To my surprise, a lot of people seemed to really like the changes. No one even had posted their extended descent into madness and meditated as to why they always drop $60 when nothing ever changes and everything is wrong in the world and what is the point of it all anyway?  Well, considering I’ve been buying this game since 2002 came, it didn’t take too much to convince me to get it.

So I ran out, picked up and threw it in the XBox360 (Paul VBlue is my gamertag in case anyone cares). My friend came over and we did an exhibition on Heisman difficulty between a couple ACC teams (I can’t quite remember at this point).

I could have really done without the marching bands at the beginning of the game. I doubt any band is actually going to form the EA Sports logo. Once we got into the game play I started to notice the differences right away.  The movements are all much smoother and more realistic feeling. While there are some animations that don’t always quite work, most of the gameplay looks and feels very good.  A big change is your QB’s throws as he’s being hit. My offense in 2009 involved sitting in the pocket, stepping up and launching a perfect pass 40 yards downfield just before getting leveled. Try to do that in 2010 and it barely gets to the offensive line. More realistic, sure, but a little tough for me to get used to. Another thing is that the CPU defense actually takes rational pursuit angles that you can’t throw off with a wiggle of the control stick. I could shake almost any defender just by running slightly towards the post and then cutting hard to the sideline.

The defenses are pretty similar, but your defensive AI doesn’t seem quite as incompetent as last year and you can even get a bit of a pass rush at times (!). I freely admit that I generally SuperSim (best feature ever) the defense, so I may not be the best judge.

The game was going fairly well until midway through the third quarter. The game just up and froze. Alright, maybe this is a bad sign, but it happens right? It could just be a freak chance.

We restart the XBox and start the Michigan dynasty. I try to download rosters, but unfortunately, EA shipped beta rosters with the retail version of the game, so the standard people who get the game 2 weeks early weren’t able to put together rosters by the release day, and there likely won’t be a complete one for another few weeks or so.  We decided to just with number, since HB #4 seems more like Minor than have him be called Darius Simmons or something.

First thing I saw when we got started was “Add a new pipeline state.” This is new so I click it, and apparently you can now buy “Dynasty Accelerators” which give you benefits in recruiting and whatnot. These cost points/money. Will people actually buy these? I hope none of you do. I mean, really. Just don’t do it.

Anyway, I like the new recruiting lay out (grid vs. list is generally a good UI choice if you have quite a few options). You can also numerically and graphically see how much your pitch is affecting a recruit which is nice. I always got frustrated when it would take 90 minutes to pitch a guy and you really don’t know if it’s doing anything.  Besides that and the new lay out, recruiting seems fairly similar to last year.

The last big, new thing is the inclusion of Erin Andrews.  I started a Road to Glory, but got bored pretty quickly, since it’s just a repackaged Campus Legend mode (which I knew, but was hopeful for something more). The injury reports, which happen with much more frequently*, are a nice break to the standard Nessler, Corso, Herbstreet booth, and aren’t even quite as generic as I would have thought.

Overall, I really enjoy most of the changes made to the game. The more aesthetic things (marching band, 3d “dorm room” in RtG, etc.) I could have lived without, but overall, they fixed a lot of things that were really annoying, and the game play is much, much better.

The bad parts:

• The menus are slow – I move really quickly in the play selection menu, but  sometimes it doesn’t load a submenu by the time I try to select something.
• No full rosters - It seems really weird to me that a mistake that huge could make it through, but it is EA. You can get the updated rosters here.
• The game crashes all the damn time – This is the big one. I tried loading it to my HDD, I’ve wiped the disc, but no matter what I do, it will usually end up freezing before I decide I want to turn it off. This has caused some annoyances and lost data, and I have to assume there’ll be a patch for it, but for right now it just really makes me want to write EA strongly worded letter. They get so much right in the gameplay, but a lot of the time I can’t even get to it.

I’m sure the more I play, I’ll find things that are annoying, but it’s definitely one of the best versions I’ve played in a while. Hopefully, EA will add some patches to make this game as good as it can be. What do you guys think?

*4 games into the 2009 and my QB #5 has been knocked out of the game on 3 separate occasions.

Enjoy:

Tim and I will be at Ashley’s by 5am. Wish us luck.

I can’t remember how that game ended, except that Michigan was not able to win. I certainly didn’t understand what happened over the next few years as it came to light how much was wrong with the Michigan Basketball program.

