The 3-2-1 from B1G Media Days

CHICAGO - Three things we learned about Michigan State football during Big Ten Media Days, two questions and one prediction:

1. Team chemistry and collective will are back in high gear.

This stuff might be overrated and impossible to gauge to those of us on the outside, but coaches swear about the importance of team chemistry and unity.

Dantonio always likes his team’s chemistry at this time of the season, but I swear he is more impressed than usual about his team’s workmanlike attitude and togetherness when discussing the 2019 Spartans at Big Ten Media Days.

He didn’t pound his fist on the podium and make promises. Usually, he leaned forward, softened his voice to a lower tone and spoke with a sincerity that made it sound like he didn’t care whether the listeners believed him or not, but he knew the truth.

“When I talk about our team’s attitude and their care for each other, I mean there is a tremendous attitude from within that has grown and just keeps growing that people are for other people,” Dantonio said. “They feel good about each other and they feel good about where they’re at, and that’s a positive thing. When you’re the coach in that capacity, it makes you feel special. It doesn’t guarantee winning, I understand that. I feel like they are going to do everything they can. They have thus far.”

Pause. His tone softens, almost in forewarning.

“We’ll be right there,” he said.

Right there meaning right in contention for the trophies his teams have gathered in the past.

It’s all reminiscent of the summer of 2013 when Dantonio divulged that long-time strength coach Ken Mannie had told him several times in previous weeks that there was something special about that team. It was all gaining shape beneath the public radar, but within full view of those overseeing the program.

That was the team that won the Big Ten, won the Rose Bowl and finished the season ranked No. 3 in the country. If there had been a College Football Playoff that year, Michigan State likely would have been invited to it, and Dantonio would have two CFP appearances by now. The man can orchestrate. He has an ear and an eye. His senses tell him something is up this year.

“I have been so impressed, probably more impressed than in any of my 13 years here as head coach, with the way our players have gone about their business off the field and in practice and in workouts," Dantonio said. "I mean there is a sense of accountability from within. You see a hand behind the line (before a drill rep), there is nobody putting a hand over the line (to cheat forward). They do it with a passion and they do it with a positivity that is quite remarkable.”

It starts with the defense.

“They are unusual,” he said of a unit that ranked No. 10 in the nation in total defense last year. “They are very unique. They are playing to a higher level.”

Dantonio has had great defenses at Michigan State, Top 10 defenses, championship defenses. But this group gives him a different twinkle in the eye.

“I like our guys because they get their hands dirty,” he said. “They’re not satisfied with where they’re at. We have guys that have an intense amount of pride in the work that they do, and that equates to job done.

“These guys don’t settle. It doesn’t mean we will win but it means we will have opportunities.”

The Spartans were borderline great on defense last year. Nine starters are back on that side of the ball. They are confident but they are not full of themselves. Dantonio knows he can poke and prod them, challenge them to reach for more.

Example:

Dantonio heard that preseason All-America defensive end Kenny Willekes made a statement that Spartan quarterback Brian Lewerke has to have his best year this season.

Dantonio agreed with Willekes, and he turned the challenge around back onto Willekes. Dantonio pointed a motivational finger at Willekes and said, “And I’m going to tell them (the media) that Kenny Willekes has to have his best year as a Spartan.”

Willekes pointed his finger back at Dantonio and said, “You tell ‘em.”

Challenge accepted.

“That’s the kind of person he is,” Dantonio said. “And so is Joe Bachie, and Raequan Williams, and really Josiah Scott, and really Mike Panasiuk, and really David Dowell, and I could go on. They are not satisfied with where they’re at."

And the offense? That’s what will determine whether this team is a spoiler in the Big Ten East, or a contender to win it.

“You need to assess where you’re at, adjust and reset the button and go,” Dantonio said. “And I think our players have done that. I’ve been very impressed with how our offense has taken to the challenge.”

