Previously: CB Reon Dawson, CB Channing Stribling, S Delano Hill, S Dymonte Thomas, CB Ross Douglas, CB Jourdan Lewis, LB Ben Gedeon, LB Mike McCray, DE Taco Charlton, DT Maurice Hurst Jr., DT Henry Poggi, OL Patrick Kugler, OL David Dawson.

It's impossible to watch Logan Tuley-Tillman wander around a football field and not hearken back to the The Blind Side, specifically the bit wherein Michael Lewis describes the freak of nature that is the perfect left tackle.

He was wide in the ass and massive in the thighs … he had long arms … he had giant hands, so that when he grabbed ahold of you it meant something. But size alone couldn't cope with the threat to the quarterback's blind side, because that threat was also fast. The ideal left tackle also had great feet. Incredibly nimble and quick feet.

Tuley-Tillman has all of these things, which is why a who's who of college football programs offered him as soon as they found out a man of his particular dimensions existed. He had offers from Michigan, Ohio State, USC, Alabama, and Notre Dame by last January, because frames like his don't come around too often.

• ESPN's Michael White: "Long arms and bottom-heavy frame make him an absolute natural at either tackle spot. Showcased exceptional technique and patience in his pass set."
• 24/7's Clint Brewster: "LTT has outstanding footwork for a guy his size and does a nice job of keeping defenders in front of him. Tuley-Tillman’s upside is unlimited and he will be even quicker once he gets into better shape and sheds some extra pounds off."
• 24/7's Jason Sapp: "Long body and athletic legs ... Good first kick and reposts his arm well on counter action ... Will work on technique as his body matures and develops, but a high ceiling to be a force on the line ... Wide base."
• 24/7's Steve Wiltfong: "…has long arms and all the stereotypical things you are looking for in an offensive lineman. If he can keep his weight down, he has a chance to be special.”
• ESPN's scouting report praises Tuley-Tillmans "great size and athleticism," "long, broad frame," "very good lower body flexibility, "long arms and nimble feet."
• Scout's profile lists "arm length" and "size" as assets and mentions his "good frame with long arms."

Or you could just look at a picture. While the left one is doing something a bit goofy with perspective, without pads it's clear the guy's thighs are wider than his torso. The right is straight on, and also features a wide, wide human:

This is what a left tackle from central casting looks like.

In addition to being a large and fortituously-shaped human, Tuley-Tillman wasn't a slouch on high school fields in Illinois. ESPN's eval has all the stuff about his frame above and is really, really positive on the rest of it:

Tuley-Tillman is a dominant run blocker. He uses his great initial quickness to immediately establish an advantage when drive blocking. His agility and balance allow him to play on his feet in space. He comes off the ball low and hard … displays the foot quickness, agility and balance needed to adjust his feet to quick change of direction movement. … a tough customer who displays a nasty, no quit, finishing attitude.

They remained the highest on Tuley-Tillman throughout his recruitment, again likely because of their fire-and-forget ranking style. Other sites had LTT in the top 50 to start and steadily dropped him for reasons we'll get to in just a moment.

Other evaluators also praised Tuley-Tillman's nastiness, including Rivals's anonymous dude who was obviously an offensive lineman just based on his enthusiasm for hurting people…

Tillman is consistently giving great effort to finish his blocks with cruelty, which is a joy to watch. He stands 6-7 tall and uses his 280-plus pounds to punish defenders. He shows good quickness off the ball and gets into his block quickly on running plays. His foot drive is good and his hand placement is pretty good as well.

…and that odd Kyle Turley article from 24/7:

Tuley-Tillman has a big nasty streak, great size and always finishes. Coaches want to see a guy make his block, drive, and finish, and Tuley-Tillman does this. He also does a good job of maintaining his hands on guys and keeping them in front of him.

In these highlights, he has great leverage and point of contact. Not that he cannot improve in this area, as every lineman can and should, but he excels at it.

In pass blocking, I really like his kick. He uses this great kick perfectly to allow him to get into position to take on any defender.

LTT "has all of the building blocks and a great opportunity to be something special," says Turley after citing some technical issues that he downplays.

Of course there is the catch. Tuley-Tillman gradually slipped on recruiting rankings as the year went on because his technique issues became more apparent and his weight underwent an alarming swing:

"I'm looking to get add bulk up top, and I'm expecting to make big changes to my body at Michigan," he continued. "I weighed 340 pounds last summer, but I'm down to about 302 pounds right now. I can feel the difference in my quickness, and I like being at the lighter weight."

