon alluded. Bacon was on 97.1 “The Fan”, a Columbus sports talk radio show (one of the hosts was former Ohio State linebacker and media personality Bobby Carpenter, the other I don’t know) and discussed the burgeoning scandal (is that the correct word? Or has it already burgeoned? Whatever.)

Bacon noted that the radio silence coming from the university regarding the scandal is telling, in that nobody has really leapt to Jim Harbaugh’s defense. He also described the relationship between Harbaugh and Athletic Director Warde Manuel as “frosty at best,” aka they can’t stand one another.

But the most interesting nugget that Bacon revealed was about Stapleton. I’m going to transcribe directly here in case you can’t listen to the whole 10-minute segment:

“Watch a guy named Jim Stapleton. Jim Stapleton is a Michigan alum who blackballed Harbaugh when he was trying out for the Vikings [head coaching job] because [Stapleton] was on the board of the Minnesota Vikings. He now got himself onto the NCAA infractions committee, and he hates Jim Harbaugh. It doesn’t matter who the source is, if it’s right or wrong, if Michigan did it, they’ll still pay a price. That’s not the point–you can’t kill the messenger. But as far as the leaking goes, that’s where it’s coming from [Stapleton].

It really be your own people sometimes, huh?

Well, now we know why Harbaugh didn’t get the Vikings head coaching job this past winter even though it was widely expected he would get it.

We know why the NCAA is apparently out to get Harbaugh–because this guy Stapleton is on the board of infractions.

And now it seems pretty clear that this guy Stapleton was the one who blew the lid off of this story and took it public–at least that’s what I inferred from Bacon.

Who is Jim Stapleton? I found this picture of him, as well as some background information on him, at MGoBlog, probably the #1 independent Michigan Wolverines athletics site. They start it off with a comment left on one of their boards:

“I do handyman type work for a commercial property management company in Ann Arbor. We have a half dozen big properties on Main St. lots of our tenants are big local companies you’d know. One tenant tells me that a guy he does a business with is a lawyer who is closely connected to UM athletics, and apparently despises Harbaugh. He apparently was a big Ron English advocate back in 2014 during the coaching search, I kid you not. He was bitter that Michigan didn’t go with “his guy” and has never let go of that bitterness. Not long ago he got himself onto the infractions committee at the NCAA and he has major pull now wrt their investigations, and it was shortly thereafter that cheeseburger scandal erupted.“

Upon further digging, it turns out that this anecdote is in reference to Jim Stapleton, who is listed on the NCAA’s website as a member of the committee on infractions.

The article goes on to detail Stapleton’s influence at Michigan over the past decade or so. He apparently was accused of “sabotaging” former head coach Rich Rodriguez, disagreed with the school’s decision to get rid of Brady Hoke, and wanted them to hire Ron English (former head coach at Eastern Michigan, current defensive coordinator at Louisville) in late 2014 instead of Jim Harbaugh.

Stapleton’s background is that he’s a lawyer, was a former regent at Eastern Michigan, and is described as a big Michigan booster.

The MGoBLog article doesn’t really detail any other reason Stapleton might have for despising Harbaugh other than Stapleton wanted Michigan to hire English instead. You would think, though, that nine years into Harbaugh’s tenure, he would drop the grudge. But apparently he hasn’t, and I think there’s got to be more to it than just sour grapes from 2014. Why would he hold this against Jim Harbaugh when Jim Harbaugh wasn’t the one who made the decision to hire Jim Harbaugh? There had to be a reason he opposed Jim Harbaugh’s hiring in the first place, is my guess.

Jim Harbaugh, after all, does not have the best track record at, y’know, getting along with people he works with.

Everywhere Jim Harbaugh goes, he makes enemies. People simply cannot stand the guy. He can’t get along with the Athletic Director; a prominent Michigan alum despises him so much he blackballed him from the Minnesota Vikings, and now he’s the reason the entire Michigan football program is crashing to the ground.

This guy Stapleton must have realized what he was doing, I’m sure. He knows full well that when all is said and done, this could set the Michigan football program back decades. And yet he blew the whistle anyway, so deep is his hatred of Jim Harbaugh.

