2022 U-M football fan survey (Part 1): Jim Harbaugh's flirtation with the NFL is already an afterthought
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Last week, I sent out the 2022 U-M football fan survey to newsletter subscribers. After getting just shy of 14,000 total votes cast in a 48-hour period, I cut off responses and quickly pivoted to tallying up and analyzing the ballots. Thanks for such an overwhelming response in such a short window.
I quickly realized that I needed to pivot from my original plan. Rather than have this turn into a weeks-long process that results in one super-long newsletter, I’ve decided to break this into three different parts. The first part, focusing on questions about coaching, will be below. I hope to have parts 2 and 3 out over the next week or so. One will deal with player personnel, and the other will deal with current program expectations and concerns.
For each of the 17 total questions on the survey, I’ll break down how everyone’s responses tallied up and share which ones I’m aligned with the majority of the fanbase on and which ones I’m not. There are multiple examples of each.
So let’s dig into the first batch of questions surrounding Jim Harbaugh and his coaching staff:
Question 1: Which statement best describes your feelings about Jim Harbaugh’s offseason flirtation with the NFL?
I was angry that he interviewed for an NFL job and I didn't want him to return to Ann Arbor.
I was angry that he interviewed for an NFL job but I'm glad he returned to Ann Arbor.
He had every right to interview with an NFL team after last offseason. I’m glad he’s back.
He had every right to interview, but I wish Michigan would’ve moved on from him once he did.
Your choice: He had every right to interview with an NFL team after last offseason. I’m glad he’s back.
My choice: He had every right to interview with an NFL team after last offseason. I’m glad he’s back.
Breaking it down: This was one of my easiest questions to answer, and it appears the vast majority of y’all were in the same boat, too. The “he had every right to interview with an NFL team after last offseason, I’m glad he’s back” response received more than three out of every four votes cast, and got four times as many votes as the next closest response (“I was angry that he interviewed for an NFL job but I'm glad he returned to Ann Arbor”). Between those two responses (which both lead to the respondee being happy Harbaugh is back this fall), that’s more than 95% of the total responses. So less than one in every 20 people who responded to this question is ultimately upset that Jim Harbaugh returned. For a fanbase that’s oftentimes fickle, angry and holds grudges, that’s an incredibly high rate of approval (and rightfully so). The most extreme option (“I was angry that he interviewed for an NFL job and I didn't want him to return to Ann Arbor”) got less than half of a percentage of all responses. I certainly didn’t think it was a viable option, but I’m still pleasantly surprised to see such a small number there, because just because I like to avoid both sides of the outlier spectrum doesn’t mean everyone else does. If this is a sign of more sensibility entering this fanbase, then that’s a fantastic byproduct of the 2021 season.
What this ultimately tells me: Even though it seemed like a really big deal at the time, Jim Harbaugh’s NFL flirtation is going to be water under the bridge by the time this football season rolls around, if it isn’t already the case now. Let’s just call the 2020 and 2021 offseasons a wash and say they cancel each other each, shall we?
Question 2: Which new addition to the coaching staff are you most excited about?
Jesse Minter -- defensive coordinator
Mike Elston -- defensive line coach
Grant Newsome -- tight ends coach
Your choice: Mike Elston — defensive line coach
My choice: Jesse Minter — defensive coordinator
Breaking it down: Here’s our first disagreement. Let me preface this by saying me not choosing the same coach that the majority of you guys did isn’t an indictment of that hire — I was and still remain totally on board with the Elston hire. That was about as no-brainer of a hire as it gets once Shaun Nua went to USC. A guy like Elston with Michigan ties makes a ton of sense for this staff, and it’s a win from a program perception standpoint, too, when Michigan can get a long-time Notre Dame assistant to make a lateral move, even if there were other circumstances at play (Marcus Freeman taking over at Notre Dame and not prioritizing Elston when reshaping his new staff).
Minter is going to get the nod for me here, though, because I think it’s a more significant hire. There was both a higher likelihood of getting it wrong and more at stake if it was a bad hire. And I’m confident that it’s not going to be a bad hire (I’ll have more thoughts on Elston later in this newsletter).
I know some people aren’t enamored by the Minter hire because, let’s be honest, it’s hard to be enamored by anyone or anything associated with the Vanderbilt Commodores. And if you compare Vanderbilt’s defensive numbers with Michigan’s from a year ago, you’re going to have a hard time talking yourself up about this hire. But if that’s the level of depth you’re going to put into comparing the two systems, you deserve whatever horrible conclusion you end up coming up with.
Minter was a target for this staff last year when it had a defensive backs coach vacancy before Vanderbilt swooped in and offered him a coordinator position. The fact that he was a priority target last offseason in a coaching cycle where Jim Harbaugh made home run hire after home run hire tells you all you need to know about Minter’s appeal, ceiling and fit with this system.
Like I said when I broke down the hire back in February, I get the skepticism. Vanderbilt was 118th out of 130 in total defense last season. There were only four Power 5 programs with worse defenses last fall. But I truly believe that if Mike Macdonald was in charge of Vanderbilt’s defense last season, you’d see similar results. You can have the best scheme in the world, and it doesn’t mean a thing if you don’t have the athletes to make it work. And it certainly doesn’t help when you’re playing your conference games against SEC offenses stockpiled with five-star athletes.
I know a lot of Michigan fans wanted to see “a big name” hire when it came to replacing Macdonald. But Macdonald himself should be the biggest data point for why going for a “splashy hire” probably is not the right move. And Michigan’s track record both last year and throughout the Harbaugh Era has shown time and time again that fit and familiarity really should be the top priority for these types of vacancies, and Minter checked those boxes better than any other legitimate replacement candidate.
No two new hires last year made more noticable impacts (see: scheme and philosophy) than Macdonald and Weiss, the two guys that came from the Ravens. Like those two did last offseason, Minter comes highly recommended from John Harbaugh and others that have worked with him over the years. He knows the scheme that Michigan excelled with last year, and his hire means the Wolverine defense doesn’t need to run its third different system in as many years, which would be annoying in a vacuum but particularly on the heels of the dramatic improvement it made last fall.
Long story short: Harbaugh was tasked with bringing in a new defensive coordinator for the second straight offseason. He decided to prioritize system over sizzle and I think that’s the right move. So that’s why Minter gets my vote here.