I’ve decided this will be a semi-regular feature. I really couldn’t think of anything for Miami but there’s plenty in this game.

The Weather is Straight out of The Odyssey. You know how Odysseus and a few of his men get stuck in Cyclops’s cave? They took some timber, sharpened an end and blinded Cyclops and then escaped by lashing themselves to the undersides of his sheep, so they slip out without being detected. Well, unfortunately for them Cyclops was Poseidon’s son, and Poseidon controls the weather on the ocean. Poseidon was angry that they did that to his son and whipped up a storm that sunk every boat save Odysseus’ and knocked his off into the edge of the world. I’m not sure what giant creature Rich Rodriguez blinded, but whichever deity controls the weather in South Bend sure as hell was pissed. The kicker is that this malevolent deity waited until its team was up by double digits before unleashing its wrath. Crafty…

Jimmy Clausen is Portia from The Merchant of Venice. Portia is definitely the hero of this play, and Jimmy Clausen was arguably the hero of the game on Saturday. I would personally say Michigan’s slippery hands were the hero, but if you want a person, Jimmy will do. The short version of this joke is that Portia is a women who dresses up as a man to save the day. I mean, have you seen Clausen’s hair? The longer story, is that she went to save Antonio who was in danger of losing a pound of flesh as he guaranteed his friend’s, Basonio, loan. Basonio is inept at his job, but still manages to land Portia, a wealthy heiress, by performing an arbitrary task. Weis, on the same token, is an inept coach who managed to land a very highly regarded (albeit feminine) recruit, most likely by consuming two whole turkeys. I’m not sure who Antonio would be. Maybe Jack Swarbick, Notre Dame’s Atheltic Director. The main components of Antonio are loyalty, a basic level of competancy and a strong hatred of jews, so maybe? I don’t judge.

Finally…

The Game in General is The Jungle by Upton Sinclair. The main character, Jurgis Rudkus, is a Lithuanian immigrant fresh off the boat (well, that plus the trip to Chicago). He has an indomitable love for the American dream of pulling himself up by the bootstraps. Jurgis could be Michigan in general. Stepping bravely into new uncharted lands with a firm belief that, despite toil and tribulations, there is a higher goal that will inevitably be achieved. Early on in the novel, tragedy strikes quickly in the form of unscrupulous guests taking advantage of a wedding party and even taking what few donations were given leaving the family with nothing. Similarly, right out of the gate some players coughed up the ball and Michigan was left with a 21 point debt.

Although the main point of The Jungle may have been an evisceration of capitalism in favor of socialism (which some may agree with), the main thing I remember about the novel is a couple good things happening to Jurgis and then some massive tragedy coming out of left field. For example:

1. Jurgis gets a job
2. The women of the family were able to scrounge and make a nice meal
3. Jurgis‘ son drowns in the mud while Jurgis is working.

In the game, most of what happened was good: McGuffie looked dominant, Threet looked acceptable++ and the receivers were making plays, but then there would be a hope killing turnover. Eventually it was too much for Jurgis (Rodriguez) to deal with and he just gave up (put in Sheridan*). The last hundred or so pages are basically socialist propaganda which, if you’ve been over to Wolverine Liberation Army since the game, you got as well. Sometimes these are just eerie…

*Reports are Threet came out with cramps, which seems like a logical answer.

Posted under Analysis

As always, the board.

Moved to Committed:
NJ DE Anthony LaLota. Woo! A defensive end!

Added:
FL LB Mike Marry. Michigan shall make his next cut (info in header).

New Information:
OK RB David Oku. Never mind about deciding this week: he has delayed his announcement yet again.
FL QB Denard Robinson. Still feelin’ Michigan (info in header) despite the multiple QB commits.
SC OL Quinton Washington. Official visit for Wisconsin game, and Michigan looks surprisingly strong in his recruitiment (Sam Webb audio).
AZ DE Craig Roh. Sam Webb thinks he’ll end up at Michigan, unless Rick Neuheisel is particularly slimy (audio).
SC DE Sam Montgomery. Has decided which 5 schools to visit, including Michigan.
MI S Thomas Gordon. Announcing in a couple weeks, and MIchigan looks good (audio same as above).

Etc.:
2008 MI DE Nick Perry qualified on time, and is now at USC. It was thought that if he failed t qualify, Michigan might be back in the picture for him.
2008 NJ LB Marcus Witherspoon ended up at Rutgers, where he will be eligible to play this year.
FL DB Corey Addison. He is thinking about an official visit to Michigan. His commitment to SoCar will leave him off the board for now, but keep him in mind.

Analysis:
Michigan finally grabs a defensive end. If they can grab Craig Roh, a huge weakness will be accounted for at the position.

