Purdue's D is pretty good, or at least was able to handle Illinois' offense pretty well. Illinois couldn't do much on the ground and Short was very disruptive. After seeing what MSU did, I expect Purdue to blitz quite a bit and put a lot of pressure on Denard, so it'll be interesting to see how he reacts this time. I have no real clue how Purdue put up 21 points though, so I think Michigan should be able to hold their offense to not much of anything so unless it's a complete implosion by Denard, Michigan should be easily.
I was kind of hoping Kiel could do for IU what Brees did for Purdue, but IU isn't exactly having the same level of success that Purdue did in Tiller's first year, so I can see him wanting to jump ship. IU still has a good group of coaches that they've brought in, so there's some hope for the future there, I think.
Sure they won, they got the guy they hated out(Rich Rodriguez) and got what they wanted, a Lloyd assistant that says the right things and runs the program the way they wanted. I don't buy that everyone loses, sure those people look bad, but they obviously didn't care when they were doing it. They were more interested in doing what they felt was best for themselves and didn't give a shit about Michigan or the players. And they won.
Suspend Gholston if you want to, or even Rush as well. It won't actually change anything. I don't really think either of those kids are naturally evil or dirty players, I think they're getting all of that from their coaches. They promote and encourage this type of behavior, of course the kids are going to act that way. Someone said that after Rush injured Denard, the coaches and players were high fiving him on the sidelines. Suspending these kids just tries to cure the symptoms while the real problem goes unchecked and it will keep happening over and over until someone steps in, which doesn't seem likely. Suspend Dantonio and Narduzzi for a month and don't do anything to the kids Get the point across that this type of behavior is not acceptable from the coaches, and the players will stop doing these things.
However, the media has painted the narrative that Dantonio is a saint and is just trying to help these troubled kids out, so nothing will happen. There might be a suspension for a player or two, but it'll be one game and after that everyone will just forget about it.
Braylonfest, easily. I caught the 2nd half/OT with a buddy of mine at our favorite restaurant, which was full of Purdue fans that had an extreme hatred of Michigan. I got so much shit for telling them it wasn't over yet and some much joy out of seeing them get shut up so quickly. Was just one of those games where I -knew- Michigan was going to win and didn't care what the score was at any point.
As someone who basically lives in West Lafayette and nearly everyone I know is both a Purdue fan and hates Danny Hope, I have a feeling JHSNCAH will become very popular.
Also, these posts have been fantastic, I wasn't sure if I wanted to grab the book but after reading this I can't imagine not having it delivered from Amazon the day it's out and reading it instantly.
If I had to guess, it's becuase there really aren't manyquestions beyond "Why did you hire Greg Robinson?" and "Why did you keep Tony Gibson on staff?" on that end that we don't already know about. We know about the attrition. We know about all the high ranked guys that just plain were busts the last couple years. What else is there to really talk about?
All the drama/politics/etc. were a pretty large unknown for a large portion of the fan-base. I think we'd all heard rumors about "factions" that were trying to undermine the program and how it might be related to Carr/etc., but never anything but rumors from unnamed sources on message boards. It sounds like the book does a good job of at least trying to layout what happened and with actual sources. That seems a lot more interesting to me.
I can see one chapter or so on the defensive coaching thing, and if that was left out then it could have improved the book I'm sure, but even with that I think a large majority of the book would be about the "other" stuff.
Agreed, the improved secondary play and actually having depth across the board on D has been pretty huge. Minnesota probably gets a first half FG against last year's team and a cheap TD against the backups in the 2nd half.
The major difference, to me, is that the Big Ten appears to be way worse this year. Iowa looks worse, Purdue lookd worse, Ohio State looks worse, Michigan State looks worse. Minnesota is somehow worse. Northwestern is probably worse since Persa isn't 100%. Illinois may be better but Liuget dominated that game last year, as much as a defensive player can in a game where both teams score 60+.
With how bad the rest of the league looks, besides Nebraska/Wisconsin, the expecations should be at least 10 wins at this point. Put the same team in last year's schedule, and expectations probably drop to 7-8 wins. This should be a great opportunity for Michigan and Hoke to build up a lot more goodwill in the event next year doesn't go as well with a much tougher schedule.
I decided to search google for "football team scored 39 points" and the first result was Michigan beating Michigan Agricultural(which became MSU, according to Wikipedia) 39-0 in their inagural meeting in 1898. It's like Google knows me too well and made sure to list a Michigan score first...
Possibly, but most people around here think 3-3-5 = only what we saw last year, so they think it's a useless D. A well played 3-3-5 should be an interesting test for Denard, but I'm not sure if it's the best to handle Denard. SDSU runs an aggresive version and blitzes a lot, which should leave Denard some easier quick throws and running lanes to take off. The best way to handle him is probably to only rush 4, keep contain, and force him to beat you from the pocket throwing the ball.
Heh, last year I made a comment about how I felt Gallon was the 2nd most explosive player on offense, but didn't really have the route running/hands to be a good WR yet. I got a lot of heat for that comment. Glad to see that once he ironed out some of the kinks on offense that he's showing my comment to be at least close to correct. Dude is amazing in the open field, will be very interesting to see how he's used in the next couple years.
They had some bounces go their way, which was good to see. Brian keeps railing that the turnover margins will regress to the mean, I think this is part of what he meant. The past couple years, when a good play was made it seemed like the bounces never went Michigan's way; they did today. Whether or not that continues is obviously just random chance, but if they can keep putting themselves into the position for those things to occur, good things will happen.
However, the defensive line seemed invisible and the secondary looked poor. I have a feeling a decent team with a somewhat experienced QB will pick this team apart and actually be able to beat them big when the blitz comes. On a lot of those blitzes in the first half, they had people 1 on 1 and open but couldn't make the play. The good teams Michigan will play this year will have the ability and athletes to make those plays. That doesn't mean it's the wrong strategy, just a risky one if Michigan has to blitz that often to get any pressure at all.
