Recruiting vs. The Process ?
Michigan's recruiting has been an interesting parallel to the actual performance on the football field in particular. Fast promising starts that lead to under whelming and disappointing finishes. Ohio should NOT be out-recruiting us in Football or Basketball but they are. We should not be watching kids like Webb, McDowell and possibly Cole commit to other schools....but we have and just might lose out on the whole trio. We have done a nice job in recruiting but we are now coming to face the consequences of broken promises and misleads. Kids were being sold on winning the B1G and playing for National Titles. We are no where near either of those goals.....and that is what Michigan should always be in contention for. We haven't been a contender since 2006. So when will it change?
The change has to come from a special team. Possibly Team #135. It seems like Michigan is attempting to cheat the process by reeling in 5 star talents to fix the problem before proven coaching and a restored "Brand" is in order. Michigan needs to win and they need to win last year.....the excuses about 2nd year offense this and 3rd year offense that are lame and not what top talent wants to hear. Top Talent wants to win and play top level college football. Michigan is NOT playing top level college football at the moment....and when you retain the entire staff of a POWERHOUSE program that is severely underachieving you are not sending a message to recruits that you are serious about winning.
Michigan needs to win 10 plus football games year in and year out and win rivalry games. Thats what kids see and thats what will convince them to come to Michigan. The recruits that aren't Michigan Kids need another reason besides the Winged Helmet to come to this program. They want to win. Ohio is winning. Bama is winning. FSU and Oregon are winning. These programs can legitimately tell recruits that they will play for conference and National title games. What can we legitimately tell our recruits? Honestly. We need to cut the damn excuses and raise the expectation levels of this program immediately before we judge commits or recruits for looking elsewhere.
The Change starts with the Kansas State game and anything less then a supreme sense of urgency around the program will simply speak loud and clear that we as a program have fully accepted our current and lengthy state of mediocrity. The only thing that can pull us out of this mess is some improved coaching and the members of this football team deciding that they want it to look like Michigan again. It's sure as hell been a while since we've seen some Michigan Football.
We do need a Few Good Men and recruiting will always be paramount. We need to focus on making sure that we have Michigan Level coaches and that they are developing our kids to be Michigan football players. A few 10+ win seasons from now we could be where we want to be....and thats preparing for USC in the Rose Bowl. Anything less is a failure and until we ALL start thinking like that, we will continue to look up to our Rivals in the standings.
It's all in the Process and there are no shortcuts.
December 18th, 2013 at 8:50 AM ^
about that. In fact,his lost isn't felt because of Pepper...tho bruise egos believe CT kids should be ALL ours. There are going to be those kids who allegiance to their state school aren't going to be strong...he's one.
McDowell...wasn't aware the recuriting process was over,and he's not going to pull the trigger from Michigan. Let's wait before we jump to conclusions on his decision.
Cole...2015,nuff said. Hasn't said we aren't being given serious consideration...so lets get 2014 first sign,then onward to the next crisis.
December 18th, 2013 at 8:55 AM ^
December 18th, 2013 at 10:01 AM ^
to what?
December 18th, 2013 at 8:52 AM ^
December 18th, 2013 at 9:08 AM ^
I stopped reading when you said that Ohio shouldn't be out-recruiting us.
They are the only major university in what is likely the 4th best state for high school football talent. They have built in advantages that we could only dream of having. They out-recruit us damn near every year. Thats the way its always been.
December 18th, 2013 at 9:23 AM ^
Michigan produces less than a quarter of the talent Ohio does year in and year out. People can wear "worst state ever" shirts all they want, but Michigan doesn't hold a candle to Ohio as a producer of football players.
December 18th, 2013 at 11:16 AM ^
One could say the same thing about Oklahoma vs. Texas, yet Oklahoma has far and away outperformed Texas in the Stoops/Brown era.
December 18th, 2013 at 11:40 AM ^
Michigan has outperformed OSU at times too, but that doesn't mean OSU lacks the recruiting advantage of having a great many more talented players in its home state.
