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Hell yisssss

Hell yisssss

Dug McDaniel?

Dug McDaniel?

I dont think Nick Saban is a…

I dont think Nick Saban is a bad actor and I think his perspective has merit.

However, anybody who has made tens of millions over the last 40 years of college football should take a backseat.

NIL was a convenient legal…

NIL was a convenient legal argument and was always a temporary state of affairs until the next court case.  Honestly, it's such a nebulous concept that it was never going to be the state of affairs at any point.  It doesn't matter what NIL is or isn't.

 

And schools and collectives exist on a market.

All I'm saying is that I'm…

All I'm saying is that I'm both 2018 and 2024, Michigan doesn't have the horses to put guys on an island against at least 3 of the teams they will face this year.

If Martindale tries to call this defense like he has his NFL defenses, it will probably go poorly.  If he can adopt the various zone strategies of his predecessor, the defense will probably be up to taking on any opponent this year.

Your non WJ choices for…

Your non WJ choices for cornerback are DJ Waller, Jaden McBurrows, Jyaire Hill, and Myles Pollard.  Take the best one out of that list and compare him to a RSSr who was on an active NFL roster the next three years.

And there is roughly zero chance Moore and Stewart are better than Gary and Chase.  Chase was an All American and Gary was the 12th pick in the draft that year.  And their backups with Josh Uche and Kwity Paye.

I'd call pass rush and pass coverage a wash between the two teams.

Fwiw, Oregon has Dillon…

Fwiw, Oregon has Dillon Gabriel, who was 1st team all big 12 at Oklahoma last year.

And he had two horrible…

And he had two horrible seasons defensively at his last stop and played a major part in the culture collapse on that team last season.

His record is mixed.

Man, c'mon.  I was…

Man, c'mon.  I was responding specifically to point 3.

To recap:

You:  Michigan will run more 0 and cover 1 this year and it will be fine because the problem when Brown ran it was personnel.

Me:  Brown had a defense full of draft picks including the best secondary in the conference, so the problem wasn't personnel.

You:  Where do these assholes get the idea that Michigan will be a cover 0 team?!

To clarify:

I never said what coverages Michigan would be running.  You said that they would be running more of those man coverages.  I am simply pointing out that Martindale doesn't actually have better personnel to run that than Brown.  Brandon Watson was actually a pretty solid player and DJ Waller or whoever Martindale tries to put in man coverage will be far worse.

And frankly, it sounds to me like you are saying "Martindale isn't going to run a base cover 1 defense, he is going to run a defense unlike what he has run for most of his career as a defensive coordinator."

That isn't exactly all that comforting.

 

 

Man.  Winovich, Gary, Uche,…

Man.  Winovich, Gary, Uche, Paye, Mone, Kemp, and an early Aiden Hutchinson.

On point 3:  When Michigan…

On point 3:  When Michigan got shredded for 62, Brown had two 1st team all big ten corners in Hill and Long at corner with a RS Sr Watson (who would end up making it to an NFL active roster for a moment) as his third CB.  He had a soph 4.5* Ambry Thomas as his 4th CB.  His starting safeties were future NFL starter Josh Metellus and 5th year captain Tyree Kinnel.

 

There is an easy argument that the talent that got torched under Brown was every bit as good as what Martindale will have next year.

Eventually won out?  Miss St…

Eventually won out?  Miss St was up by 3 TDs at half and won 45-6.

I don't particularly

I don't particularly disagree, just think you are overstating it.  Yes, Beilein is good at identifying kids who can immediately come in and provide non-disaster minutes.

Out of those late adds, excluding Caris, only MAAR started on a tournament team, and he had the tenth highest efficiency and usage rate on a team that was in a play-in game.  I also don't know yet whether any of those players are going to produce beyond their limitations.

Did Beilein correctly identify diamonds in the rough, or did most staffs at schools of Michigan's resources and regard correctly manage their roster so that they didn't need to use up a multi-year roster spot on guys like Dawkins and Spike.

