Lack of Transfers A Good Thing
One thing I thought might be a downside to RR and the intensity of his workouts and practices would be more transfers from players that did not see a clear path to playing time. I must say I've been pleasantly surprised that since the initial wave of defectors it has been pretty quiet. We've loaded up at certain positions so some may be coming soon, but so far pretty quiet this year.
I bet you were right in there too with the likes of Woodson or Leach or whenever you were at Michigan.
I'm sure that you have no idea either and that you are just talking out of your ass. Since this is the internet.
Listen, children. You are arguing pointless BS right now. As a former D-2 football player, maybe I can shed a bit of light on this subject (I was well acquainted with a few UM players under Coach Carr).
Coach Carr/Gittelson's system involved virtually no free weights. It was designed to keep players from potential injuries that arise from strenuous free weight exercises. Michigan was taking top athletes and putting them through body builder workouts.
Coach Rod/Barwis' workouts involve intense free weight exercises that are potentially (if done incorrectly) more hazardous but also more beneficial to stabilizer muscles. This type of workout TRANSLATES BETTER TO THE FOOTBALL FIELD.
Between how I trained in high school (Gittelson-like workouts) and how I trained in college (Barwis-like workouts), there is no comparison. I was more cut, more flexible, faster and shiftier in college. Yes, I was older, however the college workouts markedly improved my overall game.
To conclude this long post, Coach Carr's program was antiquated, not a "country club." It was not the type of program a football team should run if it wants to maximize potential. The players that did not like the new workouts (Boren comes to mind) were probably, in fact, "lazy" due to the more intense workouts, however the change in atmosphere is most likely what upset them most.
But when comparing the two S&C programs:
1. Had Barwis Beach
2. One did not
I don't think that Boren liked Barwis beach which is where the "country club" meme comes from. Because comparatively to what RR and other schools around the nation are doing it was a country club and that no matter what coach was brought in would have "revolutionized" the way that Michigan players trained and we would have suffered just as many transfer casualties.
But thank you very much for the more educated opinion/experiences. It is good to hear from someone who actually knows stuff instead of just hear say and 3rd person bs.
"But thank you very much for the more educated opinion/experiences. It is good to hear from someone who actually knows stuff instead of just hear say and 3rd person bs."
Your entire argument has been based on third person BS about Gittleson's workouts, what he told them to eat, etc.
Regardless, the point still stands that Carr/Gittleson won at Michigan, while Rodriguez/Barwis have not. So whether Gittleson's ways were antiquated or not, they won games. They also produced perhaps the best QB in the NFL, the reigning NFL Defensive MVP and Heisman winner, a national championship team, the former #1 pick in the draft, etc., etc.
Rodriguez/Barwis might reach those same levels, but until then, there's not much to argue.
I get your point that Carr and Gittleson were not idiot bums but please tell me you are not attributing the success of Brady, Woodson, Long etc to Gittleson's methods or Carr's coaching. Those players were all extremely rare talents who would've found success no matter what. Do you think Wayne Fontes deserves credit for Barry Sanders?
So yes Carr and Gittleson have had far greater success at Michigan than RR and Barwis, but the later group also did very well at WVU and have had an unbelievable set of obstacles thrown in their way in Ann Arbor.
April 26th, 2010 at 10:16 PM ^
How do you know that Brady, Woodson, Long, etc. would have succeeded? That's purely speculative. There have been plenty of "surefire locks" who've fell flat on their faces in college, whether due to coaching, off-the-field problems, etc.
No, Wayne Fontes doesn't deserve all the credit for Barry Sanders. He surely deserves some credit, though. Did Barry achieve all those awards and stats on his own?
I'm not dismissing the obstacles that Rodriguez/Barwis have had to overcome. I'm saying we should stop throwing Carr/Gittleson under the bus.
"It is good to hear from someone who actually knows stuff instead of just hear say and 3rd person bs."
you know bouje, by definition, sun1np's whole argument was hearsay, right? he was not in the michigan football program but "heard from people who were". that my friend is a clearcut example of hearsay.
