Diaries

California DB Tony Jefferson recently announced his intention to take an official visit to Michigan, although committed to UCLA. Jefferson is a four star safety with a fake [ed: !!!] 4.5 40 time. As I mentioned in a different thread, my computer broke again, so this will be somewhat brief, and in a different format. I spoke with him about the change in his recruitment, and here are some bullet points about what he said:

• Wherever he goes, he will be enrolling early, which means he will be deciding soon.
• His visit will be November 7th for the Purdue game.
• "The coaches (from Michigan) have been talking to me for awhile now, and they've really turned up the intensity. That's part of why I'm taking a visit. I've been talking to coach Singletary and Rich Rodriguez. They've basically been telling me that I'm a priority for them, and they really want me."
• "I've been watching their games, and I really like the way they've been playing defense. I know at Michigan I could get a really good education, and always be fighting to play in a bowl game; I like that."
• "I have a really strong feeling towards Michigan. I get along really well with their staff, and Tate Forcier has been talking to me alot. He's a San Diego boy, and he's been telling me about how much he loves it."
• He said that UCLA hasn't done anything wrong, he just doesn't want to second guess himself.
• His final list is UCLA, Florida, Michigan, and Miami.
• An interesting side note: He has a lot of family in Florida, and confirmed that if he committed to Florida, his family might move there.

It seems like Florida has the best shot, but he seemed sincere when he said he has a strong feeling towards Michigan. Since he's never been on campus, you never know. The coaches have definitely shown him they want him, and he mentioned that it means a lot that they're showing so much interest. He'll visit Florida on November 28th and will decide shortly after.

There have been a number of points spinning around that when taken together create some thought provoking questions:
1) RR’s own previous assertion (while still the coach of UWV) that Pat White had an unusual ability to make split second reads in the offense along with other posters correctly noting RR’s W/L increased dramatically with White at the QB.

2) An offense that is 70% installed (last RR quote) with counters to counters to counters to that defensive counter (as noted by Brian’s post after ND) which should always find some defensive mismatch.

3) A freshman QB that is 10 months into a system and arguably the most college ready QB (based on his personal training before college) that we have ever seen or will likely see. (He is a far cry from some kid showing up in the fall for practice).

Now take this all together and combine it with a comment Norm Parker, the Iowa DC, made which was recanted during the IA/MSU game “Ferentz is similar to Dantonio in that the system is not about them, it is about the players” (shortened paraphrase where my initial reaction when the comment started was "wow, KF likes to drink puppy tears" disappointed with the rest of the quote).

The reason this is more interesting is watching some of the offensive struggles we have had lately and really an inability to really adjust mid-game (thinking the dline twisting at Iowa in the second half that kept killing up) that is really confusing. We have 70% of an offense, we possess counters for most schemes, we have an offense (minus the signal caller) that has been in the system for a year now and I wonder when it all begins to click. I make the comment about Tate being “college ready”, but yes, the kid is being thrown into it and will undoubtedly struggle. However, with his abilities, why aren’t we getting a bit more production though? He has a number of strengths and definitely no slouch, B10 coaches would kill to have him on their teams. Is the offense too complicated for a younger guy or a backup to run? When White went out at Pitt, his backup was terrible and he should have been a groomed player in the system. Have we created a system that can really run with only a very special type of player? Why does it seem that we are unable to exploit our current strengths better to take advantage of our talents?

This not an indictment on the program or the system, just a conversation. It simply seems curious why, with the adaptability in the scheme why we have not been able to find a bit more consistency or more regularly exploit some gaps in a defense. We continue to come back to needing to execute, one and a half years into it, I had hoped to at least see some continual progress regarding execution. It is simply more of a head scratcher when you watch it not have some steady foundation where you say "we need 3 yards and will run x play, because dammit it will work".

My only real bitch is with the receivers not getting open. I do not buy into the fact we do not have talent. Again referring back to the IA/MSU game, I was seeing IA receivers get open on crossing routes and I would not trade those two WR corps. We have to bring a fresh look to our routes to give these guys a chance or take a look at what Dews is doing from a coaching standpoint.

Last week I posted on mgoboard the initial rumormongering that the BigTen Conference Baseball Championship Tournament would be moving to Columbus, OH semi-permanently. That rumor has gained traction now, as Columbus Dispatch writer Bob Hunter now confirms the rumor and sets a timeline of next week for the official announcement of a contract between the Columbus Clippers, the Greater Columbus Sports Commission, and the BigTen that puts the tournament in Columbus through at least 2013, with options through 2016.