Fisher left and Traylor picked Brian Ellerbe to be the replacement. Traylor left the following and Michigan truly began it’s decade of aimless wandering.  The teams and the players Ellerbe brought in couldn’t capture my interest, even though basketball has always been my favorite sport.  I really like Bernard Robinson Jr. and LaVell Blanchard, but they weren’t enough to get me into Michigan basketball.  In 2001 it looked like we might turn the corner.

Tommy Amaker was a hot coaching prospect. He had a good pedigree with his history at Duke and he took Seton Hall to the Sweet Sixteen. In 2002 he brought in Daniel Horton, Lester Abrams, Amadou Ba, Sharrod Harrel, Graham Brown and Chris Hunter. Horton beat out Dee Brown at Illinois for Big Ten Rookie of the year.  There was another great class brought in the next year.

There was a lot of excitement for these teams, and they often looked like they could make the tournament. I remember after they won the 2004 NIT people were talking about how Michigan won the 1984 NIT and then went on to become a number 1 seed in 1985.  That didn’t happen.

Amaker had six years and couldn’t get in the tournament with talent that has become the NBA Developmental League All-Star team.  I was surprised when it was announced that Amaker would no longer be the coach. I figured there would be one more year with the coming freshman class of Kelvin Grady, Manny Harris and Alex Legion.  Bill Martin decided to make a bold move in firing Amaker and made an incredibly safe decision to hire a coach with over 30 years of head coaching experience.

The first season was the painful square peg and round hole feeling that Michigan fans know a little too well by now.  The players didn’t look like they were getting the system, and some weren’t even trying.  In 2007, Michigan only won 10 games, and in many it looked like there was no way they could score.

Coming into this season, there were three seniors on the team, two of which started as walk ons.  There were 3 players over 6′9″, one red shirted, another played a total of about 10 minutes. At most points during the season Michigan started 2 freshman. Zack Novak was matched up against people 5 inches taller, 40 pounds heavier and with 3 more years of experience.  This should not be a tournament team.

Then Michigan beat UCLA. Most fans were brought back down to Earth by the Duke and Maryland games.  Then Michigan beat Duke and didn’t drop another out of conference game.  I had become used to Michigan dropping two or three games they shouldn’t have.  That didn’t happen. They made it to the conference season only losing to two good ACC teams.

The conference season was up and down, but the team was always in the game and always in the hunt for the Big Dance. They entered into their last four games needing to win two and they beat two tournament teams, Purdue and Minnesota.  The formula was then set: win one at the Big Ten Tournament and Michigan is likely in.  Michigan completely dominated Iowa, looking like they could beat anybody.  They then looked flat against a very efficient Illinois team.

The rational side of me had read all the great bubble breakdowns and knew that there is no reason Michigan shouldn’t be in, but at Crisler, with a few thousand other Michigan fans, I was still nervous. Coach Beilein didn’t reassure us with his pre-rally speech. It was good, but it had the sound of trying to cover the bases in case Michigan didn’t make it.

Once the show started, you could feel the crowed tense up just before every 8, 9, 10, 11 or 12 seed were announced. After each bracket, the fear grew. There were a lot of bubble teams that I didn’t think would make it that did. The crowd grew a bit nervous, and nearly exploded when Minnesota was announced as part of the field.

They had gone through the top half of the last bracket, and the spots for Michigan was down to 2. I was already gearing myself up for disappointed. “If NCAA refs have been screwing over Michigan all year, why shouldn’t the NCAA selection committee?”.

Then Michigan was announced as the 10 seed in the South Bracket taking on 7 seed Clemson in Kansas City. Then,  this happened:

There was a huge sense of release from the crowd. people were jumping up and down and hugging, and it lasted well after CBS has cut away.  Beilein thanked the coaches; David Merrit addressed the crowd; the players led the crowd in singing the Victors.  Beilein and the players left the court to do their media interviews, and I walked home unable to wipe the smile off my face.

As I was walking up my block, there were some people running in to check Southwest Airlines to see how much it would cost to fly out to Kansas City.  It’s like a curse that has left a seemingly permanent malaise was finally broken.  It doesn’t matter what happens in the NCAA Tournament. This team has done something that, on paper, better Michigan teams couldn’t.

There’s excitement for Michigan basketball again. There were more people at this announcement than were at the Eastern Michigan game last year.

