Team 137 by Jim Harbaugh. Football talk and Predictions.

[WM Wolverine]

smh. You brag about history but then you ignore a decent amount of it. You can't subjectively determine which history is important and what isn't. I'd agree the further back you go and less valuable but you can't completely ignore it.

[Jeff Buchanan]

The thing about "redefining" recruiting not only involves those things you mentioned talent but also it involves the kind of culture a coach creates when going about recruiting.

JH didn't invent much of anything he's doing although his execution of them are decidedly new and innovative plays on similar themes. I actually think James Franklin should be credited with camping out of state.

The difference is that Franklin was pretty low key when he did it and nobody made much about it. Harbaugh blew it up like Apple markets it's upcoming iPhones. I think the Forbes article clearly looks at the kinds of things Harbaugh is doing as representative of a previously known yet presently undervalued "brand" getting reborn. Repackaged and re-marketed is a good analogy in corporate parlance.

Young people love this kind of thing while us gray-hairs don't want anything to change. It's too hard to learn new UIs for the telephones and computers we keep for a decade or more and get pissed off when an update rolls around that we have to download to keep that device functional. 18 year old recruits aren't like that ....... they want the newest of the new.

Harbaugh is playing to that and that is part if not all of the thing he is doing that is different from the institutionalized aspects of CFB.

[iam416]

smh. You brag about history but then you ignore a decent amount of it. You can't subjectively determine which history is important and what isn't. I'd agree the further back you go and less valuable but you can't completely ignore it.

I'm not sure why you're "syh". I thought I addressed history in its totality in the post above. You mentioned the B10 thing, which I didn't know, so I decided to look at it from 1913. Whatever.

I could go back to 1897 and still say OSU > M and ignore even less. We all know the history. M best days were Yost. OSU's best days are, honestly, Urbs.

Sorry to offend. Didn't mean to. I'd never read ol' Point-A-Minute out of the history books.

[iam416]

JB:

I don't consider "more aggressively marketing" your brand to be "redefining" anything. I don't want to get hung up on the word -- but to me "redefining" isn't some sort of trivial thing, it's a paradigm shift; it's an entirely new way of thinking.

I get that JH is a Hype Machine on speed, but that's not particularly new. You know, I think one way that Oregon appeals to kids is with their uniforms -- they're far more sane now, but back in the day, they were ridiculous. I don't consider that "redefining" either, even though it's a very trendy thing. At the end of the day I still think recruiting is very straight-forward. You have to put in the time to build the relationships. There are no shortcuts. I just don't buy into the "fluff." I really don't.

Your opinion may differ (as does WB's). I respect that. I think I've sufficiently given my opinion and the reasons therefore, so I don't think I'll comment further -- I'll let you guys get back to the "echo chamber" (until Hanni comes along!)

[Pasadena Blue]

comparing JH and Urbz is stupid. Urbz entered at a time when M had Hoke and Dantonio was looking for respect (and MD was getting out-recruited by Hoke!) --- it was the perfect time to insert into the B1G. On top of that he is at the only big time school in a state with much more football talent. Add to that having just come off of successful tenure at a talent rich state like Florida where he had built up relationships, etc (whereas JH left the college ranks for a few years before returning to M) ... of course Urbz is going to have a better opening run than Harbaugh.

In fact, given that several of the advantages that I have cited are never going to change in M's favor, I suspect O-state will continue to out-recruit M just about every year (at least in terms of average # of stars). What this will mean is that in order for M to win, JH will have to out-develop and out-coach Urbz. I realize you are perfectly happy with Urbz as you should be, and you are doubtful that JH can do that --- and your are further emboldened by this year's beatdown, and that is fine.

I like our coach as well, and we'll see how it shakes out --- if JH is a better coach than Urbz, which is what many of us believe, he will need to overcome the talent disadvantage and show the results on the field. I still like our chances.

[iam416]

PB:

I think you miss the mark with your "talent rich state" rationalization. It's true -- Ohio is talent rich. However, I think it's largely irrelevant as it doesn't really explain UFM's recruiting success, at least as measured by recruiting rankings (using 247 Composite). In 2013, his monster class, he landed 10 top 100 kids. SEVEN were from out of state. 9 of their 12 highest rated kids were from out of state. In 2014, he landed 10 top 100 kids AGAIN. And again, 7 of those 10 were from out of state. In 2015 he only landed 6 (3 OoS) -- he also had #105 and #107 (OoS). This year's class featured 7 top 100 kids, and 5 were from OoS. The class of 2017 will, once again, include numerous OoS top 100 kids.

