Class size is important. It's always better to have more rather than less bullets in the chamber.
There are a lot of 4 stars in the class so the quality is very good, but I think people underrate the importance of quantity. In the NIL era, we should be bringing in 30 recruits a year.
Look at MSU's class. It looks like it is going to be small so that means they have to have a high hit rate. A bigger class provides a better margin for error.
The size of this class should be thought of as a strength and not as a reason to say that the class doesn't deserve to be in the top 5 or 10 or whatever.
It is an important game to most of the fanbase, an important game to the state, an important game to the players, and the only important game to Michigan State, who has just as much of a say in this as Michigan.
Jett absolutely is a prime reason for why Michigan was losing those must-win games at the end of the season. He was playing losing basketball.
On offense, he would just jack up terrible shots (which stopped falling like they had earlier in the season) and ball-movement would just stop as soon as the ball got into his hands (leaving the other four players to just stand around).
On defense, he was still just loafing. He could not stop dribble penetration and would constantly lose his man on back door cuts for easy baskets. He showed zero toughness in boxing out his man and rebounding. The complete lack of effort was the most annoying aspect of him being on the court.
I personally hope he leaves for the NBA. He's a cancer that needs to be rooted out before his lack of effort and toughness metastasizes to the rest of the team.
100%. Jett was an absolute coach-killer this year.
He showed enough flashes on offense to warrant playing (at least on this team), but his utter lack of interest in playing defense and his tendency to take (and miss) horrible shots amounted to a lot of losing basketball. Notice how the team looked much better when he was injured. He was basically this year's Caleb Houstan.
That's what happens when you are forced to rely on freshman to lead the team.
If you're referring to the play near the end of regulation against Wisconsin, he was very clearly fouled going up for a shot. He should've had 2 free throws.
Granted, the refs made up for the missed call by somehow ruling that the ball was last touched by Wisconsin.
The overall point is that Dickinson has overall good hands ... no idea what you've been watching.
Team defense has been soooo much better since Jett went out.
Jett's uncanny ability to either lose his man away from the ball or get beat off the dribble was hurting the entire structure of the defense. This is the same way that T Will's limitations bog down the offense.
That's the design of the defense. They're doubling the pick n roll to stop dribble penetration (which seems like a good strategy given that Wisconsin has been ice cold from the three point line). They rotated pretty well after that and the Wisconsin player happened to hit a contested three. You tip your hat and move on. I'll take Wisconsin shooting those contested threes all night.
They got an open 3 from Baker which was a much better shot than you typically would see when winding the clock down to 5 seconds. You're only complaining because he missed it (even though he's one of the team's best 3 point shooters).
I thought the set to end the game was pretty decent actually.
They get a high ball screen off the inbounds and Bufkin would've had a decent look had he took the shot (at least for an eight second play), but Bufkin inexplicably kicked the ball out to Jett and Jett had no chance to do anything with a defender all over him and two seconds left on the clock.
Hate to dog the kid because he is clearly trying hard, but he does more harm than good when on the court.
Also, Bufkin and Jett need to be benched every time they lose their man for an easy basket. All season long we have watched those two get burned for layups or dunks because either they aren't moving their feet or they overplay their defender which opens up an easy back cut.
It makes this team really hard to watch at times because they aren't improving on the little things.
Juwan Howard : 2022-2023 Michigan Basketball :: Scott Frost : 2021 Nebraska Football.
Good schemes but players are situationally so bad which causes close losses.
The last sequence on offense was so bad ... When Bufkin drove the ball, he needed to put up a shot. With that little time left, there was no way that a kick out was going to result in a better shot by Jett. Just awful.
Hot Take #2
Juwan Howard would be a better NBA coach than college coach. They run really nice sets but the players make really bad decisions. Hunter Dickinson gets periodic brain cramps and Terrance Williams is absolutely unplayable at times.
Travel from the airport to the game – heard from some people that the train down to New Brunswick is the way to go. I saw on NJ Transit website the Northeast Corridor train runs regularly from EWR to New Brunswick. ? any experience with the train on weekends ?
You will be fine taking the train. They run more or less every hour on the weekends. If coming from EWR, make sure to take the Northeast Corridor line and not the North Jersey Coast Line which will take you to the Jersey Shore. Also, make sure to take the train heading towards Trenton (i.e. away from NYC).
The station there looks on Google maps to be a 2 mile walk to the stadium - safe and doable. ? Suggestions on trains ? rental car ? uber ?
The walk is completely fine. You will walk through campus and see all the students partying. Good luck on getting an Uber. If you're going to rent a car, you might as well do so at EWR and drive to the stadium directly from the airport.
Places to eat?
New Brunswick / Piscataway generally has trash food. Get a fat sandwich at RU Hungry and then head to NYC to get an actual meal.
Prior experience with stadium ? We are on the visitor side
Trash stadium with no atmosphere whatsoever. There will be a lot of U-M fans/grads in attendance.
When it comes to Hart feelings in particular, there's nothing I remember more than Hart ghosting some linebacker who thought he was about to get a TFL because he'd managed the spectacular precognitive feat of anticipating another outside zone from Mike Debord.
If you create a culture where your employees genuinely like working for you, then they will give you a chance to counter (because they still want to work for you albeit at a higher income level). Otherwise, if an employee leaves without at least seeing whether you would match the offer, you should take that as a reflection on you and/or your company, not that employee. It is common sense that people who like where they work don't want to leave.
If you create a culture where your employees genuinely like working for you, then they will give you a chance to counter (because they still want to work for you albeit at a higher income level). Otherwise, if an employee leaves without at least seeing whether you would match the offer, you should take that as a reflection on you and/or your company, not that employee. It is common sense that people who like where they work don't want to leave.
If you create a culture where your employees genuinely like working for you, then they will give you a chance to counter (because they still want to work for you albeit at a higher income level). Otherwise, if an employee leaves without at least seeing whether you would match the offer, you should take that as a reflection on you and/or your company, not that employee. It is common sense that people who like where they work don't want to leave.
If you create a culture where your employees genuinely like working for you, then they will give you a chance to counter (because they still want to work for you albeit at a higher income level). Otherwise, if an employee leaves without at least seeing whether you would match the offer, you should take that as a reflection on you and/or your company, not that employee. It is common sense that people who like where they work don't want to leave.
I mentioned this in the thread on the board. Doyle has a very compact and smooth trhowing motion (in contract to Joe Milton's throwing motion). I think Milton has a stronger arm but Doyle has far less mechanical work ahead of him.
Agree with most of the sentiments so far. This young man has a very compact and smooth throwing motion (in contract to Joe Milton's throwing motion). I think Milton has a stronger arm but Doyle has far less mechanical work ahead of him.
I agree that great coaches make personnel errors sometimes. I would also concede that Smith's lack of speed prevented the the team from having as many explosive runs as they could have had last year; however, I wouldn't say that the team wasted carries with him.
Smith was easily the best runner when it came to grinding out yards. He hardly ever fumbled (Evans had one more fumble in roughly 100 less carries). Finally, Smith was easily the best pass blocker. I think it was easy to underestimate Smith's value because his major weakness was so obvious (lack of speed) but his strengths (good balance, ball security, pass protection) were less noticeable.
I know Evans and Higdon had far better yards/attempt numbers than Smith, but a lot of those yards were coming in garbage time or for specially designed plays. In my opinion, all the RBs were very similar in their ineffectiveness when the blocking broke down (most RBs will struggle when their OL struggles). Obviously, Evans and Higdon could turn in more explosive plays when holes opened up, but their presence on the field was also a strong cue to the defense to prepare for a running play or some sort of screen-pass/draw play.
I'm honestly astonished at how often those screen passes and draw plays worked when Higdon, Evans, or Isaac were in the game (especially on 3rd and long) because it was very obvious that the coaching staff didn't trust the trio's pass blocking. I only distinctly remember Ohio State stopping the draw play (but this was because they also have very good players and very good coaches).
Henne was a very good QB at Michigan, but one of the things holding him back in the NFL is his throwing motion. There are also other issues as well that cropped up during his time at Michigan (locking in on receivers, accuracy issues, etc.) that appear to have continued in the NFL.
He has good arm-strength, but his throwing motion is way too long. He brings the ball down to his hip during his windup. It negates his arm-strength because it allows NFL defensive backs the time to break on his passes. Bringing the ball down to his hip also causes his arm slot to be too low somtimes, resulting in a 3/4s delivery that causes his passes to sail on him (i.e. tacopants). It doesn't help that he has generally played on mediocre to bad teams with mediocre to bad offensive lines his whole career.
I wish him all the best because he was a great Michigan Man, but unless there are many changes to his mechanics (which is unlikely this late in his career), I believe that he will struggle if he wins the starting job.
If available to you, try the TD Premier checking account (can be opened in 20 minutes at a branch). The account has no FX transaction fee or non-TD ATM fee (TD doesn't itself charge a fee and they will actually reimburse the fee that the other bank/ATM charges you).
You can then basically go to any ATM in the world and get local-currency cash without paying any fees while getting the previous day's spot rate. I opened one up a few years ago specifically for this reason when I was traveling out of the country.
