Former Michigan State linebacker Kyler Elsworth -- the name might bring to mind a certain tackle -- hates Michigan so much that he wants them to win just about every game.
Wait, what?
"That's a touchy subject, and this might make some Michigan State fans mad," Elsworth said on 97.1 The Ticket's podcast The Time That. "I actually don't root against Michigan."
C'monn. You don't have that internal hatred for the Wolverines?
"I do," he said. "But what's better? Beating a Michigan team that has a losing season, or knocking a Michigan team off that's doing great and we beat them when they're ranked?"
Point taken.
"I want Michigan to be at their best," Elsworth went on. "I want their fans to think that they are everything -- they're No. 1, they're great, they're maize and blue, they're the greatest thing since sliced bread. And then, I want to beat them and I want to beat them handedly. That way, when we do win, Michigan fans can't come back and say, 'Well, you beat us in our down years, you beat us in our rebuild years, you beat us when we had a new coach.'"
So yeah. That's how much Ellsworth hates the Wolverines. He wants it to hurt as much as possible when the Spartans win.
"Let's say Michigan wins every single one of their games for 20 years, but they lose to Michigan State every single year in that 20-year span. Their fans can say, 'We had great teams for 20 years, we were a powerhouse, but we just couldn't beat Michigan State. They were better than us,'" Ellsworth said. "I can't say I ever root for Michigan. I don't root against them."
Elsworth knows how it feels to be on the winning end of the rivalry. In four seasons at Michigan State, he went 3-1 against Michigan. (The Spartans also won during Elsworth's redshirt freshman season in 2009.) He'll never forget the feeling of winning at Michigan Stadium for the first time, a 34-17 victory in 2010.
"Funny thing. All you gotta do is sit around for four or five years and then make one tackle," Elsworth said. "That's all you gotta do out there, kids."
The @MSU_Football tackle for all the --s.#NationalRedRoseDay pic.twitter.com/YmkgJ2R4ry
— Michigan St. on BTN (@MichiganStOnBTN) June 12, 2019Other highlights from Elsworth's interview:
A Le'Veon Bell story: "Maybe he'll be mad if he hears this. Le'Veon came in his first year and (defensive end) Will Ghoslton came in at the same time. Will Gholston, highly recruited, five-star recruit. I think Le'Veon was maybe a two-star. He wasn't this almighty recruit that everyone sought after. I remember our first scrimmage, Le'Veon, still shifty, very patient, got run down by one of our third-string middle linebackers. We went in the locker room and no one was saying anything about it -- still a 45-yard run, but he got caught from behind -- and Will Gholston came in and let him have it. He said, 'Mannn, I can't believe you got ran down by a third-string middle linebacker! Wow.' Le'Veon was getting mad about it so they got in this argument. Things get heated, they get chirpy, and I still remember to this day, after Le'Veon tried to come back at Will, Will said, 'Listen, man. I can give you one of my stars and you still wouldn't have as many stars as I do.' And I remember thinking, like, holy cow, here we are six years later and the dude that could've taken one of his stars is now arguably the best running back in the NFL."
On the phone conversation he had with Bullough prior to the Rose Bowl: "I said, 'Hey, man. What's going on?' He said, 'Listen, I'm not going to be there. I wanted to call you and tell you personally that you are ready for this moment. You know your stuff. This isn't anything that you don't know and anything that you can't handle. You've been busting your butt behind me, you've been busting your butt as a competitor for this opportunity. Go take it and do with it what I know you can do.' And I didn't feel like I needed to say, 'Hey, Max, what did you do?' I didn't feel like it was my place to do that. If Max wants to tell me, he'll tell me, and in time maybe I'll learn. But my focus that week was, I could care less what he did right now. I know that my role increased, and I don't want to be known as the guy that lost the Rose Bowl for Michigan State."
On the theories about Bullough's suspension: "Since time has passed, I know just as much as you guys. I know nothing. I've heard bar fight, I've heard peeing off a balcony, I've heard so many different stories. ... I've never asked him, he's never told me. I could care less what he did. Honestly, I could care less. Does part of me want to know? Maybe a little bit, but it doesn't change anything. I can tell you this. The things I have heard, the ones I just mentioned, I'm 100 percent sure it's not those things. But I cannot say with certainty what it is."
On Connor Cook not being named a captain his senior year: "Here's where I think everyone kind of blew it out of proportion. Who was our quarterback before him? Kirk Cousins. He was a great quarterback, but a guy who is, study, work hard, go to church, go to sleep, wake up, don't drink. All the right things that you're like, 'Wow, no one can be that good.' The golden boy. And Connor is a guy's guy. Again, works hard, studies, does all those same things, but at at the same time will go out and have a beer with you and have a good time with you, and more so really meshed well with the receivers, with the linebackers, with the guys that, listen, we're going to work hard but we also play hard. So I think that if he would have been anywhere else following whomever quarterback, it would have been just another college athlete and it wouldn't have been blown out of proportion like it was."
