WSJ article by Jason Gay on Schlissel's
remarks about collegiate athletics. Not sure he will help our cause to get a new AD quickly or replace Hoke. This may embolden Schlissel to sit tight and give Hackett and Hoke at least another year.
http://online.wsj.com/articles/when-colleges-tell-the-truth-1415856063
November 13th, 2014 at 11:52 AM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 12:22 PM ^
He's never won a conference title anywhere. In year four, we are still looking for an elite-level road win. If he was anything more than above average, we would have seen it by now.
November 13th, 2014 at 1:49 PM ^
Correction: We're still looking for a road win over a team with a winning record in the regular season.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:38 AM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 11:44 AM ^
I sorta miss THE PARTY ROOM and Ghost of whatever today has to offer. They kept it lively.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:50 AM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 12:04 PM ^
Hoke is a bad coach. The defense really is not that good and the OL is still subpar. Whatever improvements are minimal.
This program has immense potential and it's being squandered by people who are content with mediocrity.
Whatever happened to being the "leaders and best"?
November 13th, 2014 at 1:07 PM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 11:38 AM ^
for coaching pay. So correcting your statement, we have a "steady hand that is not a big-name ... football coach" that is big-money.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:47 AM ^
I meant that I think Schlissel's new coach will not be a big-name coach, but rather another steady-hand type of coach. In particular, I feel that everyone is assuming that we will have some type of Messiah moment where Harbaugh, Miles, Mullen or some other famous coach will ride in and save the day, but based on the tendencies that I'm seeing in Schlissel and his aversion to big-time athletics, I think some of you may be disappointed with who he (or his new AD) ends up choosing.
I don't disagree that our current head coach, Hoke, is highly paid.
November 13th, 2014 at 12:13 PM ^
I just don't buy the "aversion to big-time college athletics" argument. Schlissel has come in and said the things that a U of M president needs to say with regard to the academic/atheletic balance. But none of his statements make me think that he somehow wants to shrink athletics. Can you point to his exact language that makes you think this is so? Considering that Michigan is about as "big-time athletics" of a school as you can get (see our Presidents Cup results), I don't think any President would fail to see the importance of athletics, espeically football, to the overall University's mission. It's perhaps the most visible part of the University, and it absolutely affects academics.
Schlissel's a pretty smart guy, and I think he gets all this. Which is why I don't expect him to minimize the importance of football success and finding a proven AD and head coach.
November 13th, 2014 at 12:33 PM ^
I'm worried that I don't see that much of an imbalance. Its not like we are Ohio State under Cooper. IIRC he had a player with a 0.something at one point. Brady does have his kids graduating.
I want the players to come, study, and graduate. I want them to be good citizens off the field. I remember passing Wheatley a couple times a week in the spring. He was a great guy you could always talk to, not that I did very often. Could some of them be cocky? Heck yeah. I also met some engine students that were cocky.
I do want to make sure the Gibbons incident never happens again. But I thought there was more to that then just the athletic department.
Now I've been off of the campus almost 20 years, so maybe things have changed, but it doesn't seem like it we are in a position where we need an overhaul, and that is the vibe im getting.
November 13th, 2014 at 12:09 PM ^
Above average? I guess by the slimmest of margins his career W/L is above .500 but he is in the top 5 for compensation. Is that how you'd select your employees? Pick one that is barely above average and pay them top dollar?
He's been in charge for 4 years....he HAS his key recruits already and he has so far failed to develop any of them. Especially at QB - either inherited or recruited.
Steady hand of mediocrity is not what I want....I hope the President agrees with me.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:33 AM ^
that the fanbase can become more apathetic.
The people that want Hoke back I guess are eager to find out.
