Michigan Monday: Are Champions of the East?

It looks like the Big Ten is about to reverse course on the Luke and Laura divisions, sorry I mean the Legends and Leaders divisions.    When those divisions names were created there was like a 90% dis-satisfaction return from most Big Ten fans on the names.   The Big Ten didn't care and moved forward with the names anyway.  

So how could the Big Ten get out of those names and still keep face they changing the Big Ten for the better?   They could find two bankrupt athletic departments of very good academic institutions in major TV markets and add them to the Big Ten quickly.   They did that and now they are changing the names to East and West.  

Here are the breakdowns:

East	West
Indiana	Illinois
Maryland	Iowa
Michigan	Minnesota
Michigan State	Nebraska
Ohio State	Northwestern
Penn State	Purdue
Rutgers	Wisconsin

Michigan has the much harder division, but I don't think there was much of a choice.   Michigan, OSU and MSU have to be in the same division.   When Penn State gets back they will be a good football program again.   It's hard to know what Maryland and Rutgers will have year to year but I would expect their recruiting to be better now they are headed to the Big Ten.   Games against Nebraska and The Little Brown Jug will be few and far in-between now.   I like the sound of future Big Ten Championship games with Michigan vs. Nebraska or Wisconsin.

• I hate hate stories like this one:  Rumeal Robinson's Championship Ring is on EBay for $90K.  I know RR life has taken a turn for the worse but it's really too bad that he has to sell a ring for the biggest moment of his life.   Maybe Stephen Ross will buy it and donate it to the U of M athletic department.

• Draftcountdown.com has Big Will on the Super Sleeper list.   I agree, I think Big Will could come into is own in a year or two in the NFL.  He came along way under Greg Mattison and Brady Hoke.

• Former FSU QB Clint Trickett could visit Ann Arbor and fill that graduate transfer role that Michigan is looking for next season.   There are a couple of issues with Clint coming to U of M, I believe he has 2 years of eligibility left and most QB's are looking to start not be a back-up to Devin Gardner.  Clint was at West Virginia's Spring Game this weekend and is also considering South Florida and Auburn.