MGoPodcast 12.7: Didn't Take the Points
1 hour and 20 minutes
We are, as always, presented by UGP & The Bo Store, and if it wasn’t for Rishi and Ryan I might be doing a podcast on how the election might affect environmental regulations in water & wastewater. Our associate sponsors are also key to all of this: HomeSure Lending, Ann Arbor Elder Law, the Residence Inn Ann Arbor Downtown, Michigan Law Grad, Human Element, The Phil Klein Insurance Group, FuegoBox, and Information Entropy.
1. Offense
starts at 1:00
The QB runs were absent and so was the interior run game, which was terrifying because their DL were beating up our OL. Another offense that can't throw more than 15 yards downfield: touch passes sail 20 yards over their receivers.
[The rest of the writeup and the player after The Jump]
2. Defense
starts at 21:59
The 3-3-5 continues to get gashed. Michigan hasn't recruited a cornerback who can run since Ambry Thomas.
3. Basketball & Hot Takes
starts at 37:35
But hey, 5-star recruit. Will Jimmy Howard win a title in the next five years?
4. Around the Big Ten wsg Jamie Mac
starts at 1:00:33
Well it turns out the defense of Minnesota is horrible, Ohio State does horrible things to people, Illinois stayed in a game with their fourth string quarterback, Indiana is a powerhouse now apparently, and oh dear Northwestern-Iowa is some terrible football.
MUSIC:
- “Stardust"—Willie Nelson
- “Drunk on the Moon”—Tom Watts
- “Drown”—Chastity Belt
- “Across 110th Street”
THE USUAL LINKS:
Kirk Ferentz must be rolling over in his grave.
November 2nd, 2020 at 8:44 AM ^
Oh boy, this should be good !!
November 2nd, 2020 at 8:52 AM ^
Wash, rinse, repeat. Is this the last 6 years combined into one shitty year?
November 2nd, 2020 at 9:58 AM ^
I agree with Brian and Seth that pretty quickly after the game, I was like oh well.
I get that you guys have access to the program which prevents you from coming on these podcasts and calling for Jim’s head. But, isn’t it a bad thing for lifelong fans to just get over a loss like this so quickly as we really aren’t that surprised this would happen under Harbaugh?
November 2nd, 2020 at 10:49 AM ^
This isn't a problem that started with Harbaugh. It probably starts at the tail end of the Carr era. Calling for the firing of every coach since then, including Carr gets old and has gotten old.
Don't know what to say except that it sucks.
November 2nd, 2020 at 10:58 AM ^
I wouldn't put it all on bad losses feeling like a normal thing. That is certainly part of it, but you also have to consider the pandemic in the room. We didn't even know if there would be a season at all. There's so much insane shit happening in the world and college football right now. Who even knows if the season will be played to completion. Just hard to let one game ruin your weekend right now.
November 2nd, 2020 at 11:38 AM ^
Yeah, apathy might be harder to cure than rage. But let's lie down on the couch and pick this apart.
Every fanbase calls for the coach's head after a loss. Michigan's issues, however, are baffling in their predictability. We keep getting holes in the roster that are clearly visible from three years out!
Again, we don't need world-beaters. We just need bodies. I've tried to make this clear, I don't know if it's such an advanced concept or if people were being obtuse just to troll, but last year we didn't need a Mo Hurst or even a Bryan Mone to shore up the D-line; a Matt Godin or RVB would've made all the difference. Instead we rolled out Glasgow (NTG) and Mason in clearly desperate moves over a problem they had to have seen coming for years. We still have Brown rolling out a 3-3-5 and world-class DEs diving into B gaps because our plan was, what, swing for the fences on five-stars and then scramble when that doesn't work? Yeah we reeled in Smith and Hinton but again, we need bodies at D-line. Depth. 330 million people in this country, and a household name like Michigan couldn't find the next Matt Godin?
