December 2010

Run Defense vs. Mississippi State

The most terrifying bit of the game lies in here. You've heard it before but: this offense is Illinois part II. Chris Relf is a big, stocky runner with some talented sidekicks in a system that runs a ton of option until you freak out about it, then nails you for freaking out about it. They also effectively deploy the new hot thing in college football:

This isn't a veer of any sort but it is inverted,—the quarterback is the upfield threat—power-ish,—backside tackle(!) pulls around—and effective. Their running game is as diverse and almost as hard to stop as Michigan's. Michigan finished the year 11th, MSU 16th. The "almost" comes with a deeper look at the numbers: MSU runs a freaking ton, with 561 carries on the year against just 265 passes. That's a hefty 68% run rate reminiscent of Pat White's days at West Virginia. The Bulldogs average a full yard less per carry than Michigan, and that's a large chunk of the reason FEI has Michigan the #2 offense in the country and Mississippi State #72.

You can chalk that up to a distinct lack of Denard Robinson. Chris Relf is more Cam Newton than Robinson, albeit a version of Cam Newton without the ability to run away from Patrick Peterson. He's a tough inside runner with good vision and the occasional sweet move downfield but he's not a bolt of lightning. The reason MSU runs so much inverted stuff is to take advantage of his interior power.

On the outside the answer was a combination of Vick Ballard and LaDarius Perkins. Ballard is the team's leading rusher with around 900 yards, with Relf at 700 and Perkins at 500 and guys down the list picking up spare yards here and there. Michigan won't see slot receiver extraordinaire Chad Bumphis due to injury, so his role taking end-arounds, reverses, and jet sweeps figures to fall to Perkins. He's he fastest guy they've got left. Blue Seoul:

He's extremely dangerous on edge running plays.  Especially the sweep.  Expect him to carry the ball 5-10 times.  But they'll probably have another 5-10 plays designed to go to him on either screens, wheel routes, or some other trickery.

With the extra practices, expect him to line up in the slot and then motion around, possibly to the backfield or to get the ball on a jet sweep.

Ballard is more of a north-south guy with good top end speed but not a whole lot of wiggle. Watch if MSU tips their option plays by tailback—Blue Seoul says Ballard was de-emphasized as the pitch guy as the season went along because he had a tough time maintaining the proper relationship with the QB.

Michigan will also have to watch for the shovel. While technically a pass play it's more like a different twist on the triple option. Remember that TE Gonzalez getting guaranteed first downs for Florida by pulling across the formation and taking a shovel pitch from Tim Tebow? Yeah, that has migrated over to Mississippi State. MSU lacks a TE with ridiculous athleticism so they will align in a wing set with one of the tailbacks as an H-back and then run the shovel away from the strength of the formation.

The MSU offensive line seems pretty mediocre to me but as he got deeper into the Bulldog season Blue Seoul came away with a certain appreciation for the tackles and center. Not so much the guards or the depth:

The only weak spot is #62. He is a good run blocker, but has made several mistakes in pass protection. I suggest running a lot of two man stunts or blitzes on his side making him choose who to block and who to let go.

There seems to be a significant talent/experience dropoff when the backups come in. In the one game where they had to shuffle linemen around because of injuries, Ballard was held in check and things were not pretty.

As far as Michigan goes, who knows what the hell we'll see. Everyone's pulling for a four-man line and whatnot but this actually seems like a game the 3-3-5 was built for—a matchup against a dedicated spread rushing attack. Expect to see Jordan Kovacs in the box 90% of the time on running downs as Michigan deploys an extra man on the edge in an attempt to slow down the option they couldn't against Illinois. Kovacs made some critical mistakes in that game that were compounded by the youth of a freshly-inserted Ray Vinopal and an odd scheme that saw Jonas Mouton rendered mostly useless.

Michigan's best hope for a surprisingly good performance rests in the ankles of Mike Martin, which have been pronounced 100%. If he can go full bore we'll see the combination of Actual Mike Martin and Kenny Demens we never really got in the regular season. Greg Robinson will line Demens up two feet from the guard and get him obliterated but I'm saying there's a chance of usefulness.

