A couple weeks before last season, I threw out five positive predictions for the Wolverines. If you’re wondering how last season measured up to expectations, check out the post — none of the five came true (although Tate Forcier came close to completing the 60% of his passes I expected him to, finishing with a 58.7% completion percentage) and Michigan finished 5-7. This year, I’m throwing caution to the wind and trying my hand at this “optimism” thing one more time; here are five hopeful predictions for the 2010 season:
Denard Robinson averages 250 yards of total offense –There’s no question Denard Robinson is a special athlete, and if his passing has really progressed as advertised, he could put up some big numbers this season. 250 yards of total offense per game isn’t an outlandish number for a dual-threat quarterback — in 2009, that number would be good for 33rd in the country, and many of the players near the top of the list aren’t household names, but quarterbacks who can eat up yards on the ground. As a sophomore, Pat White averaged 261.3 yards per game, and while I don’t expect Robinson to match White’s production, I think he’ll come close, and close enough to make the Michigan offense very dangerous.
Mark Moundros totals 70 tackles – That’s right, redshirt senior fullback-turned-linebacker walk-on Mark Moundros, who is currently in a battle with redshirt senior Obi Ezeh to start at middle linebacker, will have at least 70 tackles, the exact figure Ezeh turned in last year. All indications point to Moundros as the probable starter come Saturday, and he had displayed solid tackling ability and a nose for the football since moving from fullback in the spring. It appears that Greg Robinson’s defense will have the middle linebackers attacking the line downhill, which should play to Moundros’s strengths. I don’t expect him to be a world-beater, or even an all-conference caliber player, but anything better than “decidedly below-average” will be a step in the right direction after 2009.
Carvin Johnson earns Freshman All-America honors – This doesn’t sound quite as outlandish as it appears in print, as Jordan Kovacs was a College Football News second-team Freshman All-American last year, but it still means Johnson will be a solid contributor to this year’s defense. The Louisiana native appears tailor-made for the spur position, which is essentially Stevie Brown’s linebacker/safety hybrid spot, as he is a very good tackler who drew rave reviews in his senior season after flying under the radar as a recruit. Johnson won’t be asked to do too much in coverage, but when he does, he shouldn’t be overmatched — he practiced some at cornerback this fall and recorded seven interceptions en route to being named first-team all-state in Louisiana’s largest division last year. Like any true freshman thrust into a starting role, there will be some bumps in the road, but I expect Johnson will be a pleasant surprise for the Wolverines in 2010.
A Michigan receiver breaks 50 receptions – In Rich Rodriguez’s first two seasons at Michigan, the production from the wideouts has been disappointing — Roy Roundtree led the team with 32 catches last season after Martavious Odoms paced the team with 49 in 2008. With Roundtree, Odoms, and Darryl Stonum all poised for big seasons, and Michigan’s quarterback situation looking like the best it has been since Chad Henne graduated, I expect at least one receiver to crack 50 receptions in a breakout season. The safe bet is for Roundtree to eclipse that mark while working from the slot, but don’t count out Odoms, a great possession receiver who is now working on the outside — he could see a lot of screens and quick passes that could pad his stats significantly.
Rich Rodriguez keeps his job – I’m not even necessarily predicting a bowl appearance, not with the defense in the shape it’s in, but I do think this team will show enough progression to allow Dave Brandon to keep Rich Rodriguez around for 2011. Rodriguez has seemingly caught every tough break imaginable in his two-plus years in Ann Arbor, and while this team still has a ways to go before they win like the Michigan of old, they’re certainly moving in the right direction. The offense should begin to resemble Rodriguez’s outstanding West Virginia units, and there is plenty of young talent across the board. I think this team will look just good enough for Brandon to give Rodriguez a chance to lead what should be an experienced and talented 2011 team, which only seems right, as Rodriguez has finally built the foundation for what should be a Big Ten contender.
Let’s all hope that these predictions hold up much better than last year’s, and I’ll have the flip side to this coin — my five “less hopeful” predictions — coming up soon.
The position previews continue today with a look at one of the team’s best position groups, the interior line:
Returning Contributors: David Molk (RS Jr.), Stephen Schilling (RS Sr.), Patrick Omameh (RS So.), Ricky Barnum (RS So.), Rocko Khoury (RS So.), Elliott Mealer (RS So.), John Ferrara (RS Sr.) Ready to Contribute: Quinton Washington (RS Fr.) Incoming Freshmen: Christian Pace Key Departures: David Moosman
The Projected Starters: Michigan fans will be happy to see center David Molk healthy and back in the starting lineup after missing most of the 2009 season with foot and knee injuries. Molk has arguably been the team’s best offensive lineman when healthy the past two seasons, and he is the perfect fit at center in Rich Rodriguez’s offense — a strong, agile lineman who excels in zone blocking and getting to the second level.
