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Brian January 13th, 2023 at 1:14 PM

As the Harbaugh turns. UPDATE

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.

NIL implosion. Wild West NIL stories continue to fly in; this one is a very public decommit from quarterback Jaden Rashada. Rashada's a nice prospect (#56 on the composite) but not the kind of guy you'd think would rake in absurd money. This seems kind of absurd!

Nov. 10: Rashada and the Gator Collective agree to terms on an NIL deal exceeding $13 million with Rojas and Grosso reportedly signing the contract. Such a massive pledge is thought to dramatically exceed the Gator Collective’s fundraising level, so the deal presumes assistance from Hathcock or other Gator Guard donors. After signing the contract, Rashada decommits from Miami and flips to Florida. …

Dec. 7: Rojas sends a termination letter regarding the $13 million contract, according to a program source close to the situation. There are conflicting accounts about why the deal crumbled and who pledged to pay what. …

Jan. 11: A program source with knowledge of the entanglement says Rashada won’t be enrolling at Florida. “There’s a lot of panic. It’s like stepping on an ant pile.” There’s also the potential for litigation, hinging upon whether the November contract is binding. The collectives, according to another program source with knowledge of the situation, are offering a lesser deal to Rashada — still above seven figures — to stay at Florida, with the caveat that he release everyone from all previous claims.

In a "my shirt is raising questions" move, Rashada's dad has said Jaden has not asked for his release from a letter of intent he signed just days ago. But he's not on campus.

It is ludicrous that Florida would be coughing up a 13 million dollar package for a guy who's not even a five-star, and the implosion of this… uh… situation should bring a little bit of sanity to the numbers being tossed around. Yeah, someone said someone was getting X dollars. The likely number is a lot lower. I believe packages in six figures. Once we get to seven I start thinking that someone is running some game.

Okay? Ryan Day seems to have misidentified the problem:

Kevin Wilson just got hired by Tulsa so the obvious guy to delegate it to is also gone. Maybe this was part of a deal to keep Brian Hartline around?

In any case, Ohio State's offense has been rather good of late and I welcome all potentially destabilizing changes.

Well… bye. Kevin Warren's tenure as Big Ten commissioner was short:

Big Ten commissioner Kevin Warren has been named the next president/CEO of the Chicago Bears, the franchise announced Thursday. Warren, 59, took the Big Ten's top job in 2020 after 22 years in NFL operations with the Los Angeles Rams, Detroit Lions and Minnesota Vikings.

I mean… whatever? There was one thing of note that happened during his tenure and I don't think Warren was principally responsible for the USC and UCLA additions, which seemed pretty inevitable after the SEC took Texas and Oklahoma. I contend that any person capable of being named Big Ten commissioner would have necessarily had the same business brain and come to the same business conclusion, and then he had to sell it to a bunch of people with the same brains. And… I mean… at this point fine, right? Much better than adding Rutgers and Maryland from a fan interest standpoint.

The Athletic has a list of potential replacements that I tried to read before my eyes glazed over in a fog of gray suits. Whoever it is will walk into a job that's more or less Todd Collins's NFL career at this point: expansion happened, media rights happened, playoff expansion happened. Just hold a clipboard and collect a check. 

Everything you could possibly want about basketball statistics. Tennessee basketball blogger Will Warren has compiled a comprehensive list of stats, sites, ham sandwiches, more stats, more sites, and etc. about basketball. I have been scouring the internet for years looking for information worth relating and some of this stuff is even new to me. I found the drill down of shot types to be particularly informative:

Catch and Shoot attempts are shots that require zero dribbles to get off. You’re thinking of the platonic ideal Klay Thompson attempt as I type this, I assume. The average hit rate of these are around 34-35% in a typical season, which is a little above the overall 3PT hit rate of 33-34%. This goes into two specific divisions:

  • Unguarded catch and shoot threes are what they sound like: open threes where a defender isn’t within 4-5 feet of the shooter. In real time, you might think that 80% of three-point attempts look open, but that really isn’t the case; it’s more like 45-50%. Average hit rate in 2022-23: 37.4%. (Sammie Puisis, South Florida.)

  • Guarded catch and shoot threes are the opposite: the shooter at least has a hand in or near their face, and while they still may hit the shot, there’s a real closeout being attempted here. As mentioned above, an unguarded and guarded three may not look that different in real time, but I promise that if you slow the game down, you can tell the difference, like, 90% of the time. Average hit rate: 32.1%. (Darius McGhee, Liberty.)

Will's running a partially subscription site this year so if you have any interest in Tennessee I recommend it.

Midseason CSBs. The NHL's issued their first numerical ranking of draft prospects for 2023; there is good news and bad. The good news is that Adam Fantill is the #2 North American skater and Gavin Brindley is #40. The bad news is that the rest of the Melpocalypse class is… not high. Recent addition Mike Burchill is #120; Mel commit Charlie Cerrato is #165. Michigan also has Nick Moldenhauer, who was a third round pick last year.

Brandon Naurato has picked up a bunch of five-star types who will be draft eligible in years down the road so I'm not concerned this will be an ongoing issue, but the costs to the extended timeline via which Michigan and Warde Manuel investigated, dithered, and fired Mel Pearson are clear. 

Meanwhile on Naurato. I don't pretend to any level of scheme sophistication when it comes to hockey, so this is a pretty validating outside take from an NHL scout:

Here's to a strong second half starting tonight.

Etc.: Hockey has signed a two-year home-and-home deal with St. Cloud State; should be a fun series. MOLLY WHERE ARE YOU NOW? Harbaugh hired Tom Mars to deal with the NCAA whatnot. I think I am obligated to link Zoltan Mesko tweets.