Les Miles talks about his interest in coaching Michigan

Submitted by yoyo on August 7th, 2019 at 8:54 PM

Les Miles talks about misfortune about never being offered the head coaching job at Michigan. He even compliments Moeller. Sorry to rehash this topic but I bet we wouldn't have descended so deep into the darkness with Les.

 

.https://www.detroitnews.com/story/sports/college/university-michigan/2019/08/07/les-miles-bo-schembechler-very-special-but-michigan-snub-broke-my-heart/1946576001/

MaizeBlueA2

August 8th, 2019 at 12:06 AM ^

I get that Jay got his job because of his dad...but he's been pretty damn good at it. From a recruiting standpoint and from a pure coaching standpoint.

People love to hate on him.

Les Miles is done, and he's not a position coach. Jay is hungry, improving, and is a WAY better RB coach than Les Miles could ever be at this point in his career. It's not even close.

Would I love to have Wheatley back or Mike Hart? Sure. But we could do a lot worse than Jay Harbaugh. He's earned the respect at this point, he's never been the weak link.

This year will be a big time test with the guys he has and I'd like to see what he does at the RB position with the 2021 class because there are 3-4 blue chip guys that Michigan has a legit shot at...we need 2 of them. But he's earned the opportunity to have his crack at it over the next 1.5 years.

BlueWolverine02

August 8th, 2019 at 12:29 AM ^

Has Jay really done that great of a job as a RB coach though?  How many times do I need to read a UFR and hear about all the yards the RBs left on the field by not seeing their blocks correctly or not picking up the blitzing LB.  I feel like these are the kinds of things a RB coach should be able to improve on.

1VaBlue1

August 8th, 2019 at 9:47 AM ^

Valid points, but they don't obscure the fact that Jaybaugh has earned his keep from the start.  His TE's were among the best group in the nation, and his RB's have performed well enough to gain national acclaim and decent draft choices.  Higdon, nor Evans, were ever good blockers, and neither of them ever will be.  When did Mason miss a block?  Or Wilson?  They are both pretty devastating as blockers...

Jay is a young coach, and he's performed very well at a premier program.  The only reason people (like you) don't like him is because he's the head coach's son, and you just want to scream 'NEPOTISM!!!'.  That was a concern in 2015 - it is no longer a concern.

CMHCFB

August 9th, 2019 at 7:04 PM ^

I’d rank him fairly high.  I responded to a tweet unrelated to UM football about making tough choices and said “that’s how you end up with Jay Harbaugh as your RB coach”.  It was obv a negative connotation and I did not tag him at all, that would have been rude.   Weeks later on the day that OSU lost two recruits they expected to sign he liked the tweet.   I had to appreciate his awareness and the polite FU message he sent with the timing of it.  

Hold This L

August 7th, 2019 at 9:06 PM ^

I think the trade off is we would have never had 3-9, 5-7 twice. We wouldn’t have a higher ceiling of a program but we had to go through 6 pretty lousy years of football we would have otherwise avoided. 

Watching From Afar

August 7th, 2019 at 9:31 PM ^

They hire Les and the chances of Mallet staying significantly increases (Threet almost certainly never starts a game), recruiting doesn't dip (Miles was great and is still great at that), and yeah that floor never caves in.

Maybe struggle to beat OSU and win the division, but a Les Miles coached and recruited team doesn't lose 9 games outside of the SEC in the late 2000s.

People knock Miles for the end of his tenure at LSU and forget how good he was at LSU because the best coach in the SEC was god damn Nick Saban. Miles was the 2nd best coach in the SEC up until maybe 2 out of his last 3 years. He was easily at top 5 CFB coach during his tenure at LSU even including the drop off at the end.

MJ14

August 7th, 2019 at 10:29 PM ^

Lloyd Carr - 6-7 in bowls, 1 national championship, .753 winning percentage, 5 Big Ten titles.

Les Miles - 7-4 in bowls, 1 national championship, .770 winning percentage, 3 SEC titles

Les Miles coached yearly against Urban Meyer and Nick Saban from 2007 through 2010. Before that he had Meyer for a couple of years and after Meyer left he was competing with a juggernaut. Miles coached against 2 of the top 10 coaches of all time as well as a plethora of other extremely good coaches in a very tough conference. I think the SEC is overrated as it is now but there for about 4-5 years they were loaded at the top and Miles consistently was right there at the top with them. Lloyd Carr screwed Michigan out of getting a better coach than him. 

1VaBlue1

August 8th, 2019 at 9:54 AM ^

This is true.  However, I'm not in the camp that says he did it intentionally.  I take him at his word that he thought he had news to relay, and it blew up in his face.  As he said back then - and every day since - he's left the news reporting to others since then.  He only opines, which is sometimes just as disturbing as his 'news' turned out to be...

Michigan4Life

August 13th, 2019 at 11:00 PM ^

That was the biggest shortcoming of Les Miles offense. They had a lot of offensive talent but they were mediocre at best because the QB play has been average at best but mostly bad. This is the biggest reason why LSU fans felt that they underachieved relative to the talent they have in the program.

I guarantee that there will be a ton of Michigan fans complaining about Les Miles inability to produce a good QB if he was coaching Michigan

bfeeavveerr

August 7th, 2019 at 9:04 PM ^

Any program could use a top notch recruiter. Les Miles could recruit. 

 I'm sure he could have brought in enough talent to keep our bowl streak alive. 

 

maize-blue

August 7th, 2019 at 9:04 PM ^

Miles would have done just fine at UM. But personal squabbles and administrative politics kept it from happening.