Like John Beilein said: “Making the tournament is only the first step.”  A step that he was able take in two years. I can’t wait to see what happens in the next two years.

]]> http://www.umvarsityblue.com/2009/03/a-decade-under-the-influence/feed/ 5 http://www.umvarsityblue.com/2009/02/tate-forcier-interview/ http://www.umvarsityblue.com/2009/02/tate-forcier-interview/#comments Thu, 12 Feb 2009 15:48:52 +0000 Paul http://www.umvarsityblue.com/?p=2750 This is Tate speaking to the media on signing. He really does sound like a pro dealing with the media. Sorry for the sub-par videography. For most of the time, I was holding the camera with one hand and the mic with another.

I have interviews with Campbell, Vincent Smith and Mike Jones that will be coming throughout the rest of the week.

(Part 1 Part 2)

Taylor Lewan

Rodriguez said that Taylor has exactly the type of frame that he looks for in his tackles.  He has a big frame, but still has a ton of athleticism.  Taylor himself has said the Jake Long is his favorite player, and he could end up having a similar game. He’s a bit smaller, only 6′6″ and 270lbs, but with a year or two in a college conditioning program, he should be a monster.  Coach noted that he has only been playing OL for a year, so is somewhat a blank canvas and may have been underrated by the recruiting services.  I’m guessing he’ll redshirt, but I would be surprised if he didn’t contribute down the line.

Denard Robinson

Coach said that Robinson may be the fastest kid they recruited. He doesn’t have the fake 40 times of Teric Jones, but watching his game film, you can really get a sense of how fast he is out on the field.  Rodriguez also conceeded that while Denard may not be the tallest player out there, he has a knack to make plays when it appears there’s nothing there.  The consensus of Robinson is that this is his year to compete to start at QB. If he wins it, he could start for a long time, if not he’ll likely switch positions down the line.  He’s got a lot to work for this offeseason and fall.

Craig Roh

I was kind of under the imppression that Roh would end up taking a red shirt this year, but Rodriguez said that he was excited for Roh to make an “instant impact.”  That could mean pushing the older guys to work harder, but maybe playing time. He’s kind of slight right now coming in at 6′4″ 230lbs, but he’ll have summer conditioning and fall practice to put on some size.  Roh has a unique technique where he starts extemely low. Also, judging by the UA All-American game, he has a mean spin move that is very effective against good HS tackles. It will be interesting if Coach Tall will try to change his technique to a more orthodox style or just help Roh improve his technique.

Michael Schofield

Schofield is very similar in size to Taylor Lewan (I think we’ve figured out Rodriguez’s type), but maybe not quite the all around athlete that Lewan is. Coach seemed very proud to share that not only did Schofield not give up a sack all year, but also the entire unit went the entire season without a holding penalty.  Obviously Schofield has experience playing on a talented, well-coached offensive line.  Hopefully that will help as he gets used to the college game. I have to imagine he’ll red shirt as the OL is fairly deep at this point and he still needs some size.

Vincent Smith

Je’Ron Stokes

Rodriguez didn’t seem to be taken on the rollercoaster ride the blogosphere was subjected to regarding his commitment.  Coach made it pretty clear the he expects to Stokes to make a pretty quick impact on the football team.  He said Stokes will immediately compete at inside and outside receiver in addition to returning kicks.  Having that amount of flexibility should allow him to see quite a bit of playing time his freshman year.

Fitzgerald Toussaint

Early favorite for best name of the class along with Vlad Emilien.  Tim and I had a chance to see Fitz play live, and while he was largely held in check, he still busted some great runs when it looked like he would be hit for a loss. He has a huge stable of moves and flat out athleticism.  Rodriguez wants him at running back and returning kicks. Coach predicts the Fitz will have an immediate impact on the team.

J.T. Turner

Rodriguez mentioned that some sources considered Turner the best player in the state of Ohio. So that means, along with Campbell and Roh, University of Michigan got commitments from, arguably, the best players from Michigan, Arizona and Ohio.  Turner had a great performance at the UA All-American game, playing corner and some safety.  Coach said he expects to play Turner to play both Safety and CB, and said that unless something unforeseen happens, Turner will see the field as a freshman.  I always get nervous at freshmen in the defensive backfield, but Warren, Jackson and Woodson all had good freshmen years, so maybe my anxiety is misplaced.

