MGoBlog in Chicago Recap
Last night was the UMCGC's annual football preview with Brian, Seth, Zach Eisendrath (former M football staffer) and Adam Rittenberg (ESPN). The Club of Greater Chicago put on a great event with plenty of Lou Malnati's, 312, etc. and Brian and Seth gave interesting presentations before a nice roundtable Q&A. There were about 90 attendees.
Brian went position by position discussing just how good various groups are going to be. This was a nice update from what made it into HAIL thanks to fall camp tidbits. Video examples of what players do well was also a big hit.
Seth talked Don Brown's hybrids and had a few choice videoclips to show just how he messes with defenses.
Big takeaways that I had that the board may find interesting:
- The WRs are going to be good. Brian said maybe even a step up from last year overall, with more big mistakes thanks to youth
- Hudson was made for this defense and should reprise most of what Peppers did on defense really well
- Cornerback is still an open question - so expect more blitzing/QB pressure
- Mike Onwenu is down to 360 and may end up platooning a bit with Ruiz
- RT is a true battle
- For the West, Brian is high on Iowa, Adam thinks its Wisconsin, then possibly Northwestern
- Bredeson should be OK to good - he was -5 to PFF but the other two freshmen starters in the league were -16 and -25. Brian missed a great opportunity to make a "Not that Michael Jordan" joke while in Chicago.
- Brian thinks 10-2, Seth 9-3.
- Thank Malik McDowell for a lot of MSU's problems last year. When your best player goes 100% like they did at M (Peppers, Wormley, Butt) that trickles down. When your best player takes plays off and gets away with it (MSU) that can destroy a culture.
- Harbaugh's as innovative in private as he is in public. We all heard about Rome, we didn't all hear about new video carts and instant film review in practice. M's now on par with elite schools when it comes to using tech & the latest and greatest teaching tools.
- Look for info from Seth soon on a preseason kickoff event and a homecoming tailgate.
August 18th, 2017 at 2:11 PM ^
I think this is exactly the case.
Let's face it. Many 17 year old kids who are superb athletes are not particularly introspective. If I'm one of these kids & I'm a bit naive/cocky and just KNOW I'm going to be a multimillionaire NFL athlete (with basically zero back-up plan), I very might well just look at the college choice as a place where I'm biding my time until I get to The League. If that's the case, I could easily see a kid viewing his choice through the lens of:
- Which team/staff will get me noticed by scouts & develop me best for the NFL Draft; (NFL experience, prior draft success, playing time/roster/scheme); and
- Outside of football, what is the absolutely easiest & most fun enviornment in which I can bide my time & focus all of my energy on #1? (i.e., easy academics, attractive women, party school, maybe weather/nice campus).
If I already think I'm God's Gift at age 17, it's entrely plausible that personal growth/development doesn't play into the calculations at all.
That's not to say knuckleheads don't come to Michigan. And there are great kids on every single roster in the Power 5. But birds of a feather tend to flock together.
If you ask me, because of this team/campus culture thing, some of the biggest rivalries we have in recruiting are Stanford & Notre Dame (when they're good), not so much the Florida States of the world. For certain kids, our awesome "40 year plan; not a 4 year plan" pitch just falls on totally deaf ears, because they're basically thinking, "Yeah, my 40 year plan is to play ball & party at school for 3 years, then play in the NFL for 17 years, then be a retired multimillionaire for the last 20 years).
It just doesn't enter into the equation.
August 18th, 2017 at 10:43 AM ^
August 18th, 2017 at 11:01 AM ^
Yeah? Well I'll be in North Carolina. Because I live here.
August 18th, 2017 at 11:54 AM ^
The mgostaff knows this, McDowell is just a symbol, but the problems went much deeper than him. Not even talking about the criminal offenses (which is obviously most important, which the staff also knows), but just football.