Left guard Stephen Schilling is a former five-star prospect who earned All-Big Ten honorable mention last year from both the coaches and the media. With 36 career starts, Schilling is the most experienced lineman on the team, and he is a very strong player who is at his best in the run game. Schilling should once again vie for postseason honors in his final year as a Wolverine.
Redshirt sophomore Patrick Omameh has surprised many by going from a two-star defensive end prospect to starting the final three games of 2009 at right guard, where he projects to start full-time this season. Omameh has been very impressive in spring and fall practices, and like Molk he is a very agile athlete for his size (6-4, 299 pounds). Many, including myself, expect big things out of Omameh in his first full year as a starter, and when combined with Molk and Schilling he rounds out what should be a stellar interior line for the Wolverines.
The Competition: Although the starting lineup appears set, Michigan has several solid backups in the interior line should the team need to replace one of the above players. A trio of redshirt sophomores — Ricky Barnum, Elliott Mealer, and Rocko Khoury — should be the primary backups. Barnum is a former four-star and an extremely versatile player who can line up at any position along the line — he saw snaps at both center and guard during Saturday’s scrimmage, and will likely be the top backup at guard this season. At 6-5, 313 pounds, Mealer is a huge guard and a solid athlete who saw action in 11 games last season. Khoury has worked at center since arriving in Ann Arbor, and with Moosman gone he will be pressed into action should Molk go down to injury again this year. He is reportedly much-improved at the quarterback-center exchange after struggling with it in practice last year.
Others: Redshirt senior John Ferrara has been passed on the depth chart by the trio of sophomores, but he has six career starts at guard and would be a capable and experienced replacement if called upon. Redshirt freshman guard Quinton Washington is a former four-star recruit, but he’s likely a year away from sniffing the two-deep at one of the most stacked positions on the roster. True freshman Christian Pace is a promising center prospect very much in the Molk mold, but he is a lock to redshirt as he continues to add weight after enrolling early in the spring.
Outlook: The interior line boasts three players with all-conference potential, and should be one of the strongest position groups on the team in 2010. Having Molk healthy alongside Schilling and Omameh should be a huge boost to the offense and give the Wolverines one of the top lines in the Big Ten. On top of having a great starting trio, the team has a great deal of depth in the interior of the line — it’s hard to see this group being anything but a strength this fall.
This seemed likely after the rumors swirling around this week and Austin White’s absence from yesterday’s scrimmage; Rich Rodriguez confirmed today that White is no longer a member of the Michigan football team:
Michigan head coach Rich Rodriguez hosted his annual media day press conference on Sunday. One topic of discussion was the status of freshman running back Austin White.
Rodriguez confirmed that White, who enrolled in school last January, was no longer part of the team and wished him well in future endeavors.
White was an early enrollee out of Livonia Stevenson, and a three-star running back according to Rivals.com. With the Wolverines already planning on rotating 3-4 running backs early in the season, including fellow true freshman Stephen Hopkins, White’s departure shouldn’t impact the 2010 squad. I have had the chance to meet Austin during my work with The Wolverine, and I wish him nothing but the best wherever he may end up.
I’ll get this out of the way right now: In no way should Troy Woolfolk’s devastating leg injury — and the resulting nightmare of a depth chart — have any bearing on Rich Rodriguez’s job status at Michigan. To say Rodriguez has had horrible luck with cornerbacks during his tenure in Ann Arbor would do a disservice to the term ‘horrible.’ AnnArbor.com has a brief rundown of how Michigan got so thin at the position, and it isn’t pretty:
In addition to [Justin] Turner’s untimely departure, Donovan Warren left school early after the 2009 season to enter the NFL Draft, expecting to be a mid-round draft pick. Instead, he signed an unrestricted free-agent deal with the New York Jets.
This spring, the Wolverines signed highly touted recruit Demar Dorsey. He could have played safety or cornerback, but the university denied his admission.
Boubacar Cissoko started the first four games of the season at right cornerback last year, but was kicked off the team for violating internal rules, and subsequently pled guilty to four robbery charges.
