GBMWolverine: Mailbag Question — Michigan Football — Three Questions about the Program
Posted at 6:00am — 1/15/2011
GBMWolverine: Mailbag Question — Michigan Football — Three Questions about the Program
Sorry for asking these questions as a mailbag question as they are more appropriate for the board.
1) Did RR lose the support of his players at any point this season?
2) Do you think Brandon should have fired RR after OSU game instead of waiting given what has transpired?
3) This is a question many fans have-why were there so many transfers during the RR era?
Thanks,
Peter F (Tarkenton on message board)
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GBMWolverine Response:
First off Peter, thank you for being a part of our message board and thank you for three pertinent questions. And so from one to three:
1.) This question is tough to answer with total certainty.
We have heard rumors and have been given instances of unhappy players, but that happens at every college program, especially with players who believe they should be playing ahead of a teammate or be playing more.
The performance of some of Michigan’s key players definitely slipped and Michigan once again faded as the season wore on just like they have in the three years under Coach Rod at Michigan, especially in the Big Ten.
Michigan was embarrassed in the last three games of the season (Wisconsin, Ohio State, and Mississippi State). All observations of performance could be linked to a team losing confidence in a coaching staff.
Counter-points include the team playing hard in The Gator Bowl, players verbally supporting Coach Rod through the evaluation process, and recruits talking about the positive atmosphere at Michigan when they visited.
In our opinion the weight of losing, uncertainty and all the rumors led to this team starting to lose faith, even though the players valued their coaches.
2) A reasonable argument can be made on both sides of the issue.
In our opinion this team deserved to play The Gator Bowl with the staff that got them there.
As David Brandon stated, the evaluation was to take place when the season was over, which meant after the Gator Bowl. Let’s just say David Brandon’s #1 candidate was Jim Harbaugh and Jim wanted to coach his Stanford team in the Orange Bowl and didn’t want to talk about the Michigan situation until after the bowl game. Michigan would be in the same situation as right now, but without a coach since the Ohio State game. Hindsight is always 20-20, and even with hindsight no clear verdict could be rendered on Mr. Brandon’s strategy.
3) Coach Rod himself has stated often it takes a special player or coach to be part of his program. In his own words it takes thick skin and therefore is not for everyone.
Some of the problems started when Coach Rod said he would adapt his system to the players that were on the team, but that very first practice we attended we knew that wasn’t going to happen and we believe a lot of the players knew the same and left before spring practice started.
Many of the transfers were with Coach Carr era players, who either didn’t fit, or did not like the new program. A big turnover in similar circumstances is not unusual when a new head coach takes over. For it to continue into year three, that was a clear problem.
As we enter the Coach Hoke era at Michigan we hope this is the last question about Coach Rod and what happened in the past especially some things that happened three years ago. Quite frankly just like Coach Rod, made reference to the movie Lion King “It’s in the past” and it is time for Michigan, Michigan fans to look to the future of this program and also he said “We only talk about Michigan” players.
We don’t mind talking about Coach Rod or what happened, but it is time to get away from some of the problems that plagued him and this program for the past three years.
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Written by GBMWolverine Staff
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