These two "wait for next year" arguments just dont jive
Argument 1 : The debacle on defense isn't the coaches fault. The talent on the field is too poor to do anything with (RR himself made this argument with Lombardigate).
Argument 2: We are returning 22/24 starters next year. We are so gonna PWN fools next year : If Lombardi himself couldn't do squat with these guys, GERG and Gibson are going to somehow magically teach them how to maintain gap, tackle soundly and not give 15 yard cushions?
The RR apologists need to get together and pick one of these arguments and roll with it. Both just don't make any sense.
Counter argument: But but...what if the coaches arent "turrible" and what if the players make somewhat of a sophomore leap, couldn't we at least be decent?
No. Average (at best) coaches aren't exactly going to achieve any soph leap from these guys. proof? proof:
Roh is same or worse this year. Ezeh flamed out. Mouton is arrrgghhh mostly same sometimes worse, Kovacs same, JT slightly better relative to last year (but sucky as hell on a b10 scale) , CC is OMG bad, Cam is bad, Banks is same/ worse. Mike Martin is better.
You take that trend line and want me to believe that some magical "leap" is going to happen simply because these are going to be older...okay.
Beside, given the rate of attrition that seems normal under RR, we are still going to be starting 4 Frosh's next year and you guys will still be making this argument next year:
In Cartman's voice:
" But mooooommmm...we're gonna be soooo goood next year.....".
November 1st, 2010 at 12:45 PM ^
Sounds racist to me. (And yeah, I'm going to completely ignore any points you made.)
November 1st, 2010 at 12:45 PM ^
Fuck the Tar Heels. And DON'T Go Blue.
November 1st, 2010 at 12:48 PM ^
If so, we can close up this topic.
Though I may be in the RR apologist camp, I don't believe that you can keep the coaches blameless. I think that people hold on to the notion that our secondary would be way better if Warren would've stayed and Woolfolk wouldn't have been hurt near the end of training camp. So they cut the team some slack there. I think that's valid, but not something to totally excuse the coaches.
Also, these young players are learning on the fly. You cannot deny that. So some of the errors being made can be attributed to technique, discipline and just trying to catch up to the speed of play.
Honestly, I'm not an X and O person, so I never understand how difficult it is to play defense. My limited brain says let's just play a prevent, bend but don't break defense. Or let's just send the house and pray the QB is erratic. Bo had some great defenses, but it seemed like it was a read and react team as well. See the ball, fly to the ball. And their technique was sound. But if there was one thing Bo, Mo and Lloyd did not have to do was throw a whole bunch of freshmen out there. That is what we have had to do.
And with the whole thing about them being better as sophomores, look at how much better Kovacs is this year. He's not spectacular, but solid. That's all we need out of our defense with an offense like this.
November 1st, 2010 at 6:13 PM ^
Our defense is so depleted, we're never going to get there with just the normal growth, or marginally more expedited growth with either coaching or more recruiting attention.
We need immediate help, and we should try to find it in junior college talent. They'll be a year or two bigger, and with more than high school experience. It's obviously only near term because of eligibility reasons (isn't that why Panter seemed to not be here for very long, because his Juco years took away from eligibility), but it will buy some time.
Will Juco defensive players be superstars? Probably not. But we're not looking for superstars, we're looking for mediocrity and some depth. Wouldn't some reasonable Juco players be a good quick fix?
November 1st, 2010 at 12:48 PM ^
Our 2006 defense was no better than our 2005 defense.
November 1st, 2010 at 12:53 PM ^
will either get better, or the wont. Simple as that. I'm just gong to watch and root for this team as hard as I can. These kids are out there giving 100% every Saturday.
November 1st, 2010 at 12:57 PM ^
down.
You can logically understand that Avery, Talbott and Christian, C & T Gordon, Carvin Johnson, and Jibreel Black - all of whom are true or RS freshmen - will benefit from another year of practice, film, and lifting. Demens is in his first (half) year of play. Herron and Fitzgerald have seen the field and will be seniors. Floyd, Roh, and Kovacs will be entering their 3rd year of significant playing time. RVB and Woolfork should be potential All-BT candidates/2nd team and Martin should be a lock.
There is every reason to believe the D will be better next year. No one is expecting tops in the B10. I'm expecting improvement to middle-to-back in FBS (50-75), with a chance to do better if the O puts pressure on opposing teams and causes them to change their gameplan.
And the O should be lights out. B/C they're all good and they're all back (minus Schilling)
November 1st, 2010 at 12:58 PM ^
The defense cannot stop anyone PERIOD...Someone has to be accountable and that person has to be the defensive coordinator. He has done a horrible job. For whatever reason GERG is not working out, grading talent, calling plays, developing players, etc.
November 1st, 2010 at 12:58 PM ^
This was not worth my time.
