I realize there is a chance to pick up transfers after Spring, but we whiffed on virtually all the QB portal talent, during in large part to the glacial pace of Harbaugh getting to the Chargers offer. You'd have thought, aside from ambiguous NIL potential, that M would be a great landing spot for at least one of the studs that transferred in the January period - coming off Championship, McCarthy very much leaning pro, no clear starter behind him, etc. So now we're stuck hoping for some fly-under-the-radar great #2 at some school to bounce after Spring practice? Hope is not a strategy, as they say. We're all going to need to give Sherrone some grace for a few years to put things together.
The downfall of the program is mystifying. I expected Howard to be an A+ recruiter and grow into the HC nuances. Also mystifying is the seemingly great assistant coaching bench for this team - if Howard had some coaching or recruiting blind spots, you'd expect the assistants to compensate. In spite of the disappointing on court results and off court stuff, I still wish him the best and want him to succeed. Just a bummer.
If reports are accurate that JJ is still noticeably limping, no way he runs effectively, so foresee a fair amount of wildcat with Orji and Edwards. Even better if they throw a few times to keep the defense honest and pick up a few chunk plays.
A 10-22 record by season end, including a loss in the 1st round of the B1G tourney, is a better than average probability. Given the poor recruiting success and off floor issues, I can't see anything other than a full scale coaching transition. Disappointing bc I thought Howard had all the ingredients to do well, but it hasn't worked out.
This game was a shift in mojo between JJ and CJ - we were expecting those two to be lethal coming into the season, but for whatever reason things hadn't quite gotten lift off. I see those two linking up on some big time plays over the next 3 games. Also, I'd personally list Turner as one of my top 3 Known Friends... to hit those FGs in this game was absolutely huge, and essential to the win.
And did Bielema really verbally come after Brian with that nonsense? What is wrong with people?
It's been often said on this site, but they look best with a Reed/Hunter combo, and then Dug and wingers. Every time Reed comes on it feels like the energy is up, he rebounds, gets a few put backs, and can now shoot FT.
The result was virtually Kenpom chalk. We were in it when we were shooting 60% but reverted to the mean and NC took control. Dickinson had an uncharacteristically poor game, and if he'd held season form we win. But it didn't play out that way and we couldn't quite get over the hump. Its far from a lost cause, and the team has some good clay to work with. 20 games left, we'll probably need to win 13 of those; seems doable. Why are we talking about Coach Howard's demeanor - did anyone see Coach Davis lose his s***? How about Harbaugh circa 2017? From where I sit, I see Howard really intentionally working on his in game emotions.
Not sure I see us scoring as much as the consensus. Our O is untested, and has shown some propensity to stall out. We'll still put points on the board, but I have it in the 31 point range rather than 40+. Maybe 17 at the half and a couple of TDs in the 2nd half.
As much as we're a run first team, my sense is that the balance will be skewed to at least 50%+ pass this season. Which should also open more run lanes and make the O even more lethal. QBs just need to make the throws, which both Cade and JJ appear to be ready for. We'll see how play calling looks the first month before we get into the teeth of the schedule.
Reprehensible by Coach, and hopefully he shows some remorse. My guess at probabilities: 50% suspended for the rest of the regular season, 30% rest of the year including tournaments (post-season now looking bleaker), and 20% fired for cause. Much will depend on his willingness to authentically and publicly fall on his sword. I like him so much for the program, but simply inexcusable.
Great, let's sling it against Georgia to negate their front. M has at least 12 guys who can make catches between the wideouts, slots, TEs and RBs, and Cade is really good on the intermediate throws.
The consensus for the IU game is that M will play angry and win this game easily. But the IU coaching staff is good, and there is now plenty of film on how to exploit our weaknesses, and at the same time we haven't shown an ability to do anything different than what we always do. I see this game as much closer and more uncomfortable than we'd all like to see.
It's irrational and stupid, but I'd have traded a L to Wisconsin and/or Nebraska this year for a W vs MSU. This is likely Harbaugh's challenge with much of the fan base: rivals just matter more for bragging rights, and we've been owned by rivals over his tenure.