That was up from about 285 and may have been understating things. Tuley-Tillman is now listed at 285 on Michigan's roster, so he's made the full round trip. If you're trying to be optimistic, Tuley-Tillman's ability to flip a switch and get down to a weight where Michigan would actually like him to put it on instead of take it off is impressive.

Tuley-Tillman also struggled at some camps, partially because of the weight and partially because his high school is not exactly Eastern Christian Academy:

“The week I had, it was different because we come from a high school that was 0 and 9,” said Tuley-Tillman. “Not having that high level coaching and being able to be taught how to block, when to block, when to punch and when to do this and that. It was rough and I lost some reps.”

“It was one-on-one pass protection, which is like standing under the rim saying don’t jump, but don’t get dunked on. But it got me better and I appreciate the coaches taking the time to break stuff down one-on-one with me.”

Ace had a good example of where he stood in relation to David Dawson when he named LTT the boom or bust guy in the class:

…a relative newcomer to the game of football and spent his high school days overpowering opponents with sheer size and strength—as a result, he's got a long way to go from a technical standpoint. At last summer's Sound Mind Sound Body camp, Tuley-Tillman and David Dawson both got extensive work in with Michigan OL coach Darrell Funk—Funk used Dawson as an example for how to execute certain technical aspects of line play, then spent a good deal of time trying to get Tuley-Tillman to that level.

And that was a good outing for him compared to some earlier efforts. Hemholdt noted($) that he was in "noticeably better shape" at SMSB and did a better job than he did on a "rough" day at the Columbus NFTC.

As a result of the weight and the camps, LTT took a big ol' rankings hit. The Rivals version($):

…added the weight you'd expect of an offensive lineman - he went from 285 pounds to 321 in the course of a single offseason - not all of it was good weight. That is partially on account of a shoulder injury that has prevented him from working as hard in the weight room as he'd like. While his strength was never a question, his agility suffered from the weight gain, and Tuley-Tillman will have to work his way into shape to move back up the rankings.

He did get back into shape. The rankings did not respond, but it did pay off on high school fields despite his terrible, terrible team not being able to do much. Josh Helmholdt caught him as a senior, after the wild swing:

Peoria Manual entered Saturday's game against Peoria with an 0-3 record and dropped this contest 44-0. But in the final minute of the game Tuley-Tillman was still on the field, still blocking all-out to the whistle and still trying to get his team up. Technically we saw a lot of the good things the 6-foot-7, 315-pound Tuley-Tillman showed in the summer: getting into his pass set quickly, utilizing his length, having fast, active hands. But his effort from kickoff to final whistle, especially after playing both ways all game, was the most impressive thing he showed this day. Tuley-Tillman has been knocked for his work ethic at times in the past, but he has really rounded into a leader and a high-motor kid.

Now that he's in a college weight program his weight should go up steadily, not dramatically, until he tops out in the 320 range. Some guys do have problems not blowing up a la Oprah, and fans (read: me) will keep an owlish eye cocked in the direction of the roster for any hints things are getting out of control for the next couple years.

Tuley-Tillman did enroll early. Since he's an offensive tackle destined for a redshirt we didn't get any extra information on him—can't find anything on this site or MLive of importance after January first—other than the highly encouraging 285 pound weight. While that early enrollment isn't going to get him on the field this year, it should accelerate his progress, possibly even to the point where he is a viable option next year.

Etc.: Ohio State fans, man. Helmholdt mentions that another asset for Tuley-Tillman is his left-hand dominance, which he likes in a left tackle… except if Shane Morris is the guy that'll be a detriment to the blindside tackle. I am not looking forward to three years of "but Shane Morris is left handed" when talking about the OL. I'll deal.

Why Schrodinger's Jake Long? Ideal left tackle that needs time and technique to reach a ceiling that's rather distant at the moment. Long is 6'7", 320. LTT will end up there. Long is awesome at football. Tuley-Tillman… ask again later.

Guru Reliability: Pretty good. Camps, but hard to tell much from high school stuff when your team is so dire. Also there's a fairly large split in option between the fringe top 100 guys and fringe four star guys.

