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| Patrick Kugler |
Height: 6'5"
Weight: 297 lbs.
High school: Wexford (PA) North Allegheny
Position: Center
Class: Redshirt sophomore
Jersey number: #57
Last year: I ranked Kugler #75 and said he would be a backup center. He played in one game.
Kugler has not lived up to the expectations some people had for him coming out of high school. A highly ranked player, the son of an NFL offensive line coach (and now the head coach at UTEP), Kugler was expected to compete for playing time very early on an offensive line that was not very productive. Some thought he would play as a true freshman or beat out Jack Miller as a redshirt freshman. Instead, he has never been higher than the third-string guy, and the one game he played last season was when part-time center Graham Glasgow was suspended.
Whether we like it or not, Kugler is a key backup this season. The Wolverines have not done a great job of recruiting the center position in recent years. It's perhaps the most important position on the offensive line, so it's dangerous to ignore. The danger level rose a bit this offseason when Jack Miller, who would have been a fifth year senior in 2015, chose to leave the program. He had been the starter for all of 2014 and part of 2013, and he had been a solid contributor. In steps Glasgow, who played center quite a bit in 2013 but spent most of his time at left guard last year. Glasgow ran into some more legal trouble this offseason, and I don't know if he can be counted on to be available for an entire season. The coaching staff tried left tackle Mason Cole at center this spring, but his snaps were very inconsistent. Backup interior lineman Blake Bars has also snapped the ball a little bit, but he can get overpowered and does not maintain leverage well. If anything happens to Glasgow, the easiest thing will be to insert Kugler, but he has a lot to prove.
Prediction: Backup center
Hmmmm....and so the trend continues... highly ranked prospects failing to live up to expectations!
ReplyDeleteI had such high hopes that Kugler was going to be the answer at Center. Its time for him and the other highly ranked recruits to produce. What would this line be without the walk-on Glasgow and the true freshman (last year) Cole??
He's a redshirt sophomore. The expectations were not expectations so much as hopes, driven by the needs of the team. Miller wasn't up to the job until 2014 and others had struggled at center. So - we all wanted a savior. That Kugler wasn't that is not a problem.
DeleteSeeing the same stuff with Shane Morris and Ty Isaac - the dissatisfaction in the incumbent leads to speculation and irrational hopes in "the other guy", especially if that guy came with recruiting hype, but in spite of no evidence beyond that to substantiate the expectations.
While it's a bit early to label Kugler as a bust, he's certainly been at least a mild disappointment. A guy this highly touted, with an Oline coach for a father (so you'd think his technique would be about as well developed as any high schooler) should be seriously in the mix for a starting job in his third year in the program, and he doesn't appear to be even close to that. Additionally disappointing since he's been competing against walk-ons the whole time. Of course, pretty much all of our Oline recruits have failed to live up to expectations, so he's got a lot of company. Still hard to understand how Hoke and Co. recruited the Oline so well and coached it so badly.
ReplyDeleteJack Miller, who I think started about 16 games over the last two years, was not a walk-on.
DeleteThere actually has been a little buzz that Braden might be in danger of losing his spot. It'd be nice if it was because of other people pushing him, rather than his own limitations, but either way. Kugler's one of the guys that will be in the conversation to start if Braden (or anyone else) falters.
DeleteThis is why the TREND of 2015 is more important than whether we win 8 vs. 9 games. Harbaugh and company can't by magic win all the games this year, but they can improve the fundamental play of the team. If we see more of the same as we have in 2013 and 2014, then sound the alarms. But if we see solid, competitive football then we can celebrate and look forward to 2016 and beyond.
ReplyDeleteYep "trends" are more important than winning....that makes sense...
DeleteWinning matters, right now. If the team is getting better substantially then they will win games. Hoke's teams were competitive and lost a lot of close games. Rodriguez's teams were competitive and lost a lot of games. Progress will come via winning games.
That's right. Let's have more Akron type wins. That's the ticket.
DeleteRodriguez's teams were NOT competitive against good teams. See 2011 Ohio State, 2012 Mississippi State.
And for Hoke see 2014 Notre Dame, 2014 MSU, KSU bowl game, 2013 MSU, 2012 Alabama.
DeleteHoke got Michigan to play better against OSU and deserves a ton of credit for that but also had us getting dominated by Minnesota and barely scratching to beat Akron and UConn...
The narrative changes only if you WIN. Michigan has a bunch of winnable games this year. They don't have to play anybody (other than maybe OSU) who is a real threat to run a deep and veteran team like Michigan's off the field.
They need to win the close ones. The outcomes of against teams like Utah, BYU, Maryland, Northwestern, PSU are the difference in the trajectory of this program. Not if they can manage to avoid blowouts in both of the games where it's feasible (MSU/OSU).
Exactly. What most of us have been hoping for (in vain as it turned out) the last few years is not necessarily to see a huge jump in performance in one year, but to see the team improving over the course of a year and to see a clear upward trend for the team and individual players. And you can have all kinds of 8-4 seasons. You can have 4 solid wins, four shaky wins against teams that weren't that great and 4 convincing losses (so that you weren't that far from 6-6), or you can have 8 solid wins against the teams you should have beaten and 4 close losses against better teams (so that you weren't that far from 10-2). The latter is what to hope for this season.
ReplyDeleteThis is far better put than the above comment, but at the same time...Michigan will be favored or small underdogs in every game this season besides Ohio State. We SHOULD be competitive in every game and we need to win more close ones than we lose.
DeleteRespectfully disagree. This is (quietly) a veteran team, and it now has a top staff. Time to win some games.
