This Week in Badgers: Transfers, Returns and Relegation
Season 2 / Episode 15
Welcome to This Week in Badgers where we have not been banned from Twitter for our pro-Sorgi viewpoints. Yet. This week we’ll look at some player movement, past transfers and end with a deep dive on Big Ten realignment.
NEWS
This happened a week ago and I’m sure you’re tired of reading about it so I’ll be quick.
Jack Coan to Notre Dame!
Badger QB transferring to Notre Dame is a headline that in many scenarios would be an enormous story, especially when the teams play each other the next year! Something we talk about for years but this…feels sorta like sure, why not?
While I appreciate the Reverse Randy Wright, I don’t think Coan ever elicited enough emotion (good or bad) out of the fanbase that would make it a big deal when he left, and he seemed to leave on good terms with the team so no drama there. I haven’t seen any big Coan retrospectives or tribute columns online, people seemed to have moved on pretty quick.
Maybe he does a Russell Wilson impression and we revisit this a year from now. Maybe he’ll pull a Hornibrook and comment about how great it is to finally have receiving weapons, but for now it seems fine.
The Long Island Laser, remembered.
This Week in Badgers Roundup:
Bunch of announcements:
BACK: Pryor, Wilder and Burks
GONE: Rand, CVL, Burrell, Stokke, Loudermilk, Baynelly
WAITING ON: Danny Davis, Caesar Williams, Dunner, Groshek
I think that’s it, I might have missed someone. Not a whole lot to add, Pryor coming back is obviously the biggest headliner out of the group and all the other comings and goings were expected to some degree. Not sure where Danny Davis is leaning but he’d be the next big one. Groshek feels like a bigger deal now than before the Watson transfer, though landing Stepp would help there.
What else…
Reggie Pearson’s Dad is TWEETING
Isaac Guerendo missed most of the season for who knows what reasons but is POSTING working videos looking healthy and wearing Badger gear
You can APPLY to coach the Defensive Line
The Colorado State RAMS will be in Madison in 2026. This would have been a cool home and home but will settle for probably a good home game, who knows by 2026 we all might be dead.
I complained about projected Depth Charts last week but ENJOYED Jesse Temple’s crack at it. Bonus points for the snap count numbers from last year.
This one might be old news by the time you read this.
There’s not a whole lot of off-season drama so far and feel like Badger fans are going to overreact greatly to this decision whether he picks the Badgers or goes somewhere else.
Ebay Find of the Week
This seller had a ton of really cool stuff for sale and a collection that I really, really envied. I messaged him on one item but was too late, but this one…I don’t know about this one.
Ebay Find of the Week Part II
Oh no.
Let’s Remember Some Guys
Jack Coan transferring to Notre Dame got me thinking about other Badger transfers. Every year the Badgers have a handful of guys that transfer out but its pretty rare for them to lose a guy that ends up being an impact player elsewhere, it’s usually someone lower on the depth chart transferring to a school where they can get more playing time.
The Badgers are in the sweet spot of being good enough that players aren’t transferring to play at a higher level but they aren’t so good that 4 and 5 star guys are transferring because they’re blocked for playing time. The two* guys that come to mind for me that really went on to be great players elsewhere were Aaron Stecker and the guy we’re going to remember today, Shelby Harris.
*Others I considered: Aron Cruickshank, Kim Royston, Reggie Mitchell, David Gilbert, Manasseh Garner. We can quibble on the specifics, but feel like they were players that were fine after leaving Wisconsin but not really difference makers in the two-deep. Am I missing anyone obvious? I feel like I am missing an obvious 90s guy but I can’t think of it.
Shelby Harris was part of a strong in-state group in the 2009 recruiting class. 247 had him as the #2 recruit behind Jodran Kahout and ahead of Ryan Groy, Tyler Dippel and Travis Frederick. He came in at 235 lbs and a was set to be a DE in Dave Doeren’s 4-3 defense.
At the end of his Redshirt Freshman year he got into trouble with Kraig Appleton and Nick Hill, leading to a suspension from Bielema. It may have involved an altercation with their recreational substances distributor, if you were one to traffic in message board gossip. He took that as a cue to move on from Wisconsin and landed at Illinois State where he was great in 2011 and 2012, ending with 85 tackles, 7 sacks and 16 TFLs from the DT spot his last year there. The 85 tackles at DT seems impossible but we’ll get into FCS stat tracking some other day.
He was again kicked off a college team when Illinois State dismissed him the following spring and he didn’t play anywhere in the 2013 season.
From there its pretty interesting. After a year away from football he participated in Northwestern’s Pro Day at 30+ lbs heavier than his playing days at Illinois State (285 lbs from 255) and ran a 4.88 40 yard dash. That was enough for the Raiders to take a chance on him in the 7th round. Looking back at it, it seems surprising he was able to get drafted with his red flags from the two schools and pro day numbers that were fine but nothing crazy. The Raider blog at the time noted they couldn’t even find a highlight video for him.
He stuck it out in NFL practice squad purgatory from 2014-2016 before landing on the Broncos in 2017 where really started to make his mark. This year he was a full time starter this year with some Pro Bowl buzz before getting injured. Of course very understandable why he wasn’t going to work out at Wisconsin, but quite the journey to NFL regular status.
Shelby Harris, remembered.
Big Ten Relegation
The best way to kick off an off-season that will be filled with dumb ideas is by coming up with a truly dumb idea — new and constantly changing Big Ten divisions. The recently completed 2020 season featured cancelled rivalry games, December football, “Championship Weekend” and all sorts of previously taboo ideas, so why not put everything on the table and get it right?