Variance: Vast. Could be Long 3.0. Could transfer to a MAC school.

Ceiling: Vast. Prototype NFL left tackle who happens to be a long way away.

General Excitement Level: Uh, moderate? I do like the idea of adding a Tuley-Tillman to a lot of high-quality recruits, because if you miss on him oh well and if you hit oh baby. I'll give him a plus for getting all the way back down to 285 after the weight gain.

Projection: Is OL, redshirt.

After inevitable redshirt he'll probably be looking up at Erik Magnuson and Ben Braden. Probably. Even if you assume Braden is on track to have a starting tackle job next year, the other one will be an honest-to-goodness battle between Magnuson, Tuley-Tillman, Chris Fox, and maybe one of the 6'5"-ish guards (Kalis, Samuelson, Bosch) if Michigan is just overflowing on the interior.

Pick a name out of the hat there. If it is Tuley-Tillman that is a great sign, because that means the highest upside guy hacked through a jungle and has come out the other side kicking ass.

Ohmygod Ohmygod his tie is red his tie is red HOW CAN WE TRUST THIS MAN???!!!

I have to start Part III off with an apology: there will be FOUR parts in this series.  As I looked at the data left to review for Borges' play-calling and the cumulative data I planned to analyze in Part III, I realized it would make for a long, long post.  You people don't tend to like that.  Plus, this way, you'll have an extra distraction at work on Monday AND Tuesday.

In Part I, Borges' first years in coaching (going back to 1975) and his rise to OC at UCLA were summarized.  Part II examined Al's disastrous decision to return to Cal, his subsequent punishment as the OC at Indiana, and his triumphant and terrible years at Auburn.  Now, it's Brady Hoke's turn.

"Resigned" sounds so much better than "fired," but that's what happened to Al Borges before the 2007 season ended at Auburn.

Borges sat out the 2008 season.  It was the first time he had not been part of a coaching staff since 1974, and he had been an OC since 1985.  There is no doubt that Borges took the blame for Auburn's 2007 woes, and, while some of that is surely justified, Tuberville was part of the problem too--he got canned in 2008.  Nevertheless, Borges was the fall guy in '07, and was forced out even before the Tigers' appearance in the Chick-fil-A Bowl.

If you've read Parts I & II, you know Borges is a California guy.  So after a year away from the only job Borges had ever had--still living in East Alabama where his wife served as Associate Athletic Director for Marketing and Communications for Auburn--I'm sure he was thrilled to get Hoke's call, even if it was coming from San Diego State.

Interestingly, SDSU had been among the schools that had reported interest in hiring Borges in 2005, after his record-breaking season at Auburn.  I'm not sure Brady had to be very persuasive, but all Hoke had to sell as a Head Coach at that point was an undefeated regular season at Ball State.

On Christmas Eve, 2008, Borges joined Brady Hoke.  They haven't been apart since.

The 2009 season at San Diego State was less than spectacular.  Coming off of a 2-10 performance in 2008, the Aztecs didn't seem to have much talent, and had average attendace of 24,376 in a stadium that holds over 70 thousand.  Not good.

But they did have Ryan Lindley.  In 2008, the freshman had taken the starting job and had a respectable season for the unrespectable Aztecs.  Throwing for 2,663 yards and 16 TDs, it was a decent season and earned him a 117.17 rating.  The running game?  It averaged 3.09 yds/att and accumulated a pathetic 878 yards for the season.  Denard accounts for 878 yards in like six quarters.

2009 wasn't exactly a turnaround.  SDSU doubled their win total, but that got them to just 4-8.  And the offense certainly wasn't humming, averaging just 23.3 pts/gm (#85 nationally).  Here's the final tally:

The frightfully bad running game from 2008 was even scarier under Borges in 2009, but the passing game did take some big steps.  At 77% of offensive yardage, the '09 Aztec passing attack represents the most yardage-biased phase Borges has ever coached--a full 5% greater than his 2000 UCLA passing offense.  Lindley's rating improved to 123.45 on 3,054 yds, a 54.7% completion rate, 7.0 yds/att, 23 TDs, and 16 INTs.

The running game was atrocious.  Bradnon Sullivan's 558 yards led the team.  He averaged just 3.62 ypc.  Only Borges' 2000 UCLA running offense averaged fewer yds/play.