Quinton Washington

This was probably the biggest suprise of this class. I was pretty sure he was going to stay at home in South Carolina, but Washington chose the maize and blue, which is good as Schofield and Lewan both appear to be tackles while Washington is an interior lineman. He’s listed at a sizeable 6′3″ 315lbs, and is reported to be athletic to boot.  Like the other two linemen in this class, I’m going to guess that he’ll get a redshirt. There’s a ton of depth this year and having that extra year at the end can really make a huge difference.

Adrian Witty

I’m not sure if this is Rodriguez being political or sincere (probably somewhere in between), but he called Adrian Witty the most “overlooked” recruit in this class. The more cynical fans see Witty as additional bait in order to get a commitment from Robinson, but Coach mentioned that Witty had a very productive senior year with quite a few interceptions.  I have to assume Witty will redshirt this year, and I’m not quite sure where he’ll end up when all is said and down. Hopefully, he’ll be able to contribute.

Finally, Tim will be appearing on the Big Show with John U. Bacon on WTKA at 4pm (listen live online here).  He’ll be talking about blogging and recruiting. It should be interesting, or at least something different.

Tomorrow we switch gears to basketball and talking about Michigan State. If you don’t want to wait until tomorrow, Dylan at UMHoops.com is off and running, including a chat with KJ at SpartansWeblog.  We’ll have a limited UFR (just the plus/minus) from the Penn St. and UConn games as well as the standard preview of the opponent.  There will a be a live blog on MGoBlog (maybe cross posted here).

Wednesday we’ll have reaction to the basketball game and hopefully be ready to run some of the player interviews from the signing day press conference.  Standard caveat of all great plans of mice and men, etc., but that’s our tentative schedule. Should be an exciting week.

Recruiting the State of Michigan

Coach Rodriguez came back to this point 4 or 5 times during the press conference, which seemed fairly telling. A lot of the local papers have accused the new coaching staff of forsaking the state of Michigan in favor of Florida and other southern states in which the coaches had connections during their tenure at WVU (or, for many of them, South Florida).  On first look, that may  appear to be valid, since there are only 4 players in the class from Michigan, and MSU snagged the better half of the state’s top 10 recruits.

Rodriguez addressed this bluntly a few times. At one point he said “people who say we don’t recruit the state of Michigan are way off-base,” and  “it’s the first place we look.” He mentioned that Michigan is the place where the first targets on the board come from.  He also said that he’s not going to take a Michigan kid just because he’s from Michigan. They’re going after guys who fit their system, and they’ll look in Michigan first, and go national if they can’t find what they need in the home state.

One reason for the lack of commitments from kids in Michigan is that the coaching staff hasn’t had the time to develop the relationships with the high school coaches. Coach Rodriguez’s coaches clinics have a good reputation, so this should turn around quickly. Expect Michigan to push hard after the big name in state prospects (Devin Gardner, William Gholston, et al).

Effects of a 3-9 Season/Negative Recruiting

This was another recurring theme during the press conference.  He said that some of the recruits had some questions about the season and the issues that the team faced. The struggles made some people a little wary, but Rodriguez also said that because of some of the weaknesses on the team, he was able to promise every recruit the opportunity to come in and immediately compete and make an impact.

He also said that negative recruiting often comes back and bites the person spreading the rumors. One example he gave was southern schools trying to scare kids by talking about the weather in Michigan. A lot of kids from Florida were braced for an Arctic expedition only to find it wasn’t as bad as they thought.

Obviously Rodriguez didn’t name any specific coaches, but at the beginning of his statement he made a statement to the effect of “there was a lot of negative recruiting out there we had to fight through.” He kind of pulled back a little bit and said that, in general, most coaches don’t do any negative recruiting. Usually it’s a young, over-ambitious assistant trying to reach.

Rodriguez, predictably, stated in no uncertain terms that neither he, nor anyone on his staff recruit negatively. He said, “if you got a good enough program to sell, why bash someone else’s?” Also, as previously mentioned, there is a real chance of backlash when recruiting goes negative.

Decommitments

This got brought up more than once, a lot of times by the reporters asking questions. Rodriguez said he “wasn’t surprised by anything on Signing Day.” This may be spin, but it was apparent that he had a pretty good idea of what was going down, especially with the two defensive tackles. He basically conceded that a commitment from a kid who is still taking visits doesn’t really mean anything; you still have to recruit him hard, since the commitment basically doesn’t exist.

