recruiting is legit yo

Every recruit ever committed to Michigan. To recap the "Hello" posts if you missed any of them during GMD11:

• Three star OH CB Tamani Carter, a recent Minnesota commit, was offered by Michigan and flipped.
• 3/4 star CB Raymon Taylor, an Indiana decommit, went with Michigan when they offered him the second time around.
• Michigan replaced decommit K Matt Goudis with CA K Matt Wile, an Army All-America participant who doesn't have the rankings but we're talking about kicker rankings here.
• 3/4 star LB Antonio Poole was offered and quickly committed after meeting with Mattison. Touch The Banner also has a take.
• Michigan snake oiled Purdue commit and three star TX QB Russell Bellomy. TTB sees shades of McNown.

In addition, OH TE/LB Frank Clark and CO LB Leilon Willingham have moved into the "expected to commit" category. Clark's from Glenville, of all places.

The names and stars aren't that impressive—the partially shirtless are shirtless in the same way Martavious Odoms was, a four star to one site and a generic three star to the others—but if we're talking about Michigan 2013 is the new Martavious Odoms better than air? Yes. And who doesn't like Odoms, anyway?

Even if this is just a version of Rodriguez's quick strikes upon taking the Michigan job, Hoke and Mattison (and I guess some other guys*) are doing this in about a fourth of the time Rodriguez had to assemble the last eight members of his hybrid class. And they screwed over Purdue in the process, thereby twisting the knife on Danny Hope and blowing up one of the very first Rodriguez The Demon memes: the "gentleman's agreement." Excellent work all around. Hope you play as a redshirt senior, kid.

Now we've got some insight into what the coaches think is lacking on the team: defense. Here is a small child reacting to this not at all obvious revelation.

there's gambling in this establishment?

More than the linebacker avalanche it's Michigan essentially turning down one-time silent WR commits Devin Lucien, one of those borderline four star types, and Hakeem Flowers, a three star with epic offers. Both tried to firm up those commits with the new staff and were politely told "defense or GTFO." They chose the latter. Michigan has a surplus on the outside now but surely one of those guys wouldn't have been overkill, right?

Similarly, this Heitzman kid they picked up from Vandy is a 6'3", 225 pounder who doesn't seem like he's got a high upside as a DE. So everyone assumed he was a tight end, since Michigan was trying hard to acquire one even before the shift to a more MANBALL philosophy. He denies this, saying Michigan isn't even talking about offense. Which is weird because between Roh, Paskorz, and Beyer Michigan seems to have undersized weakside DE covered for a good long while.

*[Seriously, all the commits save the Purdue snake oilin' are on defense, and the only defensive coach other than Mattison is Mark Smith. Smith is a 50-something dude who's afraid of flash photography. While a lot of the guys are linebackers I think "I coached Ray Lewis" is more the pitch than "I was the ILB coach at Indiana State for 22 years."]

Rick Comley announced his retirement. Red Berenson is "surprised." He's the only one.

Good for Michigan State hockey, good for interesting games against State in the future, still extremely uncertain if they'll get back to where they were under Mason. They've never recruited at the level Michigan has but made up for it with suffocating anti-hockey. Now they're not very good, playing in a dead, half-full building, and trying to compete against the OHL, Michigan, Miami, and Notre Dame. If they hire a real star they'll get back quickly but is Blasi going to leave Miami for MSU? Is George Gwozdecky? I have a hard time seeing MSU splashing the cash for their hockey coach—we'll see.

If it's Danton Cole that's the equivalent of hiring Brady Hoke. He'll be decent but that hire won't put the fear of God in Red or Jeff Jackson. The only name in the TOC thread on this is current assistant Tom Newton, which would be like hiring Mike Debord if Carr had stuck around for the 3-9 year. I'm sure you can dismiss that possibility.

While we're on hockey here's that delightful interlude from the aftermath of the Brown scrum:

Via Michigan Hockey Net.

People started muttering about what it would take for John Beilein to get the axe. It's in the paper and everything. BWS is digging out the wet owl and following that up with the obvious argument about his record.

This is what it will take for John Beilein to get fired this year: Armageddon. There are enough arrows pointed in the right direction, mostly in the persons of Burke, Brundidge, Robinson, Hardaway, et al, that Michigan will give Beilein the epic length of rope they gave Tommy Amaker. He won't get nailed next year and the team will be considerably better in 11-12, and probably better yet in 12-13, whereupon they'll either be a consistent tourney team or even the smitten Michigan athletic department will have to cut the cord.

