Bacon said something interesting on 105.1
He said his souces wouldnt go on record so it is not in Endzone, but a caller brought up that Bandon made personel recommendations when he came in to watch film on Sundays with the staff (so not cool) and said he was thinking of firing Hoke midway through last season and bringing in Greg Schiano. Did anyone else hear about this or have any more information?
As mentioned Bacon said he couldnt go into it but the way his voice sounded it wasnt difficult to tell there had to be some truth behind it.
August 25th, 2015 at 5:02 PM ^
Nothing would surprise me anymore.
August 25th, 2015 at 5:02 PM ^
I would not be shocked if Brandon had decided that Morris should start the Minnesota game. And stay in the game despite his ineffectiveness, injury not included.
Source: no one who knows football thought Shane gave us the best chance to win, especially after a couple of series.
August 25th, 2015 at 5:10 PM ^
August 25th, 2015 at 5:13 PM ^
I tried to put this in an edit, but the fact that Shane wasn't pulled despite having a bad game/half/whatever (I've tried to eliminate my memory of that game) just reeks of "My boss told me to do it this way, so I'm doing it this way."
The plan was to play Shane. So Shane was going to play.
August 25th, 2015 at 5:27 PM ^
August 25th, 2015 at 5:35 PM ^
That was the Big 10 opener. The season was far from lost at that point.
August 25th, 2015 at 5:46 PM ^
dude that was the week after utah. they were beating the cupcakes and getting hammered by anyone with a pulse. it may not have been completely toast by this point but it was not "far from lost" it was "almost lost" and then MD and Rutgers sealed it.
Fortunately that seems like a hundred years ago now.
August 25th, 2015 at 6:31 PM ^
August 26th, 2015 at 12:39 PM ^
Against teams with a pulse at that point (i.e., Notre Dame and Utah). In those two games the defense had outscored the offense as well (7-3).
August 25th, 2015 at 5:46 PM ^
August 25th, 2015 at 7:03 PM ^
August 25th, 2015 at 6:47 PM ^
August 25th, 2015 at 9:19 PM ^
Beg to disagree, it was like looking up at an avalanche and saying that there was a chance of snow. We did not play well against decent teams as ND and Utah humiliated us. Would have required a miracle to right the ship.
August 25th, 2015 at 5:42 PM ^
First post EVAR after reading for 9 years, but:
The book addresses this question - make sure you buy it! DB had a history of meddling in not just football but in almost every sport, and generally speaking it seems like those interventions served to undermine the coaches.
August 25th, 2015 at 6:01 PM ^
lol buy it you guyz!!
i guess DB is a pretty darn good hoops coach then...
August 25th, 2015 at 6:03 PM ^
always deserve a +1.
August 25th, 2015 at 6:07 PM ^
in 2024, Tom09!
August 26th, 2015 at 1:38 AM ^
Bacon's books are always entertaining but I don't really believe some of the stuff he writes are from the best sources. Brandon being a turd isn't anything ground breaking and after the Minnesota game Brandon was lame duck anyways as was Hoke. Not to mention he doesn't mention at all that the powers to be were already secretly contacting Harbaugh's people after Minnesota asking if he had some interest.
August 26th, 2015 at 1:39 AM ^
Bacon's books are always entertaining but I don't really believe some of the stuff he writes are from the best sources. Brandon being a turd isn't anything ground breaking and after the Minnesota game Brandon was lame duck anyways as was Hoke. Not to mention he doesn't mention at all that the powers to be were already secretly contacting Harbaugh's people after Minnesota asking if he had some interest.
August 26th, 2015 at 11:41 AM ^
August 25th, 2015 at 5:20 PM ^
that we had no idea what Brady was dealing with.
August 25th, 2015 at 9:10 PM ^
August 25th, 2015 at 9:16 PM ^
I do recall him saying something along those lines . . . maybe a year ago? I'm not sure.
August 25th, 2015 at 5:24 PM ^
Right, I always thought that the Shane Morris start against Minnesota had Brandon's fingerprints all over it.
