Mailbag: Lear, Rudock Deep, Punt Agonies, Whoville
Pretty much
As flies to wanton boys are we to th' gods,
They kill us for their sport.Scott
What's going on with Rudock?
Brian - you made some comments today on the podcast about how Jake Rudock's inability to hit the deep ball has finally bitten us in the collective asses, which I agree. You also mentioned that when you watched him last year, while he wasn't dead-on every time, he was able to hit the deep pass from time to time - something he clearly can't do this year.
My question is this - to me, this does not seem like a 'new coach, new system' type of a problem. Those issues seem to be the ones where he fails to even attempt a throw to a wide open receiver (which he does all the time - but I give him more of a pass for that as the "new system / new coach" issue). But when he throws the deep pass, only inaccurately - that suggests to me an issue with maybe his mechanics or something else that has thrown off his accuracy past 15 yards. Any thoughts why that might be? If anything, I would expect his deep accuracy to improve with a guy like Harbaugh teaching him the fundamentals. Again, I separate this from other issues such as "stares down Butt" or "ignores screamingly open routes every once in awhile."
Thanks,
Jeff
Yeah, you got me. Some of the Rudock problems are issues that make sense given what we saw from him at Iowa. Not throwing at sort of covered Jake Butt on second and goal from the 18 is a Rudock problem I can understand. That is his reputation. Rudock not finding receivers is a problem I can understand. He's in a new system.
Rudock underthrowing Amara Darboh by about 20 yards is inexplicable. Any quarterback is going to be off on some long throws; to miss as often and as badly as Rudock has is not something that I saw last year. That's not just homerdom. Preseason, PFF put out an article titled "Michigan can win with QB Jake Rudock" that noted he was 12th in downfield (20+ yards in the air) accuracy by their system last year. In the Maryland game, BTN had a similar stat:
The disparity is certainly bigger now.
I don't know if he's hurt or his mechanics are messed up or what, but for whatever reason his ability to hit downfield passes has collapsed. Why? I dunno. Is there something different in what he's doing here?
2014
2015
Since one is in the middle of the field and one on the sideline. Those are throws of about the same length. Am I crazy or does the 2015 video look like a guy who's loading up to get it as far as he can while 2014 sees Rudock make a throw that's comfortably within his range? I dunno.
Something is wrong. A problematic injury, possibly one that caused the weird Iowa QB depth chart thing, is a possible explanation. The other explanation is ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
Ref hot take
Brian:
Having read Seth’s analysis of the officiating (and you really should make him do that weekly) my question is why – why did this happen to us? If you ascribe these “errors” to incompetence, shouldn’t there be an equal number of blown calls going in our favor? Incompetent referees should be just as likely to screw things up for team A as team B and over the course of a 60 minute game shouldn’t it balance relatively out if they are simply incompetent?
The obvious alternative to incompetence is the officials had an agenda and carried it out. Granted, we still should’ve won the game but with so many critical calls being made against Michigan it made the game much closer than it needed to be and allowed the last play to finally tip the scale in MSU’s favor. And if it’s an agenda – why does it exist?
What say you? Incompetence, agenda or something else?
MGrowOld
If you flip a coin a million times there are going to be stretches in there where you get a long series of heads or tails. Michigan just ate an game that was virtually all tails. There's no need for a further explanation. Over the past decade or so it's been definitively proven that the replay officials are not good enough at their job, but that's all. The Big Ten tends to use retired referees in the booth, with evidently disastrous results.
If there was any sort of "plan" here Michigan wouldn't have gotten a free touchdown when their receiver barely scraped the pylon a few years back in this very game. Remember that? That call was overturned from the correct call to free TD. Replay officials should no longer be people with rotary phones. Actual officials are probably the best we've got. That sucks; not much to do about it.
[After THE JUMP: HSPs future, Whoville analogy, we should have done this or that]
Hybrid space players of the future
With the success of Jabrill Peppers in the HSP role and the HSP as the future of defense, what does the future of the position look like for Michigan? Michigan could have as little as one more year of Peppers, his replacement is likely on campus or committed right now, but it isn't clear (at least to me) who the heir apparent is? Who are your top candidates to take over the spot after Jabrill Peppers moves on to the NFL?
