In support of Brady Hoke - three years and a positive direction
With the tide of negativity right now about Hoke and the program, hopefully we can allow a thread with the alternative point of view - the first three years of the Hoke era have been a success.
Hoke inherited a program that was fractured. Many alums, former coaches and players, boosters, high school coaches, and others felt alienated. In short order, Hoke restored many of these relationships.
The team was a wreck. In the last three games of the 2010 season, we had been embarrassed by Wisconsin, OSU, and Mississippi State by a combined score of 137-49.
Immediately, the program on the field was transformed into something we could take pride in by Hoke. The team went 11-2 with a win over OSU and a BCS bowl victory. We were praising the very coaches many demonize now. Hoke's first full recruiting class was top drawer - a trend that has continued throughout his tenure.
But Hoke's initial success depended largely on the recruits of Lloyd Carr still populating the upper classes. As those players graduated and the remnants of Rich Rod's classes moved into the upper ranks, there was a growing void of talent at the top - exactly where the strength of the team should be in terms of quality and quantity. In this regard, we bottomed out in the 2013 season. The very upper classes were from the RichRod era. We can argue the merits of RichRod as a coach, but what's left in those classes clearly wasn't what we need to compete at the highest levels. In fact, given the void in the upper half of our roster, being competitive and bowl eligible is an accomplishment of sorts.
Depth takes time to build, and the elite classes we continue to bring in will provide that. The trend now will be upward, as the depleted classes graduate and are back filled with new players of the quality and type we need. Replacing the staff now would likely derail the direction toward the type of team to which we are accustomed.
December 29th, 2013 at 11:32 PM ^
December 29th, 2013 at 11:33 PM ^
"On the road or neutral site we look like a high school team and are constantly unprepared and look flat". That is a pretty big insult to a lot of very good high school football coaches. I actually don't think many high school teams are as bipolar as Hoke's though. I agree with you that it is a huge issue and a puzzling one at that.
December 29th, 2013 at 11:54 PM ^
he was saying that it might as well been a high school team, considering the level they play at in those situations. Not that high school teams are schitzophrenic on the road.
December 30th, 2013 at 12:17 AM ^
Oh I get what he was saying and agree with what he said. What I am getting at is that there are high school coaches out that there that do a better job of preparing their teams. It is brutal watching this team play on the road.
December 29th, 2013 at 11:20 PM ^
It's kind of a stretch to say that a team that is less successful each year for three years is headed in a positive direction, unless you're thinking it's somehow spiritually more enlightened to lose football games.
Should Hoke be fired?
Well, we all know that isn't going to happen, in fact we've been told it isn't by the individual who would make that decision, so there's little point in discussing it.
The question thus becomes whether the team's performance can be improved while Hoke remains on the job (one more year at best if things continue down the road they're currently on).
There are a few signs that the coaching staff may be beyond redemption:
1. Poor road play against decent teams has been a recurring theme for a couple of years.
2. Wildly inconsistent play, with multiple position meltdowns, has become part of the team's week-to-week personality, and it's getting worse, not better.
3. Inexplicable play calling at critical times has been an obvious problem.
4. The team is slow to make the necessary in-game adjustments, and when the team has been poised to win, it has collapsed late in games.
These are big problems, and they will not be easy to fix. I think that's what has a lot of us doubting this staff.
December 29th, 2013 at 11:29 PM ^
December 29th, 2013 at 11:24 PM ^
I still believe in Bo's concept: a coach needs five years to get in "his people." Rich Rod didn't get the five years he deserved, nor did he get the support he deserved. Hopefully, the more impatient in the fan base, donor base and administration have figured out that keeping another coach for less than five years would make it a very unattractive job to elite head coaches.
No matter what preferences any of us have, Brady Hoke deserves our support.
December 29th, 2013 at 11:39 PM ^
with you Tater. I hate the idea of 2 more years of Hoke considering how badly RR was treated and how Hoke is being treated with kid gloves but if we keep firing coaches every 3 years there is not anyone worth a damn that will ever want to coach here.
