Michigan #25 in Post-Spring Top 25 on ESPN
Mark Schlabach posted a post-spring top 25 on ESPN today. I figured I'd post it to talk some football. Florida State remains at #1. Of the B1G schools, MSU is at #6, Ohio is at #7, Wisky is at #15, Iowa is at #18, the Nebraska kitty cats are at #24 and Michigan at #25.
I guess we deserve to be ranked lower in the conference because of last season but I personally feel 6th in the B1G is pretty low. What are your thoughts? I'm a little surprised to see Iowa 7 spots above us.
http://espn.go.com/college-football/story/_/id/10884991/college-footbal…
If Penn State, Penn freaking meteoric crateor of football, State is better than us, this coaching staff better resign.
and we all know that nothing happened.
Not entirely true - Borges got canned and that game was probably one that tipped the scales in that direction.
Along with the Akron, Connecticut, MSU and Nebraska games.
And 2012 MSU, Iowa, Nebraska, and Ohio State if we really want to dance on his grave
Yes, they beat us, but first of all, that's not exactly the measure of one team being better than another (every season many teams lose to teams that aren't "better than them, otherwise the national champion would always be undefeated).
Secondly - that was on the road, and was about as close as a game can be. Plus - we hit one of those FGs and we narrowly win. Saying PSU is better than us because of that game is a major stretch. They lose more talent than we did and the game is in Ann Arbor this year. Also - new and likely inferior coach at Penn State this year.
A Penn State team stripped of scholarships should never, and I mean never, beat a Michigan team. There are no excuses for losing this game. The road? Bullshit. If the coaches can't get their team prepared for an undermanned team anywhere, then shame on them and they should have all been fired on that result alone.
The one thing the guy can do is recruit. You put enough talent on the field and inspite of coaching they sometimes find a way to win.
Why would you think that Franklin can't coach? He is a very dynamic indiviual who took a painfully piss poor Vandy team with little talent to bowl games three years in a row, and was 9-4 his last two years. Motivation in sports is huge.
Unless Franklin does(did) something really stupid, with his ability to get talent in Penssylvania and the mid-Atlantic states, I see him turning PSU into a team that could be at the top of the B1G when the fallout from the sanctions have run their course.
For us, it is all about that O-line. If they are even average, we can definitely be a top 25 team.
Speaking of Franklin and sanctions, wasn't PSU and/or Franklin going to make a statement last week about the allegations stemming from the hostess organization at Vandy and Franklin contacting a rape victim? Did I miss it?
That story seemed to have no real attention in the press, from what I could tell, so it might have just come and gone without me noticing.
ask yourself, who to replace hoke with?
i think everyone is gonna be in for a great surprise this season, and we will rise again... but i question whether its gonna be with gardner
Tough question, let me think about that one for a while.............
Are you joking? Because who would replace Hoke, I think, is a serious question. And I think it's one that if people were really being objective, would be a really hard one to answer. I think there are serious questions about the ability of Michigan (and Brandon) to identify and bring in a good head coach. Not that they can't, but do we really trust that the AD could?
If you are being serious about Harbaugh: he's never coming. The guy clearly wanted to go to the NFL, and he's kicking ass there. There's no way he ever comes to UM.
We should be lower. We sucked last year.
Until we start playing Michigan Football again. And we will. Go Blue!
... is a meaningless term at this point to me. I'd prefer that we have high caliber individuals play great football for a consistent period of time (10+ years) so that the term can stand for something again. And I'd prefer if our coaches talked about the tangible inputs that lead to success vs. trying to replicate the inputs of a bygone era.
I'm jaded at this point.
Michigan is only on there based on name and to get page clicks. Besides, this ranking has no credibility with Mizzou unranked and Florida at #19.
First off, that 25 ranking is BS..... we should be in the top 20.... seriously.... hope you all noticed that we finally have a DL now.... the defense is the key, not the offense... look at msu... its their D that puts them top 10.. but wow, thats high at 6, considering they lost all those guys on D... steroids are a great thing.
All the focus has been on the offense, but the fact is, the way back to being good again, is the defense. And Hoke seems to have the character, to make it, and dantoni has done some crappy things, so i gotta think eventually that character wins....
No...Michigan should NOT be in the top 20. That is a crazy statement.
Also, you don't know how good the DL is...no one does for that matter. We won't know how good this team really is until we play MSU. If MSU crushes Michigan again, then it will be another crappy second half of the season.
regarding 'roids in E. Lansing, but (until recently) I've had no real reason for the suspicions besides the athleticism of a bunch of 2 and 3 star kids. Now we have Bollough so who knows?
Were you being sarcastic, way over-exagerrating in attempt to get humorous responses, or are you just in a bad mood today? I too feel this pointless ranking overestimates us (at this point at least), but you are blowing this way out of proportion. It's one thing to be critical and skeptical of your team, but it's another to vehemently disgusted by them. I'll withhold my downvote for now and just assume you were just trying to poke fun at some ridiculous posters on here.