Of course, I said this about Rich Rodriguez, too, but John Beilein is the kind of saint Michigan likes to be associated with.

Doctor Saturday embarked on his annual defense of the "recruiting-industrial complex." Every year the numbers are the same: on an individual and team basis recruiting numbers are not fate but not useless. Get The Picture set to highlightin' the bit I was going to highlight because Michigan is Georgia:

Those 13 schools [at the top of the recruiting rankings] alone have consistently produced a majority of the top five in the final polls, half of the top 10, at least half of the teams in the BCS and all of the national champions in the BCS era. (With Auburn’s triumph – thanks mainly to über recruit Cam Newton, the five-star headliner of a top five class last year – only two of the top dozen recruiting powers have failed to win a BCS championship: Georgia and Michigan. [Emphasis added.]

We've had a lot of reasons our recruiting success hasn't translated to the field—at least, not the field in Ann Arbor. Georgia not so much, as they seem around where Carr was in '05—good young second year quarterback on a team that's around .500 with a declining coach that has maybe a kick or two left at the can.

People who don't lift weights found out what "rhabdomyolysis" is thanks to Iowa. I'm on with Orson when he dismisses the "save the children" aspect of the media reaction—the big issue is more effective sickle cell trait screening, not squatting until you pee brown. While Iowa's strength coach should probably be fired it's more stupid than immoral.

But man can Iowa rack up the terrible PR. Kirk Ferentz wasn't even at the press conference, and the university thought it could get away with a bland press release about thirteen kids being in the hospital. Add that to Iowa's seemingly biannual drug explosion, that weird press conference held late last year in which unnamed rumors were debunked without mentioning what they were, the laundry list of Hawkeye arrests, and that sketchy sexual assault cover-up-type-substance and it's a wonder that beautiful square-jawed Kirk Ferentz is still regarded a molder of men. Or maybe it's not.

"Nice jaw!"

Was that a question?

"No."

All right then.

The meme was blessed by Steele. Remember those depressing charts from the past couple years with returning starters and whatnot? Yeah…

…different story this year. That doesn't even count Troy Woolfolk, though it does count Terrible McFieldgoalkicker. Call it a wash.

Oh, Snape. Michigan soccer associate head coach Paul Snape got the head job at Butler. I'm only mentioning it so I can post… awww. Stupid Google. I can't find the version of this…

That I once saw somewhere that said "Oh, Snape." Also it turns out to be a Harry Potter reference. Stupid Harry Potter and the horrifying things you'll see photoshopped if you attempt to find the slightly modified version of this stupid animated GIF.

Etc.: Thumbs up to the Mountain West for its supreme dickery in moving this year's TCU-Boise game to the blue turf. Mark Smith looks like that all the time, but it's less alarming when he's talking. Hecklinksi, meanwhile, sounds like he's saying "you are feeling very sleepy" no matter what he's saying. It's very soothing.

2007: The Disaster

I was scanning some message board or another and came across a statement about the '07 recruiting class and how it was dooming Michigan this year, so I took a look. The conclusion: holy pants, what a disaster. Here they are by position group they'd are or would be playing on this year's team, with available players bolded.

The dossier

QB: Ryan Mallett is doing well… at Arkansas.
RB: Vince Helmuth transferred to Miami(Not That Miami), where he has zero carries. Avery Horn left school and was at Reedley CC in California last year. He's not there this year, but he's not anywhere else, either.
WR: Junior Hemingway is a starter. Zion Babb landed at a JUCO after getting the boot and was supposed to transfer to Colorado but didn't make it. Toney Clemons did make it to CU; he's their second-leading receiver with 18 catches for 219 yards.
OL: David Molk is going to be a four-year starter. Mark Huyge is the first guy off the bench at either tackle position and started all of last year.
TE: Martell Webb is a co-starter with Kevin Koger and has been a four-year contributor but not a star.
DL: Ryan Van Bergen is an above-average Big Ten player. Renaldo Sagesse is a backup who gets spot snaps. Steve Watson moved from TE to DE and is this year's David Cone.
LB: JUCO Austin Panter is out of eligibility. Marell Evans transferred to I-AA Hampton. Brandon Herron is Craig Roh's backup when he's healthy.
DB: James Rogers is a very bad starter. Donovan Warren was a multi-year starter who made a bad decision to leave for the NFL. Michael Williams is buried on the depth chart and headed for a medical hardship because of concussions. Artis Chambers transferred to Ball State but is not on the roster. Troy Woolfolk's ankle exploded.

