All Things SkunkBear

[RDU Irish]

OL is all about playing as a unit. We will be returning 4 players with PT experience, yes, but the unit as a whole will be new. TBD there...

WR -- we have no idea who's back and who's not, but make no bones about it, we lost our most talented received in Stepherson. Claypool and ESB, if they can play consistently, can be top-tier. But what have we seen to suggest they will? I LOVE Austin and everything we hear about Young gives us reason to be optimistic (plus McKinley anyone?), but the truth is until they prove it on the college level consistently, it means nothing. I just think we have more questions on O than we realize. I think there's a shit-ton of talen, but it's largely unproven or inconsistent.

NOW, if we had a reasonable schedule (like 95% of the rest of FBS teams), maybe these guys could have a couple cupcakes to get up to speed and establish a rhythm and confidence, but alas I digress...

Isn't this the story of all CFB? Who has the benefit of all proven veterans along all fronts? 4/5 proven OL is a really good way to start the season - a stack of large 4 star individuals vying for the fifth spot is a recipe for success - not fear/doom/gloom?

WR - Really? How can you not be excited about this group? A serviceable QB is what will determine if they are "good" or not. Boykin showed us what can happen when you put it where your 6'4" monster can make a play. ESB showed us what happened when you get hung out to dry and potentially killed. QB will define this WR group. And Austin has all the makings of a phenom. I suspect there is a very long list of schools that would trade for our WR crew.

 

[IrishLax]

Does it really matter? ND makes UM quarterbacks look like Heisman candidates and when ND should win they don't. I hate playing Michigan.

I honestly think putting Michigan back on the schedule was a borderline fireable offense for Swarbrick. Makes no sense for anyone...

 

[TomHaverford]

Al Washington DL coach at Cinci looks to be the new RB coach at UM.

will coach SAM LB's and Viper according to Sam Webb. Webb hinted that this guy would be hired weeks ago. That twitter tool Brandon Justice announced it yesterday on twitter and said RB's. He's wrong. That dude ain't got sources, he just steals info.

 

[TomHaverford]

I wouldn't say that's their only issue. Their "stud" WRs were duds this year plus their Oline is a train wreck. I'll give them the defense, but even USC exploited it. I am pretty confident that ND is going to win that game. At home, first game, they'll probably have a new QB in their possibly new system.

The "stud" WR's were true freshmen. Combine true freshmen WR's + bad QB play and that's what you tend to get. Go look at how true freshmen WR stats look over the years, not very good. Outside of QB, WR is probably the hardest position to play at a high level as a true freshmen.

Tarik Black sure looked like a stud the first 3 games until he got hurt and missed the rest of the season. DPJ is an athletic freak. He was up and down. As most true freshmen are. Wouldn't count him out for the count. Extremely talented athlete. Nico Collins was hurt most of the year and only played in 3-4 games all year. I'd say it's kind of hard to judge them. They are all very talented however. And oh yeah, by the way they were literally not being coached. Michigan doesn't have a WR's coach. Rumors are that entire offensive staff is going to get blown up and changed. Pep Hamilton and Tim Drevno are supposedly on their way out.

South Carolina exposed the defense? How? South Carolina had 3 points and maybe 3 first downs total well into in the 3rd QTR before Michigan just went into melt-down mode had like 5 turnovers and blew a 16 point lead. You keep giving a team chances and short fields they are going to score on you. You keep going 3 and out, the defense will tire out. Michigan's defense was still ranked very high, despite having a horrendous offense. You give that defense even an above average offense- look out.

Michigan was replacing 10 starters on defense from 2016 and they still had a whale of a defense. The DL depth should be better in 2018 with the return of a healthy Donovan Jeter and Luiji Villain. They were both going to be in the rotation but both got hurt in fall camp and had season ending surgeries. Their young CB's are only going to get better. LaVert Hill was a true soph. and David Long a RS Frosh and they were both excellent. Ambry Thomas hasn't even really played yet and my guess is he leapfrogs Brandon Watson to be the nickel heading into 2018. They'll return 9 defensive starters and their entire 2 deep. That defense should be nasty with Gary and Winovich leading the charge and Don Brown calling the shots.

