Lynn Henning Responds to Justify His Questioning - Below are the entire emails between Lynn and myself.....
Your thoughts?
1st Email from me to Lynn -
Ya know Lynn, I grew up in EL from 1966 - 1982 when I graduated and moved to Los Angeles. I thank the stars for the type of program access that the internet affords a fan of their hometown program and the media that covers them. I do not understand your inability to respect the MSU program and especially Mark Dantonio -
As an example - perhaps you could have phrased your perspective question in a respectful manner that befits the job and the man - ie. "Coach, years ago the media and the football country was consumed with UM v. OSU.... But in recent times, your program and OSU have been the class of the B1G......." (and then you could have actually ask your perspective question).
The way you did phrase it shows you do not have a complete grasp of the football landscape in our current times and/or you wanted to needle Coach and get a nice quote for everybody at the PC, either way you come off as a typical arrogant um consumed media propagator that is scared to carry the same type if disrespect into a um PC, sad commentary on how well I remember some of you "old" perspectives....
2nd Email from Lynn to me -
Not sure what the problem is. That is, if you read -- or heard -- the entire sequence of questions. Not many, apparently, did. Which is a group that would seemingly include you.
Real simple.
I asked Mark, based on his early years at MSU and at Ohio State, if he years ago could have foreseen this rivalry ascending to where it is today. A fair question, because this was back in the '90s.
I said, properly, that for decades and generations the U-M-Ohio State rivalry dominated this region and did he think this Michigan State-Ohio State rivalry had now taken on a kind of equality?
Fair question. Unless someone either didn't read it, hear it, or was too partisan to see that there were historical and complimentary parallels being drawn.
But this is a different time and era. And partisanship is so dark that something reasonable is turned into a polemic.
Wish that weren't the case.
The question was good. The response was very good. And there was nothing to argue about. Until social media got a hold of a snippet of the dialogue.
Ugly. And silly. And really sad
3rd Email from me to Lynn -
Lynn,
You are right in that there was a snippet of your question, here it is verbatim as I am unable to copy the gif -
"Follow up to that, we're so conditioned in this region to think Michigan/Ohio St, Michigan/Ohio St and for good reason..."
The above quote was certainly not part of your quoted response to me in the above email and the point I made to you in regard to your phasing still stands. This type of phrasing does not express anything other than a long ago perspective and relates it into current time frames - you did not chose to say "we used to be conditioned.." or any past tense what so ever, instead your statement was that we are currently conditioned..... AND..... this was a MSU PC during the week of the OSU game where you are talking about the Michigan/Ohio St rivalry, no need to have even (in a true respectful environment) bring them up.
I have watched way too many instances where Izzo and Dantonio and Merchant, etc. are all subjected to being asked completely non relevant questions about U of M. Again, I wonder if you are going to be willing to carry that same type of phrasing and level of dis-respect, for the environment and agenda at hand, into a U of M PC? Like next week you could ask Harbaugh - "Does U of M losing 7 of 8 to MSU lessen the rivalry between U of M and OSU?"
Just for your edification - U of M has lost 13 of their last 15 to OSU, so is this our current conditioning to think of Michigan/Ohio St or do you need to have been born prior to 1990 to have some memory of U of M being a rival in the U of M / OSU game?
4th Email from Lynn to me -
Here's the entire set of questions and answers in which I participated.
Q. When you think back to your time here as an assistant and then coordinating down at Ohio State, first of all, do you agree that there has been a relative equality to the rivalry that's grown and secondly, Mark, how surprised are you that frankly that has happened?
COACH DANTONIO: Well, when I was here before we had great games against Ohio State, you know, '98 we went down and won, but also if you remember back in '99, they came here and we won, it was a big defensive game and we won that football game. In '97 they blocked a punt, I believe, or something happened, they won, going away. Back up here, it would have been 2008, I believe, they came up here and we had a good football team, and Pryor ran down the field, and I couldn't believe how fast he was. He just was going by me. But, you know, didn't play well in that game, but we both came into the game with big records.
So we have had some big games with them, some games that were very anticipated games. People were excited about the opportunities and things that lay ahead. So we've got to measure up, there is no question.
Q. As a follow-up to that, we're so conditioned in this region to think Michigan and Ohio State, Michigan and Ohio State and for good reason --
COACH DANTONIO: Not really. (Laughter.)
Q. Seriously in this region, whether you would agree with it or not, that's been the norm now for 46 years.
COACH DANTONIO: Uh-huh.
Q. Is there an equality here, which I guess you just answered.
COACH DANTONIO: In terms of us versus Ohio State? We're competing. We're competing every single week and we look forward to every game on our schedule and there are some very big games on our schedule, and we get ready for 'em. I think when you go to the end of the year, next week's game is a very important game, too, because it's the end of the year. So everything gets ramped up even more because these games have more meaning at the end of the year, as well as the OSU/Michigan game; they just have more meaning because it's the end of the year. The win and the loss are determining factors in where you go, what bowl games do you go to, do you win the east or not. Those type of things get entered into it, so that's as big as anything. If we were playing the fifth game, we would be past that and we would be moving on to something else here, but this is our 11th game of the season and, you know, this is -- it's all coming down the funnel.The comparison to Michigan-Ohio State's rivalry -- which will be apparent again next week -- is proper in terms of MSU-Ohio State's ascent. Michigan people get asked all the time about Michigan State. But when that happens, folks like you are silent. Dead silent.
The questions were good. So were Mark's answers. The parallels were proper and important and, despite your narrow assessment, a compliment to how the OSU-Michigan State rivalry has grown in status and significance.