December 18th, 2013 at 11:50 AM ^
And Mack Brown has the advantage of a talent rich state....Are you agreeing with me?
If you're going to routinely compete with your better positioned rival, you need an advantage and that advantage probably has to come from a superior staff. That's my theory anyway.
December 18th, 2013 at 11:54 AM ^
OP said that OSU should out-recruit Michigan. We were pointing out the flaw in that assumption...Can Michigan out-recruit OSU? Of course. It's been done.
Everyone wants Michigan to have a better coaching staff than OSU. You are arguing against no one if your argument is "We should want a better coaching staff than OSU."
The question, of course, is who that coaching staff would consist of.
December 18th, 2013 at 12:14 PM ^
Fair enough!
December 18th, 2013 at 11:56 AM ^
but when is the last Michigan roster that was truly more talented than its OSU counterpart? The loaded 1997 team had 24 players drafted between 1998-2002, OSU had 27 drafted in those same years (31 Michigan players went on to play in the NFL, but I couldn't easily find the same stat for OSU).
They've had 65 more drafted players since the inception of the NFL draft and the state is a high school powerhouse while Michigan is...not. If Michigan is going to beat OSU it will almost always have to overcome a talent advantage, and it has been that way for a very long time.
Edit: Don't mean to go down a road of despair or anything (and this isn't even a very good metric) but going by total draft picks we're further below OSU (-65) than we are above MSU (+44). Again, not the best metric, but there is a real talent disparity at play over many decades and this is one data point to look at.
December 18th, 2013 at 12:27 PM ^
But we have a massive recruiting advantage over MSU and OSU and Michigan have trended similarly in recruiting for probably the past 13-15 years, save perhaps 2010-11.
Again, does it come down to coaching? Has Michigan simply not developed its talent at the level MSU and OSU have? Sure, Rivals and Scout aren't the end all be all of evaluation, but in general aren't 4-stars more likely to perform at a higher level than 3-stars?
December 18th, 2013 at 4:57 PM ^
- 1999 7/9
- 2000 13/9
- 2001 11/11
- 2002 12/11
- 2003 12/10
- 2004 12/11
- 2005 8/13
- 2006 11/10
- 2007 11/10
- 2008 12/12
- 2009 8/13
- 2010 12/5
- 2011 10/8
- 2012 10/9
- 2013 10/8
total: 159/149
in the B12: 99/92
Until 2010 Brown had the edge in both categories
Outperformed, yes. "Far and away" is not a phrase I'd use to describe a difference of about half a game per season, especially since the gap only opened up in the last four years.
December 18th, 2013 at 6:39 PM ^
Oh Jesus.
Let's go through it, Mack Brown vs. Bob Stoops:
9-6 Head to Head
7-2 Conference Titles
1-1 NC, 4-2 appearances
9-4 BCS bowl bids
And Oklahoma did all that without being in a talent rich state.
By your standard, because we beat a bunch of bad teams under Lloyd Carr we were pretty much Ohio State's equal when they had Tressel, despite getting smashed 6-1 in the head to head match-up, them winning a NC and winning four conference titles to our two, them going to five BCS bowls and us going to three.
December 18th, 2013 at 8:22 PM ^
Texas and Oklahoma play basically the same conference schedule year after year. What small differences there are in a given year even out over time--that's why I included conference records. Against those identical schedules, Brown won two more games during the 1999-2009 span.
Stoops had slightly better top-end years, more and worse years at the bottom end, until 2010. It was 6-5 OU head-to-head at the time, which you might find convicing but I think is pretty obviously not statistically signficant. Since then there's been a clear difference between the programs, before that there wasn't. Since you only compare the top-end years, it looks like Stoops was better, and if that's your criterion I suppose he was. I think I acknowledged that in my post, too--I just objected to your exaggeration of the size of the difference, and still do.