DeleteLook at it this way: If (as you suggest) U-M goes 6-6/7-5, what then is your goal for 2016, when MSU and OSU are on the road and Wisconsin rotates back on the sked? Is 7-5 fine then too? When exactly does Michigan need to start winning? And how do you think recruiting will be going with the OSU and MSU streaks even worse than they are now?
Michigan needs to start winning ASAP. For some reason, a large segment of the fan base doesn't want to acknowledge that, I guess because they're worried about this year and don't want to be let down if the result is 7-5.
Of course, it's not the end of the world if that's how it turns out. But people are kidding themselves with this idea that there's no harm in losing four, five, six games while MSU and OSU remain at the top of polls. You might give U-M a pass for losing some close games, but U-M's rivals on the recruiting trail will not. They'll say we own these guys, and they'll still be right.
Well, it's a veteran team full of players that have been badly coached and developed. Experience alone doesn't buy you 10 wins. And "top staff" or not, this team has only had a few weeks of practice under the new coaches. The players who were underachievers under Hoke and Co. are not going to be turned around that quickly (assuming they ever are).
DeleteSeven wins would certainly be disappointing this year, but not that unlikely, I have to say, given the lack of proven talent at so many positions. I'm hoping for at least a solid 8 wins, though. Next year, given that we lose so little, 10 wins should be a very real possibility. This staff should be able to squeeze one good year out of Hoke's seniors.
well said. msu and osu already have huge head starts in terms of overall talent, player development, public perception, recent onfield performances and bowl game success, etc - michigan cannot pass off any more games or seasons as cost of doing business during some ultimate reclamation project.
Deletethey need to win now - which harbaugh understands (even if large segments of the fanbase do not). those other programs are not slowing down.
itd be nice to hit the recruiting trail with a relevant swagger on the heels of some big time recent W's instead of pitching the "were rebuilding some kind of empire and we want you to help us get to the top." bc that on-field performance would really help michigan land some of those truly elite DL and other high impact recruits thatve been signing elsewhere each february
(sure, harbaugh has proven he can accomplish a lot with a little, but its made much easier with faster, more elite athletes)
Kugler's failure to develop is the most disturbing to me of the many, many high profile recruits to do nothing under Hoke. And one of the biggest indictments of his coaching. You can convince me that one or two four-star guys in a class just didn't pan out. You can probably talk me in to believing that half the four stars in a class were just overrated and actually not good football players. It would be a stretch to convince me that almost all the four and five star guys in a class--guys like Dymonte Thomas, Ondre Pipkins, and Derrick Green--simply didn't have what it takes. But for a five-star, top-rated-at-his-position, son-of-an-NFL-offensive-line-coach, reputedly nasty, physically huge, center like Kugler to shit the bed . . . Sorry, you got to go, Brady.
ReplyDeleteIf Kugler hadn't been permanently psychologically damaged by the last coaching staff, I fully expect Harbaugh and Drevno to turn Kugler into an all-conference lineman in the next two years.
Is this serious? Kugler was psychologically damaged by Hoke and Funk? Progress on the OL has no doubt been disappointing under Hoke, but this type of excuse making for a player not looking good is over the top. Football is football. Guys like Glasgow, Schofield, and Miller all made nice improvements under the previous staff. Hoke and Funk did not prevent Cole from looking good as a freshman. If the kid grew up under the roof of an NFL OL coach, he is the last person who would make lame excuses about not moving up the depth chart.
DeleteAfter watching Kugler the last couple spring scrimmages, I think there are more straightforward reasons he has yet to seriously compete for a starting role, despite UM's problems at C and G the last couple years. He does not look particularly powerful, aggressive, or quick. This year in particular, it was obvious that Glasgow was way ahead of him. I think Kugler may be comparable to Miller in that he is getting better and may one day develop into an average player.
SMDH. Hes a sophomore! He's probably going to start for Michigan within the next couple years.
DeleteIf Kugler is really the 6th highest OLmen, I think he should be ranked higher, going above some other starters who are interchangeable parts (e.g., RB, LB). If Braden falters or Cole gets hurt it could be Kugler who comes in with Glasgow and Magnuson sliding over.
ReplyDeleteBut we don't know where he stands yet relative to Dawson, etc. So overall this is a good rank for him.
I was one of those people that though Kugler could pass Miller, but Miller stepped up last year into a serviceable player. He's an example of why patience is necessary with OLmen. Most of them aren't going to be NFL caliber players that can start in their second or third year. There's a long history of quality starting OL-men who don't really emerge as even viable backups until their 3rd or 4th year and then turn into solid starters their 5th year.
Jack Miller will be missed this year because of the lack of depth, but I'm hopeful that our top 5 guys are all better than he was last year.
Kugler should, at the very least, get some work as a backup this year and hopefully we see signs that he can step in and start next year.
Of course, that brings up another point, that over the whole RR/Hoke debacle years, we've had relatively few games where we've been far enough ahead to give our backups decent playing time. That's a big detriment to player development, and especially so on the Oline, where, unlike the Dline, you typically don't rotate multiple guys or different packages in throughout the game. If it's close, your starting OLine is going to get basically all the snaps, and your backups get no game experience at all. It would be nice to see that start to change this year.
DeleteNot sure the in-game development in garbage time is that important, but I agree it would have been helpful.
DeleteRodriguez did have plenty of blowouts, problem was that sometimes we were on the wrong end of them. Hoke did not prioritize scoring enough points to put his team ahead comfortably and seemed to prefer games ended as soon as possible.