Total contributors from the redshirt junior/senior class

(starters bolded)

QB: 0.
RB: 0.
WR: 1, Hemingway.
OL: 2, Molk and Huyge.
TE: 1, Webb.

DL: 2, Van Bergen and Sagesse.
LB: 1, Herron.
DB: 1, Rogers. (Woolfolk was a success but would displace Rogers from this list if healthy.)

Of the guys who are gone, exactly two contribute to a I-A team: Mallett and Clemons. That's like six genuinely good football players out of 20 (Mallett, Hemingway, Molk, RVB, Warren, Woolfolk). That is not a successful recruiting class.

2008: The Divide

2008, divided into Rodriguez and Carr sections. JT Floyd and Brandon Smith committed post-RR but had Michigan as their leader for so long before that they are categorized as Carr guys. The two decommits aren't considered, but Wienke is a third-stringer at Iowa and TE Christian Wilson has eight catches in his career at UNC.

The Rodriguez dossier

QB: Justin "Win At All Costs" Feagin got in trouble and is gone.
RB: Michael Shaw is probably the starting tailback if healthy.
WR: Terrence Robinson is a marginal contributor. Martavious Odoms and Roy Roundtree are productive starters when healthy.
OL: Patrick Omameh is starting as a redshirt sophomore. Ricky Barnum is the primary backup at guard and should be a two-year starter.
LB: Taylor Hill transferred two weeks after arriving. He is a productive player at I-AA Youngstown State.

Six of eight guys are still around with five of them looking like successes, pending Barnum moving into the lineup next year.

The Carr dossier

RB: Mike Cox is fourth string behind Shaw and younger folks. Sam McGuffie got concussed three times in his freshman year and transferred to Rice, where he's their leading rusher.
WR: Darryl Stonum is a starter.
TE: Kevin Koger is a co-starter with Webb; Brandon Moore is still on the team but has not seen meaningful snaps.
OL: Dann O'Neill transferred to WMU, where he is a starter. Kurt Wermers transferred to Ball State after flunking out and complaining about how RR was bringing in people who "weren't his kind of crowd." Rocko Khoury is Molk's backup and did okay against Iowa. Elliot Mealer looks like a career backup at guard.
DL: Mike Martin is awesome.
LB: Marcus Witherspoon never enrolled because of a Clearinghouse issue. Kenny Demens just got his first start and looked pretty good. JB Fitzgerald has been buried behind Mouton and then Roh.
DB: Brandon Smith was too slow to play DB, didn't want to play linebacker, transferred to Temple, and promptly washed out. Boubacar Cissoko got pulled from the starting lineup for performance reasons, was kicked off the team, and saw his life spiral out of control. JT Floyd is in the starting lineup by necessity.

Ten of sixteen guys are still around with… uh. Stonum, Koger, and Martin are obvious successes. Demens and Floyd are contributors. Fitzgerald, Cox, Moore, Khoury and Mealer are looking like either career backups or meh senior starters on par with Greg Banks, though in Khoury's case he's locked behind a very good player.

Blame-y Section

This isn't a Yet Another Defense Of Rich Rodriguez post, it's Yet Another Roster Implosion Explanation post. (All right: some of both.)

In retrospect the #12 2007 class was overrated. Vastly so.

At the time the line was about the two hyped five stars and the "high upside" guys behind them who were underrated by the services and so forth and so on. The two five stars mostly lived up to that hype, but Mallett did it at Arkansas because of the coaching transition* and Warren took off for the NFL because he thought he was still that good. Meanwhile, the high upside guys mostly can't play football. Even if everyone from the class was still around Michigan would be suffering. Save Mallett, no one who left would see the field. Maybe Artis Chambers would provide some help in the secondary, but he moved to linebacker before his transfer and washed out at Ball State—it's hard to see him displacing Kovacs.

It should have been obvious that recruiting was going in the toilet when Michigan made two desperate reaches at linebacker, grabbing a JUCO guy and a two-star with one other offer(Temple), then made a desperate reach to get a second offensive lineman in the class. But three different groups are proving that subscription models can work on the internet because hope is impervious to reason.