 

[Ndaccountant]

The "stud" WR's were true freshmen. Combine true freshmen WR's + bad QB play and that's what you tend to get. Go look at how true freshmen WR stats look over the years, not very good. Outside of QB, WR is probably the hardest position to play at a high level as a true freshmen.

Tarik Black sure looked like a stud the first 3 games until he got hurt and missed the rest of the season. DPJ is an athletic freak. He was up and down. As most true freshmen are. Wouldn't count him out for the count. Extremely talented athlete. Nico Collins was hurt most of the year and only played in 3-4 games all year. I'd say it's kind of hard to judge them. They are all very talented however. And oh yeah, by the way they were literally not being coached. Michigan doesn't have a WR's coach. Rumors are that entire offensive staff is going to get blown up and changed. Pep Hamilton and Tim Drevno are supposedly on their way out.

South Carolina exposed the defense? How? South Carolina had 3 points and maybe 3 first downs total well into in the 3rd QTR before Michigan just went into melt-down mode had like 5 turnovers and blew a 16 point lead. You keep giving a team chances and short fields they are going to score on you. You keep going 3 and out, the defense will tire out. Michigan's defense was still ranked very high, despite having a horrendous offense. You give that defense even an above average offense- look out.

Michigan was replacing 10 starters on defense from 2016 and they still had a whale of a defense. The DL depth should be better in 2018 with the return of a healthy Donovan Jeter and Luiji Villain. They were both going to be in the rotation but both got hurt in fall camp and had season ending surgeries. Their young CB's are only going to get better. LaVert Hill was a true soph. and David Long a RS Frosh and they were both excellent. Ambry Thomas hasn't even really played yet and my guess is he leapfrogs Brandon Watson to be the nickel heading into 2018. They'll return 9 defensive starters and their entire 2 deep. That defense should be nasty with Gary and Winovich leading the charge and Don Brown calling the shots.

 

[koonja]

Does it matter? Harbaugh is their coach, and he can't beat winners.

What is it like 400 days since they beat a team with a winning record?

 

[zelezo vlk]

Does it matter? Harbaugh is their coach, and he can't beat winners.

What is it like 400 days since they beat a team with a winning record?

Fake news! They beat Purdue

 

[IrishLion]

Fake news! They beat Purdue

Haha mighty Harbaugh, slayer of the Boilermakers.

 

[zelezo vlk]

Haha mighty Harbaugh, slayer of the Boilermakers.

Who among us has not slain Boilermakers?

 

[TomHaverford]

Who is their's?

Shea Patterson.

 

[TomHaverford]

Does it matter? Harbaugh is their coach, and he can't beat winners.

What is it like 400 days since they beat a team with a winning record?

have major questions about his offense. best QB he's had in 3 years now was the Iowa transfer Jake Rudock, and it's not close. Speight was garbage. O'Korn was worse than garbage. Peters was very up and down- but he was a freshman.

major problems with his offense imo. it's not very creative. there aren't "free" plays bc they rarely use the no huddle and go into hurry up mode. doesn't spread things out enough. and seems like players struggle to pick his offense up bc it's too complex.

He needs to blow up his offensive staff and start over. He needs to do what he did with Don Brown. He had no previous conenction to Don Brown. He googled top defenses in college football over the last few seasons and that's how he found Don Brown. True story. He needs to do that again. Just go out and hire the best OC available. Worked wonders for Franklin at Penn State. He ceded control of the offense and went out and got Joe Moorehead and Moorehead turned around that offense basically overnight.

 

[phork]

Enos, former MSU coach and CMU head coach and most recently Arkansas OC hired by scUM. Imagine an MSU guy running the UM offense. Craziness.

 

[TomHaverford]

Enos, former MSU coach and CMU head coach and most recently Arkansas OC hired by scUM. Imagine an MSU guy running the UM offense. Craziness.

unclear what Dan Enos' role will be. sounds like it won't be OC according to the insiders though. good hire regardless of what his position is imo. Solid recruiter and coach, superior to Drevno or Pep Hamilton in every way imaginable. Enos was Dantonio's best recruiter when he was at MSU. Still a lot of coaching staff shake-up to go down though. Same insider over on 247 who reported Enos would be hired like 3-4 weeks said this on the 247 board, before it was officially announced that OT/TE coach Frey was taking the FSU job...

