Gwen Bush/ Recruiting staff house cleaning info?
I normally hate these kind of open question posts, so I apologize in advance, and am prepared to get some negs. But I'm very curious and I think its relevant to the state of the Football program.
In the Roundtable last Thursday Sam stated that the recruiting staff underwent a 'House cleaning'; with Gwen Bush gone, and Chris Partridge promoted. While I'm totally on board with giving Partridge as much influence as possible in recruiting, I'm not sure that the staff that helped us get two top 10 classes needed to be purged.
And what happened with Momma Gwen? I looked at her Linked in page and she is still listed as a UM staffer. I did some google fu over the weekened and didn't see anything on staff upsets or Gwen Bush leaving. I think she was a big factor in some recruitiments.
The lack of clarity and the talk of 'toxic atmospheres' (Bleacher Report) combined with Sam's 'House cleaning' is starting to get very worrisome to me.
Does anyone have any more info?
February 12th, 2018 at 10:00 AM ^
The running game wasn't our issue this year and we got pretty good at the stuff Drevno coaches up. If I'm not mistaken (I'm not) the right tackle spot was our weakest OL position. Frey coached tackles last year. Frey is gone.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:07 AM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 10:22 AM ^
is that the apology was made for two O line coaches mixing the shit out of things, and that the last one standing was ssaying ' From now on it's straightforward'.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:29 AM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 10:29 AM ^
on staff at that point felt he owed some type of mea culpa for getting qb's demolished last year.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:50 AM ^
That was a bullshit report. If anything of the sort was said I'm sure it was twisted from the actual message.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:54 AM ^
This is a geniune question. It seems like the running game took off against subpar competition and came crashing back to earth in the big games. It might be an inaccurate impression, but it seems like we should've been able to salt away the OSU and S. Carolina games if our running game was strong.
February 12th, 2018 at 11:21 AM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 11:36 AM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 2:45 PM ^
Yeah, it's amazing how many people think you should have big games against the best defenses. Uh, they wouldn't be the best defenses if people had big games against them.
How many teams had big games against the UM defense?
February 12th, 2018 at 3:56 PM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 11:37 AM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 2:39 PM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 4:00 PM ^
if we can make it the centerpiece next year, might open up other things, old skool like. Part of me thinks this year looks a whole lot different with continuity in the blocking scheme right from the get go.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:04 PM ^
February 13th, 2018 at 7:45 PM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 10:44 AM ^
Some say that Warde Manuel wouldn't let JH fire Drevno and/or Hamilton because the contract buyouts were too large.
I'm not sure I believe that particular rumor as JH was supposedly given full autonomy in regards to the football program.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:52 AM ^
Good that you don't believe the rumor. You shouldn't have posted it either. No chance that is true.
February 12th, 2018 at 11:03 AM ^
wants a little work, or I agree with the guy above me--comes across as no more than rumor-mongering. And given the pressure to win, I too would be very skeptical.
Given that we're not in the day-to-day mix, we're all about the results. But Harbaugh may have his reasons for sticking with a coach even when the results, over the short-term, are not ideal. Generally speaking, he's always going to be in possession of a hell of a lot more of the variables than we are.
February 12th, 2018 at 1:58 PM ^
"....but Drevno gets to stay"
Its never that simple when it comes to building a staff at any organization. Not everyone is going to be great at their jobs, not everyone is easily replaced BUT it sure seems that Harbaugh is shifting some responsiblity away from Drevno so maybe that's the deal..for now.
Harbaugh has made it clear that he wasn't happy with the O's performance and I think you'd have to be out of your mind to think he'd risk this program and his reputation to keep Drevno or anyone else on the staff.
Harbaugh has been building high performing staff's for a long time and he been around coaching all his life...why anyone doubts his commitment to winning is beyond me.
February 12th, 2018 at 9:57 AM ^
Take Papa Drevno instead
February 12th, 2018 at 11:04 AM ^
her own son's tenure at UM is finite; she may have her own ideas about what to do with her life.
February 12th, 2018 at 11:14 AM ^
She'll do fine.
February 12th, 2018 at 12:34 PM ^
I miss Mama Gwen. Also haven't heard Professor Needs a Raise mentioned in a while :(
February 12th, 2018 at 10:04 AM ^
The insider info that is out there is basically:
- Harbaugh was tired of hiring recruiting support guys who were looking to leave ASAP for assistant coaching jobs. We had a lot of guys over the past couple years who were great at recruiting but wanted to move up in the coaching ranks and jumped at the first opportunity (Tony Tuioti for example). So Harbaugh wanted a more stable recruiting framework.
