As Signing Day nears, people commit to schools. That's how it works. Michigan has had a long wait after their summer flood and now sits on five guys that will either fill out the class or commit heinous crimes that can never be forgiven. In the spirit of late January/early February recruiting overkill, a rundown of the prospects and what my own Bayesian spidey sense (assembled from message board trolling, tips in the inbox, and a few conversations) is feeling at the moment.

If you don't read every word of the recruiting roundups, let this serve as a 1,000 foot view.

OH TE Sam Grant. Grant recently decommitted from Boston College after a long period of being a commit in name only and is either down to Michigan and Oklahoma or those two schools and Arkansas, depending on who you listen to. I have no insider information on him but his visit schedule is telling. In chronological order, he took trips to:

1. BC
2. Michigan
3. Arkansas
4. Oklahoma
5. Michigan

That second trip is telling, likely an attempt to confirm his decision or bring a family member up to get them on board. With Kyle Kalis undoubtedly in his ear and Oklahoma flush with tight end recruits (three already), this one seems like the least dramatic recruitment on the board.

Verdict: Michigan.

IL OL Jordan Diamond. Diamond has seemingly had Michigan in the lead for over a year now, when he popped up on Michigan's radar during their recruitment of Simeon teammate Chris Bryant. A recruit not committing to an obvious leader over a long period of time can be a bad sign—it's often a signal there's something impassable. In Diamond's case, once Meyer arrived and started shooting offers out to anyone with four stars in the Big Ten footprint rumors started swirling about an Ohio State commit; he visited.

That moment has passed, leaving Diamond with an official top four of M, Arkansas, Auburn, and Wisconsin. Unofficially, that top four is a top two of M and Arkansas. The delay here is supposedly alarm at Michigan's offensive line recruiting class and Diamond's seeming inability to start from day one at Michigan. If Michigan makes it clear that the need at tackle is dire and that a couple of the touted players in the class are likely destined for guard (like Kalis and Garnett if he chooses justice and light), he should be blue. People close to Diamond believe that he really wants Michigan.

Verdict: Michigan.

WA OL Josh Garnett. The biggest fish on the board is down to Stanford and Michigan. There is an interesting divide between the most informed Michigan observers (Sam, Tom), who believe it will be M, and most national analysts, who believe it will be Stanford. Garnett is going to make a lot of people wrong no matter who he chooses. Tom's confidence has been on the wane a bit of late; Sam, too, has been a little more reserved about Michigan's chances. This seems based on vibe more than new information, which isn't forthcoming. Some of the West Coast analysts predicting Stanford admit that they haven't gotten any new information out of Garnett in forever.

Meanwhile, Kevin Erik Magnuson [ed: damn my memory for obscure old M hockey defensemen] and Garnett twitter footsie has reached levels heretofore unseen. Garnett has a bunch of people snowed either way; the choice here is between distance from home and being able to enjoy a milkshake with Magnuson at a school that has a much better track record of sustained success than Stanford.

This one is a tossup on which I don't have inside info. But…

Verdict: Michigan.

MA CB Armani Reeves. After decommiting from Penn State, Reeves is down to Michigan or Ohio State. Michigan came in second on Reeves's first go-round and familiarity on its side—Ohio State just hired their defensive backs coach a couple hours ago. Ohio State has a commitment from best friend and fellow PSU decommit Camren Williams. Quien es mas macho?

Nobody knows. This is another recruitment that will go into the hat dance a genuine mystery; Rivals East Coast analyst Mike Farrell was "surprised" that the Urban in-home didn't lock Reeves down and now gives Michigan a ludicrously specific 52-48 edge based on nothing more than Bayesian spidey sense vibes. It's likely that not even Reeves knows where he's going at the moment.

Verdict: Flip a coin.

CO OL Alex Kozan. Kozan is down to Iowa, Michigan, and Auburn, three of the four schools he took officials to. Ohio State, the other, was presumed to be the heavy favorite. The way that changed suddenly implies that OSU pulled its offer. With the lingering OSU fandom push him away or will revenge bloodlust push him towards Michigan? Nobody knows.

No one knows anything about Kozan, really. I can't find one thing that indicates he's leaning one way or the other and haven't heard anything personally. All I've got is that it's the Auburn site on 247 that seems to be posting the most relevant items, like his announcement date. Auburn is nowhere near the 25 maximum and though they are hypothetically near 85, things happen, you know.

