What started as a one-liner in a high school commencement speech in June has since turned into a mantra for Michigan football entering its second season under the direction of Jim Harbaugh.
"You should set your dreams so big that everybody laughs at them," the Wolverines head coach said at Big Ten media days, two weeks before repeating himself on the eve of Michigan's training camp. "And if nobody's laughing at them, then you didn't set your goals high enough."
Only there seems to be a small problem with Harbaugh's "us against the world" mentality.
As the 2016 season approaches, the expectations for the Wolverines have been no laughing matter.
Whether it's been ESPN.com's Mark Schlabach or Sports Illustrated's college football preview, Michigan has found itself a trendy playoff pick for those prognosticating the upcoming season. While Michigan was eighth in the preseason Amway Coaches Poll, several national media outlets—including Bleacher Report—propped the Wolverines up as the Big Ten's top team throughout this past offseason.
And perhaps rightfully so.
After all, this is a program that has plenty going for it as East Division rivals Ohio State and Michigan State find themselves stuck somewhere between rebuilding and reloading. Add in a highly touted defensive coordinator in Don Brown, an even more promising recruiting class and another year of player development under Harbaugh's watch, and it's easy to see how Michigan has become one of college football's most prominent preseason teams.
Having that Harbaugh guy around doesn't hurt either.
"With Harbaugh's track record and what he was able to do Year 1, I guess it just kind of comes with the territory," Michigan great and ESPN College GameDay analyst Desmond Howard told Bleacher Report. "It's just who he is and who he's proven to be. When you look at his resume, that's probably one of the main reason why expectations are so high."
But perhaps thanks to the attention their head coach attracts—especially in the offseason—important question marks about the Wolverines appear to be getting treated more like footnotes than the roadblocks they could become. With all the positive publicity, at this point it seems fair to ask: Has the hype for Michigan entering 2016 exceeded the reality it will face in the coming year?
With what we have available, let's take a look at whether what we—the media—have been saying about the Wolverines has been warranted entering the upcoming season.
The hype: Michigan has the most talented roster in the Big Ten
According to NFL.com draft analyst Chad Reuter, Michigan lays claim to the most NFL-caliber talent in its conference. Reuter ranks the Wolverines as possessing the sixth-most NFL talent in all of college football, one spot ahead of rival Ohio State.
"Jim Harbaugh has wasted no time turning the Wolverines into a recruiting power," Reuter wrote, "but he also has helped veterans reach their potential."
In particular, Michigan has been profusely praised for its strong secondary—ESPN ranked it as the nation's best—and what is widely regarded as the Big Ten's best receiving corps. Altogether, the Wolverines return 14 starters from last year's team—the third-most in the Big Ten—while also adding the nation's fifth-ranked recruiting class in the 2016 cycle.
If Michigan doesn't meet its goals in the coming year, lack of talent won't be the reason why.
The reality: From a talent standpoint, there's a lot to like in Ann Arbor
On the defensive side of the ball, the Wolverines return six starters from a unit that ranked fourth in the nation in 2015. At each level of the U-M defense, at least one or more key returnee can be found, including defensive end Chris Wormley, safety-turned-linebacker Jabrill Peppers and All-American cornerback Jourdan Lewis.
"They bring back one of the nation's best defenses," 247Sports director of recruiting and recruiting insider Steve Wiltfong said. "They have one of the best secondaries in America."
What's more is that of the few holes Michigan enters 2016 looking to fill, the Wolverines seem to have done so with players who have only improved the talent level of their defense.
Of the prospects who comprise U-M's highly touted 2016 class, those most likely to make an instant impact play on the defensive side of the ball. In 5-star defensive lineman Rashan Gary, the Wolverines possess not only the nation's top prospect, but a 6'5", 287-pound man-child capable of stepping in at any spot on the Michigan defensive line.
"The thing they're maybe lacking is a pass rush," Wiltfong said. "But then you also have Rashan Gary who can bring that across the front. He was maybe the missing piece on defense."
At linebacker, the Wolverines already find themselves more athletic than they were a year ago, not only thanks to the addition of Peppers, but 4-star prospects Devin Bush and Carlo Kemp. But make no mistake—the star of the show when it comes to the Michigan linebackers will be Peppers, a do-it-all Swiss army knife who is now being used as a pass-rusher in new defensive coordinator Don Brown's attack-heavy scheme.
"I've already seen how effective he is at that," Harbaugh said of Peppers' new role.
Considering Brown oversaw a Boston College defense that ranked as the nation's best a year ago, it's safe to say the Wolverines are in good hands, even following the departure of former defensive coordinator and new Maryland head coach D.J. Durkin.
Offensively, the Wolverines are even more experienced, with eight returning starters, four of whom come on an offensive line that should only see additional improvement with another year of development under the direction of offensive line coach Tim Drevno. Michigan's front five is also deeper than it was a year ago, thanks to the addition of 4-star offensive tackle Ben Bredeson, the nation's fifth-ranked player at his position in the 2016 class.