In 2010, Hoke did what had taken him five seasons at Ball State--he turned SDSU into a winner.  The Aztecs would ring-up a 9-4 record that was close to being even better--their four losses were by a combined 15 points.  The offense would put-up 35.0 pts/gm (#19) and never scored fewer than 21 points.  They hung 35 points on #2 TCU in Fort Worth, nearly beating the Horned Frogs, and coming closer than anyone else would during the regular season (Wisconsin came within two points at the Rose Bowl).  Here are the Aztecs numbers from 2010:

Was Al Borges dumb in 2009 and smart in 2010?  No.  Al Borges had a better O-Line.  Al Borges also had a freshman named Ronnie Hillman--now a Denver Bronco--who ran for 1,532 yards and averaged 5.85 ypc.  His 262 carries were nearly 200 more than Walter Kazee, the sophomore who was the "other" RB in the offense and had 324 yards on just 67 carries.  Sullivan, a senior and the leading rusher from the previous season, had just 40 carries for 124 yards.  Only Borges' 2005 Auburn rushing attack--the Kenny Irons year, not the Cadillac/Ronnie Brown year--averaged more yards per play on the ground.

But as good as that running game was, the passing game was better.  Lindley pumped out 3,830 yards (#7 in the country) on 421 attempts (9.1 ypa) and threw for 28 TDs and 14 INTs.  To put that in persepective, it would be the best season in Michigan history for a QB by 509 yards and three TDs.  Lindley's rating sky-rocketed to a silly 149.43, good for #21 in the country and ahead of guys like Geno Smith, RGIII, and Matt Barkley (and one spot behind...Denard Robinson).

Which brings us to...

Dave Brandon approves this message

Most of us are familiar with Borges' trials since his arrival in Ann Arbor.  He had never coached a spread offense before, and never had a QB rush for significant chunk of his teams' yards.  Rather than summarizing those seasons, here are the numbers from 2011:

As a percentage of plays called, Borges had never run the ball more.  Perhaps even more significantly, the ground game accounted for 55% of the yards gained in 2011--the first time a Borges-led offense had more yards rushing than passing, and 7% more than the 48% from his stinky 2003 offense at Indiana.  It was also his first rushing attack to average over 5 yards per play, and was more than a quarter-of-a-yard better than his previous best.  The flipside is that Denard's passer rating would suffer, falling almost 10 points to 139.73.  We would score 33.3 pts/gm (#26), go 11-2, and win the BCS Sugar Bowl.  Yeah, you know that.  But it's fun to look at.

Of course, 2012 was...not as good.  But it certainly wasn't bad.  At 29.8 pts/gm (#57), the 2012 offense had three parts: 1) Denard 2) Nebraska 3) DG/Denard hybrid.  It makes for a strange statistical study, and I'm not sure how significant it is, but here you go:

This is still Borges' third-best ground game (in ypp) and a pretty good passing game (rescued by DG).  Denard's passer rating dropped again, this time to 126.63--his worst since his freshman year.  What may surprise you is that Denard actually ran for more yards in 2012 than he did in 2011.  The unfortunate accompanying truth is that no RB rushed for more than 514 yards (Fitz) or 5 TDs (Fitz again).

Perhaps more useful to examine would be the final five games of 2012:

I was surprised to see how run-heavy we remained, although, as I noted, this was really still a fusion offense, utilizing spread concepts to continue getting Denard carries.  There is no doubt that the running game suffered without Denard as the QB, just as it is crystal clear that the air attack was far more effective.  Overall, in fact, the offense averaged more yards per play than it did in 2011 and, at 32.8, just 0.5 pts/gm fewer.

So what does all this mean?  That's for you to decide.  But in Episode Part IV - A NEW HOKE, I will put the data together and attempt to find patterns and tendencies while spending some time pointing out some important potential error sources.

247 and ESPN have both updated their rankings since the last edition, and with several new commitments around the conference there are plenty of changes in this week's recruiting rankings. Most notably, Nebraska finally kick-started their 2014 class with seven commits in the last two weeks after having just two previously, moving them up into the MSU-Iowa-Wisconsin tier where they belong.

