Does Hoke typically run a physical camp or is that just this year?
Not sure if there has been any posts on this, did not notice anything recently. Just wondering if Hoke is an old-school, run a brutal camp to see who survives or if he is just trying to set the tone for this year. Could be bias in the reporting since there has been a staff change, but it seems that the physicality of the practices have been noted pretty often by a variety of sources. I am all for tackling drills and some live scrimmage, however, I also want the team intact (knock on wood everybody has been healthy).
August 29th, 2011 at 6:14 PM ^
He watched Junction Boys with Tom Berenger in July.
August 29th, 2011 at 6:21 PM ^
If it means the defense will play better who cares? We had more injuries in past years.
August 29th, 2011 at 6:21 PM ^
Hoke invented the physical training camp. All other training camps pale in toughness and teamwork.
August 29th, 2011 at 7:27 PM ^
August 29th, 2011 at 6:28 PM ^
DON'T QUESTION THE MACHINE
August 29th, 2011 at 6:31 PM ^
I heard that R Lee Ermey assists in these practices.
August 29th, 2011 at 7:12 PM ^
Could you imagine him pacing the sidelines and berating B1G officials? He'd make Bo blush.
August 29th, 2011 at 6:38 PM ^
MANBALL!
August 29th, 2011 at 6:41 PM ^
Well some of the articles from his start at SDSU mention Hoke's focus on toughness, so I"d assume it's something he always does.
August 29th, 2011 at 6:48 PM ^
MANBALL
August 29th, 2011 at 9:23 PM ^
Hopefully Michael Shaw runs with that kind of rage. Nobody will want to even attempt to tackle a crazed man like that.
August 29th, 2011 at 6:49 PM ^
The past few defenses have seemed to lack toughness. The one thing I look forward to the most is the fear in the opponent's eyes at the mere thought of a michigan defense.
August 29th, 2011 at 6:52 PM ^
No, they lacked things like talent and skill and technique and foundamentals.
Lacking toughness is reason #691831 why Michigan's defense blew last year, right above #691832: Cinnamon Toast Crunch
August 29th, 2011 at 7:37 PM ^
Come on.... I think I speak for all of us in saying that you have totally understated Cinnamon Toast Crunch's role in our defense. I'll never forgive those cinnamon sugar coated square bastards.
August 29th, 2011 at 8:28 PM ^
A few too many players got run over a few too many times for toughness not to top the list.
August 29th, 2011 at 8:22 PM ^
Where's the /s in your post?
August 29th, 2011 at 6:56 PM ^
They have to work off all that chowder.
August 29th, 2011 at 6:59 PM ^
The toughness is needed due to the fact the our defense forgot how to tackle last year.
August 29th, 2011 at 8:09 PM ^
Sometimes coaches use tough camps as a way of trimming the fat off of an inherited roster. Found out who wants to be here and will buy into the team, leave the rest in the dog house. Another reason is that they need to find out what they have on both sides of the ball. Film isn't reliable because you are running a different scheme and Mattison should never be forced to watch a Gerg run defense.
I will be happy when Friday's practice ends and there are no injuries. Personally I would scale down the reps of penciled in starters as it gets later into camp but we are coming off a pretty bad year defensively, so that was not a luxury we can afford.
August 29th, 2011 at 7:16 PM ^
We only had a handful of people who really played well enough to secure a starting role. After that there were a lot of guys with average to above average scouting reports or on field performance filling out the depth chart. Lots of people who excelled at one thing but blew at another.
It makes sense to tke that group of borderline guys, throw them in the shark tank, and see who is still swimming at the end of the day. It sounds cruel but if someone gets banged up in practice, that's the nature of the sport. As one of high school coaches once said "They say there are two kinds of bikers, those who dropped the bike and those who will. Well there are two kinds of football players as well, those who sit a season with injury and those who will."
August 29th, 2011 at 7:51 PM ^
I think Hoke likes running a tough camp. Every year is the same stories about how this one was the toughest. If there was a difference between Hoke and RR I think it was depth.
I think RR likes running a very tough camp but when you look at out depth chart thye last few years I think you have to make compromises. RR would have loved to hit real hard but if you are looking at Avery, Rogers and Floyd as your CB's and you have a gamecoming up are you going to put those guys thru intense drills or try and teach them where to line up with your limited time.
It obviously didn't work so he would have probably been better off just making them tougher, but I understand the theory at least.
August 29th, 2011 at 7:52 PM ^
This camp is just as physical as Rich Rod's camp (I believe Brian debunked this myth a week or so ago). That doesn't really answer your question, but rather addresses an underlying assertion that Rich Rod's camps weren't as physical.
August 29th, 2011 at 8:13 PM ^
The linemen said that they did more hitting and contact drills this year.
August 29th, 2011 at 8:21 PM ^
Frankly, I'm not sure we can take Brian at face value when he compares RR and Hoke, given how defensive he is about RR. Sam Webb reported that this camp was the toughest he's seen at Michigan in several years, including the later Carr years.
August 29th, 2011 at 8:23 PM ^
There is no way we ran as physical of a camp under RR. I don't care how you want to spin it but we barely had enough depth on our roster to run a functional scrimmage. Losing Troy had to at least make him a little gun shy during last year's camp. This is not to say that RR ran a country club but the man had no choice other than backing off on contact drills. I think our tackling suffered greatly because of this.
Edit; This is more of a comment in regards to Brian not you jmblue.
August 29th, 2011 at 9:48 PM ^
My fault: This was not at all Brian. This was commenters in a board thread.
http://mgoblog.com/mgoboard/video-first-practice-pads
See the video below.
August 29th, 2011 at 8:24 PM ^
I'm glad you added those last few words, because I'd be very confused otherwise.
Hitting is one thing, and it may have been lacking in RichRod practices, but all we heard about back in '08 was how the "country club" mentality was no more.
With Hoke, we may have the best of both worlds.
August 29th, 2011 at 9:25 PM ^
Under RR it meant running until you puked and your ears got singed by expletives. Under Hoke it means running until you puke and you get cauliflower ears from using your helmet as a pile driver. Blocking, tackling and gameday street justice are sure to improve. Our team should be tougher mentally, too, because they will have learned how to compensate for the brain damage caused by all that pile driving.
August 29th, 2011 at 9:54 PM ^
Let me clarify. There was a post (I think it was Brian responding to this issue in a mail bag post, but could have been Misopogan) in which we saw camp videos from this year and camp videos from last year and the teams were running the same physical drills.
This notion that Rodriguez wasn't running physical camps was seemingly born out of thin air.
EDIT: It was actually just a message board topic and Brian nor any moderator was involved. Here we go:
First day of pads 2010:
First day of pads, 2011:
Look practically identical to me.
August 29th, 2011 at 10:18 PM ^
You're misunderstanding what Webb and others are saying. It's not that RR's teams never practiced in pads, but that they did so less frequently than Hoke's team has to date. Webb says he hasn't seen a Michigan team go full-on in pads this often in several years.