Predictions for Football Season?

6 wins. 

Just to give me something to review next December? I'll predict 9 to 10 wins in front of full houses.

6-6 just seems very likely and reasonable given the talent on this team. I'd add a game or two in the W column if we had strong feelings of 2-3 guys on the defensive side of the ball really stepping up. We don't. I can't believe the talent level is so low on the defensive side. I get it, things happen, attrition, bad luck, etc. but it's charge hard to imagine we aren't at least saying "man this will be a tough year on 'D' but at least we have a lockdown corner, monster on the interior line, and a stud LB" or something long those lines. 

I just see this defense being similar to last year. 

Pain!  My son just reminded me that Michigan’s last Rose Bowl was 2007.  Incredible, it seemed like an every other year event for much of my life.

Haley - 7

United States - nothing

I've got 7-5 with a +/- variance of 1 game. And I don't think there is much debate this year.

This is a mediocre team with enough recruited talent that they should win the truly winnable games. And they're not good enough or coached well enough to pull any upsets this year.

There's no way they win more than 8. But I'm fairly confident they won't win less than 6, definitely not less than 5.

Harbaugh is fired after this year, there is a mass exodus of recruits and we have to start over.

The only way Harbaugh comes back, IMO is if he does win 8 games, the team shows life and promise late in the season and we beat the shit out of someone in the bowl game like we beat UF in his first year. 9-4, nice bowl win, playing well late in the season (which shows the young guys are improving)...he'll be back for sure.

8-5 with that same scenario...maaaaybe returns. Maybe. 

Anything less than that*, fired.

*unless you want to be "that guy" and say what if McNamara and Bowman struggle out the gate, we lose 6 games in a row. Then JJ reels off 7 straight impressive wins, including beating OSU. 

Sure if you want to live in fantasy land, I'm sure he'd return in that situation as well. But realistically I listed the only way I see him coming back and the only "maybe."

At this point I have to say 6-6.

I don't know if its covid, or the bad taste from last year but my hope and interest in Michigan football is at an all time low. I've finally fully accepted that Harbaugh will not get us back to the same level we were under Bo/Mo/Carr. When he came in and won 10 games his first year topped off by dominating FL in the bowl game, followed by damn near beating OSU on the road in year 2 I really thought we were on the path to winning BIG 10 championships.  2017 was a humbling, but then 2018 revenge tour season I had hope we could still be on the right track, but as of 2021 I think we are as far from championships as when Harbaugh took over from Hoke. When I think back to some of the really good teams from Bo-->Carr they all had really great  JR/Senior leaders on the team and not just 1 or 2 guys. It seemed like when we did have a really good freshman or sophomore player they could come in and play their game because they could always rely on the older guys to lead the way when the going got tough. This program under Harbaugh has had less player leadership every year, and as a result when the going gets tough, the team completely folds. His most experienced, senior led team was honestly his first year when he took over from Hoke. In my opinion the 2 most recent losses this program had to Wisconsin are more embarrassing than losing to app st. At least against app state the team fought hard, they just simply got out schemed and couldn't slow down that style of offense. In the Wisconsin losses, the team just laid down and took an ass kicking. Call it Michigan arrogance or whatever, but "Playing for Michigan" used to be such a high expectation for the program, now there is no pride and no culture with Michigan football. 

Yea that’s where I’m at. 6 wins is absolute max. 5-7 seems most likely. Gross. 
Of course most posters on here can’t handle the truth and prefer to live in fantasy land. 

Im optimistic based on what I saw from Mcnamara last year. I think he's a gamer and he has that "swag" a QB needs. His play along with the RB group, and Solid OL, will win us some games. 

The defense has talent - all of the mouth breathers saying this team lacks talent are wrong. We had a stubborn "gimmicky" defensive coordinator last year. Lets hope this new group adapts/changes their approach in a game. A good coach adapts to their talent, and builds from there. Lets hope this young staff can do that. 

What we tend to be lacking is depth. As long as they stay relatively healthy I believe we will surprise a lot of people. We may "steal" a few but I think we win at least 9 games. 

Hate on - expectations are low so lets kick some people in the nuts. 

Pain.

I'm not really ready to talk about football season.

I'm okay with MLB and Formula1 for now to distract me from the fact that September 4 will be on us before we know it.

But, as far as a prediction? I'll go with this:

Western Michigan - W

Washington - W

Northern Illinois - W

Rutgers - W

@Wisconsin - L

@Nebraska - W

Northwestern - W

@MSU - W 

Indiana - L

@PSU - L

@Maryland - W

OSU - L

So, that's 8-4. In other words, a typical Michigan football season.

I will say this: I think there is a VERY SMALL chance of winning more than 8 games. Which will be a bit different under JH than in years past. I'd put the odds of 9 regular-season wins or more at less than 10%. Which, in Year 7, is...#NOTGREATBOB. 

I predict finding a fun fall Saturday hobby like.....oh let's say wicker furniture. 

Harbs has been “looking at everything” so I expect a close opening win against the Broncos of WMU. After that,  who knows.

I think 6 to 8 wins is the most likely range so I'll go with a tepid 7 wins!

5-7 (maybe 4-8 if shit REALLY hits the fan) is the floor, with 8-4 being the ceiling. My expectations are pretty low.

HAIL HAIL to Michigan the Iowa of the east!

The defense looks bad, according to reports. These defensive coaches need to simplify things for these kids to understand. This NFL mindset will hurt more than help. They are trying to teach Rocket Science to those kids who are just getting to know algebra. 

