Unverified Voracity Got A Job Just Yesterday Comment Count

Brian

nli_0[1]

DON'T DO THIS

WEBER FIASCO DEFCON 1. The damn day after Mike Weber signs a LOI to Ohio State, running backs coach Stan Drayton leaves for the Bears. Weber:

Tony Paul:

The timing of this move is odd, to put it mildly.

John Fox was named the new Chicago Bears coach in early January, and much of his coaching staff was in place shortly thereafter. It seems curious Drayton would be making the move only after Weber signed his letter of intent to play for Ohio State.

UCLA pulled a similar stunt with their DC. Roquan Smith managed to find out before he used the fax machine, but you have to think that maybe some of UCLA's defensive commits would have looked around if UCLA had announced when they knew about it a month before signing day. Just more of the usual crap.

Recruits! DON'T SIGN A LETTER OF INTENT.

DON'T SIGN A LETTER OF INTENT

I mean, if you're a random three star and they say sign this paper or we're moving on, go ahead. If you're a big deal, do this:

The NCAA last fall began allowing football prospects who plan to enroll in January to sign financial aid agreements with college programs as early as August 1 of their senior year. The agreement, which allows the college program to have unlimited contact with the player and publicly speak about him, binds the school to the prospect, but not the prospect to the school. So there's nothing to dissuade a situation like that of Josh Malone, who signed financial aid agreements with four schools before ultimately signing with Tennessee.

Sign a financial aid agreement. It's like the LOI, except backwards, and that makes schools hate it. Instead of stuff like this happening to you, you can have hilarious quotes like this apply to your situation:

"You're basically taking the word of the kid," Mallonee told the AJC. "That's part of the issue."

Yeah! A kid who might drop a school for no reason or sell a school a false bill of goods. Damn kids. Always doing mean things with all the power they have.  

Meanwhile. Can't say I'm surprised about this.

Upshot. Could this lead to Weber flipping back to Michigan? Maybe. Schools can release players from LOIs.

Institutions are now empowered to grant a full and complete release from the NLI at anytime. To do so, an official Release Request Form must be initiated by the prospect and submitted to both the NLI office and the signing institution.

There's also an opportunity to appeal when school refuses to release a player, a process that ND signee Eddie Vanderdoes successfully went through a few years back. I'm unclear on what, exactly, this means as part of the Vanderdoes case:

The victory for Vanderdoes comes after a rather lengthy (and sometimes public) spat with Notre Dame and head coach Brian Kelly, who allowed Vanderdoes to enroll at UCLA, but refused to release him from the letter of intent he signed with Notre Dame in February.

Kelly can't prevent a guy from enrolling wherever he wants, and there appears to be no partial release from a LOI. The Bylaw Blog post on the topic implies that this was a straight-up win for Vanderdoes after Kelly refused to release him.

In any case: OSU could release him if the publicity gets bad enough, or Weber could decide to go somewhere else and attempt to appeal. If he did not win that appeal he would have to sit out his freshman year and he would lose that year of eligibility, making him a true sophomore in 2016.

Weber would have to want to pursue that, of course. It's possible he gets over it.

ESPN doing Hatch things. Hatch things:

Hiring various people for 'crootin' and 'lyzin'. Michigan announced they've hired longtime college coach and Harbaugh family associate TJ Weist as a "senior offensive analyst." Weist was the WR coach at Michigan in the early 90s, when a guy named Desmond Howard was hanging out, and was most recently the OC at Connecticut.

This analyst position is not a full assistant job, so Weist won't be able to work with players directly or recruit. He'll do film, find tendencies, and advise. Usually when established coaches take these jobs they're short-term gigs before something opens up elsewhere.

Michigan's also hired Gwendolyn Bush as "director of player development." Bush is the mom of Wayne Lyons, the fifth-year Stanford transfer who's supposed to be landing in Ann Arbor.