Overall, watching this game felt a lot like watching the UConn game last year. The D looks passable and made some plays when it needed to and the offense was good but didn't really show much. It's easy to compare this game to OSU/Wisconsin/Bowl game last year and think it was a huge leap in D, but compare it to UConn and it was pretty similar.
That was my first thought as well. I had been out partying the night before, apparently woke up at a friend's house just as the game was starting. So we're watching the game when he suddenly realizes he has to go to work, so I had to leave as well. I live about 30 miles away, and managed to make it home during halftime despite it still being a near blizzard outside. Didn't miss a down.
I think I felt happier at the end of that game than I had about a football game since the 1997 OSU game.
Agreed, 100%. NFL 2k5 is still the most fun football game I've ever played. My buddy and I usually rent the new Madden game each year, try it for a week or two, then go dig his PS2 out and play 2k5 again. It's just a superior game engine and EA has no reason to want to overhaul theirs. I don't blame them, why improve when you don't have to?
Agreed, the number of times the other team would have a huge play, then in the replay you'd see Mouton in the completely wrong position or lying on the ground after a missed tackle was egregiously high.
You aren't likely to get much agreement here. Everyone loves to pile onto Dantonio and MSU's treatment of criminals, but soon as it happens to a Michigan player instead, people are going to keep rationalizing it down until he should only be suspended for a couple games, if that.
When it comes down to it, fans and coaches of nearly any team just want to win and they don't care how. The fans will buy into the theory that their coach is a great guy and is molding his young players into great men and he's done enough to punish a player behind the scenes and if the coach lets him play, that means he's worked through his troubles enough to earn his spot back. Michigan State fans said that about Dantonio and his band of merry criminals. Ohio State fans said the same thing about Tressel and all the violations with his players.
Now it's starting here, too. Hopefully it doesn't get near as extreme as it has at those two programs,
Even if Hoke is the answer and Michigan puts together a good 5-10 year run... I don't know if I'd put them as a top destination for a coach. The prestige and history factor would help, sure. But after the things you mentioned, I think a lot of coaches would be wary to come into Michigan if they weren't already connected to the program. I wouldn't blame them either. All those fans and alumni got what they wanted, a "Michigan man" in charge, but they need to realize the way it appears from the outside, that unless you're already connected to the program we won't give you a chance at all.
I don't think "But I only barely broke the law!" is a very good defense. The point of the limit being so low is partially to make sure people just DO NOT DRINK AND DRIVE. Excusing someone because they just barely went over the limit seems silly. It'd be akin to saying "But officer, I know I fired that gun in the general direction of that guy, but the bullet was really far away from him, can you let me off?"
I don't know, I think willingly risking the lives of numerous people near wherever the person is driving drunk is a lot worse than stealing money or even punching a hockey player in the head. I'm not very convinced by the addiction argument, either. If he was just getting drunk a lot, then yeah get him help, but on two occasions that we know of, he willingly got behind the wheel while drunk. To me that's just inexcusable. I'm okay with the idea of keeping him on the team, but he should never play another down, even after a redshirt year. If he wants to go the Dantonio route and let him play at some point, that's his perogative but the poster above is right, fans supporting it will be on a real thin line of hypocrisy
I would imagine because college coaches are more interested in winning games than making sure their players do well in the pros. Now, the kids doing well in the pros is important to a coach I'm sure, so if they can help them they will, but why take your Heisman contender QB and make him a WR just so he could do better in the NFL? Especially if it works in college to use that guy at QB.
To put it better, should Hoke move Denard to WR so he has a better chance at making it in the pros in a few years?
Cam was on a better team and was much better at getting money from his university?
Joking aside, there isn't much difference. I think if you're going to look at potential upside, you can look back to someone like Steve McNair. Give him a couple years on the bench with a decent mentor and he might be able to make something of himself. Who knows, people can grow up in a hurry at times.
Now, I personally think QBs like Pryor/Newton/Vince Young are way too risky to spend much of anything on, but I can see why teams take that risk. I think some team would probably take a risk on someone like Pryor.
Didn't Cam Newton just go #1 in the draft? Teams don't learn on these things, someone will take him because of his upside. Highly athletic QBs with questionable passing ability are the types of players that a coach thinks they can turn into a superstar with just the "right" coaching. Even someone with rather questionable character, people will take a risk on. Mallett was picked, and actually went to a really good spot for him to get his attitude turned around.
In the media, yeah. It seems likely that Brandon's list was 1) Jim Harbaugh 2) Brady Hoke. It seems a lot more likely that the guys mentioned above would actually be on tOSU's coaching search list.
I was just imagining the hilarity if Ohio State, backed into a corner on a coaching search, ended up hiring Rich Rodriguez. The first few hours of this board would be pure gold. Assuming it didn't crash, anyway.
It's quite possible I'm completely wrong about his teams. I know I've read many times that "size" wasn't everything for them. Speed, quickness, etc. was much more important. I want to say that when Barwis was brought in there was a lot of talk about getting away from the slow giant Olines under Carr and back to the trimmer, quicker Olines that Bo ran with. And similar stories about the Dlines/etc. And note, smaller doesn't mean weaker.
The main point is that if Carr is saying the team needs to just be "bigger" to win in the Big Ten, that he seems to be ignoring the past. But then again I wouldn't expect anything different from Carr and his group of players.
Isn't Michigan a school that reveres a former coach whose teams usually were built on being smaller and quicker? I wasn't around for the Bo era, but weren't his offensive lines small guys that were set-up to be quicker/have better technique than the other side? The name is escaping me, but wasn't Bo's first nose tackle the size of a safety now?