Hoke is not the answer and if it takes 2 more years for people to see that.....so be it.
December 30th, 2013 at 12:23 PM ^
A guy making millions and not physically abused is not being "treated badly". Look, Rich decided to install his offense with players who didn't fit and went 3-9 his first year. No one forced him to do that. That doomed the chance that anyone would be patient with him (and his blame everyone else attitude didn't help either). Hoke's building a team back though the on-field results were awful this year. His being flexible, however, buys him the time that 3-9 would not.
December 29th, 2013 at 11:26 PM ^
This is stupid. There is nothing other than winning. Football is a points based game where there is a winner and a loser, nobody who has ever played has played to lose, but now you say there can be success without winning?......winning is the ONLY thing. Who gives a fuck about alumni and relationships and all that bullshit, I don't care how its done, just win, absolutely nothing else matters
December 30th, 2013 at 12:41 PM ^
Your view is woefully shortsighted and expresses a near complete lack of understanding of what it takes to, "just win."
Winning requires a foundation, and Michigan's foundation was cracked and crumbling. It takes time to rebuild a foundation.
I feel that one of the great ills of "modern society" is the "instant gratification" that has crept into our collective psyche. If you don't get what you want immediately, throw it away and buy a new one...repeat until you get what you want.
Sad, IMO. Greatness isn't build by continually looking for the newest and best thing.
December 29th, 2013 at 11:52 PM ^
The 2013 and 2010 seasons are near identical. One of those seasons made it justifiable to can the entire staff. Yet the former shows the staff is beyond reproach? Sorry, I just don't see it that way.
December 30th, 2013 at 2:52 PM ^
The 2010 recruiting season was the worst of my lifetime; the 2013 recruiting season has been halfway decent. If half the 2013 class ends up quitting school and/or football I'll change my tune, but I wouldn't say the state of the program is "nearly identical" in those two years.
December 30th, 2013 at 7:23 PM ^
has been made enough times on this board as it is. I'm not gonna bother going through them again. Considering doing so will likely be just as effective as the other hundred attempts. ie, not at all, from the looks of things.
December 30th, 2013 at 7:57 PM ^
As far as I can tell, the argument hinges entirely on the fact that the records in those two years were the same. You've never addressed the counterargument, so you're probably right that your next failure to do so will be similarly ineffective.
December 31st, 2013 at 5:26 PM ^
5-0 start
One side of the ball showing some ability at first, but struggling against competant teams
The other side of the ball showing complete ineptness against most everyone
Utter collapse down the stretch of the season
Finishing 7-5
Getting trucked in the bowl game against a middle of the pack BCS conference team
Put up an embarrasing effort on, at least, one side of the ball against Ohio State and Michigan State.
Now, tell me, am I talking about this season or 2010?
December 31st, 2013 at 10:07 PM ^
You have once again failed to address the content of my post.
If you haven't recognized yet that RR's recruiting in 2009/10 and 2010/11 was a major reason he was fired, I can see why you don't understand the firing.
January 2nd, 2014 at 12:01 AM ^
And you fail to realize that some of the recruiting woes at the end were because RR was fired and the commits went elsewhere.
And no matter how much, or why, the recruiting situations might be different, that doesn't stop 2013 as a season, on the field, from being a carbon copy of 2010. Keep trying to spin it, I really don't care anymore.
January 2nd, 2014 at 12:18 AM ^
There were no such recruits in the 2010 class because RR wasn't fired that year. Who did we lose in 2011? What I recall from Brian's posts on the board was general relief that Hoke was able to hold the class together in the face of what were expected to be mass defections.
A lot of his 2010 recruits dropped out of football, if not out of school altogether, but what did that have to do with RR's firing?