Thanks for the notes
Your thoughts?
1st Email from me to Lynn -
Ya know Lynn, I grew up in EL from 1966 - 1982 when I graduated and moved to Los Angeles. I thank the stars for the type of program access that the internet affords a fan of their hometown program and the media that covers them. I do not understand your inability to respect the MSU program and especially Mark Dantonio -
As an example - perhaps you could have phrased your perspective question in a respectful manner that befits the job and the man - ie. "Coach, years ago the media and the football country was consumed with UM v. OSU.... But in recent times, your program and OSU have been the class of the B1G......." (and then you could have actually ask your perspective question).
The way you did phrase it shows you do not have a complete grasp of the football landscape in our current times and/or you wanted to needle Coach and get a nice quote for everybody at the PC, either way you come off as a typical arrogant um consumed media propagator that is scared to carry the same type if disrespect into a um PC, sad commentary on how well I remember some of you "old" perspectives....
2nd Email from Lynn to me -
Not sure what the problem is. That is, if you read -- or heard -- the entire sequence of questions. Not many, apparently, did. Which is a group that would seemingly include you.
Real simple.
I asked Mark, based on his early years at MSU and at Ohio State, if he years ago could have foreseen this rivalry ascending to where it is today. A fair question, because this was back in the '90s.
I said, properly, that for decades and generations the U-M-Ohio State rivalry dominated this region and did he think this Michigan State-Ohio State rivalry had now taken on a kind of equality?
Fair question. Unless someone either didn't read it, hear it, or was too partisan to see that there were historical and complimentary parallels being drawn.
But this is a different time and era. And partisanship is so dark that something reasonable is turned into a polemic.
Wish that weren't the case.
The question was good. The response was very good. And there was nothing to argue about. Until social media got a hold of a snippet of the dialogue.
Ugly. And silly. And really sad
3rd Email from me to Lynn -
Lynn,
You are right in that there was a snippet of your question, here it is verbatim as I am unable to copy the gif -
"Follow up to that, we're so conditioned in this region to think Michigan/Ohio St, Michigan/Ohio St and for good reason..."
The above quote was certainly not part of your quoted response to me in the above email and the point I made to you in regard to your phasing still stands. This type of phrasing does not express anything other than a long ago perspective and relates it into current time frames - you did not chose to say "we used to be conditioned.." or any past tense what so ever, instead your statement was that we are currently conditioned..... AND..... this was a MSU PC during the week of the OSU game where you are talking about the Michigan/Ohio St rivalry, no need to have even (in a true respectful environment) bring them up.
I have watched way too many instances where Izzo and Dantonio and Merchant, etc. are all subjected to being asked completely non relevant questions about U of M. Again, I wonder if you are going to be willing to carry that same type of phrasing and level of dis-respect, for the environment and agenda at hand, into a U of M PC? Like next week you could ask Harbaugh - "Does U of M losing 7 of 8 to MSU lessen the rivalry between U of M and OSU?"
Just for your edification - U of M has lost 13 of their last 15 to OSU, so is this our current conditioning to think of Michigan/Ohio St or do you need to have been born prior to 1990 to have some memory of U of M being a rival in the U of M / OSU game?
4th Email from Lynn to me -
Here's the entire set of questions and answers in which I participated.
Q. When you think back to your time here as an assistant and then coordinating down at Ohio State, first of all, do you agree that there has been a relative equality to the rivalry that's grown and secondly, Mark, how surprised are you that frankly that has happened?
COACH DANTONIO: Well, when I was here before we had great games against Ohio State, you know, '98 we went down and won, but also if you remember back in '99, they came here and we won, it was a big defensive game and we won that football game. In '97 they blocked a punt, I believe, or something happened, they won, going away. Back up here, it would have been 2008, I believe, they came up here and we had a good football team, and Pryor ran down the field, and I couldn't believe how fast he was. He just was going by me. But, you know, didn't play well in that game, but we both came into the game with big records.
So we have had some big games with them, some games that were very anticipated games. People were excited about the opportunities and things that lay ahead. So we've got to measure up, there is no question.
Q. As a follow-up to that, we're so conditioned in this region to think Michigan and Ohio State, Michigan and Ohio State and for good reason --
COACH DANTONIO: Not really. (Laughter.)
Q. Seriously in this region, whether you would agree with it or not, that's been the norm now for 46 years.
COACH DANTONIO: Uh-huh.
Q. Is there an equality here, which I guess you just answered.
COACH DANTONIO: In terms of us versus Ohio State? We're competing. We're competing every single week and we look forward to every game on our schedule and there are some very big games on our schedule, and we get ready for 'em. I think when you go to the end of the year, next week's game is a very important game, too, because it's the end of the year. So everything gets ramped up even more because these games have more meaning at the end of the year, as well as the OSU/Michigan game; they just have more meaning because it's the end of the year. The win and the loss are determining factors in where you go, what bowl games do you go to, do you win the east or not. Those type of things get entered into it, so that's as big as anything. If we were playing the fifth game, we would be past that and we would be moving on to something else here, but this is our 11th game of the season and, you know, this is -- it's all coming down the funnel.The comparison to Michigan-Ohio State's rivalry -- which will be apparent again next week -- is proper in terms of MSU-Ohio State's ascent. Michigan people get asked all the time about Michigan State. But when that happens, folks like you are silent. Dead silent.
The questions were good. So were Mark's answers. The parallels were proper and important and, despite your narrow assessment, a compliment to how the OSU-Michigan State rivalry has grown in status and significance.
Thanks for the notes