On top of that, this was back when there wasn't the passing spreads. Option football was still rampant. If at any point in football history, having giant guys to power the other team over would have made sense then, right?
Part of me is glad(don't jump on this here until you read the whole point) Bo isn't around anymore. The last 4+ years would have probably done him in anyway. I'm glad he didn't have to see a large chunk of the former players in the program completely turn their back on the school, then jump in to pile on after Rodriguez was finally let go.
On the fip side, there's pretty much no way he'd let any of that crap fly if he had still been around. So who knows how it would have turned out. But I do find it intersting that this whole thing has been about Carr and his style/ideas while nearly completely ignoring everything Bo did.
The way I see it, if Stonum plays a single down this year, Hoke is on his way to being the next Dantonio. Obviously a lot more would have to happen to get there, but if he lets the guy play after all he's done he's no better than letting Winston play or any of the other asinine things Dantonio has done with regards to discipline.
I'm okay with the idea of keeping him on the team in a symbolic fashion to try to keep him out of more trouble, but his playing career should be over.
Again, the two things aren't mutually exclusive. If OSU doesn't implode, if all those Cass Tech kids are at Southeastern with the MSU coaches are still there and the other top in-state kids grew up MSU fans instead, Hoke and co. could be working as hard as possible and they probably wouldn't have gotten that many of those recruits and OSU would still be dominating MIchigan in every aspect.
Luck, in situations like this, seems to be things that happen that are good for you that you have no control over. Did Brandon or Hoke have any control over the coaches leaving Detroit Southeastern? Did they have any control over leaking all that info about what's happening at OSU? Did they go back in time to impregnate women 17 years ago in the Cass Tech area to make sure there were good recruits from there?
Both things can be true here. He can be incredibly lucky and he can be working hard to take advantage of situations that arise. That seems to be happening.
Not really, I think he's just saying Hoke has been very fortunate in things he has no control over and has done one thing right(hired a competent DC, we think).
Nothing that has happened thusfar can prove whether or not he's a good coach or not, that won't be until the fall, and probably not for 4 years or so when you can actually start to get an idea how good/bad a coach is. So far he hasn't screwed up any of the little things, some of which Rich Rodriguez did. I think that's what Brian is saying here. I think it's pretty obvious those "little things" are pretty important at Michigan, to the fans, media, and alumni. So Hoke not screwing those up is pretty important.
It's not about the mental side of the pitcher or conventional wisdom or any of that. It's manager's wanting to save their ass. Managers and coaches in all sports will routinely use sub-optimal strategies because they're the safe route. If a manager uses their ace reliever in the 7th inning to get out of a bases loaded jam, but then they lose it in the 9th, he'll get cruicified by the fans and media. Nevermind that it was most likely the correct strategy. If he uses his 2nd or 3rd best reliever in the 7th, and they give up a grand slam, no one is going to question the manager. He did the "right" thing in the eyes of idiots so people will just be upset they lost.
You see the same thing in Football. Coaches will punt when it's incredibly stupid to do so just because they are "supposed" to do it. Perfect example from a couple years ago: Patriots go for it on 4th and 2 against the Colts. They don't make it, Colts score and win the game. Fans and media go apeshit for 2 weeks about how awful the decision was to them. The reality is, the Pats made the right choice based on game situation, it just didn't work out that time. Pretty much only Bill Belichick has the guts to actually do that, and the history/support with his team to do it, have it not work, and not have to worry about job security.
As for the conversation above about books, Moneyball is a nice read for a story, but pretty much the only lesson to take from it is that if you are a team with a limited budget, you should figure out what the market is undervaluing and stock up on that. At the time, it was high OBP hitters. That's quickly evolved to defensive players as the league as a whole has become more intelligent and those high OBP guys aren't as cheap.
If you want a really good read on stats and their application to baseball, go buy this book:
As a sports fan, I'd naturally find the NBA playoffs more interesting because you're more likely to get the best team as the champion. However, the games are fixed so I haven't watched a single NBA game since that Kings-Lakers game 6 a few years ago.
NHL seems to have both more parity and a higher chance for a hot goalie to greatly alter the course of the playoffs. So looking at it similar to the NCAA Basketball Tournament, I can see the appeal of just wanting to see upsets/chaos.
So I'd probably say NHL playoffs, but I think NBA would have more potential to be better due to the way the game works. Assuming both teams were on equal footing from the refs, it'd be much harder for a hot team to make a run through 4 7-game series and more likely for the best teams to make the finals.
I don't think scheme is a big deal for next year. 4-3, 3-4, 3-3-5, 4-2-5. Whatever they run, they should be better with losing basically no one important. The big thing to turn this D into "decent" or better is finding someone to eat space and double teams in the middle so Mike Martin can attack more and not be forced to play nose tackle. That happens and a lot will change for the good for Michigan's D.
In this day and age, I think there's a few things.
1) Ability to recruit good players that will fit needs. Charlie Weis could recruit top players but not so much guys that fit in well for what they were trying to do. For top schools I think this brings the added dynamic of getting the superstar players to commit. Guys like a Dee Hart, Michael Dyer, Marcus Lattimore, etc. It's a lot easier to recruit when you aren't going up against Saban, Meyer, Spurrier, and co.
2) Ability to teach different types of people so they get it. You can be running a spread read option, you can be running the run and shoot. Or you can be running the triple option. It will work if you are able to make everyone understand what they're doing. At a college level this is more about actually teaching than in the pros where it's more about explaining, I would say. Anyone who's taught for any period of time knows that there's many different ways that people will learn, and the ability to teach things in a variety of ways so everyone gets it is one of the hallmarks of a good teacher.