Changes since last rankings:

5-31-13: Purdue picks up Greg Phillips.
6-6-13: Iowa picks up C.J. Hilliard
6-7-13: Nebraska picks up Drew Brown.
6-8-13: Penn State picks up Michael O'Connor. Indiana picks up DeAndre Herron.
6-11-13: Ohio State picks up Sam Nuernberger. Nebraska picks up Tanner Farmer.
6-12-13: Indiana picks up Alexander Diamont.
6-13-13: Illinois picks up Austin Roberts.
6-14-13: Rutgers picks up George Behr and Robert Martin. Nebraska picks up Trai Mosley and Zack Darlington. Iowa picks up Jyaz Jones.
6-15-13: Nebraska picks up D.J. Foster, Demornay Pierson-El, and and Mick Stoltenberg. Maryland picks up Andrew Gray. Purdue picks up Kirk Barron and David Blough.
6-16-13: Rutgers picks up Logan Lister. Michigan State picks up Vayante Copeland. Minnesota picks up Gaelin Elmore.
6-17-13: Northwestern picks up Nate Hall. Minnesota picks up Connor Mayes. Indiana picks up Wes Martin.
6-18-13: Illinois picks up Henry McGrew.

Chart? Chart:

*Full rankings and explanation here.
^The average of the average rankings of the four recruiting services (the previous four columns). The figure is calculated based on the raw numbers and then rounded, so the numbers above may not average out exactly.

NOTE: Unranked recruits are counted as two-star players.

On to the full data after the jump.

Junior Offers Out

Kennard and Coleman

Junior day came and went with one offer issued, that to OH SF Luke Kennard, which duh. Kennard isn't on the verge of committing and would like to narrow things down.

“We’re going to have to start narrowing it down some,” said Kennard. “Top 10 or top five, and then see where we go from there.”

Kennard plans to visit each of the schools that make the cut, naming Ohio State, Michigan, Indiana, Butler, and North Carolina first when asked who has the best shot to survive the trim.

Kennard is planning to hit Michigan's team camp at the end of July; M is reputed to  be in strong position. Kennard hit up the Elite 100 camp last week and impressed Scout's Brian Snow($):

Luke Kennard, SG – The Ohio native had another excellent event proving to everyone that he is not only a high level shooter, but pretty darn good at everything on the basketball floor. He is more than athletic enough to guard high level wings, and then on offense his IQ separates him from most of his peers. Kennard is still somewhat left hand dominant, but he was able to get by guys going either direction. Add in that he makes plays for himself and others, and Kennard might have been the most complete wing at the entire camp.

A Beilein guy no doubt. Kennard is talking about a decision at the beginning of his junior year, which you'd think favors Michigan. Kennard has gotten around to Indiana, OSU, and Kentucky, though, so it wouldn't be a slam dunk.

IN SG Jalen Coleman wasn't offered over the weekend because he was playing in an AAU tourney and was unreachable, but he got his yesterday. He's not as familiar to Michigan fans as Kennard is. He did tell Scout's Kyle Bogie($) that he is planning some summer visits, "especially Michigan," amongst some other tantalizing things. Coleman will be a knock-out, drag-down fight between various Big Ten programs and potentially Louisville. He's named after Jalen Rose($), so we've got that going for us.

He told Inside The Hall that, like Kennard, he doesn't plan on taking his recruitment out too much longer:

“I don’t think it’s going to be senior year, I doubt if it’d be that late,” he said. “Probably his junior year he’ll be making the decision on what school he’ll be going to because it’s good to get that done, especially being an upperclassman so you can just focus on your team.”

Indiana offered Coleman when he was a freshman and seems like the main competitor.

WI C Diamond Stone has met the visit prerequisite but wasn't offered; Sam Webb says that's because he hasn't sent in his transcript, and once he does that he'll (obviously) get the offer.

I think we're for real

It's still a little boggling to consider that Michigan can go out and snatch a top-ten national recruit who isn't an enormous puppy-man, but the more information we get on 2015 NV C Stephen Zimmerman, the more I think Michigan's in it. His mom is handling a lot of his interviews, and even though this is an interview with a Kentucky site things keep coming back around to the Wolverines($).

I'm curious--who are the schools that he's having these 20 minute conversations with?

That's a loaded question... Coach Payne at Kentucky has and Coach Jordan at Michigan, they've tried to get to know Zimm. Coach Rice at UNLV too, and I think they have a little more knowledge of Zimm because his brother is his high school coach, so I think they have a good relationship. Those are the ones I can think off the top my head.