This has led to a couple of assertions that Michigan is getting down and dirty. If so, let's be clear why: it's not because Michigan wants a defensive back who will be around for one year. It's because Bush was—uh—"team mom" for South Florida Express, a high-powered 7 on 7 outfit that launched the careers of Teddy Bridgewater and Geno Smith, amongst many others.

SFE won the national 7-on-7 championship, which is apparently a thing that exists now, and got profiled in SI, etc etc.

Meanwhile, Lyons. The Lyons transfer thing has broken loose from the paysites and made the Mercury News:

Stanford coach David Shaw on Wednesday enthusiastically described all 22 players who signed letters of intent as part of another well-regarded recruiting class. He was slightly less eager to discuss a player who might be leaving the program.

Cornerback Wayne Lyons is reportedly considering a transfer to Michigan, where he would play one season (as a graduate student) for former Stanford coach Jim Harbaugh.

"For those guys going into their fifth year that want the opportunity to play someplace else,'' Shaw said, "I've never said no, never tried talk anybody out of it.''

Lyons started seven games last year for Stanford's kick-ass defense. Michigan doesn't really need a defensive back but they've got a slot if Joe Kerridge isn't guaranteed a scholarship (and since it's highly likely someone leaves the team before fall that's probably moot anyway). May as well fill it with a quality player.

Michicon Valley. SJSU hires a familiar name:

Then they did the thing:

SAN JOSE -- San Jose State officially announced two of its coaching hires on Thursday, with Al Borges being named offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach and Dan Ferrigno the special teams coordinator/tight ends coach.

Greg Robinson is of course the DC. It will be… interesting to see how SJSU does this year. I predict bad.

Meanwhile in offensive coordinator hires that Michigan fans are extremely skeptical of. Tennessee is actually, officially doing their thing:

DeBord has never coordinated anything approximating a mobile quarterback and couldn't even find a position coach job after leaving the NFL, instead landing at Michigan for an Olympic sports administrator thing. Let's see if he can submarine Butch Jones's 80 recruits per year.

Dabo's very particular. This private bathroom thing is a thing.

I've heard worse ideas. BYU signed a guy who's never played football before. Does this sound like an idea on par with hiring an Olympic Sports Administrator to be your offensive coordinator? Not so fast my friend:

That's no moon. Unless it's orbiting a planet. Then it totally is.

Etc.: In case you were considering taking Dave Zirin seriously about anything ever, you probably shouldn't. Vegas odds for the hockey national title are bonkers. Iowa wasn't real happy with the Higdon flip.

Signing day interviews with JayHar, Baxter, Jackson, and Wheatley (Jr).

Comments

MLaw06

February 6th, 2015 at 12:50 PM ^

Bottom line is OSU did Mike Weber dirty.  OSU fans should stop trying to rationalize it or equate it to other program's actions... just admit that someone at OSU did Weber dirty.  Period.

Cake Or Death

February 9th, 2015 at 12:06 AM ^

can fucking swear all you want.  It's the names that a fourth grader would use that are tiresome (on par with scUM, etc. elsewhere).

We are fine, but it's not just me.  I'm just letting you know what it's like where you are posting  Nothing personal.  Go Blue.

the blue planet

February 21st, 2015 at 7:33 PM ^

Seems personal, though.  Especially since you called someone a "tool" in Nov. 2011.  Maybe I'm just not clear about your standards for people other than yourself on this blog (especially a blog where the author tags someone as "a piece of **** human being").   Anyway, maybe we can agree to....Go Blue!  

georgia buckeye

February 6th, 2015 at 1:34 PM ^

OSU fan and graduate here, and I agree.

Everyone knows when college football coaching staffs make their changes, and it isn't the day after NSD.

I'm not tuned in enough to other programs to know where or when this may have happened before, but that doesn't matter. If we are older than seven our moral code has to be deeper than "he does it too."

It is always nice to imagine that the sports teams that we follow are the "good guys." The real world disabuses us of that notion regularly.

So a bad day for OSU, but ultimately not a surprising one.