And now it's cornerback. Again, we don't need Charles Woodson out there to make the rest of the pieces of this defense work, but we do need players to fit the scheme, or the scheme to fit the players. Brian is 100% correct in that Gray is in a reverse Blake Countess situation; a poor damn corner who doesn't have the requisite raw speed to play press man. I know the coaches have more football knowledge in their toenail clippings than my entire brain, and you can't teach zone coverage in a day or even a year, but "don't put a slow guy in press man with no safety help" isn't an advanced scheme concept; it's common sense vs. incompetent levels of procrastination here. They did it because A) they ran out of NFL-caliber corners, B) forget the 5-stars, they didn't even recruit 3-star press man corners, C) ditto for the D-line, and D) Brown doesn't want to learn zone. These are all serious challenges, but they had years to fix any of them and still wound up empty-handed. That's really dumb.
As a fan, I was fuming when refs robbed us of victories against MSU and OSU. I still seethe at how Wisconsin ended Newsome's career. These aren't things I can control, but I got upset because I saw merit and injustice. Greatness that never was to be because of human filth. To me, that's something to get upset about. When the CB problem Brown now has is three gorram years in the making and he's still throwing out press man 3-3-5 like he has the bodies for it (narrator: "he does not"), you just shrug your shoulders and go "eh". It's not Gray's fault he's not fast. It's not Kemp's fault he's not a nose. MSU is trash, but they didn't win this game by trying to break the QB's neck. O'Neill's crew is infamous but Gray's PI flags were legit. If I'm upset at all, it's at the coaches for wasting eligibility, but COVID granted everyone a mulligan this year. So. . . eh? What do I get upset about? Incompetence lost to hunger. That's what should happen.
November 2nd, 2020 at 9:58 AM ^
Glad the podcast hit the key issue - poor recruiting at the most critical ability spot (CB) for this defense. A 3* like Clark can work in this press coverage but a 3* like Gray is not a fit. The right 3* is better in press than the wrong 4 or 5* but UM should always have 4* ability that also fits the scheme.
MSU had a junior high game plan to simply throw a go route to a fast guy and the UM roster lacked the personnel to handle it. Losing Ambry was huge and Gemon has some good ability, but the roster really has no other talent like Clark or better to play CB?
November 2nd, 2020 at 10:38 AM ^
That line about "we're Iowa" hit, because it's true. "Oh no, the one talented guy on the team is unavailable, I guess we're fucked."
November 2nd, 2020 at 6:54 PM ^
Oh we are 110% Iowa. And JH aing going anywhere unless he wants to, he wont get fired....so he is Kirk, we are Iowa.
Wet fart noise
November 2nd, 2020 at 10:13 AM ^
The lack of a QB after six years is pathetic. Starting a "project" at QB in his third year who can't throw a pass with touch on it and is 100% ineffective past 15 yards is damning. How bad was MacCaffrey? How bad is McNamara? They must be gawdawful if they can't pass better than Milton.
Milton should have gone to a MAC-level school to learn to play the position.
November 2nd, 2020 at 10:18 AM ^
I still believe our QBs have played scared under Harbaugh and don’t want to create turnovers. The thing is, throwing the deep ball on 1:1 coverage seems to result in a catch or a penalty more frequently than an interception. Also, an interception on a 40 yard pass isn’t all that different from a punt.
November 2nd, 2020 at 10:23 AM ^
Depends on the down. A pick affects the team psyche, particularly the qb. Also it can ignite the opposition.
November 2nd, 2020 at 10:31 AM ^
True, but it also impacts the defense as it shows you’re willing to throw the ball deep and they can’t just load the box.
November 2nd, 2020 at 11:59 AM ^
Rocky Lombardi agrees with this assessment.
November 2nd, 2020 at 10:48 AM ^
There’s no need to criticize a kid who was starting his second game with a young OL and WR group.
He did have over 300 yards and 0 INTs. The QB wasn’t the problem in this game on offense. It was the lack of running game. Milton will be a good one.