Did Harbaugh nail this guy’s wife or something? Who knows.

But man, it looks as if being a monumental prick is catching up to Jim Harbaugh. You just can’t make this many enemies and not expect it to bite you in the ass eventually. I mean, all the guy did when he was coaching the 49ers was win, and they got rid of him after just four years. They couldn’t stand him.

When you are as reviled as Jim Harbaugh is, you’d better be squeaky clean, because eventually someone is going to try to bring you down.

And now, Harbaugh has apparently made himself quite a powerful enemy. This guy Stapleton is an attorney, he’s got lots of money, and clearly he has lots of access and pull within the program.

I wonder if we’d know any of this about the scouting/spying if Jim Harbaugh didn’t have such a penchant for making enemies everywhere he goes. In other words, I wonder if Stapleton would have blew the lid on this if he didn’t despise Harbaugh so much.

It’s also possible that this scandal is why he despises Harbaugh so much–maybe Stapleton just has a strict moral code and his conscience compelled him to blow the lid on this. After all, he’s on the infractions committee, this is definitely an infraction.

But the fact that it now appears this whole scandal was exposed by a Michigan insider really changes the whole dynamic.

It is no longer a situation where the NCAA is trying to piece this together and getting no help from within the Michigan program. It is not Michigan vs. the NCAA; there is someone inside of the Michigan program that is not only aiding and assisting the NCAA, but is actually part of the NCAA itself. Someone with access has opened up the gates to the NCAA from the inside.

At this point, I don’t see how Michigan will be able to hide anything. This is how every conspiracy seems to unravel: someone on the inside flips, or blows the whistle. This is typically how investigators or prosecutors get their major breaks. Once they find that one person who is willing to flip, it’s game over.

Okay, now moving on to the latest story to drop, this one coming from the Washington Post. (Boy has this story really blown up, huh?)

This seems like a pretty big deal:

The sign-stealing investigation threatening to disrupt Michigan’s football season began after an outside investigative firm approached the NCAA with documents and videos the firm said it had obtained from computer drives maintained and accessed by multiple Michigan coaches, according to two people familiar with the matter, evidence that suggests the scandal’s impact could broaden beyond the suspension of one low-level assistant.

I wonder if it had something to do with Matt Weiss, the former Michigan Co-OC who was fired earlier this year for unspecified and mysterious “computer access crimes”.

I don’t think Weiss’s “computer access crimes” had anything to do with this spying scandal. I really don’t. I think it was something worse–like some sort of inappropriate images, or maybe he was stalking some secretary he was previously having an affair with or something. For some reason I think the Weiss ordeal was about him being a sicko or a pervert.

But it’s possible that whomever was investigating Weiss found out about the spying ring in the process, and this whole scandal was uncovered inadvertently.

These people spoke on the condition of anonymity because they were not authorized to speak about an ongoing NCAA investigation. They did not disclose who hired the outside firm that approached the NCAA. The NCAA, the Big Ten and Michigan declined to comment.

Now the speculation begins: who hired the outside firm? That’s the million dollar question.

Some people have been saying it’s the Vegas sportsbooks who first sounded the alarm after they started noticing how great Michigan had suddenly become against the spread. If Vegas sees a team go 23-11-2 against the spread (and counting) over the past three seasons after previously going 32-38-1 against the spread the previous 6 seasons, their alarm bells start going off. They know something’s up, and that pisses them off because it’s costing them money–the lines are mispriced because Michigan is doing something that Vegas had not previously accounted for.

I understand why Vegas would have a very keen interest in making sure everything is on the up and up at Michigan–it’s costing them money.

What I don’t understand is how Vegas can launch an investigation of the Michigan football program without actually enlisting the police. Vegas is powerful, but I don’t think they’re that powerful. Vegas can’t just hire a private firm to investigate anybody they please. I mean, sure, they could hire a private eye, but a private eye can’t just barge into the Michigan football facilities and start going through their computers. To do that, you either need the subpoena power of a court, or you need to already be investigating them for something else and stumble upon this inadvertently.