Michigan bounced back in 2008, but a lot of that was the late Rodriguez additions. One man's listing of the top ten recruits in that class, Rodriguez guys bolded:

1. Mike Martin
2. Patrick Omameh
3. Roy Roundtree
4. Martavious Odoms
5. Kevin Koger
6. Michael Shaw
7. Darryl Stonum
8. Kenny Demens
9. Ricky Barnum
10. Rocko Khoury

RR's strike rate on 2008 recruits was considerably higher than Carr's, as Michigan seemed like a magnet for overrated guys. Witherspoon, Cissoko, Smith, O'Neill, McGuffie, Fitzgerald, Moore, and Stonum have all under-performed relative to expectations, with only Martin exceeding them. You can make a case that coaching has something to do with it but I believe evaluations are a major factor. From time to time a guy who knows an NFL scout relays his impressions (this year's theme: "Michigan has nothing on defense except for Martin. Who is this Rogers guy?") and from day one this guy said O'Neill was way too stiff and would not work out. Similarly, it's hard to imagine just what position Brandon Smith was going to play in the Big Ten.

Class of 2008 departures who might see the field this year are… well… Cissoko? Definite nos: Wermers, O'Neill, Feagin. Very probable nos: Hill (OLB; would not beat out Mouton or Roh), Witherspoon (could not find the field at Rutgers and washed out), and Smith (like Cam Gordon except worse).

So. Michigan's 2007 class was a disaster and attrition from it did not matter save Warren's early NFL entry. The two thirds of Michigan's 2008 class acquired by Carr was appreciably better but still not so good; Rodriguez's late additions brought it up to something approximating an average Michigan recruiting class when it comes to on-field success.

(By the way: Rodriguez's second class is looking divergent as hell. Massive nuclear strikes at QB and OL, yet another disaster of a DB class—Witty, Emilien, and Turner are all gone and Mike Jones is a linebacker.)

Note: some of this is pretty elderly due to the season preview extravaganza last week.

Hey… like… does anyone have ND tickets they want to sell to their favorite blogger? Email me if so.

ND Week. Here we go.

Also this:

Funny. The Funny or Die guys are Michigan alums, you know. They've got a movie premiering at the Michigan Theater October 8th. They also have a Ralph Williams shirt:

Zero. The Fulmer Cup has closed, and Michigan's score checks in at zero. Woo! This follows their one point from last year (Boubacar Cissoko's disorderly conduct charge) and their two from '08 (Darryl Stonum's DUI), and just goes to show what a program of renegades Rodriguez is building around these parts.

The Cup only runs in the offseason and therefore missed Justin Feagin's Bogus Journey,  but since Michigan State would have put up 40 points from the Posse Roundup & Engineer/Woman Beatdown, a Fulmer Cup that ran year-round would have been awesome.

Georgia is your champion, by the way, finally breaking through with their innovative system of suspended licenses.

That ain't right. Barking Carnival points out this breakdown of the ESPNU 150:

That can't be right. BC points out USA Today's helpful database on NFL draft picks and says California—home of the most NFL draft picks since '88—gets disrespected, but doesn't go into the numbers. I added and divided and came up with this:

Everywhere except Texas gets dissed by a wildly unbalanced ESPN ranking system. Maybe not by as much as that suggests since population's been slowly moving out of the Midwest, but that only explains one small slice of the lack of balance. The South does have the most talent, but not to the extent suggested by ESPN.

Raise them well.

In which insulting letters are sent to Jon Voigt. The final edition of Six Zero's series of profiles on mgo-denizens covers yrs truly. Marvel at the pratfall in which the blog's genesis can be found! Relive the acquisition of the press pass! Discover my favorite food! Explore the ways in which my life is like Kathy Griffins! No, not plastic surgery! Find out in what fashion Jon Voigt is insulted! Be relieved at this bit if you're one of those people who frets I might go work for ESPN!

I really hope MGoBlog is my job for life as long as we start going to bowls on the regular in the near future. Insufficient emphasis. I desperately want MGoBlog to be my job until I retire. I've rarely been so attuned with a fictional character as when Sterling Cooper was trying to get Don Draper to sign a contract, and when he actually signed it and was immediately slapped in the face with it I felt it was cosmically justified. So... yeah. It will take a lot to do something else.

Wallpaperin'. The hibernation of Nothing Is Illuminated has created a gap in the otherwise all-encompassing Michigan blogosphere: wallpapers. We Are True looks to fill that.

