Jim calls "exit strategy" story, TOTAL CRAP in letter to recruits.
October 23rd, 2019 at 10:12 AM ^
Good for him!!! We all knew it was bogus anyway.
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:04 AM ^
The world of fake news. Shameful.
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:46 AM ^
That was a great letter. Short, crystal clear and informal. No weasel words or double talk. I may have some issues with his football coaching but I would have no problem whatsoever if someone I love wanted to play for him. It's clear he cares about his players and their future.
October 23rd, 2019 at 10:12 AM ^
It's even sadder when 50% of the people on this site take the bait like ignoramuses after he clearly isn't leaving this job like that.
October 23rd, 2019 at 10:15 AM ^
I can't recall the last time i remember a fanbase being so 50/50 on a coach.
October 23rd, 2019 at 10:19 AM ^
50/50 ... not even close. 80/20 more likely.
Rich Rod and Hoke would like a word with you regarding a split fan base.
October 23rd, 2019 at 10:24 AM ^
I would completely disagree on 80/20. I think its split dead down the middle. Maybe 80/20 on mgo for some reason.
October 23rd, 2019 at 10:28 AM ^
The reason the MGoBlog audience would be 80/20 against losing/firing Jim Harbaugh is because they’re engaged Michigan football fans who have sense enough to realize Harbaugh’s done a creditable job turning around a program that was in utter disarray.
October 23rd, 2019 at 10:50 AM ^
Exactly. There's a lot more to it than just "durr he hasn't won a Big Ten championship durr" and when it comes to coaching hires/firing, you decide on a coach based on what you believe he can do going forward, not what he's done so far. So you consider everything that has happened that is out of his control, everything he can control, and what changes he can make to improve things, and make your decision based on that.
Also, he fits in with the culture here. He has the right blood type, so to speak. Whether we like it or not, there aren't many coaches out there who would be accepted by the fanbase right off the bat. Many would be rejected the way Rich Ros was for stupid reasons like "the spread doesn't work in the Big Ten".
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:19 AM ^
Speed in Space does not work in the Big Ten.
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:57 AM ^
Nobody gets me.
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:58 AM ^
Lol I got it.
October 23rd, 2019 at 4:18 PM ^
It seemed obvious.
October 24th, 2019 at 3:31 PM ^
“The *Dickens* out of people...!”
October 23rd, 2019 at 1:56 PM ^
31-0
Just Saying.
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:47 AM ^
I posted this in a thread yesterday but I think the point needs to be made again:
Here's a list of embarrassing losses Michigan had prior to Harbaugh, meanwhile JH has lost to good competitive teams on the road, only losing to MSU and OSU at home.
2007: App State
2008: Illinois, Toledo, Purdue, Northwestern
2009: Illinois, Purdue
2013: near losses to mighty Akron and UConn
2014: Minnesota, Rutgers, Maryland
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:24 PM ^
Are you insane? None of this happened?!!
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:51 PM ^
Oh man this list only scratches the surface. You only included losses to bad/mediocre teams. What about blowouts to good teams? Because we're hammering Harbaugh for @OSU and @Wisconsin, but the problem is Michigan didn't do any better before. In fact, it was way worse.
2008: @OSU, 42-7
2009: 35-10 loss to PSU at home, @ Wisconsin 45-24
2010: Wisconsin at home, 48-28, I don't think they threw a pass in the 2nd half (or was it the 2009 game? Who even knows lol); @OSU, 37-7; blowout loss to Miss. St. 52-14.
2011 and 2012 were the only years that didn't have it (except Bama in 2012, but it's Bama in game 1 so whatever)
2013: @MSU, 29-6, physically dominated
2014:@MSU, 35-11, again physically dominated (sad TD at the end to bring the total to 11); 31-0 shutout @ND; 26-10 home loss to Utah, followed up by the Minnesota debacle previously mentioned
Basically we were losing just as badly on the road most of the time, but *also* losing in blowouts at home to good teams. Outside of the first game against OSU, Michigan has not been blown out at home under Harbaugh.
October 23rd, 2019 at 1:02 PM ^
You sure have a way to ruin someone's lunch. /s
But please do not bring them up again.
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:30 PM ^
It's DERP... wow, you need to know your interwebs memes.
Derp... Wisconsin (Pwnd by ILL)
Derp... Ped State
The problem is we can't even take care of the low hanging fruit here...
Is Harbaugh going to the NFL? Nope... that wouldn't have him back! LMAO
October 23rd, 2019 at 1:55 PM ^
User name checks out.
October 23rd, 2019 at 2:06 PM ^
You know, the interwebs is a big place. Just a thought, but you could start your own blog calling for Harbaugh to get fired. I'm sure you'd get plenty of traffic.
