Worst: Where To Go From Here

Listen, I'll write a bit about this game, but I'm getting to that age where being a masochist and re-watching terrible games should be left to the professionals. I lived 2019 Wisconsin-Michigan once; I'll happily go to my grave with that being it. Before the season I thought Michigan was a 10-win team; that's probably still on the table just because I don't want to contemplate a world where Michigan leads the conference in fumbles lost and instead have a couple of those games where the breaks go their way and they maybe, say, beat OSU or ND despite being demonstrably worse. The bottom could absolutely fall out, though; this schedule was already one of the hardest in the country when fans sorta assumed Michigan was a top-15 team; if they aren't this goes from "challenging" to, well...

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Games I sorta assumed would favor Michigan (Iowa, Maryland, MSU, even PSU) suddenly become toss-ups and ND and OSU are "I hope they work the body and don't just punch UM in the face". And yeah, if you've been on Twitter, this site, the general internet, or walking through any public or private establishment where more than 2 Michigan fans currently exist you've heard discussion about whether or not this is it for Harbaugh. Michigan is undeniably scuttling; depending on who you ask it started some time last year (either against ND or OSU) and has basically been circling the drain since then.

The optimist in me wants to believe it's just a temporary malaise, something you overcome with a combination of effort, luck, and the CPU opponent meter turned down a notch or two. I've said for some time that people's vision of Michigan doesn't quite match the reality since the second half of Schembechler's run. I might as well bookmark this page because it tells a story of a program that loses 3-4 games a season way more often than they win 10 or more. Bill Connelly's tweet about Michigan's S&P+ showing over the years tells a similar tale; Harbaugh's got Michigan back to where they were during "the good times". The problem is Michigan's peak used to equate to the class of college football; that's not the case anymore. Teams like Alabama, Clemson, Georgia, OU, and OSU just occupy a tier above them, and while Michigan theoretically has the combination of tradition, resources, and willingness to bull-rush their way into that group, it just hasn't happened. And I'll be honest, I'm not sure it's going to any time soon and I don't know who leads them there if/when they do.

People love to complain that Harbaugh is this fallen golden boy and Michigan needs a change, but we've now seen 3 different types of coaches try to lead Michigan and none have really succeeded. Each had their moments but John Bacon has a bookshelf full of stories chronicling how they each fell short in some way or another. Harbaugh has been through multiple coordinators, tried to install various offensive systems to maximize the talent available, and recruited to a level that should be sufficient for it all to coalesce into cohesive units. It's unlikely he's suddenly gotten lazier or dumber in his later years, so it's not some unexpected self-sabotage. So I don't know what's wrong, and maybe it ultimately is something with the staff or the head coach, but I'm going to be the contrarian and say that change for it's own sake isn't going to work.

For better or for worse, Michigan has tried three different distinct offensive coordinators (and their systems) since Harbaugh arrived to make the offense "work"; we can quibble about his level of influence in each but it's undeniable this has been a point they've tried to address. And I'll be honest, it looked fine for most of last year. Yes, it lacked explosiveness downfield, but there were tweaks that could have been deployed to address that (shorter routes, using the RB in the passing game, etc.). If anything, Michigan's biggest issue last year was pace, and while Gattis has sped that up it's not like "run the play quicker without huddling" can only be accomplished with a new offensive system. Hell, it's mostly just reading from cards.

That's not to say I wanted Michigan to stick with Hamilton as their OC (I didn't), and I'm happy to see Michigan drag itself into the modern era offensively because (a) the ceiling is much higher if they ever get it to work, and (b) most HS programs and players run it, so going forward the players you have coming in will have a bit more familiarity with it (even though I think familiarity tends to be overrated a bit). But like I said after Army, you can't impersonate a new offensive system with a couple of wrinkles but fail to give yourself over fully to the transition, warts and all. I believe this offense will get better as the season progresses; we saw hints of it during the 4th quarter when they aired it out more and utilized their NFL-sized receivers. That's what made PSU's Deep State offense so dangerous, and if you can force defenses to respect it then everything else you want to do gets less predictable and, thus, easier.

This game went about as poorly as one can imagine, and it puts into question how the rest of the year will look. But Michigan football's history since Carr has been a combination of coaching upheaval and disappointment, and it's hard not to see how that becomes a vicious cycle. I didn't expect this year to be magical, and so if the end result is Michigan wins 8-9 games but can set itself up for the future, so be it. The whole "fire everybody" crowd will never be happy (and hilariously reactionary), and so I'd rather Michigan weather the bumps now than get back on the carousel.