FWIW, No Pep, no Frey, seen today in Schembechler Hall and Dreveno was seen cleaning his office out. Could mean a lot of things like as simple, he is getting a new office in Schembechler Hall or maybe his office was really dirty and needed some serious cleaning by the cleaning crew.

he didn't expand on that Drevno part. Either Drevno is moving on or has accepted a demotion. Interesting to see what happens. Sounding more and more like that entire offensive staff has been blown up. Probably nothing, but some Michigan coaches and players have started following Matt Canada on twitter.

 

[phork]

Won't make much of a difference if Hairball is still calling the offense like he has been.

 

[connor_in]

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">I know what I’m wearing to this year’s Michigan vs Michigan State game <a href="https://twitter.com/hashtag/DanEnos?src=hash&ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">#DanEnos</a> <a href="https://t.co/TYfhd4Zm26">pic.twitter.com/TYfhd4Zm26</a></p>— SPARTANTIQUES (@SPARTANTIQUES) <a href="https://twitter.com/SPARTANTIQUES/status/949383045081194497?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 5, 2018</a></blockquote>
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[TomHaverford]

Won't make much of a difference if Hairball is still calling the offense like he has been.

not sure Jim calls the plays. Think it's mostly Drevno/Pep Hamilton, with input from Jim. Obviously at the end of the day the buck stops with Harbaugh and his fingerprints are all over the offense. But Drevno is also the OL coach and Pep also the QB coach, and both of them have been pretty damn mediocre at coaching their positions and Co-OC's an offense for $1.15 million per year each. $2.3 mil for this garbage? You kidding me. If they want to piss away money, why not just go hire the best OC out there that money can buy for $2.3 million a year.

Jim needs to make wholesale changes on that offense if he doesn't want a repeat of 2017. Patterson being eligible will help a little bit for sure. He's definitely a better option than anything they have on that roster right now. But the RB's, OL's, and WR's just aren't being developed and the offensive scheme sucks. The RB's have no idea how to pass protect or pick-up blitzes and the WR's suck at running routes. Bunch of really good athletes there who don't know how to play WR. Hmmmm...wonder if that's because they don't have a WR coach.

2018 is a make or break year for Harbaugh imo. If he doesn't make more staff changes to the offense it has the potential to sink him and 2019 his seat would be on fire.

 

[ACamp1900]

Fear not fare lady, for your season opens with a ND squad coming off a ten-win season... you're sure to start the season like sex on fire and go blazing into conference play.

 

[TomHaverford]

Fear not fare lady, for your season opens with a ND squad coming off a good year... you're sure to start the season like sex on fire and go blazing into conference play.

pretty confident in saying Michigan loses to ND to start the season. The offense is bound to have bumps and bruises if Harbaugh does what is necessary and makes the sweeping changes to that offensive staff.

If he keeps Drevno and Hamilton? Omg forget about it. ND will be guaranteed victory. Michigan won't go anywhere with those bums running the offense. If those two losers are back- take it to the bank- ND will win pretty comfortably.

The defense has the potential be elite. IF they can fix some issues at safety. Michigan's safeties were pretty bad in pass coverage in 2017. Some of that is scheme, some of that is their lack of talent. Don Brown plays his safeties in man coverage a lot. Tyree Kinnel and Josh Mettelus stink in man coverage. They are just not athletic, not quick twitch, not fast enough to be covering receivers in man coverage. Brown either has to adjust his scheme to hide those guys in zone coverages more or he has to flat out find replacements who can hold up in man coverage.

The front 7 and the CB's should be nasty though. Winovich is coming back. I really think Ambry Thomas is going to breakout as a sophomore like David Long and LaVert Hill did. Should have 3 excellent CB's there. After the way Aidan Hutchinson looked in that Army Bowl, I'd be shocked if he didn't leapfrog the very mediocre Carlo Kemp to back-up Rashan Gary. Luiji Vilain and Donovan Jeter both coming back healthy from injury will help bolster that DL rotation a lot. Kwity Paye and Aubrey Solomon played a ton for true frosh DL's, know the Michigan coaches are really high on both of them.