100% agree on the notion that we have become essentially Iowa; The Lions is a bit of a harsh analog - pick your sport, The Cubs, Tottenham FC, Pete Sampras, etc. Consistently good, every once in while catch fire / get some luck and be great, but not a title contender. If you're the AD, for better or worse, you probably stick with Harbaugh. He runs a clean program, cares immensely about the school, and will get you to a decent bowl game every year. Rolling the dice on a new coach at this stage seems like a classic case of asymmetric risk to the downside.
Kalani Sitake at BYU would be interesting to take a look at. Rebuilt the program over 5 years, has an exciting offense and QB with Heisman chatter. He played at BYU and is LDS, but could make 4x+ at Michigan.
Before this season I was of the view that we were essentially Iowa football under Harbaugh. Run of the mill for 4-5 years, then inexplicably crush it one year to keep the fan base hopeful, rinse and repeat. But it's clear we're not even that level of competency. If you're not going to be a perennial contender, you have to catch lightning in a bottle every once in a while - exhibit A, Ed Orgeron. Harbaugh cares deeply, he's insanely competitive, but I'm sure by his own admission things are not working. We're looking at a 1-7 year - Rutgers and Maryland are far from gimmes - which should force Warde's hand rather than extend the agony.
A lot of us expected Harbaugh to turn things around quicker than most good coaches, but there were lots of pundits shading 8-4 records for us in the pre-season, even presuming a theoretically improved Speight would be running the offense. So now that we realize we aren't BCS quality just yet, I for one just need to reset and hope for improvement week to week, beat the teams we're supposed to beat, and maybe steal one from Wisky or OSU. This coaching staff on balance is really good: every head coach would love to have Brown and Mattison, Frey's a proven top class O-line coach and will get that group turned around, Harbaugh is a great recruiter and motivator, and his culture of competition makes us better. He's also committed to winning, so if the O or any other position group isn't getting it done, I don't doubt for a second that he will make staff changes. So frustrating to be a fan right now, but I still believe we'll be competing for championships soon.
... through the entire qualifying campaign, and truly a disaster in the near term for US soccer.
Gulati is bad guy #1 for me in all this. There are some clear cut steps that should have been taken years ago (e.g. establishing development academies), and this is only one of many failures on his part over his tenure. We should have evolved further by now than just a plucky team competing on heart and effort in lieu of skill. What concerns me now is that the way the President of US Soccer is elected, there's a decent chance that a) Gulati is in with a shout to stay on for another term, or b) he gets replaced with someone else who's already in the administration who won't bring a single new idea to the table.
Brian, keep up the good work, and look forward to notes from you around the election in February.
I have to say, I was a bit surprised that Harbaugh didn't give Perry a little time on the naughty bench after his ball spinning penalty. And then he did it again on that great crossing route catch a few series' later. It's like he can't help himself. One suspects that the coaches will drill that out of him before Saturday.
Played their hearts out but just weren't in sync today. Outplayed and out coached. I'd say the QB competition is definitely open come Spring practice. Amazing they had the lead in the 4Q after getting smoked for most of the game on both sides.
It goes without saying that we need to focus recruiting on OL. Was and has been our achilles for many years, and next year holds no promise of an upgrade.
Loved that Tyree Kinnel TFL on their second drive. I was watching it live and could see him make a break for it out the peripheral side of the screen. It looked like he got shot out of a cannon. Great angle, great hustle, great anticipation and great solo tackle.
I cannot bring myself to fully expect an outcome that aligns with the respective records of these two teams. As much as I wish with a white hot passion that M smokes MSU to oblivion for all the crap that's happened over the Dantonio adminstration, and on paper you'd expect us to do that, I can't move off the idea that MSU is going to play well above their station on Saturday, and this game is going to be a nail biter.
Hoping this jedi mind trick makes me all the more pleased when we do in fact smoke them.
Congratulations to Coach B and Kam! Most of us wrote them both off this year, and this was a great win against a good team in their back yard. Good for them!
KenPom with another spot on prediction. He would have been right in regulation time if Olah didn't the fade at the end, but was right anyways in OT. Truly remarkable to be that mathematically accurate that often.
