Michigan Football: Enough uninspired coaching from Jim Harbaugh

The sad performance by Michigan football in the Outback Bowl raises many questions about Harbaugh and his staff.

There’s more than enough blame to go around after a heartbreaking second half meltdown in the Outback Bowl by Michigan football against South Carolina, but here’s a thought – the coaching has not been impressive.

Michigan football looked like the most uninspired, most predictable, most boring team playing in any of the important postseason matchups.  At the end of the season, penalties, interceptions, and fumbles provided the only adrenaline, and turnovers at this point in the year are all about coaching. The most incisive comment may have come from commentator Chris Carter following the Outback loss:

Following a game that saw Michigan struggle on offense, Carter called Harbaugh “the most overrated coach in football,” and said he offered “no creativity after a month of practice.”

The rest of the Big Ten?  7-0 in bowl play against tough opponents.  Wisconsin, Ohio State, Penn State, Michigan State, Iowa, Purdue, Northwestern – all looked like programs on the rise.  Outside of the Big Ten, how ’bout Central Florida, 13-0 with a big win over Auburn?

Michigan Wolverines Football

Want more to chew on?  Scott Frost and his CFU coaching staff are moving to Lincoln, where they have already started to recruit for Nebraska.  Lane Kiffin is back from the dead, taking an FAU program that had been described as “running on embalming fluid” to a conference championship and a bowl win over Akron.

And there’s this:  Nick Saban makes $87,000.00 more than Jim Harbaugh, which sound like a lot until we remember that Harbaugh makes $7, 000,000.00 a year.  The difference is that Saban is taking his team to the national championship again while Michigan ends up 8-5 and looking pathetic.

And then, three of Harbaugh’s assistants pull in more than a million dollars a year. Don Brown has earned that million six times over as he has coached the defense brilliantly, but we gotta wonder about Tim Drevno who coordinated the offense and even though Pep Hamilton may be courted by other major programs, we have to consider his work this year as passing coordinator.

So, kudos to the Michigan players who emerged during the course of the season, a few of whom will be heading to the NFL.  Michigan has lots of excellent returning talent and some real-deal recruits heading to Ann Arbor. If Brown sticks around, the defense will get great coaching, but unless the offensive coaching improves, it’ll be another long and frustrating season.

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It’s up to Jim now.  Let’s hope we see the Harbaugh we saw in the first season back.