3) Ability to bring in assistant coaches that you share similar beliefs with but will add something to the team that you aren't able to do. Be it teaching certain principles, be it recruiting, be it calling plays. Whatever it is.
4) Ability to be prepared for any game situation and know what to do. When to punt, go for it, or kick a field goal. When to call a timeout or take a penalty and save it. A lot of that can be mathed out pretty easily, but being able to have all that information memorized or quickly accessible and the ability to act on it correctly is huge, in my opinon. Les Miles may be absolutely awful at clock management, but he appears to be pretty good at when to go for it/punt, or when to call fake FGs/punts. Note: I absolutely did not want Miles here.
Now, does Hoke matchup well with those things in my book? Hard to say this early. My instinct says #1 won't be a strength of his, but he's never really had a chance to recruit somewhere good. #2 looks encouraging. #3 will be hard to say until he finishes out his staff. Borges doesn't look like a great get, but he seemingly did a good job with his DC at SDSU. #4 I don't think you could say without watching a lot of SDSU/Ball State games. If I had to guess, he will be incredibly conservative like Carr was, leery of making any decision which might appear risky.
I personally came here for the high end analysis we get from Brian(UFRs mainly) and other posters on the site(Mathlete comes to mind, along with guys like steve sharik and Magnus that give us a great look into coaching side). Brian's opinions tend to match up with my own, so that of course helps.
I don't expect any of that to stop. Brian isn't super happy about Hoke because his coaching record isn't stellar. He's not a very young HC and doesn't seem to have any specific aspect of his coaching that really stands out. The things that make him a great candidate to others(Michigan Man aspect... the rah rah attitude) are the type of things some people just don't value that highly/at all. I'm in that group, and I get the feeling Brian is too.
I don't think Brian's passion for writing was built up because of Rich Rodriguez. I'm pretty sure the site started and became popular before Rich Rodriguez got here. Brian's been a Michigan fan for what I expect is most of his life. I don't really think a subpar hire is going to make him stop beein passionate or stop writing about the team he loves.
There may be some people that stop following the blog, but I suspect most of them are the most diehard "BELIEVE WHAT THE PROGRAM SAYS AND DO NOT QUESTION IT" type that I don't think are going to be a big loss. At the same time I'm sure there will still be more people that discover the site or get driven away from Scout/Rivals/Mlive/wherever that want to go somewhere with a higher level of intelligent discourse.
If I had to guess, he probably changed his commit to here because of either RichRod or whichever coach on the staff that was recruiting him. That relationship was severed when the coaching staff was fired. Maybe that was a good part of the reason he decided to come here. Maybe the turmoil of the coaching search and the length of it played a part.
Most likely it was the coaching change. It'd be very easy to get attached to a certain coach, especially if they were recruiting you as hard as I imagine Rodriguez was due to our kicking situation.
There's a somewhat decent sized contigent around here that seems to think if you don't blindly agree with every possible decision the school makes that you're a traitor and will get negged. Don't let it get to you.
Well said. I think one thing to add to that is one of the main things people are using to extoll Hoke's virtues is that the players seem to love him and, I'm making an assumption here, the team chemistry that will result from this. I have two responses to this.
1) Team chemistry was most definitely not the problem in 2010. I can't remember liking a team more or feeling that a Michigan team had as much chemistry as they did this last year. The results may not have been where we wanted them, but dammit they enjoyed each other and playing. It made it a ton of fun to root for them, as I'm sure we can all agree.
2) Being a rah-rah players love me coach isn't the only way to get to that level of team chemistry. Bill Parcells could get players to run through walls for him because they wanted so badly to prove him wrong. He was incredibly negative and just plain mean to his players, and the ones that stayed continually say how much they love him and how much it motivated them.
That's not to say I want a coach like Parcells, at least in terms of the way he handled his players. My point is more that there are multiple ways to motivate the players. The thing we should be looking at is the success the coach has. Rich Rodriguez didn't have problems motivating the players to play together. He was very successful on that end. Brady Hoke appears to be someone that can do the same thing.
So in those terms, things will stay the same. That's a good thing, I think we can all agree on that. To me the focus should be on his actual ability to coach football, not just constant "he's a good guy!" or "I want to play football after hearing him talk!".
Chizik was one of the top defensive coordinators in the country and one of the prime "hot candidates" for every coaching job for awhile. He bombed at Iowa State, then Auburn brought him in AND brought in high dollar, high quality coordinators with him.
Hoke's resume reminds me more of Greg Robinson than Gene Chizik. Was on the staff for teams that played very well and won national titles/super bowls in the distant past. Had middling success elsewhere. That's not to say Hoke will have the same success, or lack thereof, as Greg Robinson, but I think the resumes are more similar than Hoke and Chizik.
I tend to agree. I expected to see a lot harsher things from Brian today than was posted. I took the lack of profanity laden tirades to be an indicator that he's accepted it's happened and will at least give him a chance to look like a viable coach.
+1, very well said. You summed up my feelings incredibly well. I don't really have much to add, but I had to respond just because it's uncanny how similarly I feel to exactly what you said.
Recent Comments
Purdue's D is pretty
Purdue's D is pretty good, or at least was able to handle Illinois' offense pretty well. Illinois couldn't do much on the ground and Short was very disruptive. After seeing what MSU did, I expect Purdue to blitz quite a bit and put a lot of pressure on Denard, so it'll be interesting to see how he reacts this time. I have no real clue how Purdue put up 21 points though, so I think Michigan should be able to hold their offense to not much of anything so unless it's a complete implosion by Denard, Michigan should be easily.
I was kind of hoping Kiel could do for IU what Brees did for Purdue, but IU isn't exactly having the same level of success that Purdue did in Tiller's first year, so I can see him wanting to jump ship. IU still has a good group of coaches that they've brought in, so there's some hope for the future there, I think.