It appears as though most people either didn't catch the sarcasm or they just didn't find it humorous.
I'll go with not humorous, Chuck.
Problem is, extreme sarcasm and some people's mode of actual expression are hard to tell apart. Which, of course, is the point.
Rob
1) Our run game was terrible and there are still a ton of question marks.
2) We have yet to play consistent on the road (see #1)
3) I have a feeling our D will need to take over games this year for us to be above average (9-3 or 10-2).
How could we possible argue with "middle of the road" predictions after what happened last year (again...see #1 above). If our Oline can magically gel early this year....the sky is the limit. Otherwise, bring hoke and co back for the finished product in 2015.
What makes you think that?
I think we either finish 10-3 or 11-2. I believe we drop The Game at the shoe and win or lose the bowl game. A loss against Ohio that late in the season will drop us in the polls but an impressive win in a bowl game can get us back into the 10-15 range. Obviously if we lose the bowl game we will be in the 15-unranked range.
I like your optimism and eventually I think they can make the jump to a 9-10 win team but I'm not sure next year is when that happens (maybe 2015). Typically, you're going to have to have a jr/sr laden team to get that kind of ranking (4 of 5 o-lineman are fr/soph). For a totally unproven offensive line that gave up a ton of sacks and had very little rushing yards it's hard to assume UM can win big games on the road, and they have a bunch of them (ND, MSU, and OSU). I'm not saying they can't win those games, it's certainly possible, but it's also very optimistic to say you expect them to. I personally expect them to lose those games with the unproven o-line until they show some development. The defense should be good, but I doubt they are dominant (which will be what's needed to compensate for a bad o-line IMO). MSU's defense last year was dominant. UM's defense will be good and better than last year. They won't be as good as MSU's was last year. None of our CBs are as good as Dennard was. None of our DEs are as good as Calhoun was. Our LBs and d-tackles are probably pretty even. Their safeties were also better than ours are at this point. We have talent but most of it is unproven.
I am fine with being unranked to start the season and hopefully earning a ranking after the first few games. With so many question marks going into this season, the last thing we need is to give a tomato can school a target to knock off a top 25 team.
He also has Florida at #19. The same Florida that finished 4-8 last year. Although ESPN talking heads are not on the college football playoff selection committee, the worldwide leader is very effective in swaying sport opinions.
Did anyone else read that NYT article about the rise of Louisville thanks to ESPN?
http://www.nytimes.com/2013/08/26/sports/at-louisville-an-athletic-boom…
Interesting Read.
Florida does have a pretty loaded defense despite losing some big time players off of last year's unit (Roberson, Purifoy, Watkins, Powell, Patton, Easley will likely get drafted), but they completely gave up last year after their lose to Mizzou. But their defense should likely be a top 20 unit coming back, incremental improvements on offense and the SEC-bias and I could easily see them in the top-25. Four or five losses in the SEC for a brand name team like Florida is good enough to be ranked.
Four or five losses in the SEC for a brand name team like Florida is good enough to be ranked.... IN THE TOP 10
FIFY
These polls are barely more than page click bait. Add Nebraska to the Florida and Michigan rankings that are based on little more than large fan bases that will share the link and eat this stuff up. I hope we end up top 25 and I'm sure one of these teams will surprise but you're exactly right as to why these teams are in the rankings.
Everyone used to say "Number __ in the polls but #1 in our hearts"? Man, those were the days.
#25 would seem high if a Florida team that won three fewer games than we did last year wasn't ranked another six spots above us.
its the four letter network. As someone above noted, they create this stuff just to generate clicks. Secondly, we still have the pre-summer camp polls, the summer camp polls, and then the ever-important pre-season polls. /s Don't worry...we still have plenty of opportunities to poke holes in the reasons why we are or are not ranked before a single down of football is played.
Iowa Schedule
- Northern Iowa, Ball State, Iowa State, @Pitt
- @Purdue, @Maryland, @Minnesota, @Ill
- Wiscy, Nebraska, Northwestern, Indiana
Avoid: MSU, OSU, PSU, UM
That's why Iowa ranked where they are. They could be 9-3 and be an "average" team. Wiscy, Neb and @Minn are probably their 3 toughest games.
Then again some of our rivals are saying we have a pretty easy schedule because we avoid Nebraska, Wiscy, and Iowa. Being realistic both Iowa and UM avoid the major toughies (the top 3 programs in the opposing division) in their crossovers in 2014.
Everyone in the conference should play ALL the other teams.
Clearly Iowa owns Delaney!!
/RCMB'd
No on a serious note it's a stroke of luck but another team will have the same situation in 2015 as there are only 2 crossovers and someone will get a combo where those crossovers are Maryland and Rutgers. Then in 2016 the 9 game conf schedule begins.
I believe Indiana vs Purdue is the only protected crossover game in the new era, so in theory Purdue will get Indiana, Maryland, and Rutgers as their crossovers every X number of years even after 2016. It will be rare but it will happen.