105

Days since MSU has beaten M in Men's Basketball or Football!!!

Using History To Predict The Future (take 2)

I'm not going to go into all of the numbers, but using the winning % in Hoke's first two seasons at his prior HC job, compared to the winning % the season he got there, as well as using the winning % of RR teams the first two seasons after he left, compared to his last season there, the expected record for the next two years are:

2011 7-6
2012 5-7 (or possibility 6-7 if the 6th win is during the regular season).

There you have it.

Temptation and War Chant

Prior to the game, I was having a really good time at the Gator Bowl.

Big Chill Free Skate

I was finally able to to get this off my phone and on to YouTube. Warning - watching may cause dizziness or vomiting...

Coach Hoke

As I discussed a few days ago, I'm not particularly happy with the whole coaching search. Brady Hoke may be the right choice, but I don't feel like the "process" was handled well.

Here's my take on what Brandon has told us of the process:

• He really didn't know if he was going to fire Rodriguez - even after the Gator Bowl fiasco.
• He hadn't had any serious talks with Jim Harbaugh prior to RR's firing
• He only offered the job to Brady Hoke

Things that I think are true even though he told us they aren't:

• This was never a national coaching search (I think the serious candidates were Harbaugh, Hoke & Miles)
  
• It was completely limited to Michigan Men (as above)
  
• Michigan was looking at cost or at least "value" when making the decision (Hoke is a lot cheaper than either Miles or Harbaugh would have been)

Brandon keeps bragging that he only offered the job to Hoke. I'd at least like to hear why he didn't offer it to Miles or certainly Harbaugh! Is it more than they wouldn't take it? A lot of perception is Miles would have taken it if he had been offered. Jaimie Morris on WTKA this weekend said he feels if Harbaugh had been seriously offered the job he would have taken it.

The most important aspect of the whole thing is none of this is Hoke's fault. As with every Michigan coach, I want him to succeed. He said the right things at the press conference. To my surprise he seems to have the majority of the "Michigan Family" united. Outside of the blog world, there hasn't been much negativity.

I guess we'll find out in 316 days when the regular season comes to the end.

Another championship game casualty

From the Uniwatch Blog

Meanwhile: Over the past month, ESPN produced two “BCS Champs” iPad apps — one for each school. I know, because I contributed an article to each of them (very odd to write two pieces and know for sure that only one of them will be published). The Auburn one is now available at the iTunes App Store, or whatever it’s called; the Oregon one, as I joked in last night’s comments, will be distributed for free to impoverished iPad users in the Third World.

Who Is House?

Michigan coaching situation - What the heck is going on?

I guess the easy answer is David Brandon was telling the truth all along. He really was going to assess the program at the end of the season, and that's what he's doing, common sense be damned. In the business world there is no regular season, no signing season etc.

In college football, it seems to be a MAJOR disadvantage (like set back the program even further) to fire your coach without having someone already in mind this late in the season.

I was hoping all along that Brandon had a secret deal with Harbaugh to come in after the bowls were over. It is pretty clear that isn't the case. Maybe he thought he could get JH, maybe he thought M would do better in the bowl game and he could reasonably keep RR. But none of those things seem to be happening.

Brady Hoke could have been hired the day after the OSU debacle. That would have made the bowl prep more useful, would have been a more consistent face for recruiting. Instead, it looks like he's a desperation hire in January, after M's biggest recruits have already said they're looking elsewhere. Hoke may be the right choice, but choosing him means M wasted 5-6 weeks with RR still on the job.

It will be difficult for Hoke to reconcile the split fanbase. Who's really excited about this choice? I don't think he really qualifies as a "Michigan Man," does he? A position coach for 8 seasons, is that really all it takes? Would Billy Harris have been an option when Mo was fired? I don't think anyone would have been happy with that and he played for Michigan.

Now Hoke has had some success as a head coach. One good season at Ball State and San Diego State each, but his overall record is still only 47-50. I guess that is better than Moeller's at Illinois, but does anyone think Hoke is half the coach Moeller was?

I've said before my biggest fear in a coaching change situation would be no one wanting the Michigan job, further showing how much Michigan has fallen from relevancy. I don't think having Brady Hoke want the job relieves any of those fears.

I read in Craig Ross's book that when the basketball team fired Steve Fisher, Johnny Orr said he would be the interim coach for a season (I think he even said for free!) allowing the AD to take time to find the right guy. Instead they went head first into the Brian Ellerbe era, mostly because there was no one else. I don't want Hoke to be equivalent to Ellerbe. Maybe, Gary Moeller, Lloyd Carr or even Jerry Hanlon could step in in this situation?

FGs

We all know that M's FG kicking this year was horrible. 4 of 14 is 28.6%, which is 120th in the nation (out of 120).

What I didn't realize until just now is that M Opponent FG % is 90.9 (20 of 22), which is 116th in the nation.

Ouch.

M vs SEC Video

Um, no.

Pro-RR confusion

One of the arguments the anti-RR crowd uses is that in 2008 RR did not fit his system around the players he had, but rather tried to fit the players into his system.  Currently, the pro-RRers are saying that isn't true.

However, I remember very well in 2008 there were a lot of arguments about whether he should change his system or whether he should continue to implement it his way so it would help the overall transition in the long run.  And, back then, the pro-RR group was all for doing it the way RR was doing it, which was to have Steven Threet try to run the same offense that DRob is running today (read this sentence a few more times and let it settle in.  then, try not to laugh or cry).  Briangoblog had some long posts with this argument.  Heck, even RR in the past 2 years, when things were looking bad (like during a pre-bowl interview this year) brings up the issue of taking time for the transition into his system.  He doesn't say something like "It takes time to transition into my system because we are still running other kinds of offenses until we have all the correct personnel".  He just says it takes awhile to transition.

Why am I mentioning this now?  Because, even today, the day after the worse bowl loss in the history of University of Michigan football, I am reading, in blogs/fan fora, etc. that in 2008, RR didn't just try to implement his system, regardless of the personnel he had.  I'm guessing they are using the talent argument again, which may have some validity for a bad season that year.  But 3-9 came about because RR only cared about implementing his offense without regard to personnel.


Now that is has been said in bold/purple/underlined/highlighted in yellow, it is officially the truth.

My Candidate for M Football Coach

If somehow, M isn't able to get JH or some other 'name' coach, I suggest they still fire RR and hire this guy:

This is Joe Tricario, the linebackers/special teams coach of the 6-5 FCS Stony Brook Seawolves.

Michigan connections:
-He used to coach at Furman, and I have a friend who went to Furman for law school.  That friend is from the Kalamazoo area.
-He coached in the CFL (Toronto) and the WLAF (Montreal).  Many people think the UP is in Canada.
-His father was the coach at Mt. St. Michael Academy.  St. Michael is the patron saint of artists.  Ann Arbor is known for being artsy.

Joe Tricario is a Michigan Man.

Points

At one time in the season, M had outscored the opponents by 80 points.  The final outcome is M -32 (if my math is correct).

I don't know if I have mentioned this yet, but I'm thinking Brandon should fire RR and hire anyone who has ever read the word "football".

RR

I think I've said that  if Brandon doesn't have a good replacement for RR, we should keep him for another year, that we shouldn't just fire him and hire "some guy" to replace him.

I am changing my mind.  Fire him!  Replacement with 'anyone'.  I don't care who.  Anyone that has ever coached football.  No, anyone that has ever watched football.  Ever.