96goblue00

March 8th, 2012 at 5:34 PM ^

Your defense was a disaster and getting worse year by year......and you offense, while good against weaker competition, had mixed results against decent to good competition. Need I remind you of our performance against Miss State in the bowl?

"I thought our time was coming"

If  you mean your time was coming for another mediocre season then you're right.

Cake?....not really, more like a messy pie

IncognitoWolverino

March 8th, 2012 at 5:37 PM ^

To alter RichRod's metaphor, he had put a beautiful offensive cake into the oven, neglecting to remove a disgusting stuffed gopher from the top of the yet-to-be-baked cake, representing the defense.

Hoke, Borges and Mattison came in, cleaned the disgusting gerg-flavored gopher off the top, fixed up the cake, put the hybrid frosting on the cake and then topped it off with (a) sugar (bowl win).

It was a delicious season.

Maizenblueball

March 8th, 2012 at 8:13 PM ^

My sentiments exactly.  RR is delusional to think that all the ingredients were there.  There were a few turds in the "ingredients", and a few of the "chefs" were more like meth-smoking busboys from Applebees.

 I supported RR entirely while he was here, until it became clear that the Defense was getting worse, the team looked out of place and not lined up properly on many plays, and appeared to be giving up on him against Miss. State.  After that EMBARRASSING bowl performance, RR had to go.  I do wish RR the best at AZ, unless he ever plays us.  All the ingredients RR?...I think not.  Hoke is changing up the recipe, and I can't wait!

VermontMichiganFan

March 8th, 2012 at 6:05 PM ^

Yes the defense was garbage- and there were many issues and very underwhelming results- but the team that won a BCS bowl was mostly his guys.  I think it's fair to say he had a big part in that.  His system and his coaching strategies (particularly his defense) did not maximize the talent he had- but he pulled in lotsof the talent that won a BCS bowl game.

It's fair for him to be bitter and upset- I think the RR bashing gets too carried away- if he did as bad a job as many people try to claim then how could a team he mostly built be a succesful team right away? 

96goblue00

March 8th, 2012 at 6:49 PM ^

some of the most important pieces along the defensive and offensive lines were recruited by Carr: Martin, Molk, RVB. You are forgetting about the 5th years and seniors on this team. I'll give him Fitz and Denard but make no mistake, I am willing to bet $$$ that we would not have gone 11-1 with a win in the Sugar under RR's regime, no sireeee Bob.

BigBlue02

March 8th, 2012 at 7:23 PM ^

Don't you think it's strange you keep mentioning only Molk, Martin, and RVB as the impactful seniors and 5th year seniors? Why don't you talk about all the other seniors and 5th year seniors Carr recruited that had an impact last year. Oh, I know why you can't, because we had an unusually small number of seniors on the team.

Wolverman

March 8th, 2012 at 10:10 PM ^

- if he did as bad a job as many people try to claim then how could a team he mostly built be a succesful team right away?

 

 um i don't know maybe better coaching of the players would be my guess. Recruting is a small portion of a great staff and RR recruiting was mediocre, nothing special.

 it wasn't just the almost impossible turn around on defense but, also on special teams.

Sopwith

March 8th, 2012 at 9:18 PM ^

and no one has yet provided an answer.  So I'll ask again on this thread---

Can anyone name a team that has ever had no statistical drop-off on offense when they go from playing bad defenses to playing good defenses?  It can be in any era of college football.  Actually, it can be pro, or high school, or a video game.  And it can be any team sport with measurable offensive statistics.  Seriously, someone even anecdotally please come up with one.  Otherwise, this idiotic argument about "our offense didn't perform as well against better defenses" meme should stay buried with the dead horse that is all RR related threads.

BigBlue02

March 8th, 2012 at 5:51 PM ^

It's basically the same quote he said on air months ago (it might even be the exact quote and espn just took it and put it in the story). We had a long thread that will go exactly like this one. People defending him because they saw the same things RichRod did. Other people stating the "fact" that his opinion is wrong and Michigan would have still been mediocre. This isn't really an amazing discovery. He recruited everyone on this year's team and we were bringing back plenty of talent and 20 starters. Whether he would have won 11 games is up for debate, but saying he thinks his team would get better returning 20 starters isn't far fetched. "Breaking news: Coach thinks he could have won with a team of all of his recruits. News at 11."

BigBlue02

March 8th, 2012 at 6:41 PM ^

This is not entirely true. Mike Martin signed his LOI to play for RichRod. Although you are kind of making his point for him. How many college football players can say they played for 3 different head coaches (not counting interim coaches)?

born1ntheArbor

March 9th, 2012 at 8:23 AM ^

Yes, but not all 22 players would necessarily be called "playmakers". Remember when Molk didn't play in the opening of the Sugar Bowl? That didn't go so well. There's a reason we had Van Bergen on the field playing with a Lisfranc ligament sprain instead of pulling him out. There was a reason Mike Martin was the one played more than normal when there wasn't enough depth due to injuries. Junior Hemingway was the game MVP because he was able to catch the two TD passes.  I'm not saying that the rest of the team consisted of young children who couldn't differentiate between a football and a slice of cake. What I am saying is that these were impact players and they really stood out.

unWavering

March 8th, 2012 at 5:32 PM ^

Sorry, I don't buy this RR.  I think 2011 would have been his best year yet, but there's no way that our defense was going to even be respectable.  I understand his point of view, and he's partially correct, but I think Hoke has done a better job than he would have if he were still here.

jtmc33

March 8th, 2012 at 5:34 PM ^

Offense:  "It's like you made a cake from scratch and put it inthe oven.  Someone else is putting the icing on and eating it."

Defense:  "It's like you made a cake with help from a monkey, only using chop-sticks, and while wearing mittens.  Then someone else has to come into the kitchen and clean up your f'ing mess"