Adrian Witty was a highly touted 2009 cornerback recruit, but never made it to campus as a non-qualifier.
You could argue that Rodriguez brought some of this upon himself: Witty and Dorsey were both his recruits and neither met Michigan’s academic standards (Witty wasn’t admitted by the school in 2010 after meeting NCAA eligibility requirements one year after being recruited), but few were complaining when the Wolverines added Dorsey on signing day to a strong crop of 2010 corners, and nobody could have foreseen just how desperately the Wolverines would need instant-impact corners at the time.
As for the others, Warren was a Lloyd Carr recruit — and Michigan’s top corner — who didn’t wait for his NFL draft evaluation before declaring early, and Cissoko was another Carr holdover who let off-field demons get the best of his career in Ann Arbor. Rodriguez can hardly be blamed for either departure. And Turner? Having one of the nation’s top 50 prospects decide he doesn’t want to work hard enough to play Division I football came as a surprise to everyone — he was a can’t-miss prospect who missed, and nothing in his recruiting profile raised any red flags until he showed up late and out of shape for his freshman season. Even then, fans expected Turner would turn it around and compete for a starting role this fall, but Turner never fully committed himself to football, and now he’s gone.
Rich Rodriguez has done everything he could to hold together the cornerback position. In 2008, with former five-star Warren and the talented Woolfolk already on the roster, he added Cissoko (a four-star and Rivals.com’s No. 4 corner) and three-star J.T. Floyd (unlike Cissoko, not a Carr holdover, as he committed after the coaching change). In the class of 2009, he locked up Turner, Scout.com’s No. 3 corner, and added Witty for depth. When Witty didn’t qualify and Warren departed early for the NFL, Rodriguez loaded up on 2010 corners with Army All-American Cullen Christian and three-star prospects Courtney Avery and Terrence Talbott, and pulled a recruiting coup when he landed Dorsey on signing day. Of those players, only Floyd and the three freshmen (excluding Dorsey, of course) remain healthy and on the team. The last thing this team could afford was a serious injury to the only experienced corner, and that’s exactly what happened yesterday.
Until we see what Greg Robinson and the defense can make out of Michigan’s depleted secondary, we won’t know just how large of an impact Woolfolk’s injury will have on the defense. At this point, however, it’s tough not to measure that impact in losses — multiple ones at that — and I only hope that Dave Brandon, as well as the Michigan fans, take that into account in what has been billed as a make-or-break year for Rich Rodriguez.
There has been a somewhat overwhelming response to my post yesterday on the Demar Dorsey situation, and I just wanted to clear up a couple things that have repeated popped up in my email, in the post comments, and on other sites:
I have made my stance on Rich Rodriguez very clear over the last couple years: I think he is still the best coach for Michigan right now, and I have no “agenda” in any of the comments I made about him yesterday. Given the version of events that was outlined to me yesterday, I concluded that Rodriguez was at the very least one of the parties that deserved some blame for the situation. I think it has become pretty obvious by now that there have been some bumps in the road on the administrative side as Rodriguez continues to learn what will and will not fly at Michigan, as compared to previous stints at places like West Virginia at Clemson. I don’t believe there’s any conspiracy on the part of the athletic department or the university as a whole against Rodriguez — there simply have been a few instances where they weren’t on the same page. This was one of those instances. I very much agree with what Brian Cook wrote yesterday:
As per usual, many people can take the hit. Rodriguez is one. Without knowledge of what he’s been told is kosher and what he’s been told is not—and how strenuously—how much is a guy working from assumptions built up after ten years at Clemson and WVU and how much is pure stubbornness from a guy who should know better isn’t clear. If there is someone on the staff who is supposed to be in contact with admissions and know which guys are borderline and which are no way—and I honestly don’t know if there is one—then it falls on that person. If there isn’t then there should be, and I expect that there will be.
The one line that drew the most criticism from my source’s email was this one: “Three felonies aside, strictly for academics, the director of admissions, [U-M President Mary Sue] Coleman, and [AD Dave] Brandon all agreed that Dorsey had no place at Michigan.” Why? The Detroit News posted an article two days ago that contained this quote from Dave Brandon [HT: MGoBlog]:
Brandon balked at the suggestion he had anything to do with Dorsey not gaining admission.
“That’s ridiculous,” Brandon said. “Admissions is not part of my portfolio at this university. I’ve got plenty else that I’m doing.
“The misinformation is the athletic department is involved and there is some conspiracy involved. In this particular case, and, frankly, other cases, the admissions office concluded and made a judgment.”
