Meechigan: It's where the cool kids coach [Eric Upchurch]

Secondary Coaching Candidates Part I: The A-List Comment Count

Seth May 10th, 2021 at 3:04 PM

The unluckiest sports program on Earth caught a doozy in the dinglies last week as co-DC/cornerbacks coach/crack recruiter Mo Linguist took the late-opening Buffalo head job. How bad the fallout will be depends on which replacement coach Michigan can get in this late hour. Here are the gentlemen Michigan could take a swing at. We'll tackle some of the big names first and if we're still shopping later this week I'll have a Part II with other candidates once we have a clearer idea of the market.

STEVE CLINKSCALE, KENTUCKY

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CURRENT JOB: Kentucky defensive passing game coordinator/DBs coach.

SUMMARY: Age 43. Well-regarded Midwest DBs coach who’s responsible for all of the Kentucky recruiting incursions into Michigan and a chunk of the recruiting success the Wildcats and Cincy have had against MSU in recent years.

HISTORY: Defensive backs coach at Kentucky under Mark Stoops since 2016, set to pick up passing game coordinator duties this year. Was DBs coach for three years at Cincinnati under Tommy Tuberville, promoted to co-DC in 2015. Prior to that was cornerbacks coach and special teams coordinator under Tim Beckman and Tim Banks at Toledo (2009-‘11) and Illinois (2012). Spent seven years (2001-‘07) after college as DBs coach of his alma mater, Ashland, in North-Central Ohio. Originally from Youngstown.

SIGNIFICANT STATS: Passing defense YPA (sack-adjusted) under Clink:

KENTUCKY:

2015 (prior): 6.30, #70 ovr, #12 SEC

2016: 6.72, #83 Ovr, #11 SEC

2017: 6.69, #87 Ovr, #12 SEC

2018: 5.21, #21 Ovr, #4 SEC

2019: 5.08, #10 Ovr, #3 SEC

2020: 6.43, #64 Ovr, #6 SEC

CINCINNATI:

2012 (prior): 5.81, #39 Ovr, #4 Big East

2013: 5.34, #14 Ovr, #2 American

2014: 6.25, #70 Ovr, #7 American

2015: 6.49, #80 Ovr, #5 American

PLAYERS : Safety Lonnie Johnson Jr. (2019,  6th round to Texans) was a JuCo who committed to Ohio State once upon a time. CB Kelvin Joseph (2021, 2nd round to Cowboys) was a sit-out transfer from LSU. CB Brandin Echols (2021 6th round to Jets) was another JuCo. Safety Mike Edwards (2019, 3rd round, Bucs), who was already starting when Clink arrived. Safety Mike Tyson (2017, 6th, Seahawks). Clink also recruited 2020 All-American James Wiggins to Cincy before he left.

CONNECTIONS: Knows Gattis well through Tim Banks, the former Penn State co-DC who’s now the DC at Tennessee, and has been another thorn in Michigan’s side in recruiting.

PROS: Has had three players drafted over the last three years, after UK hadn’t sent a defensive back to the NFL since 2012. Outstanding recruiter, has been a massive thorn in Michigan’s side in recruiting (e.g. 2020 Oak Park 5-star DT Justin Rogers) and even worse for Michigan State. Can match Linguist for connections in Tennessee, and gives the staff a presence in Ohio that they currently lack.

CONS: MSU might be able to flip back some of the 3-stars Clink has committed to UK.

WOULD HE KEEP WILL JOHNSON AND THE REST? Yes. He might also reopen things with TN LB Keaten Wade.

WOULD HE TAKE THE JOB? That’s the big question. He turned down overtures from Michigan when Chris Partridge left but now that Michigan has a “co-DC” title, more money to offer, and an almost completely different defensive staff, maybe things will be different this time? Kentucky hasn’t had an issue giving their assistants raises to keep Michigan from poaching them.

[AFTER THE JUMP: More memories of recruitments lost]

ARCHIE COLLINS, PITT

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CURRENT JOB: Pitt secondary coach

SUMMARY: 45, lifelong Spartan who played for Saban, steered kids to State as a PSL coach, has coached DBs under Dantonio assistants since 2013.

