SIAP: Hoke thinks his team is overrated

Submitted by glewe on

Warning: Freep article. Mostly just quotes though, so the editorializing is minimized.

http://www.freep.com/article/20111003/SPORTS06/111003050/Brady-Hoke-thi…

U-M coach Brady Hoke said today he ranked the Wolverines for the first time this year -- “somewhere in the Top 25 teams.”

He then was asked whether he thinks U-M is overrated entering Saturday’s game at Northwestern. “Yes,” he said.

Where should it be ranked?

“I don’t know, but we’re going to find out,” he said. “I told our team that, too, so I’m not telling you anything I didn’t tell them yesterday. We’re not playing the football we need to play. We’re not playing well enough. We’re not finishing things well enough. There’s a lot of fundamental things.”

Ryan Van Bergen was also quoted as agreeing, as he (and the team) think that rankings only provide motivation for the other team to beat you.

Brilliant, I think, that coming off of a 58-0 win, he's insisting that we're not playing well enough. Love it.

spacemanspiff231

October 3rd, 2011 at 11:20 PM ^

It's being honest.  Hoke, perhaps, is being a little overly critical of his team, but he's just being honest in saying that we're overrated.  We're not the 11th best team in the country.  There's definitely more than 10 or 11 teams that would beat us handily and he knows it.  The win over Minnesota was a solid one, yes, but expected.  Minnesota is one of the worst Division I programs in the country.  Not BCS, Division I.  Eastern would definitely beat them.  Just about any team in the MAC would definitely beat them.  Michigan is making huge strides and will be good but they haven't really proven themselves yet this year.  Hopefully that's coming soon.  We'll see after the next 2 games.

Beavis

October 3rd, 2011 at 4:30 PM ^

Of course he is going to say those things.  

He was critical of Blake Countess, for christssake.  I mean... he is going to say things like that so his players don't get too big of a head.  Only if we win a B1G or natty title will he really start to say what he feels.  

Volverine

October 3rd, 2011 at 4:30 PM ^

I think he was a part of the '97 national championship team (and several other good ones) and knows what it takes to win championships and hasn't seen it consistently from this year's team yet. Keep in mind, he knows it's harder now to win it all with the Big Ten championship game and BCS championship game pairing 1 against 2. I'm not sure anyone really thinks we're the 11th or 12th best team in the country, but it's hard to argue with 5-0. I honestly don't think Hoke would call us the best team in the Big Ten until we actually win a Big Ten championship. He's no Urban Cryer.

CRex

October 3rd, 2011 at 4:54 PM ^

The issue I see is dealing with Wisconsin's running attack.  You have to be able to rotate in fresh linemen on the longer drives.  We don't have a lot of DT/SDE depth and have a very limited rotation there.  Whereas Wisconsin can easily rotate backs and has spare linemen.  

We can beat Wisconsin, but I think we have to pull it out the same way we did against ND the last two years.  No way we shut that offense down.  

sheepdog

October 3rd, 2011 at 4:33 PM ^

Under 21 points the rest of the way (excpt Nebraska maybe) - which is possible - I would not say we are undderated.  Going with our pretty solid 10.2 average, I would be elated if we did this.

Possible?  maybe.  we will see.

Section 1

October 3rd, 2011 at 8:30 PM ^

Well, I suppose the games are yet to be played.  There's a long way to go.  Rodriguez, no longer Michigan's coach, made a prediction.  We'll see how it goes.  Here's what I see so far:

  • A whole lot of Rodriguez-looking offense, picking up where they left off last year, with big contributions from a lot of Rodriguez-mold guys:  Denard Robinson, Vincent Smith, Roy Roundtree, Jeremy Gallon, Drew Dileo;
  • A whole lot of personnel holes filled on defense: Troy Woolfolk where Troy Woolfolk is supposed to be; Rodriguez-recruits Blake Countess and Jake Ryan contributing early; more solid play from older and healthier DL-men Mike Martin, Ryan Van Bergen and Craig Roh.

So yeah; exponential improvement might turn out to be true.  It might turn out to be true with or without the coaching (probably very good coaching) from the new staff.  I don't wish to knock the new staff.  There's no reason to knock the new staff.  By every measure imaginable, they are doing great.

