\u201cThe Stampede,\u201d a podcast on the Texas Longhorns<\/a>, Michigan\u2019s interim head coachsaid the recent confluence of events \u2014 the abrupt firing of head coach Sherrone Moore on Dec. 10, a pending investigation into the football program and athletic department, and uncertainty around the head coach \u2014 may keep others from playing i the Dec. 31 game against Texas.<\/p>\n\u201cWe sent them home for Christmas yesterday (Monday), and I think there\u2019s a really good chance that we\u2019re going to have many more opt-outs for the game unfortunately,\u201d Poggi told co-hosts Mack Brown and Vince Young. \u201cBecause we\u2019re in such a state of flux, and when they get to this business of it, they think \u2018We don\u2019t have a coach, we\u2019ve had this situation with our former coach, there\u2019s investigations, all these things. I don\u2019t know who\u2019s going to coach me. Why do I want to play in that game?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n
\u201cI can see some of that happening. I would tell you, on the 26th, we\u2019re probably going to have a significantly different roster than we had yesterday when we sent them home.\u201d<\/p>\n
Michigan was already planning to play without defensive end Derrick Moore, linebacker Jaishawn Barham and offensive lineman Giovanni El-Hadi, Poggi revealed on Monday. Asked if he expected any other players to opt-out of the bowl game, Poggi said no. <\/p>\n
So, what changed? Poggi seems to suggest that families and agents may work to convince the players to stay home during the holiday break as Michigan works to sort everything out. Moore\u2019s firing over an extramarital affair with a staffer has created a ripple effect in the football program, triggering a coaching search that has come up empty so far, the departure of the team\u2019s offensive coordinator. <\/p>\n
It also has athletic director Warde Manuel pressing pause on all financial agreements, Poggi said. <\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re not able to give anybody a financial agreement because we don\u2019t have a permanent coach,\u201d said Poggi, who lobbied for the permanent job during a news conference on Monday. <\/p>\n
\u201cI probably shouldn\u2019t say this, but I say a lot of things I probably shouldn\u2019t say: Everybody says the (transfer) portal opens on the 2nd \u2026 those deals are being made right now.\u201d<\/p>\n
Michigan is set to reconvene as a team and fly to Orlando on Friday, Dec. 26, with the team\u2019s next practice scheduled for Saturday. As for who will be there? <\/p>\n
Poggi isn\u2019t quite sure.<\/p>\n
\u201cI\u2019m thinking, honestly, there could be 25 guys possibly not come back. How do you do that?,\u201d Poggi said. \u201cWe\u2019re coming, (and) we will play hard. I don\u2019t know how many we\u2019ll come with, quite frankly, and I don\u2019t know how well we\u2019ll play. <\/p>\n
\u201cBut we\u2019ll play hard, and I want them to be able to say the rest of their lives (that) we went, we played really hard against a great opponent, and we gave it our all. When lesser men would have maybe not, and probably will not, be there on the 31st.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Biff Poggi revealed the names of three Michigan players who have opted out of the Citrus Bowl. Turns…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":368011,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[67],"tags":[1607,2662,6672,399,69004,180664,81207,1303,398,396,397,2806,10595,99,59234],"class_list":["post-368010","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-ncaa-football","tag-college-football","tag-college-sports","tag-cornhuskers","tag-football","tag-huskers","tag-memorial-stadium","tag-mens-sports","tag-michigan","tag-ncaa","tag-ncaa-football","tag-ncaafootball","tag-nebraska","tag-nu","tag-sports","tag-wolverines"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368010","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=368010"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/368010\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/368011"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=368010"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=368010"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/us\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=368010"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}