HISTORY: Cass Tech who played for Saban in the mid-nineties, then reappeared at Cass Tech a few years later, coaching defensive backs under Thomas Wilcher from 2003-’04. That led to a DC position with Mackenzie High until that closed in 2008 and Collins took over at Detroit Southeastern and recruited a powerhouse that won back to back PSL championships in 2008 and 2009. Michigan fans remember a lot of those Detroit Southeastern kids and Archie’s tactics for steering them away from Michigan, most notably WR Fred Smith and OSU DT Johnathan Hankins. Collins was also Will Gholston’s legal guardian. Dantonio finally plucked Collins as a grad assistant in 2010, where he worked with the “No Fly Zone” through 2012 before landing the defensive backs position at Central Michigan under fellow Spartan Dan Enos. In 2017 Collins was named defensive passing game coordinator, then he followed Pat Narduzzi to Pitt in 2018 and has been there ever since.

SIGNIFICANT STATS:

PITT:

2017 (prior): 7.02, #102 Ovr, #13 ACC

2018: 6.11, #56 Ovr, #7 ACC

2019: 4.79, #3 Ovr, #2 ACC

2020: 5.71, #23 Ovr, #1 ACC

CENTRAL MICHIGAN:

2012 (prior): 6.85, #82 Ovr, #7 MAC

2013: 6.59, #85 Ovr, #8 MAC

2014: 6.54, #86 Ovr, #6 MAC

2015: 6.05, #57 Ovr, #7 MAC

2016: 6.38, #68 Ovr, #6 MAC

2017: 5.09, #10 Ovr, #1 MAC

PLAYERS: Had Will Gholston, Fred Smith, Charles Burrell, Ed Davis, and Johnathan Hankins at Southeastern. Developed CB Dane Jackson (7th round, Bills) and safety Damar Hamlin (6th round, Bills) into pros at Pitt, and had three guys (Kavon Frazier, Xavier Crawford, and 2nd rounder Sean Murphy-Bunting) drafted out of CMU, the first Chippewa defensive backs to be drafted since 1985.

CONNECTIONS: Sherrone Moore overlapped with him at CMU. Coached under Thomas Wilcher, the Michigan RB whose late fumble in the 1986 Game nearly cost Harbaugh his guarantee, at Cass Tech.

PROS: Excellent Detroit-area recruiter, intimate knowledge of how Dantonio teaches and runs his Quarters system that was the bane of running QB-based offenses for a decade. Turn a long-time enemy into a friend.

CONS: Offenses adapted to Quarters and there were deep issues with the Dantonio era at Michigan State that wouldn’t fly here. Non-zero chance he pulls a Dan Enos and takes the job only to leave within days wearing a Muck Fichigan shirt.

WOULD HE KEEP WILL JOHNSON AND THE REST? Most likely. Archie is still respected around Detroit as much as he wasn’t on our message boards.

WOULD HE TAKE THE JOB? Probably not. Like Luke Fickell, the hate probably runs way too deep for this to ever make sense.

CORY ROBINSON, NEW ORLEANS SAINTS

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via his Twitter

CURRENT JOB: Secondary assistant for New Orleans Saints since 2020.

SUMMARY: Age 34-35. Recent Maryland/Rutgers/Temple/Toledo CB coach with deep ties to DC-area recruiting.

HISTORY: Robinson made the jump the NFL in 2020 after a year each at St. Frances High, Maryland, Toledo, Temple, Rutgers, and Maryland again. A cornerback for Central Connecticut State from 2005-‘08, Robinson returned to his hometown of Baltimore after college to create a football/mentorship nonprofit while coaching at Calvert Ball High, whence he sent a quarterback to Boise State. Biff Poggi plucked him to be the defensive coordinator for St. Frances, and then Maryland hired Robinson to be their director of recruiting in 2015. Matt Campbell and his DC Jon Heacock, then at Toledo, poached Robinson for their cornerbacks coach in 2016, but that too only lasted a year, as Robinson joined Matt Rhule/Phil Snow as cornerbacks coach at Temple. From there Chris Ash hired Robinson at Rutgers, and Mike Locksley brought Robinson back to College Park in 2019 as defensive passing game coordinator and CBs coach under Jon Hoke.