Given the players they had available, 20-11 seems about right. A few good wins against Texas, Maryland, Purdue. The thing that clearly frustrates us all is the style in which they've lost to better teams. You hope for some pluckiness and coaching juju from Beilein to keep us close or steal one or two more games, but we weren't in the same zip code with better teams this year.
He needs someone else to be a threat to spread the floor, dribble penetrate, to find open looks. They aren't built to do that w/o Levert. Other teams figured that out pretty quickly. I still think he ends up with Stauskas-like stats before he's done at M with a bit of experience and muscle.
IMG Academy tuition $73k a year for tuition y'all. x3-4 yrs potentially. I guess if you get a full ride to college that's money well spent if you have it, but dang.
The talent disparity is pretty wide. It gets tiring to see M as the scrappy underdog against strong teams. Teams do go through cycles, and M had some great tourney runs in recent years, but it's hard to see them turning the corner with this group. A healthy Caris and Spike would not have mattered against MSU, IU, SMU, Iowa, etc. so we can't fall back on that. Walton, Irvin, Dawkins look like solid D1 players. That's it at the moment. I like Beilein as a coach, but he needs a few Greg Mattison/Chris Partridge types on staff to recruit players. Clearly not a strength for him.
What's just as encouraging is that we now have a coaching staff that can do something with this talent we're picking up. There are a lot of consistently excellent teams that pretty much make their living on lots of 3 stars and a few 4 stars. That Georgia is top 5 in recruiting year after year and have been kind of meh or a little better in that stretch speaks to the issue. High confidence that the Harbaugh regime will get the most upside of the guys they bring in, which is fun to be a part of as a lifelong fan.
I've been feeling slightly uneasy about the oversigning business - realizing that all elite schools do it - but this is a great reminder as to why it is necessary.
Between TE/WR/Slot and backs who can catch, we are just stacked. One of the cool things about this regime is that with really good coaching, some of the players we've all come to think of as meh might switch to another gear next year. Beyond seeing the team win, it's fun as a fan to see guys break out due to hard work and good coaching.
M wins 10-8. Rudock leads the team in rushing yards, but they find a way to pull two drives together, a TD in the first half to Butt and FG in the 2nd. Florida scores a TD and 2 pt conversion but misses 2 FG's. Here's to a more balanced offense in 2016.
First half was pretty solid. OSU capitalized on their shots but we sustained drives and got into the red zone. Not bad for no run game. Second half was just odious in every possible way - the dong punch on Peppers, Bosa's INT and Meyer's smug sideline cheerleader routine were top of my list of things to hate.
If not for our sieve-like run D we would have had a chance to tie the game up at the end. IU runs power on their last full drive and end up scoring "too quickly" - an OK run game against a good D should have resulted in hard fought yards, clock running, with maybe a late FG. But they scored so quickly, leaving 2+ minutes on the clock, everyone I was watching the game with said in unison - that's good, at least we have time on the clock. IU is undoubtedly cursed - they screw themselves even when they're crushing it.
Lyons It is what it is, but it seems strange that Wayne Lyons isn't more integral to the secondary at this point. He was a solid, experienced starter on a good Stanford team, in a position of need for us.
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I realize there is a chance to pick up transfers after Spring, but we whiffed on virtually all the QB portal talent, during in large part to the glacial pace of Harbaugh getting to the Chargers offer. You'd have thought, aside from ambiguous NIL potential, that M would be a great landing spot for at least one of the studs that transferred in the January period - coming off Championship, McCarthy very much leaning pro, no clear starter behind him, etc. So now we're stuck hoping for some fly-under-the-radar great #2 at some school to bounce after Spring practice? Hope is not a strategy, as they say. We're all going to need to give Sherrone some grace for a few years to put things together.
Same, wondering when Kenpom is going to catch up to our performances.
The downfall of the program is mystifying. I expected Howard to be an A+ recruiter and grow into the HC nuances. Also mystifying is the seemingly great assistant coaching bench for this team - if Howard had some coaching or recruiting blind spots, you'd expect the assistants to compensate. In spite of the disappointing on court results and off court stuff, I still wish him the best and want him to succeed. Just a bummer.
