casey prather

Bzzzt. UMHoops reports that Casey Prather's choice is Florida. Sorry for my incorrect earlier speculation/enthusiasm. Michigan is still pursuing MI SF Trey Ziegler, who won't decide until the spring. If they don't get him it'll be on to the class of 2011.

Old School. The 1957 Michigan-Indiana game via home video:

That comes from Uni Watch, which also notes via a reader that Michigan has some weird inconsistencies in the way they name players on their uniforms:

As you might know, Michigan football has a freshman QB, Tate Forcier. He’s the younger brother of Jason Forcier, who was once a third-string QB on the team (about five years ago or so) and then transferred to Stanford. When Tate started practicing in the spring, there was a thought that Jason would transfer back to Michigan and both brothers would be on the team at the same time. This never happened, but Tate still wears a ‘T. Forcier’ nameplate, as if Jason were on the team.

Meanwhile, we have Kevin Grady at FB and his brother Kelvin Grady at WR (who had been on the basketball team last year and then moved to football this summer). They’re both K. Grady — in fact, they’re both Ke. Grady — but they both wear just ‘Grady,’ even though they’re sometimes on the field at the same time. I sorta wish they did FNOB, which I love, or else ‘Kel. Grady’ and ‘Kev. Grady,’ but alas, they just wear their surname.

Finally, we have Stevie Brown at LB and Carlos Brown at RB. Carlos’s NOB is just ‘Brown,’ while Stevie wears ‘S. Brown’ — weird.

I’m surprised this would happen at Michigan, where they take the home uniforms so seriously.

FNOB = "first name on back." You can probably extrapolate what NOB means. Uni Watch has a weird insider lingo that fosters some community or something.

Let me take this opportunity to denounce a spreading scourge: nameless jerseys. If you're Notre Dame or Penn State, okay, whatever. But it seems like everyone is doing it now in an attempt to emphasize team unity or other such sportwritery nonsense. When Eastern Michigan is doing it, things have gone too far. I want to know who is who as a fan.

Baby's first Michigan-Michigan State game. The universe isn't quite back in order—Michigan State opened a slim underdog but is now a 1- to 1.5-point favorite—but it's getting there:

Michigan-Michigan State is big for both football teams, but for the Spartans, it could be their season

That's Mike Rothstein penning a headline that could have been written at any point in the last 40 years, though probably not with as much truth behind it as this time around. This is Rothstein's first exposure to Michigan State's particular mania…

The anger came in every syllable flying out of Kirk Cousins’ mouth. The disgust was evident on his face, the frustration obvious in his mannerisms.

Michigan may have multiple rivals and already pocketed a rivalry victory against Notre Dame this year, but an hour northwest, at Michigan State, there is only one rival. And there is only one game.

Michigan.

“This game is personal,” said Cousins, the Michigan State quarterback. “And we need to win it, and we’d better win it.”

particular mania

"The lack of respect they have, period," defensive end Trevor Anderson responded when asked about his dislike for the Wolverines. "It's sickening."

particular mania

The Spartans' offensive line is hurting and hasn't helped produce a single 200-yard rushing game this season.

But that didn't stop left tackle Rocco Cironi from chiming in.

"I think everybody has a hatred for Michigan," he said.

…I wonder if he thinks State is acting a little odd, in his experience? It would be interesting to get an outsider's perspective.

Win at all costs. Dantonio on Glen Winston:

One move that appears certain is additional carries for Glenn Winston, a sophomore running back from Detroit.

Winston is considered one of the team's top three running backs along with freshmen Caulton Ray and Larry Caper.

"You can't starve the horse that pulls the cart," said Dantonio of Winston's status.

Students going to game: "AJ Sturges" chant plz.

Um… really? My first instinct is that this is insane:

Time for BCS To Include BlogPoll in Formula

That's registered BlogPoll voter Dan Shanoff touting the poll in relation to the Coaches' and Harris polls, which are run by old men who haven't watched a football game since nineteen dickety-two. But the list of grievances presented by Doctor Saturday a month into the season is compelling:

But a month into the season, is it too much to ask the AP, coaches and Harris polls reflect the slightest shred of common sense?

LSU is No. 4. Because ... ?

Oklahoma is No. 8. Because ... ?

The coaches rank Oklahoma State ahead of Houston.

