It's amazing things have turned out the way they have, but that's where we are.
When Harbaugh coached Stanford, I thought they were extremely fundamentally sound. Beyond having Luck, they had an incredible power running game with Toby Gerhardt, and their offensive line was dominant. When Jim Harbaugh walked into the Coliseum in 2009 and beat Pete Carroll 55-21, he was a superstar coach. Interestingly, Andrew Luck was only 12-22 for 144 yards in that game. Stanford ran for 325 yards and 5 TDs against the same USC program that absolutely stymied our running game in the 2007 Rose Bowl. Another interesting factoid from that season - they were still only 8-5 that year, with Luck completing only 56.5% of his throws for 2575 yards, and 13 TDs with 4 INTs. It was the next season when Luck really broke out and they became awesome.
I thought, for the first time since Bo retired, we had hired a coach who was going to make this a program that taught fundamental football at an elite level.
And no, even though Gary Moeller and Lloyd Carr each had some outstanding seasons, we did not play elite fundamental football under either. It's the difference between Steve Fisher and John Beilein. I thought we had found our football equivalent of Beilein.
It's hard to say what went wrong. In JH's first two years, with the exception of the 2015 OSU game, our defense was very physical at the line of scrimmage and we tackled well. As an aside, can you imagine DJ Durkin out interviewing for a head coaching job during Ohio State week under Bo? It would have made his treatment of Bill Frieder seem benign. The shift to Don Brown had some growing pains at times - Colorado came out and boat raced us early, and Frost was right, UCF was more physical and ripped off some disturbing long runs. And in the FSU game, they killed us by isolating Mike McCray against Dalvin Cook in pass coverage (it's too bad Peppers did not play).
But, Don Brown made a huge name for himself with a great gameplan against OSU in 2016, the best we've seen since what, 2007?
The one weird and disturbing thing all along was our inability to run the football in a physical manner - the very thing Harbaugh perfected at Stanford and with the 49ers. I always thought Greg Roman was a guy we needed, and I think it even more right now.
The wheels started to come off in 2017. Speight seemingly regressed. O'Korn was a disaster. The defense did not play well against MSU, and fell apart against Wisconsin. But then we had an excellent game plan against OSU again, where any halfway competent QB would have led us to a win. Heck, if we had the McNamara from last night in that game, we win. (He looked pretty good). But then we blew a huge lead in our bowl game against a weak South Carolina team. Against OSU, when Barrett got hurt and Haskins came into the game and threw all over us, that was a sign.
2018? Start off with a loss to ND that while initially disappointing, turned out to be not horrible as they went undefeated. We rip off 10 wins in a row, with the "revenge tour" against MSU, PSU and Wisconsin, looking really good. We have finally found a QB. Yet, the week before OSU, Indiana gave them the blueprint for attacking our defense. And then Day, Haskins and company destroyed us.
The defensive wheels just fell off from there. Last year? Wisconsin destroyed us with bully ball. PSU isolated Hamler on safeties and crushed us downfield. And OSU and Bama had their way with us (we played both relatively tough for a half).
At this point, I see no path toward redemption under Harbaugh. The team is not physical at all, on either side of the ball. Every team we have faced this year with the possible exception of MN (who is not good) has thrown all over us. Wisconsin ran all over us. The defense is an utter disaster. This is Jim Hermann's gimmick defense circa 1999 or 2000, when teams just lit him up.
Offensively, no one has earned a paycheck this year. The young line is not good, at all. Show me one guy out there doing something positive. There's some speed - Corum, Wilson, Henning - but it's hard to get those guys the ball. The tight ends can't catch a cold. The only glimmer of hope yesterday was McNamara, and the one series he had. I think you have to start him going forward. I liked what Milton did the first couple weeks, but it's clear now he can't see the field and he's just not accurate enough - that overthrow to Corum being a prime example.
It's hard to believe things are really at this point, but they are. It feels like 2009 or 2014, where we can't stop anyone and our offense is inconsistent at best.
We need a young coach with some strong ideas on offense and some passion, some young recruiters, and a really good, fundamentally solid defensive coordinator who does not run a gimmick defense. The schemes run by schools like Iowa, Wisconsin, or Northwestern would work just fine.
Thank God I'm also a Michigan basketball fan, otherwise this would really be a gloom and doom fall.