-Mathlete
Tyree Kinnel. Kinnel is an excellent athlete who is a corner/safety tweener, but don't just take it from me:
“Kinnel is just a great athlete. I would put him up there with guys like Cam Burrows and others like that from years past. He’s half safety and half corner. He has great coverage skills. He has good size. He is a fit kid.”
All three major recruiting services made that exact comment about Kinnel. While he's not Peppers his reputation is the kind of guy who can cover in space and lay a lick when that's required. He is, or will soon be, the heir apparent.
I mean, probably. Safety is looking mighty thin right about now. Next year Michigan will have senior versions of Hill and Thomas plus Kinnel and true freshmen. The only safety type they have committed right now is Josh Metellus, a sleeper out of Florida. Kinnel might get drafted at safety and then you're back to Countess-style nickelbacks.
Acquiring safeties is a major priority in recruiting the rest of the way.
How likely is the OSU game to be a defacto division championship now?
Enquiring minds want to know:
What is the predicted probability of State winning each of their remaining games? We need them to lose two. We have to count on them losing to the Buckeyes. What is the other game we need to pin our hopes on? Is it at Nebraska? Home against Penn State? Do the Hoosiers have a chance?
Joel
If you go by the advanced stats there's a surprisingly good shot. S&P has the Spartans just 26th. If we assume a loss to OSU, S&P gives MSU just a 21% chance of winning out otherwise, with games at Nebraska and home against PSU near coinflips.
That is optimistic. The stats don't know that MSU has been missing big chunks of their OL that has returned; also the outstanding weakness of MSU's defense will be difficult for Nebraska and Penn State to take advantage of. But if MSU was in dogfights against terrible Purdue(#98) and Rutgers(#92) outfits, every game on the schedule is losable. Except Maryland.
All of the infinite "we should have done X" emails.
This can stand in as a proxy for the rest:
In a situation like the one M found itself in on Saturday, have you ever heard of or seen a team put a man back behind the punter, sort of like the safety man on a kneel? He could protect against a high or low snap that goes past the punter, or in the case like Saturday, or a simple block, he's there for a potential tackle. Might be silly to plan for catastrophe like that but high/low snaps, bobbled snaps, and blocked punts collectively are not uncommon. And I can't help think that if Pepper was ten yards behind Blake we might be having a different conversation right now.
In Jim we trust,
Tim
Yeah, that would have been better than having Jourdan Lewis amble downfield by himself. Yes, they probably should have been in whatever formation they have for punts from their own goal line. No, they shouldn't have tried something weird or fancy to drain the last ten seconds. It took both a fumbled snap and a very bad decision afterward and that bad decision ending up directly in the hands of a guy running full speed for that to happen on a play that won't happen for another 20 years across CFB.
Practice time is limited and better spent on things that had won the game until a series of highly improbable things all happened at once.
But yeah next time have a safety.
Whoville man
Hi Brian,
I've encountered something odd, and after looking around, it's more common then I thought. It seems that Spartan fans, are angry that Michigan fans, aren't as upset, as they feel we should be. They want us to be devastated. To admit that it was the most gut wrenching, soul stealing thing that's ever happened in our lives. The fact that most of us are keeping things in prospective... this is Harbaugh first year, building a culture, waiting for a QB to make his offense go, ect.... well, it's disturbing a lot of Spartans. They feel like this should be a referendum loss. That this loss should define Michigan, and Harbaugh.
It's almost to the point they're more upset about us not being upset, then they are happy about winning. I even heard Wojo talking about this strange phenomena. He said it reminded him of, the Grinch stealing Christmas, yet all the people in Whoville coming out and singing... and the Grinch perplexed as to why... that's Spartan fans right now.
Chris
For real. Twitter's been interesting this week. I put up the game column and had a pile of Spartans descend on me for calling their trash program for what it is. Sorry guys, but if you play a guy who pulled a gun on someone this summer and repeatedly try to injure Michigan players once a game is decided and have a linebacker suspended from the Rose Bowl for still-undisclosed reasons that your beat writers scramble to cover up and run all the way from the other endzone to taunt the Michigan student section, I am going to call your program trash. You can call me whatever you want; the difference is that I don't care and won't read it.