Sure they won, they got the guy they hated out(Rich Rodriguez) and got what they wanted, a Lloyd assistant that says the right things and runs the program the way they wanted. I don't buy that everyone loses, sure those people look bad, but they obviously didn't care when they were doing it. They were more interested in doing what they felt was best for themselves and didn't give a shit about Michigan or the players. And they won.
Suspend Gholston if you want to, or even Rush as well. It won't actually change anything. I don't really think either of those kids are naturally evil or dirty players, I think they're getting all of that from their coaches. They promote and encourage this type of behavior, of course the kids are going to act that way. Someone said that after Rush injured Denard, the coaches and players were high fiving him on the sidelines. Suspending these kids just tries to cure the symptoms while the real problem goes unchecked and it will keep happening over and over until someone steps in, which doesn't seem likely. Suspend Dantonio and Narduzzi for a month and don't do anything to the kids Get the point across that this type of behavior is not acceptable from the coaches, and the players will stop doing these things.
However, the media has painted the narrative that Dantonio is a saint and is just trying to help these troubled kids out, so nothing will happen. There might be a suspension for a player or two, but it'll be one game and after that everyone will just forget about it.
Braylonfest, easily. I caught the 2nd half/OT with a buddy of mine at our favorite restaurant, which was full of Purdue fans that had an extreme hatred of Michigan. I got so much shit for telling them it wasn't over yet and some much joy out of seeing them get shut up so quickly. Was just one of those games where I -knew- Michigan was going to win and didn't care what the score was at any point.
As someone who basically lives in West Lafayette and nearly everyone I know is both a Purdue fan and hates Danny Hope, I have a feeling JHSNCAH will become very popular.
Also, these posts have been fantastic, I wasn't sure if I wanted to grab the book but after reading this I can't imagine not having it delivered from Amazon the day it's out and reading it instantly.
If I had to guess, it's becuase there really aren't manyquestions beyond "Why did you hire Greg Robinson?" and "Why did you keep Tony Gibson on staff?" on that end that we don't already know about. We know about the attrition. We know about all the high ranked guys that just plain were busts the last couple years. What else is there to really talk about?
All the drama/politics/etc. were a pretty large unknown for a large portion of the fan-base. I think we'd all heard rumors about "factions" that were trying to undermine the program and how it might be related to Carr/etc., but never anything but rumors from unnamed sources on message boards. It sounds like the book does a good job of at least trying to layout what happened and with actual sources. That seems a lot more interesting to me.
I can see one chapter or so on the defensive coaching thing, and if that was left out then it could have improved the book I'm sure, but even with that I think a large majority of the book would be about the "other" stuff.
I'm very very very glad
I'm very very very glad ESPN only showed that once so far on replay. Yikes.
Agreed, the improved secondary play and actually having depth across the board on D has been pretty huge. Minnesota probably gets a first half FG against last year's team and a cheap TD against the backups in the 2nd half.
The major difference, to
The major difference, to me, is that the Big Ten appears to be way worse this year. Iowa looks worse, Purdue lookd worse, Ohio State looks worse, Michigan State looks worse. Minnesota is somehow worse. Northwestern is probably worse since Persa isn't 100%. Illinois may be better but Liuget dominated that game last year, as much as a defensive player can in a game where both teams score 60+.
With how bad the rest of the league looks, besides Nebraska/Wisconsin, the expecations should be at least 10 wins at this point. Put the same team in last year's schedule, and expectations probably drop to 7-8 wins. This should be a great opportunity for Michigan and Hoke to build up a lot more goodwill in the event next year doesn't go as well with a much tougher schedule.
indeed, this Minnesota team vs Delware State '09 would be one heck of an awful football game.
I decided to search google for "football team scored 39 points" and the first result was Michigan beating Michigan Agricultural(which became MSU, according to Wikipedia) 39-0 in their inagural meeting in 1898. It's like Google knows me too well and made sure to list a Michigan score first...
Possibly, but most people around here think 3-3-5 = only what we saw last year, so they think it's a useless D. A well played 3-3-5 should be an interesting test for Denard, but I'm not sure if it's the best to handle Denard. SDSU runs an aggresive version and blitzes a lot, which should leave Denard some easier quick throws and running lanes to take off. The best way to handle him is probably to only rush 4, keep contain, and force him to beat you from the pocket throwing the ball.
Heh, last year I made a comment about how I felt Gallon was the 2nd most explosive player on offense, but didn't really have the route running/hands to be a good WR yet. I got a lot of heat for that comment. Glad to see that once he ironed out some of the kinks on offense that he's showing my comment to be at least close to correct. Dude is amazing in the open field, will be very interesting to see how he's used in the next couple years.
ND will eventually run out of bullets to shoot itself in the foot with and start actually winning games. I suspect it starts this week. ND 38 MSU 24.
They had some bounces go their way, which was good to see. Brian keeps railing that the turnover margins will regress to the mean, I think this is part of what he meant. The past couple years, when a good play was made it seemed like the bounces never went Michigan's way; they did today. Whether or not that continues is obviously just random chance, but if they can keep putting themselves into the position for those things to occur, good things will happen.
However, the defensive line seemed invisible and the secondary looked poor. I have a feeling a decent team with a somewhat experienced QB will pick this team apart and actually be able to beat them big when the blitz comes. On a lot of those blitzes in the first half, they had people 1 on 1 and open but couldn't make the play. The good teams Michigan will play this year will have the ability and athletes to make those plays. That doesn't mean it's the wrong strategy, just a risky one if Michigan has to blitz that often to get any pressure at all.