That's a good reason for the $266,647. Why doesn't the AD then just reimburse the University for the academic support specialist's salary? It appears that the "Total Allocated" figure is a net amount. Wouldn't a full reimbursement back to the University result in a $0 number? Since the employee is still being paid by the University vs the AD, the conflict would still be avoided.
I agree with kdhoffma that the AD does eventually end up making net payments back to the University (especially considering that the AD writes a giant check to the University on top of student-athlete tuition payments).
For me, it's more about optics. There are still idiots out there who think "my tax money" is being used to pay Harbaugh's salary. Figures like this reinforce the idea, regardless of the actual truth behind the numbers.
Does anybody know why the AD takes $266,467 from the University as described in the "Total Allocated" column (i.e. "sum of student fees, direct and indirect institutional support and state money allocated to the athletics department, minus certain funds the department transferred back to the school")?
It doesn't appear that the AD needs the ~$250k given the reported ~$6MM margin (understanding that the $6MM can be wiggled around through accounting adjustments).
The optics just look bad when the University is appearing to take funds from the University when the ADs of other public universities are not.
Marginal tax rates do not equal effective tax rates. The tax brackets are based on marginal income.
Yes, in your example, by going $1 above, you are going to pay 33% instead of 28% but only for that $1; it does not change the tax rate applied to the income you earned prior to moving up to the 33% tax bracket. Yes, your overall effective tax rate will increase, but it will not increase by 5% of your taxable income. In fact, if you only make $1 extra, your effective tax rate will barely change at all.
Example 1: Let's say that you are an individual whose taxable income (all income minus deductions, credits, etc.) is $91,900. Your marginal tax rate is 25%. Your effective tax rate is approximately 20.3632%.
Income from 0 - $9,325 = $9,325 of income ---> taxed at 10% = $932.50
Income from $9,325 - $37,950 = $28,625 of income ---> taxed at 15% = $4,293.75
Income from $37,950 - $91,900 = $53,950 of income ---> taxed at 25% = $13,487.50
Total Taxes paid is $932.50 + $4,293.75 + $13,487.50 = $18,713.75
Total income of $91,900
Effective Tax Rate = $18,713.75 / $91,900 = approximately 20.3632%
Example 2: Let's you say make an extra $1 so that your taxable income is now $91,901. You have jumped a tax bracket, so your marginal tax rate is now 28%. Your effective tax rate is now 20.3635%. It barely made a difference (0.0003%).
Income from 0 - $9,325 = $9,325 of income ---> taxed at 10% = $932.50
Income from $9,325 - $37,950 = $28,625 of income ---> taxed at 15% = $4,293.75
Income from $37,950 - $91,900 = $53,950 of income ---> taxed at 25% = $13,487.50
Income from $91,900 - $91,901 = $1 of income ---> taxed at 28% = $0.28
Total Taxes paid is $932.50 + $4,293.75 + $13,487.50 + $0.28 = $18,714.03
Total income of $91,901
Effective Tax Rate = $18,714.03 / $91,900 = approximately 20.3635%
This idea that you get drastically screwed because you made an extra dollar which caused you to jump a bracket is just a ridiculous view that unfortunately a lot of people share.
Yes, funding from the State of Michigan only represents roughly 15% of the University's revenues, which is much lower than it used to be. Let's be clear though. If 15% of the University's budget disappeared, we would all be pretty angry.
As long as Umich takes public money from the State of Michigan, it needs to favor in-state students. That's just a political reality, or else say goodby to 15% of the budget.
The problem with this model is that the $65k (or whatever the gradient thresholds are) is more or less an arbitrary number. Sure, it may be based off of some calculation (e.g. multiple of the poverty line, median family income in Michigan, etc.), but there are going to be people who barely exceed the cutoff who are not demonstrably in a better financial position than those who are below the cutoff and receive the free tuition benefit (as some have already pointed out). This leads to bad incentives and may be deemed by some to be unfair.
The better model would be to cap the per student tuition at a percentage derived by using marginal income brackets similar to the methodology of our tax rate schedules. I believe that it would be the most fair given that the cap is progressive, and it wouldn't create a dranconian penalty to families for increasing its income over some arbitrary number. Sure, the income ranges themselves would be arbitrary numbers, but the extra tuition costs from jumping a bracket would be more paleatable.
Of course, this then would mean that the Umich would be functionally reducing tuition for many in-state students. Given the qualifiers attached to the current plan, I would be curious to see what percentage of in-state students Umich projects will qualify.
It will be very interesting to see Harbaugh develop Milton's mechanics. Milton's arm strength is clearly evident; however, he needs to correct some issues.
Granted this is just one highlight video from one 7on7; however, every now and then he opens up his hips too much (i.e. steps too far to the left ) that causes him to be off-balance when throwing. His most obvious area for improvement is his throwing motion; his windup is too long/slow and his elbow is too low which messes up his arm slot. This won't necessarily preclude him from being successful (hello Philip Rivers), but it does make things harder if he doesn't clean some things up.
But jeebus, the ball just explodes out of his hand. Understanding that good quarterbacking also involves being accurate, reading coverages, understanding the playbook, and a million other things, you simply can't teach that arm strength.
Milton's E11 video reminds me a lot of Shane Morris's E11 tape from Morris's sophomore year. I haven't really watched Tyler Shough's tape, but it will be interesting to see if the staff pursues a more mechanically developed prospect for its second QB. Like most/all of us, I will definitely be rooting for Milton, and I think 4 or 5 years with Harbaugh will turn him into a 1st-rounder.
The play at first looks like standard inside zone with Smith heading toward the frontside, but Glasgow and Kalis don't look like they're trying to combo and seal the DT. Glasgow almost looks like he's blocking down on the DT. The playside linebacker is filling his gap and the D linemen are flowing (or trying to flow) playside which creates a crease that Smith runs through.
The problem is actually Braden. Because this play looks like inside zone, the linebacker that Braden is supposed to block takes a step to the playside. This gives Braden a very good angle to push the linebacker down the line which would lead to a huge gap for Smith to run through. Instead, Braden just falls over without impeding his man who ends up filling the backside gap and stopping the play for a minimal gain.
There is a difference between "doing everything for the last marginal dollar at the expense of everything else" and making decisions based on financial considerations.
Brandon was the king of the marginal dollar (e.g. banning seat cushions, banning water bottles, putting a giant noodle outside Michigan Stadium, etc.). This was unnecessary as the harm in fanbase goodwill greatly outweighed whatever extra revenue (of which I assume was probably minimal considering how dumb those ideas were) was generated.
There are very prudent reasons, however, for why an athletic department would want to smooth out revenues. The AD's bills don't magically decrease simply because the football team only had six home games that year. Consistent revenues are preferable from a budgeting standpoint and a capital planning standpoint (things that theoretically should benefit the student-athletes and the fans).
Just because an athletic department makes financial decisions doesn't necessarily mean that it is nickle-and-diming its fanbase. Running a major Power 5 football program (which also basically supports 20+ other varsity sports) sometimes requires agreeing to shitty things to benefit the overall organization.
The extra game (revenue) in '18 has no bearing on fixing the decrease in '19 cash flows. Sure, the AD could hold proceeds from the extra home game in '18 in reserve (not likely though). Yes, the $2MM buyout changes the equation and it sucks. I obviously don't have the AD's budget forecasts so I have no idea where that fits. Maybe you're right and it messes up the entire analysis.
It could be true that Manuel is a complete dipshit who just got owned by Swarbrick. I would imagine that a lot of thought was put into this, and in my view, I can at least see some logical rationale behind the whole thing.
True, Michigan could have asked Arkansas to flip the '18/'19 schedule. If I'm Jeff Long, I probably would have asked Michigan for $2MM to do this :)
The issue then is that Michigan is still playing Arkansas instead of Notre Dame. Just my opinion, but I see that as the worse option.
I don't see a problem with killing two birds with one stone. Manuel was able to get Notre Dame back on the schedule and able to get those '18/'19 home/away games fixed.
Fair point. "Hands are absolutely tied" was probably not the best statement.
My point is that there is a distinct possiblity that the home and home with Arkansas was going to get moved/reversed/changed regardless. Otherwise, to squeeze seven games of revenue into six games, the AD would have to raise prices for football (by at least 17% total over the entire season). Not sure the fanbase would like kindly upon this.
All three rivals away in the same year is a bad thing. No doubt about it.
I do, however, like that Manuel fixed the six-home-game issue in '19. Also, I would rather see Michigan play Notre Dame than Arkansas. Obviously, there are disagreements on the relative merits and drawbacks of the arrangement, but this is just my opinion.
That's a fair point that Manuel's hands weren't necessarily tied and that he could have deferred until 2020/2021 to schedule Notre Dame.
My point is that there is a distinct possiblity that Michigan's '18/'19 arrangement with Arkansas was going to get changed regardless. That six home game schedule in 2019 was problematic.
Essentially, to squeeze seven games of revenue into six games, total revenue for those six games (tickets, concessions, parking, etc.) would have to be increased by ~17% at a minimum (given that price increases would distort demand). I'm not sure the fanbase would take kindly to paying higher prices for seats.
From an optics standpoint, all three rivals away in the same year is bad. From financial standpoint, it potentially makes sense. It wouldn't be the worst thing to kill two birds with one stone (i.e. fix the six home game issue while getting Notre Dame back on the schedule).
