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Brian

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Decent turnout in Indy [Mike Spath]

All the Harbaugh. We haven't had any, you know, games yet but so far the Harbaugh era has absolutely lived up to its promise.

As Ace has documented in cripplingly long recruiting roundups, the Summer Swarm tour is piquing the interest of dozens of high level recruits in this class and the next three. Michigan's nailed down a number of commitments already; there's a wave of guys naming Michigan their leader and/or plugged in gents making Crystal Ball predictions for Michigan.

While it's been a lot of under the radar types to date, 1) Harbaugh's first two recruiting classes at Stanford were generic three stars and Andrew Luck and 2) the wave of guys Michigan is thought to lead for has a lot of big timers in it.

Doesn't that mean… yes, it does. Michigan currently has 14 or 15 spots in its recruiting class. There are a few guys who will have fifth year options but don't project to be contributors; that still leaves Michigan at around 18 spots for a class that it feels like will hit 25. There is going to be some attrition before February.

If a couple of these medical hardships that are poorly kept secrets finally get announced in the near future that number looks pretty reasonable; I don't think we're ever going to see the near zero attrition Michigan had under Brady Hoke. Harbaugh drives people too hard for that.

Headlines. The Montgomery Advertiser:

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That's today, three days after Michigan's Alabama stop. The last time I took a screenshot of a media organization days after something happened it was Sports Illustrated bombing Michigan dang near a week after the Shane Morris incident. Harbaugh has changed the script a little bit here.

See also Gregg Doyel, who spent the weekend following Harbaugh into Indianapolis bathrooms and firing off hot takes in Michigan's favor:

Eliminating satellite camps? That makes a recruit's life harder. It would make a kid like Jovan Swann, a big-time defensive tackle recruit from Center Grove High, drive almost 300 miles to attend the Michigan football camp in Ann Arbor. Swann, whose brother Mario is a defensive back at Indiana, is interested in the Wolverines. He has a scholarship offer from Michigan State (and Indiana and Iowa and more), but not from Michigan.

"As a parent, I decided I'm going to take (Jovan) to any school that he has an interest in," said his father, Mario Swann Sr. "I would have taken him to Michigan this summer, but now I don't have to."

And this is wrong? This is not wrong.

The spectacle of millionaires complaining about their vacation days is not winning over hearts and minds here. Harbaugh, shirtless, weird Jim Harbaugh, is.

That charity camp BTW. Details:

Harbaugh said he found somebody to follow on Sunday.

"I got a new one. I got Lauren Loose now. I'm going to follow her," Harbaugh said. "I'm going to follow her example. Fighter, courageous, happy, spiritual. She's got what I'm looking for. I'm going to follow her. Find somebody. Find somebody every day. You know who's doing right. Go be a good follower. Learn how to do that."

Loose is the daughter of former Lafayette defensive coordinator and current Army defensive coach John Loose. She is a pediatric brain tumor survivor and the one who the football camp is named for. The event raises funds for brain tumor research and cancer services through the Lauren's First and Goal Foundation.

Sunday's event raised $101,800 and the total for the year is $132,787.

Michigan is keeping this on the up-and-up—they're travelling with a compliance person to make sure they don't rack up minor violations—and they're doing a lot of good for the kids who come out, the causes they're helping out, and themselves. You'd have to be a sociopath to be against such a thing, but we are talking about football coaches.

Also. Detroit will get an extended version of the satellite camps:

Harbaugh, his Michigan coaching staff and the team's sophomore football players will work with the United States Marine Corps to "teach life skills, football, language arts and STEM-based curriculum" to 100 Detroit-area boys from grades 6-8 from July 6-18.

Former NFL player Riki Ellison founded the program nine years ago, and runs similar efforts at Stanford, Northwestern and West Point. He'll assist Michigan with its own version of the program.

People were concerned when Michigan canceled its fantasy camps. They've more than made up for that karmic loss.

There will be no apology. You know me: I approve of anything short of a stabbing that makes a college football game spicier. Harbaugh is amping up damn near everybody, whether it's Saban in Alabama or a bit closer to home:

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OSU's WR coach took this about as well as perpetually aggrieved DJ Byrnes takes a harmless tweet from a teenager, throwing a twitter shit fit that has since been deleted. Michigan has not scheduled a contrite press conference in the aftermath. Hail Hackett.

Speaking of the man. Random old This Is Sportscenter commercial featuring Harbs:

"This Is Sportscenter" has been around forever.

Just a rando with a story. Take it with a grain of salt:

This is probably not a good move if you would like to continue your employment no matter how accurate it may be. Again, just some rando with SOURCES on twitter.