Verdict: Flip a three-sided coin.

Random Surprise Fellow. I think Michigan can take all five of the above if the chips fall their way. They have 23 with three early enrollees and have 27 scholarships open right now with one blindingly obvious candidate to not receive a fifth year. If Michigan strikes out on one or more of the above, do they have an Englemon in their pocket?

I have heard they do, a generic three-star defensive lineman currently committed to another BCS school. Michigan initially did not pursue him heavily but if there's a signing day flip don't be shocked. I think it'll take more than missing out on just one of the above for that to happen, but if it's a choice between leaving three scholarships open and taking a mystery guy I'm betting on mystery guy.

[ED: Meta. I was just going to put a bullet in a UV about this but things got a little crazy and I ended up with a full post.]

Joe Paterno's death was a hugely misreported fiasco of the sort that is inevitable given the speed of information in the internet age. This post is an attempt to provide a framework for existing in a world of uncertain information.

This is what happened: Onward State, a blog/online newspaper run by PSU students, reported Paterno's death based on an email sent to Penn State players that turned out to be a hoax. This was good enough for a local radio station and StateCollege.com. It hit twitter and was then picked up without attribution by CBS Sports. It took off from there once the imprimatur of a major news agency was on it. Black Shoe Diaries has a detailed chronology of the mass screwup if you're interested in details. Shirtless Mark Twain isn't sure if he approves of this whole business or not, but would like you to know that rumors of his rippling pecs have been sorely undersold.

It's a story about the internet screwing up in very understandable ways. Onward State had what seemed like reliable information, and it passed their threshold for reporting. It is not a good threshold, but not everyone has one these days. CBS's Adam Jacobi did something unwise and sloppy. Pagewhoring Huffington Post saw an opportunity for views and cares about nothing else.

We've seen this happen before when a newspaper intern replicates an internet rumor on one of the dingy blogs shuffled off into the corner of large metro papers: as soon as a rumor gets paired with header graphics associated with a real newspaper, everyone else is confirming it via "sources." In this instance, CBS's screwup was compounded because they didn't even provide a link to the primary source; Huffington Post did the same thing, but that's just their MO. Jacobi is a BHGP founder and should have known better.

I've screwed these things up myself. Earlier this year I erroneously reported that Kaleb Ringer had been booted from his high school team based on information that seemed solid but obvious was not. By contrast, a couple years ago I had the sense not to run anything about the serious car accident that Jon Bills and Mark Moundros were in despite having a ton of solid sources telling me about it. That seemed like a place to let journalists be journalists.

As I go along here that realm has steadily expanded. I probably won't report something like the Ringer thing again for a lot of reasons. Michigan playing Alabama is one thing to be wrong about; a high school kid's problems or lack thereof is another. This leaves windows open for crass opportunists like Ace Williams, but it's the internet. There's always going to be a bottom of the barrel.

------------

Anyway, these things evolve naturally. As this site expands it has more at risk and becomes more cautious. People just starting out have little to lose and have not experienced the backlash from being wrong—or the frightening period between your post and official confirmation of it. Also some of them are total idiots.

From the user's perspective, the thing to do is maintain a Bayesian approach. Phil Birnbaum explains what that is:

Generally, Bayesian is a process by which you refine your probability estimate. You start out with whatever evidence you have which leads you to a "prior" estimate for how things are. Then, you get more evidence. You add that to the pile, and refine your estimate by combining the evidence. That gives you a new, "posterior" estimate for how things are.

You're a juror at a trial. At the beginning of the trial, you have no idea whether the guy is guilty or not. You might think it's 50/50 -- not necessarily explicitly, but just intuitively. Then, a witness comes up that says he saw the crime happen, and he's "pretty sure" this is the guy. Combining that with the 50/50, you might now think it's 80/20.

Then, the defense calls the guy's boss, who said he was at work when the crime happened. Hmmm, you say, that sounds like he couldn't have done it. But there's still the eyewitness. Maybe, then, it's now 40/60.
And so on, as the other evidence unfolds.

That's how Bayesian works. You start out with your "prior" estimate, based on all the evidence to date: 50/50. Then, you see some new evidence: there's an eyewitness, but the boss provides an alibi. You combine that new evidence with the prior, and you adjust your estimate accordingly. So your new best estimate, your "posterior," is now 40/60.

