football

http://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2013/11/19/5122844/this-week-in...

Not surprisingly Georgia is the feature.  I had flipped to that game just as the ball was snapped on that 4th-and-18.  All I could do was stare at my TV in complete stunned silence.  Then I snapped back to reality and started texting everyone I knew to turn on CBS if they weren't already watching.  Unreal.

Got sent this link last night from Mike Pettigano, the Brian Cook of PSU blogging who also writes for this paper:

http://www.northjersey.com/sports/HS_Football_Paramus_Catholics_Jabrill_Peppers_Don_Bosco_personal.html

Nothing at all interesting in there unless you have an insatiable appetite for all things Peppers and/or New Jersey's power football programs. Jabrill is playing his former team, Don Bosco (former M targets Yuri Wright, Elijah Shumate, and Darius Hamilton).

Extrapolate itty bits of "gets it" if you're into that sort of stuff.

I’ve been hearing from a lot of people that Michigan cannot develop its young talent.  We can use the excuse that we are young, but the issue of youth is much deeper than most think.  

Take for instance redshirts.  MSU has only burned 6 redshirts from their 3 deep rotations on offense and defense.  Only 3 of those guys are current starters.  Michigan has burned 29 redshirts from their 3-deep rotation and 6 of those guys are starters on defense.  Redshirts may be a bit overrated, but spending an additional year in the program surely cannot hurt.

Average weight gain for an FBS college football athlete is around 5-10 lbs per year*.  Combined strength for bench and squat usually increases by 20-30 lbs per year.  That doesn’t necessarily account for increase performance, but can definitely account for increase in strength.  Another obvious factor is the understanding of playbooks, schemes, reads, and overall football knowledge a player will gain in one year.

So what does this mean for the future of the program?

Next year gives us the ability to redshirt almost everyone, unlike the current year.  Guys like Peppers and Harris will most likely not, simply due to depth and talent.  We most likely will not improve by a whole lot next year. Our schedule is one of the toughest we’ve seen, aside from last year, but we will have some experience and depth that we have not seen since 2007. 

2015 seems to be the year Michigan will start to be a dominant program we all want it to be.  We will only be missing 8 players from the 2009 class and 8 from the 2010 class in 2015 (16 players is not even enough to field a team). We also will not lose a ton of players from the 2011 class and will have the Junior and Senior leadership we are lacking this year.  5 of our current offensive starters and 5 of our current defensive starters will be back in 2015 (assuming no attrition).  That’s 10 players that will be 3-4 year starters for the program, along with a plethora of other Sophomores and Freshman who are getting significant PT. 

*Obtained from Barwis Methods

When it comes to Darrell Funk  and the offensive line fusion cusine, I have no interest in arguing how bad the line is right now or exactly whose fault it is.  That argument is older than the average age of the starting interior linemen at OSU.

My question is this: why did Patrick Kugler, whose Dad was the Steelers OL coach and is now the head coach at UTEP, come to Michigan to play football?  I can't imagine his Dad and he didn't watch Funk coach during practices before deciding he was the guy they wanted to be Patrick's position coach.  If Funk is Kugler and Son approved, where does this evidence play into the overall conversation in the "fire Funk" vs. "young line, not all Funk's fault" discussion?

This was spotted in the Michigan lockerroom last season before the Outback Bowl. Many speculated that that would be the jersey. The Outback Bowl one wound up being somewhat similar.

Could this be the alternate jersey for this year since it is already made?

http://mgoblog.com/mgoboard/new-football-uniformz-spotted

Does anyone know what Kyle Meinke is talking about wrt to players switching uniforms before the MSU game?

@AceAnbender All told, I'd never expect to see a surprise switcharoo like we saw at MSU. Heard players were pissed.