So, in the past 4 seasons, UFM has landed 33 top 100 kids and only 11 of them have come from Ohio. These are the recruits that jack up your ranking. I think any suggestion that UFM is simply relying on Ohio to out-recruit teams is fallacious. He recruits nationally. And he's just a really, really good recruiter. There are no credible ways to marginalize his results. If UFM continues to out-recruit JH, it's not because he's in Ohio, it's because he's a better recruiter.

In any event, M will surely be more talented than OSU this season. If, as many of you believe, JH is a better coach than UFM, then the outcome is assured. Still, I have modest hope based on UFM's objective record as a HC, which I don't think can be marginalized, rationalized or excused away.

What honestly puzzles me are proclamations of M hegemony. I find them remarkably odd and detached from the objective reality with which I'm familiar. I get predictions of parity. That seems a quite possible outcome. Two very good coaches and two elite programs going at it. I'd expect a split over the long-term. While there's a fair amount of the latter amongst what I'd consider reasonable M fans, there's also a ton of the former amongst the same cohort. I don't really get it in any rational sense.

EDITED to remove as much snark as possible!

[Jeff Buchanan]

Prett much agree with your assessment wrt recruiting.

Also agree with your view that "parity" is way more likely than "hegemony."

I'm not sure where you get that hegemony is a predominant view among posters here as it pertains to M's potential to dominate osu and the BT. There is certainly some boasting but it's only in response to the snark about JH that comes from our rivals who are frequent posters in an M forum. Most reasonable people believe that osu, under Meyer's is in a great position to compete nationally and that M is certainly not going to dominate osu under Harbaugh.

It is going to be a good run though for M. That's what I believe.

[iam416]

It's not "12 out of 14" hegemony, but more like 7 out of 10. I think you've mentioned something along those lines on several occasions in the past. I don't typically lend much credence to it as a sincere thought, but I have seen it repeated. And not just by you.

Don't get me wrong -- this is an M forum. Duh. It's not surprising; it's expected. So, no foul at all. I just don't necessarily get it from a rational perspective.

I think fans from both sides see OSU-M erroneously as a zero sum gain. In one way they're correct -- only 1 of them can win the East and thus put themselves on the road to the CFP. But in a broader sense, it's not. UFM can recruit out of this world AND JH can do the same. They can both produce CFP-caliber teams.

However, I often see a sort of bizarre implication that "if JH and M is great, then OSU won't be as good." And I see it from both fanbases. There are, e.g., plenty of OSU fans that caterwaul about JH and worry about how he will knock OSU backward. As if it's a zero sum gain.

At the end of the day the quality of the program and the team is down to each coach. What the other guy is doing just doesn't matter. If the OSU-M series becomes result-competitive again -- for, what -- the first time in nearly 30 seasons (that's staggering) -- it's not because OSU got worse under UFM. They're not getting any worse for the foreseeable future (well, except the upcoming season...heh).

[froot loops]

People claim Hoke was out recruiting Dantonio, it never showed on the field.

[lineygoblue]

Duh. That's why he was fired.

[edindetroit]

Duh. That's why he was fired.

/\ this

[froot loops]

If you have talent it should show even if you have a buffoon coaching. The Hoke teams never really did. Very bad.

[iam416]

Hoke inherited RichGOD's shitty recruiting.

Hoke recruited really well in 2012 and 2013. It's not particularly unreasonable to argue that talent began to show last season and that those classes are the backbone of this year's team. In fact, it's rather obvious.

Hoke is just a bad coach. From player development to gameday, he sucked and, perhaps most critically, he entrusted two plenty-talented QBs to a fucking nincompoop with zero inclination or ability to use those talents.

[WM Wolverine]

Hoke recruited little in the 12 and 13 classes that helped early. Some exceptions but both lines held back the rest of their teammates till they developed in 15 as third, fourth year players.

[WM Wolverine]

Yeah, the RR recruits did very little after year one for Hoke.