There is, obviously, another

There is, obviously, another way to look at this.

Caris Levert is a huge success story.  No need to debate that.

On the other hand, Dawkins, MAAR, and Spike as underclassmen all had the kinda same profile:

1)  Older players - two were from prep programs, and the other was literally the oldest he could be and still be in his graduating class - and already very developed for their class.

2)  Thrust into larger than optimal roles on mediocre teams because of a badly mismanaged roster.  Spike, for all his dramatics and NCG performance, was below average efficiency and scoring 2.6 PPG before being forced to become the leader of the team his junior year when he was far more suited to a bench/role player spot.

3)  Generally lowly recruited because of being very limited players.  So far moments of appearing to rise above those limitations have not come to fruition.

LOL.  "Athletes don't think

LOL.  "Athletes don't think like that".  Glad you are there to clarify how all athletes think.

And they all would have to sit out a year and waste half of that eligibility.

First off, the vast majority

First off, the vast majority of Alabama's medical hardship guys did not publicly dispute them.  It was still assumed that when Alabama was oversigned come signing day and non-contributors started dropping, that it was processing.  People are just applying the same standard of doubt.

Second, you say Michigan isn't Alabama until they are publicly disputed, then you (very oddly) dismiss the guy who publicly disputed his medical hardship from Michigan.

They are going into their

They are going into their senior year at Michigan, would likely transfer to a less prestigious academic school, and they would have to sit out a year.

If given a choice of staying at Michigan and not playing or attempting to find playing time elsewhere, they very likely made a wise decision.

LOL
1)  Those quotes pretty

LOL

1)  Those quotes pretty definitively settle the discussion:  It was Beilein that pushed Max out the door, not the other way around.

2)  Beilein pushing him out the door in order to get Wilson, Wagner, and Doyle - all who were ineffectual and played extremely limited minutes anyways - is not a good argument for Beilein's coaching ability.

Are you arguing with him or just agreeing in an insulting manner.

It would matter as Michigan

It would matter as Michigan is currently a few scholarships over the limit.

You should break that down a

You should break that down a little bit.

The four games he missed they were 3-1 with a loss at Iowa.

The four games you are talking about that he was in the roster, they were 1-3 with losses to Iowa, Nebraska, and Wisconsin and a win against Maryland.  In those games he averaged 20pts, 8reb, and 6assts.

So basically, the games you picked actually support the idea that having your best guy playing at a high level necessarily makes a big difference.

Two points:
1)  One mid first

Two points:

1)  One mid first round pick on the roster and a bunch of guys that aren't even sniffing the draft is pretty weak "NBA talent".  Its made even worse that that one guy is the last remnants of the 2012 class and none of the classes since look to have NBA players in them.

2)  I would bet that the people who are saying that Beilein must recruit better and get NBA talent aren't that satisfied by 8/9 seed, injury-free, best case scenarios.

 

This team kinda looked like a

This team kinda looked like a bubble team when Caris was on the floor for the first 14 games.  Let's quantify some things:

I think with Levert, Michigan would probably be 22-9 and likely a middling eight seed with very little chance of advancing past the second round.  I think we would have spent most of the year on the good side of the bubble, and would finish the year looking like a bubble team next season.

That isn't really a "huge difference" to me.

Dead period starts on NSD

Dead period starts on NSD though.  Hard to form the relationships with the coaches.

He plays football in class 7a

He plays football in class 7a in the Miami/Fort Lauderdale suburbs.  In the vacinity of Pembroke Pines, Hollywood, and Plantation.

You all act like he was playing in South Dakota.

The staffs at Temple, Syracuse, and Illinois all managed to find Weaver and offer him before Michigan did.  Then Weaver showed a lot of improvement on his tape, and more teams offered.

Michigan was not a necessary component in this.

