Actual vs Projected Starters
No excuses at all, the product on the field is inexcusable ans Harbaugh should be fired. At the same time, we can still acknolwedge how young this team is and how many players are new / out of position. I am hopeful that this will pay dividends down the road.
From Touch The Banner:
November 29th, 2020 at 12:05 PM ^
I've been saying this for most of Harbaugh's tenure. He gets in the QBs' heads WAY too much, and it does harm. Unless they have generational talent (Luck) or are very experienced (Rudock, starter at Iowa and grad transfer ; Speight, a senior and still struggled to a degree) the QBs have trouble. It strikes me as a very NFL way to deal with QBs, and these are not NFL players.
Putting so much into their heads reduces their natural ability to make plays. Last week, Cade wasn't "prepped" and he went and did the thing, Rutgers caveats of course. I can't comment on this week aside from what people have reported.
November 29th, 2020 at 9:39 AM ^
Injuries and opt outs are part of the reason M is so bad this year. Even Saban would have had a hard time winning a lot with the combo of youth/injuries/opt-outs.
But that does not erase (1) poor roster/recruiting management for certain position groups (DTs and CBs), (2) years of bad offensive game plans, weird play calling, and failure to make in-game adjustments, (3) stubborn/inflexible approach on D that fails to adapt to personnel and is easy for good teams to scheme around, (4) terrible record against ranked opponents, (5) playing very flat in road games, (6) never developing an NFL QB by year 6, (7) never being able to manage the clock at the end of the half/game, and (8)...a long list of other things so fill in your own blanks.
From the outside it does seem like JH of 2020 is not the same as JH of 2015-16. Something appears to be going on with his life, or possibly, as some have speculated, his health.
If this is part of the problem, it has to be known within the staff and to some extent among players. And if true, this alone would dictate a mutual parting.
But even if it is not true, there is a pattern of factors leading to under-performance that pre-dates the 2020 season.
Those same factors operate to produce a historically bad 2020 result when combined with the injuries and opt-outs making an already-too-young-and-full-of-gaps-roster even worse.
TL:DR--Yes the roster is very young. But...that is no excuse for being this bad.
November 29th, 2020 at 10:47 AM ^
I believe that his health is the problem, and he is on some meds. He had a personality change, which doesn't happen over night unless chemicals are involved. I hope he is physically ok, but he needs to step down, as whatever is the case, he cannot function at the same level as before.
November 29th, 2020 at 10:28 AM ^
Did Eubanks even play? At some point I went for a walk, not to waste such a lovely afternoon...
November 29th, 2020 at 10:43 AM ^
I don't trust this staff ability to evaluate anything. After seeing McGrone sit as a freshmen until someone got hurt, and then the McCaffrey fiasco, compounded with Cade sitting until game 4, they have no clue. Meritocracy should be the best players playing. Our staff looks at a walkon and gives him preferred status over a much better freshmen. The reason is because he seemed to be giving more in practice. I have a feeling we have better LB's on the bench than what are starting .
November 29th, 2020 at 10:51 AM ^
The injuries and opt outs are not his fault
What is his fault is being unable to fill the spots behind them. Losing a linebacker should not mean you're immediately starting a walk on. Being unable to keep McCaffrey for whatever reason is his fault. Losing linemen to Cincinnati and Rutgers when it's your job to convince them to stay in the program is his fault. Nobody on the defense looking prepared is his fault. This is a perfect shit storm of a season and maybe we wouldn't have lost to MSU or psu if we had the injured and opt outs back. But it's obvious this team wouldn't have competed with OSU or even Wisconsin. That's a failure in year 6
November 29th, 2020 at 11:04 AM ^
This also shows another issue though: lack of depth
Why does Michigan seem to get so much attrition compared to other schools that can retain guys who are willing to wait until their junior or senior year to play, while we lose guys in their first few years to lesser teams? It's genuinely an issue when a team like Michigan has guys like Shibley, Reynolds, and Grey starting out of necessity because we have no one better
November 29th, 2020 at 11:09 AM ^
Keegan looked pretty damn good i thought
November 29th, 2020 at 11:10 AM ^
Now do the same for Penn State.
November 29th, 2020 at 11:13 AM ^
I do get a kick out of the ostriches on the board.
