How did the Skunkbears fall so fast? Recruiting?
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Replies to: How did the Skunkbears fall so fast? Recruiting?
tOSU is simply that much better, but Rich Rodriguez bled them dry
Right now, tOSU is at the top of the Big Ten, without any question. While Indiana is having a nice season, they're still a good notch or two (or three) below tOSU in terms of talent. They've had top tier coaching throughout those years (Tressel and Meyer, and arguably, now Ryan Day), and those guys knew how to bring in NFL talent to their rosters, while also developing them.
Those coaches also knew how to adapt their schemes to best fit the talent they were given. They were also fortunate that they had plenty of talent to choose from when they started.
Michigan is about where we were in 2008 / 2009. Still undergoing the rebuilding process and despite a bad year, showing improvement, but the natives are certainly restless.
Hiring Rich Rodriguez was the lynchpin here, where he ran that program into the ground. While some may say that he was their equivalent of Tyrone Willingham (and I don't disagree at all), at least Rodriguez wasn't lazy when it came to recruiting, that he pulled in some pretty good talent throughout his time there.
Lloyd Carr left a roster stocked very nicely with talent, including one of the top QB prospects groomed to play in a pro-style offense (Ryan Mallet), and a pretty good pro-style QB in the way of Steven Threet. When Rich Rodriguez came in, he basically tried to fit too many square pegs into his round hole scheme by forcing a roster full of pro-style players to play a run-first, spread-option offense. Putting in Nick Sheridan (the worst passing QB on the roster) as the starter made things worse.
The offensive line was a group of big earth-movers, who weren't designed to be used in the same way that smaller, more nimble linemen were, and Threet was a bad match for a run-first spread-option offense. Those guys would have done just fine with the 2007 pro-style scheme, since it was based on precision pocket passing designed to setup the run, and that they had a conservative, but effective, zone-blocking scheme that worked well enough.
When Rodriguez made all of the wholesale changes, including changing the blocking scheme to an aggressive hybridized man to man blocking / zone blocking mixture, you saw a lot of offensive linemen whiffing on their blocks, because they weren't very good at being able to switch between schemes on the fly.
By the time Rodriguez adapted the personnel of his team to his run-first, spread-option scheme, the Michigan faithful were already tired of him, and gave him the boot.
You could easily say that Rodriguez being there basically set up Brady Hoke for failure, since he tried to turn that team back into a pro-style offense with no real throwing quarterback on his roster.
Don't get me wrong. Brady Hoke wasn't a good coach at that level. He also made the same mistake that Rodriguez did, by trying to turn Dennard Robinson into a pro-style quarterback, as well as doing the same for Devin Gardner, and he didn't exactly do a good job of bringing in offensive linemen. Devin Gardner and Shane Morris basically got turned into paste, which was quite a shame for Morris, seeing how he had all of that talent.
Still, if they had hired Hoke in 2008, instead of Rodriguez, I think you would have seen a much better run of years, since his methods were a much better fit for the talent on that roster.
They really haven't "fallen." They are at their best since Carr.
Rodriguez was in over his head and failed. Ditto Hoke. That was 9 years of bad or mediocre.
Under Harbaugh, they have been consistently pretty darn good. They just haven't beaten Ohio State or made the playoffs.
They have not become elite, but they have not "fallen," either. This season is weird - I'd hold off on the eulogy.
Perhaps but 3-3 versus MSU and 0-5 versus tOSU. (1-5 combined at home) gets him gone.
As you say, weird year,so he may get another...
Also embarrassing losses.
They’ve only kept the loss to OSU in single digits once. The last two years, they’ve surrendered 62 and 56 to the Buckeyes. They’ve lost four bowls in a row, the last two by a 20+ average. In season three, Harbaugh looked like he was on course to turning Michigan into what he was hired for, building a championship contender, going into the MSU game undefeated and ranked #7. They lost. Since then, UM has gone 25-16 overall, with a number of “bad” losses, either losing to bad teams or getting steamrolled. Harbaugh was supposed to make them a top tier team. He’s never finished better than third in the Big 10 East. UM fans are itching to start over. If he gets another year it will be because he doesn’t get NFL interest and/or they don’t want to buy him out.