Worst: The Offense

Listen, I'd love to have some detailed conversation about the various issues with the offense against Wisconsin but considering midway through the 3rd quarter Michigan had run 27 plays and Wisconsin 55, there isn't a ton to go on. The top-line numbers sorta tell the whole story: 0/10 on 3rd down, no rushing first downs and a third of their 15 due to penalty. 2 lost fumbles, 18 minutes TOP vs. 41 by Wisconsin, and 2.1 ypc on 19 rushing attempts. Until the very end of the 3rd quarter Michigan didn't have a drive that lasted more than 6 plays, and only 2 that lasted even 1 minute in game time. By comparison, Wisconsin's offense left the field 3 times in under a minute, but two of them because they scored TDs.

Shea Patterson appears to be broken; he was pulled toward the end of the first half and other than a nice throw to Ronnie Bell that turned into a big gain because of YAC he didn't play particularly well until late into the 4th quarter (and even then he seemed limited physically). The running game was virtually non-existent; some of that was because Michigan was down 14 after only 6 plays offensively and some was just an inability to string anything along. This was a game where Michigan desperately needed to "stay on schedule" and find some bread-and-butter plays to keep a drive going, and yet Michigan's most successful play in the first half was Pass Interference (they go 2 first downs off that and 2 more first downs the entire first half, and one of those was on Bell's catch).

Michigan's offense came to life a bit once Wisconsin's defense rolled out their "All-CTE"/"we're up 35" scheme, but for all relevant parts of the game it was disjointed, uncreative, and thoroughly stunted both by Wisconsin's defense as well as their own missteps. They fumbled AGAIN on their first drive of the game, which feels like it's gotta be a record but I'm not looking that up even in Incognito mode. There were no real attempts to stretch the field except on obvious passing downs, which led to both Patterson and McCaffrey just getting drilled numerous times. Every pass was short, or into coverage, or both, and at this point I don't know (or care) if it's due to poor playcalling, preparation, execution, angered gods, whatever.

When they started just airing it out it worked; it felt like Carr's last game against Florida where they realized they had WRs who were better than Florida's DBs and actually took advantage of it. And I guess if you want to find that one silver lining in this game it's that; if that was Gattis basically calling a bunch of bombs because nothing else was working, then that's an offense they can run going forward. It'll be higher-variance than UM is used to, but at this point it's at least positive sometimes, unlike basically everything else we saw for 3+ quarters in this game.

Best: Maybe a Silver Lining

I'm a bit loath to read too much into the offense's emergence downfield given the game situation (Wisconsin was down two members of their secondary and were up a bajillion points), but the "throw it downfield to your big, talented receivers and let them beat the smaller, less-talented corners" offense was encouraging. I disagree with the sentiment that an offense relying heavily on jump balls is tenable in the long term (Penn State's bombers a couple years ago were successful in large part because defenses cheated up to try to corral Barkley and McSorley), but for whatever reason this offensive line can no longer open up running lanes consistently and so that's one way to loosen up the back end of a defense is to take it's top off.

It won't matter against Rutgers; even with their slight improvements on both sides of the ball the Scarlet Knights have given up an average of 218 yards on the ground (please don't look slightly above them in that list), and my guess is that will continue against Michigan's janky run outfit. But my hope is that when Iowa comes to town Michigan continues to roll with stretching the field vertically. Collins, Black, Bell, and DPJ are all good enough athletes to make plays downfield, and even with the drops and poor throws it's still a part of the offensive system that should work.

Worst: Basic Physics

Much like the offense, the defense was overmatched from the opening kickoff and never seemed to get their feet under them. Taylor is a beast when you've got a bunch of NFL-level lineman and LBs; trying to stop Wisconsin with the smallest Glasgow on the line in short yardage is suicide. I know a lot of people took issue with Don Brown's defensive gameplan against OSU last year but it was reasonably sound until everyone realized Watson couldn't keep up with OSU's receivers and the defensive ends couldn't get any pressure. But this game, I don't know. I know he only has so many guys on his roster who are tackle-sized to plug inside, and there's logic to the idea that if you can't go through them, maybe you can go around them or between them. It definitely felt like a system designed to generate TFLs come hell or high water, and at times they would get a hand on Taylor only for him to break free. But Wisconsin did what Army was supposed to; they went on epic, time-consuming, soul-crushing drives (three 12+ scoring drives) and dominated time of possession to a degree that the defense was visibly deflated toward the end of the first half. And frankly, I didn't blame them; they had been on the field for 23 of the 30 minutes available and been smashed for 43 plays.