So I don’t think Vegas initiated this investigation. They might have tipped off the person who initiated the investigation, but I don’t think they hired the outside firm to investigate Michigan.

I think it had to be someone with authority inside of the Michigan athletic department or at the NCAA.

Was it Jim Stapleton? Does he have the power to do that? I’m just speculating here, but it’s the explanation that makes the most sense to me. He’s got both pull in Ann Arbor and he’s on the NCAA infractions board.

I think this was an inside job. It’s starting to look more and more like that’s the case.

Of course, online Michigan fans have all the evidence they need: Ryan Day did it.

It just has to be true!

Moving on….

While NCAA rules do not explicitly prohibit sign-stealing — the practice of decoding signals opposing coaches use to send in play calls to players on the field — the organization does ban video-recording opposing coaches, as well as in-person scouting of upcoming opponents. And according to the investigation conducted by this outside firm, Michigan football has been utilizing a sign-stealing operation involving both in-person scouting as well as video-recording coaches, these people said, since at least last season, when the team went 13-1, winning a second consecutive Big Ten title before losing in the College Football Playoff semifinals.

The ESPN stories by Pete Thamel have said the spying goes back to 2021, and yesterday’s in particular noted that Stalions bought tickets to both the 2022 and 2021 SEC Championship games, which means definitely goes back past last season.

The outside firm’s investigation began this season, these people said, and involved interviews with people knowledgeable about Michigan football’s scouting operations, as well as reviewing documents and videos related to sign-stealing efforts. Last Tuesday, these people said, this firm presented its evidence to top NCAA officials. The next day, the Big Ten later confirmed, the NCAA informed both the conference and Michigan that it had opened an investigation.

Stalions played a major role in overseeing and coordinating sign-stealing efforts, the outside investigation found, but the firm’s evidence suggested he wasn’t acting alone. The outside firm did not present any evidence directly linking Harbaugh to the sign-stealing operation, according to the people with knowledge. In the days since Stalions’ name circulated as a key figure in the investigation, videos and photos circulated on social media taken during Michigan games showing him standing near coaches, including the team’s defensive and co-offensive coordinators.

Among the pieces of evidence the firm presented, these people said, was a detailed schedule of Michigan’s planned sign-stealing travel for the rest of this season, listing opponents’ schedules, which games Michigan scouts would attend, and how much money was budgeted for travel and tickets to scout each team.

They had it BUDGETED.

And we all knew this because there’s no way Stalions bankrolled this operation himself.

The opponents targeted the most on this schedule, these people said, were not surprising. Atop the list was Ohio State, Michigan’s top rival in the Big Ten, and scouts planned to attend as many as eight games, costing more than $3,000 in travel and tickets. Next on the list was Georgia, a potential Michigan opponent in the College Football Playoff, with four or five games scheduled for in-person scouting and video-recording, also costing more than $3,000 in travel and tickets.

In total, these people said, Michigan’s sign-stealing operation expected to spend more than $15,000 this season sending scouts to more than 40 games played by 10 opponents. According to the university’s public salary disclosure records, Stalions, listed as an administrative specialist in the athletics department, made $55,000 in 2022.

Yeah, there’s no way Stalions paid for this out of his own pocket.

The outside firm also presented to NCAA officials photographs of people investigators believed to be Michigan scouts in action — including current students interning with the football team. The photos showed these people seated at games of Michigan opponents this season, aiming their cellphones at the sidelines. Days later, the outside firm told the NCAA, cellphone videos depicting the coaching staffs from these games were uploaded to a computer drive maintained and accessed by Stalions as well as several other Michigan assistants and coaches.

They caught them red-handed.

No timeline has been disclosed for when the NCAA could conclude its investigation. Harbaugh, in his statement, said he and his staff will “fully cooperate” with the NCAA investigation. The news came just months after an earlier NCAA investigation of Michigan concluded with a finding that Harbaugh violated recruiting rules and failed to cooperate with investigators. The university suspended Harbaugh for three games at the beginning of this season as a result.