When Harbaugh coached Stanford, I thought they were extremely fundamentally sound. Beyond having Luck, they had an incredible power running game with Toby Gerhardt, and their offensive line was dominant. When Jim Harbaugh walked into the Coliseum in 2009 and beat Pete Carroll 55-21, he was a superstar coach. Interestingly, Andrew Luck was only 12-22 for 144 yards in that game. Stanford ran for 325 yards and 5 TDs against the same USC program that absolutely stymied our running game in the 2007 Rose Bowl. Another interesting factoid from that season - they were still only 8-5 that year, with Luck completing only 56.5% of his throws for 2575 yards, and 13 TDs with 4 INTs. It was the next season when Luck really broke out and they became awesome.
I thought, for the first time since Bo retired, we had hired a coach who was going to make this a program that taught fundamental football at an elite level.
And no, even though Gary Moeller and Lloyd Carr each had some outstanding seasons, we did not play elite fundamental football under either. It's the difference between Steve Fisher and John Beilein. I thought we had found our football equivalent of Beilein.
It's hard to say what went wrong. In JH's first two years, with the exception of the 2015 OSU game, our defense was very physical at the line of scrimmage and we tackled well. As an aside, can you imagine DJ Durkin out interviewing for a head coaching job during Ohio State week under Bo? It would have made his treatment of Bill Frieder seem benign. The shift to Don Brown had some growing pains at times - Colorado came out and boat raced us early, and Frost was right, UCF was more physical and ripped off some disturbing long runs. And in the FSU game, they killed us by isolating Mike McCray against Dalvin Cook in pass coverage (it's too bad Peppers did not play).
But, Don Brown made a huge name for himself with a great gameplan against OSU in 2016, the best we've seen since what, 2007?
The one weird and disturbing thing all along was our inability to run the football in a physical manner - the very thing Harbaugh perfected at Stanford and with the 49ers. I always thought Greg Roman was a guy we needed, and I think it even more right now.
The wheels started to come off in 2017. Speight seemingly regressed. O'Korn was a disaster. The defense did not play well against MSU, and fell apart against Wisconsin. But then we had an excellent game plan against OSU again, where any halfway competent QB would have led us to a win. Heck, if we had the McNamara from last night in that game, we win. (He looked pretty good). But then we blew a huge lead in our bowl game against a weak South Carolina team. Against OSU, when Barrett got hurt and Haskins came into the game and threw all over us, that was a sign.
2018? Start off with a loss to ND that while initially disappointing, turned out to be not horrible as they went undefeated. We rip off 10 wins in a row, with the "revenge tour" against MSU, PSU and Wisconsin, looking really good. We have finally found a QB. Yet, the week before OSU, Indiana gave them the blueprint for attacking our defense. And then Day, Haskins and company destroyed us.
The defensive wheels just fell off from there. Last year? Wisconsin destroyed us with bully ball. PSU isolated Hamler on safeties and crushed us downfield. And OSU and Bama had their way with us (we played both relatively tough for a half).
At this point, I see no path toward redemption under Harbaugh. The team is not physical at all, on either side of the ball. Every team we have faced this year with the possible exception of MN (who is not good) has thrown all over us. Wisconsin ran all over us. The defense is an utter disaster. This is Jim Hermann's gimmick defense circa 1999 or 2000, when teams just lit him up.
Offensively, no one has earned a paycheck this year. The young line is not good, at all. Show me one guy out there doing something positive. There's some speed - Corum, Wilson, Henning - but it's hard to get those guys the ball. The tight ends can't catch a cold. The only glimmer of hope yesterday was McNamara, and the one series he had. I think you have to start him going forward. I liked what Milton did the first couple weeks, but it's clear now he can't see the field and he's just not accurate enough - that overthrow to Corum being a prime example.
It's hard to believe things are really at this point, but they are. It feels like 2009 or 2014, where we can't stop anyone and our offense is inconsistent at best.
We need a young coach with some strong ideas on offense and some passion, some young recruiters, and a really good, fundamentally solid defensive coordinator who does not run a gimmick defense. The schemes run by schools like Iowa, Wisconsin, or Northwestern would work just fine.
Thank God I'm also a Michigan basketball fan, otherwise this would really be a gloom and doom fall.