Aaron McMann posted something on Mlive a few days ago in the injury update
If reports are accurate that JJ is still noticeably limping, no way he runs effectively, so foresee a fair amount of wildcat with Orji and Edwards. Even better if they throw a few times to keep the defense honest and pick up a few chunk plays.
A 10-22 record by season end, including a loss in the 1st round of the B1G tourney, is a better than average probability. Given the poor recruiting success and off floor issues, I can't see anything other than a full scale coaching transition. Disappointing bc I thought Howard had all the ingredients to do well, but it hasn't worked out.
Really no personal fouls or cheap shots in the game. I clocked that toward the end, thinking the same thing.
This game was a shift in mojo between JJ and CJ - we were expecting those two to be lethal coming into the season, but for whatever reason things hadn't quite gotten lift off. I see those two linking up on some big time plays over the next 3 games. Also, I'd personally list Turner as one of my top 3 Known Friends... to hit those FGs in this game was absolutely huge, and essential to the win.
And did Bielema really verbally come after Brian with that nonsense? What is wrong with people?
It's been often said on this site, but they look best with a Reed/Hunter combo, and then Dug and wingers. Every time Reed comes on it feels like the energy is up, he rebounds, gets a few put backs, and can now shoot FT.
The result was virtually Kenpom chalk. We were in it when we were shooting 60% but reverted to the mean and NC took control. Dickinson had an uncharacteristically poor game, and if he'd held season form we win. But it didn't play out that way and we couldn't quite get over the hump. Its far from a lost cause, and the team has some good clay to work with. 20 games left, we'll probably need to win 13 of those; seems doable. Why are we talking about Coach Howard's demeanor - did anyone see Coach Davis lose his s***? How about Harbaugh circa 2017? From where I sit, I see Howard really intentionally working on his in game emotions.
Not sure I see us scoring as much as the consensus. Our O is untested, and has shown some propensity to stall out. We'll still put points on the board, but I have it in the 31 point range rather than 40+. Maybe 17 at the half and a couple of TDs in the 2nd half.
As much as we're a run first team, my sense is that the balance will be skewed to at least 50%+ pass this season. Which should also open more run lanes and make the O even more lethal. QBs just need to make the throws, which both Cade and JJ appear to be ready for. We'll see how play calling looks the first month before we get into the teeth of the schedule.
Reprehensible by Coach, and hopefully he shows some remorse. My guess at probabilities: 50% suspended for the rest of the regular season, 30% rest of the year including tournaments (post-season now looking bleaker), and 20% fired for cause. Much will depend on his willingness to authentically and publicly fall on his sword. I like him so much for the program, but simply inexcusable.
This looks like a favorable schedule to me, which obviously means we'll hit the Under on wins
Great, let's sling it against Georgia to negate their front. M has at least 12 guys who can make catches between the wideouts, slots, TEs and RBs, and Cade is really good on the intermediate throws.
I like whatever disrepekt juju the team gets from the seeding. Almost wish we were 3 to really get it flowing.
The consensus for the IU game is that M will play angry and win this game easily. But the IU coaching staff is good, and there is now plenty of film on how to exploit our weaknesses, and at the same time we haven't shown an ability to do anything different than what we always do. I see this game as much closer and more uncomfortable than we'd all like to see.
It's irrational and stupid, but I'd have traded a L to Wisconsin and/or Nebraska this year for a W vs MSU. This is likely Harbaugh's challenge with much of the fan base: rivals just matter more for bragging rights, and we've been owned by rivals over his tenure.
100% agree on the notion that we have become essentially Iowa; The Lions is a bit of a harsh analog - pick your sport, The Cubs, Tottenham FC, Pete Sampras, etc. Consistently good, every once in while catch fire / get some luck and be great, but not a title contender. If you're the AD, for better or worse, you probably stick with Harbaugh. He runs a clean program, cares immensely about the school, and will get you to a decent bowl game every year. Rolling the dice on a new coach at this stage seems like a classic case of asymmetric risk to the downside.