The Big Ten will move the tournament to Ohio State's Bill Davis Field for one year so it can have it in Huntington Park the next two, sources say. Previously, the conference champion was the host, so it says a lot about Columbus' trial run that the Buckeyes will be the host even if they don't finish on top.

League and local officials are hoping that this is the beginning of a long run in Columbus. The city will have an option to add three more years starting in 2013.

So while not only does Ohio State get the tournament just 3 miles from their home field at the stadium of the AAA Indians affiliate Columbus Clippers, but next year, they are hosting the tournament at their own home field on campus. In a year they are expected to have a top tier team, the conference is just giving them home field advantage.

As a Michigan fan, I'd be hugely upset with this. If we make the tournament, we're bound to face an even more hostile environment even in games not against Ohio State just do to the school rivalries. If we somehow end up a higher seed (based on off season projections, that's unlikely), and we're forced to play in front of a packed Bill Davis, that's just unfair.

If I were a Minnesota fan, I think I'd be livid. The Gophers are a lot of people's off season favorites for the year, and they know they have to travel to Ohio State for the conference champion to face the team who most pick to finish second. That's just unfair.

That said, both of those injustices could end up being nothing. If Ohio State does win the regular season, I think the one year move to Bill Davis will be passable. If OSU, for some reason, ends up somewhere else, I think several teams will have a reasonable concern for how the tournament is being scheduled, not only this year, but in future seasons as well.

While I appreciate the BigTen's effort to create a preplanned site for the tournament that suits the travel schedule for each school's teams and fans, I think they are doing the league an injustice by making it permanently in Columbus. There are multiple other fields that are close enough to other BigTen teams. A list of minor league parks and a few independents (map of MiLB parks for those who would rather look):

Toledo MudHens

• Pro: Central to a majority of the conference schools, especially the baseball ones other than Minnesota
• Pro: AAA-level stadium
• Pro: No true homefield
• Con: Meh familiarity of the area for most schools

Indianapolis Indians

• Con?: Potential NCAA conflict with Native American team name?
• Pro: AAA-level stadium
• Pro: East-West centralized in the conference geography
• Pro: Transportation in/out is easy
• Con: Meh familiarity with most schools

East Lansing Lugnuts

• Pro: AA-level stadium
• Pro: Held previous NCAA games when MSU used to play there occasionally
• Pro: One less team that may have to travel
• Pro: Teams familiar with hotels in the area due to playing at MSU

Fort Wayne TinCaps

• Pro: A-level stadium
• Pro: Centralized to most of the baseball schools
• Pro: No homefield advantage
• Con: Unfamiliar area for most schools

Madison Mallards

• Pro: Ultimate irony - having the BigTen Championship for baseball in the only BigTen town to cut its baseball team.
• Pro: Solid college baseball summer league stadium, including 200,000 fans during its 2009 season (we're not talking your average Michigan high school field, it's nice)
• Pro: Schools are familiar with Madison
• Pro: No homefield advantage
• Con: It's not centralized to most of the baseball power
• This is my personal favorite due to irony and being a way to promote Wisconsin to one day returning to baseball.

Dayton Dragons

• Pro: A-level stadium
• Pro: Central to baseball schools except Minnesota
• Con: Meh familiarity area for most schools

Kane County Cougars

• Pro: A-level stadium
• Pro: Central to the whole conference (W of Chicago)
• Pro: No homefield advantage
• Con: Unfamiliar area for most schools

Joliet Jackhammers

• Pro: Independent League Stadium
• Pro: Central to conference baseball schools (SW of Chicago)
• Con: Unfamiliar area for schools

Gary RailCats

• Pro: Independent League Stadium
• Pro: Central to conference baseball schools (SE of Chicago)
• Con: It's in Gary, IN
• Con: Unfamiliar area for schools

There's also a A-level team in South Bend, Akron and a few other cities that may or may not be the best travel destinations due to either not being very central or being a bit out of the way (Grand Rapids, Iowa and Illinois teams, other E. Ohio and Pennsylvania teams). Some of these excluded might also have some value, but I don't think I started to stretch around Kane County. I also admit that I'm not familiar enough with several of the collegiate parks in the Northwoods league, but like the Madison Mallards, several are very nice.

I think my bigger point is that if the conference wants to go to a pre-planned site, it should be either neutral or rotating. Sure, sometimes a team may get an unfair homefield advantage. Sure, sometimes you might not be central to all 6 teams in the tournament. What you do get is a fair chance at home field advantage. If you can't earn the home field, it needs to be fairly distributed.