Harbaugh has been the captain of this maize and blue Titanic for six years. It has hit an iceberg and he needs to go down with the ship.
My fear is that Manual will give him another year and force him to replace Brown. UM might go 8-4 and the beat would go on...
November 29th, 2020 at 11:18 AM ^
What if they resigned him to a long term deal in the Spring already? But they didn’t announce it because of Covid.
November 29th, 2020 at 11:27 AM ^
You could also say very untalented at several positions
November 29th, 2020 at 11:34 AM ^
In year 6 why do we have 2 walk ons on the 2 deep. And these aren’t Glasgow level walk ons. Penn st ran right at Shibley all day yesterday, their final scoring drive, besides the PBU by Dax, we’re all formations designed to put Shibley at the point of contact, and they moved without any resistance. It’s not his fault, he’s a walk on, he tried his best, I commend him for his effort. But how on Earth in year 6 do we not have a serviceable backup linebacker?
November 29th, 2020 at 11:46 AM ^
We probably do. Put in one of the younger guys at this point and let them play! Quit with the walk-on bullshit.
November 29th, 2020 at 12:17 PM ^
November 29th, 2020 at 12:16 PM ^
It's completely rational and fair to say that 2020 dealt Michigan football a shit hand AND the current staff deserves to go. Lots of programs have had to deal with uncertainty and line-up issues. But foreseeable roster issues have combined with an on-field product that appears disorganized, and at times disinterested, both of which seem to reflect the HC's attitude.
But perhaps the most unforgiveable sin is the offense. While the defense has been atrocious this year, at least it has had a consistent identity and, until 2020, consistent success (and failure against OSU). The offense has never looked like a cohesive unit with identity and purpose. That is inexcusable in today's CFB world.
November 29th, 2020 at 12:35 PM ^
Cade is the way. He is just too inexperienced right now
November 29th, 2020 at 12:48 PM ^
I swear I’ve heard the same “young players” excuse for the last decade. Either that or I’m going crazy
November 29th, 2020 at 12:49 PM ^
It's even more pronounced when you look at returning production from last year. IMO this was always going to be a bad season (like 8-5 or something) because of the massive amount of lost production from last season (We were ranked 125th in returning production). Now maybe it's COVID and maybe it's something else, but many of the other teams near the bottom of that list are shockingly bad this year (LSU, MSU) and several of the teams near the top of the list are shockingly good (Northwestern, IU). Here's a look at the 2019 starters and where they are now:
QB: Patterson – Graduated
RB: Charb/Haskins
WR1: DPJ – NFL
WR2: Nico – COVID
Slot: Bell
TE: McKeon - NFL
OT: Runyan – Graduated
OG: Bredenson - Graduated
C: Ruiz – NFL
OG: Onwenu - Graduated
OT: Mayfield – Injured
K: Nordin - ?
P: Robbins
PR: DPJ – NFL
KR: Jackson – Injured
DE1: Paye
DE2: Hutch – Injured
DT1: Kemp
DT2: Warm body
LB1: McGrone – Injured
LB2: Glasgow/Uche – Graduated/NFL
Viper: Hudson - Graduated
CB1: Levert Hill – Graduated
CB2: Ambry Thomas – COVID
S1: Hawkins – Injured
S2: Metellus – Graduated
Even with all of this said, the degree to which we have been bad is shocking and a lot of it was avoidable. We probably would have stood a shot yesterday if we had a viable backup quarterback once Cade got injured. Milton appears to have no confidence at this point and he struggles to complete a pass. McCaffrey sure would be nice to have on the roster. Additionally, the MSU loss doesn't happen if Don Brown bends just a teeny tiny bit on his philosophy and doesn' let Vincent Gray get burned alive over and over for 60 minutes.
November 29th, 2020 at 2:27 PM ^
Great post... experience is one of the most important and underrated aspects of CFL. It's not the NFL, these are still kids the youngest of which are literally transitioning from HS and have to learn to go to college (itself not easy, certainly not in my own life), much less learn how to be part of a high-level college football team.
It's not a coincidence that our best team was 2016 in which we were deep and talented across the board. We severely underachieved that year actually and could have (should have?) won all three of our losses.