Key Matchup: Jordan Kovacs and Cam Gordon against the option. The edge safeties will be key players against a play Michigan struggled badly against in the Illinois game. They've got to correct their mistakes.

Pass Defense vs. Mississippi State

I don't think you're supposed to hold it like that.

Here's the other bit of why FEI is so down on the MSU offense relative to Michigan's:

CHRIS RELF

That is a UFR chart of Relf's performance against Kentucky and it's basically on par with Denard Robinson… as a freshman. You remember what that was like. It wasn't very good. Massive caveat: that was by far the worst game of the season for Relf. I did the Arkansas game, too, and here it is:

CHRIS RELF

That's better but still pretty ugly. Relf ended up 20 of 30 for 224 yards, which is a decent 7.4 YPA. His receivers dropped no easy ones—they could have bailed him out on two or three bad throws—and his deep balls were wildly off target. His successes came mostly on plays where he had all day in the pocket and could zing darts across the middle of the field, and on several plays he was reduced to ineffective scrambling after holding the ball a long, long time.

His two key deficiencies as a passer are that tendency and his total inability to hit deep balls. Blue Seoul suggests putting the corners in all inside leverage all the time and blitzing like Manny Diaz is in charge and I agree—in third and long situations Michigan should drop eight only as a changeup and send waves of blitzers, playing the percentages when it comes to Relf and tough throws.

At receiver, with Bumphis out the main guys are Chris Smith and Arceto Clark, with Brandon Heavens a third option. All are sophomores that seem pedestrian, though it's hard to tell given the limited opportunities they receive. They don't get much downfield separation but seem sure-handed.

Pass protection has not been good. Despite passing only 32% of the time Mississippi State gives up almost two sacks a game. They're 53rd in the NCAA's raw stats but would be well down the list if the NCAA ranked by sacks per pass attempt; against Arkansas there were a lot of blitz pickup breakdowns. Bizarrely, though, Arkansas is 6th nationally in sacks and still left Relf back in the pocket for ages for most of that game.

Mississippi State will attack the level between the linebackers and safeties on play action, attempting to hit chunk plays on digs and seams and whatnot; Relf's limitations and their lack of a go-to receiver makes deep balls futile unless the opponent massively busts a coverage, which Michigan will do twice. Relf's likely to miss it when it happens or miss the throw anyway.

On the other hand, the Michigan secondary.

Key Matchup:

Oh all right, the Michigan secondary: Jebus. What is it? Does it exist? We could ram them through a particle accelerator to find out if not for "laws" that you should keep off my body, kthx, and by body I mean joke physics experiment. Keep your laws off my joke physics experiment.

But seriously folks, Michigan cornerbacks should force guys outside and deep and hope Relf's accuracy is as advertised, with the linebackers getting appropriate depth on play action drops and the deep safety coming up into that middle range where Mississippi State makes its hay. Will they do this without getting burned? Probably not.

Key Matchup: Martin, Roh, and Van Bergen getting to Relf against (hopefully) single blocking afforded by a lack of stupid three man rushes I hate so very much.

Let's make a deal.

Saturday Michigan takes on Mississippi State in the Gator Bowl and Sunday something may or may not happen involving the throttling of an infant Denard Robinson in his cradle and the tears and lamentation that may or may not result. That would hypothetically also mean the reign of terror Greg Robinson's hair and the zombie minion that goes by the name of Greg Robinson would be over. The city of Ann Arbor emerging from its cocoon of upper middle class ennui to shoot AK47s in the air would at least partially offset the tragic, still hypothetical loss of baby Denard. I have taken too long on this bit.

Two days later Jim Harbaugh and his Stanford Cardinal take on Virginia Tech in the Orange Bowl. After he may or may not be destined for Michigan or the 49ers or the moon. The latest from Harbaugh is reminiscent of one Brian Kelly last year:

"I only talk about the job I have now," Harbaugh said when asked if he or his representatives had spoken to the 49ers about their coaching vacancy.

He acknowledged having a "dual focus"—

WHHHAAAA?