Sauce Castillo

February 6th, 2015 at 12:52 PM ^

I hope this Weber story catches on nationally.  Would love for it to blow up in Urbans face.  At the very least it seems that Cass Tech coaches aren't too happy from tweets out there.

not TOM BRADY

February 6th, 2015 at 12:53 PM ^

Wilcher with some pretty scathing quotes on the radio.
"chengelis: Wilcher on @dery1051 says he has to stand by Weber now "This is not going to be an easy thing. This is not going to go away."

iawolve

February 6th, 2015 at 12:59 PM ^

Something like an outline of the state of Michigan with a block M in it with a tag line of "All your failed coordinators will be ours!"

Thinking about the one we had for West Virginia when we poached JB and RR around the same time.

 

Brhino

February 6th, 2015 at 1:01 PM ^

I clicked over to that BGHP link about Karan Higdon.  181 comments on the article, and not one bad word about Michigan.  Kind of surreal.  Reasonable folks, those Iowans.  Plus I got this out of the deal.

 

jmdblue

February 6th, 2015 at 1:13 PM ^

1) Yes. Zirin is completely nuts.

2) Is it possible to make a $1 Billion short bet on Wisconsin winning the Hockey NC?  Alternatively, I'll take any and all action at 28-1.

Trey Mendes

February 6th, 2015 at 1:27 PM ^

Didn't Kellen Jones transer to OU from UM AFTER reporting for fall camp.  Wasn't the logic that he was allowed to do that and play without sitting out a year because he hadn't yet enrolled?

This is confusing and stupid.

As for Weber, I can empathize with him as the parent of a teenage college student.  I have little sympathy for an OSU football player.  I'd be super pissed as his dad.  As a Michigan fan, file under "meh."  I only talk about players who play for UM.

lilpenny1316

February 6th, 2015 at 1:26 PM ^

Or did he assume that?  Wilcher made it sound like Weber was torn between the school he wanted to go to (UM) and honor his committment to OSU.  I didn't hear anything about the Higdon offer playing a role.

Blue Bunny Friday

February 6th, 2015 at 1:51 PM ^

 



He told reporters at his announcement that Higdon’s decision to choose the Wolverines made his choice to stay with the Buckeyes much easier.

Link.

"I thought I was really the only back to get recruited in that class and when I heard (Higdon) was committed, it was like, 'Oh, well then there you go.'" Weber said. "That was the answer. That's what it was."

 

Freep link.

Don

February 6th, 2015 at 2:51 PM ^

And it was the wrong answer.

I just can't gin up any outrage over this. Mike Weber committed to Michigan, and then changed his mind before Brady Hoke was let go. He stated in his decommitment message that he would announce his eventual choice at the AAA game on Jan. 3. If he had done that, he would have been an uncommitted recruit for Jim Harbaugh to try to win back to UM.

Instead, Weber verbally commits to OSU on December 11, almost three weeks before Harbaugh was hired. It's not as though there was no talk about Harbaugh being a possible candidate for the Michigan job in early December, and Weber could easily have waited until the new coach was installed before committing to OSU. In other words, in spite of his alleged lifelong love for Michigan, he decided not to give the new coaching staff the opportunity to recruit him on even footing with OSU. The new UM coach was going to have to flip him.

 

HermanDaGerman

February 6th, 2015 at 3:20 PM ^

Especially in hindsight.

"It's not as though there was no talk about Harbaugh being a possible candidate for the Michigan job in early December, and Weber could easily have waited until the new coach was installed before committing to OSU."

If you were a 17-year old with (presumably) NFL aspirations, would you take this risk?  What if OSU had decided to move on and recruit another RB and Michigan had ended up with Greg Schiano or some such?

 

Mr. Yost

February 6th, 2015 at 5:35 PM ^

If I was a RB...what they were doing seemed pretty damn exciting to me.

Zeke Elliott had a 3 game Heisman run over Wisconsin, Alabama and Oregon. No pushovers.

Meanwhile everyone and their mom is saying Michigan has NO shot at Harbaugh.

EDIT (or Wheatley for that matter).