Etc.: This is probably the oldest thing but it was awesome if you haven't seen it: Bobmurph deploys xtranormal in the service of truth re: Big Ten Divisions. Nick Saban on talent: "I don't know where we're stockpiling all this stuff at, but we've got room for lots more." Jesus.

For future reference. Returning starters is always a handy 10,000 foot metric for projecting a college football season and Phil Steele has helpfully assembled a comprehensive list. The Big Ten:

Big 10

Theoooooo! I want this to happen so bad:

A name to watch in Michigan's search for a linebackers coach: Central Florida DC Dave Huxtable.

Yes, it is for the dumb reason. Rudy. Vanessa.

Rodriguez mentioned during his impromptu halftime presser that he expects to have a linebackers coach within a week of signing day. This seems to point to Huxtable as a strong possibility since there'd be no reason to wait on scooping up an unemployed guy like former South Florida and Clemson DC/LB coach David Blackwell. However, Rodriguez has temporarily deputized recruiting coordinator Chris Singletary so he can go on the road and this is reason enough to wait.

Huxtable seems like a good choice. He's been the DC at USF for two years and before that was the linebackers coach for four years. Conference USA is a tough place to get a read on opponents since sometimes you get bombed by a BCS power through no fault of your own, but the conference stats are impressive:

Last season [2008], the squad ranked first in Conference USA in three categories - rushing defense, pass efficiency defense and tackles for loss. UCF recorded 8.62 tackles for loss per game, which ranked third in the country. The Knights were second in the league in total defense, holding foes to just 333.75 yards a contest.

In 2009, UCF was 4th(!) nationally in rush defense, sixth in sacks, and 13th in TFLs but the pass defense dropped off a cliff—83rd in efficiency and sixth in the conference. The end result wasn't terrible. UCF ended up 48th in scoring D despite getting bombed by BCS schools Miami, Texas, and Rutgers.

Olivia.

The most heavily scouted Grand Ledge-Jackson game of all time. With multiple scouting reports out there that go out of their way to say that MI C Jon Horford doesn't wow you, it's safe to say he kid is not a monster recruit. And he's a half-foot taller than anyone on Jackson's team, so those guys are all future chemists.

That does not stop the indefatigable local bloggers and e-journalists from descending on the Grand Ledge-Jackson game in droves. UMHoops was there. So was AnnArbor.com. We have what may be a first: redundant free third-party-generated highlight film of a three-star recruit.

Brave new world, this. As for Horford, he remains a skinny guy who people compare to Courtney Sims. Is that a compliment? Well… sort of:

He has a nice quick drop step and he knows how to use his pivot foot in that way that seems like it should be traveling but definitely isn’t and it’s just a good move. He has great touch around the basket and is an exceptional finisher given his frame. He is also a very, very good passer. Horford was double-teamed almost every time he touched the ball, and he almost always found the open man. Very good instincts on offense.

He's paying the most attention to Michigan and Providence because they're paying the most attention to him:

“Michigan and Providence are probably the two following me the closest,” Horford said. “I show them a lot of respect because they show me respect.”

How many Providence new media folk were at your latest game, Mr. Horford? The choice is clear. (If the answer is three I'm going to be super pissed.)

PREWB! Eric Lacy calls for Oren Wilson and Myles White, the two Spartans who played in the Alamo Bowl and hid their involvement in the PREWB, to get the gate for "making a mockery" of Dantonio's standards. It's about as firebreathing as newspapers get. Sample sentence:

White, 19, also has shown plenty of immaturity and unwillingness to fully disclose his reprehensible actions.

If Dantonio follows through as suggested, the body count from the incident would be up to eight. Will he? White has to be on his final chance after two previous incidents; Wilson hasn't been in trouble before and might get off with a serious suspension. In any case, it was dumb. There's video of this. They're going to figure out you were involved eventually.

(HT: TOC.)

Annual item. The annual DocSat defense of the recruiting-industrial complex in handy chart form:

…and there are many useful players who end up short of All-American status. Here's betting an evaluation of all-conference teams shows a similar distribution.

Please don't go. Manny Harris's broken jumper has bumped him off NBADraft.net's 2010 projections entirely; he now shows up as a 2011 player. UMHoops talked with Aran Smith of said site and got a take on whether or not Manny is NBA ready and if he'll return for a senior season:

Harris is one of the best college shooting guard in the country, but scouts question his ability to hit outside shots. He’s not an overwhelming athlete and doesn’t do anything well enough to offset his subpar outside shooting. He’ll have a chance to get drafted, but scouts are no longer mentioning him as a potential first rounder.