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2. The offensive system and philosophy have been 'revamped'

Anyone who watched the Redbox Bowl knows Michigan State changed its offensive system for at least one game. Anyone who watched the Green-White Game could see that the changes have moved forward under new offensive coordinator Brad Salem.

In Chicago, Dantonio expanded a little bit about the offensive forecast for 2019.

“Yeah, I think people will notice a difference,” he said. “Our offensive coaches have done a great job revamping our system and philosophy and now we have to put that into more of a game-to-game, week-to-week type situation.”

Dantonio announced in early January the hiring of Salem and the demotion of former co-coordinator Dave Warner back to his previous position as quarterbacks coach. But Dantonio hadn’t gone as far as to say the offensive system and philosophy were being revamped. You could see it on the field, but Dantonio had never described it that way.

Many critics assumed that since Dantonio hired from within, the offense would remain largely the same. Those critics didn’t watch the Green-White Game, or didn’t pay attention.

I asked Dantonio to expand on what he meant in terms of “revamping the offensive system and philosophy,” but he pivoted and changed the subject to his cuff links.

After finishing his story about the cuff links, which once belonged to Biggie Munn, Dantonio said, “next question.” That meant he wasn’t interested in revisiting my original question, nor was he willing to field a follow-up question on the change in offensive philosophy. Fair enough, for now.

The Redbox Bowl marked the first time Michigan State had played down-after-down of no-huddle offense.

“That’s something that everybody in America does and I just thought there needed to be some change,” Dantonio said. “In that point in time, that was one of the changes, along with pistol (formation). We moved to that direction.”

That was with Warner. Now the direction continues with Salem.

“I’m not going to disrupt an offensive coordinator’s ability to call a game," Dantonio said. "I maintain the same approach that I always have. I’m going to have some feelings on, ‘Okay, we’re going to do this, and we’re going to do that, and these things need to happen.’ And I’m going to bring things that I’ve seen from a defensive standpoint that are difficult to defend into that.”

But this will be Salem’s offense, under Dantonio’s acknowledgement that a revamped philosophy was needed.

“I talk to them between series and say, ‘Hey, we need to this,’ or, ‘We need to run the ball here,'" Dantonio said. "I never called the plays (in the past), other than an occasional trick.”

After last year’s struggles, critics wanted firings and the hiring of outsiders. Any outsiders. Just blood, please.

Dantonio was asked if choosing not to fire staff members and hire from the outside could harm his legacy.

“No. I really don’t,” Dantonio said. “ I think my legacy is intact.”

And he believes strongly in the thought process behind his staff changes.

“I look at our coaches’ evaluations this spring and I look back at what’s on their resumés and things that they’ve been able to accomplish and I would argue that (in the case of new offensive line coach Jim Bollman) having coached 44 players on the offensive line that played in the NFL is pretty spectacular,” Dantonio said. “Dave Warner was the offensive coordinator for the most productive offense in the history of Michigan State football. I could go on and on through every single coach. They have had extraordinary accomplishments and production. They are good teachers. There needs to be a little bit of a change or tweak but in my mind I’m banking on peoples’ relationships with the individuals. Things are changing philosophically but at the same time they were able to keep their individuality.”

Dantonio sought to latch onto the modern trend of uptempo offenses, single-back formations, and run-pass options. Nick Saban made a similar choice at Alabama in 2014. That year, Saban hired Lane Kiffin as offensive coordinator. Saban had met with former Ohio State offensive coordinator Tom Herman, after Herman had taken the head coaching job with Houston. They discussed the offense Herman used in helping the Buckeyes beat Alabama the previous year in the College Football Playoff.

Saban decided to make changes in his system to incorporate more no-huddle spread, and less two-back power. Saban told Kiffin, and his offensive staff, to learn the no-huddle spread, the RPOs, the things that had given Alabama's defense problems. Kiffin hadn't been a no-huddle practitioner in the past. Most coaches are learning this stuff on the fly, studying their peers, sharing ideas. Kiffin was no different. Salem is no different.

