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As the Harbaugh turns. UPDATE

We are in full support of Coach Harbaugh’s statement of support of President Ono’s comments supporting Coach Harbaugh and the Michigan Football Team and look forward to continuing to support Coach Harbaugh who is in full support of President Ono’s support of Coach Harbaugh and https://t.co/jOHBu6h1vc

— Shapiro Undergraduate Library (@UMichUGLI) January 13, 2023

More seriously, John U Bacon asserted yesterday that the chances he stays are "growing by the hour" after Santa Ono got directly involved. I do not buy for one second that Pete Thamel report that Michigan might not be able to get Harbaugh signed for "weeks" because of the NCAA whatever. It's 2023 and the president of the university appears to have an idea of how the world works.

Yes, please. There's been some rumbling about changes to Signing Day coming up. I find myself in a somewhat unusual position of feverishly agreeing with the SEC commissioner:

"We're crushing coaches in December," Sankey told The Athletic. "We're going to add playoff games (in December). We have to change early signing."

Sankey elaborated on the issue during a gathering with reporters on Sunday in Los Angeles, noting that with coaches voicing their concerns about the overload of activity in December, conferences "have a responsibility to take another look at it."

"From a remedy standpoint, I don't think you can go back to just the first Wednesday in February," Sankey said.

December Signing Day is dumb from a media standpoint—February was a much bigger deal—and it is now very dumb because nobody has any idea who's going to be on their roster. I get concerns that committed players keep getting recruited when they have no interest in being recruited, so let's resurrect an idea this site has promoted previously:

• Players can sign a non-binding LOI basically whenever, but let's say starting a year before a restored February signing day.
• Players in the LOI database cannot take official visits to other schools.
• Coaches from other schools cannot contact players in the database.
• The LOIs become binding on the first week in February.

This does a lot to cut down on useless attempts to get guys to flip, benefiting both players who don't want to be hassled and coaches who might like to see their kids faces, without locking either school or player in until most of the portal madness has settled.

Previously: The Offense

Resources: My charting, UF game notes, UF roster, Bill C profile, CFBstats

Todd Grantham is a lifetime coordinator with a Bo Ryan index notable for its sartorial diversity.

His crazy blitzes get home often enough to have made Grantham one of the highest paid assistants in football. They've also broken down often enough that he's lost his shit wearing the colors of Virginia Tech, Michigan State (DL coach under Saban), the Colts, the Texans, the Browns, the Cowboys, the Dawgs, Louisville, Mississippi State, and now Florida, where he followed Dan Mullen. His longest stint since 1997 was four years at Georgia, over which he cemented his reputation as a legendary douchebag you never want to play against. People of the internet know him best for giving Chas Henry the "choke" sign.

His latest defense was hard to scout. The one guy who really stands out doesn't start, but they have a number of starters who are better than decent. If there's a weak point it's the WLB, who racks up a ton of tackles because opponents run at him half the time or more.

The film: Georgia ran at Joseph half the time or more.

Personnel: My diagram: 

PDF Version, full-size version (or click on the image)

Florida had a recruiting dip under McElwain that was masked by some blue chips with rap sheets and the occasional SEC recruitment. Grantham, a DL guy at heart, immediately addressed the interior line, adding WVU grad transfer DT Adam Shuler and #1 JuCo prospect NT Kyree Campbell, pushing last year's platoon of NT Khairi Clark, NT Elijah Conliffe, and DT Luke Ancrum to backup rotations, and [/nods in the direction of 3-star mafia who were mad Michigan dropped him to pursue Philip Paea] immobile blob Tedarrell Slaton to the perma-bench. The new guys are fine but push-able, and didn't generate much pass rush against Georgia's large line.

The ends are the problem, starting with the guy they were trying to duplicate when they were fighting us for Josh Uche: All-SEC DE/OLB Jachai Polite had 16(!) TFLs and 11(!) sacks despite only playing on passing downs. He is a liability to shoot upfield on runs but doesn't need to be out there for most of them because BUCK CeCe Jefferson, whom you'll recall from our last two meetings with Florida, is still around causing havoc off the weakside, switching to strongside on passing downs. SDE Jabari Zuniga is the Kwity Paye in this rotation, playing solid against runs and flashing a ridiculous bend when unblocked—he was half of a six-play goal line stand in this game.

[after THE JUMP: more things you'll recognize]

Essentials

Overview

Uh… right. This. Michigan plays Florida, again, in a repudiation of the importance of a "New Year's Six" bowl. Two years ago, Danny Kanell was firing out crazy conspiracy theories about Jabrill Peppers faking an injury so he could skip the FSU game. This time around four different Michigan players are taking a pass, one of them the almost certainly undraftable Juwann Bushell-Beatty. Nobody is batting an eye.

For the record, those guys are Bushell-Beatty, Rashan Gary, Devin Bush, and Karan Higdon. Florida is set to have its full contingent of players. Oddly, this has done nothing to the line, which opened Michigan –6 and remains Michigan –6 as this post goes up.

Otherwise, hey, it's conference foe Florida. They've got a good head coach now, but they're still recovering from the vast expanse of Keystone Kops pratfalls that was the Jim McElwain era.

[Hit THE JUMP for a team Michigan plays more often than most of the West]