Playing Arkansas at home in 2018, Michigan would have had up to eight home games that year (five BIG home games). Playing Arkansas away in 2019, Michigan would have had at most six home games that year (four BIG home games).
Playing at South Bend in 2018 (i.e. switching the 2018 Arkansas home game with a Notre Dame away game) could be a means for smoothing out the home/away breakdown for those two years (i.e. seven home games in both 2018 and 2019 vs. the eight and six setup).
Fandom-wise, it’s sub-optimal for Michigan to play at Columbus, East Lansing, and South Bend in the same year. Nobody is debating this. Revenue-wise, it could be that playing in South Bend in 2018 is better overall for the AD’s year-to-year cash management. Regardless of how many home games there are in a given year, the AD will always have fixed working capital requirements and debt-service payments relating to prior financing on capex (i.e. stadium upgrades, Crisler Center, other capital projects, etc.). Without having the numbers in front of me, it is a possibility that the extra revenue generated from premium games such as OSU and MSU aren’t enough to offset not having a seventh game (which would be the case in 2019). It could also be that the discounted opportunity cost of not having the seventh home game in 2019 exceeds the lost revenue of removing a premium home game in 2018.
I have a pretty neutral opinion of Manuel (to me, he’s “just a guy”), but a lot of people seem to want to jump the gun on him. Scheduling Notre Dame away in 2018 doesn’t necessarily make him stupid or a bad AD. His hands are absolutely tied. Having both OSU and MSU at home during four BIG home game years is the absolute worst-case scenario for Michigan (I’m actually trying to figure out why Brandon would agree to box himself into a six home game year (even if OSU and MSU are at home)). Short of convincing the rest of the BIG to revamp the 2018 and 2019 conference schedule by allowing us to split OSU and MSU home games into different years (or moving the OSU/MSU home years to the years where Michigan has five BIG home games), I’m not sure Manuel had a good option either way.
Whatever, hopefully the next time the schedule is made (or there is realignment), Manuel won’t have been such a d*ck that the other ADs allegedly go out of their way to screw Michigan.
Playing Arkansas at home in 2018, Michigan would have had up to eight home games that year (five BIG home games). Playing Arkansas away in 2019, Michigan would have had at most six home games that year (four BIG home games).
Playing at South Bend in 2018 (i.e. switching the 2018 Arkansas home game with a Notre Dame away game) could be a means for smoothing out the home/away breakdown for those two years (i.e. seven home games in both 2018 and 2019 vs. the eight and six setup).
Fandom-wise, it’s sub-optimal for Michigan to play at Columbus, East Lansing, and South Bend in the same year. Nobody is debating this. Revenue-wise, it could be that playing in South Bend in 2018 is better overall for the AD’s year-to-year cash management. Regardless of how many home games there are in a given year, the AD will always have fixed working capital requirements and debt-service payments relating to prior financing on capex (i.e. stadium upgrades, Crisler Center, other capital projects, etc.). Without having the numbers in front of me, it is a possibility that the extra revenue generated from premium games such as OSU and MSU aren’t enough to offset not having a seventh game (which would be the case in 2019). It could also be that the discounted opportunity cost of not having the seventh home game in 2019 exceeds the lost revenue of removing a premium home game in 2018.
I have a pretty neutral opinion of Manuel (to me, he’s “just a guy”), but a lot of people seem to want to jump the gun on him. Scheduling Notre Dame away in 2018 doesn’t necessarily make him stupid or a bad AD. His hands are absolutely tied. Having both OSU and MSU at home during four BIG home game years is the absolute worst-case scenario for Michigan (I’m actually trying to figure out why Brandon would agree to box himself into a six home game year (even if OSU and MSU are at home)). Short of convincing the rest of the BIG to revamp the 2018 and 2019 conference schedule by allowing us to split OSU and MSU home games into different years (or moving the OSU/MSU home years to the years where Michigan has five BIG home games), I’m not sure Manuel had a good option either way.
Whatever, hopefully the next time the schedule is made (or there is realignment), Manuel won’t have been such a d*ck that the other ADs allegedly go out of their way to screw Michigan.
The responsibilities of these two positions are not necessarily that dissimilar. In our 4-3 under, they are essentially DEs in a shaded a 5-2.
Obviously you look for different physical attributes for the SAM and WDE, but their responsibilities are similar (e.g. keep contain on running plays, rush the passer (you will see C Gordon or Jake Ryan blitzing a lot from the SAM), drop into zones (you will see Roh dropping back a lot when we run zone blitzes), etc).
You generally want both your WDE and SAM to be hybrid-ish players in the 4-3 under; you want the SAM to be more athletic and the WDE to be bigger. None of us have seen Beyer actually play; maybe he has the mobility/change of direction skills to cover TEs or backs coming into the flat; maybe he doesn't.
Mattison said in his presser that they may make minor tweaks with the "rush linebacker" (i.e. the WDE). I'm pretty sure this is what he is alluding to and that there are no plans to stick Beyer at MLB or WLB.
I don't know the exact penalty (maybe illegal procedure) but you can't have more than one guy in motion at the snap of the ball.
You can do a "shift" where multiple guys move at the same time before the ball is snapped (you will see this with audibles), but all but one guy needs to be set for at least a second before the ball is snapped (e.g. if four guys "shift", then at least three of them need to be set for one second before the ball is snapped; the fourth guy could still be in motion when the ball is snapped).
Agreed that the DT and NT positions very much need to be addressed. In 2012, our rotation is Campbell, Washington, Ash and Talbott. Obviously this year we will see where these four stand since all of them should at least see the field some this year (maybe not Talbott). If there is any position where a true freshman will play in 2012, it is at DT.
As we know, the coaching staff is also addressing the OL situation too. I'm not trying to be a downer but for the next three years (2011, 2012 and 2013 seasons) the extended depth chart (i.e. the backups) looks very scary, especially 2013. This obviously isn't a new concept as we have all witnessed the 2010 and 2011 recruiting classes with respect to the OL and the lack of bodies (we can throw in 2009 too, now that Q Washington is a DT).
2011 Depth Chart (2 Deep in Italics)
LT: Lewan (RS So); Schofield (RS So)
LG: Barnum (RS Jr); Pace (RS Fr)
C: Molk (RS Sr); Khoury (RS Jr); Miller (Fr)
RG: Omameh (RS Jr); Mealer (RS Jr)
RT: Huyge (RS Sr); Posada (Fr) OR Bryant (Fr)
Assuming no walk-ons are good enough to play, we will have a true freshman (Posada or Bryant) in the 2-deep next year. This is also assuming that Pace is able to continue his career; I have not read anything negative about Pace's injury situation in a while so I will assume that has resumed his playing career. If Pace is not able to play, then we will have two true freshmen in the 2-deep since both Posada and Bryant will be in it. Either way, we will have two freshman in the 2-deep since Pace is redshirt freshman. Also, Bryant has been pegged as a guard and there is some chatter that Posada is a better fit as a guard as well. IDK if Posada is a guard or a tackle but I hope one of them can fill in as a backup.
We have no OTs outside of Lewan and Schofield; this is where not taking any tackles in 2010 really hurts. Again, the questions about playing Posada at tackle still apply. Hypothetically, Bryant can be a backup OT (he is 6'5") and we can slide Miller or Pace into G which is obviously less than ideal. Assuming that Posada and Bryant weren't forced into duty in 2011 thus keeping their redshirts intact, we will have at least 3 freshman in the 2-deep (either (i) 2 RS freshman (Bryant, Posada) and a true freshman (Braden or other recruit) if Bryant is a guard or (ii) 3 RS freshman (Bryant, Posada and Miller) if Bryant is a tackle. As an optimist, 2012 could be a special year since we return a very veteran starting lineup on the OL (all RS juniors and seniors with starting experience except for Khoury who will be a RS senior).
2013 Depth Chart (2 Deep in Italics)
LT: Lewan (RS Sr); ???
LG: Bryant (RS So); ???
C: Pace (RS Jr); Miller (RS So)
RG: Posada (RS So); Stacey? (RS Fr)
RT: Schofield (RS Sr); Braden? (RS Fr)
I am pretty confident that the coaching staff will be able to get their 6 OL for the 2012 recruiting class, so those "???" will obviously be filled in with 2012 recruits. The story, however, is that we will again have freshman in our 2-deep. This time, the number of freshman is 4. I have Posada as a guard, but he could also be a backup tackle and we could have the loser of the battle at center (between Pace and Miller) slide over to guard. Then in the case of an injury, Posada could fill in.
CONCLUSION
1. Our starting lineups look pretty good actually with 2012 looking like a year where our line should dominate in the trenches. The problem is that injuries and players not panning out can obviously ruin this. Since we did not recruit with high numbers, we absolutely need Barnum, Schofield, Posada, Bryant, Miller/Pace to become at least average B10 linemen (for which I'm cautiously confident), or we need to have the recruits after them be the Long/Lewan types who can play well as redshirt freshman. I'm not sure how reasonable it is to not have any injuries to the OL over the next three years, and any accuracy of the Pace rumors would obviously exacerbate things. Likewise there is a lot of pressure on the coaches (not that there isn't normally a lot of pressure on these coaches) to develop and motivate these guys as Posada and Bryant will need to develop into capable starters by their RS sophomore years.