From a skill-position standpoint, you'd be hard-pressed to find a more experienced group in not just the Big Ten, but perhaps all of college football. Senior wide receivers Jehu Chesson and Amara Darboh and tight end Jake Butt make up three of the conference's top 10 returning leaders in receptions from a year ago, while junior Maurice Ways and sophomore Grant Perry should each help add some much-needed depth.
"They added more speed at receiver," Wiltfong said. "I think you'll see some of those freshmen complement the veterans they bring back."
In the running game, the Wolverines will once again rely on De'Veon Smith (753 yards, six touchdowns in 2015), but don't count out freshman Kareem Walker or Peppers to receive their fair share of carries.
Yet despite all the apparent experience and ready-made additions on the Michigan roster, one significant unanswered question remains.
"These guys are good," Howard said of his alma mater's skill players. "But they gotta get somebody that can get them the ball."
The hype: It doesn't matter who plays quarterback for Jim Harbaugh
With stopgap solution Jake Rudock in the NFL, the Wolverines are entering 2016 unsure of who their starting quarterback will be for a second consecutive season.
In 2015, the situation worked itself out—and under Harbaugh's watch, it usually does. After all, this is the same head coach—and former pro quarterback—who turned Josh Johnson into an NFL-caliber quarterback at San Diego, helped develop Andrew Luck into a No. 1 overall pick at Stanford, got the most out of Alex Smith and Colin Kaepernick with the San Francisco 49ers and last season transformed Rudock from a grad transfer to a sixth-round pick in the 2016 NFL draft.
This has led many to theorize that regardless of who winds up behind center in Ann Arbor, the Wolverines should find themselves in good shape at quarterback in the coming year.
The reality: It's not always so simple
While Harbaugh's track record with players at his former position speaks for itself, that doesn't guarantee he'll replicate similar success in the future. Especially if the expectation is to win at the highest level, coaching development can only take a player so far—at a certain point, a player's own skill needs to come to the forefront.
"Obviously there's not a clear-cut guy, so that's why we're having this discussion," Howard said. "When you're going into camp and you still don't know who your starter is because no player has separated himself from the others, then to me, that's as much of an issue [as anything]."
That's not to say Harbaugh doesn't have options. Entering camp, Wilton Speight and John O'Korn had already emerged as the front-runners to succeed Rudock in the Wolverines huddle—those are two players who possess plenty of potential, albeit potential that remains untapped.
For Speight, the primary question centers around his inexperience, as the third-year holdover from Brady Hoke's final recruiting class enters his redshirt sophomore season with just 25 pass attempts—and nine completions—to his credit. Boding well for the 6'6", 243-pounder is that as Rudock's primary backup a year ago, Speight engineered a game-winning drive in Michigan's 29-26 win over Minnesota on the road.
In the case of O'Korn, the talent is more apparent. As a true freshman in 2013, the Fort Lauderdale, Florida, St. Thomas Aquinas product was named the American Athletic Conference's Rookie of the Year at Houston before a benching in his sophomore season paved the way for him to wind up in Ann Arbor a year ago.
But after NCAA transfer rules forced O'Korn to sit out the 2015 campaign, we're now two years removed from the last season the 6'4", 215-pounder spent as a team's primary starter.
For now, Speight and O'Korn appear to be on equal footing, with Shane Morris, Alex Malzone and Brandon Peters trailing behind. And if this Michigan quarterback competition mirrors last offseason's, we may not know who the starter will be until the Wolverines take the field against Hawaii on Saturday.
"You'd love for somebody to just take it and be like, 'Wow, we've got a guy. Let's roll with that,'" Michigan passing coordinator and quarterbacks coach Jedd Fisch said. "Do I think that's just going to happen? Eh, I think we've got a lot of guys that are battling right now."
For what it's worth, at this point a year ago, the Wolverines also didn't know who their starter would be, and Rudock wound up being what Fisch recently described as a "godsend" for the Michigan program. And Harbaugh's resume with signal-callers should inspire at least some optimism, just as it has for Butt, who will serve as one of the primary options for whoever it is who winds up as the Wolverines starter.
"It definitely helps, 'cause that's [Harbaugh's] specialty," Butt said. "I don't think there's really any concerns within our team. Both guys are very capable of getting the job done."
But until it's established who that starter will be, it will remain a question mark for Michigan nonetheless.
The hype: The Big Ten East and conference title are there for the taking
With games between Ohio State and Michigan State having played a key role in determining each of the past three Big Ten titles, the two most recent conference champions are seemingly due for down years.
"Ohio State's roster transitions so much, and people perceive Michigan State to lose a lot too—and don't get me wrong, they do," Wiltfong said. "So they think it's right there for Michigan to run the table."
In the case of the Buckeyes, head coach Urban Meyer's team is in the midst of replacing 71 percent of its total production from a year ago, according to SB Nation's Bill Connelly, including 12 draft picks, five of whom were first-round selections. Ohio State returns just six starters from last year's depth chart, with little experience to be found around quarterback J.T. Barrett on offense and middle linebacker Raekwon McMillan on defense.
