A football rivalry cannot be considered special until there’s a trophy involved.

St. Francis and Central Catholic play for the Irish Knight. UT and BGSU play for the Peace Pipe, which is so legendary that in my four years of college I never saw it except in the “NCAA Football” video game series, so I’m pretty sure it doesn’t exist. But Ohio State and Michigan don’t play for a trophy. Bragging rights are nice, but they don’t take up much space in a display case. Here’s how we fix that.

A year ago you might remember ESPN’s Lou Holtz discussing Ohio and Michigan going to war back in the day over the territory that is now Toledo. He later said, “History doesn’t record who won the war, but we have to assume Michigan did, because nobody would fight to keep Toledo.”

Normally what one ESPN college football analyst says doesn’t mean much, especially one like Holtz who this year accidentally swore on the air and later in reference to Michigan coach Rich Rodriguez’s leadership abilities, said “Hitler was a great leader, too.” But in the case of his Toledo reference, he might be onto something.

We don’t know who won the Toledo War. Indeed, Michigan ceded the Toledo territory, but only after the federal government intervened as Michigan was seeking statehood. It was basically a tie. And in today’s football world, ties aren’t acceptable.

If the historic Toledo dispute was the catalyst for the OSU-Michigan rivalry, why not take advantage of that? Why relegate the fact to a footnote in the national telecast and being reminded of it yearly by snot-nosed sports bloggers who inexplicably write newspaper columns? There is a wellspring of opportunity for the Glass City to capitalize on the annual OSU-UM game, and all it takes is a bit of revision of maps everywhere.

Hear me out, and ignore the logistic nightmare that would ensue: Every year, Toledo will become part of whichever state wins between OSU and UM.

Suppose Michigan wins this year, which is, admittedly, taking a leap of faith so far in length it would probably shatter Olympic records. If the Wolverines win, Toledo will officially be a Michigan city, and all Michigan laws apply. Lucas County will issue Michigan license plates for that year, pay Michigan state taxes, recycle pop bottles, drive 70 mph and when they travel out of state, Toledoans will tell locals where they live by holding up their hand, proclaiming “Well, here’s Michigan,” and pointing to the bottom of their palm.

This city always gets stuck in the middle of the rivalry, so they may as well embrace it to the extreme. After all, this city has stores divided down the center that sell apparel for both teams. (Fun fact: each Buckeye & Wolverine Shop contains one Ralph Nader T-shirt for sale.)

Not only will this solidify OSU-UM as the top rivalry in sports, it will generate interest and badly needed economic gains to the city. Suppose you want to open up a restaurant in Toledo? Suddenly your restaurant is now proudly serving two states. How sweet is that? Plus, how many other metropolitan cities can boast that half the time they are in one state or another, with each state perpetually fighting for our admiration? Try to top that, Kansas City.

Visit Matt Sussman’s sports blog at futonreport.net.

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 13th, 2008 at 11:26 pm and is filed under Futon Report, Special Section, Sports.
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