April 27th, 2010 at 12:10 AM ^
Hearsay, maybe. I am just speaking from a first person point of view.
If you play football, you immediately have 85-90ish new friends to start your new college. You are immediately popular around campus (I went to Hillsdale, it's small but still) and connected through these people. Some of these players also played football with guys in high school that went to other colleges to play ball. I personally had friends on about half of the other teams in the GLIAC through my teammates. Additionally, I also hung out with a few guys I knew at UofM and MSU. We would talk about what our off-season conditioning was like because they were going through it all too.
Additionally, I spoke with Coach Gittleson and some of the Assistant Strength Staff at Michigan football camp prior to my senior year of high school. They were intense, but their methods and reasoning for doing things was just flat wrong.
Whether you want to call it all hearsay or not, this is the truth.
That's your opinion, but not the truth. Mike Gittleson was the NSCA Strength & Conditioning coach of year year one year while at u of m. His program was/is not the only one of it's kind. Penn State still does HIT training, many teams in the NFL still do HIT training. HIT training is performed because these coaches feel that increasing strength translate to increased power, which is true...check out the formula for power. Also, a team being tired in a game at the end of the year doesn't always mean they aren't conditioned well, it can also mean they have been trained too much or what they call in the s&c world as overtraining. Once overtraining occurs an individual will begin to plateau and then decline in performance. This is one thing individuals seem to not realize when it comes to training in the offseason. Remember all the stories about sprinting across the golf corse? Typically, the strength coach is told what to do by the head coach. The coaches may have had Gittleson do certain things or exclude certain things because they thought they needed something when they really didn't.
April 27th, 2010 at 12:18 AM ^
Fair enough. Then from my opinion as someone who has lived it, I would rather be in the training offered by Mike Barwis than the training of Mike Gittleson. I simply believe through experience that Mike Barwis' style of training will help a football team reach more of its potential. Football is about being explosive, not simply powerful.
Yeah you're right this is the second time I've pointed this out, seeing as this is probably the 1,000th time this has come up. So what if he did? What do you know about preparing players that he didn't? Was our weight room a joke? I didn't notice it while watching the Rose Bowl for consecutive years. It was a country club? Says who? Did our record say that? Or is it just MgoBlog? How exactly were our players soft? There is one case of us being run all over in the final two years that stands out. There was about one per month last year.
We hadn't competed with OSU for the final couple years (you never thought that we could win the game).
We had a loss in every September (except for 2006) and were out of the national championship picture
We had the punting fiasco in 2003
We lost to App State in 2007. NOTHING that RR has done will EVER be worse than APP State (Unless he'd have lost to DSU last year). Nothing will ever compare to that except for a winless record.
We got killed by USC every single time at the Rose Bowl against slippery Pete
The players took on the perspective/opinion of the coaches in that "We are more talented than the other team therefore we don't have to work as hard and we don't have to think or do anything fancy we'll just run left, run left, play action, punt"
So in order to prove that Lloyd Carr and Mike Gittleson ran a soft camp, you're going to point out some of the short comings during Lloyd Carr's tenure? By that logic Mike Barwis is one of the worst strength coaches we've ever had, and Rich Rodriguez runs the softest practices known to man. You seem to confuse my argument as "Lloyd Carr was the best coach in history, and had us in the NC picture every year" as apposed to it actually being "Lloyd Carr and Mike Gittleson actually knew what they were doing." Your last paragraph is just more crap you've made up yet again.
App State would have spanked the Toledo team that beat us.
Would have wiped the floor with 2008 Michigan and that's not even debateable.. What's your point? To the public losing to app state is infinitely worse than losing to Toledo. (okay maybe not infinitely but a lot worse).
Did he win a national championship? I don't care if he tells the players to eat firewood and balloons. They won with him there. There's no need to pile on the guy 3 years after he's gone when those teams accomplished more than Rodriguez/Barwis.
That with Lloyd at the helm we would have broken the bowl streak the past years anyways.