Zimmerman appears to really enjoy the idea of playing the Mitch McGary role:

Michigan is a popular school with several guards at this camp because of Trey Burke and his success this season, I'm curious, what are your impressions of Michigan and Mitch McGary from this past season?

We were really impressed because Stephen plays with Dream Vision and we ended up playing Mitch's team quite a bit in Stephen's first summer, so Stephen got to watch Mitch and see where he was at this point to where he is after this past season. You can just see that he was a man on that court now instead of the boy we saw just a summer ago on the court. That meant a lot to Stephen to see how he developed during the year.

…

Has Stephen ever indicated that he's felt like a school has had a similar style of big that he is?

You know, the only one he's mentioned is with Mitch McGary. He'll mention, "hey, we run that play" or, "Ok I see what I did there, I can try that." So that's really the only one I can think of that he's voiced, but I'm sure you know from talking with Stephen that he doesn't say a lot of what he's thinking in his head, so he may not verbalize it until a few days later, he's an observer.

Zimmerman's going to visit a small list of schools and I'd be shocked if Michigan isn't one of them. He just told a Rivals guy that Kentucky and Michigan were the "most aggressive" schools after him.

Meanwhile, in 2014 land

Jordan Barnett, Devin Booker

Uh… nothing's really going on you guys, other than AAU tourney after AAU tourney after AAU tourney.. IN SF Trevon Bluiett is status quo, deciding between Indiana, UCLA, Michigan and fuzzy potential leader Butler. OH combo forward Vincent Edwards is status quo, deciding between Michigan and Purdue. Michigan got CA SF Kameron Chatman on campus and offered; that's the only recent Event aside from a visit from MO SF Jordan Barnett, who could be in line for an offer:

“[Michigan] said they would like to offer me, but coach Beilein said specifically that I couldn’t get an offer from Michigan unless he saw me play,” Barnett said. “Beilein hasn’t seen me. He said if he saw me and he liked what I did, I’d probably get an offer.”

He's looking to commit by the end of the summer; Iowa, Texas, and Florida are his other main suitors.

MS SG Devin Booker still doesn't have a well defined top list and plans to take officials in the fall. Duke and North Carolina are taking themselves out of the running a bit after getting commitments from similar players, so Kentucky looms as the biggest threat:

About [Kentucky] — Booker appears to be quite high on its list of priorities. Booker said he talks with Kentucky coach John Calipari “on a day to day basis.”

“Me and Coach Calipari, we text back and forth, we’ll talk on the phone,” Booker said. “He actually has a good relationship with my mom and dad, he’s been talking to them. So we’re talking about a visit sometime soon. I think right now it’ll be an unofficial. After the summer, I might take an official.”

He told a newspaper basically the same thing.

Booker's in Michigan for the summer with his mom, hopefully hanging out with Drake Harris and enjoying the weather. He plans some sort of cut at the end of the summer followed by some number of official visits.

All of this will be terribly exciting when Michigan smashes Kentucky's recruiting hegemony and spirits away a bunch of top 20 players. August and September promise to have a lot of movement, as it seems everyone mentioned in this post, be they class of 2014 or 2015, is talking about making a decision before their high school seasons kick off.

[Sorry this one will be short but HTTV is going out today.]

I love me some plumb-able data, like the kind cfbstats puts out at the end of every year. And I love me some stats made out of ingredients that are don't get mentioned, like receiver targets and Bill Connelly's ensuing RYPR metric. Yes I've played around with it before, usually in context of how awesome Jeremy Gallon is.

RYPR (stands for Target Rate x Yards Per Target x Passing S&P+ x Pass Rate) is useful because it cuts through some of the usage bias. Penn State's Allen Robinson put up conference-leading numbers last year because Matt McGloin's brain was capable of processing just two commands: "run around a bunch" and "find A-Rob." Usage isn't a total red herring; a receiver earns his targets, and the more the offense focuses on him the more defenses do as well. However the thing to do in late June isn't so much awarding production in 2012 as trying to spot guys who are going to be a handful in 2013.

The last couple of weeks I've been referencing it while adding flourishes to the pages of Hail to the Victors 2013. I thought I'd spill some of those results onto the interwebs.

2013 Dangermen

Here's the top 25 guys Michigan will probably face this season:

CR is catch rate, i.e. the % of balls thrown at him that he caught. YPT is yards per target.