…

I am on the fence on him leaving this year. Harris could be reaching that point where leaving could be in his best interest. He has to weigh the benefits of earning a degree or whether he feels ready to take his game to the next level.

Harris returning would obviously be a huge plus for Michigan, and getting drafted in the second round is worse than being a free agent. If he spends the entire offseason working on his shooting and takes a step forward as a senior, maybe he could get that life-changing guaranteed contract. Or he could just leave now.

DeShawn Sims is an NBA tweener, BTW, with a long and fruitful career in Europe ahead of him, which sounds about right.

Etc.: FL S Rashad Knight commits to Rutgers. The Tulsa World breaks down where D-I players hail from. Michigan is pretty eh, unsurprisingly. (HT: Doctor Saturday.) Apparently the Manny Harris suspension was not a fight.

Pro Football Reference has a post up that's the flipside of an equilibrium concept that Chris Brown of Smart Football has pushed a couple times. Brown's idea is that you should pitch your playcalling so that you are gaining the same number of yards whether you pass or run*. If you've got a powerful run offense and a crappy pass offense, "balance" is running enough for your passing game to be an effective freak occurrence. Think Georgia Tech of late.

On defense, though, you aren't given the option of what to run. The equilibrium is forced on you by the opponent, and if you're just terrible at one thing you don't have the option of usually calling the other thing. This is most clear when teams have just terrible rush defenses, like Stanford a few years ago. This is interesting but not directly relevant until this section:

Defenses are like chains: they're only as strong as their weakest links (for the flip side to this argument, see Brian Burke's article that offenses are like chains). Picture an unbelievable run-D teamed with an awful pass defense. That defense isn't going to be very good, as almost every team in the league could pass on them all day long. Flip the script, and nearly every team could control the game with power football against a defense that can't stop the run. On defense, if you have a weakness, almost every opponent can exploit it.

What's this offensive flipside, then? There is math integral to the post that doesn't need to be repeated here, but let me reassure you that there was consideration and multiplication before Burke arrived at this point:

So, in a very simple way, a passing play is like two chains under strain. One chain is the pass protection, and the other is the pass defense. Each link is a player vs. player match-up, and it has its own probability of breaking based on the abilities of the respective players. The first chain to break loses.

Can you imagine a football team with a starting player who is a point-failure in nearly every play? He'd be a lineman who always gets beat by a pass-rusher or a defensive back who always gets beat by a receiver. It would be ugly. …

So far, I’ve left out the most important player. The quarterback has to see open receivers and throw accurately to make big plays. He has maneuver in the pocket, and scramble from pass rushers. The QB is a big wildcard in my chain analogy.

Sweet hot Jesus in a pickle bun.

While the above-pictured players are fine young men headed for productive lives, they share two traits: they were starters at Michigan and they were underclass walk-ons at the time. Sheridan was honorable mention all-conference in high school.  Kovacs had just rolled in from an open tryout and the defensive coordinator thought he was another anonymous walk-on. And the thing about Kovacs is that I'm not sure he's the guy pictured here if he's got a scholarship. If we cast away notions of who's going to school for free and who isn't, Mike Williams or JT Floyd or Boubacar Cissoko could just as easily been featured in the uncomplimentary photo.

The crotchety variety of Michigan fan—correction, all Michigan fans are crotchety these days: the crotchety and impatient variety of Michigan fan—likes to point to the recruiting classes under Carr as evidence that Rodriguez should be on the first trash barge out of town. What ho, a graph!

There is also a table in that post in which various teams finish a lot better than you'd expect based on their recruiting rankings because Illinois is five spots lower than they should be and Michigan is eight. Last year they were nine back. The charts strongly support the idea that recruiting rankings matter. This is a strong surface-level case for strapping Rodriguez to a donkey, putting the donkey in a catapult, putting the catapult into a rocket, putting the rocket into another really unbelievably large catapult, and firing the whole mess into the sun.

Anyone who's read this blog since the wheels fell off in the Utah game can probably recite counter-arguments to the whole catapult nesting doll idea in their sleep. Hell, MGoBaseballCorrespondent Formerlyanonymous provides a link to Misopogon's definitive study of Michigan attrition in the very comments of that post. If you were to revise the recruiting rankings by hacking out everyone who is no longer on the team and weighting the remaining players by age, Michigan would plummet.