What I’m wondering is how many games the spies have already attended, and how many teams’ signs they’ve already stolen this season.

Yesterday it was reported that Stalions bought tickets to the Ohio State-Penn State game, on both sides of the field, so that he could have people spy on both teams. But nobody ever showed up to sit in those seats, unsurprisingly. At first I thought that was proof that Michigan hadn’t yet been able to spy on either Ohio State or Penn State, but then I quickly realized that Stalions easily could’ve had spies attend earlier games this season.

It underscores my overall thought on this whole thing, though: Michigan has been cheating THIS SEASON. They have already cheated in their games this season. I see no other option but to disqualify them from postseason play. You cannot allow a team that has cheated to be allowed to compete in the postseason. They cannot be allowed to take a playoff spot away from a program that didn’t cheat.

And not only that, how can they even be allowed to play against the teams they’ve spied on?

It’s one thing to find out that they spied on Rutgers after they’d already played Rutgers. But now we know they’ve spied on future opponents. How can you allow them to play against teams they’ve spied on like Ohio State and Georgia?

I don’t want Michigan to have to forfeit the Ohio State game–I’d rather see them lose it fair and square.

It’s more the Georgia aspect that really doesn’t sit well with me. Imagine Michigan gets into the playoffs and draws Georgia. We know Michigan has already spied on Georgia this season–everyone knows it. How can that be allowed?

Michigan has to be ruled ineligible from postseason play. I don’t see any other option. Let them play the remaining four games on their schedule, make sure every team on their schedule knows Michigan likely spied on them and stole all their signs, but those games don’t actually count.

It’s not nearly as severe of a cheating scandal, but I remember when I was a kid, there was a lot of controversy over Sammy Sosa being caught in the act of using a corked bat. This was in 2003. When his bat broke and the cork was discovered inside of it, they immediately ejected him from the game and he was suspended for 7 games.

Again, that incident compared to Michigan is like comparing jaywalking to grand larceny, but it’s a readily available example of someone caught red-handed in the act of cheating in the midst of the season. And the MLB suspended his ass. They didn’t wait until the season was over to conduct a full and thorough investigation–if you are caught cheating, you are disqualified, period.

When MLB players gets caught using banned substances, they are typically banned for at least 50 games if I recall correctly.

Some counter examples to that do exist, though. The Spygate scandal with the Patriots broke early during the 2007 season, in which they went 16-0 and got all the way to the Super Bowl before losing to the Giants. The NFL didn’t disqualify the Patriots for that, although I wonder if that had more to do with the NFL trying to cover it up to avoid tarnishing the brand.

However, the NFL did act much more swiftly over Spygate than the NCAA is with the Michigan scandal. Spygate was reported on September 9, 2007, and by September 13, Roger Goodell had fined Bill Belichick $500,000, the maximum allowable fine in the NFL. I’m pretty sure, from what I gather on the Wikipedia page, that the whole Spygate investigation was concluded within about 11 days–the NFL fined Belichick, then confiscated and destroyed all the Patriots’ tapes, notes and materials related to their spying, and that was that as far as the NFL was concerned.

Additionally, with the whole “Deflategate” scandal (which I never thought was a scandal at all), the NFL still allowed the Patriots to play in the Super Bowl two weeks later (the deflated footballs were found during the 2014 AFC Championship game against the Colts). It took the NFL a while to hand down its punishment to Tom Brady for that, if I recall correctly. Brady appealed it and eventually had to serve a 4 game suspension, but not until the start of the 2016 season.

So I guess there are examples where teams or players caught in the act of cheating are punished but then allowed to resume competing after serving their suspension. All the examples I’ve listed are from professional sports leagues, though.

And another difference here is that, as I see it, this Michigan spying scandal goes far deeper than even Spygate did. I know there was a lot of speculation as to how far back the Patriots’ spying actually went–there were allegations that it went back to the 2001 Super Bowl between the Rams and Patriots, or even as far back as 2000, which was Belichick’s first season as coach of the Patriots. But as far as the NFL investigation went, Roger Goodell said that the the extent of the Patriots’ spying was six tapes spanning from the 2006 season to the 2007 preseason.