I hope these issues can be resolved during fall camp. If not, a 6 and 6 season could be the ceiling.

6-6.

pretty tough for me to be more optimistic. So many new coaches, both positional and a new DC...that will definitely require an adjustment period

6.5 is the U/O and I am picking the under.

I'll always have hope.

That being said, the coaching staff has earned themselves some serious skepticism for how last season played out. Every team in America was presented with the same macro issue. The rest of the B1G was presented with the same rules/regulations. Michigan was far from the only team which scuffled, but the results-to-talent-level ratio was ABYSMAL.

I won't claim to know what kinds of wars are being fought behind closed doors in the Athletic Department. On-field results are FAR from the only thing that ADs have to consider when determining the "success" of a head coach. But...the on-field results haven't been encouraging.

Harbaugh has been proven to be CAPABLE of exceptional coaching. He's a bad spot and a John O'Korn away from having two victories vs OSU. But he's also laid some serious eggs against MSU - I swear to the Flying Spaghetti Monstrosity that we annually roll out some of the worst game planning ever conceived against them.

It won't take much to restore my faith. But I'll need to see players being put in positions to succeed, and moreover an air of excitement and buy-in from the football program, before I allow myself to care again. The apathy is creeping up on me.

Same as it ever was. 

I have lost a lot of faith in Michigan football over the past 12 years and in Jim Harbaugh in particular. 
 

There are too many new coaches and players going into this year to expect anything but PAIN. I expect as low as 3 wins and as high as 6. I hope I am way off base but the optimism coming out of the program year in and out has never or rarely been matched on the field. That said, if they can be competitive, not getting blown out, I may have some optimism for 2022. 
 

prediction: Some players will surprise fans, some will disappoint fans, and people will bitch about both outcomes. The rest of the details will play themselves out

6-6

Because (1) not having seen any information about the 2021 Michigan football team other than what has been posted and linked on MGoBlog (some of which is based on speculation without having seen or read any legitimate, insider information about the team, and much of which is negative),

(2) despite a tendency for BPONE to run high with me, offering any way-too-early predictions about the performance of the 2021 Michigan football team seems to make little sense, especially knowing how those way-too-early predictions about the 2020-21 Michigan men’s basketball team worked out, and 

(3) during the pandemic, (a) I’ve visited MGoBlog much less frequently than I’ve done in the past, so I doubt that I’ve read and seen all that has been reported about the 2021 Michigan football team and (b) I’ve learned to be more patient, knowing that I’m incapable of predicting outcomes that are far beyond my control, 

as far as the projected record for the 2021 Michigan football team is concerned, I have absolutely no . . . 

Talent and recruiting rankings are not always the same thing, although recruiting rankings do somewhat predict talent, but not always.

Who are the elite players on this team?  Not elite recruits, but elite players.  I cannot name 1.  For the first time in forever, I cannot name one great player we have returning.  We have a hand full of good players returning, not really good, but just good.  Hutchinson, Hawkins, Dax Hill are solid to good proven players on D.  A few other guys have shown potential, that's it.  And the D is learning a brand new scheme that I'm not entirely sure our personnel is ideal for.

Offense?  Bell is the best player on the team, he's good and pushing very good.  QB is an unknown, McNamara showed flashes, but he's also not extremely talented.  Johnson showed potential.  O Line...no one has shown to be better than average.  Eric All was bad at TE.  RB?  Haskins is definitely good, not shown he's great yet.  Everyone is excited about Corum, kid averaged 2.8 yards per carry last season.  

Going into 2020 we at least could point to McGrone, Paye, and Mayfield as proved really good to great players, and we were sold that Joe Milton was the next coming of Patrick Mahomes.  And I was bearish on that team.

So yeah, 6-6 seems like the baseline.  5-7 seems more likely than 7-5.

What will I be happy with?  Well I am on record as stating I think we needed a whole new staff, but I would be happy to be totally wrong.

I am not sold on the new coaches, in fact I am horrified we're bringing in a guy with so little time as even a defensive position coach (much less no time as a DC) to run our defense.  And his co DC was run out of Dallas because the players hated him.  On top of that, I was shocked we let clearly the best position coach on the team go in Warriner.  I think the new young coaches can recruit, that is clear already, but if I'm being honest with myself, we'd all be making fun of MSU had they hired these guys, because they simply don't have the requisite experience for the jobs they've been given to coach a blue blood like Michigan.  Can it all work?  Sure, there's been a trend towards young fresh minded coaches in football.  But Harbaugh is going all in on several guys who haven't ever done their new job before, at any level, I find that alarming.

The way I see it, I would be thrilled to be wrong about everything and we go 10-2, but even if I (and most in this thread from the looks of it) am right, at least that means we'll be getting a new staff in 2022.  The only thing I would hate is a 7-5 record that might put things in limbo either way.

This is probably the season with the lowest expectations since Harbaugh arrived.

Most are predicting a season with an unpredictable floor but a fixed ceiling of 8-9 wins max with almost sure loses against Whisky, PSU, and OSU and toss-ups against, Washington, Northwestern, MSU. Maryland and Indiana.  I'd say Indiana is a likelier loss than PSU.  

But who knows maybe with a revitalized staff and a surprise emergence of a Hunter Dickinson type player in McCarthy or Edwards we defy expectations like the BB team did.   

This did not age well.