- Harbaugh hired Sean Magee and Matt Dudek and gave them free reign to build their staff, and they wanted to create a "NFL-like" recruiting/scouting department. As a part of these changes, Magee and Dudek decided to move on from Bush during last summer.
It seems like that was a clear and obvious mistake, IMO.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:07 AM ^
I think she was one of those thigns that was just good about CFB. If I had a son being recruited at that level I liked how she handled things and I'd feel better that she was there.
I'm not saying its a bad thing, but I get worried sometimes when I hear about NFL principles being applied to CFB applications. They are two different worlds. I hope this works out.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:12 AM ^
1. hiring recruiting guys who were looking for more?
2. creating an NFL-like recruiting/scouting dept and, therefore, moving on from Gwen Bush?
February 12th, 2018 at 10:26 AM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 10:17 AM ^
I would imagine relationships are much more important than process or structure with college football recruiting. There are plenty of existing avenues to identify talent, closing the deal is the hard part. It's great to have both of course.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:15 AM ^
It sounds great, in theory, to run that department like an NFL scouting department. The only issue is that it doesn't seem like they took into account the fact that there is no draft for the rights to a player. You need to not only find and evaluate talent, but you need to be able to convince said talent to join your team. Hopefully the recruiting strategy is sorted out going forward.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:18 AM ^
Someone tell Harbaugh there is no high school draft!
February 12th, 2018 at 10:24 AM ^
My wild ass theory is that they got wrapped up in evaluations and analyses of players that it was lost who was supposed to be point men for the recruits.
Mulitple players said UM simply went MIA in their recruitments.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:53 AM ^
She was around to bring in the previous 2 classes. So how was that a mistake?
February 12th, 2018 at 11:08 AM ^
We wouldn't be talking about them if we would've beaten MSU and OSU. Guys aren't going to OSU, UGA or Alabama over us because of Mama Gwen. They're going to those schools because the Papa's of our offense drove last season into the ground.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:16 AM ^
Some speculation said the people who left were really good relationship people while the new people were more analytical.
(Edit: ReegsShannon's post above alludes to this as well)
Who knows why there were multiple accounts by recruits of UM stopping communication.
Partidge was given the Recruiting Coordinator tag probably to oversee some of these recruiting procedures and to ensure that they don't fall off a cliff again.
A lot of things internally went screwy this season.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:46 AM ^
No question that a lot of things did go screwy this season. Until further notice, I blame the Pope.
February 12th, 2018 at 11:07 AM ^
I'm Catholic. I'm blaming Martin Luther.
February 12th, 2018 at 11:21 AM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 11:50 AM ^
Why? Because he didn't blindly follow the Pope? Are you also going to blame the King of England for creating the Church of England because he wanted a divorce?
Whatever... LOL! Church history on MGoBlog!!
February 12th, 2018 at 12:19 PM ^
to create a James Burke's 'Connections' type thread from Martin Luther to our poor tackle drafting ability in the past few recruiting cycles....
February 12th, 2018 at 12:51 PM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 2:52 PM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 10:16 AM ^
He really needs to hit a home run this year on the field. I don’t feel like he’s the wrong guy so much as he’s lost “his” way.
And what ever happened to mining for gold? Use that philosophy when doing your coaching searches. Go to the lower ranks and find the great young minds. Kind of like Oklahoma State? did with their OC. Us going after big name guys that up and leave every year is not good for the team. Drevno is obviously not getting it done. Get rid of him. Plug in a young gun that will innovate and stay.
February 12th, 2018 at 10:34 AM ^
Sherrone Moore and Al Washington? Don Brown was a lower ranks great mind (though not young). Partridge qualify?
February 12th, 2018 at 10:42 AM ^
Michigan should just quit playing football
February 12th, 2018 at 10:54 AM ^
February 12th, 2018 at 11:09 AM ^
WTF are you talking about? I think you mean Mattison, but GMatt coached here before under Moeller. So he really is a Mo guy.
February 12th, 2018 at 11:10 AM ^
Was certainly not a Hoke guy. Harbaugh hired him after DJ Durkin took the Maryland job. Greg Mattison was DC under Hoke.
February 12th, 2018 at 11:12 AM ^