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Option #3 is good. [Bryan Fuller]

Purdue had an interesting approach to Michigan's running game. Rather than throw bodies at the problem like Illinois, or throw bodies at the problem and get their asses handed to them for the second year in a row except this time at home like Ohio State, Purdue decided to take a mixed approach: add an extra hitter, but try to disguise where he was going to be.

Here's the part you may have noticed: Often before the snap, the Purdue DTs were quickly shifting their fronts. One of the purposes of this was to try to draw a false start (they didn't). But there was more to it than that. The Boilers were trying to disguise their attacks so Michigan wouldn't be able to pick out oddities before the snap and adjust their schemes to take advantage of them. Let me show you.

This is a run in the 2nd Quarter that got stuffed because Michigan set up for one blocking scheme and then didn't adjust on the fly when Purdue shifted the line late.

Power runs are brutal to observe on film so we'll go to my standardized color scheme:

  • Purple: Blockdowns.
  • Orange: Kickout.
  • Green: Lead blocker.
  • Blue: Running back, free hitter(s).

Here's what Michigan thinks they're getting before the shift.

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Zooming in on the point of attack, Michigan wants to block down to the WLB, sealing both DTs with their guards, while kicking out the edge with their center and swinging Loveland around as a lead blocker. The hope with Counter is always that the defense will see your running back start moving to the opposite side and start shifting that way, creating a wider gap to run through.

Even before the snap however, Purdue does the opposite. Here's what Michigan really gets:

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The only difference is the DTs moved over. Don't bother trying to parse out where everybody's going. Just look at the mess they've made of the point of attack. How're we supposed to run through that?

[After the JUMP: Another angle]

This one hurt. [Bryan Fuller]

When Josh Gattis was hired this space got really excited for the incorporation of RPOs into Michigan's power running game. The very first spring game I was like "look at all the backside defenders who can't pursue the run!"

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The first game I was giddy over the RPO reads that had been slapped on to every one of Michigan's base run plays, especially their meatiest of meaty running plays, Pin & Pull.



(I also spent way too long drawing on my videos back then)

There were a couple, especially early, but what that mostly became for this program was a gimmick. If they did actually turn on the reads it was for a big game or a rival.

Time and again, quarterback after quarterback, we'd see a Patterson, Milton, McNamara, or McCarthy look at a receiver apparently running a route before handing off. A year after the transition, even the rivals weren't getting it anymore.

By Rutgers last year everyone knew what Michigan was up to. It was a gimmick. A look. They weren't really going to throw it, or burn precious practice trying. As opponents caught on to the ruse, the team gave up on the ruse. Michigan wasn't reading anybody—they just wanted you to think it, and maybe to drive a blogger or two nuts. With the exception of Penn State, nobody thought they were getting read, so nobody stayed backside.

This week I found some guys who were buying RPOs that the offense wasn't throwing. Unfortunately it was our own.

[After THE JUMP: It would seem we're out of practice.]

End around gets around round end. [Patrick Barron]

Immediately after Michigan's first drive I got an Honest Trailer's worth of requests to do the Ronnie Bell touchdown.

It wasn't that complicated—an end around that looked like Michigan's favorite power running play to the other side that caught Iowa overplaying the favorite power play. It wasn't even new, since we ran it against Hawai'i.

But it's fun to draw up big Rock/Paper/Scissors wins, and there was more going on than Schoonmaker reversing direction, so let's draw it up!

Counter

To understand why Iowa got so disoriented you have to understand the play it countered, Counter Trey.

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Trey is a base power run, a bread and butter football play they were already running when Horace Prettyman was an 8th year senior and Craig Ross was still in his late 2800s. It's withstood the test of time for two key reasons:

  1. It makes you defend the side that didn't have numbers at the snap.
  2. It forces blocking encounters between non-equivalent players.

In the base example above you've got an "F" (a TE, FB, or H-back) slamming into a third linebacker, who these days is usually more like a safety. You've also got a guard slamming into an end or OLB, a type of player that's also been shrinking as defenses look to get faster and more athletic off the edge.

[After THE JUMP: Someone forgot about the counter to Trey.]

Exploring the many exotic gaps that Washington chose not to defend.

Giles Jackson

I made a '90s mix of songs with 'Around' in the title. When I Come Around. Around Here. Run Around. Follow Me Around.

It looks like the thing that looks like the thing that looks like the thing that looks like a thing you have to overreact to.

There are two sides.

This is done on the fly, usually against power runs, as a way to screw up blocking assignments and force the ballcarrier into this now-unblocked outside defender.

We're gonna get 'em on the run boys, and once we get 'em on the run were gonna keep 'em on the run.

It came from behind!