November 1st, 2010 at 1:01 PM ^
We are in the old Catch 22 scenario. If we let Rich and staff go, we are doomed to at least 2-3 years of really crappy football, more decommits, more transfers and more bad press. If we keep Rich and staff (minusGERG), we could have a really good 2011, easier schedule, better offense and maybe an improved defense. Or we could have a repeat of this year.
I want to give Rich the benefit of the doubt. He is a good coach, who didn't forget how to coach once he hit the city limits. I am willing to wait one more year, no matter how painful the thoughts of repeating this in 2011 may be.
I would suggest Rich hire Whoopi Goldberg's character from Ghost and spend some time with Bo.
November 1st, 2010 at 1:33 PM ^
Unlike the OP, I think it is logical to argue that talent and experience, along with coaching, are problems. Those points seem to be axiomatic. The issue, that perhaps the OP is trying to point to, is saying that the problem is one or the other. And I think supporters of RR are beyond making a case for one or the other. My interest is, however, going beyond those immediate causes and looking for their causes - in other words, seeing coaching and talent/experience as effects.
It's shortsighted, and it short-shrifts the team, to stop just at experience and coaching. Those are effects of deeper causes, which I think are management and leadership. We need to ask, How is it that we find ourselves at this unprecedented place where talent/experience and coaching are so bad? Again, I think it is management and leadership. Examples include making better decisions in terms of staff, making better decisions in terms of coaching, not blaming players' lack of talent and experience, leading in a way that players will want to stay (Bo and Carr had some famous cases of players wanting to leave, but through leadership, those players stayed). I think that good management at the program level will make players more likely to stay, more likely to play their hearts out in your new system, more likely to come play for you - more likely you will land top recruits who do not also need to be marginal recruits (that other programs shy away from).
I see the more apparent problems as manifestations of more systemic, systematic problems in the management and leadership of the program. That is why I think it is more risky to stick with RR than it is to get another coach. You cannot use our ongoing transition, nor ND's, to predict how a new caoching transition will play out. That is selecting just according to failures or massively difficult transitions (our own). Those are anomalous cases. Rest assured we will never ever have another transition like the one we have seen. That is why this is so troubling to many of us - not that there is change, but that the process is only comparable to change processes that have failed. There is a reason that when we point to transition processes that went smoother than this one, those cases are also examples of transitions that were successful. Similarly, there is a reason that when we point to unsuccessful transitions, those all look like this one. Successful ones went better than ours went. Unsuccessful ones went about the same. You can argue that the unsuccessful ones were unsuccessful because they were cut short, but that is a weak place to be, predicting what would have been. All we have is what has been, and what might be.
I think that there is more of a chance that a new coach comes in, learns from our recent failure to transition, and makes a better go of it. I think that is more likely than RR turning the program around, given his lack of leadership and management ability.
[damn getting this font thing to work...Fuck...one more try]
November 1st, 2010 at 1:48 PM ^
November 1st, 2010 at 2:19 PM ^
You didn't present the arguments correctly. In fact you altered them so that they specifically contradict each other. Congrats.
November 1st, 2010 at 3:19 PM ^
don't we take a look at the situation from his point of view? 1). Why don't I have any juniors or seniors capable of starting on d? 2). Why are there no semi competent starters on d? 3). If my d was average or a little better then average we would be undefeated. 4). Why can't the arm chair coaches read the situation I was placed in, and recognize what steps I'm taking to remedy this situation? 5). After building a great winning program at WV why did I come to Michigan and listen to all this BS from people who know little to nothing about coaching college D1 football. 6). I didn't know there were so many fair weather fans an M.
I just wish people would shut up and let this program take its course to the winning tradition again!
Let the negs begin, but please just SHUT UP about firing RR!
November 1st, 2010 at 3:32 PM ^
Imagine you are an offensive coordinator going up against the Michigan defense and looking for players to attack.
Now stop drooling.
November 1st, 2010 at 4:08 PM ^
Than anyone else did I not see how bad the defense would be in the future sooner and not spend all my "snake oil" scholarships on offensive players and not spend my first full recruiting class compensating so they'd at least be sophomores and not freshmen and wait till my year 3 recruiting class to fix it after realizing it was a problem after reading a blog diary?
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<br>And why didn't I recruit better players to fill in, and then keep them all?
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<br>I mean, I'm knowledgeable and stuff.
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<br>(King Run-On)
November 1st, 2010 at 5:09 PM ^
I didn't know there were so many fair weather fans an M.
I haven't seen a single person here say he/she is giving up college football. What I have seen is many people post that they are exasperated with our horrendous play in the Big Ten. RR is 4-16 in conference play. Literally no fanbase in the country would be pleased with that. It's probably the worst Big Ten winning percentage in school history. It is completely responable to be bothered by this.