They are done. Start the bus.
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Harbaugh petition:
Because warp speed was unattainable?
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I live near U of M... anf the feeling here is that demographics is killing the Big Ten.
Passion for the sport has shifted south... at all levels! OSU is on the border of SEC country and it's "culture" (sic) is more akin to that in Tuscaloosa than to that in Ann Arbor, so it is immune to this change. Fortunately, this year the Irish are very visible in Dixie... and somewhat exotic for them (as we appear to be in Hawaii). I have treasured our independence, but BYU is the canary in the mine shaft for what it portends for the future, which shall involve the dominance of super conferences. The ACC leads all conferences in potential media eyeballs.
Likely is some truth that talent and excitement is bigger south, but ND & OSU are top 4 . . .
right now. Gotta recruit the south, and it is a challenge, but not the reason UM can’t do well while OSU can.
I like your logic here and it justifies joining the ACC permanently and keeping USC permanently on
schedule and about four other teams on a rotating basis. Best of all worlds that way for qualifying for playoffs potential.
Or bad coaching. UM and PSU have both had LOTS of highly-rated recruits.
The ‘demographics’ do not explain why other Big Twn teams are beating them, do they?
OSU is on the border of SEC country and immune? That's silly and not true.
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Agree with you on the geographic argument. However, there may be something to the football culture
argument. Traditionally, the B10 has been big, midwestern land grant public universities with excellent academic reputations and standards. Football has always been big, but just part of that mix. In the SEC, football is king and everything else including academic standards are subordinate. That’s not to say there aren’t some very, very good academic institutions there, there really are, but the culture is football first. OSU is the one B10 school that fits the SEC mix. It is a very good school academically, but football is first and foremost.
I won't argue with that, but that's not what Curly was saying.
I think you could throw PSU into the same category as you describe OSU. Just not quite as successful.
Hmm... have you been to Columbus and do you have a map?
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That's like saying Indiana borders the SEC. There's virtually zero difference between Indy and Cbus.
Ohio borders Michigan, Indiana, Pennsylvania and practically New York and Canada. Ohio is a very Catholic state too. On top of that, Kentucky is NOT a football state.
The SEC power base is in Alabama, Georgia, Louisiana and Tennessee. Then you have Mississippi, South Carolina and Florida. Hell, Missouri or Texas aren't even SEC country.
Indiana is a basketball state. OSU easily takes the cream of the Midwest recruits.
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Columbus has Schmidt's German buffet and restaurant. That alone is a major plus.
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NDavenue has a strong point. OSU thrives cuz they got Urban and brought the southern practices North
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Irrelevant. Ohio is an everything state & has 0 geographically or culturally in common with the SEC.
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Northern Ohio yes. Southern and rural not so much.
The state is replete with red necks and Cincinnati is separated from the South by a river.
Oy vey. And Pittsburgh is a stone's throw away from West Virginia. The entire rust belt...
is littered with rednecks that migrated post-war. As for SE OH (which is a lot like West Virginia), that's not where the OSU fan base is. And there is no serious or good football played there.
Again, there are 16 Catholic High Schools in Cincinnati. Southwest, West Central, Northeast Ohio are huge Catholic strongholds. The state has as much in common with Tuscaloosa as oil does with water. You keep doubling down on this crazy notion from Michiganders to make sense of why Ohio State is good and scUM is not. It's wrong.
I don't know. OSU arrest warrants for football players rival all SEC schools.
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Correct. This is has been a Michigan alibi for a while.
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Yep. Grasping at straws to justify why they can't compete with the Buckeyes.
Or a lot of other teams for that matter.
How? Because there IS a God.
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