He also said 2 or 3 time that “sometimes you want people to decommit, sometimes you don’t.”  I’m pretty sure he didn’t want both DTs to decommit, but it makes sense in the case of Jordan Barnes, DeWayne Peace, and their ilk. The offer still stands, but the communication and constant salesmanship flags until eventually the recruit realizes he is no longer wanted, and chooses someone else.  Seems a bit ethically dubious, but better than the alternative of over-signing. Recruiting is, in essence, seamy, so it’s all shades of gray to a certain extent.

If you have any specific questions about Rich Rodriguez’s portion of the press conference, feel free to leave them in the comments.

We have put together a page on each current 2009 commit and pulled information from the recruiting board, recruiting updates and Friday Night Lights posts.  Now almost all the information Varsity Blue has on a particular commit is in one place where readers can comment and discuss (and share video highlights, news stories, etc).

The page can be found here as well as in the Quick Links box at the top of the page.

When my uncle brought up the fact that he lost 6 games his first season (that’s a 2-6 season which is the same winning percentage as 3-9 fyi…), she said “Yes, but after that they won a lot of games every year.” At that point my hand was firmly attached to my forehead. When I said what the difference was between Peter Stuursma’s first year and Rich Rodriguez’s, she said that something was, but she couldn’t explain it to me.

Then I explained how Rich Rodriguez generally had a rough first year followed by a fairly good second year and then BECOMES A MACHINE. I told them how at WVU he had one bad year followed by four years of 8+ wins and 3 years of 10+ wins*. After I said that, another uncle said “10 wins won’t cut it at Michigan.” At this point I’m trying to resist the urge to fly over the table with a butter knife. Lloyd Carr was a great coach and only had 5 of 12 years with double digit wins. Bo Schembechler, THE Michigan coach in the modern era was only slightly better at 10 of 20 seasons of 10+ wins**.

I’m hoping he just doesn’t really know football. If Michigan fans think 10 wins is unacceptable, we’re worse off than I expected. 10 wins is a great season. 8 wins is a good season. Sure we’re Michigan and our team should always be in contention for a championship, but you can’t expect to be a game or two away every year. With limited scholarships, you don’t have hegemonic powers. There is more ebb and flow. It’s time Michigan fans learn to appreciate what we’ve had, have and will soon have.

*People are mature. From Rich Rodriguez’s Wikpedia entry:

**It’ s a little hard to compare the to eras given Bo only had 10 games with a much harder to reach bowl up until 1975, but Lloyd’s whole tenure was within the era of limited scholarship era. I’m not sure if the factors balance out or not.

When I woke up this morning I felt a draft in my normally warm apartment. I get up and look at the one big window I have. I pulled with blinds saw two baseball sized holes in the window. I look down at my feet and see a ton of broken glass. I didn’t want to think this was an omen.

The game itself was no different than most other games against good teams. Michigan stayed competitive for the first half and then couldn’t keep it up in the second. The game even started out identically to Northwestern: Stevie Brown takes an interception back inside the 10 and Michigan fails to get any points.

There were some flashes of what a mediocre team looks like. Michigan had a touchdown drive, something the team couldn’t do last year. The defense was lights out for most of the first two quarters. Before the post Pryor hit for a touchdown, I mentioned that Pryor doesn’t look that much better than Nick Sheridan.

At halftime I thought that Michigan had a chance. Then reality came and gave me a swift kick to the balls. I’m not angry at anything for OSU getting their fifth straight win over Michigan. I’m not torn up about a team that has more losses than any other team in the 129 years of Michigan football.

This season was bad. It was almost as bad as it could have been. Every time something was fixed with this team something else broke. Michigan was very close to being mediocre, but instead injuries and serendipity forced this team to bad. We all knew this was possible; we all knew this was somewhat probable. At this point, all we can do is put our heads down, take the jeers and wait for next year.

This isn’t something Michigan fans are used to. 2004 was a rebuilding year; so was 2006. Michigan has had such a run of continued excellence that people started mistaking excellence for mediocrity. I guarantee that Rich Rodriguez knows the difference between the two and knows that this team is neither. I also guarantee that Rich Rodriguez knows what it takes to move this team from where they are to where we all want them to be. He’s a winner, and the only way someone can become a winner is by winning. There’s no compelling, rational argument against his future success.

If you want to complain about the coaches, players or other fans, go ahead. If that’s what you need to do to make this season bearable, fine. Personally, I’m going to hold onto my rational hope, keep my head down and wait for next year. It can’t get any worse.

