Mike Elston new DL coach
BREAKING: #NotreDame defensive line coach Mike Elston is expected to leave South Bend for the same position at #Michigan.
— Tom Loy (@TomLoy247) January 13, 2022
Story: https://t.co/8wNGFam7cJ#IrishIllustrated @247Sports pic.twitter.com/xMDtaDNZRk
January 13th, 2022 at 3:33 PM ^
I've seen this posted before; what does that even mean?
January 13th, 2022 at 3:55 PM ^
An NFL reporter personage/Twitter personality named Amber Theoharis (who almost nobody here had heard of despite her 275k Twitter followers) Tweeted that Jim Harbaugh to the NFL was basically a done deal last week. Her "sources" were telling her "an announcement would be made soon" and she responded downstream in whatever they call a Twitter convo with "he's going to NFL." She was shooting down "is it the Bears?" and not responding to "Raiders?" so she sort of started this firestorm that Harbaugh to the Raiders was imminent. Then she promptly deleted the "he's going to NFL" response but kept the original "announcement" Tweet up, basking in the Twitter interactions.
In her original nothing of an "announcement" Tweet, she thought she was being cute by writing "chirp chirp chirp" (Twitter birdies and all), and she misspelled "chirp" twice so it came out as "chiro chiro chirp" blaming it on autocorrect (whatever, she later spelled LOL as "LOIL.")
So, basically we have a fake insider with no real access and a spelling problem that made a lot of people anxious that Harbaugh was leaving. And I, for one, will not let that fact die. The chiro chiro chirp is, to me, the siren song of a public personality being wrong or disingenuous about breaking news now.
January 13th, 2022 at 4:04 PM ^
Means you don't spend enough time on the blog. Recommended minimum is 2 hours per day.
https://twitter.com/ambertheoharis/status/1479512538479939585
January 13th, 2022 at 4:30 PM ^
If Harbaugh stays, I guess I'll say "If" at this point, I'd love to see M fans blow her twitter up with those three words alone.
January 13th, 2022 at 2:44 PM ^
This sounds pretty good! Scummy people like Brian Kelly wouldn't keep him around at several stops if he wasn't good at what he did. And his DL's (and recruiting) at ND always seemed pretty good.
So what's it do to the Ryan Osborne speculation? Anyone have a clue how he sorts out in this?
January 13th, 2022 at 2:50 PM ^
There were rumors that he had DL coach offers elsewhere and was waiting to see how the DL spot shook out here. If those were true and he actually had offers I assume he's gone. There was a board post on here a month ago he was leaving for UConn, so I imagine there's some fire to that smoke.
January 13th, 2022 at 2:54 PM ^
Sounds like a good first step into on-field coaching!
January 13th, 2022 at 3:29 PM ^
The UConn position was filled, so that one is off the table now. But I wouldn’t be surprised if he had many more offers out there. If I were coaching a MAC level school, he’d be on my radar.
January 13th, 2022 at 4:17 PM ^
If he was as close to getting the UM position shouldn't he be able to do better than MAC?
January 13th, 2022 at 4:58 PM ^
He was close to getting the UM position because it was an internal hire, and that obviously didn’t stop Michigan from pursuing alternatives. If he were an analyst at Texas or something, he wouldn’t have been considered for the Michigan job.
Now while he could potentially do better than MAC, that requires better schools to be aware of who he is and be impressed with his work as an analyst over the resume of guys who already have DL coach experience.
He’s a promising guy and maybe a better job comes. But if I’m a MAC level school, analysts at a major program that are looking to get their coaching careers going are where you’d like to make your moves. As “better jobs” tend to prefer guys with coaching experience and you’re not competing with those guys for coaches.
January 13th, 2022 at 2:44 PM ^
That's actually an outstanding hire from what I understand. I believe he was the front runner for a lot of analysts/informed fans I believe the year Nua was hired.
Also, anecdotally a pretty good indication Harbaugh will be back.
Welcome aboard coach! Go Blue!
January 13th, 2022 at 2:45 PM ^
Oh this is awesome. ND and others are gutted on reddit that we landed him.
January 13th, 2022 at 3:19 PM ^
Yup, they're very upset at losing him. Great sign! Seems he had a similar situation as Ed Warinner at Ohio State. Great position coach who wanted to become a coordinator, but when that didn't work out, left to be a position coach elsewhere.
January 13th, 2022 at 4:14 PM ^
I hope it's not the same as Ed Warinner.
January 15th, 2022 at 2:18 PM ^
I hope you're right about him being to the D Line what Ed Warinner was to the O LIne. Because that sounds beautiful.
January 13th, 2022 at 6:58 PM ^
They were upset, but also like, "Fair enough."
What was weird to me is that they didn't view him as a totally awesome recruiter but as a great developer of talent. Let's hope they're wrong.
January 13th, 2022 at 2:45 PM ^
Beat me by one minute. Good job quick draw.
January 13th, 2022 at 2:45 PM ^
I’ll believe it when The Guardian writes a story on it
January 13th, 2022 at 2:51 PM ^
Guardians of the Galaxy or Cleveland Guardians?
Or, perhaps there is a feature in Barstool Sports with an Eminem look-alike in it.
January 13th, 2022 at 2:57 PM ^
I am Groot!
January 13th, 2022 at 3:17 PM ^
This is all you ever say.
January 13th, 2022 at 2:48 PM ^
Wow -- that is impressive.
January 13th, 2022 at 2:48 PM ^
#BringRoccoHome
January 13th, 2022 at 2:53 PM ^
Yeah...that's a huge hire.