--on his team, which will play Virginia Tech in the Orange Bowl on Monday, and on his daughter, Katherine, who was born just before Christmas.

Aw, come on, Harbaugh.

So what's going to happen? I still don't know. No one does. Last time on this show I said I didn't have anything solid and probably wouldn't because of the nature of the "search" but that the mystical aura wasn't looking so hot:

I'm not inclined to put much in the widespread chatter that had RR out the door after the OSU game and seems to be continuing since its sourcing seems to be pissed-off-you-guys folk clearly unhappy with the state of the program taking small interactions and interpreting them as they desire. However, the vibe I'm getting from other people who seem to be on the fence about what to do—or at least close to it—also makes it seem unlikely Rodriguez is back. Emphasis on all the qualifying words in the previous sentence, please. I've got nothing solid because no one does.

I also said that Brady Hoke would be named Michigan's coach over my dead body and the last semblance of sanity in the universe but that wasn't based on inside information. It was more a "has everybody gone CRAZY!?!" moment, and if the threat of Hoke didn't linger in the air I'd apologize for it. As it is I'm on the battlements with an axe* waiting to behead anyone who pops up and says "my name is Buh—." Bill Parcells is duly warned.

With less that a week left before the month of limbo is over, I haven't received anything that pushes my opinion much one way or the other. To reiterate, that's:

1. There is a nonzero chance Rodriguez is fired, otherwise there would have been an announcement.
2. Schools do not start coaching searches on January 2nd.
3. There's only one guy out there that could plausibly be socked away or all but in time for Michigan to have a reasonable finish in recruiting and could justify yet more chaos in a program that is pointed in the right direction, even if vaguely.

So it's Rodriguez or Harbaugh and we'll probably know the day after the Orange Bowl. With all due respect to people who would argue otherwise, it makes no sense to fire Rodriguez in January if you do not have a coach lined up immediately. Since the list of people other than Harbaugh who Michigan could install within a week reads "Buh—[blood theatrically spraying from neck]" your alternatives are between rushing someone through without pause for consideration—which worked out so well last time—or dragging the search almost up to Signing Day, leaving your recruiting class a smoking crater and possibly dooming the next guy, who will forever be Not Jim Harbaugh, to repeat the cycle.

I have heard some things that push me more towards Harbaugh:

• Some connected guys at Cal email that Tedford is aiming to poach Harbaugh's OL coach since he has "agreed to go elsewhere already" as of the 17th of December. Caveat: the Cal rumor mill bears no animus towards Rodriguez but would love to see Harbaugh anywhere but Stanford, so as things get passed down the chain they get more certain.
• A player who split his career between RR/Carr years tells an emailer that Harbaugh will be installed on the fifth. Caveat: why the hell would some former player know?
• An emailer who reports things second hand but has been reliable in the past suggests that Mary Sue Coleman isn't a big fan of Rodriguez, which isn't much of anything to go on but just adds to the pile.
• Media people I talk to generally say the best thing is probably to give him one more year but that they don't expect he'll get it. Also not much of anything but vibe.

The only thing pointing the other way is the generally sunny disposition coming from within Schembechler Hall, but with recruits the coaches are saying they've got no idea what's going on but if they're still around after the bowl they'll still be around forever, or something to that effect. That's a hard sale right there.

If I was 55-45 Harbaugh a month ago I'm 65-35 Harbaugh now. I wish I could be more certain and wouldn't make the decision I think is likely if I was king of the world, but that's life. We'll know soon enough.

AWFUL BONUS: If there is a change you can go start the Denard transfer watch at DEFCON 2, since Robinson knows what he is—the Big Ten offensive player of the year as a sophomore at quarterback—and where he fits. How screwed up is a program that manages to get both Ryan Mallett and Denard Robinson to transfer away from certain starting QB jobs in the course of three years?

This hasn't happened yet. Breathe. I am talking to myself mostly.

*(To avoid a Tucker Carlson moment let me clarify: I am not going to cut Brady Hoke or anyone's head off with an axe.)

