IMO, Brian was wrong about saying sticking with Morris was a sign of throwing the whole team under the bus. Gardner had proved ineffective the other games. They were going with Morris and showing they were going to stick with Morris and believe in him to compete.

But when things didn't go well for a half and then sometime in the third quarter he looked like he sprained his ankle when throwing a pass while wrapped up around the leg, I probably would have pulled him after that drive. It's hard to say without being on the sideline though, it would depend, IMO, on having talked with him.

It's always hard and it's always a fine line. When do you let a kid compete through an injury like an ankle sprain or pull him because he's only hurting himself and the team by playing? I don't think it's black and white, I think it's far from it. I think when he struggled to stand after the roughing flag they determined he needed to be out of the game and they, both Hoke and Nuss, were supposedly telling him to go down. I think if DG was ready to get on the field Morris would have been off the field. I think if Morris would have gone down after that hit that DG would have nominally taken over for the rest of the game (outside of losing his helmet). 

I don't know if there is a definitive answer. I think there are answers in hindsight. I think there are answers that fit narritives (that's not saying the concussion narritive, that's saying the "stick with one QB narritive, play the hot hand narritive, try to get a spark narritive, etc). Without being on the sideline or in practice or in warm ups I just think it's difficult to say with accuracy when Morris should have for sure come off the field before he did. From my perspective, it likely would have been earlier (I was leaning toward the team needed a spark, any spark, and Morris wasn't providing it at that point), but not being there it's tough to say.

The fuck? Maybe they should have given a concussion test on its own, not "Oh by the way I guess I'll half-ass check you for a concussion while I'm looking at your ankle,"

The fundamental rule of coaching these days is that if a player takes a hit to the head and exhibits any changes in behavior at all, you take them out immediately and have them passed by a qualified medical professional before return to play. That's actually written into state law in Michigan for youth sports through high school.

Hoke and the other coaches' failure is that they left Morris in for the next play. That, right there, regardless of whether or Shane he had a concussion, was a failure of a basic responsibility of any coach from the earliest youth leagues up to the pros. You don't guess. You don't diagnose from the sidelines. You don't let the player decide. You protect his brain, because it's more important than the game.

the head coach "surely was aware," by the time of his press conference two days later, whether his trainers actually made any such assessment on the sideline -- before, by the way, the coach sent him back into the game a mere 90 seconds after he left.  And yet Hoke doesn't claim to know about any such assessment.  Here's an imagined conversation between Hoke and Shane's parents:

Mom:  Our son took a hit, his head snapped backward and bounced off the ground, and he needed a teammate to prop him up.  Did your medical staff look into that before he was sent back into the game?

Hoke:  Nah, a concussion test can be done at any time.  So even if his life and well being were momentarily in danger during the game, it all worked out in the end -- at least we think so, although Shane still could exhibit symptoms for weeks/months.  And I'm confident my staff, when speaking to Shane with his helmet on for a few seconds before we sent him back in, had fully evaluated his speech, cognitive abilities, and pupils -- a real lifesaver, because otherwise we would have had to burn a timeout in a blowout loss.  So in short, you're a moron to be concerned about your son.

When the coach keeps the player in the game, it's tough for the medical professionals to do much of anything.

I agree with you, but I think the poster's point is that you cannot perform a concussion assessment when the player is still on the field.  That's the outrage.  That after someone takes a hit to head, is wobbly on his feet, he was not taken out to do an initial assessment for a brain injury.  Instead Hoke didn't even give the medical staff an opportunity to perform such an assessment.

You're the right the staff wouldn't do the checking themselves; however, the medical professionals are not going to use one of Michigan's three official timeouts. It's up to Hoke or really anybody in the staff to get Morris off the field so that the medical professionals can do a proper test.

There is no way in heck that we did a proper concussion test during the game. Posters have pointed out Morris was on the sideline for about two minutes before being sent back in due to Gardner's helmet coming off.

It would take a miracle to help this staff, especially the head man, if God forbid Morris did have a concussion and got hit in the head again.

Action needs to be taken because the staff fucked up handling the possibility that Morris had a concussion whether or not he actually did.

Hoke and Brandon need to resign post haste. Enough is enough.

Hoke and Brandon should GTFO before they really fuck up our program.

Et tu, Space Coyote? I don't want Hoke to have the authority to overrule the medical staff if they say a guy can't play. But to hide behind that and say Hoke has no responsibility to see a guy in Shane's condition and say "hey, let's sit this guy and give him a head check just to be safe" is absurd. The buck stops with the head coach, Hoke's trying to pass it, and you're apparently totally cool with that.

but I consider the trainers to be part of Hoke's staff, and the buck stops with him.  As matters now stand, it appears that Hoke, the coaching staff, and the training staff all failed to see the need to evaluate Morris on the sidelines for a possible concussion.  Hoke has now stated, two days later, that he merely "assumes" that Shane was evaluated by someone for something in the 90 or so seconds before he was sent back into the game, with Hoke's express approval (after being asked by an official if he'd prefer to take a timeout instead).  I was merely expressing my view that Hoke should be a little more concerned that his assumption might have been unfounded --- and maybe, just maybe, he'd want to get to the bottom of what actually happened to avoid any more incidents like that in the future.  Apparently not, however.

Yep, count me as another vote for deliberately dense.  Or just flat-out trolling.  Meanwhile, can we get a ruling on Godwin's law -- does Stalin count?

You can't really be this stupid, can you?

If he had to be assessed post-game for a hit that happened two plays before he came out of the game, then the University of Michigan coaching staff failed Shane Morris by allowing him to play those two plays.

AFTER THE GAME IS TOO LATE how much clearer can we be? Even if a post game evaluation cleared him, having him on the field was still dangerous. Any responsible concussion protocol takes several minutes, minimum. Shane was not off the field long enough to complete half of it. The lack of a positive concussion test is totally irrelevant. It's like saying that it's okay that no one inspected the engines on an airplane as long as it didn't crash.

I don't understand why Morris didn't just lay on the ground and wait for medical staff.  It is a universally understood thing in sports at any age level that if you are hurt and stay down, play will be stopped and you will get medical attention.  Instead of limping around and waving at the sidelines, just sitting on the ground would have worked.  The situation with Morris resulted from a lot of things, not just Hoke's mishandling of the situation.