Kiper under the pillow says: "Spartans are Undervalued"

So, here's da ES, sleeping in this morning, and with the radio under my pillow... ES starts to stir around 9:30 am.  Spin that dial to listen to something other than NPR or the BBC...and, there is Mel Kiper ALL OVER THE SPARTANS.  Just my luck.  He's just salivating over Baker, Cousins, Cunningham, Martin.  Barking out praises to Worthy, Robinson, Allen, the "pedigree" of Bullough.  Concerned about the O-line.

Kiper's one-liner:  "THE SPARTANS ARE EXTREMELY UNDERVALUED."

Love it, but maybe he should keep to the NFL Draft?

It should be noted Kiper and that other chum on ESPN radio picked Nebraska over Wisky in the Big Ten title game.  But, Kiper really hedged his bets on the Big Green - "so many offensive threats"... Nice!

Cunningham and Dell plead guilty

Lovely. From ESPN:

"Two more Michigan State football players have pleaded guilty to misdemeanor assault and battery charges stemming from a Nov. 22 campus fight. Receivers B.J. Cunningham and Mark Dell entered the pleas in district court Wednesday. Conspiracy charges were dropped and each player faces up to 93 days in jail at the March 8 sentencing.

Cunningham and Dell are among 11 current or former Spartans facing assault charges from the fight with members of a campus fraternity.

Running back Ashton Leggett pleaded guilty to two counts of assault earlier this month. He's transferring from Michigan State to Illinois State."

Michigan State Suspends 8 Including Cunningham, Dell, Rucker, for Being IDIOTS Involved at Post-Banquet Assault

Wow - this post-football potluck affair has turned into a fiasco for Michigan State football. According to the Lansing State Journal, police report that eight additional football players (or more) were at the scene of the altercation at Rather Hall that resulted in several MSU students being injured, just 90 minutes after the football banquet concluded last week. The eight have been suspended from the team, and potentially may not play in the bowl game. The suspended players are wide receivers BJ Cunningham, Mark Dell and Fred Smith, cornerback Chris L. Rucker, running back Ashton Leggett, linebacker Brynden Trawick, defensive tackle Ishmyl Johnson and defensive end Jamiihr Williams. All saw significant playing time this year.

And, it looks like it ain't over yet as police continue to investigate -- there are many witnesses and video evidence. The attorney of the injured MSU student states that others were also at the scene of the altercation: ""We stick by the statement that there were 15-20 members of the football team involved," the attorney told the LSJ. "Of that number, there were three that we could not identify because they were wearing ski masks."

MSU Athletic Director Mark Hollis, who was in Chapel Hill, N.C., for the men's basketball game told the LSJ: "Obviously the whole situation is a disappointment to me as an alumnus and as an athletic director. I think today we made a swift decision based upon the information we had available to us."

ES commentary: First, while I've said before not to rush to judgment in many cases for failure of having all the facts, this is a different situation because of the public nature of the incident, "indisputable video evidence" (we've heard that one before on the field), and the swift consequences. ES gives kudos to Mark Dantonio and athletic director Mark Hollis for taking quick action in suspending these players - the players need to be respectful of the institution, Michigan State University, and their football team.

What a bunch of disrespectful idiots -- they must be held accountable for their actions. If any member punched or hurt any student, they should be dismissed from the team immediately. Period. Also, we should also make sure that the non-athlete students involved are also held accountable... and we have not heard that side of the story.

Each member at the scene that didn't participate in the violence should be required to: stay home instead of going to the bowl game, apologize publicly, provide community service above and beyond what they already have done as Spartan athletes, and point out those who were wearing ski masks. Maybe actually force them to take additional credits in the spring and fall -- they obviously have too much time on their hands and could be put to better use studying. If their mere presence helped to precipitate the violence, maybe they should be kicked off the team as well. They should make better judgment decisions.

Those who were wearing ski masks should be most ashamed of themselves and should be immediately kicked off the team and have their scholarships revoked. I don't care who they are. We don't need them.

Look how lovely the publicity is over at ESPN. The ES is disappointed and embarrassed to be a Spartan this morning. Those athletes involved aren't students on scholarships, they are bullies.

ES Game Day Preview: MSU 30, Michigan 27

Michigan (4-0, #22 AP, #30 Sagarin) at Michigan State (1-3, #59 Sagarin),

Saturday, October 3, 2009. 12 Noon.
TV: Big Ten Network
Weather: 51 degrees, 40% chance rain.
Latest Line: Michigan State favored by 2.