Michigan’s spying scandal goes back further than just a year and entails at least 40 different games. It feels like a much bigger deal than Spygate, even though Spygate was a massive story back when it broke in 2007.

So, is this the biggest cheating scandal in sports history?

It certainly feels like it, although we are in the moment now, and we don’t have the full details (even though what’s been revealed already is pretty staggering). We won’t be able to say for certain until the dust settles, but from what has been revealed already, the scope of this Michigan spying is much wider than Spygate.

I’m trying to think of other scandals…

The Black Sox scandal of 1919 is pretty much the worst of the worst, as players on the White Sox threw the World Series for money. But that was more in the points shaving/financial corruption category rather than cheating. Those guys on the Black Sox did the opposite of cheating–they lost on purpose.

The MLB steroids scandal of the 1990s comes to mind here. But for as big a scandal as that was, it was individual players at the center of it, not teams. It wasn’t like entire teams were juicing and dominating the league–it was more about the individual players who were juicing and the ramifications on their individual legacies. The steroid scandal, as far as I’m concerned, did not threaten or shake the fundamental credibility and integrity of the sport.

The Astros sign-stealing scandal of 2017 was a big freaking deal, and people still despise the Astros because of it to this day. That, to me, feels about on par with what Michigan did.

There have been a ton of scandals to rock the sports world over the years, but I honestly can’t think of a more blatant and egregious system of cheating than Michigan. I’m trying not to get too caught up in the moment here, but as I see it, it’s between Spygate, the Astros and Michigan, and this just feels like it’s the worst of the three.

The thing about Spygate is, like I said earlier, the gap between what people think or assume or allege the Patriots did, and what the NFL actually punished the Patriots for. Spygate may have been more about people’s imaginations running wild about all the nefarious things the Patriots might have done than it was about the transgressions the Patriots were actually found by the NFL to have done.

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Also, a warning sign we should’ve picked up on: Josh Gattis, Michigan offensive coordinator in 2021 wins the Broyles Award as the nation’s top coordinator. Then goes to Miami in 2022 and is one of the worst coordinators in the entire Power Five.

Some hilarity from 2019. Oh how the mighty have fallen:

Immediately after getting blown out 56-27 by Ohio State, their 8th straight loss to Ohio State, Michigan fans were at the end of their rope. All they had left to hang their hats on was, “At least we are morally superior!”

How about that?

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And finally, from Sports Illustrated, the picture of just who, exactly, Connor Stalions is gets a bit clearer–he is an utter fanatic with delusions of grandeur. You’ll see why shortly.

It did not take Connor Stalions long into the text conversation to start boasting about his connections to the Michigan football team: “I’m close with the whole staff,” he wrote. Particularly, he said, he “became close with CP and Jay Harbs,” apparently referring to current linebackers coach Chris Partridge and running backs and assistant special teams coach Jay Harbaugh, who is the son of head coach Jim Harbaugh.

“Pre-covid, stole opponent signals during the week watching tv copies then flew to the game and stood next to [then Michigan offensive coordinator Josh] Gattis and told him what coverage/pressure he was gettin,” Stalions continued.

These texts are part of a lengthy back-and-forth in January and February 2021 between Stalions and a then student at a Power 5 school who was looking to break into the college football industry. 

The former Power 5 student shared the full text conversation with Sports Illustrated, verifying the messages’ origin by removing Stalions’s name in his contacts to reveal a phone number. That number was linked to Stalions’s name on the public database WhitePages. There was no response when SI called and texted the number. Stalions’s text messages to the student provide a vivid picture of his motivations, revealing an aspiring coach obsessed with helping Michigan while looking to build his own career and one day lead the program.