November 13th, 2014 at 12:06 PM ^
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November 13th, 2014 at 12:00 PM ^
I could never stop watching Michigan football or find another team to root for. But I would see a long-term Hoke extension as a sign that mediocrity has been accepted, and I would work to reduce my emotional investment. I know, that sounds mealy-mouthed, like how does one even do that? Basically I just mean I would become a "strictly game day" fan. I would still watch every game and root for Michigan every time. But the following recruiting, following blogs, endeavouring to learn about players, schemes, position groups, that would likely all be left behind. I'd still hate OSU and MSU, but it would just be an annual week apiece instead of all year. If that's "fair weather fandom" to some, downvote away. I don't believe it is. It's not changing allegiances or tuning out or rooting for failure so someone gets fired, it's simply adjusting for expectations. I'd still read a season preview so that when game day comes I know the who, what, where, and when, I'd just no longer care enough to know the how or the why.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:23 AM ^
I can't see Hoke coming back next year, especially without Dave Brandon at the helm. I hope that I am right. If they bring Hoke back, they will need to extend him because he will be in the last year of that contract and what will it do for recruting, with another bad year and a coach flapping in the breeze. No one respects Hoke's coaching abilities. He never was a coordinator and is not much more than a glorified DL coach who is about .500 as a HC, mostly in low level conferences. He was hired to be Dave Brandon's lackey.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:31 AM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 11:35 AM ^
Brady Hoke must go and he must go ASAP. Any delay only prolongs the misery. It makes no sense to keep him.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:46 AM ^
And I am going to say it to you.
In with the butterflies, out with the bees. You getting pissy about it on the internet certainly isn't going to change shit so stop trying to change the opinions of people that disagree with you.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:51 AM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 12:03 PM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 12:03 PM ^
Just like nothing this site had to say about DB changed his mind?
November 13th, 2014 at 12:08 PM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 12:32 PM ^
Really? So you think Santa is not real? You braodcast that? OMG!
November 13th, 2014 at 11:49 AM ^
As an alum, ew.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:59 AM ^
Nice post, Gameboy
Sincerely,
A Fellow Fan
November 13th, 2014 at 12:01 PM ^
You don't build a mecca to football if being at the top of your field isn't foremost on your mind. If they don't want athletics to be important, they've been going about it all wrong for close to 200 years now. Could have saved us all a lot of money, time and effort.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:32 AM ^
“It’s no longer about education,” Snyder continued. “We’ve sold out to the cameras over there, and TV has made its way, and I don’t fault TV. I don’t fault whoever broadcasts games. They have to make a living and that’s what they do, but athletics—that’s it. It’s sold out.”
The quote from Bill Snyder was interesting too really - I believe someone posted the article in which he said this back in August, but didn't get a lot of play on the blog. I mean, he's caught up in it during the season, of course, but this is an interesting observation from someone who currently coaches a team.
I will say, however, that I do agree with the idea that the athletic department at Michigan grew increasingly disconnected from the university - the "diminishing connectedness", as it was termed. Michigan could, with its resources, easily achieve excellence on the field and in the classroom together and I don't think Schlissel has really said otherwise, but athletics and academics should ideally be on the same page with the school's mission as much as possible, in my own opinion.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:35 AM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 11:49 AM ^
It's so sad to see some of the fanbase slowly burp and yawn its way into thinking that keeping Hoke around next year makes sense. The signs that he he might be righting the ship are (a) finally pulling away in the second half from an Indiana team with a fourth-string QB, at home and (b) beating a terrible Northwestern team on a last-second failed two-point conversion. Nobody in America was suggesting Hoke should be retained after the MSU game. The only things that have changed since then are the aforementioned events, which in any other year would be considered failures, not signs of light.
WE GOT BLOWN OUT AT HOME BY MINNESOTA SIX WEEKS AGO CAN YOU REMEMBER THAT FAR BACK
It's not your fault, Michigan fan. There was a time when it wasn't this way. We can find that time again.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:51 AM ^
He also won a BCS bowl. Yes, maybe he overachieved that year, but I also think he is underachieving this year. If the trend went the other way, i.e., if we flipped the years and the team was improving every year, then I think everyone would be on the Hoke bandwagon. The fact is, he would have the same statistics, but a positive trend and I think people are letting our current negative trend weigh too heavily on their view of Hoke and the team.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:55 AM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 10:51 PM ^
Yes
He's overachieving in underachieving.