So if some guy with 50 followers claims Armani Reeves is headed to Michigan because Urban was late for his in-home visit, you might increment your 50% to 51%. If Mike Farrell says its 52-48 you might bump it to 52%, but if Farrell said he thought Reeves was definitely headed to Michigan you could push it up further. You base your confidence in the opinion on previous accuracy, with a list like this…

1. TomVH/Sam Webb
2. Established message board posters
3. National analysts
4. Random message board posters
5. Raving lunatics
6. People who don't know what football is
7. Fictional races from another galaxy
8. Hyperintelligent tacos
9. Regular tacos
10. Tacos that aren't too bright even for tacos
11. Ace Williams

…and change your baseline confidence based on the information and your confidence level in it. This is something people do naturally, but too often the weight they put on the information is either 0 or 1 when it should be somewhere in between.

For purveyors of information, it's time to put an explicit confidence level on what you're relaying. My mistake with the Ringer thing, other than mentioning it at all, was saying something was the case when I should have said something less certain. When I got tips about the Michigan-Alabama game I erred by saying with certainty a contract would be signed on a certain date when the people involved with the thing probably didn't know that.

I try to follow a policy of revealing as much as I can about the nature any information I pass along without exposing a source, and that added transparency is necessary in an age when information—valid information—can come from anywhere or anyone. I still make mistakes. That's inevitable. I'm trying, though.

However, not even linking to the original report is a mortal sin. If you are going to run something based on someone else's reporting it is vital that you explicitly tell readers that. Otherwise one report from a little-known online news source turns into multiple reports, some of them from organizations with people paid to do reporting, and the echo chamber starts going exponential. If you do not link, you are telling people that you are reporting it, and when it turns out to be wrong you can't point the finger at anyone but yourself.

Jersey City (NJ) St. Peter's Prep junior Charlie Callinan is one of several wide receivers currently on Michigan's radar for the class of 2013. Callinan already holds an offer from Rutgers and his interest from several BCS programs in the Midwest and East Coast. The 6'4", 205 pound prospect is a member of the ESPNU 150 Watch List, while 247Sports ranks him as the #15 player in New Jersey and the #49 overall receiver among the junior class. Callinan has been in regular contact with Michigan assistant Curt Mallory, and I had the chance to talk to him last night about the recruiting process and where he stands:

ACE: How is everything going in your recruitment? Which schools are going after you the hardest right now?

CHARLIE: Everything is going pretty good. Right now, coaches are coming through, making their stops, just talking to me and watching us work out. I'm in contact with a bunch of coaches and schools, so it's been going pretty good. The [schools going after me the] hardest right now would probably be Rutgers, Michigan, Michigan State, Boston College, South Carolina, UConn, and Virginia.

ACE: Do you have any early favorites out of those schools?

CHARLIE: I don't really know about favorites, but I'm definitely interested in checking out those schools. I could see myself at every single one of those, and I've heard a lot about all of those schools. I don't really know about favorites, but all of those schools are pretty nice.

ACE: Talking about Michigan specifically, which coach has been in contact with you, and what's your impression of the coaching staff and the school?

CHARLIE: I've been talking to Coach Mallory a lot, Curt Mallory. He actually gets on a personal level with you, we'll talk a lot and we'll talk about how the week is going and stuff like that. He'll talk about the school and all that—he's a good guy and I heard a lot about him, I've heard a lot about the program, so I'll probably make it up there for a visit and check it out, and I'll see how it is.

ACE: How did you junior year go in terms of your personal performance? If you know your stats off the top of your head, feel free to rattle them off.

CHARLIE: It wasn't that good—we're more of a running team, so I don't get many looks at receiver. I'm still the number one receiver on the team. I had 35 receptions for 550 yards and five touchdowns.

ACE: If you had to scout yourself, what would you say are you biggest strengths as a player, and what are you looking to improve for your senior year and beyond?

CHARLIE: My strengths are [that] I can use my size pretty well, and I'm a pretty big kid. I'm about 6'4", 205, so I know how to use my size, and I know the game pretty well. I'll run really good routes and I'm just smart with the game, I can read coverages and all that. My speed is getting there, and I'm working on it, but next year that's what I'm mainly focusing on. I'm pretty fast now, but I really want just high-end speed. You can always get faster so I'll be working on that.