Also...if I'm not leaving ND if Harbaugh isn't at UM.
January 13th, 2022 at 2:53 PM ^
So we pulled a reverse Greg Mattison on ND. ND hired Mattison away from Lloyd in the mid-90's, I think that was Brady Hoke's chance to move up to DL coach. Like others have noted, he's probably a great coach at his position, but how do you work with a guy as unpopular in his profession as Brian Kelly for so many years?
January 13th, 2022 at 2:57 PM ^
To be fair, he followed Kelly from Central to Cincy to ND, and ND is a place where you bite your tongue to stick around. Michigan is as well, unless you're Mattison, I suppose.
January 13th, 2022 at 2:58 PM ^
You let his shit go in one ear and out the other, and continue doing your job well. If you let someone else's shit get to you, shame on you. Even assholes can make you feel bad only if you let them.
This is something easier said than done, for most people - myself included. I'm pretty good at it, but think that Kelly would have perturbed me quite a bit!
January 13th, 2022 at 3:18 PM ^
That's simplifying it a lot. When someone else's shit impacts your ability to do what you do well, ignoring is avoidance.
When you're on a high-performing team, everyone's actions impact the ultimate goals. Few teams bond and handle adversity well when they're letting issues fester.
January 13th, 2022 at 4:17 PM ^
Would you honestly let your direct supervisor's responsibility for killing a student be something you let go in one ear and out the other?
January 13th, 2022 at 6:27 PM ^
This post is...........AWESOME!!
January 13th, 2022 at 3:25 PM ^
To answer your last question: money.
January 13th, 2022 at 2:56 PM ^
A really nice pickup. Nua is a good coach but this is definitely an upgrade as a recruiter and a good coach to boot.
January 13th, 2022 at 2:56 PM ^
Or so the Germans would have us believe.
January 13th, 2022 at 3:09 PM ^
Before or after they bombed Pearl Harbor?
January 13th, 2022 at 2:59 PM ^
Very nice pickup and certainly seems like it is further evidence that Harbaugh is staying.
January 13th, 2022 at 3:07 PM ^
Welcome back, Coach Elston!
January 13th, 2022 at 3:09 PM ^
Wow. Hitting refresh finally paid off. Huge get for the good guys.
January 13th, 2022 at 3:14 PM ^
If I were to pick any position coach to have an elite recruiter, it would probably be D-Line. A great DL can mask a lot of other weaknesses on defense.
January 13th, 2022 at 3:24 PM ^
The game of football is won and lost up front. On both sides of the ball. A great offensive line makes everyone else better. Receivers have more time to get open. QBs have more time to survey the field for said receivers. RBs have bigger lanes to run through.
Same goes for defensive line. If you have a great or elite DL, your secondary knows it has to hang on against opposing receivers maybe a half second or even a full second less than it otherwise would, and that half second could be the difference between a 20 yard gain and a 7 yard sack.
I know when a lot of NFL teams hit the reset button and are building an entire team back up, they start with the QB. If I'm a GM rebuilding my team, I'm investing as many resources as I can in the big nasties up front first. Well before I think about a QB.
January 13th, 2022 at 3:15 PM ^
Great news. Welcome back Coach Elston !
January 13th, 2022 at 3:18 PM ^
Hope he visits Keon Keeley and talks up the good guys!
January 13th, 2022 at 3:18 PM ^
Soooo....is Keon Keeley coming with him?????
January 13th, 2022 at 3:20 PM ^
This has to be a great sign that Harbaugh is coming back. I get that Michigan is where he played in his college days and it may be a homecoming for him, but still, I imagine most coaches worth their salt would never commit to coaching at a school without feeling pretty damn confident of who they'd be working for going into the season.
I know I wouldn't want to, because what if they hire another guy who wants to come in and establish a defense that I don't coach or scheme for.
January 13th, 2022 at 3:23 PM ^
A step up in class for Elston and an improvement over Nua for UM.
January 13th, 2022 at 3:24 PM ^
Guess Ryan Osborn isn't sticking around. Seems like a really good hire.
January 13th, 2022 at 3:25 PM ^
Very excited to have Mike back in Ann Arbor, I know some of his family and am very happy for them! Anyone know if Coach Osborn will stick around as an analyst or will he move on? I know he was pretty instrumental in some of our recruits so would be huge to keep him on staff along with Elston coming on board.
January 13th, 2022 at 3:27 PM ^
Mike Elston is one of the few defensive line coaches who appears to have a national reputation. From a recruiting and player development standpoint, he seems to be among the best of the best.
January 13th, 2022 at 3:30 PM ^
If he’s a major recruiting force for ND, this is a good pick up. For all the NIL talk, they consistently put together highly ranked classes while operating under basically the same constraints as Michigan (ND’s fanbase and admin is probably even more traditionalist than Michigan’s).
January 13th, 2022 at 3:48 PM ^
Great to hear. Curious about how his coaching experiences meshes with MacDonald's scheme. I've not paid particularly close attention to ND's defensive schemes but I feel safe in saying they aren't as "multiple" as Mac likes to be. Would be interested to hear if that is something that matters at the position coach level or not.
January 13th, 2022 at 4:19 PM ^
Not typically as impactful for the position coaches. “Multiple” tends to mean personnel/alignment more so than it does anything else. Once you break it down to position groups, the duties remain more or less the same. DL have to get pressure, eat blocks and stop the run. LBs have to cover and make tackles in space. DBs have to cover receivers. When you’re “multiple” you’re just adding different coverages and different alignments to the equation.
For a DL coach especially, not a whole lot changes. You’re teaching the same technique, you’re just molding it to fit the scheme.