Scott Bell's Newsletter

We’re nearing the home stretch of my 8-part series breaking down all of the major position groups in the Big Ten. I’ll roll out previews for LB and DB today and this weekend, respectively, and then this weeks-long series will end in the first installment of what will become my weekly Big Ten power rankings on Thursday, Sept. 3 leading up to Michigan’s opener. ICYMI — the first five parts of the series are live and can be found HERE (QBs), HERE (RBs), HERE (WRs), HERE (OL) and HERE (DL).

A couple quick announcements at the top, before I get around to sharing audio from my weekly radio appearance on WTKA with Sam Webb and Ira Weintraub from earlier this week. First, today was going to be the day I rolled out Part 6 of my Big Ten positional season preview series (a look at LBs). I’m actually going to bump that (as well as Part 7 on DBs) to next week.

Don’t look now, but we’re already halfway through my 8-part series breaking down all of the major position groups in the Big Ten. This weeks-long series will end in the first installment of what will become my weekly Big Ten power rankings. On Monday, I wrapped up previews on the offensive side of the ball with a look at offensive line. You can read that HERE.

Last Monday, I kicked off an 8-part series that will play out over the next few weeks and will break down all of the major position groups in the Big Ten — and end in my first installment of what will become my weekly Big Ten power rankings — with Parts 1, 2 and 3 covering Big Ten QBs on Monday, RBs on Wednesday and WRs on Friday. If you missed it, you can check them out HERE (QBs), HERE (RBs) and HERE (WRs).

Earlier this week, I kicked off an 8-part series that will play out over the next three weeks and will break down all of the major position groups in the Big Ten — and end in my first installment of what will become my weekly Big Ten power rankings — with parts 1 and 2: a breakdown of Big Ten QBs on Monday and one on RBs on Wednesday. If you missed it, you can check them out HERE (QBs) and HERE (RBs).

Earlier this week, I kicked off an 8-part series that will play out over the next three weeks and will break down all of the major position groups in the Big Ten — and end in my first installment of what will become my weekly Big Ten power rankings — with part 1: a breakdown of Big Ten QBs. If you missed it, you can check it out HERE. Now comes the second part, which is a look at the RB position across the Big Ten.

After a week away for vacation, I returned to the airwaves Monday morning to chat with Sam Webb and Ira Weintraub on WTKA in Ann Arbor. This week’s appearance was relatively short and sweet — a ~15 minute chat about the outlook for the Big Ten this fall, with some Detroit Lions talk sprinkled in at the end. You can listen to the full appearance HERE. Also: Keep your eyes on your inbox overnight, too.

We’re now less than four weeks away from actual Michigan football games being played. After an offseason full of headlines that had next to nothing to do with the on-field product (both from a Michigan perspective and in terms of the Big Ten and college football product as a whole), I’m thrilled to get to write about some actual X’s and O’s in this space.

A quick programming note at the top: The Bell family is about to head off to the Bahamas for the first week of August. That means no radio appearance on WTKA Monday morning and there won’t be any newsletters coming out this week. With Big Ten Media Days happening in Chicago this week, though, and with the Warde Manuel news finally behind us, this felt l…

This time last week, Michigan announced that Warde Manuel would be stepping down at the end of the calendar year. The news that Manuel would be departing has felt like an inevitability for most people in recent months. It wasn’t really a case of what the end result would be. But rather, it was a case of how we’d get to that point and whether the parting of ways would be mutual, forced, cordial or something else on the separation spectrum.