UNC details. Local paper with some excerpts from internal UNC emails:

“Occasionally when we have a number of people with special issues we can put them together in a special section but we never ever put an athlete into a special section alone – just too many red flags and we have a little bit of academic credibility to try to uphold,” Crowder wrote back. “All of that being said, talk to me and we’ll see if there are any creative options.”

There are hundreds of these emails, many of them heavily redacted. It's clear that the athletic department specialized in keeping kids eligible with non-classes. If anything will rouse the sleeping bear that is NCAA enforcement, this is it.

I suppose. A dozen people sent this to me and more yelled at me on twitter about it, so yes there was an embarrassing fluff piece on Dave Brandon in the Detroit News. It reads more like a People profile of Eva Longoria—"the couple intends to experience daily life in the Big Apple", etc—than something written by a person with self-respect. It thus says everything you need to know about its author, Daniel Howes, without me chipping in.

Just one thing:

Brandon sounds like a man pleased to be back on the familiar ground of corporate America. There he'll be tackling marketing and operational challenges, building (or repairing) a brand buffeted by changing technology and changing consumer tastes. (All of which, by the way, applied at Michigan, as much as the die-hards refuse to acknowledge it.)

Brandon's most important single act as athletic director was hiring Brady Hoke, a man whose main qualification was having been an assistant at Michigan during the 90s. Hoke was dead set against the changing technology of college football; his hire was anything but "innovating the space." All other gestures towards modernity are frippery around a fusty core.

Anyone who still believes Brandon is some sort of visionary after years of ham-handed missteps followed by lies probably contributed to the $607 United Passions brought in at the box office this weekend. But someone's got to believe the Emperor's new clothes are amazing.

Etc.: Michigan MLB draft primer from user Raoul. Summer Swarm tweet recap. Northwestern's "#funbad" game of the year is so obvious you don't need to click through. "#funbad" is such a Northwestern concept, and I mean that affectionately.

Comments

Yard Dog

June 8th, 2015 at 12:22 PM ^

and I could have sworn I read one of the articles from late last week where it stated pictures of Harbaugh with recruits were not allowed?  Just was curious when I saw the pictures that were shared. Obviously that wasn't true?

Colt McBaby Jesus

June 8th, 2015 at 12:31 PM ^

Right, but he was clearly posing with different recruits in some of the pictures (if you look at the collection of tweets some of the recruits tweeted the pics with him). I'd assume that Michigan cannot send out any tweets of him posing with recruits, but that the recruits are more than welcome to do it? I dunno, NCAA rules are strange.

dragonchild

June 8th, 2015 at 12:32 PM ^

Anyone who still believes Brandon is some sort of visionary after years of ham-handed missteps followed by lies probably contributed to the $607 United Passions brought in at the box office this weekend. But someone's got to believe the Emperor's new clothes are amazing.

I was just reading this and holy shit my monitor's on fire!

The FannMan

June 8th, 2015 at 12:51 PM ^

"You'd have to be a sociopath to be against such a thing.

I am sure that the NCAA is finding a way to ban this since they don't get a nickel want to protect the student athlete.

Farnn

June 8th, 2015 at 12:51 PM ^

Does anyone know what some of the more level headed writers at 11warriors think of DJ Byrnes?  The guy makes a fool out of himself with his taking issue with every percieved sleight against OSU.

RationalBuckeye

June 8th, 2015 at 1:19 PM ^

His morning fluff pieces are entertaining if rather uninformative. If I recall correctly he served a suspension from writing about a year back for being a dick, and that's basically his nature. He's smart enough to spear the trends in sports and recruiting, but he does so in a way that's pretty cynical and can easily rub you the wrong way. I've never been a big fan, but I do follow him on Twitter.



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WWTSD

June 8th, 2015 at 3:20 PM ^

but  his role there isn't the same as the others.  He's got a totally different job in my opinion.  I don't think you are supposed to take too much seriously and it's more of an OSU 'RAH, RAH, RAH" take.

As on OSU fan, I like him but I don't look at him like I do Birm or Ramzy or some of the others.

I think without any doubt that he is a guy you root for when he's on your side and despise when he isn't.  I belive that if he was doing his thing on your side, you guys would eat it up and we would hate him.

WWTSD

June 9th, 2015 at 10:55 AM ^

I'm sure there is someone somewhere on your side that does.  There isn't an equivalent on this site. 

Well, I think sometimes Brian gets his panties in a bunch sometimes and comes close.  But, no, I would say you guys don't really have an equivalent.

My point was that if you did, you guys would probably love him.

