Smart Football on Harbaugh (Solid Verbal podcast)
The whole thing is worth listening to. The bit on Harbaugh starts 47 minutes in and lasts for about 4-5 minutes.
LINK (embed is below)
A summary:
- He thinks that it's going to work there but not "a quick fix"
- Harbaugh's offense is "Bo Schembechler football with Jon Gruden's playbook."
- Harbaugh learned a lot of offense from Bill Callahan while a QC guy at the Raiders
- He thinks that Harbaugh will delegate the details of his offense to his OC, but he thinks wrongly that Jedd Fisch will be the OC (he's pretty down on Fisch)
- So the offense probably won't look exactly the way it did at Stanford.
The other thing that's interesting from this blog's readership's perspective is that Chris Brown also talks about offensive styles and systems, and he points out that whether you're an up-tempo spread team or a traditional power team, "it all works." He does suggest that offenses get in trouble if they don't commit to an offensive identity and philosophy (something that set off alarm bells in my head). He suggested that it's fine to have a preference -- coaches obviously do -- but that you need to stick to that preference and have an identity. Ultimatley however, all systems go about putting pressure on defenses, but using different methods. That discussion begins at the 40 minute mark.
April 17th, 2015 at 12:10 AM ^
Tired of the won't happen right away talk. Every expert thinks we'll only win 7 games. I don't think talent is the problem judging by the fact that we pushed the Buckeyes DL down the field for 28 points and comments about Lawrence Marshall not knowing how to line up from Durkin when he first got there. I don't think we'll go 15-0 or anything but we should win 8-9 games this year and be back in the double digit win column next year. If there's one thing Hoke did well, it's recruit. We have way better athletes than Jim encountered at the start of his Stanford job.
April 17th, 2015 at 12:15 AM ^
He's worried about the same thing we all are: the QB position. The positive take here is that JH's forte is improving play at that position. On the other hand, Harbaugh won't have as much time with them as he had with Alex Smith in the NFL. But Rudock helps a lot here: there are almost always growing pains with first year starters.
I don't think there is crazy potenial on offense. There's potential for it to be average, and that's about it. We don't have the skill position players to light up the scoreboard and become a great offense. I think we'll actually be a really frustrating offense most of the season. Lots of stalled drives and three and outs. Since we don't have the game breakers on offense to stretch a defense, we should be a pretty easy offense to contain. Best case scenario, the offense becomes average, doesn't turn the ball over, can grind out some yards on the ground and we win a lot of 20-14 type games.
April 18th, 2015 at 10:32 AM ^
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April 17th, 2015 at 10:27 AM ^
Hoke's tenure is going to be a problem for several years into the future. As time goes on, his hire looks worse and worse. A nice guy who was in way over his head.
We all assume that his recruiting was good because of the ranking of the recruiting classes and the number of stars given to many of his recruits. I think it is becoming obvious that many of the recruits will not have the careers we imagined for them, in part due to the coaching they received and partially because some may not be as talented as we thought. The lack of talent in the skill positions on the offense is going to be a daunting challenge. Hopefully Isaac will be able to strut his stuff along with Drake Johnson. Our WR situation is scary. Hopefully, Harbaugh will be able to overcome some of these shortfalls with a creative scheme, but there is no easy short term fix for the holes that need to be filled. Go defense.
April 17th, 2015 at 12:20 AM ^
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April 17th, 2015 at 12:25 AM ^
I don' t know why he thinks it's Fisch. I think he reads Brian's stuff on MGoBlog, so I'm not sure what's going on there. Evidently he's not following Michigan football super carefully.
April 17th, 2015 at 12:53 AM ^
I'm assuming it's because Fisch is the "Passing Game Coordinator."
April 17th, 2015 at 12:02 PM ^
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April 17th, 2015 at 12:03 PM ^
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I was listening to this the other day and had to laugh when he said that the offense at Stanford wasn't Harbaugh's and the offense in San Fran wasn't Harbaugh's and that the offense at Michigan wasn't gonna be Harbaugh's it was gonna be Fisch's.
Brown knows schemes for sure, but he's not paying much attention to the coaching staffs themselves, apparently.
The biggest one is the "Bo with Jon Gruden's playbook". Harbaugh doesn't have a small playbook, but his playbook is not huge. He was certainly influenced by Bill Callahan in that he runs a true West Coast passing offense very similar to Callahan's. But he really took the core of those concepts and works with them, it isn't nearly as expansive as what Callahan ran in Oakland or at Nebraska. Even Harbaugh's run playbook will likely be trimmed a bit, but the passing portion won't be anywhere near the Gruden/Callahan size.
Now, if he means it's "Bo football with a Jon Gruden playbook" as far as "he wants to be a run first football team, power football team, like Bo, but his base schemes are very much from the Jon Gruden/Bill Callahan tree" then I can agree with that.
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April 17th, 2015 at 10:28 AM ^
Here's his site (LINK). It's smart because he's really great at breaking down and explaining football concepts. There's a lot of reference to him on MGoBlog (see, e.g., here) so I figured people knew who he was.
April 17th, 2015 at 12:27 PM ^
Real name Chris Brown. His website along with a couple of great posters here have been really helpful in understanding football offenses, particularly spread concepts.
If you listen to the rest of the podcast he doesn't particularly go into depth on any team's personnel, he is focused more on the coaches. You can throw the baby out with the bathwater if you want, but he's a really intelligent football analyst.
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April 19th, 2015 at 12:25 PM ^
Funny how people feel the need to defend him. It's rare that any "expert" has any better insight or information about MICHIGAN FOOTBALL than found around here all the time.
He doesn't know more about what MICHIGAN will likely run under Harbaugh in season one than we do. It might be "Bo" or might be "Bo with West Coast influences" but one certainty is that it will be an offense designed around the talent and strengths of the roster ...not just a "scheme."
Drevno in his own words back in January ...referring to he and Harbaugh on the Offense -
"And then we go teach it. ... I'll run (the offense), but he'll be in there and he'll help, he's part of it," Drevno said. "You have to use his expertise, he's a very good football coach and he was an outstanding football player. We'll work together."