Hello. Things that transpired in my absence:

Basketball got splattered by Purdue.  Hello, reality. You suck. Michigan hadn't played terribly in a game anyone could see yet this year, but they did so yesterday, and those NCAA bubble dreams should be shelved. From the first Jajuan Johnson undefendable hook shot it was clear Purdue was on another level from Michigan's previous victims, especially on defense. Michigan had far too many possessions where the ball barely approached the three-point line until there were ten seconds on the shot clock. The resulting chuck-fest was reminiscent of Amaker's teams.

Michigan's comeback at the end of the first half was nice to see—Stu Douglass was so on fire he drove to the basket for an easy layup that wasn't blocked into the third row—but even as it was happening I was thinking "this can't last." Lo, it did not.

A side note: Purdue employed a strategy I've long thought is a low-cost way to lower your opponent's efficiency: a token press. Don't trap, don't get yourself out of position for easy buckets, just defend all 90 feet. Michigan crossed the half-court line four or five seconds later than they would have normally and often struggled to initiate the offense when the ballhandler picked up his dribble just past the line. On a half-dozen possessions Michigan had no semblance of an offense until half the shot clock was gone.

A kicker committed. I've searched for this a million times already so I know it's not out there but this, truly, is news that should be met with that bit of Monty Python and the Holy Grail wherein the animated peasants give a desultory "hurrah." The tubes don't have this because if you type "holy grail peasants" you get this a billion times:

Which is fine and all but doesn't have much relevance to Michigan's kicker situation. He's Matt Goudis, Tim all typed him up and stuff, and he should be a massive upgrade for Michigan's national-worst field goal kicking.

I'm most encouraged by the bit of the ESPN profile that says he's a "refined ball striker"—yes, yes, that's what she said—with a "motion that's very repeatable"—ditto—since Michigan went with a guy who didn't have great technique but made a lot of high school field goals in Brendan Gibbons and that didn't so much work out. I don't really care if kickers can hit 50-yarders since in most situations you're better off going for it in that portion of the field; give me a Garrett Rivas any day of the week.

Anthony Zettel committed… to Penn State. Guh. If Zettel was going to wait until the 28th of December, what's one more week to see if Rodriguez is retained or booted and if the latter who his replacement would be? That's a major loss for the class and a guy who will rankle every time he does something for Penn State, and one that would have been averted with one more win somewhere along the way this year.

Tate Forcier said a bunch of stuff. Angelique Chengelis scored an excellent interview with Tate Forcier at some of the Gator Bowl festivities. The bit most directly relevant to the "will he or won't he" stuff:

But not long after the UConn game, a posting on Twitter [ed: by that swimsuit model] said Forcier would transfer.

"That was like the fourth time I'd heard that," Forcier said. "I would have left if I was leaving. You just never know what can happen. It's God's plan. You don't know who's watching, and it's really what you make of it. So I stuck it out. It was actually after the UConn game that I just decided I'm going to stick here at least for this year.

"I think it took time for me. If I were to leave, I didn't realize what I would be leaving. One of the things I noticed, everyone who left would have had a shot to play if they would have stayed."

Forcier also says Michigan's system is "tailor-made" for Denard, that he "knows he can run" the offense but that "Denard is better in it, honestly." All of this sounds like a guy resigned to the idea he's a backup at Michigan if he stays, which is a mature way to approach things… and almost certainly provides strong motivation to depart after the year. He's certainly going to think about it:

"Anytime somebody says something to me about leaving, I say, 'I'm still here, aren't I?" Forcier said, pulling his jacket hard to make sure the Michigan logo is properly displayed. "You still see me with all this Michigan stuff on me. This is me. I'm already acclimated to everything here. The education is something you can't pass up.

"You never know what could happen. I just think it's really about what you make of it. When I get in (games), I try to do what I can do and make the most of it. I'm pretty much going to ride my own road. It's up to me."

I do have a credible-seeming email in the inbox about Montana getting a big time I-A QB transfer from a "west coast kid not on the west coast," FWIW, but even if that points to Forcier no names are in it. Since Forcier has a redshirt available it would seem to make more sense for him to transfer to another D-I school, anyway.