Robinson has made gravy out of some situations that looked ugly going in, but never stuck around long enough that you could really credit him for it. Maryland’s 2019 recruiting class rebuilt the secondary, but they had recent Bama assistant Mike Locksley, Aazaar Abdul-Rahim, and Elijah Brooks on that staff as well.

SIGNIFICANT STATS: Hard to pluck because he never stayed more than a season. New Orleans jumped to #2 in the NFL in Total DVOA, and #3 Pass DVOA in the NFL to Football Outsiders, up from #8 and #10 last year. Maryland was awful in 2019 but #5 in the country last year when guys Robinson recruited were no longer freshmen or injured. I liked the Rutgers secondary under Chris Ash too—that defense was #37 in YPA between seasons of #86 and #108. On the other hand, Robinson’s lone year at Temple was #34 in passing YPA sandwiched between seasons at #8 and #5 in the country, and Toledo in 2016 dropped to #62 between years of #48.

PROS: Seems like a good recruiter, especially in the Baltimore-DC nexus. One year of NFL experience went much better than Linguist’s. Has been around some excellent pattern-matching staffs. Toledo, Temple, and three years in the Big Ten East mean he’s familiar with Michigan’s recruiting footprint. Interacts with coach twitter.

CONS: Most successful coaching stops were under DCs and/or defensive-minded head coaches, so it’s hard to credit Robinson for any of them. Moves about as often as Linguist, so would be a flight risk.

WOULD HE KEEP WILL JOHNSON AND THE REST? Probably. Robinson would be the most “We got the guy most like Mo Linguist” hire.

WOULD HE TAKE THE JOB? Unlikely. Linguist was cut loose after a coaching change, while Robinson has an NFL job. That said, the Saints are due to for a rebuild with Brees’s retirement, and their cornerback situation could be really bad—Marshon Lattimore will be an expensive free agent and their other starter is Stanford rookie Paulson Adebo, who opted out last year. Not that the Michigan situation is much better.

CHRIS HAWKINS, ARIZONA STATE

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via his Twitter

CURRENT JOB: Defensive backs coach, ASU

SUMMARY: Age 26, part of Herm Edwards’s surprising success, was a USC safety/grad assistant before that. Son of Armond Hawkins, one of the directors of Ground Zero (Domani Jackson, Xavier Worthy, Ceyair Wright, Darion Green-Warren, Giles Jackson, etc.).

HISTORY: Top-50 player out of Rancho Cucamonga, USC safety in 2014-’17, spent a year in commercial real estate, then became a grad assistant for two years before Herm Edwards grabbed him. Named to 247’s 30 under 30 list. Been out-recruiting Michigan for defensive backs. At ASU. Brother Armond Jr. is director of high school relations at USC.

SIGNIFICANT STATS:

ARIZONA STATE

2018 (prior): 6.52, #77 Ovr, #9 Pac 12

2019: 6.76, #79 Ovr, #6 Pac 12

2020: 5.75, #26 Ovr, #2 Pac 12

MICHIGAN CONNECTION: Via Sam($), Edwards is a Courtney Morgan friend from the 7v7 circuit.

PROS: Will Johnson the assistant: Excellent recruiter who just happens to be the son of one of the guys who run Southern California’s biggest 7-on-7 team. Has some track record in turning around the ASU secondary in a short (two-year project) time.

CONS: Turnaround needed a lot of transfers, a market Michigan has limited access to because of asinine* admissions rules. Would be an extremely young outlier on an already extremely young staff. Hasn’t coached in the Big Ten.

WOULD HE KEEP WILL JOHNSON AND THE REST? Unknown. Good chance since like Johnson, Hawkins grew up in 7v7 world. Might get Michigan back in with Domani Jackson and former target Larry Turner-Gooden.