December 29th, 2013 at 11:52 PM ^
Year 3: Gallon, Touissant, Gardner, Lewan, Schofield, Dileo and... That's it on offense. Washington, Clark, Taylor, Gordon, Morgan, and Countess on defense. First year running a pro style offense.
Year 4: the leap.
December 30th, 2013 at 12:01 AM ^
Let's hope that leap looks like something out of the Matrix.
December 30th, 2013 at 12:02 AM ^
The reason I negged and disagree with you at least partially is because you referred to the upperclassmen in 2011 as Carr players. David Brandon did the same thing and I think that is wrong and unjust. Hoke and staff get credit for 2011 but RichRod should too. Those upperclassmen were either wholly developed by RichRod (they had three years or so of his staffs's tutelage) or recruited by him.
Again this doesn't take anything away from Hoke but it is looking more and more like Hoke used RichRod's players and as he is getting more of his own things fall apart.
Now it may be true that you are right in that starting next year we should start to see the fruits of Hoke's recruiting and tutelage since the upperclassmen will be mainly his own but that is why 2013 is so great and so important.
We will know. I think Hoke should get 2015 regardless unless we go 3-9 and something disastorous like that since five classes is a just amount for any coach to get and we don't want to change the program willy nilly like a certain program that has been returning to glory.
We will know a lot next year since like you said and I am saying Hoke will have upperclass players he recruited. The caveat to all this is if somehow Hoke and Brandon think there is some surgical changes to the staff they can make to get better results. If they make moves and get some stud replacements then I personally could see giving three more years to, again, be perceived as a fair program that gives its coaches time to succeed.
If Hoke and Brandon take a look at this debacle of a season and determine that the course we are on needs no changing whatsover and we get similar results to this year next year well I'll be pissed to say the least but again five years since that is what RichRod and all coaches deserve.
December 30th, 2013 at 12:08 PM ^
They aren't Carr players, Hoke players or RR players; they're Michigan players. That's what folks need to remember.
...it is looking more and more like Hoke used RichRod's players and as he is getting more of his own things fall apart
I think what you missed in writing the above quote is that so many of "RichRod's" players left the program. So yes, a handful of talented Michigan players from the RR era have been great on the field, but so many of that same era left the program (and/or positions of need weren't even recruited). Things aren't "falling apart" now that Hoke has "his" players; but they did get super wobbly as Hoke transitions from a full roster to an incomplete roster to a full roster once again. I hated the "bare cupboard" excuse often used by RR, but in "filling" the cupboard, he ignored the most important positions of need that would have been difficult for any coach, regardless of style, to deal with.
December 30th, 2013 at 12:06 AM ^
Go Blue! In Hoke(and the entire staff) I trust!
December 30th, 2013 at 12:14 AM ^
for the meaningful and erudite contribution. Proud we share a degree in common.
/s/
December 30th, 2013 at 12:27 AM ^
to decide who can say what on this site. So kindly take your own advice if that's gonna be your stance.
December 30th, 2013 at 12:45 AM ^
December 30th, 2013 at 12:14 AM ^
December 30th, 2013 at 12:18 AM ^
At the same time, however, Michigan offered silly money for this particular coaching staff. Didn't Dave Brandon call it "paying for value" or some such thing?
The wallet is open. The surplus is there. I think the money would be a secondary concern to whether or not Harbaugh (or any other significant, proven coach) would actually want to come here, should that need finally arise.
December 30th, 2013 at 12:24 AM ^
December 30th, 2013 at 12:41 AM ^
December 30th, 2013 at 7:13 AM ^
December 30th, 2013 at 8:32 AM ^
Agree..If you can get Jim or John, you make a move without hesitation.
December 30th, 2013 at 1:10 AM ^
I get what you are trying to say, but do we really need the lame Brandon-esque shots at RR about the Sugar Bowl team?
So powerful and so spiteful is the Lloyd Loyalist faction that they will tell you Lloyd deserves all the credit for players like Martin, Van Bergen, Koger, Molk, etc. Guys who never played a down for him. Astonishingly, they can make a lot of fans see it because they have their Michigan Man glasses on. The same ones worn by the people working to destroy this program with politics.