I hope he stays but you can't blame him for leaving. We'll always have triple overtime against Illinois.

Old man yelled at cloud. A guy in the News who literally writes Gil Thorpe wrote some thing about how Rich Rodriguez is a slippery money-grubbing so-and-so with a distinctly Hun disposition that's about what you'd expect from Gil Thorpe:

wsg Ming The Merciless

I'm not going to rehash the usual defense of Rich Rodriguez's contractual whatnot—in brief it's "John Beilein, saint"—but here's an oh snap from MVictors in response to the assertion that "Fielding Yost didn’t sign contract extensions and then flirt with other schools to extort raises":

“No matter how long Yost’s contract was (one-year, two-year, five-year) in his first decade, it was always a source of relief in Ann Arbor every late-Nov/early-Dec when he announced he was for sure coming back. Occasionally, there were reports he was considering an offer from, say, Wisconsin — or from the East. One year he even boldly and publicly disputed the wording of his contract as to whether he’d be allowed to coach elsewhere if he opted out of coaching Michigan.   Another year he threatened to retire, he was so discouraged.  Yost worked it masterfully to his own advantage."

If you think the response to this column has been harsh check out the comments on any Gil Thorpe online, wherein a bunch of snarky hipsters snark at each other about how terrible Gil Thorpe is.

Jim Harbaugh was like "oh no he di'in't." The report about Harbaugh signing an extension and staying at Stanford from the Stanford AD—always questionable—was obliterated by one Jim Harbaugh:

Harbaugh has yet to sign with Stanford, and when asked about his supposedly pending contract extension he stated:

"I haven't even discussed it."

Perhaps more interesting, when asked to respond to remarks from the Stanford AD implying that Harbaugh will sign the contract, "Maybe he misspoke."

On the other hand, his brother thinks he'll stay on the Farm and Harbaugh himself thinks Andrew Luck is staying in school. So there you go. We are inside of a week until we know.

Denard said he was "100 percent." Eeeee:

“He’s not banged up anymore,” receiver Roy Roundtree said. “He’s ready to go and he’s just getting the offense ready.”

Robinson didn’t divulge how much of an impact the injuries had on his performance, but he said while speaking at the team’s hotel that he was now “100 percent.”

Martavious Odoms became available for the Gator Bowl. Michigan's wide receiver depth gets a boost:

"Rodriguez says Odoms has been able to do everything in practice and should be good to go in the bowl game."

7-5 Iowa, fresh off a loss to Minnesota, beat Missouri. Good start for the Big Ten and a reason for the conference to be thankful the bowl matchups shook out the way they did—would Michigan have any chance to stay within two touchdowns of Blaine Gabbert and company with their secondary? Probably not.

The big story as far as 2011 goes was Marcus Coker bulldozing the Missouri defense for 200 yards and establishing himself the next obvious target for the wrath of Angry Iowa Running Back Hating God. If he's not struck down by providence, it looks like Iowa's got themselves a version of Beanie Wells the next few years.

Billy Sauer fought Bobby Goepfert. Seriously:

Billy's in the ECHL now. This kind of stuff happens.

Etc.: Ryan Mallett is an "overrated prospect who definitely should return" to Arkansas because he's got a bad case of the Stanzis (Stanzi as a junior, anyway). A few players had trouble getting to Jacksonville because of weather. There was also an "impromptu dance-off." Smart Football emerged from hibernation. Michigan will not have Jon Merrill and Chris Brown for the GLI (which starting tonight with a game against Michigan Tech) as both made the World Junior team. Craig Roh is a nice dude.

Dear Santa Diary,

All I want this year is for Michigan to get a kicker…oh and for Ohio State to implode and have their best players all lose their eligibility because of some stupid yet indefensible scandal…

MGoBlog/MySanAntonio

MERRY MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

The well known bloggist Geaux_Blue started a diary series this week called "Shunning Wings," wherein he promises to profile various recruits who spurned Michigan. The first candidate is Terrelle Pryor who, for better and for worse, put an indelible mark on both programs, leaving Michigan virtually empty at QB in '08 and resigned to underclassmen for '09-'10, and putting the exclamation mark on Jim Tressell's conservative, unlikeable iteration of the Ohio State program.