2. Again to state the obvious, it is absolutely critical that we get at least 5 lineman this year with at least two guards and two tackles. The previous sentence was actually true for last year's class but that obviously didn't happen due to reasons that I wish to not re-live. Failure to do this will result in 2014 looking exactly like 2008 (DTs switching to OL and starting games).
3. I don't think we will see a true spring game until 2014 since that will be the first year that we can fill our two-deep with non-freshman (of course assuming that we get our 5-6 OL recruits this year).
If Jake Ryan is at SAM, that may explain the DE confusion. The SAM is ideally a tweener DE/LB that can really run; think Shawn Crable without the missed tackles.
"I assume they weren't zone blocking, as Hoke doesn't like it."
Hoke never said he doesn't like zone blocking. He said he doesn't like to zone block all the time. SDSU did run zone strech plays in their bowl game.
It makes sense to mix up our blocking schemes, especially since the zone plays and power plays are good counters to each other. There were a few games last year where RR blocked down and pulled his guards.
1. A good coach is a good coach, regardless of conference. RR didn't fail at Michigan because the Big Ten was so much tougher than the Big East. Urban Meyer never was a head coach at a power conference before going to Florida. Tressel was able to parlay his success at I-AA into success at Ohio St. Dantonio (18-17) and Chizik both had mediocre to bad records at their previous stops before moving into the Big 10 and SEC respectively. The thing that Meyer (ND), Tressel (OSU), Dantonio (MSU, OSU) and Chizik (Aub, Tex) all had was experience working at a big-time program (either as a position coach or coordinator). Hoke has coached a Michigan before and he has turned around programs. I don't understand how those programs being in the MAC or Mountain West change anything; the ability to change culture/attitude is universal, regardless of where you coach and in what conference.
2. Why are people so convinced that the switch to a more balanced offense (balanced as in spread/power/i-form balance not run/pass balance) will spell the doom Denard? Hoke never said he won't run zone blocking; he said he doesn't like running it all the time. Borges never said we won't run the spread, he said we won't be a spread team (i.e. we won't run the spread exclusively). Borges did say that we would be under center 50%; I would assume the 50% of the time we're in shotgun will be out of spread formations. I would assume out of these spread formations, we will still run the ball a lot. The coaches still expect to run Denard 15 times a game which is much more manageable than the 20+ last year. Denard will never be mistaken for Tom Brady but he showed that he can be an effective passer, and I expect him to be even better if they can fix a few things in his throwing motion. Denard should still rush for close to 1,000+ yards and I expect his passing yardage will skyrocket because we will run a more sophisticated passing attack (or at least we better).
3. If we can pull the top recruits out of the south and west, then yes, I would prefer recruits from there because they are better. With the exception of Denard, however, it's not like we were cleaning up in the south and west. It looks like we were pulling players from those areas that were comparable in talent to those found in the midwest. If that's going to be the case, then I would prefer players from the midwest; they are easier to reel in and they have less of a weather adjustment. Talent does trump all though; if we can get to the point where we have our pick of recruits, then I would obviously prefer the best of FL, CA, TX, LA, GA over the best of the midwest. Let's focus on the low-hanging fruit first (especially since the talent is good in the midwest this year) until we can rebuild towards a national championship level.
4. He did fine in the press conference I thought. He won't win speech contests but he said what he needed to say. RR always got into trouble because he would try to make jokes at his press conference and the media would always turn it around on him (e.g. Vince Lombardi not being able to coach this defense). Also, RR had a tendency to try to explain what went wrong which came across as making excuses or throwing his players under the bus. We will see, but I just don't see this happening with Hoke.
Like most of us, I was underwhelmed by the hire but I'm more than willing to give the guy a chance. He has a lot of things lined up for him (returning talent, support from alums and AD). If he can start creating some positive momentum (which he has already started with media perception) then maybe this will snowball into great things. Look at Dantonio at MSU; he's a mediocre coach leading a mediocre program but those guys love him there. He is providing stability and positive momentum. Take our program, even after the last 3 years, get our Dantonio (minus the douchiness) and we maybe get back to being an elite program.
I didn't take it as you calling me out, and I respect that you obviously know what you're talking about.
I think we should be under the assumption that our safeties are fast enough to cover TEs. There are occasional fast TEs, but the TEs are generally not the burners that are going to be beating you deep or making quick cuts that create seperation. If it's the case that our safeties can't cover TEs, then we can't play man.
Likewise using your example of the personnel package of Hopkins, Hayes, Koger, Hemmingway, Roundtree, we need to switch out of man if Hayes motions to the slot and we don't have a safety that can cover him. If they go big (with Hemmingway as the H-back), we can very much play man, assuming that a safety can cover Koger.
I agree that the offensive coaches are looking for ways to gain an advantage on the offense through formation, motion, personnel groupings, but the defense doesn't have to just sit there and take it. Shouldn't a defense change their scheme/calls/coverages based on what the offense shows (e.g. example of Hayes coming out of the backfield so you check out of man)?
Thanks for the explanation of the cover-6. Always just called it "rotating safeties", good to put a real name on it.
I agree with you about the true freshman CBs not necessarily being ready to play and that we should cut them some slack. I agree that they can become better tacklers with more experience/coaching/size/strength/etc. I still think that they are going to have some problems going into their sophomore years.
I'm not understanding the analogy to LBs. One of a LB's major responsibility is to stop the run; that is not necessarily the case with a CB based on the scheme. If your LB is a poor tackler, there is not much you can do to hide it; you can, however, hide or scheme around a CB who has problems tackling by giving them deep zone responsibilities. That was all I was saying. I was just stating an opinion about the best coverage given what I perceive to be our personnel's relative strengths and weaknesses.
Also, if our safeties aren't fast enough to cover slots in man, then we need to substitute them out and bring in somebody (maybe a CB) who is. If our secondary can't stay with every receiver that lines up on a particular play, then we can't play man on that play (e.g. if we only have two guys who are able to cover, then we can't play man on plays where the offense comes out with 3+ receivers). All I'm saying is that none of our safeties (assuming Woolfolk isn't a safety) are known for being burners, so I don't see how running a base coverage that requires each of them cover half the field is putting them in a position to succeed.
I do think we're going to run some cover-2 but I would assume that we will see a lot more cover 6, cover 4, cover 3 and cover 1 based on our personnel.
"I think of the 4-3 under as something halfway between a 4-3 and a 3-4"
The 4-3 under is actually a 5-2 defense where the line is shaded to the strong side and the "5-2 strong side DE" is a "4-3 under SLB" with pass coverage responsibilities.
The defense is designed to be very stout against the run and also create a lot of pressure from the line on pass plays for the reasons that Brian discussed (3-tech and weakside 5-tech being one-on-one with their OL counterparts).
The 3-4 is very closely related to the 5-2, however, so I guess Brian's view still holds.
By "lets assume that we are going to be running cover 2, which is a very likely", I'm assuming that you mean that one of our many coverages will be the cover 2.
I'm not sure our safeties are fast enough yet for us to run a cover 2 as a base coverage. Also, if Woolfolk stays at CB, we may want to utilize his speed more by giving him deep responsibilities. Also, the other CBs (Floyd, Avery, Talbott, Christian) weren't exactly the best tacklers either; not sure asking them to support the run as cover 2 CBs caters to their strengths.
Obviously the cover 2 has a lot of advantages and thus we need to run it on occasion, but I think our secondary would get abused if we ran it as our base coverage.
It sounds like we are going to be running a lot of man. I would imagine that we are also going to be rotating our coverage a lot out of a 2 deep safety look where Woolfolk as a weakside CB takes his deep outside 1/3, the weakside safety takes the deep middle 1/3, the strongside safety takes the strongside outside 1/3 and the strongside CB takes his flat and supports the run.
The main responsibility of any defensive lineman is to make sure they don't get driven back. I agree 100%, but that's a given for any defense. If your DL is getting dominated and pushed back 5 yards every play, you will not be good, regardless of where you line up. I'm assuming that our DL is not so undermanned that they will be at least able to individually hold their own against blockers.
With that said, in the 4-3 over/under defense, the main responsibility of the lineman is still to maintain an outside technique on the blocker. That doesn't mean you shoot the outside gap; you still need to engage the blocker and hold your ground but the defense will give up long gains if a lineman gets hooked (obviously the same holds true if a lineman gets driven back). That's why the linemen are lined up in outside shades to make it harder for the blockers to accomplish this. I think we're saying the same thing.
I agree that a 3-3-5 is supposed to be a 1-gap defense, but I'm not sure that's what we were playing last year. It appeared that Martin's job was to engage the center and then fight to the side of the flow. Also, it doesn't look like any of the linebackers were shooting any particular gap but were rather reading the line/flow.
It's hard to tell what was going on because GERG was pinching and slanting the line a lot but personally, it was frustrating to watch the DEs when they were lined up in 5-techniques getting hooked by the tackle.
Recent Comments
Class size is important. It's always better to have more rather than less bullets in the chamber.
There are a lot of 4 stars in the class so the quality is very good, but I think people underrate the importance of quantity. In the NIL era, we should be bringing in 30 recruits a year.
Look at MSU's class. It looks like it is going to be small so that means they have to have a high hit rate. A bigger class provides a better margin for error.