My idea: Big Ten Relegation
I’ll admit I roll my eyes when soccer bros on Twitter make arguments about relegation for American sports. Great idea but no, the Minnesota Twins are not going to move down to AAA after a bad season and an NBA team that got $500m in taxpayer money for an arena isn’t going to swap spots with a G-League team, ever.
However, if we’re using the concept as a scheduling framework in college sports, I think it would be awesome.
Logistics of Big Ten Relegation:
Following the season the conference is divided into two 7 team divisions. Division A has the top 7 teams from the previous year, Division B has the bottom 7 teams.
The following Fall each team will play the other 6 teams in their division, plus 3 teams from the other division for a total of 9 conference games. Priority for the “crossover games” will go to trophy/rivalry games.
Once the season starts the standings are kept as if the Big Ten is one big conference without Division A/B or East/West distinctions.
The top 2 teams, regardless of division they started at, meet in the B1G Championship game
Ok I’ll get to the point
Here’s what the 2020 Divisions would have looked like, using the 2019 standings.
Obviously the benefit of this is the best get to play the best every year. The weaker teams will still get 3 games against Division A, but also get to play more teams closer to their previous year level.
Let’s look at a couple of sample schedules, first the toughest (Wisconsin) and the weakest (Rutgers).
Does either school say no to that? It gives the Badgers the top competition they want, it gives Rutgers a couple of top teams but more games they can be competitive in. There’s no reason they need to lose by 70 to Ohio State every year.
The current downside to the Badgers playing a tough schedule is other teams in the Big Ten West might have it easier so they are at a disadvantage when it comes to winning the West and making the B1G Champ game. With Relegation, their peer group are all a similar schedule so it is less of an issue.
You could have a team from Division B use the softer schedule to make a run at the top of the standings, which would be great! They’d still have to prove they belonged the next year. If you get hurt by a tough schedule, the next year it may be easier. Variety is the spice of life.
Some other advantages:
Better games! It sucks that the Big Ten West Championship often comes down to who didn’t play Ohio State. This almost guarantees the best games possible.
Resume booster! An undefeated Wisconsin team that beat Penn State, Michigan and Ohio State isn’t a question mark for the playoffs, they’re in. The SOS boost makes it easier for 1 loss teams to get in as well, we’ve seen Ohio State struggle with this in past years.
Division B teams have easier path to Bowl Eligibility. That’s the goal for Illinois, Rutgers, Nebraska, Maryland and others and it is much easier to get to 6 wins when playing teams at your level and reducing the number of automatic losses
Gives mid-tier teams something to play for. The entire conference is still playing for something in November. You can brag about 5 straight Division A finishes or Nebraska can fire Frost for 7 straight years of Division B.
The two best teams play for the Championship, we’re not bound by arbitrary divisions.
Some disadvantages
If you’ve made it this far you’re probably internally screaming WHAT ABOUT THE RIVALRIES. Even if teams are split across the divisions they can probably make a rivalry fit in to one of the crossover games, and if they can’t fit it in, that’s OK too. We learned in 2020 that life goes on without rivalry games, and if Wisconsin is a really good team in Division A and Minnesota is a bad team in Division B, do they really have to play? I’d rather have a good team than a blah game against a “rival.”
Did we already try this with Legends/Leaders? Well, sort of. They tried to do a one time division set up based on program strength at the time and people hated it. My new setup is ever evolving and removes the focus on division standings and gets us back to the full conference standings, not divisions. Like the good old days. Now let’s talk about 1 pm start times.
Effect on non-conference. Not sure how big of issue this would be, but if the Badgers know they’re going to get a full slate of the Big Ten’s best do they still schedule Notre Dame and Alabama? I would hope so but I could see this being something that deters teams from going big with non-conference games
Would it incentivize losing? I don’t think so but I’m open to the idea that a team might not go all out if they want an easier schedule next year (I’m thinking of one boat rowing coach in particular). Maybe we can start a trend of giving coaches (or players…) bonuses for Division A appearances, give Division A teams an extra scholarship spot, or something like that.
B1G Champ game might lose some drama. You could have teams play in the last week of the season and then match up a week later. Not ideal, but I’d argue most of the Championship games have been pretty boring anyways. As long as Ohio State is running the show you might as well do everything possible to get the true #2 team in the B1G against them and not the 4th or 5th best team because they happen to be in the West which only happens when Northwestern makes it, never when Wisconsin does, of course.
Other logistical stuff
Probably a nightmare to figure out home/road games and could have situations where say, Michigan plays at Indiana back to back years. Which should be fine! We’ve already put up with inconsistencies like the Badgers not playing Michigan from 2011-2015. I think people would adjust to the schedules being wildly different from year to year as long as it gets the best matchups.
Longer road trips are possible with non-geographic based divisions
Won’t know schedule years in advance
I’m sure teams like Rutgers and Illinois like the ticket revenue when Michigan and Ohio State come to town and this might eliminate that. I’m not very sympathetic here, get better teams and problem solved.
These are all drawbacks but I think the advantages outweigh it and the logistical stuff will be routine to the to point that after a few years we’ll forget it was ever an issue. The NFL changes their schedule every year and the Big Ten was changing their schedule from week to week this year, there’s no reason they need to schedule games 10 years in advance.
Best teams play each other every year! One big conference! Let’s go!
Will this ever happen? Well, no. Not a shot in hell, at least now. Schools love schedule certainty and they love their rivalry games and this threatens both. Its at least a conversation starter. 2020 showed us that we can get creative and as the Hunger Games taught us, every revolution begins with a spark.
Quoting the Hunger Games is either a new low or high for this Newsletter, I’m not sure which.
We’ll cut it there. Thanks for reading.
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Go Badgers.