December 30th, 2013 at 1:19 AM ^
I agree.
I can't believe he included the most disgusting thing Brandon has done in a series of hard to stomach things - that shot at our guys who played their hearts out but just happened to play under a coach Brandon doesn't like - no one should ever blithely repeat that bullcrap. I thought I couldn't be shocked anymore by the nonsense inside this program, but that low blow by Brandon about Lloyd's players really surprised me.
December 30th, 2013 at 1:32 AM ^
I'm not even sure saying Brandon dislikes RR is accurate. Rather than personal, I do believe he feels professionally threatened by the prospect of RR becoming a big hit in Arizona and how that would make DB look. I don't think it's a coincidence that those things were written just a few days after after they trounced Oregon. He was trying to spin the narrative back in his favor with a message of "And if you thought I let go of the wrong guy, think again!"
December 30th, 2013 at 1:34 AM ^
I don't know, and I suppose I don't much care. I just know it was a disgusting shot at a number of our players who deserved better - and it was clear that some of those players felt slighted. It was douchey, whatever the motivation.
December 30th, 2013 at 1:32 AM ^
I don't know how to buy it anymore. You've got guys on the defense who have been coached by the same staff for three years now looking completely clueless, undisciplined, playing with terrible technique.
You have a defense that, with the exception of Pipkins (and Ryan for the early part of the year), really didn't suffer many injuries and still was that befuddled by a middling Big 12 team.
You've got a line that looks just as bad as at any point in the season, if not worse - shouldn't even a young line show some type of coherence by the bowl game, after a whole season and a month of bowl practice? Of course our genius coaches didn't help with all the line juggling, but that's on them.
You had a full season of Freddie Jack not being able to develop an alternative to Fitz or sticking like glue to an inadequate Fitz.
You have players talking out of turn constantly and players coming out and saying they weren't into games as much as they should have been.
You have a senior captain acting the fool both on the field and, from what I've heard, off the field.
You have the special teams looking that dogshit in the bowl game - no discipline, terrible coverage. This is simply not a well-coached team.
You have the offensive coordinator who isn't particularly good and as an added bonus doesn't do recruiting.
You have a head coach who, please forgive me - I just don't get this bullshit with the no headset. I don't get it. I feel like I've read years worth of talk about it, but I keep coming back to the reality that I don't get why our coach isn't like all the others, why this is okay when the team looks this terrible, and why it's okay when he's supposed to be at least a great motivator, but then we read about players not being all that motivated.
I don't get it.
I just can't buy what Hoke and Brandon are selling. Sure, it was a young team, but young teams are supposed to look different by the end of the season. There's supposed to be some sense of "positive direction," to borrow the OP's phrase.
At a certain point, I don't know how you don't call bullshit on the whole thing. I want to be wrong, but I don't think I am. It's a God damn mess.
December 30th, 2013 at 2:05 AM ^
everyone is frustrated. but michigan is hardly the first team to look they didnt want to be at the "no one gives a fuck's dog shit bowl".
hoke should get 2 more years, 1 if next year is another mess. the 'not his fault' argument has too much merit to rush into firing hoke after this season. no one was calling for his head after years 1 or 2. which really speaks volumes for how bad this season was.
the effect a coach has is too speculative - some of you look pretty foolish "knowing" where to place fault. the omens and augurs are bad, but its better to give this guy a chance to redeem himself than to rush into another bad coach.
December 30th, 2013 at 2:28 AM ^
I don't like the trajectory but I understand why it happened. But at some point Hoke's first classes are going to have to start making a difference. I can't necessarily say that coaches are bad. I don't think they're great with the exception of Mattison. It really is not fair to judge Hoke and staff until 2016. However, if we keep going on into 2015 with 4 or more losses, it may be time to dump Hoke and his staff. I'm fairly confident Hoke will turn out to be a good coach for us, much like LC was.