 

[IrishLax]

pretty confident in saying Michigan loses to ND to start the season. The offense is bound to have bumps and bruises if Harbaugh does what is necessary and makes the sweeping changes to that offensive staff.

If he keeps Drevno and Hamilton? Omg forget about it. ND will be guaranteed victory. Michigan won't go anywhere with those bums running the offense. If those two losers are back- take it to the bank- ND will win pretty comfortably.

The defense has the potential be elite. IF they can fix some issues at safety. Michigan's safeties were pretty bad in pass coverage in 2017. Some of that is scheme, some of that is their lack of talent. Don Brown plays his safeties in man coverage a lot. Tyree Kinnel and Josh Mettelus stink in man coverage. They are just not athletic, not quick twitch, not fast enough to be covering receivers in man coverage. Brown either has to adjust his scheme to hide those guys in zone coverages more or he has to flat out find replacements who can hold up in man coverage.

The front 7 and the CB's should be nasty though. Winovich is coming back. I really think Ambry Thomas is going to breakout as a sophomore like David Long and LaVert Hill did. Should have 3 excellent CB's there. After the way Aidan Hutchinson looked in that Army Bowl, I'd be shocked if he didn't leapfrog the very mediocre Carlo Kemp to back-up Rashan Gary. Luiji Vilain and Donovan Jeter both coming back healthy from injury will help bolster that DL rotation a lot. Kwity Paye and Aubrey Solomon played a ton for true frosh DL's, know the Michigan coaches are really high on both of them.

I think Michigan beats ND by 2 TDs next year. Kelly has not once handled a "QB controversy" offseason well at ND in terms of getting the team ready to play out of the gate.

2011 - Rees vs Crist, open with inexplicable loss to USF with Crist benched.
2012 - Golson was "Plan A," start off hot in Ireland, go 12-0.
2013 - Golson suspended, lose to Michigan in a spectacular collapse.
2014 - No competition, start 6-0.
2015 - No competition after Golson transfer, start with destruction of Texas and then kept it rolling with Kizer.
2016 - QB competition through fall camp, we know what happened.
2017 - All in on Wimbush, destroyed teams for 8 weeks with a 1 point loss to Georgia sprinkled in.

All of Michigan's problems are easily fixable with a talented QB and improved line play. ND just lost a very good DC and two elite OL that are going to be very hard to replace. I don't see how ND scores consistently on Michigan, and I don't see how ND stops a Michigan team with a QB to get their WRs the ball.

Then again, I thought ND would get rolled by LSU... and I reserve the right to completely change my mind in the spring.

 

[phork]

not sure Jim calls the plays. Think it's mostly Drevno/Pep Hamilton, with input from Jim. Obviously at the end of the day the buck stops with Harbaugh and his fingerprints are all over the offense. But Drevno is also the OL coach and Pep also the QB coach, and both of them have been pretty damn mediocre at coaching their positions and Co-OC's an offense for $1.15 million per year each. $2.3 mil for this garbage? You kidding me. If they want to piss away money, why not just go hire the best OC out there that money can buy for $2.3 million a year.

Jim needs to make wholesale changes on that offense if he doesn't want a repeat of 2017. Patterson being eligible will help a little bit for sure. He's definitely a better option than anything they have on that roster right now. But the RB's, OL's, and WR's just aren't being developed and the offensive scheme sucks. The RB's have no idea how to pass protect or pick-up blitzes and the WR's suck at running routes. Bunch of really good athletes there who don't know how to play WR. Hmmmm...wonder if that's because they don't have a WR coach.

2018 is a make or break year for Harbaugh imo. If he doesn't make more staff changes to the offense it has the potential to sink him and 2019 his seat would be on fire.

I am sure. I am friends with a guy who knows Drevno personally. He says that Harbaugh calls most of the plays.

 

[connor_in]

https://twitter.com/PeteSampson_/status/950867515399462912

 

[ulukinatme]

I think Michigan beats ND by 2 TDs next year. Kelly has not once handled a "QB controversy" offseason well at ND in terms of getting the team ready to play out of the gate.