Overall, watching this game felt a lot like watching the UConn game last year. The D looks passable and made some plays when it needed to and the offense was good but didn't really show much. It's easy to compare this game to OSU/Wisconsin/Bowl game last year and think it was a huge leap in D, but compare it to UConn and it was pretty similar.
ND - L
EMU -
WMU - W
ND - L
EMU - W
SDSU - W
MINN - W
NW - L
MSU - L
PURD - W
IOWA - L
ILL - W
NEB - L
OSU - L
Bowl Game - W
That was my first
That was my first thought as well. I had been out partying the night before, apparently woke up at a friend's house just as the game was starting. So we're watching the game when he suddenly realizes he has to go to work, so I had to leave as well. I live about 30 miles away, and managed to make it home during halftime despite it still being a near blizzard outside. Didn't miss a down.
I think I felt happier at the end of that game than I had about a football game since the 1997 OSU game.
Agreed, 100%. NFL 2k5 is still the most fun football game I've ever played. My buddy and I usually rent the new Madden game each year, try it for a week or two, then go dig his PS2 out and play 2k5 again. It's just a superior game engine and EA has no reason to want to overhaul theirs. I don't blame them, why improve when you don't have to?
Agreed, the number of
Agreed, the number of times the other team would have a huge play, then in the replay you'd see Mouton in the completely wrong position or lying on the ground after a missed tackle was egregiously high.
I'd +1 you if I could. It will be quite funny to see the people that argue for him getting a 5th chance, though.
You aren't likely to get much agreement here. Everyone loves to pile onto Dantonio and MSU's treatment of criminals, but soon as it happens to a Michigan player instead, people are going to keep rationalizing it down until he should only be suspended for a couple games, if that.
When it comes down to it, fans and coaches of nearly any team just want to win and they don't care how. The fans will buy into the theory that their coach is a great guy and is molding his young players into great men and he's done enough to punish a player behind the scenes and if the coach lets him play, that means he's worked through his troubles enough to earn his spot back. Michigan State fans said that about Dantonio and his band of merry criminals. Ohio State fans said the same thing about Tressel and all the violations with his players.
Now it's starting here, too. Hopefully it doesn't get near as extreme as it has at those two programs,
Even if Hoke is the
Even if Hoke is the answer and Michigan puts together a good 5-10 year run... I don't know if I'd put them as a top destination for a coach. The prestige and history factor would help, sure. But after the things you mentioned, I think a lot of coaches would be wary to come into Michigan if they weren't already connected to the program. I wouldn't blame them either. All those fans and alumni got what they wanted, a "Michigan man" in charge, but they need to realize the way it appears from the outside, that unless you're already connected to the program we won't give you a chance at all.
I don't think "But I only
I don't think "But I only barely broke the law!" is a very good defense. The point of the limit being so low is partially to make sure people just DO NOT DRINK AND DRIVE. Excusing someone because they just barely went over the limit seems silly. It'd be akin to saying "But officer, I know I fired that gun in the general direction of that guy, but the bullet was really far away from him, can you let me off?"
I don't know, I think
I don't know, I think willingly risking the lives of numerous people near wherever the person is driving drunk is a lot worse than stealing money or even punching a hockey player in the head. I'm not very convinced by the addiction argument, either. If he was just getting drunk a lot, then yeah get him help, but on two occasions that we know of, he willingly got behind the wheel while drunk. To me that's just inexcusable. I'm okay with the idea of keeping him on the team, but he should never play another down, even after a redshirt year. If he wants to go the Dantonio route and let him play at some point, that's his perogative but the poster above is right, fans supporting it will be on a real thin line of hypocrisy
I would imagine because
I would imagine because college coaches are more interested in winning games than making sure their players do well in the pros. Now, the kids doing well in the pros is important to a coach I'm sure, so if they can help them they will, but why take your Heisman contender QB and make him a WR just so he could do better in the NFL? Especially if it works in college to use that guy at QB.
To put it better, should Hoke move Denard to WR so he has a better chance at making it in the pros in a few years?
Cam was on a better team
Cam was on a better team and was much better at getting money from his university?
Joking aside, there isn't much difference. I think if you're going to look at potential upside, you can look back to someone like Steve McNair. Give him a couple years on the bench with a decent mentor and he might be able to make something of himself. Who knows, people can grow up in a hurry at times.
Now, I personally think QBs like Pryor/Newton/Vince Young are way too risky to spend much of anything on, but I can see why teams take that risk. I think some team would probably take a risk on someone like Pryor.
Didn't Cam Newton just go
Didn't Cam Newton just go #1 in the draft? Teams don't learn on these things, someone will take him because of his upside. Highly athletic QBs with questionable passing ability are the types of players that a coach thinks they can turn into a superstar with just the "right" coaching. Even someone with rather questionable character, people will take a risk on. Mallett was picked, and actually went to a really good spot for him to get his attitude turned around.
In the media, yeah. It seems likely that Brandon's list was 1) Jim Harbaugh 2) Brady Hoke. It seems a lot more likely that the guys mentioned above would actually be on tOSU's coaching search list.
This actually made me
This actually made me burst out laughing. Good job.
I was just imagining the
I was just imagining the hilarity if Ohio State, backed into a corner on a coaching search, ended up hiring Rich Rodriguez. The first few hours of this board would be pure gold. Assuming it didn't crash, anyway.
Thank you, that's exactly who I was thinking of. The name was just escaping me.
It's quite possible I'm
It's quite possible I'm completely wrong about his teams. I know I've read many times that "size" wasn't everything for them. Speed, quickness, etc. was much more important. I want to say that when Barwis was brought in there was a lot of talk about getting away from the slow giant Olines under Carr and back to the trimmer, quicker Olines that Bo ran with. And similar stories about the Dlines/etc. And note, smaller doesn't mean weaker.