Similarly, the Spartans are now without several key cogs from last year's playoff team, including quarterback Connor Cook, wide receiver Aaron Burbridge, left tackle Jack Conklin, center Jack Allen and defensive end Shilique Calhoun.
If ever there were a year to take advantage of a wide-open Big Ten, this would appear to be it.
The reality: To quote 'GameDay' analyst Lee Corso, 'Not so fast, my friend.'
While both the Buckeyes and Spartans lack experience, both programs have recruited at a rate that should allow them to quickly replenish their respective rosters. Over the course of the past four years, Meyer is 50-4 at Ohio State, while Mark Dantonio has won 11 or more games in four of the past five seasons in East Lansing—neither of which happens without head coaches capable of overcoming transitional periods in their programs.
Perhaps more concerning for Michigan when it comes to Meyer and Dantonio is that both head coaches started their respective rivalries against Harbaugh with wins over the Wolverines, although both games played out in different fashions.
"We all saw that game," Howard said of Michigan State's win over Michigan, which ended with a botched punt returned for a touchdown in the game's final seconds. "[If] the punter catches the ball, [then] Michigan beats Michigan State."
That may be true, but there's no getting around the 42-13 beatdown the Buckeyes put on the Wolverines in Harbaugh's first edition of "The Game" as a coach. Furthermore, Michigan will not only hit the road to play its two divisional rivals this season, but also reigning Big Ten West champion Iowa.
Not that Harbaugh seems to mind.
"I'm hard-pressed to think of anything better than to go into another team's stadium, compete against their team and their fans," Harbaugh said. "And if you can throw in the elements too, if you can throw in cold or rain or some kind of weather that you had to beat as well and then come out a victor, there's nothing better in life that I've found."
Could the Wolverines navigate a relatively tough conference schedule and put themselves in position to still have their playoff hopes alive heading into what would be the first Big Ten title game to not feature Michigan State or Ohio State since 2012? Given the advantage in experienced talent Michigan appears to possess, it's certainly possible.
The road to Indianapolis, however, might just be a little rougher than most people realize.
The hype: Michigan is back
Regardless of whether Michigan lives up to the expectations outside—or inside—of Ann Arbor for the Wolverines, Harbaugh has re-established his alma mater as a college football force to be reckoned with.
After seven combined years of the Hoke and Rich Rodriguez eras amounted to little else but false hope and plenty of heartbreak, college football's winningest program is back where it belongs as one of the sport's national powers and is set up for long-term success thanks to Harbaugh's apparent recruiting prowess.
In other words: Michigan is back.
The reality: They're on the right track under Harbaugh but still have plenty to prove entering 2016
"The perception is that Michigan is 'back.' I think the fact is you look back to last year, they got beat by Michigan State in a freak game, they got handled by Ohio State," former Minnesota head coach and now-Big Ten analyst Glen Mason told Bleacher Report. "Now, yes, they did play awfully well in the bowl game, but are they back? I'm not so sure."
One of the Wolverines' most prominent alums, Howard too is wary of a "playoff-or-bust" mentality for his alma mater entering the 2016 campaign.
"I think [the expectations] fall somewhere in between definitely winning 10 games, but along the way, probably winning 11 and winning the Big Ten championship," the 1991 Heisman Trophy winner said. "They've been picked so far by several people to win the conference championship, but I think it's also about beating Michigan State and/or Ohio State too."
Falling short of those goals would certainly raise red flags should Harbaugh enter the third year of his Ann Arbor tenure without a win over either rival, but at the same time, you could say that about several college programs. As Michigan learned in just the span of a year, perceptions can shift rapidly, just as they did when the Wolverines doubled their win total in their first season with Harbaugh on the sidelines.
Where Michigan is viewed in the national landscape will change for better or worse in the coming year, but at the least, the Wolverines have already seen an increase in talent, as well as an improvement in culture under the watch of their new head coach.
"You saw Michigan in Year 1 win 10 ballgames with a roster that Harbaugh basically inherited," Wiltfong said. "They developed those guys in Year 1, and they'll continue to do that in Year 2. I expect Michigan to be better on the offensive line and certainly on defense; they bring back one of the nation's best defenses."
Just how far that will take the Wolverines in 2016 will be determined in the coming months, but the talent, coaching and timing are all there for Michigan to make good on Harbaugh's dare-to-dream mindset.
So too, however, are potential roadblocks for a roster still without a starting quarterback preparing to play its three toughest games of the season all away from the friendly confines of Michigan Stadium.
Is that enough to warrant laughing at the Wolverines for having national championship aspirations? That's for you to decide.
But if you do, Harbaugh has a message for you as well.
"Everybody has critics," Harbaugh said. "Screw 'em. They're irrelevant."
Ben Axelrod is Bleacher Report's Big Ten lead writer. You can follow him on Twitter @BenAxelrod.
Unless noted otherwise, all quotes were obtained firsthand. Recruiting and class ratings courtesy of 247Sports' composite ratings.
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