It's wrong that the BigTen is deciding on keeping the game in Columbus. One year does not mean the tournament turnout will be successful year after year. If the Buckeyes don't make the tournament in the next 2 years, I'll be interested to see just how much of a drop there is in attendance.

As much as I hope a drop in attendance happens, just so the BigTen may reconsider keeping it in Columbus permanently, I just don't know if I can actually wish that. College baseball is really gaining momentum in the mainstream, and I don't want to see our conference drop any of the current interest we've got going. So I'm left just hoping the BigTen makes a better decision, and it appears it's already too late for that.

Hello friends,

It's unfortunate that we all had to tolerate a difficult loss Saturday on national tv against a significant rival. It seems, however, that some are taking it harder than others with the poor overall performance apparently signifying huge deficits in team effort, coaching ability (offense + defense), defensive scheme (okay, maybe...or maybe it's the players) and recruiting. That is far from an entirely comprehensive list as it seemed there were various unrelated complaints as well as irrational coaching comparisons (here's looking at you Bill Stewart and Paul Johnson). I would say enough with the ACC comparisons but I'm sure I'm biased.

Of course, it's mere weeks since we had beaten Notre Dame and were undefeated. Tate was the toast of the town (and the nation to some degree) apparently almost a Heisman Candidate. Denard was then a nice change of pace (although he wasn't allowed to throw back then) and people made posts that spoke about 9-3 being reasonably possible. Posts were made with the phrases "dare I say" and "New Year's day bowl game" in the same damn sentence. Indeed, on Friday there were posts predicting blowouts for Michigan. I guess if you type it enough then hope becomes reality?

So here we are following a loss to a highly rated and credible Penn State team. This follows much closer losses to the litte brother and at Iowa. Thematically, I see turnovers (5 vs. Iowa; 4 vs. PSU) and inconsistent play as the culprits. That and a serious inability to get the defense off the field. But really, are these issues including the defensive lapses coaching incompetency or is the cause of this wildly inconsistent play the fact that +/- 70 pecent of the players are freshmen and sophomores who lack the maturity, physical/mental toughness and deep season experience needed to win consistently at this level. The fact is this team has proven they can compete with good to very good teams (ND, little brother, Iowa) but they are very young and will have huge variance in performance. It seems the hot early start and ND win got the hopes a bit crazily high; regrettably, the fall back to earth (and reasonable 7-5 predictions) is painful and eliciting a lot of debateably considered analysis.

This leads me to consider the concept of "rational thought" and whether or not it can truly coexist with the "loyal Michigan fanbase". If fan is short for "fanatic" and someone who is marked by an extreme and unreasoning enthusiasm then we're not off to much of a good start. I will apologize to the ivory tower crowd on my take on philosophical matters (I'm a therapist) but I will go with the modern view on rationalism meaning here a reliance on reason as the best guide for belief or action. I wonder if, in the heat of the game and for about the next 36 hours, "rational thought" is suspended. When we win it's 9-3, OSU dominantion, wine and Rose Bowls and when we lose apparently Paul Johnson, Brian Kelly or hell most anyone else coaching should have been hired.

I'm nobody's apologist but perhaps some rational thought looks at the young players we have, an incoming top 10-15 class, an expectation of freshman/sophomore variance (Tate's a freshman and while Denard has perfected running the throwing is not so much), improvement in defensive performance statistically (hell it couldn't have been worse), Barwis, and it being GERG's first year (the guy is not a defensive Messiah...) and you can reasonably expect some improvement over the rest of the year with decreased performance variance next year (meaning here more wins). Variance does not equal regression people.

Michigan is not about to lose all our remaining games...but we sure as hell were not winning 10 after the ND game either. Perhaps rational thought can win out but I'm not holding out too much hope.

Best wishes to all of you.

I took the liberty to use "I Blue Myself" content regarding how RR did with the spread over the years at WV and matched it up against the play time of WV's Pat White and Steve Slaton to see how the win pct changed for that team when these 2 work horses saw the field.  Both Slaton and White started playing in 2005 (both freshmen at the time, with slaton being a true frosh) with Slaton going pro after the 2007 season and White after the 2008 season.

When we look at WV records below, we see a dramatic improvement from 2001 to 2002. After the 2002 season it remained pretty constant until 2005 when Slaton and White saw playing time.

My thoughts on the shift in records from 2001-2002 and from 2004-2005 are as follows: The first shift appears mostly do to RR's spread implementation and having the right players in the system (perhaps similar to what we are seeing in Michigan from 2008-2009). The 2004-2005 change is the one i find most interesting. It appears that until Slaton and White came to WV the team was stuck in 8-9 wins and could not muster enough to compete for a BCS title. After White and Slaton took over the offense, the team won 10+ games every year.