Your personal agony is reminding you that they wouldn't dip to Indiana's level or explain the terrible in-conference numbers the past two years, and it's correct. Even a hypothetical attrition-and-youth adjusted recruiting ranking probably wouldn't see Michigan dip much farther than the middle of the pack. So Rodriguez should still be strapped to a donkey, catapult, etc, even accounting for the raw hand he's been dealt? Maybe, but Michigan had four to seven reasonable receivers last year. They had a decent backup or two on the offensive line. They went four to five deep at running back. A lot of the reason Michigan would be in the middle can't get on the field without other bits of it coming off.

Meanwhile in the secondary, they had two players who were anywhere near competent. This was because the roster had exactly four scholarship defensive backs who weren't freshmen after Boubacar Cissoko got the boot. Unless every single one of those players was good—and at least two were run of the mill three stars—Michigan was going to be facing down trouble. Since two of the scholarship players were really, really bad, Michigan had the mother of all weak links, and the defense collapsed. The year before Michigan had the mother of all weak links at quarterback, and the offense collapsed.

What pockets of hope still exist in the Michigan fanbase mostly rely on Rodriguez's stellar performance at West Virginia and struggle to understand how a guy who was so brilliant there can be so stupid here. By no measure has Rodriguez met even the modest tasks his supporters retroactively set after it was clear how ugly it was. And it's hard to see the defense improving when its three best players are off to the NFL.

This is the hope: last year's weak link was a disaster and 2008's weak link was a disaster and Rodriguez is bringing in three cornerbacks and three safeties and getting two redshirt freshman at his disposal and there's no spot on the roster that looks as utterly bereft of hope as quarterback in '08 or the secondary in '09. When Tate Forcier came in and played like an average freshman—which is to say not very well at all—the offense went from worst ever to passable.

Football is a game of weak links, and Michigan has had downright vaporous links at position groups the last two years. This is the tenuous hope: that no walk-ons play and no group is a white-hot nuclear Chernobyl. If that comes to pass Michigan will be at least mediocre; if it doesn't then it'll be an offseason of knives.

*(Passing gets a risk adjustment built in because turnovers are more common on passing plays, so you're actually aiming for a point where your YPA is about a yard or so better than your YPC.)

The previous mailbag was, uh, abbreviated. And caused great discussion about whether I should call people who send in emails dicks, to which I respond: probably not.

Anyway. This is a good question I don't have an answer to:

Brian,

After Spring practice, exactly what do the players do (supervised or unsupervised) until official fall practice begins?  I know there must be some restrictions on coaching but I'm very interested to know exactly what does go on. 

Thanks,  Marc ' 71

I am pretty sure S&C programs can continue being S&C programs year-round, so players will get a faceful of Barwis this summer. As far as what technically-not-but-actually mandatory, organized-but-not-technically summer sessions are and what, exactly, are the things prohibited… I have no idea. Anyone out there know the details on what college programs do when practice is officially verboten? What is Tate Forcier going to be doing in June related to his football pursuits? What about Will Campbell?

Brian
 
I saw that you thought Forcier will only get about half a dozen carries or so/game.
 
Do you think the QB/Forcier will be less involved in the running game this year?  Sheridan and Threet combined for 118 carries last year - about 10 a game (I didn't include Feagin's runs cause I'm assuming the reason the coaches put him in was for him to run).  A lot of complaints I read about Threet was that he didn't make the correct read on the handoff and should have kept the ball some more (to keep the defensive end honest and stop him from crashing in hard on the play).
 
I honestly don't care how much the QB carries the ball, it just seems that Forcier only getting a half dozen carries a game would a good decrease (assuming Threet should have carried the ball more).
 
Scott

Well, by half a dozen carries I mean voluntary carries. A significant number of those Sheridan/Threet carries from a year ago were sacks or scrambles, which should rightly be considered passing plays.

Also, the effectiveness equation is considerably different with Forcier. Forcier who presumably can throw better than the two guys from last year and Minor—now the undisputed #1 tailback—is way more effective than McGuffie was. So it'll make more sense to throw and run tailbacks than have Forcier keep the ball.

Reading between the lines, I sense some concern that Michigan's reluctance to run their only hope will make the offense less diverse and correspondingly less effective, and I agree. Last year teams ignored the quarterback on zone read handoffs to the point where I was typing "KEEP THE BALL DAMMIT" into the Purdue liveblog after every play. Michigan's fear of the great murky unknown behind Forcier will make their offense less effective. But that's a necessary tradeoff given the cliff Michigan steps off if Forcier is injured.