The size of this class should be thought of as a strength and not as a reason to say that the class doesn't deserve to be in the top 5 or 10 or whatever.
Too good. It's funny because it's true.
Jett absolutely is a prime reason for why Michigan was losing those must-win games at the end of the season. He was playing losing basketball.
On offense, he would just jack up terrible shots (which stopped falling like they had earlier in the season) and ball-movement would just stop as soon as the ball got into his hands (leaving the other four players to just stand around).
On defense, he was still just loafing. He could not stop dribble penetration and would constantly lose his man on back door cuts for easy baskets. He showed zero toughness in boxing out his man and rebounding. The complete lack of effort was the most annoying aspect of him being on the court.
I personally hope he leaves for the NBA. He's a cancer that needs to be rooted out before his lack of effort and toughness metastasizes to the rest of the team.
100%. Jett was an absolute coach-killer this year.
He showed enough flashes on offense to warrant playing (at least on this team), but his utter lack of interest in playing defense and his tendency to take (and miss) horrible shots amounted to a lot of losing basketball. Notice how the team looked much better when he was injured. He was basically this year's Caleb Houstan.
That's what happens when you are forced to rely on freshman to lead the team.
If you're referring to the play near the end of regulation against Wisconsin, he was very clearly fouled going up for a shot. He should've had 2 free throws.
Granted, the refs made up for the missed call by somehow ruling that the ball was last touched by Wisconsin.
The overall point is that Dickinson has overall good hands ... no idea what you've been watching.
Team defense has been soooo much better since Jett went out.
Jett's uncanny ability to either lose his man away from the ball or get beat off the dribble was hurting the entire structure of the defense. This is the same way that T Will's limitations bog down the offense.
That's the design of the defense. They're doubling the pick n roll to stop dribble penetration (which seems like a good strategy given that Wisconsin has been ice cold from the three point line). They rotated pretty well after that and the Wisconsin player happened to hit a contested three. You tip your hat and move on. I'll take Wisconsin shooting those contested threes all night.
They got an open 3 from Baker which was a much better shot than you typically would see when winding the clock down to 5 seconds. You're only complaining because he missed it (even though he's one of the team's best 3 point shooters).
Such bad awareness by that defenseman. He knows there was a quick change so he needs to hold off on playing the puck.
And TJ Hughes can't miss the net from the house like that a few minutes before on the PP.
I thought the set to end the game was pretty decent actually.
They get a high ball screen off the inbounds and Bufkin would've had a decent look had he took the shot (at least for an eight second play), but Bufkin inexplicably kicked the ball out to Jett and Jett had no chance to do anything with a defender all over him and two seconds left on the clock.
Hate to dog the…
THIS ^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Hate to dog the kid because he is clearly trying hard, but he does more harm than good when on the court.
Also, Bufkin and Jett need to be benched every time they lose their man for an easy basket. All season long we have watched those two get burned for layups or dunks because either they aren't moving their feet or they overplay their defender which opens up an easy back cut.
It makes this team really hard to watch at times because they aren't improving on the little things.
Juwan Howard :…
Hot take #1
Juwan Howard : 2022-2023 Michigan Basketball :: Scott Frost : 2021 Nebraska Football.
Good schemes but players are situationally so bad which causes close losses.
The last sequence on offense was so bad ... When Bufkin drove the ball, he needed to put up a shot. With that little time left, there was no way that a kick out was going to result in a better shot by Jett. Just awful.
Hot Take #2
Juwan Howard would be a better NBA coach than college coach. They run really nice sets but the players make really bad decisions. Hunter Dickinson gets periodic brain cramps and Terrance Williams is absolutely unplayable at times.
You will be fine taking the train. They run more or less every hour on the weekends. If coming from EWR, make sure to take the Northeast Corridor line and not the North Jersey Coast Line which will take you to the Jersey Shore. Also, make sure to take the train heading towards Trenton (i.e. away from NYC).
The walk is completely fine. You will walk through campus and see all the students partying. Good luck on getting an Uber. If you're going to rent a car, you might as well do so at EWR and drive to the stadium directly from the airport.
New Brunswick / Piscataway generally has trash food. Get a fat sandwich at RU Hungry and then head to NYC to get an actual meal.
Trash stadium with no atmosphere whatsoever. There will be a lot of U-M fans/grads in attendance.
Yes! Brian is making his way back ...
MGOBLOG snark/shade at its best!
If you create a culture where your employees genuinely like working for you, then they will give you a chance to counter (because they still want to work for you albeit at a higher income level). Otherwise, if an employee leaves without at least seeing whether you would match the offer, you should take that as a reflection on you and/or your company, not that employee. It is common sense that people who like where they work don't want to leave.
If you create a culture where your employees genuinely like working for you, then they will give you a chance to counter (because they still want to work for you albeit at a higher income level). Otherwise, if an employee leaves without at least seeing whether you would match the offer, you should take that as a reflection on you and/or your company, not that employee. It is common sense that people who like where they work don't want to leave.
If you create a culture where your employees genuinely like working for you, then they will give you a chance to counter (because they still want to work for you albeit at a higher income level). Otherwise, if an employee leaves without at least seeing whether you would match the offer, you should take that as a reflection on you and/or your company, not that employee. It is common sense that people who like where they work don't want to leave.
If you create a culture where your employees genuinely like working for you, then they will give you a chance to counter (because they still want to work for you albeit at a higher income level). Otherwise, if an employee leaves without at least seeing whether you would match the offer, you should take that as a reflection on you and/or your company, not that employee. It is common sense that people who like where they work don't want to leave.
I mentioned this in the thread on the board. Doyle has a very compact and smooth trhowing motion (in contract to Joe Milton's throwing motion). I think Milton has a stronger arm but Doyle has far less mechanical work ahead of him.
Agree with most of the sentiments so far. This young man has a very compact and smooth throwing motion (in contract to Joe Milton's throwing motion). I think Milton has a stronger arm but Doyle has far less mechanical work ahead of him.
I agree that great coaches make personnel errors sometimes. I would also concede that Smith's lack of speed prevented the the team from having as many explosive runs as they could have had last year; however, I wouldn't say that the team wasted carries with him.
Smith was easily the best runner when it came to grinding out yards. He hardly ever fumbled (Evans had one more fumble in roughly 100 less carries). Finally, Smith was easily the best pass blocker. I think it was easy to underestimate Smith's value because his major weakness was so obvious (lack of speed) but his strengths (good balance, ball security, pass protection) were less noticeable.
I know Evans and Higdon had far better yards/attempt numbers than Smith, but a lot of those yards were coming in garbage time or for specially designed plays. In my opinion, all the RBs were very similar in their ineffectiveness when the blocking broke down (most RBs will struggle when their OL struggles). Obviously, Evans and Higdon could turn in more explosive plays when holes opened up, but their presence on the field was also a strong cue to the defense to prepare for a running play or some sort of screen-pass/draw play.
I'm honestly astonished at how often those screen passes and draw plays worked when Higdon, Evans, or Isaac were in the game (especially on 3rd and long) because it was very obvious that the coaching staff didn't trust the trio's pass blocking. I only distinctly remember Ohio State stopping the draw play (but this was because they also have very good players and very good coaches).
Henne was a very good QB at Michigan, but one of the things holding him back in the NFL is his throwing motion. There are also other issues as well that cropped up during his time at Michigan (locking in on receivers, accuracy issues, etc.) that appear to have continued in the NFL.
He has good arm-strength, but his throwing motion is way too long. He brings the ball down to his hip during his windup. It negates his arm-strength because it allows NFL defensive backs the time to break on his passes. Bringing the ball down to his hip also causes his arm slot to be too low somtimes, resulting in a 3/4s delivery that causes his passes to sail on him (i.e. tacopants). It doesn't help that he has generally played on mediocre to bad teams with mediocre to bad offensive lines his whole career.
I wish him all the best because he was a great Michigan Man, but unless there are many changes to his mechanics (which is unlikely this late in his career), I believe that he will struggle if he wins the starting job.
Good luck Henne! Go Blue!
If available to you, try the TD Premier checking account (can be opened in 20 minutes at a branch). The account has no FX transaction fee or non-TD ATM fee (TD doesn't itself charge a fee and they will actually reimburse the fee that the other bank/ATM charges you).
You can then basically go to any ATM in the world and get local-currency cash without paying any fees while getting the previous day's spot rate. I opened one up a few years ago specifically for this reason when I was traveling out of the country.
Good Luck!
That's a good reason for the $266,647. Why doesn't the AD then just reimburse the University for the academic support specialist's salary? It appears that the "Total Allocated" figure is a net amount. Wouldn't a full reimbursement back to the University result in a $0 number? Since the employee is still being paid by the University vs the AD, the conflict would still be avoided.
I agree with kdhoffma that the AD does eventually end up making net payments back to the University (especially considering that the AD writes a giant check to the University on top of student-athlete tuition payments).
For me, it's more about optics. There are still idiots out there who think "my tax money" is being used to pay Harbaugh's salary. Figures like this reinforce the idea, regardless of the actual truth behind the numbers.
Does anybody know why the AD takes $266,467 from the University as described in the "Total Allocated" column (i.e. "sum of student fees, direct and indirect institutional support and state money allocated to the athletics department, minus certain funds the department transferred back to the school")?