What would have changed...
Oh that's right nothing...
Lloyd Carr was not a deity. He's not some God to place up above everyone else. He's a coach that can and should be criticized but since he brought our only "title" in the modern era he is deified.
As I've said before there is no coach not even Jesus Christ who could have won with the team that we had here the past 2 years. And RR was just in the wrong place at the wrong time.
...because you're going to Hell for that comment.
You can create that fantasy world all you want, but there's no way of knowing it's true. Nor is it fair to use such an argument to knock Lloyd Carr.
At the end of the day, we don't know what Lloyd Carr could have done in 2008. It's time we all stopped using that particular argument to throw him under the bus.
I don't view the "nobody could have won with that team" argument as a knock on Carr necessarily. The talent/depth issues that crippled the team had far more to do with transfers/transition/culture change/not offering Boren's little brother/etc. than any slip up in recruiting by Carr. I think there is room to criticize Carr as a coach, but he certainly didn't create the 8-16 record we've seen the last two years. I also don't think that any objective observer of the roster can blame Rodriguez or any other coach for 8-16.
I've yet to see anyone point out an example of a team that won with similar roster issues: youth (especially at the QB position), lack of top-end talent (NFL picks), missing ten scholarship players, etc. In my view if no one else has ever done it, that makes a pretty good case that the current coaching staff isn't to blame for failing to make it happen.
Just by way of example, USC has been a recruiting powerhouse for years and just had seven players drafted (and a good number more signed as free agents). Still, starting a true freshman at QB (even a 5-star super recruit) saw them go from perennial Rose Bowl winners to an 8-4 team. If just starting a true frosh is good for two extra losses, I think it is safe to say that having all of the roster issues Michigan has endured the last two years make it damn near impossible for any coach to win.
Neg-u-lation.
If RR fails again this year he should be gone and he'll have no more excuses (but I wouldn't be surprised if someone did really well with his players the following 2 years ala Carr).
As I've said RR inherited a shit-storm and was just in the wrong place at the wrong time. Bando will never understand this. He will always blame him.
And while I will not place all of the blame on Lloyd as I've said in this thread, to completely exonerate him and to say that he had nothing to do with this is also pulling the wool over your eyes and is pretty revisionist too.
And while I'd kill for Lloyd's dependable 9-3 record right now if we have to endure 2 terrible seasons to win a NC in the next 5 years I think that that is a good trade-off.
Thanks for sticking up for my position.
If Carr had remained coach we would not have had the same teams playing in 08 and 09. We would have had a Mallet-directed power run, play-action pass offense that would have been far superior to year one of the re-tooling process. Lloyd did not leave the cupboard bare, but the transition prompted some critical groceries to grow legs and walk away. And that left us with RS Freshman Steve Threet running Pat White's offense, behind the worst OL Michigan has had in 15 years. That went poorly.
RR has no bigger supporter than me. But we should not distort the past in our zeal to defend him.
1. While I agree if Lloyd stays that is the only way we could sniff a winning season
2. Any other coach we have a losing season if we hire outside of the (at the time) current assistants.
3. It is my firm belief and many others that Mallett was gone no matter who the coach was because:
a: It was always between Michigan and Arkansas
b: Mitch Mustain transferred out
c: He was homesick
d: Lloyd (supposedly tossed him transfer papers)
e: No one on the team liked him
f: He was a super huge douchebag (goes along with e)
4. I also don't see how our O-Line goes from magically "worst OL in 15 years" to good enough to do play actions with an immobile Ryan Mallett (who wouldn't be there). Only Boren would have stayed if Lloyd had been there and maybe some of the seniors that left but without Jake Long our line was already pretty terrible going into 2008.
5. Please stop assuming that if LC stays at Michigan for another year that RM stays. It is 50/50 at best and I would put the O/U on something more along the lines of 10/90.
6. The negative recruiting would have kept coming along with teams saying "How much longer can LC keep coaching for with his failing health come to my school and I'll for sure be the coach when you're here".
Bouje.