The main point is that if Carr is saying the team needs to just be "bigger" to win in the Big Ten, that he seems to be ignoring the past. But then again I wouldn't expect anything different from Carr and his group of players.
Isn't Michigan a school
Isn't Michigan a school that reveres a former coach whose teams usually were built on being smaller and quicker? I wasn't around for the Bo era, but weren't his offensive lines small guys that were set-up to be quicker/have better technique than the other side? The name is escaping me, but wasn't Bo's first nose tackle the size of a safety now?
On top of that, this was back when there wasn't the passing spreads. Option football was still rampant. If at any point in football history, having giant guys to power the other team over would have made sense then, right?
Part of me is glad(don't jump on this here until you read the whole point) Bo isn't around anymore. The last 4+ years would have probably done him in anyway. I'm glad he didn't have to see a large chunk of the former players in the program completely turn their back on the school, then jump in to pile on after Rodriguez was finally let go.
On the fip side, there's pretty much no way he'd let any of that crap fly if he had still been around. So who knows how it would have turned out. But I do find it intersting that this whole thing has been about Carr and his style/ideas while nearly completely ignoring everything Bo did.
The way I see it, if
The way I see it, if Stonum plays a single down this year, Hoke is on his way to being the next Dantonio. Obviously a lot more would have to happen to get there, but if he lets the guy play after all he's done he's no better than letting Winston play or any of the other asinine things Dantonio has done with regards to discipline.
I'm okay with the idea of keeping him on the team in a symbolic fashion to try to keep him out of more trouble, but his playing career should be over.
Again, the two things
Again, the two things aren't mutually exclusive. If OSU doesn't implode, if all those Cass Tech kids are at Southeastern with the MSU coaches are still there and the other top in-state kids grew up MSU fans instead, Hoke and co. could be working as hard as possible and they probably wouldn't have gotten that many of those recruits and OSU would still be dominating MIchigan in every aspect.
Luck, in situations like this, seems to be things that happen that are good for you that you have no control over. Did Brandon or Hoke have any control over the coaches leaving Detroit Southeastern? Did they have any control over leaking all that info about what's happening at OSU? Did they go back in time to impregnate women 17 years ago in the Cass Tech area to make sure there were good recruits from there?
Both things can be true here. He can be incredibly lucky and he can be working hard to take advantage of situations that arise. That seems to be happening.
Not really, I think he's just saying Hoke has been very fortunate in things he has no control over and has done one thing right(hired a competent DC, we think).
Nothing that has happened thusfar can prove whether or not he's a good coach or not, that won't be until the fall, and probably not for 4 years or so when you can actually start to get an idea how good/bad a coach is. So far he hasn't screwed up any of the little things, some of which Rich Rodriguez did. I think that's what Brian is saying here. I think it's pretty obvious those "little things" are pretty important at Michigan, to the fans, media, and alumni. So Hoke not screwing those up is pretty important.
It's not about the mental
It's not about the mental side of the pitcher or conventional wisdom or any of that. It's manager's wanting to save their ass. Managers and coaches in all sports will routinely use sub-optimal strategies because they're the safe route. If a manager uses their ace reliever in the 7th inning to get out of a bases loaded jam, but then they lose it in the 9th, he'll get cruicified by the fans and media. Nevermind that it was most likely the correct strategy. If he uses his 2nd or 3rd best reliever in the 7th, and they give up a grand slam, no one is going to question the manager. He did the "right" thing in the eyes of idiots so people will just be upset they lost.
You see the same thing in Football. Coaches will punt when it's incredibly stupid to do so just because they are "supposed" to do it. Perfect example from a couple years ago: Patriots go for it on 4th and 2 against the Colts. They don't make it, Colts score and win the game. Fans and media go apeshit for 2 weeks about how awful the decision was to them. The reality is, the Pats made the right choice based on game situation, it just didn't work out that time. Pretty much only Bill Belichick has the guts to actually do that, and the history/support with his team to do it, have it not work, and not have to worry about job security.
As for the conversation above about books, Moneyball is a nice read for a story, but pretty much the only lesson to take from it is that if you are a team with a limited budget, you should figure out what the market is undervaluing and stock up on that. At the time, it was high OBP hitters. That's quickly evolved to defensive players as the league as a whole has become more intelligent and those high OBP guys aren't as cheap.
If you want a really good read on stats and their application to baseball, go buy this book:
http://www.insidethebook.com/
It's a hundred times better than Moneyball.
As a sports fan, I'd naturally find the NBA playoffs more interesting because you're more likely to get the best team as the champion. However, the games are fixed so I haven't watched a single NBA game since that Kings-Lakers game 6 a few years ago.
NHL seems to have both more parity and a higher chance for a hot goalie to greatly alter the course of the playoffs. So looking at it similar to the NCAA Basketball Tournament, I can see the appeal of just wanting to see upsets/chaos.
So I'd probably say NHL playoffs, but I think NBA would have more potential to be better due to the way the game works. Assuming both teams were on equal footing from the refs, it'd be much harder for a hot team to make a run through 4 7-game series and more likely for the best teams to make the finals.
Well put. Rodriguez could
Well put. Rodriguez could have cured cancer and people would have complained he was taking jobs away from doctors/researchers.
I don't think scheme is a big deal for next year. 4-3, 3-4, 3-3-5, 4-2-5. Whatever they run, they should be better with losing basically no one important. The big thing to turn this D into "decent" or better is finding someone to eat space and double teams in the middle so Mike Martin can attack more and not be forced to play nose tackle. That happens and a lot will change for the good for Michigan's D.
In this day and age, I think there's a few things.