OSU fans, too. Eleven Warriors just put up a boutique site dedicated to the bad things that have happened over the past eight years thanks to Michigan's "institutional arrogance"; I pointed out that a school that…
- had its last coach fired for repeatedly lying to the NCAA
- went undefeated and missed a bowl game because their athletic director thought they could get away with the previous bullet point without a post-season ban
- actually calls itself THE Ohio State University
…accusing anyone else of institutional arrogance was ironic, and RIP my mentions.
I mean, at this point I've seen a lot of bad things. After the immediate stun effect of that game I was more or less fine. As I said in the game column, it's clear where this is going and I'm just happy to have actual football back in my life. If this happens when M has a big opportunity in year five they I might get shook up. Right now I am calm because I like where this is going… and rivals are foaming at the mouth at me for that take.
Previous stops are not this stop
MGoBloggers,
What is the likely Harbaugh tenure at Michigan if all goes according to plan? And by “according to plan” I mean successful seasons of 10+ wins, BCS bowls, and possibly an NC? Am I unrealistic to think 5 years is too much considering he doesn’t coach for more than 4 years at each organization he’s been at?
Thanks,
Jordan Davis
Harbaugh left his coaching stops before San Francisco because they were steps up the coaching ladder, not because he had "worn out his welcome." Getting the Stanford job is a great move when you're at a non-scholarship I-AA school. Getting the 49ers job is a great move when you're at Stanford.
The only actual evidence that Harbaugh can't stay in a place for a long time is what went down in San Francisco, and at this point the entire world knows who the problem actually was. Jed York's a version of Dave Brandon the 49ers can't fire.
I'm not making any promises about Harbaugh because he's an extraordinarily strong-willed guy who is not necessarily a lifer. But he's building homes here, his kids are in school here, and this is his home. I think he'll be around a good long while.
October 22nd, 2015 at 2:25 PM ^
To the point about MSU fans being upset, I don't find it surprising. I also find it funny to hear the perspectives of other fans about UM vs. MSU. Most of them had no idea it was a rivalry until recently, or at least that big of a deal. It seems to me the only reason it is a big deal is because they are winning and making it out to be a huge deal.
When Michigan goes back to winning most of the games, it will not be a big deal. Only right now are people like that woman from ESPN and others crawling out of the woodwork to make a big deal about the game. "Little brother" was about all that was said about the MSU game from the Michigan side for the longest time. Now that state has won 7 of the last 10, they have built this myth about the game being huge and then rub it in and plaster it everywhere when they win.
From the Michigan fan's perspective from 2008-2014, it's more like "Oh wow, you won. You beat the team that lost to Rutgers/Maryland/Toledo." This one stung because of how it ended, but I am not sure how much different I would have felt if it was to PSU or Indiana or anyone.
October 22nd, 2015 at 3:06 PM ^
October 22nd, 2015 at 3:08 PM ^
I never thought of them as little brother, but I never of them as a rival school. I didn't think we competed for the same things. Mostly, I just never thought about them. I do think of them more often now, because I have so many friends who are Spartans and are running their mouths all the time. Some of them are still saying "Pride comes before the fall, UM" .... and that's funny to me, because it's several years old and it seems like they might have found something more apropos by now. Plus, I've had pride before, during, and after the fall of our football program, and if they went to a top tier university they would understand what that means.
I still don't think of them as a rival though. Just a game in the schedule, and a bunch of stalkers who want our attention.
October 22nd, 2015 at 7:35 PM ^
October 22nd, 2015 at 9:14 PM ^
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October 22nd, 2015 at 3:09 PM ^
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October 22nd, 2015 at 2:25 PM ^
I am ZERO percent concerned about JH leaving. If you understand him, the university and the current state of the program, it's just not a probable outcome for at least 4-5 years. and in that case, M is likely a playoff contender most years, so OK.