ACE: You mentioned Michigan as a possible visit destination. Are there any other schools that you're planning on taking a visit to at this point?

CHARLIE: Yup. On the 11th [of February] I think I'm going down to West Virginia for a visit, and then in the next coming month or so I'll be going down to Michigan State and maybe Virginia and UConn.

ACE: Do you have any idea in terms of a potential timeline?

CHARLIE: No, I have no clue. A lot of my friends committed before the season, I know some kids who committed after, and they pretty much told me that you've just got to know where you want to go to school before you jump to any conclusions. When I realize what school I want to go to, I want to make sure it's the right school, check it out even deeper, then I'll make my decision. There's no really telling what it's going to be.

ACE: What's going to make you know that a school is for you? What are the factors that you're looking at when it comes down to picking a school?

CHARLIE: The environment around me, the team, how I get along with the coaches, pretty much the overall environment. I'm not going to go to a school where I can't really get along with the coaches—it won't be a fun four years or however many years. I'm just looking for a school where I can be successful, do well academically and just as well on the football field.

1/24/2012 – Michigan 66, Purdue 64 – 16-5, 6-2 Big Ten

Yo, dawg. I heard you like stress testing your heart. So we put the basketball team in an arena so it can either win or lose by two points unless it's getting crushed by Iowa(?!). Hope you enjoy stress testing your heart.

Seriously, though, the last five games:

• Northwestern: W 66-64 (OT)
• Iowa: L 75-59
• MSU: W 60-59
• Arkansas: L 66-64
• Purdue: W 66-64

If this continues massive swaths of Crisler will start keeling over, clutching their chests, whenever the clock ticks under five minutes. It's a hard life when you're a fan of a middling to good Big Ten team this year.

Michigan got the coveted road win, and now doesn't have to hear about their lack of such against good competition. At least not as much. I'm sure they'll bring it up. They stand atop the pile of skulls that is the Big Ten at 6-2. While that's not likely to last what with the murders row Michigan is in the midst of, if Hardaway can be the most recent version of himself they've got a shot at anyone even if Kenpom predicts a 17 point loss to OSU on Sunday.

Kenpom also predicts two more one point games. Keep the paddles handy.

Bullets that have been sweated repeatedly

Stu! I like color guy Dan Dakich a lot and thought he would point out that Michigan switched him onto Lewis Jackson late after he thoroughly trashed Trey Burke for most of the game:

Michigan’s defense was far from perfect due to its inability to contain Lewis Jackson on the pick-and-roll. Jackson sliced his way into the lane for 17 points on eight shots along with eight assists and was the catalyst for a Boilermaker offense that scored 1.09 points per possession.

Jackson was slowed by Douglass and Purdue settled into the four-minute funk that allowed Michigan to edge it. Dakich didn't mention it.

On top of that, Douglass had twelve points on eight shots, two steals, three assists, one turnover, and a couple of "Did Stu Douglass just do that?" moments. The first one, a hesitation move that got him an uncontested layup, reminded me of Chauncey Billups. He's earned his starting role.

Novak. Novak had four attempts and one three-pointer. He needs more usage. If Purdue can get its sniper eight attempts in this game Michigan should be able to get Novak at least a few.

Dakich did point out that Purdue was sticking to the corner shooters to the severe detriment of its interior defense and the numbers bear that out. Michigan shot just 14 threes (28% versus their average of 44%) and hit 58% from within the arc. Morgan was 5 of 7 and his two misses were point blank shots that should have gone down.

Hardaway! I was really frustrated with Hardaway in the first half—the accumulation of a lot of missed threes and poor decisions from earlier games and a few turnovers—and felt that resurface a couple of times in the second half whenever he'd miss or get into trouble on the interior. So I'm not the most balanced Hardaway commentator at the moment.

That said, if four turnovers are required for Hardaway to go 6 of 9 from within the arc, fine. I'd rather have his shots split 70-30 between twos and threes and for Hardaway's TO rate to shoot into the high teens (it's 12.4 right now) than the current situation. Hardaway didn't commit the requested charge. That's the next negative-indicating-a-positive step to take.

Now if the threes can just start falling… I mean, it's hard to believe the same player who shot something like 42% in the Big Ten last year is languishing at 27% this year.