I also think that the style of football that Michigan played for the last few years was more David Brandon's idea of how Schembechler and Carr would have played rather than something developed by Hoke and his assistants. Brady Hoke didn't play football like that at Ball State or San Diego State, why did his team suddenly become the slowest offense in FBS? Do you think Hoke suddenly got less creative at Michigan, or did something else happen that constrained Hoke? I think the answer is obvious.
August 25th, 2015 at 5:37 PM ^
August 25th, 2015 at 5:58 PM ^
Glad you can look at it objectively now.
August 25th, 2015 at 6:09 PM ^
seems pretty far fetched even for someone with Brandon's ego.
I mean, where would he find the time?
I think DB was a cancer on Michigan, but I think it's more logical that he meddled "a bit'; but that overall, the job of coaching Michigan football was just too big & complex for Hoke to handle.
August 25th, 2015 at 8:46 PM ^
Apparently, he found the time on Sundays, with the staff.
But I know what you mean, and I agree to a point. The thing I can't reconcile with DB over-meddling is that all the coaches seemed to have genuinely supported him. If he were overly meddlesome, I don't think the coaches would have supported him like they did. Or maybe their professed support wasn't genuine; who knows?
I do think DB meddled to the extent that he pushed/supported Hoke to do some boneheaded things like play manball with DG and Denard at QB, start and play Shane, etc. But I don't think Hoke stood up and said NO, which he should have.
August 25th, 2015 at 9:25 PM ^
Jabberwock agree with you completely - upvote. While DB and his suggestions may not have helped, Hoke was in way over his head as you point out. Forget about the win-loss record for a second, his player development speaks VOLUMES about him and his staff's inability to coach the players.
He was here a full 4 years, brought in great recruiting classes, but where are the All-Americans and the high NFL draft picks. Minnesota (YTM) has 3 players on the pre-season all B1G team and we have 1. Kind of hard to blame that on DB.
August 25th, 2015 at 6:20 PM ^
Nevermind
August 25th, 2015 at 5:47 PM ^
I kind of hope that we're all wrong on Dave Brandon's meddling because that would just make me so angry
YOU CANT EVEN DO YOUR OWN JOB WELL. STOP TRYING TO DO THE ENTIRE FOOTBALL STAFFS JOBS TOO YOU IDIOT
August 25th, 2015 at 5:51 PM ^
August 26th, 2015 at 4:42 AM ^
Stanford and Duke (and even Vanderbilt to a lesser degree) have gotten a taste of winning, or at least not being a punching bag, in Vandy's case. It would be hard to just hire a guy like Hoke who's neither young nor innovative nor associated with success.
I think Hoke's best shot in the power 5 is someplace like Kansas or Iowa State, but even that's hard to envision. He's probably going to have to go someplace lower and win some games. And by the time he does that, he may be pushing 60.
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
August 26th, 2015 at 6:57 AM ^
Brady is going to turn 57 this November, so he is already "pushing 60". I think the odds of him getting another head coaching gig at a Power 5 school is slim to none. He got his shot at the big time and he blew it. He might get a shot at another MAC school, but I'd be shocked if any Power 5 school pulled the Head Coaches chair out for him again.
August 26th, 2015 at 8:31 AM ^
that he's that old. For some reason I keep thinking he's like 48-50.
August 26th, 2015 at 9:44 AM ^
I think that'd be a great place for him to land. He has a great base here with a house and lots of connections to Michigan, Indiana, and Ohio high schools. He's good at getting kids in, and there would be no pressure there. I'd love to see this happen if possible.
August 26th, 2015 at 1:28 PM ^
Didn't he sell his house? I wonder where he moved to?
August 26th, 2015 at 3:25 PM ^
I don't really know where he lived but figured he had a house in A2 or Saline or something. He could very well have moved though.
August 26th, 2015 at 4:30 PM ^
There was a thread a couple of months ago showing a real estate listing in Saline for a house that the OP claimed was Hoke's.
August 25th, 2015 at 6:05 PM ^
There have to be a lot more variables than just "Hoke" and "DB" in that equation...