One of Michigan's smaller concerns going into this season is coverage. We'll be starting a new safety, almost assuredly Jarrod Wilson. Blake Countess comes back and J.T. Floyd graduated but it's not a one-for-one trade: Raymon Taylor is expected to shift to boundary while Countess resumes the field duties. Those familiar with Floyd's career here know his specialty was blanketing big receivers who didn't have enough speed to simply leave J.T. in the dust. Taylor is smaller, and not that guy. Depth there is still quite young and/or tiny. It's possible one of the tall freshman corners or nickel-safety Dymonte Thomas ends up spelling Taylor if Michigan comes up against a particularly large human.

Well look at the table above and find the deep threats. There really aren't that many. Kenny Bell and Allen Robinson are the guys to watch out for. Neither is paired with a secondary threat—Nebraska's next best receiver is Jamal Turner, and Penn State's Moseby-Felder is just a guy (their tight ends, e.g. Carter, are a bigger concern). Ohio State's Corey "Philly" Brown was their slot guy much of the year—the offense creates those yards for him—but Devin Smith is a go-long threat. Indiana's three guys look less scary when you consider they'd be ranked as highly in the MAC as the Big Ten.

Notably missing from that list is State's Aaron Burbridge. We saw the recruiting profile and that he was obviously better than Mumphery or Fowler, but his stats are really unimpressive: 62 targets, 364 yards for a 46.8% catch rate, 5.9 yards per target, and 40.6 RYPR. Like the other two Spartan receivers, he did seem to fall victim to Michigan State's tendency to do a lot of their passing only when they had to. One of the stats Connelly tracked was how often the guy was being targeted on a passing down (2nd and 10+, or 3rd and 6+), when presumably the level of difficulty rises. Of the guys on this list, four of the top six are Spartans, all of whom had about half of their targets come on passing downs.

Top Targets

Some of these guys appeared to be the focal point of their offenses:

A picture emerges of go-to guys who get about 20% of balls. The exceptions were Allen Robinson and whoever's playing the Percy Harvin position for Urban Meyer.

By "%SD" that means the percent of balls thrown his way that were on standard downs, as opposed to passing downs—the reverse of what I was talking about above. It helps to pick out different types of receivers: Notre Dame and Ohio State will chuck their long balls to TJ Jones and Devin Smith, respectively, but look elsewhere when trying to reach the yard marker. Conversely Connecticut seems to save Shakim Phillips (40.4% standard downs) for when it needs a conversion.

Deep Threats

These are sorted by "real yards per target", which is yards per target adjusted to what it would have been if your %SD correlated to the national average.

Finding Meaning

The point of this was to spot anyone who might be particularly dangerous given Michigan's defensive backfield. Your answers in order: Kenny Bell in single coverage, Kenny Bell's hair, Allen Robinson, Indiana, and Penn State's tight ends.

The great coach smackdown of 2013. Sound Mind, Sound Body—an offseason camp that is set up such that college coaches can go—is too good to be true and will flame out in the near future when sixty other camps imitate it and the NCAA closes the loophole. But for now, we get things like Michigan coaches doing drills right next to Ohio State coaches that can be bothered to show up.

This is the setup for an uncomfortably hilarious moment. Mike Vrabel gets done with his drill segment early, badgers Mattison about finishing his bit when there's still time on the clock before the next rotation, and Mattison Is Not Having That. Via Sam Webb($):

“How about you coach them as hard as you can for as long as you have them?” Mattison yelled back tersely.  “YOU GIVE THEM EVERYTHING YOU’VE GOT!!”

Mattison then donned his swag glasses and told Lawrence Marshall "that's why you don't go to Ohio State, Lawrence."

There's a great Greg Robinson story behind that paywall still.

Run, don't walk. Outside of paywall is a terrific article by Mike Rothstein on the basketball program's unique approach to recruiting, in which Michigan offers only after June 15th of a prospect's junior year and maintains a sedulous respect for the process of getting to know kids.

“I’ll throw this at people,” Jordan said. “‘What’s your mom’s name?’ Because there’s a curiosity of why haven’t you offered. ‘How many brothers? How many sisters? What’s your family like? Have you considered the fact that we don’t really know each other, but there is a desire for a scholarship offer?’

“So now it’s like, ‘OK.’ It’s the education.”

It does seem like the Michigan offer is now something that means something, unlike a number of other schools.