The team last year at times looked confused in the 1-3-1 defense. They didn’t get to their spots in time, couldn’t recover on the swing. It looked like it wasn’t going to work. Against UCLA the 1-3-1 allowed Michigan to aggressively trap and force a ton of turnovers.

The hardest part about watching the Amaker years was the complete lack of fundamentals coaching, especially on the offensive end. Lazy passes, bad spacing, and no movement were the norm rather than the exception. In this game we saw great bounce passes to back-cutting players, exceptional spacing for our players to get to work, and good shooting from the outside. Beyond that, there were a lot of good shots that the players just couldn’t finish. Soon they’ll be able to get those shots to go down and we’ll have a very potent offense on our hands.

At the end of the game I was waiting for UCLA to come back and win. Being a Michigan fan, my experience in the recent past is often “get a glimmer of hope; get that violently beaten to death.” After UCLA made the 3pt shot to get it within one I could feel myself thinking “OK. This is it.” Then, Michigan was able to inbound the ball, not just to anybody, but to a very legitimate closer in “Manny” Harris (quick aside: is it weird that out of Corperryale Manny Harris it’s the Manny that gets the quotes?). I jumped up and started cheering. This was before Manny nailed the two free throws. From my years watching Amaker “coach” Michigan, I fully expected either a 5-seconds call or the ball being taken away on the inbounds. Instead, they got to Manny who got fouled with 4.6 seconds left. He walked to the line and sank two huge free throws like it was practice. UCLA gets a great inbounds pass almost all the way to half court and gets to the arc. The whole time I was yelling “foul him! for the love of all that is good and holy in this world foul him!’ Instead, Harris decides he’ll just block the attempt. Game over.

Sure, UCLA is probably overrated. They lost a ton of production last year, but they are still one of the better defensive teams out there and Michigan only had 10 turnovers. 10 turnovers to 15 assists against a team that usually plays lights out man-to-man defense. This team is turning the corner. I have no reason not to believe they have a shot at the tourney come March. If they can hang with and beat UCLA, there’s very few teams they don’t have a shot to beat. Before the UCLA game, I would have been happy with a barely above .500 season where the team looks good and hangs in tough against the big dogs, but now I think Michigan has a chance to do a lot of damage, especially in conference play once they get Lucas-Perry playing.

The kids seem like they believe they can make the Tournament. I know Beilein believes they can do it. They know a hell of a lot more about their chances then I do. So, I guess get ready for March Madness.

People who have read RBUAS know that he writes more from his heart, his feelings than most other Michigan bloggers; they also know he writes circles around almost anyone out there. From reading his stuff and talking to him, I can easily see that while he loves Michigan, it’s not a nameless, faceless unit that gets judged on wins and losses, but rather a collection of interesting characters to whom he is able to relate. He probably has 2GB of Mike Hart pictures alone on his computer.

The characters that seem to intrigue him the most are those potentially great players that tend to have problems getting to that plane of greatness. Even Chad Henne and Mike Hart have a glaring hole on their resumes. Lloyd Carr perhaps was a great coach and had lost a step. Steve Breaston’s returns were pieces of art, yet in 2006, he couldn’t perform as the number one receiver. Ronald Bellamy.

I don’t understand the shouts of bandwagoneering. When Tim and I talked with him, he told us that the game that cemented his obsession with Michigan was the 2005 Rose Bowl against Texas. I can see it. Watching that game you could tell the team gave it their all. The game was the birth of arguably the best player in college football, and Michigan hung in and almost won with a freshman quarterback and halfback. Any fan could empathize with their disappointment and their hunger to do more next year.

Then 2005 happened. Then 2006 happened. Then 2007 happened.

Maybe I’m sympathetic with Johnny because we were both in college at that same time. My freshman year was that ridiculous 2004 season. How could Michigan have won the Big10 with a couple freshman leading the offense? (Answer: Mike Hart is ridiculous and… Braylon Edwards).

Then expectations were raised to very high levels for 2005. After the Notre Dame game I was disappointed, but not despondent. After Minnesota, I was despondent. Ohio State was once again tough to swallow. After the bowl game, I was ready to drive down to Sun Belt HQ (I think the mailing address is to someone’s outhouse) and do something violent.