 

 

A bigger problem than

A bigger problem than recruiting classes filling up is that I think the next few months are a dead period.  Not a whole lot a kid can do to decide on a school.

Fair enough.  That would be

Fair enough.  That would be better that what I said.



I don't think those throwing jabs have been convinced that Swenson's side is untrue yet, nor do I think most will get this message.

The choir is sure digging it though.

Or its just a movie quote.

Or its just a movie quote.

I'm thinking that he is just

I'm thinking that he is just quoting a movie he likes and not taking a shot at a high school kid on twitter.

I don't know if Enis really

I don't know if Enis really believed that or not, but I don't think the coaching staff would have honored his commitment.  They weren't scheduling his official either.

Its not all the words of one

Its not all the words of one side.

I'm comparing the words of both sides with the known circumstances and past relevant evidence.

If Swenson had said nothing about it, and someone said:

"Oh well Swenson refused to camp for the coaches because he knew he had slacked off and wasn't any good, and the coaches told him he no longer had a spot back in the fall but he did nothing about it until two weeks before signing day"

I would be very incredulous of that story.

For the record, I'm incredulous that Swenson knew nothing about his scholarship being in jeopardy, because it wasn't a well kept secret.

But after so many recruits have come out and said that they didn't have much contact with teh staff and then decommitted, I find it easy to believe that the staff kinda left an overly naive and loyal kid in a difficult spot.  I mean, Sam Webb and John U Bacon have kinda confirmed that the staff didn't actually say "You don't have a spot" until it was way too late.

The only question left for me is:  Was the staff negligent with good intentions (made a mistake letting the kid down easy), or negligent with bad intentions (not being explicit with the kid until they knew they didn't have the spots).

Because similar info has come

Because similar info has come from multiple recruits with no reason to lie, and I find it hard to believe that Swenson was told all of this and decided "I'll just wait until my recruitment is completely fucked and then make a big stink."

Plus the story about Swenson says things about him that the author can't possibly know.  How does the author know why Swenson didn't work out for the coaches over the summer?

I'm willing to believe that the coaching staff dropped subtle hints that he should start looking around (although it seems that they more often just don't contact the recruit), and that Swenson naively waited and hoped that everything would just work out.

I find the story that Swenson was aware that he wasn't good enough so he avoided working out for the coaches, and then was told in the fall that he didn't have actually have a spot to be less believable than Swenson's.

I also find it fairly unbecoming that not only is the kid without a spot two weeks before signing day, but that someone is leaking out stories about him that make him look like shit.

My exact words:  There is a

My exact words:  

There is a pretty well established history of Harbaugh and staff simply cutting off communication with recruits, rather than explicitly telling them what is going on.

I never said anything about pulling his offer.

Do you think they would have honored Enis' commitment if he hadn't decommitted?

You are right.  No one said

You are right.  No one said "lazy".  They said "complacent with his work ethic".

And they didn't say he is lying, they are just saying that everything he has said about his communication with the coaches is untrue.

Like I said, all of those

Like I said, all of those guys had very limited contact with the coaches and ultimately got the message that they should commit elsewhere.  The difference between them and Swenson is that Swenson wouldn't budge until the coaches told him explicitly.

Why are you calling them the

Why are you calling them the "facts"?

Swenson said he was scheduled

Swenson said he was scheduled for his official visit Jan.15 and that Michigan postponed it a week. When he hadn’t heard the details about this coming weekend, he called the U-M staff to find out what was happening.

“They said, ‘You’re not going to come up anymore,’” Swenson said. “That’s pretty much all that happened in that phone call. We didn’t talk that much longer.”

Kiante Enis in November:
"I

Kiante Enis in November:

"I haven't had real solid contact with Michigan. Once a month maybe. I mean I'm still pretty solid though. I don't plan on decommitting at all really, I just haven't had much contact with them."

Now he has decommited while only having visited Indiana and an upcoming visit to Miami (NTM).

