Things That Happened During The Great Malware Disaster Of 2011 Comment Count

Brian

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.

Surprise

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.

 27 Octoboer 2007: Iowa head coach Kirk Ferentz runs off the field following Iowa's 34-27 2OT win over Michigan State at Kinnick Stadium in Iowa City, Iowa.

"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…

Rk Team OFF DEF ST Total
1 Vanderbilt 11* 8 2 21
2 Michigan 9* 9 2 20
3 San Jose St 7 11 2 20

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…

th_OhSnap

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.

Comments

MGoShoe

January 27th, 2011 at 4:27 PM ^

...a foregone conclusion after his stellar freshman season, but it's disappointing nonetheless.  Too bad he didn't get (or perhaps accept) an MLS Generation Adidas designation. If he was going to go pro, it would have been nice to keep him in MLS and that program provides a college scholarship if the pro thing doesn't work out.

That said, if Saad is able to catch on with Anderlecht or another team of that quality, that would be quite the achievement. It's the age old question for soccer talent: go to college and play in every game against inferior talent or go pro and risk little to no playing time (with superior practice experiences).

Either way, best of luck to Soony.  A player that makes it in Europe who got his start at U-M would be a feather in the program's cap.

Jon Benke

January 27th, 2011 at 3:23 PM ^

You never know how much you use this site, especially the last few weeks of recruiting, than you do when it's taken away from you.  Thanks Brian, and I hope this virus never bites you in the ass ever again.

denverblue

January 27th, 2011 at 3:31 PM ^

Gwozdecky's name always come up when an opening in the upper-tier of the WCHA/CCHA becomes available (not necessarily that MSU is/has been upper-tier the last few years, but given the location/history for hockey, you would think it should be), but unless Wisconsin (his alma mater) opens up, don't look for him to go anywhere. What he's built at DU would take awhile to get going somewhere else, and I think he likes where he's at. Plus, 2 National Championships will give you some job security. Also, I've been at a few press conferences with him- he's a bit of an arrogant ass...and a midget. Definitely a Napoleon complex. From where he's at, he'll never end up at MSU. Also, Blasi is from his coaching tree- I don't see him jumping ship after building up Miami (the other Miami) unless it's to a North Dakota/Minnesota/Michigan/Wisconsin/BC/BU kind of place. Just my e-pinion.

UM2k1

January 27th, 2011 at 3:35 PM ^

I had rhabdomyolysis in 2009 (from of all things trying to keep up with my wife in a spinning class).  While it may be that the strength coach is stupid, it is a serious condition.  I was hospitalized for 2 weeks and on renal dialysis, with accompanying liver failure.  This has nothing to do with sickle cell trait (mine was a wierd confulence of events - injections for migraines + donating blood + flu previous week + stupid spinning clas = near death), and more to do with this coach pushing the players harder than their bodies allowed.  I'm not trying to be argumenative here, but I believe the "save the children" aspect does have some merit.

ATL Blue

January 27th, 2011 at 6:32 PM ^

Just to clarify, Brian's reference to sickle cell trait doesn't relate directly to rhabdomyolysis, it relates to the linked article at EDSBS stating that most of the non-traumatic deaths of football players over the last several years have occurred during offseason conditioning, several of which resulted from sickle cell crises in people previously undiagnosed with sickle cell trait.  So the overall point of that article and the reference is the lack of oversight and screening for these things in general.  

FrankMurphy

January 27th, 2011 at 3:43 PM ^

When Hecklinski said "There's no way to describe how you feel. Part of it is you're numb," I expected him to follow that up with, "And I'm still numb, as you can tell from my voice and demeanor."

Brhino

January 27th, 2011 at 3:49 PM ^

Can you imagine if tea-colored-urine-gate had happened here in the Rodrigeuz era?  The papers would have picked the story up and run to hell and back with it. 

LBSS

January 27th, 2011 at 4:04 PM ^

Now at least we know where Mike Barwis got hired after we kicked him out.

Rhabdo is most well known in the fitness world from the multitudes of fucktarded, self-described "hardcore" "elite" people who do CrossFit. There is no excuse, none at all whatsoever, for a professionally supervised workout to result in anyone suffering from rhabdo. Whoever on the S&C staff was driving that workout should be fired and blacklisted.

Sac Fly

January 27th, 2011 at 4:07 PM ^

... right now would be the worst time to do it, he has one more year. If he got fired we would probably have to deal with some of our younger players transfering, burke and brundidge decommitting and darius morris opting for the draft.

philibuster

January 27th, 2011 at 4:26 PM ^

I think we all know what's going on in Iowa City. (from http://www.nlm.nih.gov/medlineplus/ency/article/000473.htm)

[Rhabdomyolysis] Risk factors include the following:

  • * Alcoholism (with subsequent muscle tremors)
  • * Certain inherited or genetic syndromes
  • * Crush Injuries
  • * Heat intolerance
  • * Heatstroke
  • * Ischemia or necrosis of the muscles (as may occur with arterial occlusion, deep venous thrombosis, or other conditions)
  • * Low phosphate levels
  • * Seizures
  • * Severe exertion such as marathon running or calisthenics
  • * Shaking chills
  • * Trauma
  • * Use or overdose of drugs, especially cocaine, amphetamines, statins, heroin, or PCP

BRCE

January 27th, 2011 at 6:25 PM ^

Who still regards Ferentz as a molder of men? Nobody I know.

The jaw theory? Whatever. I wonder how many years it's going to take this blog to get over its bitterness over how Rodriguez was portrayed in the media.

 

 

 

 

Jarred

January 28th, 2011 at 7:56 AM ^

After Michigan stopped it's recruitment, Hakeem Flowers only had one offer if Rivals to be believed and that was from NC State.  The fact that neither South Carolina or Clemson, his in-state schools, offered him should have been a red flag.