In 2006 expectations were low; people predicted between 3 and 4 losses. I still consider my road trip to Notre Dame that year the single greatest day of my life. I still remember crying after the Ohio State game.

Once it was guaranteed that Hart, Henne and Long were back, it was basically set up as Championship or bust. After Appalachian St., I just sort of quietly walked home went up to my housemate’s room, someone who doesn’t care about football, and talked about life while watching Wedding Crashers. I didn’t check the blogs or watch ESPN until about Thursday.

Then after the 2007 season, everyone that I had associated with Michigan football during my time here was gone.

Lloyd Carr had been football coach since I really cared about Michigan. I saw him win it all in 1997. I saw him continue to believe in Navarre until he eventually beat OSU and went to the NFL. I heard about the dictionary, quoting Kipling, visiting his buddy Russel Crowe. The wins and losses are important, but I grew up with Lloyd Carr and I doubt there can be another coach with his personality, his secret desire to be an English teacher and still be as successful as he was. I don’t care if you bring up games he should have won, or calls he should have made or how he is loyal even to a fault; you are not going to move Lloyd Carr from being my favorite coach.

That’s not to say I don’t like Rich Rodriguez and I don’t think he will be successful. He is an elite coach and will win here just like he won everywhere else. His summer has made more sympathetic to him, and I like his openness and honesty instead Carr’s often intellectual curmudegeonliness, but I root for him to win games and get Michigan football securely into the top tier. I rooted for Carr on a much more personal level.

So, like Johnny I probably am less invested this season than I have been in seasons past. After the Wisconsin win my friends and I were joking about a Motor City Bowl berth. After Toledo, I just sort of shrugged and started thinking about next year. Wins are nice; losses are expected; it’s all a wash anyway. I cheer in the stands; I argue with booers; I defend the coaches, but it’s not the same as cheering for guys like Jamar Adams who checked in to see how Tim’s and my dynasty in NCAA was going.

There is nothing but snow, and rain, and a numbing, overwhelming, and undeniably hopeless decay of something I once loved, and still do, but much less intensely.

While I agree with the radical shift and believe in the new staff’s ability, I can still find some truth in this. The football program is undergoing a huge change, which is probably for the best, but there is still some part of me that misses Carr smirking knowingly at a press conference when he and everyone knows he won’t answer the question that is asked or stiff arming a sideline reporter. There’s something about Mike Hart running the exact play that the defense know he’s running and still picking up 7 yards. There’s something about the parabolic beauty of a Chad Henne bomb. That’s gone; the future is bright, but that doesn’t mean we can’t lament the passing of a great generation, despite all their faults.

We may end up loving this team, these players. Just not yet.

Michigan made a huge mistake in hiring Rich Rod. The season only get worse.
Minnesota-28 Michigan-7

Minnesota has a very tough defense and an offense that can really move the ball through the air. They’ll beat Michigan by at least 14. Michigan is steamrolling towards 2-10.

Hail to this year’s fraudulent Wolverines! U of M alums will shun each of you forever! Learn to pour some coffee because that’s the job you’ll get on graduation! 2 and 10!

This Rod hire looks worse every week, he is infamous for his arrogance and failure to make adjustments. Chances are his tenure at Michigan will be a failure. Whether the players fit his system or not, there is no reason for the ineptitude his Michigan team has displayed this season. Good coaches learn to adapt.

I agree. R Rod’s master plan is to sacrifice this year’s team and make it go 2-10, so he can claim what terrible team he inherited from Lloyd Carr. This will set the expectations way low for future years. That way, when he does finally have a winning record, say 7-5, he hopes to be praised for what genius he is. In the end, RR will turn Michigan into another Purdue. Few decent years followed by “rebuilding” year, followed by few decent years, and then so on. Don’t expect another National Championship with him.

(Source)

Various outlets are reporting that Rich Rodriguez has called Steven Threet “very, very questionable” for Saturday’s game against Minnesota. Justin Feagin has been moved back to QB to back up Nick Sheridan. If that sentence doesn’t fill your veins with icy dread, I don’t know what will. Who knows, maybe Sheridan will be lost for the season and Feagin will go nuts on the Gophers, a la Justin Siller against Michigan? (Source)

Maybe it’s because I’ve been telling myself and anyone who will listen that this will work, but I have not really taken stock of how bad this season has been. Before last Saturday, Michigan had won two games by a total of 12 points and lost seven by a total of 87 points. Some of the games were competitive, but in Big Ten play I can’t really say Michigan should have won any of the games that it lost. The Wolverines were outplayed by better teams.