It doesn't appear that the AD needs the ~$250k given the reported ~$6MM margin (understanding that the $6MM can be wiggled around through accounting adjustments).
The optics just look bad when the University is appearing to take funds from the University when the ADs of other public universities are not.
Marginal tax rates do not equal effective tax rates. The tax brackets are based on marginal income.
Yes, in your example, by going $1 above, you are going to pay 33% instead of 28% but only for that $1; it does not change the tax rate applied to the income you earned prior to moving up to the 33% tax bracket. Yes, your overall effective tax rate will increase, but it will not increase by 5% of your taxable income. In fact, if you only make $1 extra, your effective tax rate will barely change at all.
Tax Table for Individuals
Tax Rate Income Range
10% 0 - $9,325
15% $9,326 - $37,950
25% $37,951 - $91,900
28% $91,901 - $191,650
Example 1: Let's say that you are an individual whose taxable income (all income minus deductions, credits, etc.) is $91,900. Your marginal tax rate is 25%. Your effective tax rate is approximately 20.3632%.
Income from 0 - $9,325 = $9,325 of income ---> taxed at 10% = $932.50
Income from $9,325 - $37,950 = $28,625 of income ---> taxed at 15% = $4,293.75
Income from $37,950 - $91,900 = $53,950 of income ---> taxed at 25% = $13,487.50
Total Taxes paid is $932.50 + $4,293.75 + $13,487.50 = $18,713.75
Total income of $91,900
Effective Tax Rate = $18,713.75 / $91,900 = approximately 20.3632%
Example 2: Let's you say make an extra $1 so that your taxable income is now $91,901. You have jumped a tax bracket, so your marginal tax rate is now 28%. Your effective tax rate is now 20.3635%. It barely made a difference (0.0003%).
Income from 0 - $9,325 = $9,325 of income ---> taxed at 10% = $932.50
Income from $9,325 - $37,950 = $28,625 of income ---> taxed at 15% = $4,293.75
Income from $37,950 - $91,900 = $53,950 of income ---> taxed at 25% = $13,487.50
Income from $91,900 - $91,901 = $1 of income ---> taxed at 28% = $0.28
Total Taxes paid is $932.50 + $4,293.75 + $13,487.50 + $0.28 = $18,714.03
Total income of $91,901
Effective Tax Rate = $18,714.03 / $91,900 = approximately 20.3635%
This idea that you get drastically screwed because you made an extra dollar which caused you to jump a bracket is just a ridiculous view that unfortunately a lot of people share.
Yes, funding from the State of Michigan only represents roughly 15% of the University's revenues, which is much lower than it used to be. Let's be clear though. If 15% of the University's budget disappeared, we would all be pretty angry.
As long as Umich takes public money from the State of Michigan, it needs to favor in-state students. That's just a political reality, or else say goodby to 15% of the budget.
The problem with this model is that the $65k (or whatever the gradient thresholds are) is more or less an arbitrary number. Sure, it may be based off of some calculation (e.g. multiple of the poverty line, median family income in Michigan, etc.), but there are going to be people who barely exceed the cutoff who are not demonstrably in a better financial position than those who are below the cutoff and receive the free tuition benefit (as some have already pointed out). This leads to bad incentives and may be deemed by some to be unfair.
The better model would be to cap the per student tuition at a percentage derived by using marginal income brackets similar to the methodology of our tax rate schedules. I believe that it would be the most fair given that the cap is progressive, and it wouldn't create a dranconian penalty to families for increasing its income over some arbitrary number. Sure, the income ranges themselves would be arbitrary numbers, but the extra tuition costs from jumping a bracket would be more paleatable.
Of course, this then would mean that the Umich would be functionally reducing tuition for many in-state students. Given the qualifiers attached to the current plan, I would be curious to see what percentage of in-state students Umich projects will qualify.
It will be very interesting to see Harbaugh develop Milton's mechanics. Milton's arm strength is clearly evident; however, he needs to correct some issues.
Granted this is just one highlight video from one 7on7; however, every now and then he opens up his hips too much (i.e. steps too far to the left ) that causes him to be off-balance when throwing. His most obvious area for improvement is his throwing motion; his windup is too long/slow and his elbow is too low which messes up his arm slot. This won't necessarily preclude him from being successful (hello Philip Rivers), but it does make things harder if he doesn't clean some things up.
But jeebus, the ball just explodes out of his hand. Understanding that good quarterbacking also involves being accurate, reading coverages, understanding the playbook, and a million other things, you simply can't teach that arm strength.
Milton's E11 video reminds me a lot of Shane Morris's E11 tape from Morris's sophomore year. I haven't really watched Tyler Shough's tape, but it will be interesting to see if the staff pursues a more mechanically developed prospect for its second QB. Like most/all of us, I will definitely be rooting for Milton, and I think 4 or 5 years with Harbaugh will turn him into a 1st-rounder.
I wonder if this was a designed cutback.
The play at first looks like standard inside zone with Smith heading toward the frontside, but Glasgow and Kalis don't look like they're trying to combo and seal the DT. Glasgow almost looks like he's blocking down on the DT. The playside linebacker is filling his gap and the D linemen are flowing (or trying to flow) playside which creates a crease that Smith runs through.
The problem is actually Braden. Because this play looks like inside zone, the linebacker that Braden is supposed to block takes a step to the playside. This gives Braden a very good angle to push the linebacker down the line which would lead to a huge gap for Smith to run through. Instead, Braden just falls over without impeding his man who ends up filling the backside gap and stopping the play for a minimal gain.
There is a difference between "doing everything for the last marginal dollar at the expense of everything else" and making decisions based on financial considerations.
Brandon was the king of the marginal dollar (e.g. banning seat cushions, banning water bottles, putting a giant noodle outside Michigan Stadium, etc.). This was unnecessary as the harm in fanbase goodwill greatly outweighed whatever extra revenue (of which I assume was probably minimal considering how dumb those ideas were) was generated.
There are very prudent reasons, however, for why an athletic department would want to smooth out revenues. The AD's bills don't magically decrease simply because the football team only had six home games that year. Consistent revenues are preferable from a budgeting standpoint and a capital planning standpoint (things that theoretically should benefit the student-athletes and the fans).
Just because an athletic department makes financial decisions doesn't necessarily mean that it is nickle-and-diming its fanbase. Running a major Power 5 football program (which also basically supports 20+ other varsity sports) sometimes requires agreeing to shitty things to benefit the overall organization.
The extra game (revenue) in '18 has no bearing on fixing the decrease in '19 cash flows. Sure, the AD could hold proceeds from the extra home game in '18 in reserve (not likely though). Yes, the $2MM buyout changes the equation and it sucks. I obviously don't have the AD's budget forecasts so I have no idea where that fits. Maybe you're right and it messes up the entire analysis.
It could be true that Manuel is a complete dipshit who just got owned by Swarbrick. I would imagine that a lot of thought was put into this, and in my view, I can at least see some logical rationale behind the whole thing.
True, Michigan could have asked Arkansas to flip the '18/'19 schedule. If I'm Jeff Long, I probably would have asked Michigan for $2MM to do this :)
The issue then is that Michigan is still playing Arkansas instead of Notre Dame. Just my opinion, but I see that as the worse option.
I don't see a problem with killing two birds with one stone. Manuel was able to get Notre Dame back on the schedule and able to get those '18/'19 home/away games fixed.
Fair point. "Hands are absolutely tied" was probably not the best statement.
My point is that there is a distinct possiblity that the home and home with Arkansas was going to get moved/reversed/changed regardless. Otherwise, to squeeze seven games of revenue into six games, the AD would have to raise prices for football (by at least 17% total over the entire season). Not sure the fanbase would like kindly upon this.
All three rivals away in the same year is a bad thing. No doubt about it.
I do, however, like that Manuel fixed the six-home-game issue in '19. Also, I would rather see Michigan play Notre Dame than Arkansas. Obviously, there are disagreements on the relative merits and drawbacks of the arrangement, but this is just my opinion.
That's a fair point that Manuel's hands weren't necessarily tied and that he could have deferred until 2020/2021 to schedule Notre Dame.
My point is that there is a distinct possiblity that Michigan's '18/'19 arrangement with Arkansas was going to get changed regardless. That six home game schedule in 2019 was problematic.
Essentially, to squeeze seven games of revenue into six games, total revenue for those six games (tickets, concessions, parking, etc.) would have to be increased by ~17% at a minimum (given that price increases would distort demand). I'm not sure the fanbase would take kindly to paying higher prices for seats.
From an optics standpoint, all three rivals away in the same year is bad. From financial standpoint, it potentially makes sense. It wouldn't be the worst thing to kill two birds with one stone (i.e. fix the six home game issue while getting Notre Dame back on the schedule).
Playing Arkansas at home in 2018, Michigan would have had up to eight home games that year (five BIG home games). Playing Arkansas away in 2019, Michigan would have had at most six home games that year (four BIG home games).
Playing at South Bend in 2018 (i.e. switching the 2018 Arkansas home game with a Notre Dame away game) could be a means for smoothing out the home/away breakdown for those two years (i.e. seven home games in both 2018 and 2019 vs. the eight and six setup).