WOULD HE TAKE THE JOB? Unknown. Michigan probably can’t offer him a co-coordinator position, so would he take a lateral move to coach in the Big Ten? How much loyalty does he have for Herm Edwards for giving him a shot at 24?

* [“Asinine” doesn’t mean “like ass” by the way, it means to do something with the affect of a six-year-old going “Nah na na boo boo.”]

Comments

JonnyHintz

May 11th, 2021 at 6:07 AM ^

Him being in a pretty good situation at Oklahoma probably plays a part. Does it really benefit him to leave the B12 favorite and likely playoff team to come to Michigan in its current situation?
 

Ties to the program or not, it’s no big secret that Harbaugh is on shaky ground and the team is looking at 6-7 wins in the eyes of many. So not a lot of upside for Manning in a move back here. 

MGoStrength

May 11th, 2021 at 8:21 AM ^

Him being in a pretty good situation at Oklahoma probably plays a part. Does it really benefit him to leave the B12 favorite and likely playoff team to come to Michigan in its current situation?

Manning makes $450k at Oklahoma.  Mo made $680k at UM.  Potentially a $230k raise doesn't move the needle?

mi93

May 10th, 2021 at 3:35 PM ^

Mike Tyson (even if it's NTMT) is a bad@$$ name for a safety.

"Everybody has a plan until" they get leveled on a crossing route.

carolina blue

May 10th, 2021 at 7:56 PM ^

Man, just watched that game on BTN replay this evening. I always forget the near pick-6 that Griese threw on a screen with just a couple minutes left. That game was vintage Lloyd Carr.

 

on the other hand, if Griese doesn’t overthrow Tai Streets in the 3rd, this game is 27-0 and likely becomes a snoozer. 

Goblue89

May 10th, 2021 at 3:39 PM ^

Regarding Cink, Sam made it clear he was never offered a job to turn down.  Basically Michigan chose others over him twice (Shoop and Linguist).

ShadowStorm33

May 10th, 2021 at 4:35 PM ^

While that improves our chances for getting Clinkscale, it also highlights the fact that they could have avoided this cluster in the first place by offering him the position a few years ago instead of Shoop.

For your latest reminder of the state that Michigan Football has found itself, this is now two straight DB coaches (Shoop and Lunguist) that left without ever having coached a season in person...

Laser Wolf

May 11th, 2021 at 6:06 AM ^

Process over results. Even if Shoop had coached, the process that brought him here was a bad one. CB coach should be a position where you have an ace recruiter because it’s a position where recruiting matters more than almost any other position. Shoop was a bad hire even before he started. 

MGoStrength

May 11th, 2021 at 8:24 AM ^

this is now two straight DB coaches (Shoop and Lunguist) that left without ever having coached a season in person...

I love some of JH's quirks and unique sayings, all of which came from his dad btw.  I find him genuinely interesting.  It's hard to know what a guy is really like from the outside.  But, there has to be a personality issue with him when you look at our retention and assistant coaching turnover.  There is no other reasonable explanation.  

JFW

May 11th, 2021 at 12:06 PM ^

None of us knows what happened with Shoop. Linguist left for head coaching job at a good program. Zordich was here here for years.


If there is a complaint to be had at that they took a flyer on Linguist in the first place given his propensity to move around. Of course, given the state of fan base had they gotten someone lesser than him someone would be complaining about "not spending the money" or "not getting the talent".

I'm beginning to see that coaching is a job with a performance review from 300,000 pointy haired bosses.

BornInA2

May 10th, 2021 at 4:01 PM ^

Per Yahoo Sports,

"Linguist arrived in Ann Arbor this offseason from the NFL, where he was a defensive backs coach for the Dallas Cowboys in 2020. He had short stops at Texas A&M (2018-19), Minnesota (2017), Mississippi State (2016), Iowa State (2014-15) and Buffalo (2012-13)."

So that's at least six changes in nine years. Given that decade-long pattern of behavior, anyone expecting anything else is naive at best. It's not "unlucky"; we kicked ourselves in the "dinglies" hiring a guy who has never stuck around anywhere for more than two seasons.