1) Ability to recruit good players that will fit needs. Charlie Weis could recruit top players but not so much guys that fit in well for what they were trying to do. For top schools I think this brings the added dynamic of getting the superstar players to commit. Guys like a Dee Hart, Michael Dyer, Marcus Lattimore, etc. It's a lot easier to recruit when you aren't going up against Saban, Meyer, Spurrier, and co.
2) Ability to teach different types of people so they get it. You can be running a spread read option, you can be running the run and shoot. Or you can be running the triple option. It will work if you are able to make everyone understand what they're doing. At a college level this is more about actually teaching than in the pros where it's more about explaining, I would say. Anyone who's taught for any period of time knows that there's many different ways that people will learn, and the ability to teach things in a variety of ways so everyone gets it is one of the hallmarks of a good teacher.
3) Ability to bring in assistant coaches that you share similar beliefs with but will add something to the team that you aren't able to do. Be it teaching certain principles, be it recruiting, be it calling plays. Whatever it is.
4) Ability to be prepared for any game situation and know what to do. When to punt, go for it, or kick a field goal. When to call a timeout or take a penalty and save it. A lot of that can be mathed out pretty easily, but being able to have all that information memorized or quickly accessible and the ability to act on it correctly is huge, in my opinon. Les Miles may be absolutely awful at clock management, but he appears to be pretty good at when to go for it/punt, or when to call fake FGs/punts. Note: I absolutely did not want Miles here.
Now, does Hoke matchup well with those things in my book? Hard to say this early. My instinct says #1 won't be a strength of his, but he's never really had a chance to recruit somewhere good. #2 looks encouraging. #3 will be hard to say until he finishes out his staff. Borges doesn't look like a great get, but he seemingly did a good job with his DC at SDSU. #4 I don't think you could say without watching a lot of SDSU/Ball State games. If I had to guess, he will be incredibly conservative like Carr was, leery of making any decision which might appear risky.
I personally came here for the high end analysis we get from Brian(UFRs mainly) and other posters on the site(Mathlete comes to mind, along with guys like steve sharik and Magnus that give us a great look into coaching side). Brian's opinions tend to match up with my own, so that of course helps.
I don't expect any of that to stop. Brian isn't super happy about Hoke because his coaching record isn't stellar. He's not a very young HC and doesn't seem to have any specific aspect of his coaching that really stands out. The things that make him a great candidate to others(Michigan Man aspect... the rah rah attitude) are the type of things some people just don't value that highly/at all. I'm in that group, and I get the feeling Brian is too.
I don't think Brian's passion for writing was built up because of Rich Rodriguez. I'm pretty sure the site started and became popular before Rich Rodriguez got here. Brian's been a Michigan fan for what I expect is most of his life. I don't really think a subpar hire is going to make him stop beein passionate or stop writing about the team he loves.
There may be some people that stop following the blog, but I suspect most of them are the most diehard "BELIEVE WHAT THE PROGRAM SAYS AND DO NOT QUESTION IT" type that I don't think are going to be a big loss. At the same time I'm sure there will still be more people that discover the site or get driven away from Scout/Rivals/Mlive/wherever that want to go somewhere with a higher level of intelligent discourse.
If I had to guess, he probably changed his commit to here because of either RichRod or whichever coach on the staff that was recruiting him. That relationship was severed when the coaching staff was fired. Maybe that was a good part of the reason he decided to come here. Maybe the turmoil of the coaching search and the length of it played a part.
Most likely it was the coaching change. It'd be very easy to get attached to a certain coach, especially if they were recruiting you as hard as I imagine Rodriguez was due to our kicking situation.
There's a somewhat decent sized contigent around here that seems to think if you don't blindly agree with every possible decision the school makes that you're a traitor and will get negged. Don't let it get to you.
Well said. I think one thing to add to that is one of the main things people are using to extoll Hoke's virtues is that the players seem to love him and, I'm making an assumption here, the team chemistry that will result from this. I have two responses to this.
1) Team chemistry was most definitely not the problem in 2010. I can't remember liking a team more or feeling that a Michigan team had as much chemistry as they did this last year. The results may not have been where we wanted them, but dammit they enjoyed each other and playing. It made it a ton of fun to root for them, as I'm sure we can all agree.
2) Being a rah-rah players love me coach isn't the only way to get to that level of team chemistry. Bill Parcells could get players to run through walls for him because they wanted so badly to prove him wrong. He was incredibly negative and just plain mean to his players, and the ones that stayed continually say how much they love him and how much it motivated them.
That's not to say I want a coach like Parcells, at least in terms of the way he handled his players. My point is more that there are multiple ways to motivate the players. The thing we should be looking at is the success the coach has. Rich Rodriguez didn't have problems motivating the players to play together. He was very successful on that end. Brady Hoke appears to be someone that can do the same thing.
So in those terms, things will stay the same. That's a good thing, I think we can all agree on that. To me the focus should be on his actual ability to coach football, not just constant "he's a good guy!" or "I want to play football after hearing him talk!".
Chizik was one of the top defensive coordinators in the country and one of the prime "hot candidates" for every coaching job for awhile. He bombed at Iowa State, then Auburn brought him in AND brought in high dollar, high quality coordinators with him.
Hoke's resume reminds me more of Greg Robinson than Gene Chizik. Was on the staff for teams that played very well and won national titles/super bowls in the distant past. Had middling success elsewhere. That's not to say Hoke will have the same success, or lack thereof, as Greg Robinson, but I think the resumes are more similar than Hoke and Chizik.
I tend to agree. I
I tend to agree. I expected to see a lot harsher things from Brian today than was posted. I took the lack of profanity laden tirades to be an indicator that he's accepted it's happened and will at least give him a chance to look like a viable coach.
+1, very well said. You summed up my feelings incredibly well. I don't really have much to add, but I had to respond just because it's uncanny how similarly I feel to exactly what you said.