Take just the OL last year. They annointed Dave Beedle their left tackle, said glowing things about him, he won the job in camp, was supposed to be "next man up" Sparty tackle. He was awful, just terrible. Like how could any coach be paid a salary after making the decision to play him. And no one on the staff saw this, from OL coach to Dantonio. He was so bad they had to move him over to guard, where he was still bad. He's now being pushed by a true freshman. Expect a similar story at right tackle for them this year, where a redshirt freshman has been annointed since spring, and to me he looks quite bad (very small sample size, their spring game). He's being backed up by another true freshman, 6'4" 270 lb Jordan Reid. A severly undersized true freshman walked on to campus a few weeks ago and passed everybody else on the depth chart in 2 weeks of camp. This is very bad.
Watch Kody Keiler at the end of the OSU game last year for them. I think he had to play tackle due to injury or general disarray, but he's absolutely beat to a pulp on consecutive plays by the OSU DEs. Just didn't even belong on the field. Yes that's the same guy that the Alabama player destoyed in the CFP. A year later and no solution.
I'm a bit scattered here, but my point: their OL recruiting, development, and starting decisions have been abysmal. They may have a hit in LT Cole Chewins, but all the other 3* lottery guys have been total failures. Their luck ran out. But more than that, the coaching has been suspect or seemingly absent. They are nightmarishly thin at the tackle position, and they knew that last year. So what did they do? They brought in 1 offensive tackle recruit (Reid is a guard), and that a lightly recruited project from in-state who primarily had MAC offers. This is a disaster.
They're failing all over. And no, BTN Network, it's not going to get better this year.
August 18th, 2017 at 11:13 AM ^
I've been banging the drum for months about the new WRs and their contrast with the old ones. Chesson and Darboh were good players, but they were limited (particularly Chesson) in what they could do and I think the new guys will make us forget them very quickly.
Though I agree that mistakes will be noticeable out of the gate.
August 18th, 2017 at 3:01 PM ^
for as good as Chesson and Darboh were, I feel like they weren't great at deep balls, just elevating over guys to come down with it or adjusting to the ball while it's in the air. Seems like DPJ and Black will be much better at this. But I hope that they don't make so many freshmen mistakes to offset that this year. Certainly a possibility.
August 18th, 2017 at 12:30 PM ^
August 18th, 2017 at 12:38 PM ^
August 18th, 2017 at 3:10 PM ^
the competition has to be close (or the coaches just don't want to say who it is) if there truly aren't clear cut starters.
That doesn't mean anyone is or isn't "ready". You have to start two CBs, whether they're ready or not. There could be two clear-cut best CBs and they could have been named starters, but that still might not mean they're good or "ready" whatever that even means. So the competition could be close at a poor level or it could be close at a high level (or anywhere in between).
August 18th, 2017 at 4:44 PM ^
In some of the insider boards, my interpretation of it was they are equally flawed but in different ways.
I don't recall which person had which weakness, but essentially:
- Knowing coverage schemes & being in the right place/time;
- Run support/tackling technique.
- Being physically strong enough to do man-press and/or go up against big body receivers;
- Being "consistent enough" (i.e. hot/cold performances overall);
- Durabiliy/toughness (i.e., getting dinged up but still willing to play/take snaps)--begging off of practice due to dings is super bad in Harbaugh's system, and one or two of the kids seem to have come close to approaching that line.
My read on it was that a few of the players are actually quite good at most of the skills required for the job (just speculating, but maybe a 7 or 8 out of 10 on alot of the categories), but each person has at least one particular hole in their game (again, just speculating, but maybe like a 3 or 4 out of 10 in maybe one particular area).
Bottom line is I don't get the sense of long-term panic at all. The players are going to be good, but they're going to take time to fill in the gaps. Either time to lift/work out/practice man press for guys who have more slight builds, or time in the system/getting burned to learn coverages more consistently, etc.
August 18th, 2017 at 2:54 PM ^
Lou Malnati's.....
August 18th, 2017 at 6:50 PM ^
ALSO brian and i made off with the leftover beer. It's in my fridge now if anyone wants some chicago beer.
August 18th, 2017 at 10:20 PM ^
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