Dantonio, who values coaching continuity in a way similar to Clemson’s Dabo Swinney, chose to pursue offensive change with the people he had in-house rather than outsourcing.

“I think it’s very difficult when you start over and you say, ‘Okay, we’re going to hire a whole new offensive staff. Let’s take the next months to do that,’” Dantonio said. “Well, there’s two months that you’re not working toward a solution.

“Then you bring in people and they don’t know who No. 27 is from No. 32, off the field and on the field. There’s a lot of power in having the knowledge of what’s just occurred and how to fix it, and I’m banking on that being fixed.

“When you hire people that you don’t know, there’s a big unknown there. I know who’s honorable. I know that these guys will work and that these guys will care about their players. I know these guys will do more for their players off the field than on the field. There’s a cinergy in that.”

Dantonio acknowledged that it wasn’t easy to demote Warner and former offensive line coach Mark Staten to tight ends coach.

“It was difficult because I had to unseat people, but in doing that I also allowed people to maintain their relationships with players, and our players with them," Dantonio said. "There needed to be a change of scenery to some degree and I put people back in their supreme area of expertise. It’s where they became an expert. I’m banking on that and I’m banking on them being good teachers and being patient people because at the end of the day, guys, it’s players that make plays. I’m not pinning it on the players, but there has to be a system in place that they operate, but players need to catch the ball and run with the ball and tackle. They need to make plays. That’s part of it.

“Our coaches didn’t need to be motivated, but I thought they handled the change like soldiers and they went to work."

Dantonio seemed as eager to change the offense as MSU fans.

"We had a lot of injuries last year but the bottom line is you need to have more production on offense," Dantonio said. "You can’t lose games 7-6 or 9-6 or 16-13. You need to have some more production. That’s just the reality of the game. That’s true for head coaches as well. I understand that this is a big boy’s game and a big boy’s league. With that being said, I believe in our coaches and I’m loyal to our coaches and I believe in them completely as teachers and their football knowledge. They understand the game.

“Sure it’s difficult. I think it’s difficult for all of them. But sometimes you have to make decisions as the head coach and this was the possible solution that I came up with, and by doing it, I think it was the best thing that I could do. I just do.”

3. Michigan State staff members visited Clemson for ideas.

Dantonio has had open lines of communication with Swinney for years. Have Michigan State coaches bent Swinney’s ear for offensive concepts, this year or in the past? That’s a fair bet, although that information is not for public consumption or confirmation.

As for Dantonio's most recent trip to Clemson, he and Michigan State athletic department officials accompanied Dantonio for a visit to Clemson this summer. They toured Clemson’s facilities, and discussed Clemson’s take on gameday atmosphere. Michigan State is searching for ways to make the gameday environment more palatable for its customers.

Michigan State has looked at Penn State’s gameday environment and discussed PSU’s use of loud rock music. PSU cranks it up between plays.

The use of loud music piped through stadium speakers during times previously reserved for the Spartan band infiltrated the gameday experience for Michigan State basketball games at Breslin Center this year. I thought the change was obnoxious and terrible, but I’m not the target demographic.

Could that kind of noise be coming to Spartan Stadium? We won’t know until the season opener against Tulsa.

“We had a gameday atmosphere meeting this week, trying to change some different things,” Dantonio said last Thursday. “Our administration is looking at all the different things along with our help to try to do that.”

It all relates to the national trend of declining attendance.

“I don’t want to be negative but I think apathy exists in America, and impatience exists in America,” Dantonio said. “There’s a trend there, but I think you see that trend in high school, too. Maybe it’s that there are so many other sports or so many other things to do that they can watch it on social media. I don’t really know the reasons for it, I just know it exists in society.”

Dantonio has always spoke kindly about the fans who attend games, rather than obsess about those who don’t attend. Dantonio wants to make sure those who attend are active participants.