…

Stalions, now 28, revealed that he was part of a small group of people—two of whom he said were at low-level positions on different college football coaching staffs—who were putting their heads together on a long-term plan to run the Michigan football program. Stalions claimed to have a Google document between 550 and 600 pages long that he managed daily, containing a blueprint for the Wolverines’ future. He referred the document as a movement more than a plan, dubbing it “the Michigan Manifesto.”

Stalions wrote, “I think it’s pretty rare to find the right type of people who can grasp a vision of the future and want to team up and run s—. And we all got our own stuff goin on, but we all got some pretty unique approaches. Basically the way I see it, there’s a future Ohio State head coach and staff out there somewhere preparing for it whether they know it or not. And we have a group of a half dozen actively planning s— 15 or so years out. And another dozen or two on board. So by the time it’s ready to rock, we’re all on the same page and we quickly make Michigan the ultimate standard.”

So what did his grand plan consist of?

Simple: recruit players with high GPAs but low SAT test scores because they have the best work ethic.

….. In the course of his conversation with the Power 5 student, which extended over about three weeks, Stalions would claim that shortly after graduation, he obtained a decade’s worth of high school national standardized test scores and GPAs for approximately 500 Midshipmen football players—data that he should not have been allowed to possess. He claimed that he simply went to the Naval Academy’s admissions office and “name dropped” coach Ken Niumatalolo. While he said the admissions office told him to delete the data the following day, Stalions was coy over whether he had and made clear that he used the data to inform his recruiting philosophy.

….

Stalions told the student that the data led him to conclude there is a direct relationship among test scores, GPAs and the work habits of athletes. Stalions’s pet theory was that athletes with lower SAT or ACT scores but high GPAs would be strong performers on the field because while test scores indicate intelligence, GPAs “give you work ethic.” Those students, essentially, were outworking their natural abilities. However specious the theory, Stalions claimed he had presented it to other coaches.

Seems like Stalions has a history resorting to shady, unscrupulous behavior to access information he wants. Appears to be an individual with little to no reservations over flouting the rules or behaving unethically.

This guy was positively obsessed with Michigan football and believed he would one day be the head coach:

While at the Naval Academy, a source close to the football program described Stalions as obsessed with Michigan to an excessive degree. It was not uncommon for Stalions, even as a Navy student assistant, to attend Michigan games while the Midshipmen weren’t playing at home in Annapolis.

Stalions chose to attend the Naval Academy despite, he said, getting into Michigan, where both his parents attended. An article awarding him Coach of the Month honors from an organization called Soldiers to Sidelines said Stalions chose the Naval Academy because famous coaches from Bo Schembechler to Bill Belichick had either served in the military or had strong connections to the academies.

“I’ve grown up my entire life with a vision to coach football at Michigan,” Stalions told the publication.

…..

Citing Stalions’s LinkedIn, ESPN reported that he was stationed at Camp Pendleton in California during his Marines service. In addition to his travels to Michigan, Stalions claimed he would drive to Tucson, Ariz., to help former Michigan offensive coordinator Jedd Fisch as he transitioned to his new Wildcats coaching job. While Stalions wrote that he did odd jobs for Fisch at times in Ann Arbor, the initial connection was through Partridge, the Michigan linebackers coach whom Stalions called one of his “closest friends.” He said Partridge gave him his initial inroad at Michigan, allowing him to help out at the school while he was on spring break from the Naval Academy. Stalions wrote that he went to Fisch’s house in California while he was working as an offensive assistant for the Los Angeles Rams to help him organize his coaching materials. When Fisch got the Arizona job, that led to, as Stalions claims, his essentially being assistant to Fisch’s chief of staff, with a hand in the Wildcats’ roster management.

A spokesperson for Arizona denied most of Stalions’s claims, saying Fisch has never been aware of nor directed any efforts to steal signs, nor has he benefited from them, either at Michigan or Arizona. The spokesperson said that while Stalions did assist Fisch with “organizing some materials for head coach interviews in 2018 … Stalions has not been a chief of staff nor any other type of member of Fisch’s staff during his three seasons as the head coach at Arizona.”

This dude is kind of psychotic, it seems. A 600 page manifesto? I mean, come on–who writes manifestos other than megalomaniacs?