Facts: Dude got discounted tats in return for his autograph. He sold off the gold pants lucky charm they give out for beating Michigan. He sold his 2008 Big Ten Championship ring. He sold his Sportsmanship Award from the 2009 Fiesta Bowl.*

Of course, considering how badly we wanted Pryor, and how badly Rich Rod wanted Pryor, we can't pretend like this is a "this is the type of guy other programs recruit" kind of thing.

This is why MGoBlog hasn't made a very big deal of the million minor mishaps accrued each year at various collegiate football programs. Giving a moral "tsk" to a 21-year-old athlete – even if it's way beyond your own "never tell the kids" collegiate transgression list – is hypocritical if you root for an FBS team. And since a million crotchety people with internet connections already do enough of this, it's trite. If ever you find yourself sounding like a Yahoo commenter, even if you can't figure out what's wrong with what you're saying, it's probably wrong (this also goes SEC media types).

And not to mention that the whole thing reeks of the NCAA's worst hypocrisy. This is a tax-exempt organization because it's all for the kids, yet here they are laying out a five-game suspension for selling off the same schwag that OSU itself can't push enough. I can't honestly connect the NCAA's decision to delay suspensions until after the Sugar Bowl to money, but does anyone think having them sit out for MSU next October instead of Arkansas in January was made in the best interests of preserving a spirit of amateurism?

So, how to respond to all of this? A list:

• Ohio State fans: Five games for some schlock when Cam Newton was shopped for a fortune?
• SEC fans: NCAA's just protecting their golden conference – everyone knows the world revolves around OSU's record versus the SEC in BCS bowls. S-E-C!
• Big Ten fans: Wow, can Ohio State be any more of an SEC team?
• A.J. Green/Georgia: Wait, you can delay that?
• Misopogal: What were the tattoos?
• Michigan State: Adding a fifth game was a nice touch.
• Rest of World: This looks really bad.
• Michigan fans: …?

I mean, yes to all the caveats above. But this is still our big rival. This guy spurned us. And now he and his buddies are giving the Buckeyes some well-deserved time in the mud. If you're waiting for an official stance on this from MGoBlog, get it out of Brian. As for me, co-sign on any hand gestures toward the NCAA, and otherwise I'm here:**

User bluesouth breaks down the OSU plan in xtranormal form on the boards.

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* I know what you're thinking: They gave him an award for sportsmanship?

** Not a Blue Fan et al. reserve the right to call us their bitches until such time as Michigan beats Ohio State in a contest of football.

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CRISP These Now!

Before 1994 this was registration. After 2000 everything was done online. In between you wanted to kill someone.

If you were at Michigan from about Tom Brady's freshman season to Drew Henson's last, you will remember the CRISP* lady. If not, consider yourself lucky that you have no idea what we're talking about. This was Michigan's phone-based class registration system before it went all internet. Imagine maneuvering through the world's most complicated touch-tone, automated service system. Now imagine the most annoying lady's voice in the world is behind all the recordings (there was a persistent rumor they were after James Earl Jones to re-record it, which I guess they never did because students who thought this was some sort of Death Star Torture device would just starting yelling out the location of the Rebels' secret base). NOW, imagine only 127 people can use it at a time, so you are given a specific time (like 7:03 a.m. to 7:26 a.m.) that you're allowed to call, and while you're fiddling around in the system and it's misreading your inputs, your classes are filling up quickly so you will need to have backups for all of your timeslots and already know their codes. Now imagine they give you rotary dialed phones in all the dorm rooms.

Nowadays if you're interested in a course, you click on it and it fits automatically into your schedule based on parameters such as location to each other, lunch break, drinking nights, and your hall's designated videogame hour, right?