AC1997

May 10th, 2021 at 4:16 PM ^

I see your point and it is valuable....but at the same time the unlucky part is having him leave even before he started basically.  It is also unlucky that of all the coaching situations and all the low-level assistants that could take such a job.....it ended up being the one that Michigan just signed and was excited about.  In another universe where Michigan isn't karma's punching bag, the job that opens has no ties to Linguist....or another candidate is just as good....or Les Miles doesn't get fired for being Les Miles....or Linguist has already been around for a year or two before he leaves....or the timing plays out so we don't bother hiring him in the first place.  

There's plenty of unlucky to go around here, even in a world where Linguist is a notorious job hopper.

BornInA2

May 10th, 2021 at 6:14 PM ^

Six jobs in nine years including one for 200ish days would be a red flag for me in a hiring process.

This guy has a long history of chasing the next flashy object that comes along; believing that he'd magically change behavior because Michigan hired him isn't a recipe for happy danglies.

And so I don't see his leaving after setting a new PR for short stint as bad karma; it was reasonably predictable. Bad hire. Just like the knucklehead from MSU who lasted ten(?) days.

But then that's 2020s college football, right? If I don't immediately get what I want as a player, I'm in the portal: Working for a year or two to get game time is no longer a thing. Why should we expect coaches to make any more of a commitment?

JFW

May 11th, 2021 at 12:08 PM ^

Did any of his previous stays and with a quick job offer was a clear career  upgrade? This isn't a problem with our coaching staff. Sometimes you have to roll the dice, I don't mind that. Sometimes you get kicked in the crotch but I'm willing to risk that from time to time rather than just playing safe all the time.

JFW

May 11th, 2021 at 12:08 PM ^

Did any of his previous stays end with a quick job offer was a clear career  upgrade? This isn't a problem with our coaching staff. Sometimes you have to roll the dice, I don't mind that. Sometimes you get kicked in the crotch but I'm willing to risk that from time to time rather than just playing safe all the time.

bronxblue

May 10th, 2021 at 4:07 PM ^

Lots of intriguing candidates, but sure sounds like it's Clinkscale or bust.  Which makes sense at this point - trying to replace a guy in the middle of the spring is going to limit your options.  If they do strike out with Clinkscale I wouldn't mind them going after Robinson - if he plans on being an HC a co-DC job at a major college spot is going to help him more than a likely-rough year in New Orleans, and it's unlikely he'd close any doors to the NFL.  Plus, he's got a nice background in college recruiting and (I'm guessing) some familiarity with the NFL-infused defensive system MacDonald is looking to install.

It is somewhat ironic virtually all of the guys UM is looking at are younger guys who have bounced around a bit and would be leaving a job at an unexpected time, likely after making overtures to recruits about being excited at their current spot.  I'm sure questions about their character and duty to their current situation come up by this fanbase and we'll have to deal with the moral gray area such a situation has created.

I do think Clinkscale has been a pain in the ass for schools like MSU on the recruiting trail, but I wouldn't really consider him a huge pain for Michigan.  Rodgers going to UK despite being a top-75 player and a top-7 DT and a wealth of higher-rated suitors early on was always a bit of a head-scratcher, but his recruiting in the secondary would be welcome.  The concern there is overlap with other members of the staff, but as mentioned he's got connections in the Southeast and that's an area where UM needs to keep the momentum going.

 

jbrandimore

May 10th, 2021 at 4:26 PM ^

Not that I know anything about this topic Seth, but you should also look at Michigan's current assistants and see whether it makes sense for Michigan to move a current guy to DBs and then hire a new coach at the vacated spot.

That would be a very Harbaugh thing to do.

Hairbaugh Maximus

May 10th, 2021 at 4:43 PM ^

They all look like flight risks to me.  Hiring a Sparty coach who hates Michigan ( if true)  would make me nervous. Who might Harbaugh be able to poach from Ohio State?  They have come after plenty of our guys with no qualms. Payback could be delicious.