October 23rd, 2019 at 2:22 PM ^
It sucks when the MGOpoints are frozen..... and your downvote means nothing.
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:35 PM ^
Also they realize it would set the program back and we would be very lucky to find a replacement as good or better than Jim.
October 23rd, 2019 at 10:39 AM ^
I think the percentage who want Harbaugh gone is much higher on this blog than among Michigan fans generally. If you lined up 10 random Michigan fans and asked them if they wanted to fire Harbaugh, no way more than 2 tops say they want him gone. In fact, I bet 3 or 4 of them would ask if you were being serious in the first place.
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:43 AM ^
Yeah, except those 2 post here constantly, parroting Valentian talking points
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:07 PM ^
And you're never going to get a fair shake from the Valentis or the Finebaums of the world because they're coming from a biased point of view, and that bias is anti-Michigan. Right now the narrative is "Harbaugh is overrated, he's never won anything, never beat OSU, hasn't won a conference title". I promise you, if Harbaugh wins the Ohio State game next month, the narrative will change to, "One win against OSU in 5 years? Big deal. Win two years in a row and you'll impress us and Harbaugh still hasn't won the conference championship. Overrated." Harbaugh will win the B1G and the narrative will evolve to, "One conference title, but he hasn't made the Playoff". Harbaugh gets Michigan into the Playoffs, and the narrative will be, "Sure, Michigan made the Playoffs, but where's the National Championship we were promised?" Harbaugh brings Michigan a National Championship and it'll shift to, "One championship? Saban won 5 in 10 years. Harbaugh is not Saban. Overrated."
Haters are gonna hate. You'll never get your due from them regardless of results.
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:33 PM ^
To be moderately charitable to Valenti, I don't think it's an anti-Michigan bias that shades his perception of whether Harbaugh should be fired so much as he's just a reactionary idiot in general. (Or plays one on the radio at least.)
He's pretty good at pointing out flaws but bad at perspective. Everyone who's not elite sucks etc etc. But he gets away with being exceptionally negative about local teams because a good chunk of sports fans in southeast Michigan are the same way.
October 23rd, 2019 at 1:35 PM ^
He's a Spartan who openly roots for Michigan to be in turmoil. With his platform, I mean, why not throw gasoline on the fire every day?
What's really pathetic are the actual Michigan fans who think his trolls are accurate insights, then post those narratives verbatim on other platforms.
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:36 PM ^
Its funny, but that line about "...we were promised..." is something people/reporters constantly say. But the fact is that Harbaugh has never promised a damn thing! Not one single time, from since he was hired, has he ever made a single promise about winning anything.
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:56 PM ^
The closest he came was last Saturday saying "This will be our finest hour" coming out of halftime.
Yes they ended up losing still, but he wasn't wrong.
October 23rd, 2019 at 2:28 PM ^
Maybe that's part of the problem...
HE NEVER SET GOALS!
October 23rd, 2019 at 4:08 PM ^
Yeah that's it.
October 24th, 2019 at 10:15 PM ^
The goal post gets moved... I get it, pattern media behavior. Or maybe just fan behavior in general. Idk.
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:45 AM ^
I actually get the impression it's the opposite, but I guess everyone has different social circles that they live. Most of the more casual or uneducated fans buy into the "He hasn't beaten OSU! Fire him!" talk whereas I feel the majority on MGoBlog and Michigan fans on r/cfb know that while we're disappointed, we still have reason to believe in the path we're on.
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:56 AM ^
If you lined me up and asked me if I wanted to fire Harbaugh I'd ask you if you wanted to fight. ...and regardless of your response I'd beat you up for asking me such a stupid question.
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:28 PM ^
I feel like that 2016 OSU game broke something in Harbaugh’s brain and a wire never got reattached...until this year. I think he’s back, pissed off, and can’t imagine leaving Michigan without a championship or beating OSU.
Michigan’s gonna have to fire him for him to leave without the above reference and that’s not gonna happen.
One of these days he’s going to be the one catching some lightening at the right time and have some luck go his way. He’s sure had some rough stupid shit come his way. I’m going to support him as long as he wants to be here.
Beat any two of the remaining ND, MSU, and OSU then pretty damn good season considering how it started. Beat OSU and great season!
October 23rd, 2019 at 10:43 AM ^
I'm going to avoid making a comment about class vs education and intelligence, so I'll just say that people who frequent this blog generally have higher degrees of education in which they were taught critical thinking skills and the ability to look deeper at a subject than what you see on the surface or what you read on clickbait social media posts.
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:08 AM ^
I think this used to be true. I'm not so sure anymore.
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:30 AM ^
You're entitled to your opinion, but umm, no.