I thought it extreme because

I thought it extreme because it pretty much stated that Swenson was completely aware he sucked and avoided the coaching staff and then lied about it to everyone.

It would be hard to paint Swenson in a more negative light, given the known circumstances.

Per Swenson and his coach,

Per Swenson and his coach, they had a scheduled official.

That seems to be a stretch.

That seems to be a stretch.  Even if Swenson literally thought "Oh man, I suck now. I better not let the coaches know it", how would anyone but Swenson know that?

I did read it again.
This

I did read it again.

This article states that the coaching staff made the decision in the fall because Swenson was lazy, told Swenson, and that Swenson handled that information by fucking himself over.

That does not jive with what Sam Webb said or what we have heard from other recruits.

That the coaching staff informed Swenson that he didn't have an offer and would have to walk on very recently seems pretty established at this point.

"Blunt" doesn't necessarily

"Blunt" doesn't necessarily mean actually communicating with a kid:

http://articles.chicagotribune.com/2011-09-09/site/ct-spt-0909-northwes…

 

"I got good feelings from Coach (Jim) Harbaugh," Colter said of the former Michigan and Bears quarterback, who since has left Stanford for the 49ers.

He committed less than a month later.

During his first game that fall, Colter heard a "pop" after throwing a post route. An MRI revealed a torn labrum and biceps, but he kept playing as a running back and receiver while rehabbing a shoulder that eventually needed surgery.

Stanford originally stuck by him, but then their correspondences dwindled. They wanted his MRI results and claimed he would have to wait for clearance from the admissions office. Interesting for a kid who carried a 4.2 grade-point average.

Finally, Spencer said, "They just stopped calling. It was a bad situation. I wanted them to man up and talk to Kain."

"It worked out for the best," Spencer said. "Kain is a stronger person and we're a stronger family because of it. We're so happy to be Wildcats."

You're driving at the fact

You're driving at the fact that people outside the Michigan fanbase would be more likely to believe the kid got screwed over.

I'm driving at the fact that people inside the fanbase are gobbling up the growing mudslinging directed at Swenson.

Eye of the beholder.

Swenson's telling matches

Swenson's telling matches very well with what Weaver, Scott, Enis and Coulter have all said before.  That the coaching staff just tends to let silence do the talking.  They just go ahead and fix the glitch and let things work themselves out.  This time they ran into a kid that wasn't budging.

But we have huge pieces of

But we have huge pieces of evidence that support Swenson's side of things over this explanation:

1)  There is a pretty well established history of Harbaugh and staff simply cutting off communication with recruits, rather than explicitly telling them what is going on.  Kain Coulter at Stanford.  Weaver, Enis, and Scott so far at Michigan.  Matt Falcon's parents didn't know anything about his son's status until they call Harbaugh a few months after his surgery.  If the staff was this open about where Swenson stood and what he need to do, it wouldn't mesh with their history.

2)  The timing of this doesn't work at all.  They were getting red flags because he didn't come up and work out over the summer, but it takes 6 months for them to notify him?   Sam Webb makes it sound like the decision was made recently and that was wrong.  If this is true, the decision was made months ago, and they have talked to him several times without being truthful about it to Swenson.

It certainly seems the

It certainly seems the attractiveness is in the eye of the beholder, because you seem to really like the anonymous story from the Michigan side.

Someone close to the Michigan

Someone close to the Michigan program is saying Swenson is a lazy liar who avoided the coaches?  You don't say...

You do realize that, even

You do realize that, even with the Swenson drop, the staff is planning on being about 9-10 scholarships over the limit come signing day?

I'm not sure how you can distinguish this from Alabama tactics.

 

FYI, Michigan didn't get back

FYI, Michigan didn't get back from the Citrus Bowl a month ago.

Its a "Quiet period" after

Its a "Quiet period" after January 30th, so the recruiting process becomes more difficult.

Plus the contact with Northwestern is extremely recent.