The suggestion that Carr only beat bad teams doesn't stand up to the facts either, but I think there's probably no point documenting that again.
December 19th, 2013 at 7:52 AM ^
I was exaggerating the bad teams thing.
Teams like Michigan, Texas, Oklahoma, Ohio State, etc. should bottom out at 8 (maybe 7) wins. That is the baseline. These teams, theoretically (and its backed up by recruiting rankings) should have more talent than the vast majority of their schedule. So really, if you're an elite program you should be judged on how well you do after 8 wins. If we say that a truly successful season with a 13 game schedule is a 10 win season, Texas is 9-6 in the overlap and Oklahoma is 12-3.
You're judging Texas and Oklahoma from a MAC/Big Ten/SEC are the same standpoint. I'm judging them from a Top-20 programs of all-time standpoint. And when you look at it like that, the differences are substantial as the numbers show.
But yeah, if you want to just knock of the last 4 years because they were the last four years, ignore the fact that Mack Brown was already established for a year when Bob Stoops arrived to take over a 5-6 team and say that conference championships, BCS bowl bids, NC appearances and head to head record should mean as much as say beating Baylor (Not today's Baylor!), Iowa State and Kansas, then yeah there was no real difference between the two.
Tell you what: Let's just judge them from the 2005 season? That way Texas can be the best and your contrarian just for the sake of it shtick can earn you a win. Good job.
December 19th, 2013 at 10:44 AM ^
If you want to include Brown's first year, when he took over a 4-7 team and went 9-3 and won a Cotton Bowl, fine. I don't think it helps your argument much, it's a little better than taking over a 5-6 team and going 7-5 with an Independence Bowl loss. I wouldn't have mentioned it if you hadn't brought it up, but it looks like Brown had better success in the turnaround year.
I'd never done this before for Brown or Stoops, but sometimes (this came from an idea Brian threw out a few years back) I use the Massey database to see how coaches did against certain levels of teams. (Massey's good for this because the website's easy to use and the archive conveniently posts each opponent's end-of-season ranking next to each game.) I'm starting the post before I even run the numbers, to avoid any accusations that I've cherrypicked the study. I'll put it up regardless.
Let's get rid of old-time Baylor and Rice and the like, and just look at records against the top 10, the top 25, the top 50.
Mack Brown at Texas:
- vs. 1-10: 7-19 .269
- vs. 11-25: 26-13 .667
- vs. 26-50: 40-8 .833
Something clearly happened between 2009 and 2010--people around the Texas program called it the "Alabama Hangover". Through his first 12 years, Brown's records were:
- vs. 1-10: 7-14 .333
- vs. 11-25: 20-6 .769
- vs. 26-50: 32-4 .889
You can do the subtraction to see what the last four years look like; theyr'e pretty bad. Age happens. Lloyd Carr had the grace and the self-perception to step down when he felt his energy level dropping; not everyone does.
Bob Stoops at Oklahoma:
- vs. 1-10: 12-14 .462
- vs. 11-25: 28-14 .667
- vs. 26-50: 41-7 .854
Better against the top tier, worse against the next rung down until Brown's late-career decline brought them even. It's consistent with the basic theme I suppose--Brown's teams extraordinarily consistent; Stoops's teams have higher highs and lower lows. You prefer the latter; I get that.
For comparison, and since you brought hiim up, here's Lloyd Carr:
- vs. 1-10: 12-15 .444
- vs. 11-25: 15-11 .577
- vs. 26-50: 36-12 .750
And to establish a top end, Saban at Alabama:
- vs. 1-10: 9-9 .500
- vs. 11-25: 13-2 .867
- vs. 26-50: 17-2 .895
Interesting, isn't it? Saban, Stoops and Carr all had, to within statistical error, the same record against the top ten (and don't get me wrong, all three are quite exceptional in this regard. only the very greatest go .500 against the top ten). It's their performance against the next rung down that separates them.
