Michigan Football, Team 140, 2019 Season

[Rocky Bleier]

He's going to be a good tight end in the NFL.

I wouldn't mind the Steelers taking a chance on him. Jerame Tuman worked well for them.

[Hannibal]

[iam416]

Heh

[Jeff Buchanan]

Khaleke Hudson is returning.

https://twitter.com/khalekehudson/status/1081286419568619520?s=21

Here's my take on the last couple of tweets that seemed to me to be pretty positive whether the players are staying for another season or going pro.

I think the sentiments apparent in the tweets tend to put to rest some of the talk of locker room discord. This seems like a pretty well put together group. Higdon and Aubrey Soloman may be exceptions. Whatever was going on there will be forgotten as winter conditioning gets underway and the left-over bad tastes about the losses to end the season give way to excitement and hope for spring practice.

[hack]

I think the positive tweets, and the Woodson interview, tacitly confirm that there was a pretty disgruntled faction. Add that to the transfers wave that included guys with playing time or in line for it soon and it's pretty clear. Not saying it was a large group. It sure did seem to grow after OSU though. As a player, when the scheme is obviously bad you can only keep faith in your coaches for so long before you lose it.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Who was part of the "pretty disgruntled faction?" One guy? 30? I don't know.

There were, IMO, three transfers that were meaningful - Aubrey Soloman, James Hudson and Kekoa Crawford. We're they disgruntled? I don't know. Do you? I saw a quote involving Hudson from Harbaugh after JBB went out and Steuber, not Hudson, went in after the MSU game. JH said (paraphrased) Hudson dislocated a finger and had fallen a bit behind in practice. Steuber got more reps that's why he went in for JBB.

Look, I get the talk. It happens - fans and players - when Michigan loses like they did. But that's all it is. Talk. I just don't think we are in a position to know and my comment was a glass-half full one intended to suggest that.

Does Woodson's interview confirm, even tacitly, that there was a "pretty disgruntled faction?" It didn't do that for this glass half full slappy. Here's the transcript of the interview:



One other comment on disgruntled factions: I paid attention to the locker room interview that chase Winovcih did. I thought it was really good. He tells it like it is or was. For me, the key statement was that the defense was a shadow of itself compared to the PSU game. Maybe he's rationalizing but, there were enough comments in that whole interview about "not going down that rabbit hole" when he was asked about specifics because, he said, "that gets into too much negativity."

Not all that compete at a high level in any endeavor when things go wrong are able to not point fingers. Chase is one of those guys. He's a complete team player not in it for him but for The team .... at least that's how I see him. My take on the Michigan football program is that being a team player is a key characteristic of it - we don't point fingers - I hear that all the time from Michigan players and coaches. Is everybody on-board with that? Probably not. In my experience there's always one or more of that guy who is in it for himself and has his own agenda. I'm going to say that a good deal of the players (and coaches) are on board with the team concept .... but, hell, what do I know.

So, I'm not going to buy into talk of locker room discord nor am I going to speculate about it. YMMV.

[WM Wolverine]

Coaching staff was overly careful about players returning from injury; coming from 247 sports... There was a handful of players that didn't like this and almost all of them are gone. Adding to JBs list, Singleton.

[hack]

Maybe you missed the negativity because you're a glass-half-full slappy, then? Looking on the bright side as a systematic approach doesn't encourage you to see the negatives. i'd say Singleton is a big loss, and Deron Irving-Bey too.

[Rocky Bleier]

Players who have left haven't accomplished much elsewhere, Aubrey Solomon may be an exception. Deron Irving-Bey is most likely at the level he belongs. Flint Southwestern isn't a big time program.

http://touch-the-banner.com/ex-wolverine-player-updates-post-2018-recap/

[hack]

No idea, but he was a four-star DT and that's a position we're thin at. Regardless of whether he was gonna pan out, the point is that players who had a clear path to playing time suddenly decided they didn't want to be here.

[Jeff Buchanan]

I'll freely admit a slappy bias. OTH, talk of locker room discord is so wildly speculative it merits little attention, or should merit little of it.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Shea Patterson was at the US Army All-American Bowl awards ceremony and said this:



Frustrated? Certainly about the two blow-out losses to end the season. He also said, he can do more. He has the ball in his hands every play. Is there something or somebody holding him back?

Can anything be concluded about these two statements? While other programs, including osu, have made public changes in the make-up of their coaching staffs, there is nothing to be heard from The Fort. It remains in it's usual radio silence. I commented a week ago that I disliked the sillyness associated with coach secrecy. Harbaugh may be the worst of them - the submarine thing and all.

Anyway, I'm waiting. Much less patiently than in years past for an indication that Michigan football under the leadership of Jim Harbaugh is going to "move forward."

[hack]

Jeff when you go from ``no evidence of player frustration" to ``oh look here's a team player who is still happy to be here saying it", I get really dizzy and have to sit down for a minute.

[Jeff Buchanan]

With Manny Diaz returning to the Miami Hurricanes after mark Richt abruptly announced he was going to retire, the Temple job is open again. We know, Brown was in consideration for that job and in recent interviews Brown stated that under the right conditions, he'd be open to a HC position if it was offered.

I don't think he's going anywhere and that' the consensus opinion at places where I'm reading. The reason? If Temple was going to hire him they would have acted quickly. They haven't. Frankly, I think he is the least of the coaching problems, assuming they exist. I'm on the fence regarding Pep Hamilton because he's not the OC. Criticisms of M's offense, the one's I'm talking about and have been talked about here and elsewhere, are valid. I've said up thread that I'm mentally preparing myself for little change coming from Jim Harbaugh.

Given the submarine BS I mentioned above, we may not get any indication that positive change in the offense is going to happen during the next month. We won't know from spring practice although there will be plenty of speculation that big changes are happening. We won't know from Fall Camp and by that time all the memories of Michigan's colossal collapse at the end of the 2018 season will have been forgotten and replaced by hopium. Seen it, covered it.

That leaves M opening against the Middle Tennessee Blue Raiders on August 31st for a preview of Harbaugh's 2019 offense. My prediction? No changes will be discernible in that game, even if something more explosive has been grafted into the play-book. I think that is a shame and entirely predictable.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Hack .......No, I said it's foolish to speculate about locker room discord. The bad apple sort of stuff. To me, anyway, there's a difference. Shea Patterson expressing that he's frustrated about his performance can mean a lot of different things. One can draw their own conclusions about such a statement. Like Winovich said post UF loss, I'm not going down that rabbit hole. Smart guy, Chase.