I do not disagree with this statement — I trust that Dave Brandon is being sincere when he says that this was the admissions office’s decision. That doesn’t mean it isn’t possible that Brandon (and Coleman) sat down with the director of admissions to discuss what is a very high-profile recruitment of a football player who is a borderline qualifier. In fact, this is likely a very good sign: I want to hear that the athletic department and the admissions office are in strong communication when it comes to these situations, and it sounds like Brandon was simply doing his job by talking with admissions about Dorsey. I don’t think this is the usual process for reviewing and approving a recruit (I highly doubt Mary Sue Coleman gets involved in these situations often), but this has been an extremely unusual recruitment. Still, the final decision on Dorsey came down to the admissions department, and they made their decision.
I hope that helps to clarify some of what I wrote yesterday. I sincerely appreciate all the feedback — both positive and negative — that I have received in the last day. As was pointed out by “oldmancoyote” in the comments of yesterday’s post, it is important in these instances to remember one thing: we’re all Michigan fans, and ultimately we’re all on the same side here, even if we have differences of opinion. Thanks to everyone who has stopped by the blog, and I hope you all have a wonderful weekend.
When word came this week that Demar Dorsey would not be admitted to Michigan, many Wolverine fans — myself included — bemoaned the decision of the admissions department to reject an NCAA qualified player who had already been offered a scholarship, especially someone who had been through everything Dorsey has gone through over the course of his recruitment. I said this yesterday (emphasis added for reasons which will be revealed shortly):
I don’t have much to add to this — everything I said yesterday still holds true, in that this process has been incredibly unfair to Dorsey and is an embarrassment to the school and the program. Word is Rich Rodriguez is furious about the situation, and I don’t blame him one bit. He got cleared by someone at the school to offer Dorsey a scholarship, Dorsey qualified, and admissions refused to let him in (despite what sounds like a strong push from the coaching staff to reconsider) — this is not only unfortunate for Dorsey, who now has to find another school, but for Rodriguez and his staff, who will certainly be placed under scrutiny by recruits (and opposing coaches recruiting Michigan targets) about their ability to get commits on campus who may be borderline qualifiers.
The highlighted part of that paragraph was based on something stated by Brian Cook at MGoBlog before Dorsey had officially been released from his commitment:
This situation is the Draper/Labadie/compliance dysfunction all over again, with miscommunication between Rodriguez—who went to bat for Dorsey with a provost before signing day and got a signoff on him—and admissions replacing the lack of communication between the football administration and compliance. It’s a different sclerotic artery, but the root cause is the same.
Why do I bring this up? Today I received an email from a close friend with an intimate knowledge of the Dorsey situation. To protect my friend and his source, parts of the following email have been redacted, but I can tell you that I firmly believe that everything he told me is true, and it helps to clarify the entire situation a great deal. Here’s the email (emphasis mine):
Stumbled on a little tidbit of inside info … When Rodriguez offered Dorsey a scholarship,he had a [Ed: GPA and ACT score removed -- suffice it to say, the scores didn't qualify] . Florida withdrew his scholarship because of his grades. Nobody in admissions ever cleared Dorsey before Rodriguez offered a scholarship. He eventually got his grades up by dropping out of school, attending an alternative high school which he did not get credit from [Ed: this would be the LifeSkills school which released the promotional video featuring Dorsey], and taking online classes, all of which he got an A in. His ACT score (according to his coach, Michigan never saw documentation) jumped to 18. Dorsey never even filled out a standard college application, which all athletes are supposed to do to be considered. Long story short, there was no mix-up. Three felonies aside, strictly for academics, the director of admissions, Coleman, and Brandon all agreed that Dorsey had no place at Michigan. Rod never checked with anyone before offering a scholarship and having him sign a letter of intent. He just did it and then expected admissions to let him in. I feel sorry for the kid, but this was Rod’s fault, not admissions. Had Rod ever checked with anyone, he would’ve gotten a firm “no”. There wasn’t even a debate about whether he’d be let in. And apparently, Rod’s in the habit of doing stuff like this.
Anyway, I thought this was very discouraging to hear. I still have a lot of faith in Rod as a football coach, but he really is just a football coach. And since that was at odds with what you and Brian wrote, I thought I’d write to clear it up.