I do think you'll see Michigan try to make up that decrease with Feagin/Robinson packages. Those may be completely ineffective because of their predictability, but for some reason this wildcat thing seems to work well so maybe it'll do ok.

Speaking of Robinson:

I think we’re generally missing the boat on D Rob when we compare him with TF.  I’ve watched all of the highlight films and I actually think D Rob has some very good skills as a QB.  I think where we’ll see a separation between the two is the run game.  TF is not built to run it 10-15 a game, but he could be enough of a scrambler to constantly keep a defender assigned to him, which opens up some underneath stuff for slot ninjas, TEs, and RBs out of the backfield.  D Rob does have some excellent mechanics for a guy not highly touted as a QB.

I get blasted for this, but his foot work and release remind me of Peyton Manning when he’s pressured in the pocket.  No, I’m not saying he is the second coming of PM, as some said when they read my post in the diaries, but there is some good things happening with D Rob in the pocket.  He sets a good base and delivers the ball with a high and crisp release.  The one thing they both did consistently in their highlight films was throw balls into tight coverage, lock onto one receiver, and hold the ball way too long.  I think you’ll still see that this year no matter how much they get coached up.  It’s just a lot to learn when it comes to reading defenses and then being able to process that information quickly enough to be able to make the correct decision.  Again, I am going to the Spring Game to see how the team looks in person, but I think we’re realistically going to be a .500 team, plus or minus a game.

All in all, by the 4^th game, I think D Rob gets some significant snaps because he brings the run dimension that RR so badly needs to make this offense work.

Steve Matheson

Steve's not alone in his assessment of Robinson. ESPN also thought his QB skills were underrated:

Robinson is just a flat out playmaker in every sense of the word and he will surprise you with his production in the passing game. If he were taller, there is no doubt he would be a serious QB prospect, but his overall skills will likely land him somewhere else. Has a quick, live arm and is very effective in the short and intermediate areas of the field. Can throw the ball vertically with touch and lay the ball in, but does not have the powerful arm to drive the ball 50 yards on a consistent basis.

Add that to his rushing stats—85 carries for 462 yards, which is actually less than Forcier rushed for—and it is possible we've got a completely incorrect idea about what sort of player Robinson is going to be. But then you've got the passing stats:

 Key Statistics... completed 100-of-231 passes for 1,809 yards and 15 touchdowns as a senior ...

There's a big, big gap between those numbers and Forcier's. That's a 43% completion rate. I know that high school passing is often a whole lot of bombing downfield (18 yards per completion!), but those numbers say "project" to me.

I'm noticing a disturbing trend with the '07 recruits transferring at a much more alarming rate than the usual fourth-string running back bolting for a D-2 school. How do you think this will impact the team in two years or so, when most of these players like Mallett, Boren, Clemons, Horn and others would have been seniors?

Jon G

For the record, transfers out of the 2007 recruiting class; Mallett, Horn, Clemons, Babb and Chambers. (JUCO Austin Panter has also departed; Boren was part of the 2006 class.) Five guys gone in two years is somewhat alarming, but you can file Horn and Babb under the "fourth string player bolting for D-II." Mallett's departure is obviously a huge negative; Clemons was highly rated but ill-suited for the spread 'n' shred; Chambers was kind of an eh recruit but was getting a significant amount of practice buzz.

But I don't think the problem with the 2007 class is the transfers as much as that it just wasn't very good. Once you got past the two five stars there were a ton of reaches: Horn, Babb, Watson, Huyge, Sagesse, Evans, Herron, Panter, Woolfolk, and Rogers were low-rated players with virtually no offers comparable to the Michigan one. Watson was pursued by Colorado and Minnesota, Herron had a Nebraska offer, Sagesse was initially ticketed for Illinois, and that's it. Picking up the occasional sleeper isn't a bad thing, but this was class with really poor depth masked by the two big stars at the top of it. And now one of those guys is gone.

Combine that with a complete change in offensive philosophy and you're going to be looking at a lot of guys who are noncontributors. Michigan's already moved Watson and Helmuth to the other side of the ball.

So, yeah, I agree with you. Michigan's 2007 class is well on its way to bust status, one of a number of factors that will see Michigan struggle to put together an elite program until probably 2011. Fortunately, it appears both offensive linemen are panning out and most of the other guys who look to be contributors (Hemingway, RVB, Webb) have redshirted, so they've got some time.