November 2nd, 2020 at 10:57 AM ^
I'm criticizing the fact that he is still a QB project and the state of UM's program that a project is our best option. OSU, Wisconsin, Clemson, Alabama, etc....schools that compete year in and year out would never start a guy like Milton at this stage of his development unless their top two QBs went down.
November 2nd, 2020 at 11:03 AM ^
This may come as a shock to you, but we're not anywhere near those programs, hence the discrepancy.
November 2nd, 2020 at 11:26 AM ^
We sure pay our staff like we should be. Even Iowa wouldn't trot out a raw QB like this. So, if we are going to be in the Illinois/Indiana/Nebraska tier then lets cut the salaries and ticket prices and be realistic.
November 2nd, 2020 at 3:43 PM ^
Michigan = Ground chuck on a Filet Mignon budget.
November 2nd, 2020 at 11:00 AM ^
Agree, Milton is who he is at this point, I see the potential, just wish we didn't have to wait/hope he reaches it, would be nice to know your QB can make all the throws going into a season for a change.
As far as the deep ball, I am more concerned with our WR's inability to get any separation and with their size, they are not going to win many 50/50 battles. And the comment about at least it keeps the defense honest, true if you are showing you can complete the passes, but if they see you are just throwing it and hoping to complete it, the approach to just stacking the box will not change until you can show that you can consistently complete those passes.
November 2nd, 2020 at 10:21 AM ^
I think it was Brian who said Don Brown can't run zone coverage, but he did run it last year. Whether we were good at it or not, I haven't looked at the results of just that to say anything.
In any case, he sure didn't run it last Saturday... maybe they scraped it due to the limited practice time this season? No idea...
November 2nd, 2020 at 10:52 AM ^
It's not his philosophy to run zone. But he isn't building the personell needed for man coverage. This was evident when osu blasted us two years ago, last year, and probably this year as well.
November 2nd, 2020 at 11:03 AM ^
How if the heck can you be a DC at a major DI program and not be able to run/teach a zone? I don't buy that, I do buy that he is to stubborn/proud to go zone and concede that his scheme does not work.
November 2nd, 2020 at 12:17 PM ^
Because zone isn't the answer. It's just a scheme. Brown has run zone, but he runs a basic zone that's so basic it has the Al Borges effect -- offenses key on it and immediately check to zone-beaters. And there's the rub. Just like there are man-beaters that will roast slower corners extra-crispy, there are zone-beaters that will humiliate your corners if they get confused. And then what, everyone's gonna call for Brown to play more man? Mixing is ideal in theory, but practice time is limited. We tried giving the O-line a gap coach and a zone coach and that was a disaster that got several coaches fired.
In principle, man coverage is easier to teach, and if you have good pass rush, it's all you need. There's a reason why Brown ran it with success at Boston College, that powerhouse of 5-star talent. Teaching basic zone can be done in a day, but to succeed against everything our rivals will throw at it, that takes years. It's not like he can snap his fingers and go "all right, play zone coverage now" and expect MSU to obligingly keep running fly routes. No, they would've immediately switched to zone-beaters and everyone would've done even worse. He kept running man because he had no choice.
But the problem here isn't what they ran out for a day. Brown's problem is personnel. He no longer has the Hoke-ian D-lines that annihilated all in their path, and he no longer has the NFL-caliber corners that can stay in anyone's noon shadow. I don't know if he expected those to last forever because This Is Michigan or whatever (expectations are certainly different here than from anywhere he'd been prior), but I will presume that he's shocked that the talented depleted so dramatically. As I said upthread, these problems were years in the making and it still looks like it caught everyone off guard. That's an embarrassing level of incompetence.
November 2nd, 2020 at 10:52 AM ^
This is a young team. And this game was a growing pain. They, and the coaches, are fine.
November 2nd, 2020 at 11:06 AM ^
1. About the only criticism I have of Mgoblog crew is their constant discounting of MSU. I am not sure why year after year FFFF has cyan circles on everyone for MSU and yet they play pretty well. Honestly look at the Rutgers game. If not for their turnovers then MSU beats Rutgers handily.
