Previously: The Story. Podcast 13.0A. Podcast 13.0B. Podcast 13.0C. 5Q5A Offense. 5Q5A Defense. 2020 Heuristics.

Heuristicland

Turnover Margin

The theory of turnover margin: it is pretty random. Teams that find themselves at one end or the other at the end of the year are likely to rebound towards the average. So teams towards the top will tend to be overrated and vice versa. Nonrandom factors to evaluate: quarterback experience, quarterback pressure applied and received, and odd running backs like Mike Hart who just don't fumble.

Other than “worst sack rate in program history” how was the play? Mathlete put together an adjusted sack rate that accounted for things like opponents and the likelihood of sacks by down and distance, and Michigan’s defense was 61st if that helps you sleep better. Their offensive sack rate dropped to 45th by that measure. It was a weird, weird year.

Anyway it was not a year the turnover gods loved Michigan. If you try hard enough you can name all nine events. I can think of a could of dropped INTs along the way. The only thing I have to add is that in non-garbage time Ohio State picked up 8 of their opponents’ 9 fumbles and lost 1 of their 4, giving them the best fumble luck in the country. They were 2nd in adjusted sack rate so some of that was earned, but also 113th in adjusted sack rate (101st true) on offense so they should have given those back. Just thought you should know.

At such low samples this stuff doesn’t mean much. If you want to add “snakebit” to the jellyfish, pufferfish, striated surgeonfish, scorpion, hooded pitohui, dart frog, and Pfeffer’s flamboyant cuttlefish and Spartan wide receivers that punctured Michigan’s hide last year, be my guest.

[After the JUMP: Things that might mean more]

Position Switches

You want me to take on what? [Fuller]

Theory of position switches: if you are starting or considering starting a guy who was playing somewhere else a year ago, that position is in trouble. There are degrees of this. Flipping sides of the ball is very bad. Sliding an OT to OG is probably fine. Sliding an OG to OT… might be bad. Flipping ILB slots is nothing.

None of these really bother me this year, and a few are positives. I’ll note quickly that the switch to the new defensive system doesn’t change certain roles. The DTs are still DTs unless they weren’t really DTs last year, MLB/WLB are the same, safety, cornerback, and nickel safety are unchanged by the front even if the coverages have changed.

In descending order of concern:

Trying to move Zak Zinter to C in place of Vastardis: Cross-training your guards in case of injury makes sense, but this became a serious storyline from the end of spring through when he got dinged up in fall camp. It didn’t seem to take, and Vastardis seems firmly entrenched back at center. The fact that they tried—and the fact that Vastardis has lost weight two years in a row (he was 317, now 294) tells me this might be a problem spot. It also almost certainly means they were hoping to replace him with one of the guys on the bench.

RG/RT Andrew Stueber staying at RT: The cascade of injuries to the OL last year necessitated Stueber kicking back outside for most of the year after a couple of games at guard, where I was really hoping he could team up with Zinter. He might be overmatched by elite edge rushers. He also might not see one until November.

All the Defensive Ends to OLB: The concern is about the linebacker aspects, since all but the newcomers are sized and were recruited for DE. One the weakside, Aidan Hutchinson can play outside to anchor and dominate all, and that OLB spot in this defense is really a DE anyways. Taylor Upshaw, David Ojabo, and Braiden McGregor (once he’s healthy) came in with some linebacker in them, and are probably going to fit in fine. If we were worried the Anchor types like Mike Morris and Gabe Newburg might find themselves too blocky for the role, based on practice reports that hasn’t been the case (especially with Morris).

Viper Michael Barret to WLB: The vipers are going to eat the transition cost the hardest, and Barrett at the ILB spot worried me because he gave back all the points he earned screaming off the edge by getting blocked into the Gatorade by tight ends, and now he’ll have to take on any linemen that escape the five-man front. He’s got enough size to play it in Macdonald’s system, and flipping from one 4-3 OLB position to another isn’t that big of a deal. Getting passed by Hill-Green is evidence Barrett’s been removed from his wheelhouse. The Ravens would use a hybrid there so there’s a role still, and this is relatively minor.

Rush 3T Julius Welschof to 5-2 DT: Juice was starting to break through last year as an effective passing downs DT. That sounds like it would translate to a 3-4 DE but the DT position in this defense really calls for more of a regular 4-3 DT type, and by all accounts Welschof needs more time to get used to it. The other Don Brown DTs all seem well-suited to the new role, all of them more than they were to NT in the old system.

6th OL Joel Honigford to (slimmer) TE. He was an effective snowplow last year in their 6th lineman packages. He slimmed down 48 pounds and is now 257 and a tight end in fact. Can he catch a pass? Could he not at 305 when nobody was expecting it? Does this say anything about the position’s depth. Probably not.

Unused safeties to CB and vice versa. New safeties coach Ron Bellamy traded German (twin brother of Gemon) Green and Quinten Johnson to the cornerbacks for Jalen Perry and future considerations. German is another surviving member of the “let’s not get fades anymore” tall guy class but Quinten arrived the year after as an athlete with an injury. These might have been “let’s throw something at the wall” moves when they saw the CB situation, but none of these guys have produced a whisper since.