And the problems were compounded by the fact that when something good did happen to the offense, it was almost immediately undone. After giving up a first-drive TD, I'm sure the defense was excited to see the offense get into the redzone in one play. At the bare minimum I'm sure they expected 3 points in that situation, and if so that maybe changes the complexion of the game a bit. I still think Wisconsin wins because Taylor is simply that good, but a lot of Michigan's miscues amplified good plays into back-breaking ones. For example, Michigan successfully had Taylor bottled up on that first drive behind the line, but he simply bounced out and ran past a gaping hole the safety failed to maintain. Later on, Wisconsin would get multiple first downs when their receivers or backs would shake off arm tackles or flailing pushes near the sideline, and so a unit that had showed a lot of discipline with gap assignment against Army suddenly forgot fundamental aspects of defense against the Badgers.

This isn't a defensive unit dripping with talent like Brown's units of lore; there's talent but it's young, oddly-shaped, or under-performing a bit. Now, you can scheme around it, and one bit of hope is that Michigan won't quite run into a team like Wisconsin going forward; teams like PSU, Iowa, and MSU simply don't have the same backfield or line talent, and Brown should learn and tinker with his lineup. But at some point the fact that Ben Mason seemingly only saw the field as a FB and Jeter didn't record a tackle is beyond troubling, and no amount of grit and passion will cover up for the fact that one DT-sized person is currently allowed on the field.

Worst: Luck

Off the bat, Wisconsin came out and crunched Michigan on both sides of the ball; in no way should that be taken away from them. But Michigan's persistent run of "I'm not even mad, I'm just impressed" luck this year continued. As noted above, Michigan fumbled for the third time on their opening drive; for all the people complaining about the offensive philosophy and playcalling, there is no OC in the country who can scheme around what appears to be the monkey's paw curse surrounding Michigan's desire to "shake up" the offense. And while I find it weird that people keep claiming Mason is some unstoppable cudgel in the running game (despite evidence he's not), I don't have a problem with the idea of trying to smash a scrambling Wisconsin 7 yards out. Had Mason just held onto the ball, that sets up a 3rd-and-goal from 3/4 yard line, the down and distance that lets you use your whole playbook to exploit mismatches.

But instead, Michigan fumbled the ball away, they seem disjointed on the next drive, and the game was effectively over when Taylor busted through yet another uncovered gap for a 72-yard TD. I don't think the outcome of the game in a macro sense changes if Michigan scores on that first drive; Taylor ran for nearly 200 yards in the first half and at no point did Michigan look like they had a plan to stop him. But maybe it keeps the game a bit closer earlier on, doesn't deflate the defense and offense so quickly, and as someone who was once a college student I'm well aware that emotions and passion can do funny things.

Similarly, when Michigan seemingly caught a break it was for naught. I don't particularly care about the Coan first down on that first drive because Chryst seemed to have discovered 4th-down math, but Taylor seemingly fumbling and the refs belatedly pointing out that forward momentum had been stopped a second earlier and them not blowing their whistles was just part of some weird game was infuriating. Similarly, Black's TD in the endzone wasn't a catch and was properly called so on review; the more troubling aspect was the reason he couldn't catch it was because Wisconsin's corner was yanking his arm back. You'd think a review of a play would take into account all factors involved and rule accordingly, but instead the loophole where you can overturn a TD because the defense is breaking the rules with impunity led to my faint hopes of a UCLA-type comeback being dashed.

So I don't know what's going to happen going forward, but Michigan isn't going to win a ton more football games if they can't catch some breaks outside of a false start against Army.

Worst: The Worst People

So before this game, people ran with a bunch of rumors that Zach Charbonnet was somewhere between slightly dinged up/missing practice to multi-week recovery from surgery to possibly traded to the Dolphins for a player to be named later. As is tradition, a bunch of people on the internet who derive way too much of their self worth from being (a) shitty toward college athletes, (b) being "first" or "right", but usually not the same, and (c) getting people to watch a Youtube video in front of a green screen kept picking away at it, spreading disinformation and wild-ass speculation (about player safety, tensions on the team, etc.) for a couple of days. It got so bad that multiple individuals with real connections to the program had to publicly state that, yes, this unpaid college athlete is in fact not out for multiple weeks due to a mystery surgery, so feel free to gamble on the game, update your fantasy football roster, and delete that regrettable tweet you were about to post.

