liam eichenberg

Come Josephine in my flying machine and it's UP we go, UP we go! [Bryan Fuller]

See also: The defense

Resources: My charting, ND game notes, ND roster with oddly specific heights, CFBstats

Welcome back to the Respect-a-Bowl, the rivalry in which the coaches respect each other, the players like each other, the fans get along quite splendidly, the recruiting reporters nod at each others' excellence in early scouting, and everyone concurs ND athletic director Jack Swarbrick is the world's biggest putz.

Notre Dame fans say this because he nicknamed himself "Savvy Jack" for finding ways to Dave Brandon them and everyone he deals with for every possible nickel, then gloats about it. Michigan fans say it because he was the guy who pulled the series in the putziest way possible and played hardball when Michigan wanted to restart it. He didn't have to put these games on the same road/home schedule as Ohio State and Michigan State, he didn't have to play last year's as the season opener nor this year's game in the middle of the Big Ten season. In fact it would have worked out best for both parties to resume the game in September when we normally do—Notre Dame had a bye week when we played Army and played New Mexico when we had our bye.

But Savvy Jack can't call himself savvy if a deal works out for everybody. So here we are in late October, between two Big Ten East rivals, playing Notre Dame, coming off a bye with nobody in shouting distance of ranked for the rest of the year. Given Michigan's progression over the season and the Irish's weird lack thereof, I know an entire press box worth of people ready to point at laugh at the unlikeable fellow if his tactic comes back to bite him in the ass. And I'm kinda thinking it can.

The film: Georgia is ranked around where Michigan is in S&P+ and has some athletes at cornerback and MLB I thought would be a fair proxy for some of Michigan's more exciting guys. Everything here is going to be graded on a curve here because I usually don't chart against a defense this solid.

Personnel: My diagram:

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PDF version, full-size version (or click on the image)

I'm throwing out my charting this week for most of these guys since 12 total runs do not make for much of a sample. Stats aren't much use either because you already know what they tell you: against non-scrubs, Notre Dame's offense is getting the ball to very tall persons TE Cole Kmet (265 yards, 3 TDs, 10.6 YPT, 84% catch rate) and Boundary WR Chase Claypool (394 yards, 4 TDs, 84. YPT, 57% catch rate).

Claypool is Myles Boykin, basically a power forward who was so good at boxing out and collecting rebounds that they slapped a football jersey on him and taught him to go full soccer player when he feels contact from a defensive back. Kmet is an underrated receiver—an excellent route runner with a natural nose for the hole in zones—and an up-and-mostly-down blocker. Like Michigan's run game, ND's is very tight end heavy, and Kmet picked up 11 negatives in this game, only some of which can be explained by multiple false start penalties. Slot receiver Chris Finke (8.3 YPT, 68% catch rate) has 22 targets and probably as many good blocks. They'll have H-back TE Tommy Tremble (9 catches, 136 yards, and 2 TDs on 13 targets) on the field often as a third receiver, and use him more—from the USC game I watched he might be an underrated or just underutilized run blocker.

The #1 back in preseason, Jafar Armstrong missed another chunk of season and returned for one carry against USC (a four-yard loss). They're talking like he's 100% over the groin injury now and that's going to give them a run game, but Armstrong historically has been a quasi-receiver type. Lead/basically only RB in Armstrong's absence Tony Jones is on pace for 1,000 yards and is a fairly good receiver, but really he's just a guy who got more +s (and minuses) for blocking than anything he accomplished with the ball in his hands. He did get 176 yards on 25 carries (7 YPC) against USC, but on my viewing of that game I thought that was mostly on bad USC tackling.

Thus ends the high-usage skill position players. Nobody else has more than 13 targets, though freshman slot/field WR Lawrence Keys (6 catches, 7 YPT on 10 targets) had a Gallon-esque fade reception in this game. Nominal Field WR starter Michael Young didn't chart—he's at 2.1 YPT on 10 targets this year. Freshman Bradey Lenzy is a Calvin Bell Memorial end around track star (if you see #25 on the field yell "BASH!" please). Javon McKinley (200 yards and 3 TDs on 8 receptions on 11 targets) is the only outside guy besides Claypool who's over 6 feet, and McKinley's got exactly 1 catch for 11 receiving yards against teams not named Bowling Green or New Mexico over 3.5 seasons.

[after THE JUMP: Sad reminders of failed Michigan recruitments]

Buckle Up

A "miscommunication" means that Deontay Burnett is not only not a Michigan commit right now, but won't end up in the class, period. The Wolverines won't go wanting for long, though. Jay Harbaugh's tweet indicates a commitment is imminent, and I'm hearing the same thing.

Since I may have just spent a good part of my afternoon writing up a commitment post, I'm holding off on Signing Day stuff until tomorrow, when I'll write up a primer for what should be an eventful day.

Williamson Announces Tonight

In unrelated* news, three-star FL ATH Chris Williamson will announce his choice between Cal, Florida, Michigan, and UNC tonight at 10 pm. Sam Webb talked to Scout's Chad Simmons before the weekend to get the lay of the land after Williamson's recent official to Ann Arbor:

Michigan has already cemented themselves in the game, they’re right there I think with North Carolina at the top right now in the top two.  Florida beat out Georgia, an instate school for the final visit this weekend, so Florida I think is the third team.

As the weekend wore on, however, Florida picked up a lot of expert picks—I'd expect him to end up with the Gators.

*Not tongue-in-cheek—Williamson isn't the prospect referenced in the previous section.

[Hit THE JUMP for the rest of the roundup.]

No Bad Plays

malzone-roseboroAs recruits turn their focus to the first couple weeks of their high school season, the recruiting news firehose has slowed to a trickle for the moment. Thankfully, scouting of Michigan prospects is in full swing.

The Wolverine's Brandon Brown caught up with the head coach of one of the conference opponents of Darian Roseboro (right, with Alex Malzone) to get a view of his game from the other sideline ($):

There are a lot of things that Roseboro does well, that's been documented, but sometimes it's difficult for casual followers to find weaknesses. When highlights are viewed they are just that - highlights. Snider insists that a lot of times what you see is what you get with Roseboro.



"I think it's really tough to identify weaknesses with him," Snider admitted. "He's pretty tough to block. I think that as a sophomore he might've taken a play off now and then, but last year he didn't really do that. He was much more aggressive and tough.

Roseboro's highlights are, well, highlights, so if he's bringing that on a snap-to-snap basis, that's great to hear.

Reports continue trickling in from last weekend's games. Josh Newkirk spoke with LB commit Darrin Kirkland Jr. after he recorded 17 tackles, four TFLs, a fumble recovery, and an interception in his team's opener to discuss the improvements in his game this year ($):

At 6-foot-2, 226-pounds, Kirkland says he worked on his strength mostly this off-season and it showed in his game on Saturday.

I feel like my strength could be one of the key assets of my game,” Kirkland said. “Being able to shed blockers. That’s one of the biggest things I needed to conquer. As well as my quickness and my speed. Just not to be blocked by lineman, because some are very athletic. It’s helped me a lot. I have been covering sideline to sideline, and it’s really helped me in coverage as well.”

That extra work certainly appeared to pay off in week one. Kirkland also mentioned that he's struck up a friendship with five-star CA WDE Keisean Lucier-South; both will be on campus for the Penn State game.

[Hit THE JUMP for Where In The World Is Tim Sullivan, the latest on Chris Clark, several 2016 prospect updates, and more.]