I make these points simply in observation because i see some posts that assume we should be competing for a BT title and the like by year 3. I am not saying we won't, but based on RRs trajectory at WV, it seems that he needs the right talent to work his voodoo magic with his offense. If that talent is not there, a linear projection of continuous improvement might be wishful thinking. And i say "right" talent because Slaton and White were both 3 star recruits even though Slaton ran a blazing 4.3 40. 

Anyway, I'm I smoking crack or is there a valid relationship between the 2004-2005 jump in wins and the playing time of Slaton and White?


(Thanks to I Blue Myself for the content)

2001: 3-8 overall, 0-5 vs the top 30 and 0-2 vs the top 10.

2002: 9-4 overall, 3-3 vs the top 30 and 0-1 vs the top 10. WVU beat BC, Va. Tech, and Pitt.

2003: 8-5 overall, 0-3 vs the top 30, 0-3 vs the top 10.

2004: 8-4 overall, 0-3 vs the top 30, 0-1 vs. the top 10

2005: 11-1 overall, 2-1 vs. top 30, 0-1 vs. top 10
WVU beat SEC Champ Georgia, Louisville. Lost to Va. Tech

2006: 11-2 overall, 1-1 vs. top 30, 0-1 vs. top 10
WVU beat #12 Rutgers, lost to #5 Louisville (wow, how times have changed)

2007: 11-2 overall, 1-1 vs. top 30, 1-0 vs. top 10
WVU beat #5 Oklahoma, lost to #20 S. Florida.

I've heard a lot of excuses after last night's disaster; some valid and some not so much.  My favorite was Tate isn't use to playing in cold weather.  As all of you know, Michigan is the only northern team that recruits southern players.  But I digress.

Last season was Paul Johnson's first year as head coach of the Georgia Tech Yellow Jackets.  I guess I really never payed attention but I assumed Johnson had a lot of talent to work with.  Afterall, he did go 9-4 his first year while RR went 3-9.  So Johnson had to have tons of talent ready to go when he took over, right?

Not so fast my friend. Here's a little information from Johnson's bio:

"On December 2, 2008, Paul was tabbed ACC Coach of the Year by the Atlantic Coast Sports Media Association (ACSMA). Georgia Tech, ranked 14th in the BCS standings and 15th in the Associated Press poll, finished the regular season with a 9-3 record, remarkably better than every preseason projection. Sports Illustrated predicted Johnson's first Yellow Jacket team would win just three games, and Tech was picked to finish fourth in the ACC's Coastal Division. With a 5-3 record in ACC play, the Jackets tied Virginia Tech for the Coastal Division title."

"Johnson, who came to Georgia Tech in December after a highly-successful, six-year tenure at Navy, inherited a roster low in scholarship numbers and overloaded with youth. Only 76 players are on scholarship, including three senior walk-ons who were awarded scholarships prior to the start of the season, below the maximum of 85 scholarships. The roster includes 75 freshmen and sophomores, and 16 of 22 starters are either freshmen or sophomores."

So, Johnson had 76 players on scholarship and 75 were Freshman and Sophomores.  Any coach who goes 9-3 with mostly Freshman&Sophmores would do so ONLY if the young players were made up of 4 & 5 star recruits.  Right?  Here is GT's recruiting rankings over the last few years.

2005 - 48th (two 4* & six 3*)
2006 - 49th (one 4* & six 3*)
2007 - 15th (nine 4* & nine 3*)
2008 - 37th (one 4* & sixteen 3*)
2009 - 32nd (four 4* & twelve 3*)

I think it's obvious that GT's recruiting classes over the past 5 years don't compare to UM's.  Even with all of the departures, UM still has more talent on both sides of the ball.  So why has Paul Johnson's transition been so smooth and successful while the Rich Rodriguez takeover has been nothing short of a disaster?  

RR brought the spread to Michigan & PJ the triple wishbone to GT.  Both are new and unique to UM & GT.  So we can't really use the "not the right type of fit" excuse.  So what is it?  Maybe GT plays in a weaker conference.  Maybe GT caught some lucky breaks.  I don't know, but I do know GT is playing some damn good football right now while UM is struggling to not look like the football version of the Bad News Bears.  

I'm not jumping off of the RR bandwagon and will give him my full support, but I can take my maize and blue goggles off long enough to see that there a quite a few new coaches who have won more with less.  Paul Johnson, Brian Kelly & Jim Harbaugh all come to mind.

Thank you for your support,

Red