UM Football Recruiting - by WM Wolverine

[hack]

I am not suggesting that the team won't look good until then. I think I'm 60:40 that things will look right next year and that by 2020 this will be a bad memory but have nothing to do with the program as it stands at that point.

All this ultimately is going to have a lot to do with whether Patterson is eligible. I'd really rather not go into next season with a Peters/Speight battle and the coaching staff as it is today. That's not encouraging. Patterson is proven. If Patterson can play next year then everyone else on that side of the ball will look much more competent. Short of getting someone who can fix the fucking OL, that's the biggest questionmark. And maybe the solution that makes the offensive staff look competent until Harbaugh can find an actaully competent staff.

[SeattleLionsFan]

I REALLY don’t understand the Speight might be back thing. He left the team including for hole practices. Sayonara my man! It’s a shame that no decent team wants you to start but, you have a degree and I wish you the best.

[Rocky Bleier]

I REALLY don?t understand the Speight might be back thing. He left the team including for hole practices. Sayonara my man! It?s a shame that no decent team wants you to start but, you have a degree and I wish you the best.

He heard about Shea Patterson and didn't want to compete for his job. Now that Patterson may not come, there's a chance that he'll come back. Occam's Razor. He knows he can't win the job if Patterson is on the roster, and he must not be able to find anyone else who'll hand him a job.

[Rocky Bleier]

Something has gone very wrong with Harbaugh. Health problem? Drinking problem? Marital problems? Regretting that he left the NFL for college? Maybe it's none of those. I have no idea.

Could be a young team, no quarterback, a feuding staff, and resignation that the year was over when Speight went down. I don't think there was/is anything wrong with him that talent, experience, and a solid coaching staff can't fix.

[hack]

Surprisingly optimistic from you, Rocky.

Speight is waiting on Patterson, as I understand it. Willing to come back and compete with Peters. Not willing to compete with Patterson. Is what it is. If Patterson isn't eligible I'll take Speight back in a heartbeat. And hope Peters beats him out, but still.

[Da Geezer]

I still think the most-logical explanation is that Harbaugh needs to adjust a bit to the college game. And he will. He may need to be focused on the QBs and get a coordinator he trusts. He obviously hasn't been satisfied with the OL and is trying to address that. Certainly Michigan's money and Harbaugh's rep isn't pulling in currently-elite assistants, so he may need to go find some younger talent.

Correct. Harbaugh is already studying the RPO that the Eagles used to run over the Pats, and he adjusted his whole scheme in SF to accommodate Kaepernick. Rumor today is that he is going to hire McElwain as his 10th assistant. What he needs is an OL coach who can recruit Ohio. MSU is already getting some good 2019 players out of Ohio.

[SeattleLionsFan]

Surprisingly optimistic from you, Rocky.

Speight is waiting on Patterson, as I understand it. Willing to come back and compete with Peters. Not willing to compete with Patterson. Is what it is. If Patterson isn't eligible I'll take Speight back in a heartbeat. And hope Peters beats him out, but still.

If we need Speight, we need a new coach. He?s a halfway decent q.v. at best. If Harbaugh can?t get more out of a 3D year five star qb, or a 2nd year high four star q.v., then he?s the wrong fuckin guy.

[hack]

I suspect that Harbaugh needs to go back to being his own QB coach. Keep Pep Hamilton away from them. Speight developed reasonably well under Harbaugh and Fisch. Not spectacularly well, but for a good/not great prospect, he had a nice year as a first-year starter and was on an NFL track. That's good results, especially with a weak running game and OL.

Then again, Harbaugh made his money in large part teaching kids like Luck how to play QB and finding ways to win with flawed-but-talented guys like Kaep or backups like Tavita Pritchard. Did he employ QB coaches at SF or Stanford? Does anyone know off the top of their head? I feel like the way forward is to get the right OL coach, and suspect that person is not on the roster now, a proper WRs coach, since that is such a technical position and it's beyond me how you don't have a specialist working with your freshmen, and have Harbaugh focus on the QBs.

[Rocky Bleier]

Touch the Banner on change in recruiting strategy:

I also believe Harbaugh and Co. have altered their recruiting strategy since they arrived near the end of the 2015 cycle. Coming from California, they spent a ton of time trying to work connections in California, and despite their success at Stanford and San Francisco, I think they?re realizing that recruiting to Michigan is a whole different animal. Whether we like it or not, Ann Arbor doesn?t have the same sex appeal as moving to Florida or California. Stanford can recruit players from California and Georgia and Virginia and Texas without them worrying about having to deal with snow and cold weather. Michigan has had some recruiting success within the state of Michigan and in New Jersey, among some other places like Florida, but they don?t have that concern about weather to deal with. Palo Alto and Ann Arbor are two very different climates, and Michigan is a lot farther away from California than Texas is.