Re: Rudock... look, I'm not saying this is evidence that JH isn't a good QB coach, b/c 1) there is a mountain of it to support that JH *is* a good QB developer, and 2) h's been on campus for 4-5 months at most.
HOWEVER, Rudock's performace this year certainly doesn't ADD to the evidence that JH is a QB guru. it doesn't take away either.
DO the QBs & WRs still practice deep balls to the endzone from 30+ yards in warm ups? Man that was the best time sitting in the stadium, watching those guys run patterns and seeing the QBs drop laser guided bombs right into the bread basket time after time pre-game.
October 22nd, 2015 at 2:27 PM ^
He has below average arm strength. Don't get me wrong, he can put some velocity on the ball, but it takes his mechanics and everything he has to get some heat on the ball. What that leads to is inconsistencies.
When you have to "overthrow" the ball to get it where it needs to go, it is extremely difficult to coordinate all your mechanics with everything else. It's like going out and trying to crush your driver off the tee, typically you end up slicing it and not hitting it solidly instead of getting solid contact and actually hitting it farther than you otherwise do.
Rudock doesn't have the natural arm strength to push it down field, so he has to over throw when he goes deep. Last year, his mechanics were synced and he could get it there. But as soon as something breaks down, it's like trying to correct all those things in your broken golf swing. And thus, he isn't accurate right now.
October 23rd, 2015 at 10:20 AM ^
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October 22nd, 2015 at 2:36 PM ^
Regarding Rudock, I'd buy an injury issue. I mean, he sure seemed competent last year and the year before downfield, and while I think the WRs aren't great this still doesn't feel like normal throws for him. Who knows, but I don't see how he could have regressed this much in such a short period of time.
Had the clock been under 6 seconds or so, I'd have been up to the offense coming out, running a quick screen or something, and just burning clock down. Hell, maybe you just get Rudock run around in the backfield a bunch. Or put in Peppers. But with 10 seconds, you have to punt. My only issue was not going max protect on the punt; MSU had nobody back, so take your last TO/delay of game and block everyone. But it was the flukiest of flukey results.
As for MSU fans, I've not had a huge number of them freaking out or taunting. My brother (an MSU grad) texted me to say he thought it was the most insane ending ever and kind of laughed at that part of it, but no taunting or anything. And my FB feed was mostly full of UM fans feeling down and a couple Sparties saying what a crazy win that was. Not a lot of shit talking. But again, it's a school that is 7-0 and almost fell down the rankings some more after a win; of course they are going to look for joy in UM's pain. What else do they have to look forward to - getting shut out of the playoff again? Dropping below UM if/when they lose their next game?
October 22nd, 2015 at 3:46 PM ^
My feed was a little different than yours. My sparty friends are changing their avatars to that cartoon of Dantonio as Lucy pulling the football away from Harbaugh as Charlie Brown, or "Hail No," or stuff like that. One even claimed that MSU deserved to win due to the yardage thing despite all the pundits saying Michigan dominated the game. I'm like, what? Who is saying UofM dominated the game? Another guy posted an article comparing how Harbaugh "threw Blake under the bus" with his postgame comments to how Dantonio accepted all the blame for losing the B1G championship game a few years ago on a roughing the punter play.
I think the difference may be that having grown up in East Lansing, my Sparty friends are lifers, having rooted for sparty before, during, and after college. They are so in-grained in that insecure, second-class citizen culture that they can't see how "little brotherish" they are. These people are in their mid-40s and they're acting so juvenile over a football game. So I just yawn and try to ignore them.
October 22nd, 2015 at 4:12 PM ^
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October 22nd, 2015 at 2:40 PM ^
My take on Harbaugh's success as a QB coach is a little different. I think he is successful at coaching QB’s not by honing their mechanics but by working within the player’s current mechanics and pumping up his confidence and knowledge. I base this opinion on two pieces of evidence: Harbaugh's QB seminar video while he was at San Diego; and reports about John O’Korn saying the Michigan coaching staff is not trying to mess with his mechanics like Houston did. With Rudock, it might be time to mess with his mechanics, because what I see is that he drops his elbow when he tries to make a deep pass. As we’ve all seen, there’s no accuracy as a result and the ball too often flutters or loses steam at the end. He seems to have fallen into bad habits. Get the elbow up, step into it, and drive the ball, Jake! I say this without any real knowledge of how Harbaugh and the coaching staff have been coaching Rudock. Just my opinion.
