Wolverine247 Board

Sparty being Sparty.

Here is all you need to know about Bollman from Ramzy Nasrallah of 11 Warriors.

"In his only OC season, Jim Bollman took Braxton Miller, a veteran line he hand-picked, NFL talent at RB/WR and finished 107th in total offense"

I've said it before, and I'll say it again - Bollman is to B1G offenses as GERG is to B1G defenses.

At first I was surprised by this pick, but considering their last offensive coordinator, not really that surprising. Treadwell did a lot more for the Spartans than I think they realized. He developed most of their offensive talent and gave them such a good offense for a few years. Now those guys are gone and with a guy like Bollman, they'll probably stay gone.

This is the most Sparty move ever.

Supposedly one of the biggest knocks on Bollman is he's a lousy recruiter. He hates to travel.

Yea there are buckeyes on our board giving us the rundown, doesn't sound good. Best comment is as soon as Meyer fired him, 2 4 star tackles switched verbals to OSU and said Bollman never really recruited them.

Sparta going Spart.

Good god this is terrible haha.

Nothing yet. Seems like we're still compiling a list of candidates and we'll start reaching out soon. If anyone's been contacted yet, it's been kept quiet.

FWIW here's a detailed take on the hire from a Buckeye (posted on RCMB):

playmea said...

As a Buckeye fan and a Spartan fan, I want to give you guys the honest truth... I think what Dantonio did was hire a "Yes" man. Let me explain...

This move is following the Tressel model for micro-managing. Bollman will be Dantonio's guy. He's safe, he isn't going anywhere and he'll be an enforcer on the staff. Not sure if thats needed or not at MSU. But Bollman's role at tOSU was JT's yes man. Bollman carried the title of OC, but it was widely known for a very long time that JT was the play-caller. Often JT was asked about this.

Bollman worked form the booth. He is very conservative in his approach towards attacking a defense. But very dynamic in its diversity. For example, Bollman wants to be the jack of all trades but master of nothing. You can expect to see the same play ran quite often but run out of tons of different formations in his approach to break tendencies. It will be infuriating.

The good news is, like in the Tressel mold, you do NOT have to worry about your offense losing the game for you. The bad news is, more often than not, it won't WIN the game for you either.

I think Dantonio must have a larger plan in mind here for the offense. Bollman received the OC offer to sway him from Pur and Dantonio get his "guy". But Bollman may simply work on offensive game planning. He likely won't be the play caller.

As an OL coach, you are getting a guy with NFL experience. Thats good and bad. He wants to cross train everyone. You will have no specialization. He prioritizes big bodies that can move as opposed to other qualities. So you can expect to recruit a bunch of Guards and no Tackles. The Center in his mind is the most important position on the line. So he will produce some quality Centers. But thats it. You will regress in your quality of Tackle play. But the bigger issue is OL recruiting. Depth will drop. Because the ethos is to cross train everyone and no specialization, this allows OL number sot be smaller. So you can expect very low OL depth. Your two deep will consist of playing musical OL and switching them around. One guy may be the starting RT, but if someone gets injured, things will be reshuffled and he could be the backup Left Guard and the third string Center.

This was my biggest criticism of Bollman. I did not like his approach to OL recruiting and depth. I think he does a good job of training, but because everyone plays every position, I did not like our lack of specialization at positions such as OT. Ultimately, this results in players probably not getting drafted as high as they should. And their careers in college didn't seem as impressive. But ironically, these players end up doing ok in the NFL. Thats because Bollman's system lends well to performing at the next level. Where OL depth is intentionally smaller than in college. And cross training is mandatory.

Buckeyes will argue these points and declare Bollman as the worst OL coach in history. He's not THAT bad. But he's certainly going to be a point of frustration for you. But behind closed doors it was always believed that Tressel saw different value in Bollman. Its likely the same thing that Dantonio sees. I do believe that this value may not be as evident on the field. So its likely you guys will not be happy with this hire. I am a Spartan fan as well as a Buckeye fan. My wife is an alum and I went to tOSU. But I grew up in Detroit and all my friends went to MSU. I personally do not like this hire for MSU. But I believe I understand why. I think Dantonio is building his own Tressel regime. The Tressel model wins. But its infuriating to watch. It begins with having YOUR people. Dantonio is doing that. We'll see how it plays out.

Sounds to me like the only thing he's decent at is interviewing.