“So you come to games and you get a little bit tired, you have to push through,” he said. “Spartan Nation will push through.”

As for facilities, Clemson’s embarrassment of riches in that area are unmatched at any level of football.

“I took Alan Haller, Chuck Sleeper and Bill Beekman over to Clemson, because I’ve been there before and I saw the results of their program,” Dantonio said. “What Clemson did is they were right where we were in the playoffs, and then they capitalized on that and they went further. They changed the game from there.

“They built a brand new facility. I think those are the things that probably need to happen at Michigan State at some point. Everybody is operating in new facilities with new expansion. So at some point in time we are going to have to move on that. I would prefer it to be now but that’s not up to me.”

There are rumors and buzz that something is in progress at Michigan State regarding Spartan football facilities.

“I do think there is a grassroots movement, not within the athletic administration, but among others at the university that indicate that there is a push for that,” Dantonio said. “But that’s not for me to announce or anything like that. I’m just trying to be a guy that if somebody says, ‘Hey do you want a new facility?’ ‘Yeah, I’m down with that. Let’s go.’

“So that’s where I’m at and I want to do all I can to make and keep Michigan State in a place where they are a ‘have’ and not a ‘have not.’”

1. When will Mark Dantonio retire?

The short answer: Not any time soon. It’s hard to envision him abruptly stepping down like Bob Stoops or Urban Meyer. That’s not his style.

Dantonio was asked in Chicago if he had a timeline on when he would like to retire.

“No I really don’t,” Dantonio said. “I tell recruits and I guess I tell you guys here I live in the present. I like my job, I like my players. I really care for my players and I care for our coaches. And as long as they aren’t causing too many problems, I’m going to keep doing what I’m doing as long as I feel good, and I feel really well.”

As for the concept of life after football, it has crossed his mind - and he can't visualize it right now.

“I have thought about that,” Dantonio said. “My wife says that all the time: ‘You’re not ready. you’re not ready. What are you going to do all day?’

“So yeah, I guess I’ll know when it happens.”

Can he foresee the circumstances that would lead to that decision?

“The moment? I guess at some point when you feel like maybe somebody else is better-suited to lead,” he said. “I don’t know. I just go with the flow.”

The flow is still agreeing with him.

“Kids have changed in the last five years, things have changed them, media has changed,” Dantonio said. “But kids still have a passion, they still grow and it’s exciting for me to watch their growth.

“The season changes. You’re not playing football for too long, then it’s recruiting, then it changes to critiquing, then it’s spring ball. There’s always new optimism, new things to chase. So those type of things in a lot of ways keeps you young.”

He still enjoys the chase, and he has a renewed zest to his step for the upcoming season.

2. Are there any surprises in the starting lineup?

Dantonio didn’t talk depth chart issues in Chicago. Those discussions with media will have to wait until the first day of practice on Aug. 1.

There aren’t many openings in the starting lineup on either side of the ball. Left guard on the offensive line was expected to be a point of competition with Tyler Higby as a returning starter and Luke Campbell as a former starter at other positions. Dantonio revealed that Higby underwent a procedure after spring football and is the only player on the roster who hasn’t been able to work out with the team this summer. Dantonio said Higby will likely return to the field in late August.

I was critical of Higby's performance in the Green-White Game. After hearing that he had health issues, his substandard performance in the spring game is more understandable, and I feel bad about making those criticisms.

Campbell has the opportunity to make a comeback into the starting lineup after vanishing from the playing group for the last half of 2018.

At left tackle, Dantonio said Cole Chewins is healthy and ready to go, after being held out of the Green-White Game. A.J. Arcuri is contender to push for a starting job at left tackle, where Chewins played last year, or right tackle, where Jordan Reid played.

Those stories will wait until August.

1. Michigan was the popular choice at Media Days as the favorite to win the Big Ten. I’ll take the field. Michigan fans need to keep their guard up and make sure they’re not getting catfished again.