I also thought RR should of had 5 years. Though I think some of his defensive coaching friends were actually poor coaches and they made it rough on the DC RR had hired.
December 30th, 2013 at 6:51 AM ^
December 30th, 2013 at 12:17 PM ^
If you think that this is the right direction then I cannot explain any differently to you. 11-2/6-2, 8-5/6-2, 7-6/3-5.
Not a RR apologist either but 4-8/2-7 before he got there and 8-5/4-5, 7-5/4-5 since is not trending down.
December 30th, 2013 at 3:01 PM ^
- 8-5/5-4
- 8-5/6-3
- 7-6/4-5
- 4-8/2-7
- 8-5/4-5
- 7-5/4-5
I don't know how much can be learned from this kind of absurdly coarse-grained analysis anyway, but I don't see a trend there of any kind, up or down.
December 30th, 2013 at 7:36 AM ^
December 30th, 2013 at 12:00 PM ^
No development? Devin Gardner was a WR. Then, as QB, he threw 10 picks in his first 6 games this year. Over his last 6 games, we threw only 1 pick and was a broken foot away from beating OSU. Not good enough?
December 30th, 2013 at 7:52 AM ^
Hoke, you've made your bed by electing to keep your staff intact. For better or worse, you're sleeping in it. I'm tired of watching teams like Iowa and Nebraska consistently out-coach us week after week. I can't believe I just said Nebraska out-coaches us. But, sadly, they do right now.
December 30th, 2013 at 9:15 AM ^
Akron out-coached us. This staff has no idea how to gameplan effectively. They seem stuck in the mentality that Michigan can just line up and physically beat teams with superior talent. Unfortunately, we haven't been that team for many years, and I wish the coaches could display some acumen for pregame scheming and in-game adjustments. I don't see that at all.
December 30th, 2013 at 9:40 AM ^
says alot
December 30th, 2013 at 8:54 AM ^
I'm late to the party, but I don't see any reason to let Hoke go for at least one more season. Not to say he shouldn't look at his staff and shake things up if he feels there are better options, but RR's team was just starting to come together when he was let go, and we are starting to see the effects now. People forget that a big reason teams likes MSU are successful now is that they finally have stability at the top. If you look at their history, you see their most successful coaches were given time to implement their systems and create a culture around the program. UM had that for many years with Bo, Moeller (to an extent), and Carr. Even when things didn't go well (with Moeller), the team chugged along because recruiting went well, the alumni supported the staff, and the AD's office kept everything hush-hush.
The problems RR introduced both were his own doing as well as symptomatic of issues with the program. It had become both entitled and complacent, and so a guy who comes in and didn't win immediately because he had a different plan was solidly in the bullseye of fans, alumni, media, etc. that had come to expect a certainly level of solid-if-unspectacular seasons. So those first couple of years were marked with bad losses and complaints from inside and outside the program, but then when it finally looked like he might be figuring it out and bringing in the type of players he needs, the AD switches it up and Hoke is brought in. It needed to happen, I guess, but that's mostly because fans are fickle and Brandon didn't have the capital/desire/stones to give the current guy another year to really run with his players. So Hoke steps in, does a couple of cosmetic improvements on offense and gets a solid if opportunistic performance by the defense, and gets 11 wins that probabyl should go to RR. But this is year 3 for Hoke, and next year we'll start to see "his" recruits mature into leaders on the team.
That will help with creating a sense of consistency and failiarity in the program again, and as long as they don't crater I'm fine keeping him around for 1-2 more years to see what happens. The era of teams just being "dominant" for decades is over, and UM was probably the last holdout because of the bowl streak. There will be ups and downs, but the best teams usually pick a direction and follow through until such time it is obvious they went th wrong way. Hoke doesn't feel like that to me, and so he needs more time.
December 30th, 2013 at 10:05 AM ^