Detailed Spring Practice #7 Report
I haven't seen this linked to the board yet so please delete if it's already been posted, but here's a great report from the latest spring practice. It's very bullish on Shane being the starter at this point, apparently he had a great outing. OL looking good outside of center right now. Almost exclusively base 3-4 defense. Definitely worth a read.
Yes the injury report also caught my eye. Pipkins is another who never seems to be able to stay on the field. And is Chris Fox in year 3 of an ACL recovery? I wonder if he ever plays a down.
Would be nice to get a contribution from Jaron Dukes. That 2013 class of 3 WRs has been a total miss thus far.
Pretty shocking Kugler struggles with snapping the ball- this was supposed to be the "most college ready" lineman we had aside from Kalis and daddy was an NFL OL. Boggled on that front. Cole I get struggling on snaps- he has not been a center. Kugler was groomed for center for years.
Don't know who to trust at this point. Gregg Henson's report he posted yesterday was reporting the opposite.
http://gregghenson.com/practice-report-that-michigan-fans-wont-like/
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#blindsquirrel
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As opposed to the source for this "report" who doesn't reveal his own name.
March 23rd, 2015 at 10:38 PM ^
Let me help you Don - it's not that difficult to understand.
Random, nameless internet poster who says good things = honest, factual reporter of truth who clearly has keen insight and inside information
Random, nameless internet poster who says bad things = lying, deceitful scumbag who just wants to troll fans and is making shit up as he goes along as he clearly never saw a thing in person.
I agree with you about Henson, but what do we know about this guy who writes for BleedBlue? I only ask because this might be the 2nd time ever I have ever gone to that site.
Oh, I totally agree. I'm skeptical of all these reports. But Henson admitted in his post that this was based on information he heard from his contacts at practice. At least this guy said he was there. Whether or not he actually was is another issue, but the veneer of first-hand experience gives it a bit more credence.
March 23rd, 2015 at 10:08 PM ^
kicking everyone out of practice one day because the team was performing poorly. May be some of these coaches were there? A team is going to have their ups and downs. Over the past 2 years both the OL and DL have gotten soft and less aggressive. I just hope Harbaugh can get them in better shape and more physical before the start of the season. Last year a lot of BIG teams just seem to beat our lineman up. Harbaugh needs to change this softness!
His sources were pretty good on the whole Brandon ouster and coaching search.
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You know who his sources are? Then he's not doing a very good job protecting them. They were also surprisingly spot on for not being credible.
The guy is a troll for clicks. He had this to say about the Miller situation:
"Confirming that some Michigan players can't hack Harbaugh. Attrition coming. Miller was the first."
Insightful? No.
Misleading and disrespectful of the kid's right to do what is best for him? Yes.
Let's look at the context of the articles.
"Yesterday I attended practice inside Al Glick field house."
vs.
"...from what I am told by guys watching practice..."
I'm going to go with the first-hand information rather than the infamous anonymous sources.
Well, the defense was pretty good last year, and we didn't lose many people. So when Henson reports that the defense doesn't look good and they look slow, that raises some red flags for me. The only guys we lost were Beyer (who was not fast and was not great), Raymon Taylor (who was okay but not great and not a blazer), Hollowell (who apparently is pretty fast but didn't play like it), and Ryan (who obviously was pretty good).
So we lost one stud from last year (Ryan), but now our defense looks slow and bad? Hmmm...not buying it.
I buy it. The defense struggled against any half decent offense (and those not so decent aka Rutgers). The defense looked good compared to the offense and STs but all in all the defense was pretty mediocre.
Here's the thing that people don't understand:
A *lot* of defenses look bad these days. There are record numbers being put up by offenses, which means that defenses are going to be "worse" than they used to be. You can say we looked bad against good teams, etc., but every team plays both good and bad teams.
Here are a couple facts:
Michigan was #7 in total defense (311.3 yards allowed/game).
Michigan was #27 in scoring defense (22.4 points allowed/game).
The defense was pretty good. Period.
(And if we weren't tied for #121 in interceptions, those numbers would have been even better.)
MSU has looked pretty good on D lately. Just sayin.
but reinforcing the original point is that MSU gave up over 40 to Oregon and Baylor last year. I think osu did all right against them as well.
Yup.
And they allowed 4 more yards per game than us in 2014, and they gave up 0.9 fewer points per game.
So maybe we shouldn't be complaining very much.
March 24th, 2015 at 12:15 AM ^
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How exactly was our schedule so weak?
I know people give Ohio State a lot of crap for their schedules, but Michigan State has played two of the weakest possibles schedules ever in back to back years. Hooray they played at Oregon. But they also dropped Notre Dame and replaced it with three non BCS conference teams. Played both Michigan and Ohio State at home two years in a row. Haven't played at Ohio State in 4 fucking years.
well, leaving off MSU schedule which is not relevant, I'd say that our schedule was garbage b/c we were forced to play 8 B10 teams.
#thanksOBrandon
But that's just last year, when they did take a step back after losing some major talent.
I'm not really understanding your point.
I'm not arguing that Michigan State is bad at defense. They are good and have been good.
There are 128 teams in the country. Obviously, some teams are very good, and some teams are very bad, on both offense and defense. Most teams are in the middle somewhere.
Michigan State is good at defense. By some measurements/opinions, they had the best defense in the country a couple years ago. And Michigan - by some measurements - was statistically near them on the 128-team spectrum. So I'm not going to level a ton of criticism toward the defense, the defensive coaching, etc.
Let me put it this way:
If our offense was ranked the same as our defense, we might very well have been in the Big Ten Championship game or maybe even the playoff.