December 18th, 2013 at 9:08 AM ^
At the end of the day games are not won on the recruiting trails but rather the in the weight room and on the practice field. Recruiting talent only gets you so far because you have to develop that talent. There are very few freshman who can come into college and make an impact right away. Even Tim Tebow played second fiddle to Chris Leak in 2006.
December 18th, 2013 at 9:16 AM ^
Does anyone see what Al Borges is doing?
We know his play calling is poor. But it's more than x's and o's. He is destroying the mental toughness and conpetitive spirit of these young football players. Al has no swagger; they have no swagger. Al is conflicted about strategy; they hesitate. Al is not a tough man; they lose tougness.
Watching the MGOBLUE clips, you sense these kids have a good attitude. You want to see them do well. They deserve a coach who gives them the opportunity to enjoy this once in a lifetime experience and do the best they are able.
Al lacks leadership; he is not living up to his responsibility. You might disagree, but try telling Eisenhower or Schembechler or Lombardi that leadership isn't critical.
We hear how players must compete to be on the field. This football season is a disappointment for alumni and fans, but it's worse for these kids who work so hard, risk injury and play their hearts out. Al borges is not doing his job at a competitive level. There is no reason for him to be anywhere near that field of honor.
Hoke and Mattison are winners. If they keep the weak link, he will drag everything down.
December 18th, 2013 at 9:22 AM ^
Did Mike DeBord have "swagger" in 1997? I don't remember that he did or that anyone who used the word "swagger" would have approved of that coaching staff. They were a pretty stoic, non-"swagger" bunch.
December 18th, 2013 at 9:45 AM ^
Mike DeBord was horrific. That team won in spite of him. And if we are going to win with Borges here, we will have to do it in spite of him too.
December 18th, 2013 at 9:55 AM ^
That wasn't the most talented bunch. DeBord did a good job that year.
December 18th, 2013 at 11:22 AM ^
NFL Drafted starters on the 1997 offense:
Brian Griese
Jeff Backus
Steve Hutchinson
Jon Jansen
Tai Streets
Chris Howard
Chris Floyd
Jerame Tuman
Plus we threw Woodson out there occasionally, as well as Anthony Thomas.
I'd say they were pretty talented.
December 18th, 2013 at 11:37 AM ^
In 1997 those guys were as follows:
Hutchinson - redshirt freshman
Backus - redshirt freshman
Jansen - redshirt junior - named All-American the next year
Chris Floyd & Chris Howard - very nice players but not great RBs by 1990s Michigan standards
Tuman - can't argue there
Griese - middling NFL career and not the most talented Michigan QB of the 1990s by a long shot
Anthony Thomas - true freshman
Tai Streets - Very nice player but not even second-team All Big Ten until the next year.
Were they talented? Of course. Would we have taken that team this year? Yes. But was that even close to the most talented Michigan offense of the decade? No way, not in a decade that saw Tom Brady, Drew Henson, Elvis Grbac, Tyrone Wheatley, Ricky Powers, Desmond Howard, Derrick Alexander, etc.
December 18th, 2013 at 11:54 AM ^
Having 8 starters drafted into the NFL is not lacking in talent. I'm sorry, but there's no argument there. Sure it might not have been the most talented offense of the decade (and it didn't perform that way either), but they had more than enough talent. DeBord didn't work some miracle, he probably got the average out of that team.
December 18th, 2013 at 11:57 AM ^
Was it a talented team? Sure. But was it particularly talented by 1990s Michigan standards? No, but they still scored almost 27 ppg. A good job by DeBord, as I said.
December 18th, 2013 at 6:42 PM ^
Right, but with you saying they "weren't the most talented", you make it sound like they lacked talent compared to their competition. They had more than enough talent to complement the excellent defense. They weren't some struggling group that only a coaching guru could have coached up to have a good season.
I do get what you are saying though. Debord was fine that year, but guys who have 8 NFL guys on their roster usually do okay.