He added this in a follow-up email:
Brian wrote that the day before signing day Rod went to bat for [sic] “a Provost.” I have no idea what that means. There’s only one provost. If you refer to each of the associate provosts as “a provost” then there are three more. [My source] swears this never happened. Maybe he met with someone about the felonies. Again, this was not about the felonies, but instead about the grades. He had a [low GPA/ACT score] at the time. It is simple [sic] inconceivable that anyone involved with Michigan would have signed off on that.
To me, this whole story sounds much more viable than what most of us have presumed to be true for the last few days: that Rodriguez found someone who gave him clearance to offer a scholarship, only to have admissions reject Dorsey months later, with some massive failure in communication between the coaching staff and the admissions department occurring somewhere in the middle. Breaking stories is not my usual job as a blogger, but I couldn’t sit on this story — again, I believe it makes a lot of sense, and although I am forced to release it as a story from an anonymous source, I believe it to be true. If someone has a way of confirming the story, I would love to get a definite statement that it is in fact true — as a student blogging in my spare time, I don’t have the resources (or the sources) to find confirmation.
Just to clarify, I have the utmost respect for Brian Cook as a blogger — I’m sure a source did tell him that story about Rich Rod checking with “a provost,” and he certainly wasn’t the only Michigan fan/blogger to take the stance he did. Again, I made the exact same assumptions. As it stands, I still feel much the same way when it comes to Demar Dorsey: I still believe he did a great deal of work to get his life turned around and to qualify for the NCAA, which he did — he just didn’t meet the academic standards that Michigan upholds, and it was unfortunate that he was offered a scholarship when it was apparently very clear that he would never be admitted.
Instead, this looks very bad for Rodriguez, especially in light of the recent NCAA violations (regardless of who is really at fault for the violations, Rodriguez was still cited for a lack of institutional control, which appears to be the case again here). I still believe that Rodriguez is a good football coach who can succeed in Ann Arbor, but it is apparent that he will have to do a much better job of managing the off-the-field aspect of coaching if he hopes to stay out of these types of situations in the future.
UPDATE: MGoBrian has a post confirming (to the extent of his knowledge) the details of this post. Also, I have removed the information of Dorsey’s exact GPA and ACT score prior to his qualifying scores — I had no right to give out that information, and I sincerely apologize for leaving that part of the email intact. Posting that was irresponsible journalism and not right, but there was no malicious intent — I was just trying to get the story right and made a regretful error.
Also, this clears up the issue of Brian’s statement about the provost:
Ace spends a section of his post debunking the idea that Rodriguez got a sign-off on offering Dorsey from the “provost” mentioned. I think there’s been a miscommunication due to an awkward sentence. The original paragraph:
“This situation is the Draper/Labadie/compliance dysfunction all over again, with miscommunication between Rodriguez—who went to bat for Dorsey with a provost before signing day and got a signoff on him—and admissions replacing the lack of communication between the football administration and compliance. It’s a different sclerotic artery, but the root cause is the same.”
This has been taken to imply that Rodriguez had gotten some sort of sign off from admissions; unfortunately I was trying to express the opposite. When Rodriguez was clearing Dorsey with part of the university—something that did indeed happen, though it might not have been a “provost”—it was about his checkered past and not his checkered transcript. It was the failure of both parties not to explore the kid’s academic background sufficiently, or of Rodriguez not to understand that Michigan is not West Virginia in these matters*, that left Dorsey and Michigan in the position they are today, where Michigan looks stupid coming and going and Dorsey’s left to find a new home in the middle of June. That is essentially identical to the CARA form fiasco.
It’s official, and officially depressing: Demar Dorsey will not be suiting up for the Wolverines this fall, or ever. MGoBlog’s TomVH scored an interview with Dorsey himself last night in which the recruit sounded very unsure of his status with Michigan, and now the Detroit News caught up with his father, Eddie Jackson, who put any hope of Dorsey coming to Michigan to rest:
The father of Michigan recruit Demar Dorsey said his son is now free to look at other college options.
Dorsey, a four-star recruit from Boyd Anderson in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., has signed and returned papers to Michigan that release him from the letter of intent he signed in February, his father, Eddie Jackson, told The News Wednesday morning.
Jackson said Dorsey met Michigan’s academic-entrance requirements with an 18 ACT and a 2.5 grade-point average.
“He signed a letter of intent but basically what happened, I guess he didn’t qualify to their standards,” Jackson said. “Admissions sent him a letter that they weren’t going to admit him to the school and said to disregard the other letter (of intent) and was free again to start looking at other options.”
