Will Hagerup Interview
The link below is to an MLive article about Will Hagerup and what he has been doing to get himself back on track. It sounds promising and I hope he succeeds.He even spent time working in a steel factory and said he's learned to appreciate what he has.
I thought an important part of the article was the support he has from the entire athletic department. After his suspension, he had to go through weekly meetings with Brady Hoke, Dave Brandon and of course Greg Harden. He said all of these meetings including with Dave Brandon continue to this day. Some of the meetings with Brandon last 3 hours. This is a tremendous committment to turn one young man's life around.
I don't agree with everything Brandon does. You have to give him credit here. I think few people would expect the athletic direcor to take that much time out of his week for one player.
As I said before, I hope Will has learned his lesson and uses these tremendous resources he has to his advantage.
The Detroit NEWS has a similar article on Hagerup worth looking at. (Posting this as a reply to get it next to the video and original link.)
Good luck to Hagerup going forward!
we won that game. Otherwise this wouldn't be nearly as funny.
"And the biggest thing was that I came back so incredibly ready to take on this final opportunity and to embrace what Michigan is, and I don't think I quite appreciated it before. There are guys who worked there for 30 years, and would be there another 10. And I had an opportunity to go back to the best school in the country." - from the article
I always knew he went back to Wisconsin, but I didn't know about the steel mill - I found that very interesting. I would guess that the contrast between that sort of difficult work and being a scholarship athlete on a major Division I football team would give you the perspective he was discussing, and from the sound of what is quoted above, it seems to have sunk in. Glad to see him back and ready to be part of the team.
I bet the guys at the mill gave him the Good "Will" Hunting speech.
I thought your comment was funny, FWIW. Almost a Life of Pi situation for the DB haters out there. But the 3 hour thing jumped out at me, too.
It's hard to see from the outside why Michigan's Athletic Director is devoting so much time to a player discipline problem? (Although Mark Hollis is able to make time to advise our players on whether to leave the basketball program early, so maybe these guys have more time than I would guess.)
I understand that Hagerup is presumably benefitting from this, but it seems that with only so much time in a week this is an awful lot of time for DB to be spending on one player. It just doesn't seem to fall squarely in my understanding of an AD's job description. On one hand, it's nice to see DB make the time commitment. On the other hand, it seems we have some well-regarded people who have the job of advising student athletes (e.g., Harden).
that maybe Will and DB have become friends? Like an evolved mentor-type relationship? Stranger things have happened and you never know how it starts out and what it turns into over time.
That's why I couched my comment in terms of "from the outside". There are several explanations that could make this seem less counterintuitive. And I don't pretend to know the full circumstances of their meetings.
But based on what we know, and the number of staff and students DB is charged with overseeing, it still seems like a misallocation of resources to me.
I just hate it when educators or administrators mentor students. What kind of place are they running over there? We need to keep an eye on this, next thing we know, he'll be inviting them over for pizza.
First thing I thought of when I saw that was: that poor bastard. Stadium steps at 6 am is one thing, but three hours at a time with Brandon?
This doesn't even sound plausible, if you ask me.
And David Brandon taking time out each week to meet with Hagerup shows that maybe he's interested in a little bit more than squeezing every last dime outta the Block M.
Good for him.
Hopefully he has balls of steel now.
Maybe Brandon is encouraging Will to take up sky writing. Hope Will turns things around.
*crickets*