You want Jim Harbaugh fired? Trevor Lawrence, and one team’s big killer stat in the latest Cavalcade of Whimsy.
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Sorry if this column sucks, it’s not my fault …
The fury, speed, and power of the column all become one big prisoner of inertia that soon goes oh so very, very wrong …
But the silence on this from the twittersphere was deafening during the second half …
What if I told you that a current giant of a head coach went 40-21 in his first 4.5 years at his national championship-caliber football school?
What if I told you that this guy had a 6-7 season in that run, didn’t crack the top 20 in either poll until Year Five, and whose team at the end of Year Four gave up 70 points in a total annihilation of a big bowl game?
What if I told you that after all of that, Dabo Swinney turned out to be pretty good at this coaching thing at Clemson?
After 4.5 years at Michigan, Jim Harbaugh just lost another big game.
Forget that Penn State was a nine-point favorite at home, and forget that the Wolverines were a Ronnie Bell dropped pass away from tying it up after a gutsy comeback. Jim Harbaugh lost another big game, and Twitter wasn’t happy about it.
For the record, I don’t like Michigan. Actually, it’s more like I don’t care about Michigan, other than it was the first place my horrible fake ID worked in bars. I’m not some fan, and I don’t owe the guy money or anything – at least I don’t think I do – but even after this loss, Harbaugh really is doing a much, much better job than he’s being given credit for.
Out of all the coaches at their current programs since or before 2015 – when Harbaugh took over at Michigan – only Nick, Dabo, Wisconsin’s Paul Chryst and Boise State’s Bryan Harsin have a better winning percentage.
But Harbaugh can’t win the big one, right? Last year’s team whacked a 9-4 Penn State team 42-7, beat the eventual Big Ten West champ Northwestern in Evanston, and destroyed a flawed-but-decent Wisconsin team by 25. He won the game at Michigan State, too, but no one remembers or cares about any of that, because the guy can’t beat Ohio State and his teams always whiff when they have a shot at getting into the national championship picture.
You have to win a whole lot of the other games, though, to make the big ones matter.
Has a Harbaugh Michigan team lost to Illinois the week before an epic showdown against Ohio State, like Wisconsin just did when it had the whole world there for the taking? No.
Has a Harbaugh Michigan team’s doors been blown off by a mediocre Purdue team last year or an Iowa squad the year before, like Ohio State’s did when it had the talent in place in both seasons to win a national championship? No.
Has a Harbaugh Michigan team lost to a South Carolina, like Georgia did this year? More than that, has he lost like Tennessee continues to do? Has Scott Frost been able to bring the Nebraska program back from the dead in a year and a half? How’s that UCLA rebuild coming along under Chip Kelly? Should we be making plans now for Miami’s College Football Playoff parade? Do you have your rooms booked yet for Texas A&M’s trip to the SEC Championship?
Harbaugh has lost 16 games so far, and assuming Penn State and Wisconsin will be double-digit victory programs this season, only one of those defeats – the 14-13 thriller at Iowa in 2016 – was to a team that didn’t finish with at least ten wins.
It’s so hard to win 43 college football games in 4.5 seasons no matter where you’re at. So to all the people on social media who lashed out, and to all of the Harbaugh haters, and to all of those who want to see him gone and don’t appreciate what he’s been able to do …
You’re not totally wrong.
I might be the President of the Harbaugh Apologists Club, but if you believe that Michigan is MICHIGAN and should be beating Ohio State, winning Big Ten titles, and going to the College Football Playoff on a regular basis … yeah. We all do, and you’ve got a more than valid point considering there’s recent precedent for a smoothly upgraded transfer of power.
Mark Richt – feel better, Coach – was able to get Georgia painfully close to greatness, but couldn’t quite get over the hump. In stepped Kirby Smart, and kaboom.
It could be argued that Bob Stoops hit a ceiling – a very, very high one – at Oklahoma, and Lincoln Riley has been able to somehow make the program even more amazing.
David Shaw was able to take what Harbaugh created at Stanford and go to a whole other level, with three Pac-12 titles and two Rose Bowl victories.
But in the be-careful-what-you-wish-for department, Nebraska launched Bo Pelini after he won nine games or more in seven straight seasons and went to four conference championships. He “couldn’t win the big games,” got canned, and the program has gone 27-30 since then.
But this isn’t just some guy we’re talking about. This isn’t Richt or Stoops, who were both nearing the end of their respective high-end coaching lines. Yeah, you’d take Riley in a heartbeat, and Shaw has been incredible up until the last two seasons, but this is the Michigan Man coaching Michigan.
(BTW, speaking of that, different time and MUCH different era in the way the world worked, but Bo Schembechler didn’t win his first bowl game until his 12th season at Michigan. But I digress.)
You don’t just replace Harbaugh with some rising coach who’s doing a decent job overachieving at some other gig, and you don’t take a flier on some hot assistant prospect.
Harbaugh deniers, you can be disappointed, but are you venting just to vent, or do you really want Jim Harbaugh gone after winning 73% of his games?
You got a plan, son?
With all of that said, you know what’s coming in full-force this week.