I really think this dude Stalions just needed to get laid but that’s just me.

His zeal for all things Michigan football, and his voracious ambition paint a picture of a guy who is, pretty clearly, willing to do just about anything to either help Michigan win or get his foot in the door of the college football world.

Connor Stalions saw himself as the future head coach of Michigan football.

Now it’s pretty likely he’s destroyed the program.

The sanctions that are going to come down on Michigan are going to be devastating for many years to come. Harbaugh is not going to be there much longer, the whole coaching staff is tainted, players are going to transfer–everyone associated with this will be tainted.

And Connor Stalions is the face of it all.

Obviously the Michigan coaches could’ve told him to get lost when he (if he, but I’m assuming he did) approached them with his stolen opponent signs. What Stalions did ultimately falls on the Michigan coaches–and Harbaugh himself. Even if it was all Stalions’ idea, they went along with it, used the information he obtained improperly, and were all co-conspirators in this.

I’m not sure if this was all his brainchild, or if the coaches instructed him to do it and he happily obliged. In the eyes of the NCAA it’s kind of all the same.

But now Stalions, the kid who thought he was destined to one day be the head coach of the Michigan Wolverines, is now the face of one of the biggest cheating scandals in sports history. Rightly or wrongly, he is the scapegoat.

The worst part of it for him is, Michigan’s only play here is to pin it all on him–everyone has to act like they never really had contact with him, that he acted on his own volition, they had no idea what he was doing, etc. Even though we’ve all seen the shots of him basically standing shoulder to shoulder and talking to Michigan’s offensive and defensive coordinators, they will have to throw him under the bus and paint a picture of him as some rogue actor who did little more than grab coffees for them.

In fact, that’s probably exactly why they tasked him with this–because he was a nobody that they could easily cut ties with in the event this thing went south. A patsy. You can’t have a scheme like this linked to the upper echelon of the coaching staff.

I kind of feel bad for Stalions. He must be positively devastated right now. Michigan football was his life–all he wanted to do was help Michigan win. He thought he was the savior of the program, and that he would one day be in the Big Chair.

And now his name is associated with the downfall of the Michigan football program. It’s a cruel twist of fate fit for a Shakespearean tragedy, no doubt.

But unfortunately for Stalions, he brought it upon himself. Yes, he was stupid for the way that he actually went about orchestrating his spying ring–he didn’t really cover his tracks well, if at all. But his biggest mistake was in risking so much for people who were fully prepared and willing to kick him to the curb when shit hit the fan.

Stalions is going to learn the hard way that people who will either instruct you to break the rules or encourage you to break the rules are not your friends.

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One last thing I want to talk about here: it’s annoying how much the media is still gushing over how “dominant” Michigan is this year. “They’re the best team in the country!” “They’re the favorites to win the National Championship!” “They’re unbelievably good!”

First of all, they were never winning the National Championship, whether or not they got caught. They’re frauds. They’ve always been frauds.

Second of all, they’ve played the softest schedule in the Power Five.

But how can people sing their praises when it’s now been shown that they cheated?

It’s all fake! Nothing that they’ve done this year is legit–all their stats are fake. They are not really as good as people think they are. They are not as good as they’ve looked.

They haven’t been playing on a level playing field for years.

Everything we’ve seen out of Michigan this year is fake. Stop taking what they’ve done this season at face value–it’s all fake. It’s because they cheated.

The way it’s starting to look now, they were focusing their spying efforts mainly on Ohio State and other programs that they perceived to be the greatest threats to them winning the Big Ten and going undefeated. So perhaps they weren’t actually stealing signs and cheating against lesser teams in the Big Ten.

But we also pretty much know for a fact they did it against Rutgers. Greg Schiano said as much in that now infamous halftime interview.

I think they were stealing just about everybody’s signs. Because there’s still a benefit to doing it against teams that have no chance of beating you: you’ll beat them more convincingly, and then have people calling you the best team in the country because of the way you so thoroughly dominated the teams on your pathetic schedule.

I.e. exactly what’s happening right now.