2. Michigan team on offense is young. Not an excuse. What the fanbase wants is doesn't matter if its young, just perform like a high octane offense. Well it doesn't work like that for whatever reason. Why does it work at OSU? I am not sure. I think if you delve deeper, they probably have more upperclassmen. Also not sure why Michigan struggles with developing depth.
3. Defense, yes, issues. Not sure how to fix. Not averse to changing things there. Offense, lets give it sometime. Stop changing OCs every two years.
4. Look for M to improve in upcoming games. If they don't - and specifically, Milton struggles - it would be fair to question the staff then in this weird limited year.
November 2nd, 2020 at 12:13 PM ^
It's evident this coaching staff isn't top-level anymore (or at least never was, but was doing a better job at covering their weaknesses). They have enough talent on the roster to be significantly better than they are.
As has been re-hashed repeatedly, the other alarming thing that circles back to the staff is the number of coaches and players that have chosen to walk under what I'd consider odd or aberrant circumstances.
With the coaching staff you have Mattison (explained mostly for the money, but still a reprehensibly treacherous lateral move), Wheatley Sr., Patridge, now apparently Shoop. I'm sure I'm missing some.
Player-wise I can't wrap my head around Aubrey Solomon, Dylan McCaffrey, Tarik Black, Myles Sims, or Jordan Anthony. Even Wheatley Jr. and Asiasi were baffling to me at the time. Again, I'm sure I'm leaving some of the strange departures out. There have been so many of them I can't remember them all.
Working and playing for Harbaugh must be grating in a way that leads to some people simply getting fed up and needing to walk away.
November 2nd, 2020 at 12:19 PM ^
For all of the Harbaugh/Brown apologists out there, let me write it one more time:
YEAR
SIX
We are no closer today to winning the B1G (to say nothing of the NC) than we were in 2015. That, alone, is an indictment worth dismissal.
November 2nd, 2020 at 4:10 PM ^
Hard truth is Don Brown was the perfect hire 10 years to late. Don Brown creates a great defensive system to stymie an offense that was all the rage in college football at the time. He saw an offense that caused defenses across the country to play on there heels and spend more time making reads than plays. Popular defensive approaches were not getting the job done so DB said ENOUGH!!!! Were not sitting back on our heels and waiting for the offense to dictate what we do, we are taking the fight to you.
Don Brown was the perfect hire for what OSU and Urban Meyer we’re at the time. Don Brown was the perfect hire for playing Braxton Miller or JT Barrett. Don Brown was hired just as the game was changing. Don Brown was hired just as Urban was changing. We may never know if Urbans evolution was because of Don Brown or because he saw the signs the game was going this direction and would be necessary to keep up with Bama and Clemsons but he made the change non the less and it’s predictably been a complete f**** disaster for Don Brown.
He has had ample time over multiple seasons and offseason to make adjustments to his system to better adapt to both the modern offenses he is facing and the level of talent he has at the position his system puts the most pressure on. To expect any kind of change at this point would be insanity. It’s time to go
November 2nd, 2020 at 11:51 PM ^
I’m realizing, or learning that the QB run threat is paramount in modern college football and you don’t have to get a “running” qb to be successful at it. My prejudice was always the sacrifice in throwing talent that often(but not always) accompanies the smaller stature guys with the jets to break for 60. The plays that give D’s fits can be run with any standard issue QB with decent athletic talent. Sure you trade the big chunk runs that Denard etc.,can get but you damn sure could move the chains and create conflict with a lot less quicks than JT.
November 3rd, 2020 at 6:02 AM ^
A QB run that converts the 3rd and 8 will, if done a couple of times in a game, break the spirit of a defense.
Dunno what possessed me to come back to this (other than to marvel at how drastically things have changed), just love how the "DJ Turner...can't run" comment turned out to be an all-time Freezing Cold Take
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