Either 1) Michigan loses to Notre Dame, and the Harbaugh backlash will thunder down on America and beyond, or 2) Michigan beats Notre Dame, and it will be blown off until he beats Ohio State.
NEXT: Speaking of elite things that now, apparently, suck …
The Cavalcade debut of, “USE A CUCK-TAYEL STICK” …
If he was really that good, the team would be winning games by 40 instead of 35 …
Trevor Lawrence doesn’t check down on a play, gets picked off, and now, apparently, he’s going rogue in his sophomore season and Dabo can’t control him.
He hangs up an ill-advised pass into traffic for a touchdown in a game that Clemson had no chance of losing, and now he’s regressing and might not be the be-all-end-all quarterback prospect we all thought he was?
It’s hard when the Joe Burrows and Tua Tagovailoas and Jalen Hurts’ of the world are completing 119% of their passes for 104 yards per attempt, but all of this concern about Lawrence and his sophomore slide has to slow down just a wee bit.
This is the preseason. Clemson isn’t losing a game until the College Football Playoff, so this is the time to push the envelope. We all know Lawrence can hit the midrange pass to the open guy, but why not let him try out his hero ball style just to see what he can and can’t get away with?
Yeah, he threw two interceptions against Louisville. And Clemson won 45-10.
Yeah, he has eight picks on the year, but none of them came in the close call against a jacked up North Carolina.
Yeah, he barely hit half of his passes against Syracuse and threw two interceptions, and he also threw for three scores and close to 400 yards in the 41-6 win.
He’s Trevor Lawrence … it’s going to be okay.
The defense will clean up the messes, the Tigers will win everything by at least three scores, and if you don’t want him with the No. 1 overall pick in the 2021 NFL Draft, the word “yoink!” won’t be yelled loud enough by the team with the two.
NEXT: Mmmmmmm, warm toasty turnovers …
And how does one hold the ball for 41 minutes, allow nine completions, and lose?
Whether it’s Barry Alvarez, or Bret Bielema, or Gary Andersen, or now Paul Chryst, the Wisconsin program has been lather, rinse, repeat for over 25 years.
Massive offensive linemen, tremendous running backs, tough try-hard defensive types who fit the scheme, time of possession domination, limited penalties, own third down conversions, control the tempo, control the clock, impose the will and wear down defenses as the game goes on, and always, always win the …
Turnover margin.
How does Wisconsin lose games? 1) It plays the teams with ridiculous next-level talent that scoff at the Badger formula, and/or 2) someone figures out that you test the secondary with the deep ball, and keep testing it, and/or 3) it loses the turnover battle.
Yeah, duh, most teams aren’t so hot when they play great teams or give up the ball more than they take it away. But most teams aren’t among the nation’s leaders in the turnover stat, and most teams as good as Wisconsin aren’t as vulnerable when there’s a big mistake or three.
The 1993 breakthrough team under Alvarez that went 10-1-1 and took out UCLA in the Rose Bowl would’ve won at least a piece of the national championship except for one big problem in the one misfire of a game.
Back in the poll-and-bowl days of ’93, the great Charlie Ward Florida State team lost to Notre Dame, Notre Dame’s only loss was to Boston College, and an unbeaten Nebraska lost to the Seminoles in the Orange Bowl. Wisconsin would’ve finished the season as the only unbeaten team except for five Darrell Bevell interceptions – along with 423 passing yards – in a 28-21 stunner against Minnesota.
Fast forward to the last few seasons under Chryst – and past a botched handoff to Ron Dayne that led to a Northwestern win in 1996, and Joel Stave’s issues in 2015, and on and on. Last year’s team had a whole host of problems, but in the five losses: -1 in turnover margin vs. BYU. -2 against Michigan, -2 against Penn State, -4 against Minnesota. Even against Northwestern, but with three killer turnovers.
This year? The Badgers owned the turnover battle for the first six games, and lost to Illinois partially because it was a -2. To be fair to Illinois, Wisconsin’s No. 1 defense had a nine-point lead with six minutes to play and couldn’t come up with a stop, but it was put in that position thanks to a Jonathan Taylor fumble and a bad Jack Coan interception.
Had Wisconsin been -1, it wins.
Now, the luster is totally off the Badger showdown against Ohio State. In that same way, be careful of …
NEXT: Five Cavalcade of Whimsy footballey opinions and, like, other stuff
Five Cavalcade of Whimsy footballey opinions and, like, other stuff
5. Auburn is really, really good
It’s been assumed that LSU’s trip to Alabama in a few weeks is going to be sort of like a playoff game, but more like an exhibition. Of course the Tide-Tiger winner will be 13-0 with an SEC Championship, and of course the loser will be 11-1 and one of the four best teams in college football.
Auburn could absolutely beat LSU this week.
This is it. This is the last Auburn road game of the year, and then it’s Ole Miss, Georgia, Samford and Alabama all at home. LSU will probably pull it off in the Tiger on Tiger action, but if it goes to the other Tigers, the world of College Football Playoff theory quickly shifts to Oregon, and …
Just enjoy. This is going to be one of the biggest games of the season, and it’s sort of being blown off.