Tickets available.

ES will tweet from the game with comments posted in the right column; live chat will be available on the website.

Injuries: Michigan - QB Tate Forcier (shoulder), probable; C David Molk (foot), out. Michigan State - OL Joel Foreman (knee), probable; WR Mark Dell (shoulder), probable; S Trenton Robinson (doorknob), probable.

Prediction: MSU's Greg Jones blindsides scUM's Forcier in the first quarter, knocking him senseless and out of the game. MSU runs adequately behind Glenn Winston, but enough to free up QB Kirk Cousins to use his rocket arm to score TDs through the air to BJ Cunningham, Blair White, and Mark Dell. MSU's defense? Who knows, who cares. Michigan State needs to prove itself defensively, and scUM is overrated and untested on the road. The ES will split the difference, thinking Spartan DBs won't play great, but will play just well enough to win. Willthis scUM team actually go 5-0? Hey, go jump in a lake and take yer smelling salts. Spartan special teams will be the difference in the game, with a few FGs out of Brett Swenson. That's enough detail for me on this game.

Give it up to an improved coaching effort and better play out of MSU in its best game of the year, at home. There's a reason a 1-3 team is favored by 2 at home over a 4-0 team.

Halftime: MSU 14, scUM 14. Final Score: Michigan State 30, scUM 27.

Michigan State 44, Montana State 3

Congrats to our opening, 44-3 whitewashing of Montana State. Yeah.

OK, we didn't learn much today -- which is why the ES traveled and spent the weekend at Disney World. But, from the stats and info from his Brudda, we learned the following: offensive line needs to run block better - it was a perceived weakness entering the fall, and vs a FCS team, it is confirmed. The longest run of the day was from Caulton Ray, with a 20 yarder. He was 12-71 (5.9). Our two freshmen studs, Larry Caper (7-34) and Ed Baker (8-27) sufficed but were nothing special.

Most of all, what we learned is that we need to STOP DROPPING PASSES. What's going on? The stats looks good, but official stats should also count dropped passes. According to my bro, we must have dropped 6-10 passes today, and it resulted in truncated drives. Blair White was 9-162, and BJ Cunningham was 3-62. What was more significant was that opponents (Mont St) could not keep Dion Sims off the field - and he caught 2-32 and 1 TD as a true frosh. He's a stud.

As for which QB is better? I have to go with my bro's opinion from personally witnessing game action and he said that Keith Nichol (9-18-0-135, 2 TD) looked to perform "a little bit" better than Kirk Cousins (10-17-0-183, 3 TD) and "seemed better in control of the offense."

Overall, Mich St outgained Mont St. 493-160. Just obliteration, as expected.

Montana State will receive at least $650,000 for traveling to East Lansing, enough to pay nearly a third of its annual football budget.

MONST - MSU

FIRST DOWNS................... 12 29
NET YARDS RUSHING............. 62 175
Rushing Attempts............ 28 40
Average Per Rush............ 2.2 4.4
NET YARDS PASSING............. 98 318
Completions-Attempts-Int.... 13-26-0 19-35-0
Passing Touchdowns.......... 0 5
TOTAL OFFENSE YARDS........... 160 493
Total offense plays......... 54 75
Average Gain Per Play....... 3.0 6.6
Penalties: Number-Yards....... 7-55 5-46
PUNTS-YARDS................... 9-335 2-114
Average Yards Per Punt...... 37.2 57.0
Net Yards Per Punt.......... 28.6 51.5
Punt returns: Number-Yards-TD. 1-11-0 5-58-0
Average Per Return.......... 11.0 11.6
Possession Time............... 29:19 30:41
Third-Down Conversions........ 2 of 14 7 of 13
Fourth-Down Conversions....... 2 of 2 0 of 0
Red-Zone Scores-Chances....... 1-1 3-4
Sacks By: Number-Yards........ 0-0 3-22

OK, and then I saw the defensive stats and WTF - Greg Jones was a hoss, with 14 tackles, including 2.5 for loss:

53 Jones, Greg        5    9   14  2.5/16   .   .     .      .    .   1.5/11   .
11 Hyde, Marcus       2    4    6     .     .   .     .      .    .      .     .

Link here for video of the matchup


Of those 92 who voted in the ES' poll of margin of victory, only 28% said that MSU would win by 36 or more. 40% said by 20-29 points, 18% said 30-35 points. 6% said 10-19 points, and 1% said 1-9 points. Four people said Montana State would win.