October 22nd, 2015 at 2:47 PM ^
All my Spartan family and friends are asking why I didnt let loose on them, or stay inside my house for a whole week, or cry myself to sleep everynight....its because we all know what happened and whats going to happen.
We lost a game with MSU having a .2% chance of winning in those final 10 seconds...weird shit happens and that .2% was enough. And Harbaugh is building something here and its going to be special. Yes I am disappointed we lost but we all know they better saver that gift we gave them because the monster is coming.
I really do mean this, I feel bad for Minnesota. These young men are going to have their on fire.
Hail, Hail to Michigan
October 22nd, 2015 at 2:48 PM ^
Michigan could lose every game for the rest of time and move to the MAC and MSU would still have an inferiority complex toward us, but they would still be a Spartan "off brand" university and football team. They have "state" tacked onto their name. They aren't as good academically. Their culture is worse. Their strategy is to minimize UofM to seem relatively better instead of just utilizing and building off their own strengths and being actually better.
October 22nd, 2015 at 3:02 PM ^
It would not surprise me if Harbaugh and Rudock didn't have a great relationship. Rudock doesn't seem to have the Harbaugh approach to playing quarterback, and he is the only starter who doesn't give off the Harbaugh mentality IMO. He reminds me more of a player on a Hoke team.
Rudock was the best available option, so I'm sure Harbaugh is glad to have him, but I'm also sure Harbaugh is having a hard time coaching him.
October 22nd, 2015 at 10:00 PM ^
You can't coach nor teach someone with whom you have a poor relationship. Sure if Rudock was the 3rd or 4th string QB his relationship with Harbaugh might be in a hard place (although given Harbaugh's style I'd bet that his relationship with all his QB's is positive). There's simply no way that Harbaugh is going to put a guy with whom he has a poor relationship in charge of his team. If Rudock didn't share Harbaugh's approach to playing quarterback he would not be starting, Period. Is Rudock perfect? Hardly, but he and Harbaugh share mutual respect and trust. Bet on it.
October 23rd, 2015 at 1:48 PM ^
I stand by my assessment. Jake Rudock is the equivalent of Alex Smith. He is the best available option and Harbaugh is doing what he can to win with him, but he is not the type of quarterback Harbaugh wants. This makes him difficult to coach.
October 22nd, 2015 at 3:28 PM ^
October 22nd, 2015 at 3:34 PM ^
Rudock is who it is and he could have been a lot worse but i think Jim has toned him down a bit (remember all those Int first few games?). I wish he was able to make a couple of long throws a game, because that would help a lot but at the same time our receivers are not that good either. If our defense and special teams keeps playing lights out we should be okay.
As far as msu fans i dont care for them, the smart ones usually know their place and even at my work some of them said how good UofM will be from now on after watchig Saturdays game. The irony of all things was that most fo the msu fans i know didnt talk shit or wear any msu gear last friday at work but on monday all of them wore their msu gear and puffed their chest unitl i called them out how they were scared the whole time and now that they won they get to wear their gear and brag lol.
I dont deny the fact that Dantonio has done an excellent job there and those bastards need to build the guy his statue, BUT i will never ignore the fact that the past deacade B1G has been bad..actually take that back B1G has been really really bad and the only teams that have been worth mentioning are osu and msu. Some will say well before that there were UofM and osu as the two strong teams in the B1G, but I disagree. Michigan and osu were powerhouses BUT by a small margin as opposed to now where everyone besides osu and msu are cake walks. I dont know the earlier years but when i was going to school in the late 90's and early 2000s B1G was huge. You had the Drew Brees of Purdue to Randle El's of Indiana to Glen Masons of Minnesota, i think even Illinois had a winning season every other year. I mean lets be honest msu took advanatge of our horrible coaching decisions and even worse AD. From changing the style of football (which meant a complete over haul of the whole team) to a coach who talked shit about our rivals but couldnt come up with a plan to score a TD on them. All i know is JH better have a QB and team ready for ext year so when we go to EL we crash those bastards and run the score on them.