The coaches and Harris polls rank Penn State ahead of Iowa.

The coaches and Harris rank Cal ahead of Oregon.

All three polls rank Ole Miss ahead of South Carolina.

Each of these has explanation over at DocSat, though in many cases the explanation could be "duh." The blogpoll is far from perfect but the ever-expanding cadre of voters who are basing their ballots strictly on what's gone on between the sidelines—something the poll guidelines suggest should be implemented by week five and demand by week eight—makes for a poll that escapes most of those inanities. LSU and Oklahoma are still too high but lower. Houston, Oregon and Iowa are ahead of the teams they beat handily. And while South Carolina isn't ahead of Ole Miss, it's because neither features in the top 25. That's just the draft ballots, but historically what movement there is between Monday and Wednesday is of the variety that sees the final poll move more towards onfield events.

I still think it's insane. The BlogPoll contains a number of motley blogs that put "sucks" after every mention of Michigan or vote their team way higher than it deserves only to be struck down by malevolent forces. But a bunch of guys in their pajamas are transparently doing a better job of paying attention than the people actually in charge of making BCS decisions. So if it's insane, the only thing more insane is the current system.

Nice plane. I'd like to meet the man who owns this baby:

winged-helmet-plane

Wheeeeeee. Jonas Mouton Suspension Fiasco will not die:

The Big Ten Conference office announced today that Ohio State University football student-athlete Kurt Coleman has been suspended for one game as a result of initiating helmet-to-helmet contact and targeting a defenseless opponent in the fourth quarter of Ohio State's game against Illinois on Sept. 26, 2009.

This actually seems like it might not be directly related to the JMSF, as the BTN's article cites a new rule for 2009 that mandates post-game review and possible suspensions for helmet-to-helmet hits. I can't embed the actual incident, but here it is. I'm torn on this one. That was basically flinging your brain at a defenseless player's brain, and while it's less obviously unsportsmanlike than either the Mouton or Recknagle incidents it's far more dangerous.

casey-prather Next year Manny Harris will either be a senior or in the NBA, and we all kind of hope it's the NBA because that will mean he played at a high level and blew up the idea that John Beilein can't develop players for a career at the highest level. Michigan will then have zero Manny Harrises on the roster unless one of two high-profile wing recruits Chooses Wisely. One is local guy Trey Ziegler, the son of CMU's basketball coach, but his decision is a long way off. He'll decide in the spring.

The other is Tennessee's Casey Prather, who plans to make a decision in the next couple weeks. Prather's taken trips to Clemson, Florida, and Michigan. He also lives next door to Vandy and has been on a ton of unofficials there. Those teams represent his final four. In the past week, these things have happened:

  • Sam Webb said Michigan was "the team to beat" on WTKA a few days ago. This is not the same as a strong, strong, strong gut feeling but Sam is not a guy who says things like that lightly.
  • Webb wrote an article for the Detroit News that briefly touches on 2011 commitment Carlton Brundidge and then goes into serious detail about Prather's recruitment. Money quote amongst a bevy of potential selections:
    "(Rating Michigan's recruitment of Prather) on a scale of 1- 10, I would say a 12," said Jackson North Side coach Tony Brown. "I've seen more Michigan coaches at games. Michigan has been there through thick and thin. I can't say that every other school, in my opinion, showed. The head coach, he flew down to Fayette-Ware when we were in the district tournament. I was impressed then because Fayette-Ware is in the middle of nowhere. When I came out of the locker room, I looked up and there was Coach B. He was just displaying that proud M symbol on his sweats."
  • Prather decided against a Vanderbilt official visit.
  • Clemson cancelled a scheduled in-home visit and did not reschedule.
  • John Beilein made his in-home.
  • Prather's AAU coach posted this to twitter:

    Potentially I could have two guys play in Big Ten Country but are living in SEC Land...Parity at its best, I love it!

    And whats funny about that is, both guys are known for putting up good offensive numbers but Big Ten is known for grind'em out games that are won on the defensive end. Not that Hollins and Prather won't guard your butt but they're both so skilled offensively.

None of this is definitive, of course, but the tea leaves suggest that it's either Florida or Michigan. There's been some Florida chatter but look at the News article. It's packed with quotes from coaches and Prather's father. Webb's close to the situation, and the article he wrote up came from the same conversation that caused him to call Michigan the team to beat—with precious little time to beat them—on the radio. And Prather's AAU coach didn't quite say Prather was in the bag… but… yeah… quite. I'm thinking the "Beilein cannot recruit" meme will be lying in tatters soon.