This was all sinking in by Saturday. I was resigned to a loss, even a blowout, against a team that Michigan has, quite literally, historically dominated. Even at half time, I figured the same old script would show itself. If this team has proven anything, it’s that it’s inconsistent. So expected the same old script: three and outs on offense; missed tackles and blown assignments on defense.

This is the first game that I’ve been excited to re-watch since the Toledo sadness happened. That was really when I lost my optimism for this team. Subsequent games made me question next year’s team. But one game made me remember why I was so excited to see this team play in August. What they lack in consistency they make up for in potential.

This offense was an absolute machine on Saturday with one quarterback who doesn’t throw well down field and one quarterback who doesn’t throw; with the worst offensive line any of us are ever likely to see; freshmen at almost every skill position; the top two running backs not playing at 100%. For the first time the offense was able to effectively counter the defense’s adjustments. In the past few games, the original script worked well, but once the defense adjusted, the offense stalled. There were a ton of new wrinkles (e.g. Feagin), some nostalgic wrinkles (e.g. the Braylon Edwards Memorial Diamond Formation), and parts of the basic the scheme that worked better this game than any game previous. This is what we have to look forward to. We got a preview of what this offense will be.

The defense, after giving up 48 points and roughly 6.82×10^23 yards against Purdue absolutely shut down an adequate if not amazing Minnesota offense. The defense was vintage Scott Shafer. The 3-3-5 stack was, as this blog and gsimmons guessed, likely and experiment designed to stop a decent running back (Kory Sheets) because there was a third string quarterback playing. The defense against Minnesota varied between 4-3, 4-3 over and 3-4 okie. The corners played up at the line both on man to man and on basic cover two. The defensive line and linebackers played well as a team and kept the running game contained very well.

My favorite part of the defensive game plan was the 3-4 Okie Chaos on passing third downs. I can’t imagine an offensive lineman or quarterback feels comfortable with 4 stand up potential blitzers moving in and out. I have to go back and look, but I don’t believe that Minnesota picked up a first down in one of these situations. Scott Shafer isn’t just a “press-man coverage and blitz” guy. He uses the threat of blitz just as well as actually blitzing.

This is what this team will become. This game proves that these guys can coach. I don’t care if Minnesota isn’t as good as advertised. The team that showed up and played could hang with most teams in the Big Ten. But when you have the youth and inexperience that Michigan has, it’s irrational to expect consistency game to game and from start to finish. After trying to revel in little victories like converting a third down or a good kick return, it’s nice to see the entire product and revel in a victory that results in win.

We caught a glimpse of what will happen, but the best part is that soon we’ll be living in the future.

Some people may say “yeah, but it was a gritty, hustle play by the Minnesota player to get down there and dig the ball out of the pile. That’s football.” To that, I’d say when a player has possession of the football and a knee, elbow, or hip hit the ground, the play is dead. It’s a simple if A then B. We had a situation A, but it was not followed by B.

I don’t blame the officials on the field. It’s a tough situation to call. It happens really quickly and it’s hard to get a good angle in a scrum like that. But that’s why we have instant replay. And Rodriguez shouldn’t have to call a timeout to give them time to do what ESPN did in 10 seconds. Rodriguez shouldn’t have to challenge since every play is reviewed.

What do you think was going up in the booth? The replay official was watching the game in real time on his uber-high def monitors and from that decided there was nothing the least bit questionable? I’m in favor of replays happening when the call questionable, not just when the official thinks he (or she) sees incontrovertible visual evidence. I’d rather break the flow of the game in order to ensure the correct call is made.

The player will show in this paragraph

var s1 = new SWFObject(‘http://www.panel-creations.com/varsity_blue/podcast/vplayer.swf’,'player’,'640′,’480′,’9′);s1.addParam(‘allowfullscreen’,'true’);s1.addParam(‘allowscriptaccess’,'always’);s1.addParam(‘flashvars’,'file=http://www.panel-creations.com/varsity_blue/podcast/worstcallever.mp4′);s1.write(‘preview’);This play didn’t really affect the outcome of the game, but it still gets me. I think even if I was watching a game that I had no interest in, I still would have been a bit angry. I don’t blame the officials on the field; they did as well as they could in a difficult situation. The blame falls squarely on the replay official for not even calling for a replay.