This is all a long way of introducing some courses you ought to pick up:

Mississippi State 311 and 312

Course Name: History of Mississippi State's 2010 Football Team: From Arkansas to Ole Miss

Professor: BlueSeoul

Prerequisites: Mississippi State 101, 102, 103, 104, 105, 207, 208, 210

Counts As: History, Non-North American/European History Requirement, Foreign Language Requirement

Course Description: Remember the series BlueSeoul was doing on watching all of MSU (NTMSU)'s games this year? He did two more: The Egg Bowl, and Arkansas (with pics and breakdowns).

The dreaded "inverted option":

We'll be seeing a lot of this play or some variation of it.   Although this one isn't really part of their option series, it is third play of their sweep series.  (The first 2 being the sweep and the counter sweep.) You can tell that this play is a designed QB keeper by the blocking assignments. It doesn't matter what you call it, Relf will have the ball, and he will be running between the tackles with 1, 2, or even 3 lead blockers.

MSU is in a split back slot right.  Ark responds with a 4-3 and a late shift into an outside blitz. The safety moves up into man coverage and the MLB fakes a blitz.

In the comments for the Ole Miss one sammylittle asked BlueSeoul to provide a series summation before the bowl. Co-sign that!

NCAA Rankings 412

Course Name: Graph Theory Ranking: Post-Season

Professor: joeyb

Prerequisites: NCAA Rankings 312

Counts As: Statistics, Math, Global World View

Course Description: In this class you will learn which teams in FBS had the best seasons in a statistical revamp of the rankings system. Essentially it's a new computer poll, and better than some of those that are used for the BCS. Then again, uh, Auburn is 4th. Here's his Top 10:

1	Oregon	1.677444
2	Stanford	1.963008
3	TCU	2.011924
4	Auburn	2.066706
5	Oklahoma	2.25209
6	Boise State	2.321805
7	Wisconsin	2.461991
8	Ohio State	2.473381
9	Missouri	2.555164
10	Virginia Tech	2.564181

Sign up to learn more.

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* C.omputers R.eally I.rritate S.ome P.eople

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More Ohio State

This is a snapshot from this year's edition of The Game, in case you thought that was Fresno State or something opposite Denard and Co. It's also a screenshot from this year's UFR of Ohio State (Not THAT UFR). Unfortunately, Brian seems, for the moment, to be continuing the recent tradition of drowning in sorrow rather than taking the time for a post-OSU Upon Further Review since 2008. This year he didn't even bother with the un-kempt promise, which doesn't bode well for us, but UFR fans may take some solace, for the mighty mighty stubob has stepped up.

Upon Further Review: Ohio State (by stubob)

OFFENSE | DEFENSE

I'm still working on getting the charts a bit nicer, but the job is a good one. As Brian or anyone else who've UFR-ed a game will tell you, it's a heck of a job. And stubob did one heck of a job. Diarist of the Week.

This doesn't mean you're off the hook, Cook.

Making Grades

Kicker fail.

It's the end of the semester, which means it's time for report cards. AC1997 has a two-part series giving each position a grade. The position breakdowns are a bit strange, and it's more of a "how do we look next year" than "how did we do this year" kind of thing, but they're good reads and good argument-starters.

Quarterback – A+

That’s right, I went there. I struggle to see how this position could be any better. Denard will be a Heisman candidate for the next two years, Tate has proven to be a very good backup quarterback and spot starter, and Devin will now be a freshman next year and one of the highest ranked dual-threat talents of the past three recruiting classes. I guess it would be nice to have a developmental prospect, but fourth string QBs grow on trees.

I took the liberty of converting to Michigan-style grading:

Offense: 2.63

Defense: 2.19

FINAL GPA: 2.42

The offense's grade was hit severely by the Failure grade at kicker, which I guess is true. I'd much rather he'd just graded '10 and left the '11 predictions for later on.

Season's Spirit

Alternate backgrounds from monuMental, depending on whether you've been naughty or nice. Does wanting to eat the "Nice" one make one naughty? Also, since I'm late in posting this week, here's this week's masterpiece:

I shall leave you with a bit of poetry from SpyinColumbus: 'Twas the week before the Gator Bowl, and back in A-squared…