(tl;dr - Michigan sucks because they’re arrogant and blame everyone else for their problems.)

Every team and school has rivals. If I were an Indiana fan, I would surely hate Purdue. But I posit that Michigan is completely worthy of all of the hate and loathing we have for them. 

Michigan is not simply our rival. They’re an arrogant, whiny poor excuse for a program and fan base. 

Here are some reasons. I encourage you to add your own. 

Delusions of Academic Superiority, Particularly as an Excuse for Sucking: Michigan fans love to carry themselves like they’re all Rhodes Scholars. If you talk to a Michigan alum, they will inevitably refer to a diploma as “essentially an Ivy League degree.” 

They won’t tell you this, but this is because a large percentage of Michigan alums applied to Ivy League schools -- or places like Stanford or Northwestern -- and didn’t get in (as an above-average public school, Michigan is the perfect ‘safety school’.) So the student body and alumni have spent the better part of the past 50 years burying their disappointment by convincing themselves that, even though Penn rejected them, it’s basically the same. 

This happens other places, but what makes it so tiresome at Michigan is that their fans use this as an excuse for losing. They say they simply can’t compete anymore in the soulless world that is college athletics because they’re held to an academic standard that prevents them from securing blue chip talent. 

Obviously, there hasn’t been a 5* athlete in the past generation begging to be a Wolverine that Michigan has turned away because of admissions. Just like every other school in the country with big-money athletics, if a kid is really good and really talented and wants to play there, they’ll get them in (not to mention, it certainly hasn’t stopped their basketball team from recruiting elite talent.)

And as long as we're on the subject, let's vet their academic superiority:

Is Michigan that much better than many other universities in the country with competitive football programs? Not really. Michigan ranks behind Stanford, Duke, Northwestern, Vanderbilt, Rice, Notre Dame, UCLA and Cal on the list of top U.S. universities -- all of whom run FBS football programs. In fact, they’re only two slots ahead of USC and Florida! So Michigan is not even the best academic institution in its own conference, and plenty of schools (Notre Dame, USC, Florida, etc.) seem to do just fine recruiting given their academic standards. 

Is Michigan even that much more academically discriminating as Ohio State? In 2021, the 75th percentile ACT score of Michigan freshmen was 33. At Ohio State, it was 31. So much for OSU admitting anything with a pulse. 

Officiating Conspiracy Theories as an Excuse for Sucking: This has gotten out of control. Every fan base complains about officiating, but no fan base -- and I mean no fan base -- blames their struggles squarely on officiating nearly as much as Michigan’s. 

Truthfully, football officials are struggling, particularly this year. In both the NCAA and the NFL, everyone is getting screwed. 

Ohio State definitely got screwed against Oregon. Yet when you look at this message board, nobody is still complaining about the officiating as a major contributing factor to that loss. 

Yet, go to MGoBlog and every reference to the Michigan State loss is about how they only lost because of “the refs.” Nobody mentions their awful red zone offense or getting completely punked by Kenneth Walker -- or at most those are mentioned as secondary factors.

STILL, whenever the 2016 OSU-Michigan game comes up, Michigan fans never mention their 3 turnovers or Harbaugh’s idiotic unsportsmanlike conduct penalty that may have cost them 4 points. It’s all about “the spot”, which at best was a judgment call only the linesman was prepared to make. 

And as they discuss this week’s game -- it’s almost comical -- when they’re talking about what it’s going to take for them to win, every person mentions, “if the refs don’t screw us.”

Overall, this has led to a universal belief amongst Michigan fans that officials regularly make intentional in-game decisions to screw them. First off, shut up and stop questioning the integrity of officials. No official is perfect -- and they’ve struggled collectively lately -- but to question their integrity is complete dickery. I come from a family of officials. Questioning an official’s integrity is like accusing an athlete of taking steroids or a comedian of stealing material. It’s at the very foundation of their being. It’s just wrong.

More importantly, why on earth would Big Ten officials want to specifically screw Michigan? They have the second-biggest national following of any school in the conference. What do they have to gain by preventing them from attaining success? It’s completely illogical. 

Perceived Moral Superiority as an Excuse for Sucking: A Michigan fan’s ultimate argument as to why they can’t compete is as simple as, “We’re just generally so much more honorable than you that we’re too gentlemanly to succeed.”

Ohio State pays players. Ohio State conspires with the Big Ten. Ohio State blood sacrifices puppies for the devil to bring us 5* recruits. Alabama hasn’t built a dynasty because Nick Saban is a great coach. It’s because they shower their players with sacks of money and hookers. Ohio State hasn’t owned the Big Ten for the past 20 years because of great coaching and program administration. We’re conspiring with the Mafia to sell human organs on the black market, while Michigan is a gallant cavalry of scrupulous Eagle Scouts who spend all their free time volunteering for Habitat for Humanity. 

Tell that to Taylor Lewan and Frank Clark. Nothing says “Michigan Man” like punching your girlfriend in the face. 

With NIL, Ford can give every member of the Michigan football team a loaded F250 and deliver them in a cavalcade from Dearborn to Ann Arbor. What now? Why do you still suck and recruit 3* athletes?

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All of this is sickening, but in the end it works for us because it prevents them from turning things around and winning. All the way up to their big douchey coach, everyone surrounding that program does nothing but blame everyone else for their problems.