As of now, I expect to see Roh, Will Campbell, Thomas Gordon, and maybe another guy or two to finish out the class.

Posted under Recruiting

Rank	Team	Delta
1	Southern Cal	—
2	Florida	2
3	Oklahoma	1
4	Georgia	1
5	Texas	1
6	LSU	1
7	Penn State	1
8	Missouri	1
9	Wisconsin	1
10	Ohio State	5
11	East Carolina	5
12	Oklahoma State	2
13	South Florida	2
14	Auburn	3
15	Utah	2
16	Texas Tech	2
17	Oregon	4
18	Brigham Young	8
19	Kansas	1
20	Alabama	8
21	Wake Forest	3
22	West Virginia	—
23	Fresno State	3
24	Miami (Florida)	1
25	Illinois	2

Games watched:
Most of UNC-Rutgers, Kansas-USF, Michigan State-FAU, Iowa-Iowa State, portions of Maryland-Cal, Northwestern-SIU, Michigan-Notre Dame, Most of PSU-Syracuse, portions of UGa-SoCar, Much of Auburn-Miss St, OSU-USC, Most of Oklahoma-Washington, Wisconsin-Fresno St.

I actually have a couple more games on DVR that I’ll watch before submitting my final ballot. I didn’t thoroughly look at last week’s final ballot when I put this together, so there might be a few inconsistencies I have to correct.

Posted under BlogPoll

CA QB Tate Forcier
Scripps Ranch had a bye week.

TX QB Shavodrick Beaver
Rider loses to Sulphur Springs (on ESPN2) 16-22.
Beaver’s stats: 21-33 (63.6%) for 249 yards (7.55 yds/att) and 2 TDs. 18 rushes, 84 yards (4.67 yds/att).
Video:

MI RB Teric Jones
Cass Tech beats Crockett 26-6.
Jones had over 200 yards, can’t find exactly how many.

OH RB Fitzgerald Toussaint
Liberty defeats Struthers 32-14.
Toussaint rushes 19 times for 258 yards (13.6 ypc) and 4 TDs, of 72, 57, 37, and 35 yards. Take out the TDs and he rushed 15 times for 57 yards (3.8 ypc).

FL RB Vincent Smith
Pahokee beats King’s Academy 40-7.
Smith had “over 100 yards” and a touchdown.

MN WR Bryce McNeal
Breck beats St. Bernard’s 35-33.
McNeal has an 85-yard kickoff return TD, igniting a big comeback.

FL Slot Jeremy Gallon
Apopka beats Freedom 57-21.

IL OL Michael Schofield
Sandburg beats Stagg 20-8.

LA DT DeQuinta Jones
Bastrop beats Dollarway 42-6.
No Jones mention.

NJ DE Anthony LaLota
Hun loses to Wyoming Seminary Prep 0-10.

FL LB Brandin Hawthorne
Pahokee beats King’s Academy 40-7.
No Hawthorne mention.

IN LB Jordan Barnes
Homestead beats Columbia City 28-9.

FL LB/S Mike Jones
Edgewater loses to Tallahassee Lincoln 14-30.

OH S Isaiah Bell
Liberty defeats Struthers 32-14.
No Bell mention in the article.

OH CB Justin Turner
Washington loses 13-23 to Youngstown Ursuline.
Turner had a 13-yard TD reception.

TX CB/WR DeWayne Peace
South Grand Prairie beats Summit 16-7.
Peace had an 85-yard TD reception, consisting of him catching a short pass over the middle shaking a couple defenders, and running a long way.

TX K Anthony Fera
Game canceled due to hurricane.

As always, if you have anything to share, let me know in the comments.

Posted under Recruiting

The refs were truly brutal in this game. I certainly won’t blame them for the end result, but they definitely had a hand in getting the game there. Awful PI calls on Warren, a somewhat questionable one on Trent, and a catch by Mathews gave the Irish about a 15 point swing, and when playing from behind, players are more likely to take risks to make a big play. Also, the Grady fumble should have been called dead for forward progress. That was a hell of a missed call. Again, the players are ultimately responsible for the result, but this is a young team that didn’t really deserve the help in beating itself.

The defensive line was kinda crappy. Though they ultimately allowed ND to get only 3.3 yards for each carry, they gave up some critical yards in the third and fourth quarters. Still, when the defense only gives up 1 or 2 scoring drives (one ND TD “drive” started at the Michigan 11, one at the Michigan 14, two were composed almost entirely of a long pass to Golden Tate, and the final TD was scored on defense), it’s hard to find a ton of fault on that side of the ball.