4. The ACC Coastal
Was the ACC Coastal championship played on August 31st? Hand raised high and long on this one … who else threw Pitt on the pile of indifference? No offense, mediocre defense, losses to Virginia and Penn State, and … a four-game winning streak to currently be second in the Coastal. It has an okay run the rest of the way, and Virginia gets at Louisville, at North Carolina, Georgia Tech, Liberty, Virginia Tech.
The Cavaliers already have a loss to Miami in the division, so if Pitt wins out, and Virginia loses once more – the Cavaliers have a wee bit of a hiccup issue against Virginia Tech – your 2019 Panthers might just be right back in the ACC Championship against Clemson.
3. Baylor
I love Tim Brando. He’s as outspoken as it gets, and he’s still got his announcing fastball. However, if you watched the Baylor win over Oklahoma State, he went a whole lot further than this below, arguing that the Baylor turnaround was the greatest of all-time as well as …
This made me SO mad, and not because Brando is necessarily wrong.
It made me mad because now I have to argue for Penn State.
What Matt Rhule has done is remarkable considering where Baylor was at after the Art Briles era, but Penn State was all but nuked into the oblivion. The players were allowed to transfer, the NCAA was trying to invent ways to potentially hand out the Death Penalty, and the negative recruiting was at an all-time level when Bill O’Brien took over the brutal mess. When James Franklin took the gig, Penn State wasn’t going to be bowl eligible.
Penn State’s 7-0 resumé this year is a whole lot better than Baylor’s, too. And Franklin won a Big Ten title.
2. Georgia State
Remember how funny it was when Georgia State shocked Tennessee to start the season?
Ha, ha, ha … the Vols couldn’t even beat a dumb Sun Belt team that won two games in 2018.
Give all sides credit. As it turns out, Georgia State is terrific.
Senior QB Dan Ellington – the star of the upset – has thrown 16 touchdown passes and just three picks, the offense is rolling, the ground game is impressive, and after stoning Army in a 28-21 victory, the Panthers are on a three-game winning streak with a 5-2 start. They’re going to end up going bowling. Tennessee won’t, which sort of speaks to …
1. The Jeremy Pruitt show
There were problems with the refs, some on-field trolling, and there were a whole lot of issues all the way around in the 35-13 loss to Alabama. But I can’t help but giving the Tennessee a wee bit of a free pass for this.
You can send a kid out there to get concussed, potentially suffer a debilitating injury, and enjoy of lifetime of CTE, but a slight tug of the facemask? Oooooooohhhhh.
No, a head coach really can’t do that, but if you’re battling through a rough season, your program is in desperate need of something special, you’re about to go in for a touchdown to pull within a score of Alabama in the fourth quarter, and your QB, apparently, goes rogue … I sort of get it.
NEXT: The sure-thing picks of the century for this week
This week’s reason I should be the SIXTH prognosticator on the set of the new FOX College Football Pregame thingy …
I’ve already been to Brookings, South Dakota.
The sure-thing, 100%, rock-solid lock, sell the house, sell the kids, no doubt about it picks of the century for this week
PICK SO FAR: 40-14 SU, 29-25-2 ATS
Thanks, Wisconsin and Missouri. Who the hell loses straight up to Illinois and Vanderbilt? Apparently, I do.
Fortunately, these picks are all correct.
Do this, or I’ll have to move to Brookings, South Dakota. If you choose to dabble, sign up with BetMGM though this link to take part in any of these games or other action on the schedule.
– Colorado +12.5 over USC (USC straight up)
– Wisconsin +14.5 over Ohio State (OSU straight up)
– Texas -1.5 over TCU
– Auburn +10.5 over LSU (LSU straight up)
– Temple +10.5 over UCF (UCF straight up)
– Texas Tech -3.5 over Kansas
– Arizona State -3.5 over UCLA
C.O.W. shameless gimmick item …
The weekly five Overrated/Underrated aspects of the world
5) Overrated: The Jarrett Guarantano fumble …
Underrated: The Trevon Diggs return
4) Overrated: Tom Dempsey’s 63-yard field goal in 1970 – considered an almost unbreakable kicking feat …
Underrated: Dallas PK Brett Maher nailing a 63-yarder against Philadelphia and barely eliciting anything more than a polite yawn.
3) Overrated: On the same day I dealt with the type of horror that no one should have to know is possible – they chopped up cilantro and mixed it into my shrimp tacos – I endured the ultimate form of human suffering. I watched the New York Jets play New England on Monday Night Football.
Underrated: Yeah, sometimes college football gets it really, really right.
2) Overrated: What parents have to do and spend to get their kids into Vanderbilt …
Underrated: How much, apparently, Derek Mason really, really, really, really, really, really wants to be the Vanderbilt head coach.
1) Overrated: A $5,000 fine for this …
Underrated: Lane Kiffin in a world that needs so much more Lane Kiffin.
Sorry if this column sucked, I wasn’t my fault …
The column was so bad that Dabo made me join Andrew Booth and the team managers on the the 450-mile bus ride home.
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