October 22nd, 2015 at 3:34 PM ^
Spartan fans are like a hobo who found a lottery ticket who is now indignant that we aren't congratulating him on finally having made something of himself.
October 22nd, 2015 at 3:41 PM ^
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October 22nd, 2015 at 3:58 PM ^
This has probably been mentioned, but it seems like teams should figure out how many second could safely be whittled away by having the quarterback run around before taking a slide. I felt from the moment we got the ball that we should avoid a punt. We only needed an extra 3 seconds per play (assuming we didn't take the time-outs). With 40 yards to run around in that seems doable.
October 22nd, 2015 at 4:49 PM ^
(1) What are the odds that the game would end the way it did?
(2) What are the odds of the quarterback losing the ball (or stepping out of bounds) while running around before taking a slide?
I think if you want to choose the one less likely to happen, it's #1.
October 23rd, 2015 at 3:30 AM ^
Jake could have run backwards to the end zone, taking a knee for a safety. 23-22 at that point. Then Jake could have punted a coffin corner punt with no return possibility with only 3 or 4 seconds left to Sparty! Game over!
October 23rd, 2015 at 9:41 AM ^
a safety ties the game
October 23rd, 2015 at 12:11 PM ^
October 23rd, 2015 at 10:16 AM ^
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October 22nd, 2015 at 4:49 PM ^
It's in their head's. There in the greatest football stadium in the world. There in the largest football stadium in the world. They feel an obligation to call a even game. The Big House has an effect on official's. I believe their dead set on not feeling intimidated in the setting of Michigan stadium. When a equal or higher ranked team is playing more so about calls. Beat the Golden Gophers. Use tv replay. Just phone up to the announcing booth. The replay video room has to coming from nursing home's.
October 22nd, 2015 at 9:17 PM ^
Their is possessive as in "their heads"
They're is a contraction for they are as in "they're going to be late"
There is to point out a location as in "the ref threw a flag and it landed over there".
This has been your public service announcement to help not drive your fellow readers crazy.
October 22nd, 2015 at 4:49 PM ^
The "As flies to wanton boys" quote is from the Shakespeare play, King Lear. I'm just saying.
October 22nd, 2015 at 10:37 PM ^
October 22nd, 2015 at 5:14 PM ^
The obvious alternative to incompetence is the officials had an agenda and carried it out. Granted, we still should’ve won the game but with so many critical calls being made against Michigan it made the game much closer than it needed to be and allowed the last play to finally tip the scale in MSU’s favor. And if it’s an agenda – why does it exist?
Putting on my tinfoil hat, if they were to have an agenda, I imagine their rationale would be to maximize the league's chances of getting a team in the playoff, and as one of the Big Ten's two unbeaten teams, MSU would be favored over Michigan. Brian's counterexample of the 2008 game wouldn't disprove this hypothesis, because the agenda wouldn't be anti-Michigan, it would be pro-Big-Ten-team-in-national-contention (and neither team was in '08).
But I think it's a lot more likely that they're just crappy officials.
October 22nd, 2015 at 5:23 PM ^
I think if they have an agenda, it's to send a "message" back to JH that they're not crazy about how he contests questionable calls with an enthusiasm unknown to mankind. I think they liked the way Hoke dealt with things (or not) better.
But, never attribute to malice what can be explained by incompetence. So yeah, I think they're probably just bad refs.
October 22nd, 2015 at 5:06 PM ^
Ref coin, obverse: FUCK MICHIGAN. Reverse: SCREW MICHIGAN.
So how often does a coin land on its edge?
/s
October 22nd, 2015 at 5:21 PM ^
Mods. In the video above it looks like Rudock is striding farther than he did last year and dropping his rear shoulder more than he did. Please double check me. Let's get this fixed before OSU! :)
October 22nd, 2015 at 6:27 PM ^
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October 22nd, 2015 at 5:53 PM ^
October 22nd, 2015 at 6:25 PM ^
October 22nd, 2015 at 6:30 PM ^
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October 22nd, 2015 at 9:03 PM ^
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October 22nd, 2015 at 10:06 PM ^
October 23rd, 2015 at 9:09 AM ^
and now it's true
October 22nd, 2015 at 6:43 PM ^
that make me very happy in side.