I don’t have much to add to this — everything I said yesterday still holds true, in that this process has been incredibly unfair to Dorsey and is an embarrassment to the school and the program. Word is Rich Rodriguez is furious about the situation, and I don’t blame him one bit. He got cleared by someone at the school to offer Dorsey a scholarship, Dorsey qualified, and admissions refused to let him in (despite what sounds like a strong push from the coaching staff to reconsider) — this is not only unfortunate for Dorsey, who now has to find another school, but for Rodriguez and his staff, who will certainly be placed under scrutiny by recruits (and opposing coaches recruiting Michigan targets) about their ability to get commits on campus who may be borderline qualifiers.
In short, this entire situation sucks, and I hope Demar Dorsey can find a school and excel there — I just wish that school could have been Michigan.
The constant media coverage of Michigan’s football woes — both on and off the field — under Rich Rodriguez has given fans a lot of opportunities to think about the state of the program, and what they value as supporters of the Wolverines. Since the Free Press first “broke” the “story” that Michigan had exceeded their allotted practice time, I have been 100% behind Rich Rodriguez and his staff.
Now, after seeing Michigan self-impose sanctions against the football program, I feel conflicted as a fan.
Do I still support Rodriguez? Yes. He is still our football coach, and he is building a program his way in the face of constant (and often unfair) criticism from Michigan supporters and outside detractors alike. I don’t believe he is any more of a sleazebag than any other college football coach, and his awkward, bumbling attempts at facing the media have actually endeared him to me — he is clearly a football coach just trying to coach some football, and I can respect that. I believe that, if given the opportunity, he can build a very successful — and clean — program at Michigan.
Do I still think that will happen? I’m not sure. Whether it’s fair or not, Rodriguez will have to win now, in his third year, and avoid any further embarrassment in the process, to save his job, while facing a tough schedule with what is still a very young team. I truly believe that Michigan’s quickest path back to success is through Rodriguez, and starting over with a new coach will only prolong this period of discontent. At the same time, I’m tired of being an outspoken fan without a lot to say to opposing fans — “just wait ’til 2011″ isn’t the world’s best comeback, and the constant mocking from Ohio State, Michigan State, and Penn State fans is getting close to unbearable. While the rational fan in me wants to give Rodriguez time, the irrational fanatic in me needs to see a powerhouse in progress or a change in leadership. Which side is right? I have no idea.
The coaching staff isn’t the only thing I feel conflicted about. How, as Michigan fans, do we view the Detroit Free Press? I know how 99% of Michigan fans will respond to that question, and I tend to side with them — the issues with the Freep’s initial story, how they went about getting it, and how overblown it became make it impossible for me to read their paper without expecting an anti-Michigan bias, and I can’t in good conscience support what they do there.
At the same time, while they missed by several degrees of magnitude just how much Michigan violated the rules, they did get something right — Michigan did violate the rules, and there were clearly major problems in the compliance department that led to a failure to properly monitor the football program. You could argue those rules are archaic, not followed by anyone, a farce, but they’re in the book, and as a Michigan fan I expect Michigan teams to follow the letter of the law — we are not Michigan if we are not one of the upstanding programs in the country. The Freep found a story they could run with, and run with it they did — I still think the way they handled the story was an embarrassment to journalism, but part of me is strangely glad they did it. I want to know if we’re cheating, whether it’s by 20 minutes a week or two hours a day, and now we can make the proper changes so that this doesn’t happen again, ever.
It’s a strange time to be a Michigan fan. We’ve been beaten down by the worst stretch of football in decades and an off-field investigation that feels like an attack on our status as a preeminent program in the country and an example for other schools to follow — not an example of how not to run a program. Our fanbase is divided over what to do about our coach, and what level of institutional failure is acceptable in Ann Arbor before heads roll and the direction of the program changes. One could easily make the argument that these past few years have been harder on Michigan fans than any other fanbase in the country.
Right now, all I want is to see us field a successful football team. How we do that, when it happens, and who is in charge when it happens, well, all that is very up in the air right now. I hope sometime soon we will find certainty.
Even with the craziness surrounding the Big Ten’s imperialistic expansion plans and an ongoing NCAA investigation surrounding our football program, it’s still the dull months of the football offseason, and there’s not a whole lot to write about if you’re a college football blogger right now. So, I’ll warn you right off the bat: this is a half-baked idea I came up with while listening to Eminem’s new single in my car a couple days ago. It involves comparing Eminem’s tumultuous career to the last 15 years of Michigan football. Clearly I’m reaching here, but bear with me — before you know it, football season will be upon us, and I’ll be back to writing (semi-) intelligent football discourse and not trying to compare a college football team to a rapper who had a severe addiction to painkillers. If you’re still with me, I commend you. On with the show.