They were 41st in DFEI and 37th in defensive S&P. Total defense and scoring defense don't adjust for level of competition. I'm willing to bet most defenses in college football would look great against Northwestern or Indiana with their 5th string QB.
March 23rd, 2015 at 11:45 PM ^
also had the good fortune of playing some of the worst QB's in college football. Going by ESPN's QBR ratings, UM got to face (for comparison's sake Devin Gardner's QBR rating was 49.7)
CJ Brown, Maryland, 48.8
Trevor Siemian, NU, 43.3
Hackenber, PSU, 35.8
Andrew Hendrix, Miami (OH), 35.5
Kameron Bryant, App St, 33.5
Zander Diamont, IU, 19.4
So essentially UM's defense got to go up against 6 QB's who performed worse then Devin Gardner. That would make a lot of defenses look good.
a) QBR ratings are supposed to have average quarterbacks hanging out right at 50. So by the evidence you have provided, it shows that Michigan played 6 below average quarterbacks and 6 above average quarterbacks. So going by quarterbacks alone, they faced an average schedule. I'm not sure that helps your point.
b) Your statistics don't mean much if you don't take into account who the other teams above/around Michigan played. Michigan was #7 in total defense. Did teams #1-#6 play only offensive juggernauts?
March 24th, 2015 at 10:38 AM ^
a) QBR ratings are supposed to have average quarterbacks hanging out right at 50.
63% of college QB's (81 of 129) were over a 50 QBR in the 2014 season.
The median value was 58.
March 24th, 2015 at 10:57 AM ^
Okay, so how many did we play that were below that number of 58? That's the question. If we still played 6 under that number and 6 above, then the point remains the same.
March 24th, 2015 at 12:02 PM ^
10 below, 8 above.
We played 7 teams with a QB that had an above median QBR. We were 1-6 in those games... but were 4-1 against teams with well sub median QBs.
Appalachian St. (W)
Notre Dame (L)
Utah (L)
Minnesota (L)
Rutgers (L)
Michigan State (L)
Ohio State (L)
Below:
Kameron Bryant
Andrew Hendrix
Kendal Thompson
Christian Hackenburg
Bill Belton
Zander Diamont
Nate Boudreau
Trevor Siemian
Matt Alviti
C.J. Brown
Over:
Taylor Lamb
Everett Golson
Travis Wilson
Mitch Leidner
Gary Nova
Connor Cook
J.T. Barrett
Cardale Jones
Thank you. Even though you're disagreeing with me, I appreciate the additional research, since I'm not sure where you were getting those numbers.
I think playing 5 above average quarterbacks and 7 below average quarterbacks equals out pretty well. It's not 6-and-6, but it's as close as you can get one way or the other.
One thing that should also be factored in is that the good quarterbacks usually play for good teams, and the bad ones generally play for bad teams. In other words, we lost to Ohio State partly because of J.T. Barrett but also partly because of their running backs, receivers, defensive line, etc. Wins and losses can't totally be pinned on the defense when Michigan's offense was so putrid for long stretches.
I think playing 5 above average quarterbacks and 7 below average quarterbacks equals out pretty well. It's not 6-and-6, but it's as close as you can get one way or the other.
I'd call it average.
Just like our Defensive S&P/FEI stats. Average. Middle of the B1G.
Magnus, do you think those number may be artifically inflated due to a poor / mediocre offense? That is to say, other teams simply ran conservative offenses because they knew we couldn't score. That makes the defense look a little better than they actually are. For example, if you look at the MSU and OSU games, it can certainly be argued that both of their offenses probably could have done a lot more. A couple of other examples off the top of my head (the 2007 OSU game, where OSU clearly could have done more on offense, but didn't because they knew we couldn't even get the ball past midfield, and this year's Florida - Missouri game, where Missouri ran and extremely conservative offense (made Florida's defense look good), because they were counting on Florida's offense / special teams to implode (which they did).
Right. I would hope anyone with enough knowledge of the sport to attend practice and make this report would calibrate for the fact that some of these guys are playing new positions, they're using different terminology, etc.
RJS and Marshall both rushed the passer a lot from the spot, and both did well. However I think they both stand to lose playing time with Charlton and Ojemudia healthy.Is the author speculating that Taco moves to the LOLB position?
I believe people have been talking about that spot as a sort of hybrid role, which obviously makes sense if you're basically halfway between a 4-3 and a 3-4.
It sounds like that is what the author is suggesting. Taco is kind of a tweener in a 3-4, not in the bad way, but in the good way where he could play either the stand up rush end linebacker (whatever they call it) or one of the DE spots. He's a little small for a 3-4 DE so I think I like him at the OLB spot better, and we don't have a star player at that spot this year.
Especially once Godin comes back, our 3-4 DEs are pretty solid.
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March 24th, 2015 at 10:33 AM ^
Well, the defense was pretty good last year, and we didn't lose many people.
Eh... the defense (while much better than the offense) was middling last year, and it's statistics were propped up by the generally atrocious offenses in the B1G.
The defense wasn't bad - but it was:
#41 in Defensive FEI
- behind: Ohio State, Penn. State, Wisconsin, Northwestern, and Michigan State in the B1G. Minnesota and Nebraska are #42 and #43.
#37 in Defensive S&P
- behind: Ohio State, Michigan State, Penn. State, and Wisconsin.
So it was the 5th or 6th best defense, in a bad B1G. Baylor had a significantly better defense on all advanced metrics.
Baylor had a significantly better defense, but they were very close to being in the College Football Playoff. Their whole team was good.
And again, with FEI and S&P, you're talking about pretty good teams except for Penn State, which had a very good defense. Even the numbers you're using (#41, #37) put Michigan in the top third of defenses, and again, that's without even a decent offense to alleviate some of the pressure.