But once again, we see a story that uses "Rich Rodriguez" as a kind of lightning-rod.  Where he is almost certainly more right than are his critics.

bleedzblue

October 3rd, 2011 at 9:28 PM ^

Yeah man,  big contributions from Roundtree; he's tearing it up this year. If feel bad for him, he's barely seen the ball this year minus the obvious TD verse ND, and when he did get it thrown to him last game he dropped a pass that he should catch 100% of the time. I want to start seeing some bubble screens and slants/drags routes to him, which I think we will.

jabberwock

October 3rd, 2011 at 4:39 PM ^

I don't think Coach Hoke is just flexing his post big win-over-hapeless-foe "CoachSpeak Muscle".

I think he actually believes it, and I think he's right.

sorry if that bursts anyones hype bubble.

smotheringD

October 3rd, 2011 at 5:05 PM ^

Championship teams are never good enough...until they hold up the trophy.

I remember Brendan Shanahan saying after they had won 3 straight games in the Stanley Cup finals (with a demeanor like he was attending a funeral), "We haven't won anything yet.  Everyone knows the toughest game to win is one to close out a series..."

And I remember a player from the UM '97 team saying the same kind of thing.

And CRex is right...Wisky looks awfully good.  They have the offensive line we're going to have in 3-4 years.

HAILtoBO

October 3rd, 2011 at 5:07 PM ^

He's right... The toughest team we've played was ND and we squeeked it out with an undescribable win. Other than that we haven't really been tested. These next two games will give us a better feel of where we stand as a program.

Don

October 3rd, 2011 at 5:22 PM ^

That middle-schooler who called everybody who ranked Wisky #1 in the conference an asshole isn't going to be pleased with Hoke.

MGoBender

October 3rd, 2011 at 7:11 PM ^

You left out the best part of that quote.

 

"When your team is winning, be ready to be tough, because winning can make you soft. On the other hand, when your team is losing, stick by them. Keep believing."

Stick by the team, through the thick and thin. I feel so many of our alums did not stick with the team over the past few years and I hope some lessons were learned.

Section 1

October 3rd, 2011 at 8:09 PM ^

I left it out on purpose so's not to go down, uh, that road.  I imagine I wasn't keeping much of anything from the cognoscenti.  You have the full quote right, and you are probably right to mention it.

Of all the lessons Brady Hoke learned from Bo -- and I suspect that there weren't many lessons that he didn't learn form Bo -- I suspect this is the one Brady Hoke will demonstrate the most.  He will be tough on winning teams, and he will stick by teams and players when they lose.

dieseljr32

October 3rd, 2011 at 5:50 PM ^

I'm pretty sure everyone thinks UM is overrated.  Listening to talk radio it came as a surprise to the hosts that Michigan was so high.  Just because you lay a goose egg on quite possibly the worst team...ever in college football doesn't mean we should jump 7 spots.  I think like 16th or 17th is a better spot. 

Soulfire21

October 3rd, 2011 at 6:36 PM ^

Rittenberg touched on this when he posted he and Brian's votes on the Big Ten Blog over at ESPN.

He was like:

We both have Michigan very high. I'm not sure either of us thinks the Wolverines are as good as their current ranking, but given how many ranked teams lost this week, there wasn't much else to choose from after the Top 10

I think most other voters felt that way too. It's fun to be ranked high, but it probably is too high, and we should be 16th or 17th IMO.

Jlpowell

October 3rd, 2011 at 9:46 PM ^

What Bo meant to say was ND can go fuck themselves.

 

Our guys beat Northwestern and Sparty and put up similar Defensive and I'm a big time believer.  I am now.  These coaches have this team playing with a whole lot of belief, confidence, and some truly disciplined football...

 

I was begging for Harbaugh but this Hoke guy can coach..  And Thank God for Greg Mattison.

 

Ranking... Well 5-0 is 5 -0.  Were all are just scared shitless of what went on the past two years.  

However.  Our defense truly sucked.  Its not bad right now. (Hoke speak)  That may well be the game changer this year.  I pray it is.

GO BLUE!