Michigan needs to shake things up

Bruce Hooley has an interesting, and damning in my mind, article at ESPN on Lloyd Carr. After some paragraphs on Carr's rye humor these days, he notes that being too tied to tradition and "Michigan men" might be finally catching up to the football team:

"Right now, they can't tackle in space," ESPN "College GameDay" analyst Kirk Herbstreit said. "For the life of me, I don't understand it. Every February, Michigan recruits really well. But I think their strength and conditioning program has cornered the market on taking five-star guys and somehow finding a way to slow them down. It's mystifying to see it every single time they line up against that type of spread look."

Michigan's director of conditioning is Mike Gittleson, who's in his 30th season. He was the program's first such coach in 1978, a Vietnam veteran who completed his master's in exercise science on the campus where he works.

Gittleson may be the very best in his field, or he may not be. Who can tell in the world of reps, sets, sweat and supplements?

What's obvious is, he's a Michigan man, and Carr is never going to sell out one of his own for some flavor-of-the-month replacement.

When the Wolverines' offensive and defensive coordinators were artfully eased out following a 7-5 season in 2005, where did Carr go for new blood?

His own staff, of course.

Look elsewhere in the Big Ten -- to the programs annually picked with Michigan atop the conference -- for a contrast.

Jim Tressel spent three seasons at Ohio State as an assistant in the mid-1980s. When he returned in 2001, he didn't have a continuous 20-year relationship with every person who'd been in the athletic department since the Reagan administration. Tressel let go a longtime assistant who played for Woody Hayes and coached under both Earle Bruce and John Cooper, while also overhauling the team's medical staff and, twice, its strength and conditioning staff.

At Wisconsin, Bret Bielema spent two seasons as an assistant to Barry Alvarez, but essentially cleared out the staff upon taking over as head coach. Bielema kept only two assistants and named a pair of new coordinators.

Even at Penn State, where working for Joe Paterno often comes with the longevity of a Supreme Court justice, Galen Hall was brought in from the outside to revitalize the team's offense four years ago.

I think the fact that Michigan has been unable to stop the same type of offense year in year out now for at least five years and has yet to make radical changes is proof that tradition has become complacency. Michigan needs to shake things up and bring in some new blood.