OG Jack Stewart to NG. Was buried at guard and a sign they were looking for bodies to fill the defensive line. It occurred to me with the COVID year that he (and Q.Johnson for that matter) still have freshman eligibility, so there’s no rush to get him on the field. There doesn’t seem to be any talk of it either.

OPPOSITES OF CONCERN, by how amped we are about it:

Ronnie Bell back to slot WR. #SpeedinSpace means getting Ronnie the ball where he can make YAC. Don’t call this weird; it’s what he does. This is PFF in their annual preview mag:

Bell has been a decidedly better receiver from the slot compared to the outside. He has run 70% of his routes from the slot over the past two years, but it was more of a 50-50 split in 2020, so he could see more of the outside in 2021. Bell’s receiving grade in the slot since 2019 sits at 78.1, over 20 grading points higher than his grade from the outside. His yards per route run differential is staggering, too, as he has generated 2.71 yards per slot route to only 1.20 yards per outside route. Both of those slot metrics rank in the top 10 among Power Five receivers. He has also struggled to get off press coverage when on the outside. Regardless, Bell is an after-the-catch threat at all times. His 9.2 yards after the catch per reception since 2019 is tied for first in the Power Five. The only question is: How easy will it be to actually get the ball in his hands when he lines up on the outside?

Answer: You get the best deep threat in the transfer market, pair him with Cornelius Johnson and Roman Wilson outside, and start Ronnie back in the slot.

Mike Sainristil back to slot WR(?). He wasn’t bad but the addition of Baldwin means Sainristil too can move back inside after a season trying to be Nico Collins but half a foot shorter.

Mazi Smith to 3-4 nose tackle. It didn’t take long for the “Mazi needs to get his body in shape” talk to change into “Mazi is the breakout player of the defense” once Macdonald put him at the “tip of the spear” for his 3-4 defense. Smith is also up to 326 after being listed at 305 the last two seasons. Seems like a natural fit.

An Embarrassing Prediction, No Doubt

Worst Case Barring Extreme Injury Scenarios: This is a tough question this year because there are several guys they could lose—Hutchinson, Dax, Ross, and Gemon on defense, Vastardis if Zinter can’t play C and the next guy’s a true freshman on offense. Also what is an extreme injury scenario when literally their last game week was the one they were set to travel to Columbus with 35 active players quarterbacked by Dan Villari (and would have won)? Is there something worse than knocking out every one of their 8 draft picks (plus Hawkins) except the extraneous RB they won’t throw to?

Yes there is, because we’ve been through waiting to fire the coach seasons before, and if it comes to that they really could go 3-9. Really. NIU is the only freebie on the schedule.

Best Case: I consider three of their games highly unlikely, but the rest are beatable. Tape the defense back together into something functional and weird, and there’s enough offensive firepower to go 10-2.

Final Verdict

I honestly can’t tell you which is more likely. But I can paint a feelingsgraph.

In other words if there’s blood in the water after a bad start (lose to Washington, crushed by Wisconsin again, struggle with Rutgers), the enemies will frenzy, and chunks of the team who’ve done enough to prove themselves to an NFL team or a transfer destination could check out rather than risk injury for Harbaugh’s inglorious end. That’s NOT a prediction (I hope it’s not!) but a statement that there’s a bar to reach where there’s hope for next year and beyond under Harbaugh, and no floor if that hope isn’t there.

You’re going to scream at me for this I know, but it was kind of how I felt going into the 2006 season. That 7-5 season Brian titled the “Year of Infinite Pain” before he knew how much the irony on that might mature had my younger self’s faith deeply shaken. Intellectually, the injuries and the nature of those close losses, and the talent on the team should have made me feel more confident. I thought we were seeing the momentum lent to Lloyd Carr’s program by his predecessors finally petering out. I thought he was losing the team, feared their superstar DE wouldn’t take to OLB when they futzed with the front, that going nickel was going to bite them, and that they didn’t have a second linebacker, a second cornerback, or any depth behind them. Was it reasonable to doubt back then, given what we knew? Not as much as there is now.

I am no more predicting a 2006 hurrah than I am the wheels come off like the end of the Hoke and Rodriguez regimes. I’m not even on board with those who think this is the end, even if they lose to Ohio State again.

The main difference between the Seth losing faith at 26 and the 41-year-old version who gets to share it with more than a group of friends who involuntarily signed up to be emailed is improved mental health, more perspective about real shit than I would wish on you at this life point, and the knowledge that everyone not basking in the gloriously preposterous potential of a new coach also feels this way about their teams.

Think of Nebraska.

8-4. I did it: I managed to talk myself up one win from my prediction all offseason, but it’s a very very precarious 8-4—the kind that is unlikely to get to 10-2 but could crumble any moment into 4-8.

The schedule has one certain doom, two strong conference contenders, and a trip to Penn State that would be a tossup on neutral ground (Penn State is just Michigan with the order of last year’s games reversed). If Michigan can find one win in the afore mentioned group (one nice thing please?) they can afford to drop one to Washington or various down-on-their luck Big Ten teams. Trips to Nebraska after Wisconsin and to Maryland between PSU/OSU look less daunting if you consider those two teams might already be checked out on their coaches by then.

If Michigan enters November as one of those teams, it will be the usual end-of-a-coach horror show. If they get there with one loss Michigan will be back to their Carrbaughller normal. Outback or death. Let's ride!