Steven Threet, as predicted by many, has settled down the more game reps he has gotten. He finally calmed down enough to execute the throws that he was floating before. Then Sheridan came in a reminded Michigan fans why they should want Threet to succeed.

Sam McGuffie looks like the real deal. The offensive line was still sub-optimal against the Irish, and McGuffie had some impressive runs (and of course the screen pass). It was so kind of Perry Dorrestein to slam into McGuffie from behind on the touchdown screen.

Going forward, this game should probably give a little more hope to Michigan fans, though they are still disappointed for what could have been. I guess that’s what Michigan gets for RUNNING THE SPREAD OPTION IN HURRICANE KATRINA.

Posted under Analysis

So… that was a full-on Yakety Sax performance. Even with the threat of sounding like a huge homer, there was a lot of good in the game.

• Threet looked like a solid QB. Between the throws down the field and how he took off on third and long for a first and goal, he made a lot of good decisions and the execution was there.
• McGuffie is the real deal. I thought Shaw may have been the better TB after Miami, but McGuff was absolutely filthy all day.
• The fade is a hard pass to defense
• Stevie Brown made one or two mistakes. He also made a couple plays.
• Special teams FTL!
• Notre Dame spends it’s TV and Bowl money on the refs.

There will be more in depth analysis when I watch the game sober. Is it to mean to make a yakety sax montage for Michigan? I’m serious, it might be cathartic. Let me know.

UPDATE: Can I legitimately make fun of Weis for getting Paterno’d when Michigan got housed? I have ideas…

Posted under Analysis

Action since last rankings:
9-8-08 Purdue gains commitment from Trevor Foy.
9-12-08 Michigan gains commitment from Anthony LaLota.

Michigan State and Notre Dame are virtually tied. So are Penn State and Wisconsin. Once a couple more commits drop to any of these schools, it will be a bit easier to differentiate them. I left Notre Dame ahead of State for now, because I think they are more likely to close out strong, unless there’s another 2007 on the way for the Irish.

New Rankings:

Posted under Recruiting

Princeton, NJ prospect Anthony LaLota has pledged his intentions to become a Michigan Wolverine. LaLota, who attends The Hun School, stands 6-5, 260, and runs a very respectable 4.65-second 40-yard dash. Anthony is the 17th commitment in the class of 2009, and the #1 player in the state of New Jersey.

Recruiting Notes
Early in the process, Notre Dame was thought to be the prohibitive favorite for a verbal commitment from LaLota. With their three New Jersey commitments (including one from LaLota’s high school teammate Tyler Stockton), and nothing but effusive praise for the Irish from LaLota, it seemed his recruitment could have come to an end as early as June. Michigan’s offer came in June, and the Wolverines seemed to be an also-ran for LaLota’s services. Near the end of July, LaLota narrowed his impressive list of suitors to seven, and the Wolverines made the cut, though they were still considered an underdog. Late in August, Sam Webb reported on WTKA that LaLota’s decision would not be coming early, and that perhaps Michigan was stronger with Anthony than had previously been known, especially after the unofficial visit he had taken the previous weekend. LaLota also tentatively scheduled an official visit for the Wisconsin game. Then, this week, LaLota’s recruitment came to a head. Michigan and Penn State emerged as his rumored top 2, with other sources reporting that he would either pick a Big East/ACC school or Michigan. When he scheduled his announcement for Friday night at 8, Michigan fans were cautiously optimistic that he would don a block-M cap. LaLota did indeed pick Michigan, and is the 17th commitment in the class.

Player Notes
LaLota is something of an oddity, in that early on, both recruiting services ranked him at offensive tackle, and both gave him five stars. Despite this ranking, LaLota insisted that nearly every school recruiting him wated him as a defensive end. Eventually, Rivals wised up and switched his position, dropping him to four stars in the process. Scout maintains that he is an offensive tackle, and they still give him five stars (and a #3 position ranking) as an offensive lineman. Rodriguez and company recruited LaLota at end, and that will likely be his final college destination. As a strongside defensive end, LaLota is more of a run-stuffer than elite pass-rusher. However, he is not particularly polished, and will likely add some finesse moves to his repertoire in college. One exciting thing about LaLota is that his game is all based on physical talent at this time. He has only been playing football for a couple years, and is loaded with potential upside.

Request
If anyone can digitize the CSTV announcement by LaLota, e-mail me and we’ll get it up on VB.

Posted under Recruiting

For this second straight year, this game could look a little something like this:

Of course, last year, Michigan ended up pantsing The Worst Team Ever, and the Irish limped to a 3-9 season (that, in all honesty, should have been worse). So, what do we know about this years game?