Listen, I'm getting pretty old; I'm nearly twice the age of everyone on the field Saturday and that gap is only going to get wider as the season progresses. And with that distance I've come to realize how fucking crazy it is that grown men and women think sharing rumors about the health status of, again, unpaid college students with potentially millions of people is acceptable. It's nobody's business whether or not a student athlete has undergone a medical procedure or is dealing with an injury; nothing in your life should materially change upon learning that information, and if it does for you, that's probably not a good situation to be in. I'm somewhat queasy already that schools willingly communicate the health status of various student athletes with the media, but at least the student-athlete is aware of this disclosure and has agreed to it (which is why it's not a HIPAA violation). But when the millionaires who get paid to talk about, again, student athletes complain about a coach not divulging the injury report so that their lives would be easier (because reading numbers and names on a jersey is a bridge too far), I just cringe because the assumption is that knowing someone is suffering with a pulled groin or a dislocated back should be part of the public discourse.

So yeah, I wish I had some over-arching discussion point here, some neat summation. But I don't. It sucks that a college freshman undoubtedly had to deal with multiple grown-ass people digging into his medical history to find out if the well-known injury he's had somehow got aggravated during the week, and if he's available to keep playing for the team they root for when it's winning football games. In no other venue but sports (and maybe politics) is this level of public disclosure about a person's medical history expected, and while at least professional athletes are theoretically getting compensated for that lack of privacy, the same can't be said for college. At this point, if you think they need to be forthcoming with that information, then pay the damn players so at least they can benefit a bit from the massive invasion of privacy.

Quick Hits

• Michigan and Wisconsin have played 4 times since Jim Harbaugh became head coach. The average margin of victory for those 4 games is 17 points, but the cumulative difference in margin of victory is 3 (79 to 76), in favor of Wisconsin. Add in MSU (an average of 8 points but a cumulative margin of 15 for Michigan) and PSU (an average margin of 29 points, but a cumulative margin of 57 for Michigan), and you see a program that really has a problem with OSU but otherwise is equal or better than everyone else in the Big 10. Yes, I know that's the "How was the play otherwise Mrs. Lincoln?" of Michigan commentary, but I keep seeing pieces where the soul of Michigan football is lost forever because they struggle on the road against top-15 teams and I just bristle a bit at the hyperbole. Michigan football needs to get better and won't ever be considered an elite program until they can consistently pull off road wins, but considering where Harbaugh started from with those last couple of Hoke years, I think there is some purposeful obfuscation going on here.
• I have no idea what's up with the offensive line, but it was weird to see them this oft-kilter all game. Patterson has a lot of issues bugging out of clean pockets, but it's been a couple of weeks now where they can't get a strong push on the running game and too many free runners sneak through on passing plays. I'm not looking forward to the MSU game for a number of reasons, but seeing Joe Milton saunter onto the field because Patterson and McCaffrey are picking shards of highlighter puke helmets from their innards isn't high on the list.
• I have no idea what got into Wisconsin on that McCaffrey drive in the second half with two ejections for targeting. This isn't some morality argument or anything; it seemed to be localized to just that drive. Maybe it was the nature of his runs, just timing, I don't know, but those were two awful head shots that didn't need to be made. Again, I don't think it was some mandate down from Chryst or anyone to hurt McCaffrey (I leave the trollish injury-inducing cheap plays to their basketball team), but it was just rough to watch a guy get knocked out in what was basically a meaningless half of football.
• This is the king of all non-sequiturs, but when people complain about the "cuteness" of the offense that led to Mason fumbling the ball or the 2-QB system, I do want to point out that those are seemingly wrinkles in the Gattis offense. He had a package with Hurts and Tua last year and it worked; obviously we're talking about a different caliber of athlete, but I get wanting to see if it works. Similarly, giving the ball to your battering ram of a FB on the read option is a way to utilize different personnel to stress a defense. The fact none of these worked particularly well is a point of learning, but it's also not like they were pulled out for shits and giggles.

Next Week: Rutgers?

I don't know. Sure. It's probably Rutgers. I assume Michigan will win by a lot, people won't care, and Iowa will loom as the next test to see if Michigan can salvage a decent season.