 

Edit:  Despite what some of the holier than thou's below post, your side would eat this up.  Hell you guys are doing it right now in regards to Brians DJ-like take on the flyer.  He would be all for it and go around blasting you guys and that is what Brian is doing.

We all like to pretend that our side is better and the other is evil, when in reality all sports fans are hypocrites and the same thing we blast on one side is the same thing we rationalize when our side does it.

DJ Byrnes

June 8th, 2015 at 5:51 PM ^

Greetings from civilization, my friends and, more importantly, my enemies. Brian blocked me on Twitter (talk about a Twitter shitfit), so I would like to come here to dispell some tropes.

1) I am a dick. This is not in dispute. Though I must in my defense, I do have an uncanny ability to grow on people like fungus on a tree. (If you think I'm insufferable now, just imagine me as a teenager.)

2) I am not sure some of you know how rivalries work. This is still a rivalry, right? I will never apologize for taking petty potshots at Michigan, who is objectively bad. Meet me in Temecula if you feel otherwise.

3) I don't know if it was a "rant" on Twitter — I'm just bemused by the fact that a grown man who sucker-punched a #teen during a pick-up soccer game is lecturing me about anger issues. 

4) Jim Harbaugh will be good at Michigan, but he will always be Urban Meyer's whipping boy. I will say, however, I haven't been this nervous about a rendition of The Game in almost as long as I can remember. (Even John Cooper slayed the Michigan dragon on occassion.)

5) It's hard to type more than 100 words in a comment and not look insane, but I must add that I will be at Skeep's — a bar I know and love — in late November. I'll buy any of y'all a beer (except Brian, who will get a microwaved shot of Tequila), but I must warn you: I'm freaky fast with a shiv if you try to go that route.

Anyway, see y'all and your crusty-ass little city in 172 days. Your battle for fourth place in the B1G should be fun to watch until then. Warren G. Harding bless.

evenyoubrutus

June 8th, 2015 at 8:09 PM ^

It for sure is real. Can you imagine an MgoBlog staff member writing anything like this? Of course not.  I am convinced DJ's internet personality is a shtick but the fact that his readers love it so much is solid proof of what a lower intelligence their fanbase is than ours (at least in this corner of the internet).

Its me Dave

June 8th, 2015 at 1:44 PM ^

Are the flyers a new phenomenom?  If so, I'd really like to see a collection from other schools.  If not, props to the staff for developing yet another medium for trolling.

Farnn

June 8th, 2015 at 2:24 PM ^

As an OSU fan, how much does it pain you to put Blue in your username? What do you mean worked for Mack?  The kid was essentially committed to OSU already, considering he forwarded it to Smith.  And I thought it was common knowledge that Hernandez was a person of interest in a shooting from 2007 in Florida.

BlueStu

June 8th, 2015 at 2:34 PM ^

I have blue poo so it doesn't bother me.  You're right, I think Urban told hernadez to take out the bama quarterback before the championship game.  Makes total sense that urban was involved. Yes, he was a an osu lock, because their coaches are proven winners with the bling to prove it, not something on paper blasting the competition, so yeah, it worked.  

 

Nice message sent to the kids. 

 

http://www.mlive.com/wolverines/index.ssf/2015/06/michigan_football_rei…

DomIngerson

June 8th, 2015 at 7:26 PM ^

Correct. http://profootballtalk.nbcsports.com/2013/07/03/massachusetts-authoriti… A witness to the shooting does not identify Hernandez by name, but the witness said the shooter was a “‘Hawaiian’ or ‘Hispanic’ male who had a large muscular build, stood about 6-foot-3 or 6-foot-4, weighed about 230 or 240 pounds and had a lot of tattoos.” Here’s the relevant portion of the police report: “As they were waiting for the light to change, the Hawaiian football player and Reggie Nelson walked up to their car on the right side. Then without saying a work [sic], the Hawaiian pointed a small handgun in the front right window and fired five quick shots. [Randall] Cason saw [Corey] Smith slump over with blood coming out of the back of the head, at which time the Hawaiian and Nelson took off running towards McDonald’s.” Cason later explained to police that, earlier in the week, his brother had gotten into an altercation with several Florida football players. Hernandez, Nelson, and Mike and Maurkice Pouncey had been in a Gainesville nightclub on the night of the shooting — even though Hernandez was still only 17 at the time. According to the police report, Hernandez declined to talk to investigators, invoking his right to have counsel present.

Farnn

June 8th, 2015 at 1:58 PM ^

They aren't new, OSU has been doing them for a while and other schools too.  Michigan has definitely stepped up it's game under Harbaugh in the recruiting mailer department.  But a grown man acting like a teenager when he sees what another school sent a recuit?  That's pure Ohio.