Addition to the Hardaway face pantheon. Via UMHoops:

Dustin Johnston

Depth! We have none. You already know this. Exactly one bench player had more than five minutes—Smotrycz—and there were some crazy plus-minus numbers associated with his entry into the game. Morgan was +18 in his time on the court, Smotrycz –16. There was about four minutes of overlap, FWIW.

Smotrycz entry saw the massive Purdue run on which the Boilers couldn't miss. It didn't seem like it was entirely his fault but it also seemed crazy to keep Morgan, who had a Stu-like game that was even better than a scoreline that looks pretty good already, on the bench for as long as Beilein did. If Michigan's going to wear down, they're going to wear down. They're getting just 22% of their minutes from their bench, which is 327th nationally. For comparison, they're about as starter-heavy this year as they were young last year.

I think we can agree this is not a good thing. It will get a bit better next year unless there is unexpected attrition—Hardaway is not going to be coming off a year he thinks represents his skill level, right?—what with three players replacing two. Then you've got Horford back, Beilfeldt off a redshirt, and hopefully some progress from Brundidge. They should have a pretty deep rotation everywhere save point guard.

Dustin Johnson

I must not understand block/charge. There were two blocking fouls and a no-call that seemed totally ludicrous to me. The worst was when a stationary Hardaway took a violent shoulder to the chest; no call and the Purdue guy made an uncontested layup because his defender was looking for a license plate. A couple other Michigan attempts to take charges got called as blocks despite the defensive player's total immobility. You could hear Dakich's skepticism on one three-point play as the replay showed a totally stationary defender getting plowed and he said something along the lines of "uh… good job by that guy of not jumping directly into the player" as the replay showed a guy jumping almost but not quite entirely into a player.

There was also a Purdue bucket on which Smotrycz forced the driver to put almost the entirety of a size 14 shoe out of bounds that the refs missed. Michigan got one call that egregious on a Hardaway turnover magically transmogrified into a shooting foul by a ref who couldn't see what was going on since the players had their backs to him. Add it up and in a hypothetical world where the refs get everything right, Michigan wins by seven or so. I hate college basketball referees.

Dakich: thumbs up. Probably my favorite non-Raftery color guy at the moment, and I like Raftery for the atmosphere he brings a game, not necessarily the analysis. He's continually saying interesting things that make the dude watching at home understand a little more about basketball and he strikes a nice balance when he makes his criticisms. He's not a Knight-like crab but he'll point out that Jackson, for example, is getting into the lane way too easily.

Elsewhere

Recap and gallery from UMHoops. Holdin' the Rope recaps. Boiled Sports declares the game a gut punch. Hammer and Rails says it's getting old.

Six Zero back with the January 2012 installment of: 

This monthly offseason feature highlights some of the more famous personalities
here at MGoBlog.  Without pulling back the infamous veil of blog anonymity, we’ll
get to know some of your favorite posters better and possibly shed some light
on their definition of why it’s so darn Great, To Be, A Michigan Wolverine.

CLICK HERE TO VIEW PREVIOUS EDITIONS OF MGOPROFILE
(Scroll down to the MGoProfile section of the User-Curated HOF). 

 SIX QUESTIONS WITH ACE ANBENDER  

BIG SHOES TO FILL: 1. Definition(expr.) when a job that was
done by a great person will now be done by someone new.
Ex: Bob was so well-liked and successful; The man
replacing him has some very big shoes to fill.

When the acclaimed TomVH packed up his bags for the bright lights of ESPN, Brian put out the call for his replacement. And, to our surprise, the position was filled rather quickly, by some guy named Ace who previously wrote at some other blog or something.  As if other Michigan blogs exist, right?

Since then, Ace has quickly carved out his own niche, both interviewing prospective recruits and covering sporting events and pressers as well. His style and writing voice has blended seamlessly with the existing culture of the blog, and yet he clearly seasoned the official content in ways we have never tasted before. And all the while, he is omnipresent, and certainly his biggest day of the year will fall next Wednesday as we learn of the luckiest two-dozen plus young men who will get to call themselves Michigan Men.  In celebration of next week's National Signing Day, Ace broke away from the phone long enough to sit down for this exclusive MgoProfile:

Elsewhere

Previews abound. Choose from Hammer and Rails, UMHoops, and Holding The Rope. The Purdue-oriented preview doesn't distinguish between offensive rebounding and defensive, so maybe not that one.