When I previewed the Irish back in the summer, I was slightly skeptical that they would see tons of improvement. However, that didn’t stop nearly every preseason magazine from anointing them the #1 most improved team, including Phil Steele. Against San Diego State, however, the Irish looked downright pitiful against a team that got completely smoked by a 1-AA squad the previous week, and needed the benefit of a couple pretty bad calls to put away the Aztecs.

The Irish offense was once again bad. I am still shocked that John Latina has yet to be fired, as the offensive line is completely terrible once again (please don’t fire him, Notre Dame, we love him). Four starters return from last year’s line, so inexperience can no longer be the excuse for getting dominated at the point of attack by one of the worst teams in 1-A.

Jimmy Clausen and the running backs seemed to carry over some of the same major issues they had last year, as outlined (with video!) in this post. However, just from a one-game sample size, I would name Clausen the most improved Irish player.

On defense, the Irish didn’t dominate, but they did only allow 13 points to the Aztecs. Then again, one must take into consideration that San Diego state put up 379 yards on Cal Poly, and 345 on Notre Dame. This puts the Irish into “about the same quality as Cal Poly” territory.

Michigan hasn’t exactly excelled themselves this early in the year, but the moribund performance from the Irish has to put some hope into the sails of Wolverine fans. Of course, the majority of SDSU’s yardage came through the air, and Michigan’s quarterbacks are far from stellar. That said, there is little question that they are more talented than the Aztecs’ Ryan Lindley. Considering San Diego State was a blown call away from icing the Irish early in the fourth quarter, Michigan should have a little hope.

Predictions
Michigan’s defensive line should prevent the Irish from getting anything going consistently in this game. Clausen looks much better on the deep ball than he did in 2007 ,but I don’t think he’ll have a lot of time to throw it.
On offense, Michigan should be able to incrementally increase their production, as the execution gets better with a little more game experience.
Michigan wins 17-3.

By the way, here’s a way more complete list of prospect who will be at the game.

Posted under Analysis

All information (past and present) lives on the board.

New Information:
VA QB Kevin Newsome. Still nominally considering Michigan, though Forcier’s commitment pretty much shuts the door on the Wolverines re-landing him. More on Newsome: Michigan isn’t one of the 3 locks to make his top 5.
OK RB David Oku. Spoke less-than-effusively about his Louisville visit. This is recruiting-speak for “I couldn’t have hated it more.” However, he rescheduled his announcement for next Wednesday. Without having visited Michigan, the Wolverines’ chances seem pretty low.
GA TE Terrell Mitchell. Michigan is still on him.
MI DT William Campbell. Some more information on his decommitment, including that he plans to enroll early wherever he chooses. Re-recruitment article from the Freep. Sam Webb discusses Campbell in the Detroit News. Quoth the mother:

“He’s still basically committed to U-M, but I said there is nothing wrong with going to visit a few schools. There is nothing wrong with that.”

This doesn’t sound too bad. Also, the article says he won’t announce his decision until the Army game, which would contradict a recent assertion that he will enroll early.
NJ DE Anthony LaLota. Michigan and PSU are widely regarded to be his de facto top 2. Also, Scout indicates that he is likely deciding soon.
MI S Thomas Gordon. The Cass Tech player has said he’d be a near-lock to Michigan were he to get an offer, and now he has it (info in header). Is his commitment just a matter of time?
FL S Jonathan Scott. His brother transfers from OSU. I guess coming to Michigan would no longer let them engage in sibling rivalry.
MS S Dennis Thames. Fluff, including top schools (Michigan still up there). His injury will keep him out 4-6 weeks.

Removed:
MI RB Hersey Jackson. He is out for the season with an injury. He hadn’t earned a Michigan offer, and needed a big senior year to get one. So much for that idea.

Analysis:
Like I said immediately in the wake of the Campbell “decommitment,” nothing has really changed for Big Will. When he was “committed” he said he’d take 5 visits and probably pick Michigan, and following his “decommitment,” he’s saying… that he’ll take 5 visits and probably pick Michigan. On that basis alone, there’s nothing to freak out about (if we didn’t really have him before, did we really lose him).

Etc.:
NC S Devonte Holloman. He will take visits other than Clemson. Typical “not including elsewhere-committed prospects” rules apply, but keep in mind that one of them will be to Michigan. He is planning to enroll early, fwiw.
MI WR Commit Bryce McNeal. A bit of fluffy stuff.
TX QB Commit Shavodrick Beaver. Don’t forget, he plays on ESPN2 in a couple hours.

Michigan Targets Visiting South Bend This Weekend:
NC OL Xavier Nixon (though he’s not on the board anymore, could a strong game from the Wolverines rekindle his interest in Michigan?).
SC DE Chris Bonds (have seen a “maybe” next to this one).

Posted under Recruiting