2011 - Rees vs Crist, open with inexplicable loss to USF with Crist benched.
2012 - Golson was "Plan A," start off hot in Ireland, go 12-0.
2013 - Golson suspended, lose to Michigan in a spectacular collapse.
2014 - No competition, start 6-0.
2015 - No competition after Golson transfer, start with destruction of Texas and then kept it rolling with Kizer.
2016 - QB competition through fall camp, we know what happened.
2017 - All in on Wimbush, destroyed teams for 8 weeks with a 1 point loss to Georgia sprinkled in.

All of Michigan's problems are easily fixable with a talented QB and improved line play. ND just lost a very good DC and two elite OL that are going to be very hard to replace. I don't see how ND scores consistently on Michigan, and I don't see how ND stops a Michigan team with a QB to get their WRs the ball.

Then again, I thought ND would get rolled by LSU... and I reserve the right to completely change my mind in the spring.

Yeah, I don't like the fact we're starting with Michigan when they're going to be getting a new offense likely. It will be harder to game plan for, and history says we're poor at making adjustments until halftime. I kind of hope we settle on Book in the Spring and there's no controversy going into Fall. Hopefully our defense continues to improve and we don't see an incredible drop off with OL play, but yeah...would have preferred this matchup later in the season.

 

[phork]

Harbaugh can't beat anything with a pulse. Better teams have been able to exploit Browns defense, I expect ND will do the same.

 

[TomHaverford]

Harbaugh can't beat anything with a pulse. Better teams have been able to exploit Browns defense, I expect ND will do the same.

Lol. What? He's been the OC for two years now, and honestly haven't seen very many teams exploit Brown's defense. Penn State in 2017, but that's probably it.

Most of Michigan's losses this year and last were due to turnovers, points off of turnovers, and horrible offensive play.

Don't care how great your defense is, if your offense/ST's are giving up points, turning the ball over, and going 3 and out continually and giving the other team short fields, the defense is going to eventually break a few times.

Brown's scheme leaves his safeties and OLB's in man coverage a lot. Mike McCray, Josh Mettelus, and Tyree Kinnel have given up some big plays in man coverage. The defense is high risk, high reward. Look at the amount of negative plays Brown's defense causes. The guy is a havoc creating machine. Wouldn't trade him for any other DC in the land. Give him some NFL safeties and a more athletic OLB- and his defense will kick it up another notch.

And just to give you a clue as to how impressive a job Brown did this year...remember that he was replacing 10 starters on defense from 2016 and that the 2017 Michigan QB's combined to throw NINE touchdown passes on the season, finished 91st in scoring, 101st in yards per play, and 116th in passing efficiency and the guy still finished with the #3 total defense in the FBS and the #9 rated defense overall in the S&P+. The guy is a magician.

Only reason they were an 8-5 team instead of a 5-7 team was because of Don Brown, Greg Mattison, Chris Partridge, and Mike Zordich. That defensive staff is money in the bank. Offensive staff is fricken atrocious.

 

[TomHaverford]

All of Michigan's problems are easily fixable with a talented QB and improved line play. ND just lost a very good DC and two elite OL that are going to be very hard to replace. I don't see how ND scores consistently on Michigan, and I don't see how ND stops a Michigan team with a QB to get their WRs the ball.

there are huge issues on that offensive coaching staff. I do think Shea Patterson will be by far the most talented QB that Harbaugh has had since arriving in Ann Arbor. But I don't think even that will be enough to solve a lot of the issues.

The WR's are young and talented, but completely clueless at how to play the receiver position. Outside of Tarik Black and Grant Perry there didn't seem to be one refined route runner/pass catchers on that squad. Black was the best of the bunch but got hurt after 3-4 games and took a redshirt. Grant Perry was probably the most consistent WR at running routes and catching the ball, but also easily the least physically gifted/athletic.

DPJ, Dylan Crawford, Eddie McDoom, and Nico Collins all looked like impressive athletes that really struggled running routes and catching the football. All four of them.

Michigan literally did not have a dedicated WR's coach. And it showed. They had some video assistant analyst dweeb from Harbaugh's desk job army platoon helping out but there's only so much he's allowed to do according to NCAA bylaws.

They have too much raw talent at WR to be this bad. Severe lack of coaching and development at the position. They still haven't hired a legitimate WR's coach. I don't know wtf Harbaugh is waiting for there.

