Josh Pate of 247Sports talks about hypothetical drop in Michigan football performance in 2024

Michigan is atop college football after the program’s first national championship in 26 years. The Wolverines are enjoying a mini-golden age after three consecutive Big Ten titles and three straight wins over Ohio State before peaking with the national title.

Even though head coach Jim Harbaugh and a number of influential players have left the NFL, expectations and excitement remain high in Ann Arbor.

Last weekend, Josh Pate, host of the 247Sports college football podcast, asked, “What if Michigan gets a quality quarterback in 2024?” On Tuesday, Pate went the other way, essentially asking, “What if the Wolverines go 8-4 this fall?”

“It bears repeating that Michigan had a pretty historic year last year, and then a historic head coach and historic players had to leave,” Pate said. “You look at your preview magazines right now and Michigan is highly rated. Michigan is one of the favorites for the Big Ten championship. They’re one of the favorites for the College Football Playoff… Michigan will probably be in the mix this year.

“What if Michigan has a slightly larger decline than expected this year?” Pate asked.

The podcast host pointed out that while an 8-4 season sounds like a bad year for the Wolverines, bookmakers at sportsbook FanDuel put Michigan’s overall win odds at 8.5 in early July.

“If you ask me, ‘What if Michigan isn’t quite as good as the fans hope?’ I would say, ‘That’s college football,'” Pate said.

While others see a four-loss season as an indictment of new head coach Sherrone Moore, Pate also rejected that assumption.

“Take Sherrone Moore out of the equation for a moment — if Jim Harbaugh was still there this year and you had let so many influential players go, I would expect a Jim Harbaugh-led Michigan team to fall back down to earth a little bit this year,” Pate said. “So if that happens, I’m not going to bat an eyelid.”

While preparing for the podcast, Pate said one of his staff members asked, “What happens if an 8-4 or 7-5 season negatively impacts UM’s recruiting?”

“I said to that, if an 8-4 season is going to throw Michigan’s recruiting class off track, then they don’t have the right personnel up there — and I think they have the right personnel,” Pate said. “It feels pretty good and they have an opportunity — with a couple months (until National Signing Day) — to improve this cycle.”

Pate further explained that programs with good recruiting teams that fail to meet expectations in practice can turn that recruiting failure into an advantage.

“It usually works the other way around,” he said. “If you’re struggling on the field but you have top-notch resources and a halfway decent staff, they can sell playing time, they can sell opportunities, they can sell vision and future and whatnot. I highly doubt an 8-4 season would hurt Michigan’s recruiting profile at all. But if it did, that would be a stronger indication that we’re struggling than just the fact that they went 8-4.”

Pate then pointed to Michigan’s schedule, which includes games against Texas, Oregon and Ohio State (all likely preseason top-five teams), as well as a home game against USC and an away game at Washington.

“There are several games here that can be lost. 8-4 is not a crazy year. If Michigan underperforms, it’s not the end of the world.”

Michigan could be one of the biggest “question mark” teams in the country in 2024. Pate has suggested that the Wolverines could be in the running to defend their title if their future starting quarterback has a top-notch season, and he also suggested that an 8-4 record would not be a surprise.

The fact is, it will be several years before we know what caliber Michigan’s program will reach under his leadership. A season of double-digit wins would suggest the Wolverines made no mistakes in the transition from Harbaugh to Moore. Still, even a major step back in 2024 shouldn’t be a cause for concern in and of itself.

The full segment of “Late Kick with Josh Pate” referenced in this article can be viewed in the video below:

– For more coverage of the Michigan Wolverines, visit Michigan Wolverines On SI –

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