urban meyer

Usually in this space I like to talk about a thing that Michigan did differently to confound their opponent or add to the toolkit. This week, after a game when Harbaugh and his staff thoroughly outclassed Dantonio and his in all three phases, I'd like to discuss a thing Michigan has had in their kit for as long as Don Brown has been here, and how Michigan State came in with a gameplan to defeat it (and yes, how Michigan adjusted and went back to dominating).

That's because so many people were talking before, during, and after this game about Michigan's passing down coverage, what Gus Johnson, Joe Klatt and Urban Meyer were calling "Brackets Coverage" and which Brown, James Light, and this space shall call "Doubles."

Doubles Coverage

Unfortunately the guy who did the best job of explaining how Michigan prefers to defend passing downs was Urban Meyer, right before this game, so let's see what he had to say (I recommend the full video on Fox):

He's simplifying it, Urban's spread offensive mind thinking of it in terms of numbers: more defenders than offensive players over here, and over here, win: defense. But the basic gist of doubles coverage is understandable to every kid who's ever played playground football: play man and use the safeties to double-team two of the most likely receivers:

Even on this level, who gets doubled is the important part; the how they get doubled is getting into the weeds.

[Which we shall, after THE JUMP]

Sponsor note. Let's say you've got some nice first down markers. Got a big X on them. Some orange bits, a pole. You know: the real nice stuff. And let's just say an absurd person gets so angry about something completely unrelated to your markers that he tears them up! You know, hypothetically.

Well, what then? Well, do you have any contracts that might stipulate monetary penalties for this gentleman? No? Do you regret that? Yes? Maybe you should have called Richard Hoeg.

Yes, even though Richard Hoeg was an infant(ish) during this hypothetical event, he may have craftily crafted a legal framework that would allow you to recoup your first down marker costs. Or anything else related to your small business of standing on the sideline with a down marker and something about police horses.

Call today! Or maybe next week, we're all hyperventilating quite hard right now.

A lunatic. Woody Hayes at the end of the Game in 1971:

At the link above MVictors has handily gif'd crucial portions of Hayes's meltdown that you can send to loved ones during moments of crisis. Need to remind your brother-in-law that he may be a grown-ass man but he's got the emotional stability of a toddler who missed his nap? There you go.

Ohio State's current coach has a slightly different approach:

have you ever seen a man willing himself to explode, well now you have pic.twitter.com/1vdksXjRRH

— BUM CHILLUPS (@edsbs) November 17, 2018

There needs to be an equivalent of the Vince McMahon gif that's just smash cuts to increasingly distressed versions of Meyer culminating in that.

A smooth operator. Bill Bonds fulminates about the overweening importance of The Game, and you know what? He's right.

Legendary take on Michigan / Ohio State from longtime @WXYZDetroit anchor Bill Bonds. Stay 'til the end.

Classic. He's forever an all-time great. pic.twitter.com/mCLXkJch9l

— Brad Galli (@BradGalli) November 19, 2018

[After THE JUMP: Don Brown! Luke Yaklich! THE BROTHERS KARA-NAH-SOV]

Reminder. Tom VH will hold you at Literati tomorrow at 7. He'll also be on MGoRadio. Pat pat, there there. I'll be there, too, but I didn't write a book. 

So that happened, and then un-happened. Maryland retained DJ Durkin, and then fired DJ Durkin, because people are just in charge of things for no reason. Like Michigan State, the people in charge of things in this case are the regents. Reports that president Wallace Loh wanted to axe everyone were likely true, and after everyone from the student government to both candidate for governor publicly complained Maryland admitted what every adult American other than their board members already knew: DJ Durkin's career is toast.

Anyway, now's a good time to reflect on the colossal failure Big Ten expansion has been:

Let’s start with rutger. I don’t know if I need to say anything more about these guys that hasn’t been said in the past four years. They’re terrible at the major sports. They’ve embarrassingly brought down the strength of the Big Ten schedule. A few months after their Big Ten membership became official, the basketball coach was caught on video throwing basketballs and yelling homophobic slurs at players. Ex-AD Julie Hermann was routinely making shocking statements to the media and embroiled in controversy at her former schools. Ex-football coach Kyle Flood once threatened a professor if he wouldn’t change a player’s grade. The list goes on. rutger remains an easy target. We’ve already covered them extensively on this blog. Oh yeah, this [a Rutgers player being kicked off the team for a failed double-homicide] happened yesterday as well. Not great, Piscataway!

Moving onto Maryland. Until recently, the frustration with the Terps was a little more subtle than their New Jersey counterparts. The football team employed Randy Edsall. The basketball team hasn’t reached the heights it did under Gary Williams, attendance is down after a post-B1G boost, and an FBI investigation looms over the program. At least men’s lacrosse and women’s hoops have been reliable, though.

But then there is the situation with head football coach DJ Durkin, which after months of investigations regarding McNair’s death, was seemingly resolved yesterday. The Maryland Board of Regents overruled outgoing university president Wallace Loh, who seemingly wanted Durkin fired, and reinstated Durkin as the coach, despite the release of a 200-page report that illustrated the abusive behavior of the coaching staff under his watch. After all of this, one startling fact remains: a 19 year-old student-athlete died, and the head coach has been allowed to keep his job. Unsurprisingly, Jordan McNair’s family was angry about this decision, and at least 3 players walked out of a team meeting with Durkin yesterday. Now, the university administration has received tons of criticism, and is facing backlash from Maryland lawmakers as well as UMD students, who plan to hold a rally Thursday.

Great job, Jim Delany. Hope the brief surge in television revenue was worth it.

Urban's head. Meyer's strange behavior on the sideline has a cause:

Since kneeling down on the sideline in a game against Indiana on Oct. 6 because of severe headaches, Meyer has been peppered with questions about his health and future in coaching. He said the cause of the discomfort links back to a congenital arachnoid cyst in his brain, which has led to severe headaches at times in his career.

“The past four years, we’ve been working closely with coach Meyer to monitor and manage the symptoms that have risen from his enlarged congenital arachnoid cyst,” said Dr. Andrew Thomas, Meyer’s personal physician and the chief clinical officer at Ohio State’s Wexner Medical Center. “This includes aggressive headaches, which have particularly flared up the past two years.”

That sucks for him and does not excuse his conduct with Zach Smith. Verdict: still a bad dude. Not the kind that saves the president. An expired coupon kind of guy.

[After THE JUMP: secret scrimmages, ooooooh]