COLUMBUS, Ohio -- Ohio State athletic director Gene Smith wasn't intentionally trying to talk trash Tuesday afternoon when he addressed Michigan's decision to move a week of its spring practice to Florida.
Michigan coach Jim Harbaugh took Smith's comments offensively, though, and responded with a major crack at Ohio State on his public Twitter account later in the day.
Smith addressed Harbaugh's decision to move a portion of his spring practice down to Florida during a media session this afternoon, one attended by cleveland.com.
Smith wasn't taking a shot at Michigan as much as explaining that it makes more sense for the Wolverines to experiment with ways of gaining new exposure for a program under the guidance of a new coach.
The Ohio State-Michigan rivalry is bitter, but facts are facts. Ohio State and Michigan are in different spots, and Smith was explaining his stance.
Ohio State is two years removed from a national title with an established coach, while Harbaugh, who despite being established himself, is trying to build Michigan back to Michigan's storied standard.
Smith actually said that he would give the spring in Florida idea a second look if Ohio State was in a different situation.
"Is it creative? Does it help from a recruiting and marketing point of view? I get that," Smith said. "If we were jumpstarting our program I'd probably try and do that, too. But we're not jumpstarting our program. We're in a different place."
But only the bottom part of Smith's comments were presented in the Twitter Universe by some who heard them, which led to a misconstrued view of the words.
Harbaugh fired back with his not-so-subtle comments regarding Ohio State's tattoo scandal in 2010, which led to the demise of former coach Jim Tressel's career leaded the Buckeyes.
Our Doug Lesmerises was standing next to Smith when he made those comments. Here are some thoughts Doug had on the matter: