Agreed on 10-2. I think OSU's debacle of a defense last year may have caused us to forget what OSU normally is and with a capable DC, they will probably be very good by Thanksgiving. That plus a big part of last year's success was having two 1st round grade DEs. I'm not saying it can't happen, but I am saying if we win in Columbus it'll be the greatest road win Michigan football has had since...? 1997 Penn State?

I am less afraid of PSU - especially after last night - , but I do think something dumb happening @Iowa or vs MSU is somewhat likely

Id say 9-3 unfortunately before 11-1 but 10-2 feels like a sweet spot.

MSU PSU and Iowa feel like they will be close. Those are 3 solid programs. 

I give the refs 1 game a year on average and OSU is like having Bama or Georgia at the end of your season to reach any of your goals. It can happen but its a hell of an obstacle.

I remembers Rutgers last year as well. 11-1 is playoff bound and it means our defense hit our ceiling and we didnt stumble in any of the probably 3-4 competitive games. That is a tall order.

I'm torn.  The number I keep getting back to from last year is 3-1.  What is that? Michigan's record in one score games.  Michigan had not done well in those situations under Harbaugh previously.  Was 2021 the football gods payback for 2016 (1-3)?  Is this the beginning of a new era where Michigan is able to win more than 60% of one score games or an outlier? 

Just looking the at the schedule, Michigan will probably win one of MSU, PSU OSU and Iowa by more than 8.  I expect the other 3 to be one score games.  There will be probably be some other stupid game that is one a score final (Rutgers last year).  Can you squeeze out 3-1 in one score games again?

Barring serious injury, I really think the only thing that can hold Michigan back from 11-1 is not playing well in tight games.  

LETS GOOO!

Destroy Michigan State.

Wow -- those fumble numbers! RichRod's teams lost lots of fumbles. The next-highest total is in the year (2007) prior to his arrival. It's almost like the team was preparing itself for ineptitude in that area.

10-2 seems likely. Not that they can’t beat OSU, but the Buckeyes are loaded. They need to miss on a QB or stop scooping up every 5 star position player that Bama doesn’t get. 
 

Home losses under Harbaugh outside of the COVID year:

OSU - 2015, 2017, 2019

MSU - 2015, 2017

Which makes me think whatever dumb thing happens will either be at Iowa or at home vs MSU. Penn State looked shaky last night and  nobody else on the schedule should have the horses to keep pace with the offense. 
 

I’d bet on Iowa winning like 24-21 after a pick six that richochets off a ref’s face and a punt that skips like a rock to hit a Michigan player leading to a Iowa GW FG and then a classic in columbus they fall just short on. 
 

I'd put MSU in the "lean to win" category, at best.  They are  an epic pain in the ass and they will be one again this year.

The Game will decide who goes to the big ten championship and playoff again this year

bank on it

Sainristil's position switch strikes me much more like an Owen Marecic situation than a Ben-Mason-to-DT panic move.

Harbaugh's done this before.  He will flip players fill roster holes, and move around marginal guys to find them homes -- and those almost never pan out.  But every now and then he'll find a guy he trusts to have the intelligence, conditioning, and versatility to master two positions.  As crowded as the WR room is, there's no evidence Sainristil was giving the coaches any reason to keep him off the field as a receiver.  And, they're saying he's still practicing on offense.  This is a completely different story from Eamonn Dennis.

So while his snaps at receiver will be limited (just because there's so much competition for targets), I think we're looking at Harbaugh's latest, legitimate two-way player.  We need the depth at nickel, it's an important position in the modern game, and it can't hurt Sainristil's draft stock.  But a panic move, this is not.  They have other options, like starting Johnson immediately. They're expecting Sainristil to perform better than that.

We are allowed to expect him to do well there.  Maybe not shock the world, but be at least above-average, and personally I'm a fair bit more bullish than that.

Now we just gotta worry about the linebackers. . .

I'm at 11-1 and that is because I think it is much more likely that our D outperforms our decent but not great expectations for it than it is our offense underperforms our high expectations.

10-2 sounds right. That’s nationally good, but defense holds it back a bit and OSU might be a national title favorite.

And dumb stuff happens; only PSU and MSU and Iowa seem like dangerous games before the last one. But they are dangerous.

On the one hand, we’re replacing both coordinators, 3 generational defensive players, and we don’t know who our QB is. On the other, the offense is as loaded as we’ve seen in decades, and the staff has developed quality players in a ton of positions, and there’s hope for a legit pipeline of starters and schemes on both sides of the ball.

It’s really nice to have hope this year after a great season. 10-2 is a good season. Worse is not out of the question, but better has a real shot.

This could be a really, really good team. 

New drinking game:

take a shot every time Brian or Seth uses "heuristics"

Man, am I WASTED!

YOU'VE GOT TO PUMP IT UP! DON'T YOU KNOW? PUMP IT UP!

We’ll see I’m hoping we use the non conference as a tuneup to build into a Death Star of our own. Hoping we’re undefeated going into The Game with that one being for all the marbles.

We lost 9 fumbles last year? That seems…not correct. The only ones I remember are JJ against MSU and Cade strip sacked against PSU

Does everyone agree that 10-2 is a reasonable prediction?  Yes?

Let's establish that now so that if Harbaugh does another 2017 or 2020 style faceplant nobody revises history and says that our expectations were "unreasonable".

My prediction is essentially the same -- I see 10-2 and 11-1 in the regular season about equally likely. There is a chance we win at the Shoe, but there's also a chance we could stub our toe against two of MSU / PSU / @Iowa. I see a floor (barring major injury trouble) of 9-3, where we drop two of the aforementioned three AND fall at the Shoe. If everything breaks right, then it's 12-0 and a trip back to the CFP. So:

Let's say a 15% chance of 12-0, 35% chance of 11-1, 40% chance of 10-2, and a minor 10% chance of 9-3.

I feel like at some point the Death Star has to have an unlucky season. That nasty combination of untimely injuries and turnovers that leave THEM 9-3 and the GOOD GUYS 12-0!!!

Maryland and Indiana are must-wins IMO

In every Cade vs. JJ debate, there’s a poster (or posters) who brings up the interceptions Cade threw against OSU and Iowa. They need to look at that INT- column. 
The sacks- column is also important. Cade just about eliminates two of the major drive killers.

1. Stay on schedule

2. Score points

3. ??? (actually, any sort of defensive contribution works here)

4. Profit. (To the tune of an 11-1 regular season record, again.) 

I'd say 10.5-1.5 is most likely expected outcome (in other words, loss to OSU and 50/50 we make it through Iowa/PSU/MSU unscathed), and breakdown odds like this:

12-0:  10%  

11-1:  42%

10-2:  27%

9-3:  20%

8-4:  1%

I predict 1 loss and not to OSU and B1G championship. OSU has to prove this year, not UM. Let us see what they got.

My own view is that while the most likely scenario for Ohio State's defense is much better than last year against very good offenses, there's a bigger tail to the downside.  As we say in the biz, it's priced to perfection.  Was their Charmin-soft defensive line against strong running teams coaching or just essentially (in the Aristotelian sense, not "mostly") being soft?  Can replacing the interior fix that?  Maybe, maybe even probably, but it's not a 100% slam dunk.  Is their disdain for guarding the edge all due to stupidly calling "rock" all the time and/or a failing of their coaches to point out that the real estate out wide counts too, or could it also be due to the a lack of pure mental processing power?  Correct me if I'm wrong, but I thought OSU did bring extra pressure a lot against Michigan in the historic blizzard of 2021.  So, is running a defense with a lot of looks and blitzes necessarily going to fix that?  As I said, priced to perfection.

I predict I will cook 3 mgobbq recipes this season. 

15–0

You gotta score lotsa points these days, especially in big games. Our offense appears primed to score a lotta points, especially if Harbaugh doesn't insist on running between the tackles most of the time against stacked lines. J.J. maturing into a second year phenom who doesn't make big mistakes in big moments would turbo charge everything. I say 11-0 heading into C-bus against a 10-1 OSU squad looking for big revenge. Our chances down there will be 55-45% against but I actually think the OSU defense won't improve as much in one year as most others do. It takes longer than one off-season to toughen up the line and fill all the holes, even with 5* talent.

I see a high likelihood we enter the Game undefeated... As only main road game is Iowa.  We have MSU and Penn St at home.  I even bet $ 300 that I had leftover in my Caesars account from the bonus, to take us NCAA champs at 50-1.  We should be 12 to 15-1, not 50-1.  And I will hedge vs OSU and going forward. As long as we make it to the OSU game undefeated, I'll make money.   I think think qb competition will propel the team.

I ask and pray for 11-0 heading to Columbus and then for Jimmy to deliver the pregame speech of all pregame speeches which includes in some form or fashion “Michigan hasn’t won in this building since the year of our Lord 2000 and that is un-fucking-acceptable! Go out there and get it done!”

That’s what I’m thinking as well. 10-2 is probably the most likely outcome. Winning in Columbus is doable but a tall order, and it’s hard not to envision something stupid happening against Iowa, MSU or PSU that results in this team taking a loss when it shouldn’t.

My hope is that at the bare minimum, they can get to Columbus 11-0, play an extremely competitive game, and if they still end up losing they force the committee to tell them no.

10-1 going to Columbus. The loss won’t be PSU - Franklin is mediocre and the execution was marginal last night. Obviously MSU or Iowa are quirky games, but Maryland could be a trap game.

LFG - this O can be awesome and the D has plenty of games to hit their stride.