There’s another, almost unintentional, byproduct. By having prospects wait for an offer and go through myriad steps, Michigan has created more perceived value around an offer from the school. Instead of just another scholarship offer on a list, it is one the player had to work for.

“To see that they still wanted to offer me, it meant a lot after recruiting me for a year and seeing how well I developed and saw how much potential I had,” Irvin said. “That was really special to me.”

Rothstein noticed that Beilein often goes after kids who are young for their grade—Caris LeVert is a recent prominent example—and got shot down when he asked the coaches about it. So he's on to something there.

Brady Hoke problems. ESPN gives Maurice Ways a fourth star, which means the list of current commits eligible for this site's Sleeper of the Year designation reads:

• Michigan State commits

If I have to I'll open it up to kids who got just one four-star ranking, which opens the door to a whopping three guys at the moment: Ways, Chase Winovich, and Wilton Speight.

ESPN also moved Drake Harris up 25 spots to 71st; the rest of Michigan's commits had insignificant drops of a spot or two.

Sense. And sensibility. And zombies. This bowl news is trickling out so gradually it begins to remind me of the Big Ten's realignment, which was announced weekly for two months. But I think one of the priorities fans had was being able to you know, watch the Big Ten's bowl lineup and Delany has confirmed that is something on the docket:

"I think what you'll see is a truly national slate of bowls," Delany said. "I think you'll see us probably stronger on the West Coast than we've been. You'll see us as strong in Florida as we've been, but probably not as much on New Year's [Day]. I think you'll see us in Texas, and you'll see us with some games in our region, some games on the East Coast. I think it's going to be a great slate. We've made a lot of progress."

Also, the league is about to force bowls to take at least five different teams over the next six years, so no Yet Another Orlando Trip. I'm a little leery of that. The impulse behind the idea is a good one but that threatens to screw with bowl matchups.

Finally, a chorus of angels sounds from above!

"We've been trying to create a model that's more realistic," Delany said. "We'll take fewer, better tickets. If that means the payouts have to come down some, that's OK. Because it makes no sense to overpay on tickets, over-commit and find out you're really subsidizing the bowls, financing your own game."

I'm going on six years of bitching about this. No more. Freedom! (Have I told you how terrible the scholarship model is?).

Could make the West more… nahhh. Tim Beckman picks up Oklahoma State transfer Wes Lunt, who started six games as a true freshman for the Cowboys. Michigan won't see him unless Illinois rotates onto the schedule in 2016, but the addition of a quality quarterback could make the Illini the scariest 4-8 team in college football.

The one time when a coach really could claim to block a player's transfer for their own good, and Gundy doesn't. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ –edsbs

Just once, Illinois, you could try looking at a photograph of the guy you're hiring before doing so. Then you would not hire the people you hire. I challenge anyone to find a picture of Tim Beckmann that does not beg to be captioned "derp" or "hurrrr durrrr" or "is what how can do?"

NOPE

NOPE NOPE NOPE

Okay guy. It must be brutal to write something for a newspaper in June, but uh.

Freep Guest Column: Alternate jerseys and helmets continue to impress recruits

I don't think it's working. Next time put actual fireworks in the helmets?

Gant move confirmed. Brady Hoke confirmed that Allen Gant was now at SAM, stating thusly:

"He's a rangy guy and he's got length to him," Hoke said last week. "His body has the opportunity to put weight on, the structure and the genetics of the body.

"I think that's the biggest part of it."

If he tops out at 230, think Stevie Brown rather than Jake Ryan.

We missed this, but it's a little explosion-y so let's just do it now. Sam Webb puts out a Da'Shawn Hand article about two seconds after I do a final scan through my RSS feed for the recruiting roundup. Well played.

Most of it is stuff you've heard before about Professor Needs A Raise and how the Michigan staff is his favorite staff. But while I think a version of this quote was in a video somewhere this is the first time it's in text:

"My goal is try to make a decision before December,” Hand reported. “At first I was going to stretch it out, but then after talking with my pop -- we kind of had a heart to heart -- I kind of have to make up my mind. It’s a big decision, but at the same time I kind of have a gist of knowing where I’m going, but I ain’t gonna say that.”

GO LITTLE GUY GO. RUN IN CIRCLES. YES. GO.

Etc.: Books to read from Smart Football. MC79 on data versus feelingsball.