I like RR. I think he's a good coach. I support him. I want him to stay here.
BUT, saying Carr "should be criticized" for the things you list while staunchly refusing to criticize RR for a thing that's happened is...madness.
You're tearing Carr to shreds for losing ROSE BOWLS, while favoring a guy who is 8-16. That's just ridiculous. I know what the circumstances were for RR, you don't need to tell me. But come on, the current situation is not 100% out of his hands.
The o-line for the last two years would have been much better (with Boren and Mitchell), the receivers would have been better (manningham and arrington would have likely stayed), and our defense wouldn't be going into it's 4th scheme in 4 years. We probably wouldn't be facing NCAA allegations.
It's fine if you want to hold Carr "accountable" for the bad things that happened under his tenure. But don't do it if you're going to refuse to hold Rodriguez accountable for a thing.
As I've said I think that it was a combination of factors and it's not really anyone's fault. But more of the blame lies on the LC regime at this juncture in time than the RR regime.
And I'm not tearing LC to shreds for losing ROSE BOWLS, I'm tearing him to shreds for losing to App State as the #3 team in the nation. I'm tearing him to shreds for never getting out of the first month of the season unscathed.
I will for my opinion of RR this year and still realize that the team is still young and keep in mind the big picture as to what RR is trying to do here but anything less than 500 and I think he's gone and I wouldn't really put up too much of a fuss about it unless we were only a few bounces away in every game (especially if we break the OSU streak).
At this juncture I would say the blame game is:
80% LC for the first 2 years
20% RR for the first 2 years
year 3 should be about 50/50
year 4 should be 80/20
year 5 is all RR (again if he gets that far)
You cannot possibly tell me that the program had not gotten stale and that you didn't dread seeing OSU every year with Troy Smith or any "dual threat" QB.
I just don't see how you can say "It's RRs fault he should be fired now!" when we knew exactly what we were getting ourselves into in year 1. You either stick with the plan or you blow it up. We blew it up so you have to at LEAST give the man the respect that he has deserved as a football coach to give him the time to rebuild the program as he sees fit.
The program was stale with LC and that was a big reason for the change to RR. Those who called for that change need to realize that the change you asked for takes time. It sucks to go backwards before you go forward but that was an inevitable outcome when it was determined to re-tool the program.
If you’re not all in for RR at least be all in for the program and realize this is the path that was chosen.
Dawn is around the corner. IMO
epically bad. And if it is then we made a huge mistake and we can start again. But I'm curious to see when the Vegas lines come out how many wins Michigan has..
April 27th, 2010 at 12:04 AM ^
I wonder if Manningham/Arrington would have stayed though. At the end of the year, I think Manningham was fed up and wanted no part of having Mallett as the QB. Carrs patience seemed to be running out with Manninngham as well.
I don't know about Arrington either. Who knows. He had a big bowl game, 6-7 catches? 100ish yards and a score? He might have thought that it was his time to leave as well.
If Gitteson won with firewood and balloons, I am excited of how much higher the ceiling is now with Barwis.
Just win.
I think the game changed a lot since UM won the national championship. The advent of the spread offense really showed how our lack of athleticism on defense was not capable of competing with the elite programs during the latter part of LC's tenure. Hell, at least one member of that defensive staff referred to the spread offense as "communist football." They didn't even take it seriously.
So yes, they won, but even the 2006 defense got exposed at the end of the season, playing a dismally weak conference schedule.
I think this is a BS statement! Take a look at a picture of Boren while playing at U of M and then playing at OSU. He looks like he's in pretty good shape at u of m but not so much at OSU. You're going to tell me that the strength program was so bad under Gitt. What does that say about OSUs strength program then? They're winning big ten title after big ten title but they're linemen are fat. Every fan base overhypes their strength program and thinks they have the best strength coach in the country. Cincinnati has hyped Dave Lawson now that he came from Central Michigan to Cinci. Do you know where he was before Central? He was at Eastern Michigan with Genyk!
IMO-Go to Barwis Beach.