We'll never know exactly how the relationship between DB and Hoke worked, but it seems like a bit of a stretch to place the blame for the terrible offense-iveness on DB, even if DB was getting involved in personnel decisions in the last year or two. Micromanagers are usually also bad at dictating high level decisions
August 26th, 2015 at 12:41 AM ^
"Brady Hoke didn't play football like that at Ball State or San Diego State, why did his team suddenly become the slowest offense in FBS? Do you think Hoke suddenly got less creative at Michigan, or did something else happen that constrained Hoke? I think the answer is obvious."
I didn't know Hoke was more creative at earlier stops.
If you watched the Game last year, they started out with the usual 1 yard and a cloud of dust style and then at some point around the middle of the quarter the camera showed Nuss kneeling on the sideline with Hoke standing next to him bent over and in his ear and they had a very intense conversation that the camera focused on and after that the playbook opened up. They became unpredictable by down and distance, they threw to the FB, the TE's, backs, threw deep, left, right, medium, short, on the rollout, running and passing to all parts of the field. It totally worked! They got conservative again at the end of the half and gave them the ball back and let them score :(, then attacked again, but Drake went down and it was all she wrote. But for about half the game there they played offense like they could have and were kind of dominating!
That could've been Hoke laying down the law and telling Nuss to go for it, or it could've been what Nuss wanted and Hoke was giving in but reading him a riot act about how this better work or whatever.
After the game at some point I was talking about that with someone very close to Nuss and wondering why they hadn't been playing that style of offense all along? They didn't answer who's idea the temporary switch was, but they said they tried it in a scrimmage during the week and that Devin threw 7 picks! I said what about Morris then? They said he was just as bad :(
That doesn't address what DB's influence was or not over time or at certain times, but it puts things in a different light in terms of what they felt was doable with what they had. Which also doesn't tell if what they had was as bad as it was because it was or because they couldn't teach.
August 26th, 2015 at 4:25 AM ^
The thing is, though, the whole enterprise was hopeless from the get-go. In Gardner, they had an athletic QB who was mistake-prone, but they refused to tailor their offense to accommodate that. Refusing to do that is just beating your head against the wall.
Now, whether Brandon was responsible for that behind the scenes is impossible to say. But I do recall Borges speaking quite enthusiastically about finally being able to run their kind of offense once Robinson left. And nothing in Hoke's history suggests he was ever all that comfortable with having an offense predicated on a running QB.
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
August 25th, 2015 at 5:24 PM ^
I don't know if Hoke would have succeeded anyway, but I don't think we will ever know how much he controlled what was going on with the football team. I would bet a lot happened behind closed doors with Hoke and Hoke isn't going to say anything.
After reading that Brandon was worried about having enough control over Harbaugh, my belief in this is much stronger.
August 25th, 2015 at 6:16 PM ^
Sent from MGoBlog HD for iPhone & iPad
August 26th, 2015 at 9:51 AM ^
So maybe give Shane a quarter, a half even. Give me one FOOTBALL reason that Shane started the 2nd half?
I can't find the first half box, but 2.6 YPA with 0 TDs and a pick? It was absolutely clear that Shane was not better than Devin.
August 25th, 2015 at 6:21 PM ^
I actually turned the Minnesota game off after the first three series of the 3rd quarter. i think that included when Morris fumbled in the endzone for a near safety (and he was also visibly hurt and limping), a near interception and finally a pick six.
The fact that Morris was still in the game at that point made it clear that Michigan wasn't putting the best team on the field and trying to win the game. If Hoke wasn't trying to win, I wasn't going to watch.
I missed the whole concussion debacle that came up in the 4th quarter. Luckily, after an exhaustive search, I was able to find some news stories about it.
August 25th, 2015 at 10:47 PM ^
for your last paragraph. That's some good comedy right there.
August 25th, 2015 at 7:55 PM ^
I have been saying forever that Hoke and the staff were really just David Brandon's sock puppets when it came to playcalling and personnel.
That is why I wasn't so quick to attack Hoke for the Morris debacle. What if, for example, Brandon had told Hoke to play Morris and "don't take him out when things start to go bad?"
That is exactly what I thought happened. Hoke had the look on his face of someone who was doing as he was told and pissed off about it. Sadly, we'll never know, because Hoke continues to adhere to "the code" and fall on the sword for his ex-boss.
August 25th, 2015 at 8:31 PM ^