ANN ARBOR, Mich. — The assignment was simple: Find the person who got the best tattoo to celebrate Michigan’s 2023 national championship.

Unsurprisingly, there were many contenders. Michigan fans are a passionate bunch, and quite a few of them wanted an indelible reminder of the Wolverines’ perfect season tattooed on their skin. One tattoo, discovered in an Instagram post that tagged Ann Arbor’s Lucky Monkey Tattoo Parlour, stood out above the rest. It was clear this story wouldn’t be complete without talking to the guy with the cartoon drawing on his calf of Jim Harbaugh holding a chicken and drinking a glass of milk.

That would be Jimmy McLaughlin, a 36-year-old nurse from Toledo, Ohio. In the course of reporting this story, it came to light that the Harbaugh tattoo was not the most outrageous piece of body art McLaughlin acquired in the wake of Michigan’s national championship.

“Also have a wolverine going to the bathroom on a toilet shaped like the horseshoe, lol,” McLaughlin wrote in a text message.

Excuse me?

“I always kinda thought the Horseshoe looked like a toilet,” McLaughlin explained over the phone. “I had this idea cooking for 10 years, but I had to wait to implement it. You can’t be getting a tattoo like that one on a 10-year losing streak.”

The tattoo is pretty much exactly as McLaughlin described it: colorful, campy and extremely on-brand for one of college football’s nuttiest rivalries. Living in Toledo, a few miles south of the Michigan state line, McLaughlin is surrounded by fans of both teams. Emboldened by Michigan’s three-year winning streak against the Buckeyes, he went through with his plan to get Ohio Stadium tattooed on his thigh in the shape of a porcelain commode.

This is the kind of thing that seems like a great idea when your team is 15-0 and basking in the afterglow of a national championship. But what about when your team is 6-5 and a 21-point underdog at the very stadium you lampooned on your leg? That’s a slightly different story.

After talking to proud tattoo owners before the season, The Athletic contacted them again this week to see how they were holding up amid Michigan’s difficult season. A tattoo is a lifelong commitment, something that’s there through thick and thin — just like the fans who display them. While McLaughlin has received some grief from the Ohio State fans in his life, he’s not discouraged. His tally for his year includes one natty, two new tattoos and zero regrets.

“We’re still the national champions until we’re not,” he said. “Until the clock strikes zero, you better believe every Ohio State fan in the vicinity is going to know about it.”

Another person who presumably does not regret his national championship tattoo is Harbaugh, whose Los Angeles Chargers played John Harbaugh’s Baltimore Ravens on Monday night. Beneath Harbaugh’s Chargers hoodie, he sported a Skinny M tattoo on his shoulder with Michigan’s 15-0 record, the result of a promise he made to his players.

Stephen Bateman, the Grand Rapids-based artist who did Harbaugh’s tattoo, has tattooed NFL cornerback Jalen Ramsey, NBA player Andre Drummond and several former Michigan players. One of his repeat customers is Braiden McGregor, the former Michigan defensive end and current New York Jet who has tattoos covering much of his body.

After the season, McGregor visited Bateman to get a rose and a College Football Playoff trophy added to the Block M on his shoulder. The subject of Harbaugh’s tattoo promise came up, and McGregor arranged for Bateman to do the honors when members of the championship team reunited in Ann Arbor for Michigan’s spring game. The design wasn’t technically challenging, but tattooing a famous football coach with the team looking on was a bit stressful.

“They all had their phones out, probably like 20 of them,” Bateman said. “He kind of just flexed and said he was impervious to pain.”

Bateman did several other championship tattoos, including one for Dillon Gates, a 32-year-old Michigan fan from Grand Rapids. Gates’ arm is covered from elbow to shoulder with a scene of Tom Brady, J.J. McCarthy, Blake Corum and other Michigan greats walking up the stadium tunnel. The tattoo took 30 hours to complete, Gates said, spread out over three sessions.

Gates has cousins in Columbus who are Ohio State fans, but even they had to admit the tattoo was an impressive piece of art. Gates has gotten similar reactions as he traveled around Big Ten country for his job buying used musical instruments.

“I was actually in Pennsylvania, and some guy at the hotel front counter asked me to hold up my arm,” Gates said. “He was like, ‘Dude, I don’t even like Michigan, but that’s an awesome tattoo.’ Mostly, for me, it’s like a badge of honor.”

Gates got the tattoo as part of a pact with a friend, Michigan fan Patrick Coleman. Coleman has a scene on his arm of McCarthy, Corum, Will Johnson and Donovan Edwards celebrating in front of the CFP trophy. When he thought about ways to commemorate the national championship, Coleman decided a tattoo was the most enduring symbol.

“I got all the memorabilia,” Coleman said. “I got posters and flags. I got the T-shirts. Seeing all the hard times we had to go through to finally get to the top, you gotta ink it on your skin so you can always remember it.”

(Courtesy of Stephen Bateman)

In terms of creativity, it’s hard to top McLaughlin’s tattoos. He wanted something no one else would have, something that captured a unique aspect of Michigan’s season. Harbaugh talked frequently about the chickens he raised in his backyard, and the idea of him holding a bird under his arm seemed like a fitting homage.

That tattoo gets lots of comments when McLaughlin runs into other Michigan fans. Somebody spotted the tattoo when McLaughlin was walking through the parking lot before the Michigan-Oregon game a few weeks ago, and before he knew it, he was getting free food and beer at a tailgate.

“Pretty much everyone’s reaction is the same,” McLaughlin said. “Everyone starts busting out laughing. A lot of people are like, ‘What’s up with the chicken?’ I have to explain it, and they’re like ‘Ok, that’s pretty funny.’”

Life after the national championship hasn’t been sunshine and roses for Michigan. The Wolverines have five regular-season losses for the first time since 2014 and are three-touchdown underdogs in Saturday’s game against the Buckeyes. For fans like McLaughlin, that has meant hearing more smack talk from rival fans who weren’t able to say much when Michigan was dominating the Big Ten.

McLaughlin said he’s taken the season in stride. His group chats lit up last week when Michigan landed five-star quarterback Bryce Underwood, and excitement is already building for the future. As for Saturday, McLaughlin plans to watch the game in his garage rather than showing off the toilet bowl tattoo in Columbus. The season hasn’t gone as planned, but if he could go back in time, McLaughlin wouldn’t change a thing.

“For me, it’s no regrets at all,” McLaughlin said.”I was at the Rose Bowl. I celebrated after the natty. Nothing will ever be able to take that feeling away from me.”

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(Top photos courtesy of Jimmy McLaughlin)