How has Miami been the last few years. They have had the same strength coach for a while and have been doing sand training for years. They haven't looked like the fastest, most powerful team in the country lately.
It's really good to see even when the team hasn't been doing good and the program is always under attack by the local media that nobody has transfered that is a RichRod recruit.Shows how good of a guy he is. Just don't tell that to the Free Press.
Taylor Hill transferred.
That's pretty damn good...
and was on campus 40 days, so although he did transfer, it's hard to blame RR (or anyone).
How about McGuffie, though?
Or was that just Witherspoon?
That summer was nutty.
You've said his name a bunch on here. How long was he here for? I know it wasn't long at all.
He left in August of his freshman year, but he's still a Rodriguez recruit that transferred (to Youngstown State, if you're wondering).
Thanks. I couldn't remember when he left the program. I knew it was before the season began.
It's really amazing to me to see the kind of revisionist history around here regarding Lloyd Carr's tenure at Michigan. I mean, you'd think the guy didn't win 5 conference championships, one national championship, coach a Heisman Trophy winner, recruit and mold more than a few first-round draft picks, coach his teams to 11 Jan 1st bowl games...
If that's "soft," or a "country club," or "underachieving," I'll take it. Lloyd was/is a class act, a great representative of our University, and it's too bad so many here just don't seem to appreciate it.
As I've stated many times Lloyd should have been gone in 2003. I wanted him gone fired (and he also wanted out too). You cannot tell me that our depth at all of the positions across the whole team was not his fault. Because it was.
There is only 3 people directly responsible for the Michigan demise over the past THREE seasons:
1. Bill Martin for pleading Lloyd to stay
2. Lloyd Carr for leaving the cupboard barren.
3. Rich Rodriguez for being the guy who had to deal with everything
And the truth is revealed.
You really wanted Lloyd gone in 2003? So, basically, you're admitting there's absolutely nothing in Michigan football that would have satisfied you, and there's nothing Lloyd Carr could have done to make you happy. Because those back-to-back Big Ten championships in 2003 and 2004 were a sign you were right and he needed to go.
Come on.
how do you justify your sig "A house divided against itself cannot stand" and your caustic and vehement attacks against all those questioning RR when you yourself have been anti-lloyd since 2003.
In the University staying in house, promoting a guy who was never a head coach (a "Michigan Man") and having him coach there for almost 10 years. You know exactly what he's capable of, how he'll do recruiting wise and if the program is moving forward, staying stagnant, or moving backward.
When a coach is at a University for less than 4 years (especially when there was such a huge shift in philosophies) you cannot judge someone fully because you don't have a full body of work.
At year 10 you knew exactly what to expect from Lloyd: A loss in the non-conference, a couple losses in the Big Ten and maybe going to a BCS bowl. You knew that unless things aligned perfectly Lloyd would not bring Michigan another National Title.
He was a good coach, a great ambassador for the University, a great man, a great mentor, but the game had passed him by. It also just so happens that Lloyd won a NC in his third year. Really he won with Moeller's players and really if Moeller hadn't screwed up he would have been the savior and Lloyd would have still been DC. I don't think that it's any coincident that Lloyd's 2 best years were years 3/4 and that after that he plateaued whereas my guess is that RR if given the time will have an upward sloping trajectory.
So um... exactly what was wrong with what I said? Please explain how my position is "retarded".
I know that you're all "Lloyd was better" and that you're one of the people that thought that LC could walk on water but come on at least give me the respect to pull apart my post besides my spelling error for coincidence.
Should stop talking now.
April 27th, 2010 at 11:46 AM ^
Bouje, no rational person on the face of the earth wanted Carr gone in 2003.
We had just played in the Rose Bowl, and won the Big 10. He was something like 10-3 against OSU (though 2-2 in his last 4 years), and 2-2 in his last 4 bowls.
You fire that guy? Are you on drugs? You're looking in hindsight, pure and simple. Even so - WE PLAYED IN 2 BCS BOWLS IN 4 YEARS. This suggests some sort of incompetence?