It only seems appropriate to compare the last 15 years of Michigan football to the career of a Detroit emcee, and anyone with a basic knowledge of Eminem’s more recent issues can probably see where this comparison is going. Since I don’t expect all of you to be intimately familiar with the life and times of Slim Shady, let’s go through this comparison stage-by-stage (WARNING: all audio potentially NSFW):
Stage One: Infinite
Infinite was Eminem’s first album, released independently in 1996 without much fanfare or wide distribution. On it, he shows a lot of raw lyrical ability, but between the lack of solid production and without much in the way of cohesive songwriting, Infinite is mostly used as a reference for how far Eminem has come musically, and also to marvel at the talent he possessed before he became world famous.
For me, Michigan football began in 1994, when I first got season tickets to the Big House and started following the team. With the sudden transition from Gary Moeller to Lloyd Carr, Michigan was a team stuck in (relative) mediocrity, with a new coach who had never been the head man on the collegiate level. The 1995-1996 teams were talented but unpolished, capable of knocking off Ohio State out of the national championship picture but also prone to losing to teams like Northwestern, Michigan State, and Purdue. Boasting young talent like Brian Greise, Jerame Tuman, Glen Steele, and Charles Woodson, the Wolverines clearly were ready for the big time, but just weren’t quite there yet.
Stage Two: The Slim Shady LP
Discovered by Jimmy Iovine, the CEO in Interscope Records, and mentored by super-producer Dr. Dre, Eminem released The Slim Shady LP in 1999, and his major-label debut was an instant classic. With production from the Doctor himself, and taking the clever rhymes and complicated flows from Infinite to a new level, Eminem reached the pinnacle of his profession, making The Slim Shady LP both a commercial smash hit and one of the most critically-acclaimed rap albums of all time.
You can see where I’m going with this one. In 1997, Michigan finally put it all together, with Jim Hermann overseeing the country’s finest defense (and maybe one of the best in NCAA history) and the offense, with a young O-line full of future NFL stalwarts and the steady hand of a more experienced Greise, producing enough to lead Michigan to an undefeated record and the national title. This is the pinnacle, ladies and gentlemen.
Stage Three: The Marshall Mathers LP/The Eminem Show
Eminem followed up The Slim Shady LP with another classic, The Marshall Mathers LP, in 2000. His follow-up to a classic was great, and some consider it an equal to his first LP, but most consider it just a notch below The Slim Shady LP on the scale of classic albums. Two years later, Eminem released The Eminem Show, another great effort that again fell short of the ultimate standard he set in 1999, and unlike his first two albums, The Eminem Show displayed some weaknesses, as it didn’t show off the same amazing consistency from song to song that made his first two LPs so incredible.
Lloyd Carr’s teams followed up the 1997 national title with a string of successful to great seasons, consistently knocking off Ohio State and finishing at or near the top of the Big Ten standings every year. Early-season stumbles and a few disappointing performances kept these teams from achieving another national title, however, and towards the end of Carr’s tenure cracks began to show in the armor.
Eminem also began showing signs of impending disaster during this period. One of his most telling lyrics came from the song “I’m Back,” on The Marshall Mathers LP, when he says, “I used to give a f**k/now I could give a f**k less/what do I think of success?/it sucks/too much stress.” He started showing the occasional misstep, like the awful track “Drips” on The Eminem Show — think of that as the 2005 Michigan season — but he was still sharp-tongued Eminem, and his albums still sold and got critical praise, so everyone assumed these missteps would work themselves out and Slim Shady would stay on top of the world.
Stage Four: Encore
Now deep in the throes of prescription drug addiction, Eminem released his fourth major label album, Encore, in 2004. To rap fans everywhere, this is the Eminem album we all wish had never happened — he took on a new style of flow, which was so grating that even if he was putting out quality material, it would still be unlistenable. The material wasn’t quality.
Michigan took on a new style of their own in Rich Rodriguez before the 2008 season, and it certainly didn’t take well as the Wolverines piled up the most losses in school history for a single season. Like rap fans moving on from Encore, Michigan fans did their best to quickly move on from year one of the Rodriguez era.