I think the Michigan coaching staff is coming back down to Earth a little bit and saying, ?Let?s be realistic.? That?s why we?re seeing an increase in offers in the state of Ohio and a good number of offers in Michigan. Michigan can do just fine in the Midwest. Many of Brady Hoke?s recruits came from the state of Ohio, and while many didn?t have Ohio State offers, they still matched up well. Jake Ryan, Frank Clark, Fitzgerald Toussaint, Chris Wormley, Willie Henry, Roy Roundtree, and others all came from Ohio. The coaching staff can still try to pick off some recruits outside of the Midwest, but I think it?s a good plan to keep building relationships in the Midwest and take advantage of the significant talent bases in those states.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Something has gone very wrong with Harbaugh. Health problem? Drinking problem? Marital problems? Regretting that he left the NFL for college? Maybe it's none of those. I have no idea.

Could be a young team, no quarterback, a feuding staff, and resignation that the year was over when Speight went down. I don't think there was/is anything wrong with him that talent, experience, and a solid coaching staff can't fix.

I think there is more to this position than any others. I've gone from reasonable excuses for M's play to no excuse - it's all on Harbaugh. There's probably middle ground and this is probably it. For right now, I'm sticking with no excuses - fix it. The bar for 2018 is beat MSU, PSU and osu; have to win the BTE then win the BTC. After that things take care of themselves.

Anyway, on Harbaugh's health. He either has Atrial Fibrillation (there are two types, paroxysmal and chronic) or he has Wolff-Parkinson-White (WPF) Syndrome. Favor the later. A-Fib usually occurs after 65. WPW can be diagnosed much younger with a mean age of diagnosis in one's 30s. It can be easily missed and stoics will just ignore mild symptoms (light headedness, rarely syncope). There's no association with Heart Attacks or Cardiac Arrest although sequellae can cause death from that if it's not recognized by the patient and immediate care sought.

WPW is a conduction abnormality. Electrical pulses travel from the Sino-Atrial (SA) node in the right upper chamber of the heart (normal is 72 BPM). From there they travel through tissue (Bundle of Hiss) to the ventricles where the pulse excites Purkinje Fibers and you get a ventricular heart beat. The pump - its the dub in the heart sounds described as Lub-Dub and this is where blood gets pumped out your heart into the circulatory system via the Aorta.

With WPW, the normal rhythm from the SA Node is disrupted within the Bundle of Hiss and goes into a loop creating a rapid heart rate. Usually above 140, it can go as high as 220 - at these sustained heart rates exertion will cause shortness of breath and light headedness. That's because the ventricles aren't efficient at these high ventricular rates; if it gets above 280 (rare) you'll pass out and a normal rhythm usually restores itself. Rarely, you can arrest with very high (300 and above) heart rates that persist. You will absolutely know something ain't right, right before you pass out. So, if you ignore it/don't seek immediate care at the onset of symptoms that you aren't likely to ignore even if you are a stoic,a dirt nap can follow.

There are two ways to deal with this condition to stop it from happening. A single event that is on going gets electrically or pharmacologically cardioverted. When these events keep happening like they probably did with JH, you get a Cardiac Ablation. Not a complex procedure and minimally invasive, it involves ablating the bad tissue in the Bundle of Hiss that is causing the looping (WPW). It probably has an 80% success or effectiveness rate (just guessed didn't look this up).

Sometimes there are related cardiac conditions. These can be Premature Atrial Complexes or PACs, Ectopic beats - more than one SA Node - and PVC's - premature ventricular beats that are benign. They are very common and feel like skipped heart beats. They can be treated with drugs called Antiarryhmics or Beta-Blockers. These drugs don't cause side effects involving personality changes. Beta Blockers can cause fatigue but not enough for us to see changes in JH's behavior I would think.

Harbaguh could have A-Fib but treatment is pretty much the same. Depending on your risk factors, Chronic A-Fib warrants anticoagulants like Warfarin (Coumadin), Elaquis or others. Also, no impact on personality and these don't cause fatigue at all. Just don't cut yourself shaving.

[hack]

So my irresponsible at-the-extreme speculation would be wrong that he's on a medication that cools him off?

[Rocky Bleier]

Maybe he just has the same condition that Urban had in Florida. Tends to happen when your season goes to shit.

Tidbit: Harbaugh's highest rated class while at Stanford was #21.

[whodean]

The lack of top recruits in this year's class is concerning, but we're Reading too much into a down year in my opinion. Return to success next year and the recruits will be back.

[Jeff Buchanan]

I think urbz has a condition called Supraventricular Tachycardia (SVT). it is very similar to WPW and WPW is actually classified as in the group of SVTs. It's just not as bothersome because it doesn't occur as frequently as with WPW. Rates in this condtion vary between kinda-fast, like 100 BPM to 140 or under. The etiology is different in SVT - doesn't have the looping thing, is more benign and can usually be stopped by performing the valsalva maneuver (holding your breath and grunting to increase pressure in your chest) or by compressing one of carotid arteries with a finger. I've seen a lot of these. They can be scary to the patient but easily correctable. If it doesn't correct then there is something else going on and it is usually WPW, A-Fib or A-Flutter.

[Rocky Bleier]

The lack of top recruits in this year's class is concerning, but we're Reading too much into a down year in my opinion. Return to success next year and the recruits will be back.

The schedule makes that improbable.