November 13th, 2014 at 11:56 AM ^
A fair judgment of Hoke is by his performance over a period of years. We can do that and he has failed.
Your "what if" us irrelevant because it did not happen that way.
November 13th, 2014 at 12:28 PM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 12:34 PM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 1:40 PM ^
I wasn't sure the ninth time he said it, but the tenth has about convinced me. I do hope he repeats himself every time someone has an opion that varies in the slightest.
November 13th, 2014 at 2:08 PM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 12:39 PM ^
You have made your opinion known in writing eight (8) times on this OP. I get it.
What is your end of the day point about that?
BTW, I am not posting for or against the OP, but I just find your vigor in beating the keyboard on the issue amusing.
Eight (8) fucking times!
November 13th, 2014 at 11:58 AM ^
Yes, he won a BCS bowl by the skin of his teeth, in a year that OSU had a melt down thanks to tattoo-gate and MSU had it's one bad year in the last 6. Those conditions will not be replicated.
Sorry, but this argument makes no sense whatsoever...he was a career .500 coach and has a very negative trend going here despite massively fantastic recruiting hauls.
There is ZERO evidence he could right the ship even if you gave him 10 years!!
November 13th, 2014 at 12:00 PM ^
Huh? Four years ago, Brennan Boesch hit .283 with 16 homers, so why isn't he the starting left fielder for the TIgers this spring?
Oh, because that happened four years ago.
November 13th, 2014 at 12:33 PM ^
He took someone else's team, had two defensive TDs make a win over a pedestrian WMU team look a lot bigger than it was, got an improbable heroball comeback from Denard to beat Notre Dame, gave up 200 yards rushing and had a game at halftime before pulling away in the second half against EMU, won handily over a SDSU team he was coaching nine months prior, scored convincing wins over middling-to-bad B1G foes Minnesota, Northwestern, Purdue, and Illinois, interspersed with a manhandling in East Lansing and a terribly coached offensive effort in Iowa City, caught lightning in a bottle, helped by turnovers and special teams mishaps, for one game against Nebraska, won by six against an Ohio State team that was the worst in several years and was led by an interim coach and freshman QB, avoided B1G Champ Wisconsin, backed into a Sugar Bowl bid thanks to the fact that one of the two participants in the B1G Championship Game inevitably has to lose, then proceeded to win that game in freak fashion despite being outgained by a 2-1 margin. And from that "summit" it's been downhill since.
November 13th, 2014 at 12:41 PM ^
Sure, he's had close wins, but also close losses. My point is that even with the same win-loss record, if the trend was reversed, you would be singing a different tune.
November 13th, 2014 at 12:46 PM ^
If I was born in Moscow I'd be Russian. But I was born in Michigan, so I'm not.
The trend isn't reversed, though. Hoke's teams have regressed, not improved. If he wasn't losing, he'd be winning. Well, no shit. But he's losing.
November 13th, 2014 at 12:48 PM ^
November 13th, 2014 at 1:01 PM ^
People are fired from their jobs for deteriorating performance. Obviously if Hoke's program had gotten better each year, not worse, we would not be talking about firing him.
You can't just hold up the total won-loss record as evidence for retaining Hoke without recognizing the team's consistent downturn the last three seasons.
November 14th, 2014 at 1:44 AM ^
Yeah, and if I were Tom Brady I'd be doing unmentionable things with Gisele Bundchen. Or what if there were no JFK assassination? All interesting speculation but it doesn't change the reality of the situation. Just like your "what if" scenario doesn't alter the reality that Hoke is not an elite coach and his lack of skills or whatever it is results in teams that are unprepared to play in one way or another.
November 13th, 2014 at 12:48 PM ^
How did that work out for ND?
Still no elite-level road wins in year four. About to be 0-5 in red letter games, in the last five. Blown out by MSU two years in a row(let's not forget about the stake incident and apology). Worst loss in history against ND. Morris incident, the aware, but not fully aware etc...