Fandom-wise, it’s sub-optimal for Michigan to play at Columbus, East Lansing, and South Bend in the same year. Nobody is debating this. Revenue-wise, it could be that playing in South Bend in 2018 is better overall for the AD’s year-to-year cash management. Regardless of how many home games there are in a given year, the AD will always have fixed working capital requirements and debt-service payments relating to prior financing on capex (i.e. stadium upgrades, Crisler Center, other capital projects, etc.). Without having the numbers in front of me, it is a possibility that the extra revenue generated from premium games such as OSU and MSU aren’t enough to offset not having a seventh game (which would be the case in 2019). It could also be that the discounted opportunity cost of not having the seventh home game in 2019 exceeds the lost revenue of removing a premium home game in 2018.
I have a pretty neutral opinion of Manuel (to me, he’s “just a guy”), but a lot of people seem to want to jump the gun on him. Scheduling Notre Dame away in 2018 doesn’t necessarily make him stupid or a bad AD. His hands are absolutely tied. Having both OSU and MSU at home during four BIG home game years is the absolute worst-case scenario for Michigan (I’m actually trying to figure out why Brandon would agree to box himself into a six home game year (even if OSU and MSU are at home)). Short of convincing the rest of the BIG to revamp the 2018 and 2019 conference schedule by allowing us to split OSU and MSU home games into different years (or moving the OSU/MSU home years to the years where Michigan has five BIG home games), I’m not sure Manuel had a good option either way.
Whatever, hopefully the next time the schedule is made (or there is realignment), Manuel won’t have been such a d*ck that the other ADs allegedly go out of their way to screw Michigan.
Playing Arkansas at home in 2018, Michigan would have had up to eight home games that year (five BIG home games). Playing Arkansas away in 2019, Michigan would have had at most six home games that year (four BIG home games).
Playing at South Bend in 2018 (i.e. switching the 2018 Arkansas home game with a Notre Dame away game) could be a means for smoothing out the home/away breakdown for those two years (i.e. seven home games in both 2018 and 2019 vs. the eight and six setup).
Fandom-wise, it’s sub-optimal for Michigan to play at Columbus, East Lansing, and South Bend in the same year. Nobody is debating this. Revenue-wise, it could be that playing in South Bend in 2018 is better overall for the AD’s year-to-year cash management. Regardless of how many home games there are in a given year, the AD will always have fixed working capital requirements and debt-service payments relating to prior financing on capex (i.e. stadium upgrades, Crisler Center, other capital projects, etc.). Without having the numbers in front of me, it is a possibility that the extra revenue generated from premium games such as OSU and MSU aren’t enough to offset not having a seventh game (which would be the case in 2019). It could also be that the discounted opportunity cost of not having the seventh home game in 2019 exceeds the lost revenue of removing a premium home game in 2018.
I have a pretty neutral opinion of Manuel (to me, he’s “just a guy”), but a lot of people seem to want to jump the gun on him. Scheduling Notre Dame away in 2018 doesn’t necessarily make him stupid or a bad AD. His hands are absolutely tied. Having both OSU and MSU at home during four BIG home game years is the absolute worst-case scenario for Michigan (I’m actually trying to figure out why Brandon would agree to box himself into a six home game year (even if OSU and MSU are at home)). Short of convincing the rest of the BIG to revamp the 2018 and 2019 conference schedule by allowing us to split OSU and MSU home games into different years (or moving the OSU/MSU home years to the years where Michigan has five BIG home games), I’m not sure Manuel had a good option either way.
Whatever, hopefully the next time the schedule is made (or there is realignment), Manuel won’t have been such a d*ck that the other ADs allegedly go out of their way to screw Michigan.
The responsibilities of these two positions are not necessarily that dissimilar. In our 4-3 under, they are essentially DEs in a shaded a 5-2.
Obviously you look for different physical attributes for the SAM and WDE, but their responsibilities are similar (e.g. keep contain on running plays, rush the passer (you will see C Gordon or Jake Ryan blitzing a lot from the SAM), drop into zones (you will see Roh dropping back a lot when we run zone blitzes), etc).
You generally want both your WDE and SAM to be hybrid-ish players in the 4-3 under; you want the SAM to be more athletic and the WDE to be bigger. None of us have seen Beyer actually play; maybe he has the mobility/change of direction skills to cover TEs or backs coming into the flat; maybe he doesn't.
Mattison said in his presser that they may make minor tweaks with the "rush linebacker" (i.e. the WDE). I'm pretty sure this is what he is alluding to and that there are no plans to stick Beyer at MLB or WLB.
I don't know the exact penalty (maybe illegal procedure) but you can't have more than one guy in motion at the snap of the ball.
You can do a "shift" where multiple guys move at the same time before the ball is snapped (you will see this with audibles), but all but one guy needs to be set for at least a second before the ball is snapped (e.g. if four guys "shift", then at least three of them need to be set for one second before the ball is snapped; the fourth guy could still be in motion when the ball is snapped).
You can't have two players go in motion at the same time.
- BJ Cunningham starts failing drug tests, breaks his collarbone twice, then never plays football again
- Keith Nichols gains 100 lbs
- a freshman refuses to carry Keshawn Martin's shoulder pads and Martin starts crying about it
Agreed that the DT and NT positions very much need to be addressed. In 2012, our rotation is Campbell, Washington, Ash and Talbott. Obviously this year we will see where these four stand since all of them should at least see the field some this year (maybe not Talbott). If there is any position where a true freshman will play in 2012, it is at DT.
As we know, the coaching staff is also addressing the OL situation too. I'm not trying to be a downer but for the next three years (2011, 2012 and 2013 seasons) the extended depth chart (i.e. the backups) looks very scary, especially 2013. This obviously isn't a new concept as we have all witnessed the 2010 and 2011 recruiting classes with respect to the OL and the lack of bodies (we can throw in 2009 too, now that Q Washington is a DT).
2011 Depth Chart (2 Deep in Italics)
LT: Lewan (RS So); Schofield (RS So)
LG: Barnum (RS Jr); Pace (RS Fr)
C: Molk (RS Sr); Khoury (RS Jr); Miller (Fr)
RG: Omameh (RS Jr); Mealer (RS Jr)
RT: Huyge (RS Sr); Posada (Fr) OR Bryant (Fr)
Assuming no walk-ons are good enough to play, we will have a true freshman (Posada or Bryant) in the 2-deep next year. This is also assuming that Pace is able to continue his career; I have not read anything negative about Pace's injury situation in a while so I will assume that has resumed his playing career. If Pace is not able to play, then we will have two true freshmen in the 2-deep since both Posada and Bryant will be in it. Either way, we will have two freshman in the 2-deep since Pace is redshirt freshman. Also, Bryant has been pegged as a guard and there is some chatter that Posada is a better fit as a guard as well. IDK if Posada is a guard or a tackle but I hope one of them can fill in as a backup.
2012 Depth Chart (2 Deep in Italics)
LT: Lewan (RS Jr); Posada (RS Fr);
LG: Barnum (RS Sr); Bryant (RS Fr);
C: Khoury (RS Sr); Pace (RS So); Miller (RS Fr)
RG: Omameh (RS Sr); Mealer (RS Sr); 2012 Recruit #1 - Stacey? (Fr)
RT: Schofield (RS Jr); 2012 Recruit #2 - Braden? (Fr)
We have no OTs outside of Lewan and Schofield; this is where not taking any tackles in 2010 really hurts. Again, the questions about playing Posada at tackle still apply. Hypothetically, Bryant can be a backup OT (he is 6'5") and we can slide Miller or Pace into G which is obviously less than ideal. Assuming that Posada and Bryant weren't forced into duty in 2011 thus keeping their redshirts intact, we will have at least 3 freshman in the 2-deep (either (i) 2 RS freshman (Bryant, Posada) and a true freshman (Braden or other recruit) if Bryant is a guard or (ii) 3 RS freshman (Bryant, Posada and Miller) if Bryant is a tackle. As an optimist, 2012 could be a special year since we return a very veteran starting lineup on the OL (all RS juniors and seniors with starting experience except for Khoury who will be a RS senior).
2013 Depth Chart (2 Deep in Italics)
LT: Lewan (RS Sr); ???
LG: Bryant (RS So); ???
C: Pace (RS Jr); Miller (RS So)
RG: Posada (RS So); Stacey? (RS Fr)
RT: Schofield (RS Sr); Braden? (RS Fr)
I am pretty confident that the coaching staff will be able to get their 6 OL for the 2012 recruiting class, so those "???" will obviously be filled in with 2012 recruits. The story, however, is that we will again have freshman in our 2-deep. This time, the number of freshman is 4. I have Posada as a guard, but he could also be a backup tackle and we could have the loser of the battle at center (between Pace and Miller) slide over to guard. Then in the case of an injury, Posada could fill in.
CONCLUSION
1. Our starting lineups look pretty good actually with 2012 looking like a year where our line should dominate in the trenches. The problem is that injuries and players not panning out can obviously ruin this. Since we did not recruit with high numbers, we absolutely need Barnum, Schofield, Posada, Bryant, Miller/Pace to become at least average B10 linemen (for which I'm cautiously confident), or we need to have the recruits after them be the Long/Lewan types who can play well as redshirt freshman. I'm not sure how reasonable it is to not have any injuries to the OL over the next three years, and any accuracy of the Pace rumors would obviously exacerbate things. Likewise there is a lot of pressure on the coaches (not that there isn't normally a lot of pressure on these coaches) to develop and motivate these guys as Posada and Bryant will need to develop into capable starters by their RS sophomore years.