While we're talking about basketball recruiting. UMHoops has your overview for you.

Lines. Here are a bunch of Vegas lines, all of which are unfriendly to Michigan:

  • vs Notre Dame –2.5
  • @ Michigan State –4
  • vs Penn State –5
  • @ Illinois –7
  • vs Ohio State –6

Notre Dame is a touchdown favorite over Michigan State despite State's recent ownage in South Bend. This has given Jamie happy pants.

(HT: Get The Picture.)

A tempo-free start. Texas blog Barking Carnival has put together a listing of teams by "pace," which is a concept unfamiliar in football but should be known to all who have heard me rail on about how Ken Pomeroy is an American hero. It's basically the number of possessions in a game. Adjusting for that can radically change perceptions of who is best and by how much:

As we move forward, one important thing to keep an eye on is that according to the standard per game stats, which are of course all that most “analysts” are able to wrap their heads around, Oklahoma’s offense was just over 37% more effective in Big 12 games than our offense was. It’s hard to argue that they were better according to raw numbers, but 37%? Sounds crazy. …

Here we can see that Oklahoma’s offense is now rated a more reasonable shade under 11% better than Texas’ offense. And whereas Texas’ defensive advantage was nearly 27% it is now just over 8% in the new analysis.

Oklahoma's offense wasn't that much more efficient, it just moved at warp speed.

Notes on the national list:

  • Unsurprisingly, spread teams Oklahoma, Oregon, Houston, Troy, and Rice played the most possession-intensive games of anyone last year. Most of the top 20 are pass-oriented spread teams.
  • Gus Mahlzahn and his Ludicrous Speed offense was tenth.
  • Michigan was middle of the pack at 47; West Virginia was 69th.
  • Interesting teams towards the bottom: Virginia Tech (118), Ohio State (117), Georgia (111), Iowa (108), Alabama(107), and Florida (106). There does not appear to be much correlation between pace and excellence.

It's a good start, but there are a lot of limitations to the study. KenPom adjusts his official pace measures by the pace of your opponents. That corrects for situations like playing Northwestern's basketball team a lot. This study doesn't have it. Also, there's no shot clock in football* and game situations dictate hurrying up or slowing down depending on who's in the lead, so one reason you might find a bunch of good teams at the bottom is their ability to get in front and then boa constrictor the life out of a game.

I'm working on getting a comprehensive play database from Bill Connolly of Football Outsiders, and when I get that my first priority is to put together offensive and defensive rankings by drive efficiency instead of raw yardage.

*(There is a play clock but here we're looking one level higher.)

Sad Pandas. It's been a bad week for the Feagin clan. Justin, of course, got the boot from Michigan for reasons unspecified. His uncle is in much, much deeper trouble:

Meanwhile, Steven Feagin, who played at another Big Ten school, the University of Illinois, stands accused of breaking into a woman's home in Pompano Beach, knocking her out with a chemical, then raping her twice.

By no means do I want to imply that Justin's thing was anything similar, or try to draw some link between the two. It's just… it's just a bad week for Feagins, is all. Poor mom.

(HT: Big House Blog.)

Come on down. Er, up. Memphis SF Casey Prather, one of two plan A wings Michigan is pursuing fervently, should be taking an official visit this fall. Rivals' Jerry Meyer:

Michigan is very much in the running for Prather, who recently had a strong showing in the adidas Super 64 event. There is talk that Prather might visit Michigan the second week in September for the Notre Dame football game, but those plans have not been finalized yet. Regardless, Michigan is expected to get a visit from Prather. … Prather is intrigued by the opportunity for immediate playing time at Michigan.

Securing Prather would go a long way towards crushing this blog's previous skepticism about Beilein's ability to recruit at a Big Ten championship level. Also: the Trey Zeigler rumblings have shifted towards Central Michigan, where his dad coaches. Rumblings subject to change, as per usual.

(HT: UMHoops.)

Etc.: AnnArbor.com is actually linking out. The homepage needs the equivalent of radioactivity something fierce, though. Yost and Crisler lookin' swanky. Texas Monthly explains the Longhorn money machine.