Thank you.
"But he's building homes here, his kids are in school here, and this is his home. I think he'll be around a good long while."
October 22nd, 2015 at 6:48 PM ^
Oddly enough, Gerry DiNardo made some useful points on BTN re that shocking punt block, namely, that there had been some bad snaps and missed blocking assignments on earlier UM punts in that MSU game. BTN showed the actual footage, and he was right. So I do think that it is fair to point out that certain UM coaches (Baxter?) should have made an effort to correct those earlier mistakes, as well as to warn Blake to fall on the ball if things went south. Also, other people have commented on the gunner on the left side, who was blocking no one and running downfield even though there was no Spartan returner. Also, the blocking of certain linemen on that play was very poor - apart from one major missed block, it seems as if some linemen were shedding their blocks early in order to run downfield (as they would normally do) instead of holding their blocks longer, with the result that lots of Spartan defenders were in the backfield within seconds. Even so, the Spartans were lucky to be able to snag the ball in the air and run it back to our endzone. But mistakes were definitely made on that play apart from the bobbling of the ball. As for MSU fans, many of them are bad sports and, thus, insensitive bullies when they win, as is typical of immature people with inferiority complexes. Nothing new there. Finally, I know that many UM fans profess to hate the Buckeyes (and vice versa), but as a UM alum and longtime Wolverines football fan, I don't feel that way at all. I actually want Ohio State to beat most other teams, esp. outside of the Big 10 - as long as they lose to us in the last game of the regular season. After all, the UM-OSU game has much more significance when both teams are really good. IMHO, the optimal scenario is when both teams enter that game 11-0 and when we then win the game.
October 23rd, 2015 at 1:36 PM ^
I'm going with 1971, off the top of my head, not looking it up. So, I'm like, I'll take ANY time Michigan beats osu, by any score, with any respective records.
That being said, I guess we now HAVE TO root for osu to win all their games until 11/28 and then a 9-2 Michigan upsets an 11-0 osu - the only way for us to play in B1G title game & go to the Rose Bowl.
October 22nd, 2015 at 7:01 PM ^
BTW, I'm very concerned that Rudock's seeming inabilty to throw accurate long balls this season may come back to haunt us yet again, perhaps against PSU as well as OSU, both of whom will load the box with talented defenders to stop the run and thus force Rudock to win the game by completing passes downfield. Unfortunately, I doubt whether we will have enough offensive firepower, esp. in the passing game, to match the Buckeye's offense, which now seems to be hitting its stride with J.T. Barrett at QB. Needless to say, I hope I'm wrong and that Michigan will somehow prevail. Given how our defense is playing, if we had a quality passer like Connor Cook or Kevin Hogan at Stanford, we could conceivably have won the Big 10 championship and been in the NC playoffs in Harbaugh's first year as coach.
October 22nd, 2015 at 8:28 PM ^
It looks to me sometimes when he is throwing he is trying too hard. His drop-back and delivery footwork look good to me (great compared with DG), but when I look at the video clips above I noticed his left leg: it looks like in the 2014 clip, he steps and throws properly; whereas in the 2015 clip when he throws deep, he overstirdes with his left leg is landing on the heel and outside portion of his left foot, possibly from an attempt to get too much torque on the ball.
October 22nd, 2015 at 8:36 PM ^
It's all in the framing.
I would surmise it is because they think M represents the evil, dark side. So they take their 'miraculous' win as a sign of divine interevention, and feel that the dark side should see the evil of our ways and repent, and acknowledge the superior power of goodness (and Sparty hate) in the universe and the futility of our cause.
M fans, on the other hand, are confident that his is just one more 'cross to bear' on our long road to being reunited with the glory that is Michigan football's destiny.
October 22nd, 2015 at 8:36 PM ^
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