2. Again to state the obvious, it is absolutely critical that we get at least 5 lineman this year with at least two guards and two tackles. The previous sentence was actually true for last year's class but that obviously didn't happen due to reasons that I wish to not re-live. Failure to do this will result in 2014 looking exactly like 2008 (DTs switching to OL and starting games).
3. I don't think we will see a true spring game until 2014 since that will be the first year that we can fill our two-deep with non-freshman (of course assuming that we get our 5-6 OL recruits this year).
I'm pretty sure Mike Martin had four stars from both Rivals and Scout. Either way, best of luck to Godin!
If Jake Ryan is at SAM, that may explain the DE confusion. The SAM is ideally a tweener DE/LB that can really run; think Shawn Crable without the missed tackles.
"I assume they weren't zone blocking, as Hoke doesn't like it."
Hoke never said he doesn't like zone blocking. He said he doesn't like to zone block all the time. SDSU did run zone strech plays in their bowl game.
It makes sense to mix up our blocking schemes, especially since the zone plays and power plays are good counters to each other. There were a few games last year where RR blocked down and pulled his guards.
1. A good coach is a good coach, regardless of conference. RR didn't fail at Michigan because the Big Ten was so much tougher than the Big East. Urban Meyer never was a head coach at a power conference before going to Florida. Tressel was able to parlay his success at I-AA into success at Ohio St. Dantonio (18-17) and Chizik both had mediocre to bad records at their previous stops before moving into the Big 10 and SEC respectively. The thing that Meyer (ND), Tressel (OSU), Dantonio (MSU, OSU) and Chizik (Aub, Tex) all had was experience working at a big-time program (either as a position coach or coordinator). Hoke has coached a Michigan before and he has turned around programs. I don't understand how those programs being in the MAC or Mountain West change anything; the ability to change culture/attitude is universal, regardless of where you coach and in what conference.
2. Why are people so convinced that the switch to a more balanced offense (balanced as in spread/power/i-form balance not run/pass balance) will spell the doom Denard? Hoke never said he won't run zone blocking; he said he doesn't like running it all the time. Borges never said we won't run the spread, he said we won't be a spread team (i.e. we won't run the spread exclusively). Borges did say that we would be under center 50%; I would assume the 50% of the time we're in shotgun will be out of spread formations. I would assume out of these spread formations, we will still run the ball a lot. The coaches still expect to run Denard 15 times a game which is much more manageable than the 20+ last year. Denard will never be mistaken for Tom Brady but he showed that he can be an effective passer, and I expect him to be even better if they can fix a few things in his throwing motion. Denard should still rush for close to 1,000+ yards and I expect his passing yardage will skyrocket because we will run a more sophisticated passing attack (or at least we better).
3. If we can pull the top recruits out of the south and west, then yes, I would prefer recruits from there because they are better. With the exception of Denard, however, it's not like we were cleaning up in the south and west. It looks like we were pulling players from those areas that were comparable in talent to those found in the midwest. If that's going to be the case, then I would prefer players from the midwest; they are easier to reel in and they have less of a weather adjustment. Talent does trump all though; if we can get to the point where we have our pick of recruits, then I would obviously prefer the best of FL, CA, TX, LA, GA over the best of the midwest. Let's focus on the low-hanging fruit first (especially since the talent is good in the midwest this year) until we can rebuild towards a national championship level.
4. He did fine in the press conference I thought. He won't win speech contests but he said what he needed to say. RR always got into trouble because he would try to make jokes at his press conference and the media would always turn it around on him (e.g. Vince Lombardi not being able to coach this defense). Also, RR had a tendency to try to explain what went wrong which came across as making excuses or throwing his players under the bus. We will see, but I just don't see this happening with Hoke.
Like most of us, I was underwhelmed by the hire but I'm more than willing to give the guy a chance. He has a lot of things lined up for him (returning talent, support from alums and AD). If he can start creating some positive momentum (which he has already started with media perception) then maybe this will snowball into great things. Look at Dantonio at MSU; he's a mediocre coach leading a mediocre program but those guys love him there. He is providing stability and positive momentum. Take our program, even after the last 3 years, get our Dantonio (minus the douchiness) and we maybe get back to being an elite program.
I didn't take it as you calling me out, and I respect that you obviously know what you're talking about.
I think we should be under the assumption that our safeties are fast enough to cover TEs. There are occasional fast TEs, but the TEs are generally not the burners that are going to be beating you deep or making quick cuts that create seperation. If it's the case that our safeties can't cover TEs, then we can't play man.
Likewise using your example of the personnel package of Hopkins, Hayes, Koger, Hemmingway, Roundtree, we need to switch out of man if Hayes motions to the slot and we don't have a safety that can cover him. If they go big (with Hemmingway as the H-back), we can very much play man, assuming that a safety can cover Koger.
I agree that the offensive coaches are looking for ways to gain an advantage on the offense through formation, motion, personnel groupings, but the defense doesn't have to just sit there and take it. Shouldn't a defense change their scheme/calls/coverages based on what the offense shows (e.g. example of Hayes coming out of the backfield so you check out of man)?
Thanks for the explanation of the cover-6. Always just called it "rotating safeties", good to put a real name on it.
I agree with you about the true freshman CBs not necessarily being ready to play and that we should cut them some slack. I agree that they can become better tacklers with more experience/coaching/size/strength/etc. I still think that they are going to have some problems going into their sophomore years.
I'm not understanding the analogy to LBs. One of a LB's major responsibility is to stop the run; that is not necessarily the case with a CB based on the scheme. If your LB is a poor tackler, there is not much you can do to hide it; you can, however, hide or scheme around a CB who has problems tackling by giving them deep zone responsibilities. That was all I was saying. I was just stating an opinion about the best coverage given what I perceive to be our personnel's relative strengths and weaknesses.
Also, if our safeties aren't fast enough to cover slots in man, then we need to substitute them out and bring in somebody (maybe a CB) who is. If our secondary can't stay with every receiver that lines up on a particular play, then we can't play man on that play (e.g. if we only have two guys who are able to cover, then we can't play man on plays where the offense comes out with 3+ receivers). All I'm saying is that none of our safeties (assuming Woolfolk isn't a safety) are known for being burners, so I don't see how running a base coverage that requires each of them cover half the field is putting them in a position to succeed.
I do think we're going to run some cover-2 but I would assume that we will see a lot more cover 6, cover 4, cover 3 and cover 1 based on our personnel.
"I think of the 4-3 under as something halfway between a 4-3 and a 3-4"
The 4-3 under is actually a 5-2 defense where the line is shaded to the strong side and the "5-2 strong side DE" is a "4-3 under SLB" with pass coverage responsibilities.
The defense is designed to be very stout against the run and also create a lot of pressure from the line on pass plays for the reasons that Brian discussed (3-tech and weakside 5-tech being one-on-one with their OL counterparts).
The 3-4 is very closely related to the 5-2, however, so I guess Brian's view still holds.
By "lets assume that we are going to be running cover 2, which is a very likely", I'm assuming that you mean that one of our many coverages will be the cover 2.
I'm not sure our safeties are fast enough yet for us to run a cover 2 as a base coverage. Also, if Woolfolk stays at CB, we may want to utilize his speed more by giving him deep responsibilities. Also, the other CBs (Floyd, Avery, Talbott, Christian) weren't exactly the best tacklers either; not sure asking them to support the run as cover 2 CBs caters to their strengths.
Obviously the cover 2 has a lot of advantages and thus we need to run it on occasion, but I think our secondary would get abused if we ran it as our base coverage.
It sounds like we are going to be running a lot of man. I would imagine that we are also going to be rotating our coverage a lot out of a 2 deep safety look where Woolfolk as a weakside CB takes his deep outside 1/3, the weakside safety takes the deep middle 1/3, the strongside safety takes the strongside outside 1/3 and the strongside CB takes his flat and supports the run.
The main responsibility of any defensive lineman is to make sure they don't get driven back. I agree 100%, but that's a given for any defense. If your DL is getting dominated and pushed back 5 yards every play, you will not be good, regardless of where you line up. I'm assuming that our DL is not so undermanned that they will be at least able to individually hold their own against blockers.
With that said, in the 4-3 over/under defense, the main responsibility of the lineman is still to maintain an outside technique on the blocker. That doesn't mean you shoot the outside gap; you still need to engage the blocker and hold your ground but the defense will give up long gains if a lineman gets hooked (obviously the same holds true if a lineman gets driven back). That's why the linemen are lined up in outside shades to make it harder for the blockers to accomplish this. I think we're saying the same thing.
I agree that a 3-3-5 is supposed to be a 1-gap defense, but I'm not sure that's what we were playing last year. It appeared that Martin's job was to engage the center and then fight to the side of the flow. Also, it doesn't look like any of the linebackers were shooting any particular gap but were rather reading the line/flow.
It's hard to tell what was going on because GERG was pinching and slanting the line a lot but personally, it was frustrating to watch the DEs when they were lined up in 5-techniques getting hooked by the tackle.