Transfer portal plan is proof of why Kyle Whittingham was the right hire for the Michigan Wolverines
Kyle Whittingham has aced his first test as head coach of the Michigan Wolverines and has proven he already understands the team perfectly.
It has been a hectic two-week period for Kyle Whittingham since stepping in as head coach of the Michigan Wolverines.
In his own words, it’s been “like drinking water from a firehose,” as he had to hit the ground full sprint to make up the roster, as the transfer portal opened just two days after Michigan’s bowl game.
Whittingham and his staff have had to put together a plan on the fly to retain this Michigan roster. So far? It’s hard to argue with the results. What Whittingham has done, and the way he has gone about it, has been exactly what the Wolverines needed out of their next head coach.
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Whittingham’s portal strategy was the type of ruthlessness Michigan needed
If there’s one lesson to be learned here so far from what we’ve seen from Whittingham, it’s that he isn’t afraid of telling a player what they are worth and sticking to that point. Several players entered the portal, and Michigan wasn’t afraid to simply say, “You aren’t worth that price” for those players. Most notable in recent days has been the portal decisions of Ty Haywood and Justice Haynes.
Haynes is a tricky situation. Obviously, he was a proven producer and was the entire engine of Michigan’s offense for most of last season. However, as soon as news of his transfer dropped, a price point hovering around $2 million immediately started getting floated.
Michigan has the funds to easily cover that amount. However, he played seven games for the Wolverines, and that’s a steep price point to pay, no matter how productive he was. The staff at Michigan simply wasn’t going to move beyond a certain point. It’s a tough loss, no doubt, but when you’re reorganizing an entire roster, decisions like this have to be made.
Haywood was a former high-profile recruit who was once used to illustrate how elite a recruiter Sherrone Moore was. Perhaps down the line, he might prove that to be right, but what the Michigan staff and Whittingham saw was a player asking for too much money or too many guarantees for what he put out on the field.
By all reports, Haywood “wasn’t even in their top-35 players to pay“, something that might surprise many for a true freshman with his recruiting status. However, Whittingham has never cared about stars and status, and that is the attitude Michigan needs. The money that could have been tied up in these two players can now be spread out throughout the entire roster. That’s just good business.
The Wolverines are a team. Bo Schembechler, the winningest head coach in Michigan history, once said, “No man is more important than The Team. If we think that way, all of us, everything that you do, you take into consideration what effect does it have on my Team? Because you can go into professional football, you can go anywhere you want to play after you leave here. You will never play for a Team again. You’ll play for a contract. You’ll play for this. You’ll play for that. You’ll play for everything except the team, and think what a great thing it is to be a part of something that is, The Team…And when we play as a team, when the old season is over, you and I know, it’s gonna be Michigan again, Michigan.”
Whittingham is proving that he already simply “gets it” at Michigan. He knows the kind of identity and culture that this team has found success with time and time again.
It’s not always about the high-profile recruits (though those do tend to help), and it’s not about the flashy big plays. Michigan is a strong culture, and it wins that way. Whittingham won that way with Utah time and time again, and he’s bringing that to Ann Arbor.
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