December 18th, 2013 at 9:47 AM ^
Leadership is the key. Don't you see?
Rather than arbitrarily pick one word, how would you respond to the central point? Do you think Bo would approve of Al's leadership characteristics? I didn't like Al's latest comments about "execution", surreptitiously blaming the players, rather than taking responsibility.
You have a right to extend your affection towards Al. I have a right to speak up about a coach's responsibility to the football players.
December 18th, 2013 at 9:55 AM ^
They don't have to be great leaders. That's a head coach's job...And mentioning execution is a lack of leadership only in the eyes of posters on this blog. It's standard coach-speak....I'm not sold on Borges, btw, but saying he's failing the team because of boilerplate things he says in press conferences is a bit much.
December 18th, 2013 at 10:04 AM ^
December 18th, 2013 at 11:29 AM ^
Meanwhile, you jump to the conclusion that he should keep his job as the 3rd highest paid coordinator in the country because you think his playcalls are logical, which is something that I'm sure could be said about nearly every single coordinator in the country.
And so it goes.
December 18th, 2013 at 11:08 AM ^
but the seniors on that team came in following an 8-4 season. It is a wonder anyone has ever chosen Michigan as their school of choice.
As usual, I am thankful that most of the recruits along with their parents, advisors and coaches, have more sense than many of the fans.
December 18th, 2013 at 9:25 AM ^
Dave Brandon wants to win. Brady Hoke wants to win. There are no easy answers. Of course they are going to do their best to recruit even when they're losing. Should they only recruit three-star guys until they win ten games (putting aside the fact that they won eleven just two years ago)?
This is really just a "Fire Borges" post, yes? Or maybe a "Fire Hoke" post?
December 18th, 2013 at 9:29 AM ^
that just make me want to puke. Move along - nothing to see/read here.
December 18th, 2013 at 9:30 AM ^
While everyone who has ever visited this board agrees that we want to see Michigan win10+ games every year and be up there with Alabama (duh!), I'm confused by one of your points.
You seem to be saying that really good players shouldn't be recruited unless we're really good. Yet, without really good players, we probably won't get to the point where we're really good, so we'll never be able to recruit them, therefore we'll never be really good? Sounds chicken and eggish to me.
Regardless of stars, the recruits we are getting seem to ALL have good character and be very good students. I'll take that all day, and give the coaches credit for identifying that kind of kid to target. It remains to be seen if they'll produce on the field.
December 18th, 2013 at 9:32 AM ^
December 18th, 2013 at 9:38 AM ^
December 18th, 2013 at 9:47 AM ^
Has McDowell committed somewhere? And how does 2 guys from 2014 and 1 guy from 2015 constitute a "trio". How does losing one guy mean that we are going to lose out on all three? This part of the post makes no sense to me.
The rest is obvious. Winning helps recruiting. Everyone knows that. The bottom line is that it is hard to win with a team of mostly freshman and sophmores. When we have stronger Senior and Junior classes, numbers wise, we will win more games. In the meantime, we have to weather losing some recruting battles.
December 18th, 2013 at 9:52 AM ^
Winners overcome obstacles to achieve their goals.
Hoke has a winning attitude.
Mattison is a proven winner.
Let's see, am I forgetting anyone?
December 18th, 2013 at 10:03 AM ^
December 18th, 2013 at 10:08 AM ^
December 18th, 2013 at 10:52 AM ^
December 18th, 2013 at 11:46 AM ^
Fire Borges.
December 18th, 2013 at 5:30 PM ^
December 18th, 2013 at 5:57 PM ^
He's also talked about the three ways an offensive play fails. 1) the play call was bad; 2) the execution was lacking; 3) an exceptional play by one or more defensive players. As I recall, he accepted sole responsibility for 1 and much responsibility for 2 as well. I get that people want Borges fired, but why is there such a felt need to just make shit up in order to support that desire?
December 18th, 2013 at 9:58 AM ^
December 18th, 2013 at 10:12 AM ^