Stage Five: Relapse
After a lengthy stint in drug rehab, Eminem came out with his fifth major label effort in 2009 with Relapse, a somewhat-bloated 20-track album that showed flashes of the old Eminem, but also still contained traces of the obnoxious delivery and lyrical laziness that wrecked Encore. Relapse was supposed to be Eminem’s grand return and a new classic, but the general consensus was that, while it was a step in the right direction, Relapse still couldn’t hold a candle to Shady’s first three major albums.
Does that sound like the 2009 season to anyone else? It certainly does to me, which leaves us at the present time. Eminem, however, has begun work on a new album. After originally announcing that a Relapse 2 album would be released on the heels of the first one, he decided to scrap that idea — and the tracks left over from the Relapse sessions — and head in a different direction.
Stage Six: Recovery?
In the last few months, Eminem has announced a new project, Recovery, which he says will go back to the type of music that made him famous while also showing off a more mature side. His first single, “Not Afraid,” exhibits Eminem’s new delivery, one that drops the obnoxious accent and instead wows the listener with its insanely complicated rhyme patterns and lyrical dexterity. In it, Eminem apologizes for Relapse, and looks forward to a new era in his career, admitting that he doesn’t know quite what is in store for him but he knows that he is making progress.
We’ll see if Eminem can continue down this new-found path, and if Rich Rodriguez and his team can follow in similar footsteps — for both, it’s now or never for resurrecting what was once the pinnacle of their respective fields. Personally, I’m optimistic for both. The road to recovery may be long, but what comes out of that recovery will be made all the more special because of the struggle it took to get there.
By now, I’m sure you have read the story of Morgan Trent’s airing of grievances about Rich Rodriguez in the book Draft Season. If you haven’t, MVictors has you covered:
At the end of the book, Deren describes the scene with Lloyd Carr, the former Michigan head coach that recruited him to Ann Arbor, breaking the news to Trent that current head coach Rich Rodriguez did him no favors.
“Rodriguez had bad-mouthed him to every NFL scout he could,” Deren writes. “Rodriguez claimed that Morgan was lazy, he had an attitude problem and he was a big reason the Wolverines finished with a 3-9 record…”
Trent admits the words were “jarring,” and they were hard to understand given that he was so serious about his career that he actually moved in with his brother and sister-in-law and their two small children while going to Michigan.
But Trent was also worried about what Carr thought about his words showing up in the book. He talks to him, not Rodriguez.
“I really like Coach Carr. He’s been very good to me,” Morgan says. “I think at first he was wondering, but I let him know it didn’t put him in a bad light. I would never do something like that to Lloyd. He’s great.”
I must admit, I was actually a Morgan Trent defender until his senior season — I thought the guy caught more flack than he deserved and was a serviceable Big Ten corner. Not a star, certainly, but serviceable. Of course, then 2008 happened, and as Brian points out in his post on the Trent controversy, Morgan Trent just wasn’t very good in his senior season. You know, the one that came directly before the NFL draft. The same NFL draft in which Trent was selected in the sixth round — higher than Donovan Warren, who went unselected this year — a draft spot that Trent thinks was too low and now blames on Rich Rodriguez.
Um, what?
I understand that former players, especially during a regime change, and doubly especially during one as rocky as Michigan’s, have the right to speak out — positively or negatively — about the new coach and their experiences with the change in coaching staffs. When former players come out and say they’re disappointed with how the team is playing, and that perhaps there is fault in the coaching staff, I respect that, even if I don’t necessarily agree with everything they’re saying.
This, however, sounds like a completely different situation. Without knowing how much truth is in Trent’s words, this sounds like a player who didn’t like his new coach and is now capitalizing on the controversy and criticism surrounding him to lob an attack his way and, in doing so, shed the responsibility for his own shortcomings. And that, quite frankly, is classless.
Morgan Trent came to Michigan as a four-star receiver with tons of athletic ability. He spent his career as a mediocre-to-decent corner on some good Lloyd Carr teams, and as a below-average starter on an awful defense in one season under Rich Rodriguez. I’m not sure what Rodriguez was supposed to do when NFL teams asked about Trent: Lie? Don’t answer the call? Burn the game film?
Criticism is a two-way street, Morgan Trent, and you are not immune to it — I’m sure you learned that during your time at Michigan. If you had done something — anything — to prove that you were more than a sixth-round NFL talent, I’d take your words at face value. But, quite simply, you didn’t deserve to go higher, and that ultimately is a reflection purely on what you did on the field.
Alex on 
JL on 
Ace Anbender on 
Steve on 
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