The people who frequent this blog (especially those that frequent this blog over other sites) tend to sway towards Brian's thinking, which has a facade of "critical thinking skills and the ability to look deeper at a subject etc." but a horrible record against looking at anything besides the BPONE. Brian's ability to view a snap shot picture is indeed impressive, and no argument, he has a talent for stringing an impressive phrase now and again, but his views about big-scope topics (state of college football, as an example) are invariably short-sighted and inexcusably biased to what he wants the right answer to be regardless of what is the right answer.
Brian thinks he's smarter than coaches, thinks that there's some bullshit "modern" football that exists and if M would simply embrace it, that a decade of perfection and glory might ensue. Worse, he's so full of his own rectitude that he's gleefully leading people into once again shitting on a consistently winning coach to pursue his pipedreams of playoff nonsense. His version of the horror is one stupidly chosen opponent on one crapawful afternoon. My version was the 3 consecutive worst defenses in school history that people like Brian are too myopic to see how they helped bring about.
This site does a good service to the M community, and there are insights here that few fan bases can get - don't misunderstand, I log in every day for a reason. But don't lie to yourself that the people here are reliably of somehow higher standing insofar as critical thinking skills or depth of vision.
Or TL;DR, Brian's very good at finding the horse that needs beating, then he beats it to death, beats the dead horse to pulp, beats the pulp to mush, and then complains to the mush that it isn't a horse. That's not deep analysis. That's 3 useless beatings for the 1 that was helpful.
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:39 AM ^
Yeah. I actually, regretfully, unsubscribed from the mgoblog podcast. If some podcasts were blowing sunshine it just felt like mgoblog was blowing rain. He did seem consistently happy with RR due to his offense. I think that among many (in general, not just on the blog) there is a cult of the offense. Win a 7-3 game over Iowa and it's a catastrophe. Win 63-60 and its an exciting shoot out.
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:17 PM ^
I had a lot more fun watching Denard Robinson play football than I've had watching any Harbaugh teams.
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:41 PM ^
Problem was, Denard was just one player. Watching his teammates play was considerably less fun.
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:53 PM ^
Every time Denard went back to pass I held my breath. You never knew if he was going scramble and take it to the house or throw up and arm punt into triple coverage. It made for exciting football, but not winning football.
October 23rd, 2019 at 2:42 PM ^
I'm not sure I understand that.
We went 3-9, 5-7, 7-5 under RR. So.... having an exciting offense is better than actually winning 10 games and being competitive against MSU? The string of shut outs in '15 wasn't exciting? The revenge tour last year wasn't exciting? The '16 OSU game wasn't exciting?
Agree to disagree I guess. Denard was awesome, and I loved him. But losing to Toledo sucked ass.
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:40 PM ^
It is amazing to remember how sunny and positive people on this blog were in the RichRod era when we were barely sniffing .500 in Big Ten play, and how negative and despairing the tone often is now while we're winning 10 games a season.
October 23rd, 2019 at 11:42 AM ^
I'm not disagreeing with a lot of what you just said. Although you chose to be a bit of a dick about it, but I guess I do that too from time to time. I would agree that Brian has been off the mark, and I doubt he would disagree with that either. However, I'm basing my comment on interactions I've had outside this blog in other places where you feel like you need a translator to understand some of the drivel that gets posted and the lack of overall understanding of what is happening in the program. And this is not one fan who gets shouted down by the masses. It's the overall group thinking outside of this blog in many places. Then I compare it to what I read here, in the comments more so than the main posts, and it's hard not to notice a huge difference in the, um, intelligence of most of the users compared to other sites.
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:37 PM ^
I also believe that being in the same division as OSU through the Tressle/Meyer years has given a portion of the a false sense of dread and underachievement, or BPONE if you will. As horrible as he seems as a person, Meyer is a master of getting results from his coaches and players. Meyer walking into a stacked team only added to the sense of dread. My opinion is that Michigan is not as bad off as the talking heads say, but in the last 10 or 15 years OSU has just been that much better.
My opinion is that when your rival has 20 years of recruiting and coaching dominance it takes a lot longer to catch up than anyone cared to admit when you get a good coach. I have had my issues with Harbaugh from time to time, but at the end of the day I am glad he's here and hope he stays for a long time.
October 23rd, 2019 at 8:07 PM ^
100% agree with this take. I believe the two turning point in the Michigan OSU rivalry were the hiring of RichRod and the hiring of Meyer. I believe if neither of those had happened, this rivalry would be completely different right now.
October 23rd, 2019 at 12:23 PM ^
I would say Brian seems to present an internal conflict between his rational, engineer self and his rabid fan self. Both are present to various degrees at all times, but we see more of the former when Michigan is doing well, and more of the latter when we aren't. I respect both sides (I'm a fan too of course) but I feel that fan Brian sometimes falls into the trap of confirmation bias and you start having to take his analysis with a grain of salt.