2 recent Hoke interviews

Click on the '1' and the '2' in his post. =)

Is there really any other reason the OP would have said there were 2 interviews and then put (1 and 2) at the end of the sentence? Plus there's that little pointer hand that your mouse turns into when you hover over the numbers.

win a national champiosnhip if you don't win your conference championship. Wait a minute...

Can't win a National Championship without winning the Big Ten Championship first. Well, maybe in some weird, hypothetical season it could be possible...but highly unlikely. If we can get our teams back to winning Big Ten Champs regularly, I'll be ecstatic. You'd consider winning all Big Ten games (including MSU, OSU, and the championship game) an unsuccessful season?

I'd rather compete against OSU, MSU, PSU, Wisconsin, and the like than constantly be competing with the questionable schools in the SEC. Not to mention, the National Championship involves tons of stupid, garbage politics, selections, etc. Only the Big Ten Championship can be decided by wins vs. losses. For example, even if MSU went 12-1 last year, it's unlikely they would've been selected over LSU-Alabama.

That doesn't bother me so much because I think it just means Hoke focuses on things he can control. Unlike the field for the national championship, every team controls its own fate in the B1G (especially now that we have a conference championship game). If you don't win the B1G championship, it means that you lost at least one game. Not so for the NC (Penn State '94, Auburn '04, Utah '04, Boise State '09, etc). At the end of the day, every coach wants to win every single game. Hoke is no exception. 

Keep in mind that Hoke was on the staff of the '97 team that had a perfect season but had to split the title with Nebraska. That probably affects his outlook a bit and might be the reason why he talks about the B1G championship as his goal.

I'm for that. Win B1G game and then win the NC game a month after that. No biggie...;-)  Remember when Hoke shot down Dr*w Sha*rp when he asked him the same thing?

....if the SEC of last year was any indication, then you DO NOT have to win the B10 to win an NC.

I don't really think coach speak means insincere per se. And you're right, Hoke does seem to be one of the most sincere people out there. I think it's more of a way of putting things in a way that's really generic and offends no one but at the same time pumps up your home crowd. It usually revolves around a few central points that the coach feels needs to be passed onto players +/- fans +/- recruits. It also involves using a lot of words to say what normal people could say in a few words.

Hoke's coach speak usually revolves around: Michigan is a tremendous place; Michigan degree is tremendous; tradition; toughness; accountability; senior leadership; B1g championships etc...I don't for one second think that he doesn't mean any of this stuff, but they're always things I see him fall back on. And sometimes he uses them to answer questions that he doesn't really feel like answering. I remember some intense long rambling answers from Hoke that somehow tie whatever question to "toughness" and "accountability" even if it kind of makes no sense at all. It's an intense game of connect the dots where the dots aren't even on the same page. But he somehow makes it work at the time. It isn't until after the interview and you think about the answer where you go "wait...what?".