 

[phork]

Lol. What? He's been the OC for two years now, and honestly haven't seen very many teams exploit Brown's defense. Penn State in 2017, but that's probably it.

Most of Michigan's losses this year and last were due to turnovers, points off of turnovers, and horrible offensive play.

Don't care how great your defense is, if your offense/ST's are giving up points, turning the ball over, and going 3 and out continually and giving the other team short fields, the defense is going to eventually break a few times.

Brown's scheme leaves his safeties and OLB's in man coverage a lot. Mike McCray, Josh Mettelus, and Tyree Kinnel have given up some big plays in man coverage. The defense is high risk, high reward. Look at the amount of negative plays Brown's defense causes. The guy is a havoc creating machine. Wouldn't trade him for any other DC in the land. Give him some NFL safeties and a more athletic OLB- and his defense will kick it up another notch.

And just to give you a clue as to how impressive a job Brown did this year...remember that he was replacing 10 starters on defense from 2016 and that the 2017 Michigan QB's combined to throw NINE touchdown passes on the season, finished 91st in scoring, 101st in yards per play, and 116th in passing efficiency and the guy still finished with the #3 total defense in the FBS and the #9 rated defense overall in the S&P+. The guy is a magician.

Only reason they were an 8-5 team instead of a 5-7 team was because of Don Brown, Greg Mattison, Chris Partridge, and Mike Zordich. That defensive staff is money in the bank. Offensive staff is fricken atrocious.

You played garbage teams all year. The teams you lost to actually had winning records. And what did they have in common? You couldn't stop the rush. So lets not pretend that this is a world beater defence. Its good when it counts against garbage.

 

[phork]

there are huge issues on that offensive coaching staff. I do think Shea Patterson will be by far the most talented QB that Harbaugh has had since arriving in Ann Arbor. But I don't think even that will be enough to solve a lot of the issues.

The WR's are young and talented, but completely clueless at how to play the receiver position. Outside of Tarik Black and Grant Perry there didn't seem to be one refined route runner/pass catchers on that squad. Black was the best of the bunch but got hurt after 3-4 games and took a redshirt. Grant Perry was probably the most consistent WR at running routes and catching the ball, but also easily the least physically gifted/athletic.

DPJ, Dylan Crawford, Eddie McDoom, and Nico Collins all looked like impressive athletes that really struggled running routes and catching the football. All four of them.

Michigan literally did not have a dedicated WR's coach. And it showed. They had some video assistant analyst dweeb from Harbaugh's desk job army platoon helping out but there's only so much he's allowed to do according to NCAA bylaws.

They have too much raw talent at WR to be this bad. Severe lack of coaching and development at the position. They still haven't hired a legitimate WR's coach. I don't know wtf Harbaugh is waiting for there.

If anything that CFP final showed us is that none of us are winning a NC anytime soon. The talent disparity is immense. Both teams dropping in 5 star true freshmen to compete and contribute extensively.

My bet is that both Hairball and Kelly will be seeking employment after next season. When Hairball finishes in 4th in the BIG-E and Kelly dumps another sub 8 win season.

 

[Henges24]

Dan Enos already jumping ship. Headed to the Tide.

Dan Enos leaves Michigan Wolverines staff, expected to join Alabama Crimson Tide as quarterbacks coach




Fvck Michigan

 

[irish4ever]

Dan Enos already jumping ship. Headed to the Tide.

Dan Enos leaves Michigan Wolverines staff, expected to join Alabama Crimson Tide as quarterbacks coach




Fvck Michigan

Yeah, what he said! Hahaha, frickin' scUM getting what they deserve!

 

[IrishLion]

This is borderline hilarious to me: you know if the other guy is eligible, you aren't gonna win the job. But if he's not eligible, you're gonna stick around because the other QB's are also shitty enough that you might start.

Jim Harbaugh killing the game at QB.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" data-lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Source: QB Wilton Speight would be open to a Michigan return if Shea Patterson doesn't gain eligibility in 2018 <a href="https://t.co/7DMtPGRpvh">https://t.co/7DMtPGRpvh</a></p>— Nick Baumgardner (@nickbaumgardner) <a href="https://twitter.com/nickbaumgardner/status/956682681638686721?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw">January 26, 2018</a></blockquote>
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