Kalani Sitake at BYU would be interesting to take a look at. Rebuilt the program over 5 years, has an exciting offense and QB with Heisman chatter. He played at BYU and is LDS, but could make 4x+ at Michigan.
Before this season I was of the view that we were essentially Iowa football under Harbaugh. Run of the mill for 4-5 years, then inexplicably crush it one year to keep the fan base hopeful, rinse and repeat. But it's clear we're not even that level of competency. If you're not going to be a perennial contender, you have to catch lightning in a bottle every once in a while - exhibit A, Ed Orgeron. Harbaugh cares deeply, he's insanely competitive, but I'm sure by his own admission things are not working. We're looking at a 1-7 year - Rutgers and Maryland are far from gimmes - which should force Warde's hand rather than extend the agony.
A lot of us expected Harbaugh to turn things around quicker than most good coaches, but there were lots of pundits shading 8-4 records for us in the pre-season, even presuming a theoretically improved Speight would be running the offense. So now that we realize we aren't BCS quality just yet, I for one just need to reset and hope for improvement week to week, beat the teams we're supposed to beat, and maybe steal one from Wisky or OSU. This coaching staff on balance is really good: every head coach would love to have Brown and Mattison, Frey's a proven top class O-line coach and will get that group turned around, Harbaugh is a great recruiter and motivator, and his culture of competition makes us better. He's also committed to winning, so if the O or any other position group isn't getting it done, I don't doubt for a second that he will make staff changes. So frustrating to be a fan right now, but I still believe we'll be competing for championships soon.
... through the entire qualifying campaign, and truly a disaster in the near term for US soccer.
Gulati is bad guy #1 for me in all this. There are some clear cut steps that should have been taken years ago (e.g. establishing development academies), and this is only one of many failures on his part over his tenure. We should have evolved further by now than just a plucky team competing on heart and effort in lieu of skill. What concerns me now is that the way the President of US Soccer is elected, there's a decent chance that a) Gulati is in with a shout to stay on for another term, or b) he gets replaced with someone else who's already in the administration who won't bring a single new idea to the table.
Brian, keep up the good work, and look forward to notes from you around the election in February.
I have to say, I was a bit surprised that Harbaugh didn't give Perry a little time on the naughty bench after his ball spinning penalty. And then he did it again on that great crossing route catch a few series' later. It's like he can't help himself. One suspects that the coaches will drill that out of him before Saturday.
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It goes without saying that we need to focus recruiting on OL. Was and has been our achilles for many years, and next year holds no promise of an upgrade.
Loved that Tyree Kinnel TFL on their second drive. I was watching it live and could see him make a break for it out the peripheral side of the screen. It looked like he got shot out of a cannon. Great angle, great hustle, great anticipation and great solo tackle.
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I cannot bring myself to fully expect an outcome that aligns with the respective records of these two teams. As much as I wish with a white hot passion that M smokes MSU to oblivion for all the crap that's happened over the Dantonio adminstration, and on paper you'd expect us to do that, I can't move off the idea that MSU is going to play well above their station on Saturday, and this game is going to be a nail biter.
Hoping this jedi mind trick makes me all the more pleased when we do in fact smoke them.
I like Ty Wheatley evolving into power FB of the Houma/Hill mode.
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$73k a year for tuition y'all. x3-4 yrs potentially. I guess if you get a full ride to college that's money well spent if you have it, but dang.
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What's just as encouraging is that we now have a coaching staff that can do something with this talent we're picking up. There are a lot of consistently excellent teams that pretty much make their living on lots of 3 stars and a few 4 stars. That Georgia is top 5 in recruiting year after year and have been kind of meh or a little better in that stretch speaks to the issue. High confidence that the Harbaugh regime will get the most upside of the guys they bring in, which is fun to be a part of as a lifelong fan.
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Between TE/WR/Slot and backs who can catch, we are just stacked. One of the cool things about this regime is that with really good coaching, some of the players we've all come to think of as meh might switch to another gear next year. Beyond seeing the team win, it's fun as a fan to see guys break out due to hard work and good coaching.
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