Essentials

WHAT	Michigan vs Michigan State	[Fuller]
WHERE	Michigan Stadium Ann Arbor, MI
WHEN	Noon Eastern
THE LINE	Michigan –13.5
TELEVISION	FOX
TICKETS	exist
WEATHER	30-ish, partly cloudy minimal chance of snow ~8 mph wind

Overview

The one thing I will say for an athletic department with less shame than Penn State or Baylor is that when their football team is due for maximum comeuppance they show up for their paddling. MSU's post-playoff tenure now stretches for four years of below-.500 Big Ten ball when they get two (oops) free wins a year against Maryland and Rutgers. They've also added some all-timers to the Sparty No-mesday Book*. Just this year MSU has:

• Gotten sued by Curtis Blackwell, their sexual assault fall guy, which will result in a Dantonio deposition in which he answers questions about MSU's nonexistent vetting of Auston Robertson.
• Lost to Arizona State after seeing a game-tying field goal called back for 12 men on the field and missing the subsequent attempt.
• Gotten a post-hoc apology from the Pac-12 referees  who missed a leaping penalty that would have given MSU a third bite at the apple 15 yards closer.
• Seen their starting middle linebacker suspended after testing positive for PEDs.
• Scored an average of 5.7 points per game in a three game stretch against OSU, Wisconsin, and PSU.
• Lost to Illinois after roaring out to a 28-3 lead, in part because a concussed QB threw an awful pick six after not being pulled.
• Gone Full Hoke in the aftermath of that loss, with the MSU medical staff directly contradicting a Dantonio press conference.

They've also missed on the top 16 instate recruits en route to a class that currently has one(1) guy ranked in the top 500 on the composite. Pride did indeed come before the fall. Now Michigan has a nail gun, a coffin, and an opportunity.

*[a reference so impossibly dorky I feel compelled to link, but apparently not delete]

[Hit THE JUMP for ]

Run Offense vs Michigan State

I got 99 problems and Raqeuan Williams is in fact one [Bryan Fuller]

This was legitimately elite last year, finishing #1 in SP+ and driving the defense as a whole to a #2 national ranking. Despite returning the entire offensive line and the most important bits of the linebacker corps—at least until Bachie's suspension—there has been a rather large step back.

Unfortunately, Bill Connelly's move to ESPN means we don't have individual phase stats this season so I can't tell you exactly where MSU's run defense lands. It's still pretty good on the whole, but MSU got ripped by OSU (323 yards, 6.6 per) and Wisconsin (222 yards, 4.8 per). They've gone from 2.6 YPC last year to 3.2 this year, and that's with a ridiculous –73 yard performance from Tulsa that featured multiple snaps over the head of the QB. Remove that outlier and MSU's giving up 3.7 YPC, which is a hair behind Iowa and 7th in the conference.

Since Bachie only missed the Illinois game, which was a stomping for the MSU rush D, the PEDs suspension is not an explanation for the regression. Seth did the Illinois game since it was the only one post-Bachie, and so he only saw a stomping. The upshot of this is ???, especially after Michigan ripped Notre Dame in half despite having a pounding rain to deal with and then went back to trundling around against Maryland.

MSU's YPC does not match their charting numbers, but the bulk of the damage was done by two super-elite rush offenses. PSU, Northwestern, Indiana, and Arizona State have collectively averaged about 3 YPC. Michigan is unfortunately a lot closer to that end of the spectrum, unless they suddenly aren't.

Adding to the uncertainty: Michigan's run game is shifting wildly game-to-game. Their last outing saw Michigan run gap blocked more-or-less power about two thirds of the time after using virtually no gap blocked plays all year. They've had a bye week with which to cook up yet more things they think might work. They should probably be aware that MSU has been practicing against arc so much that they ran it a bunch against Illinois, successfully.

In sum, ¯\_(?)_/¯

Can Mike Onwenu and Ben Bredeson get a clear W against some excellent DTs? Can Harbaugh/Gattis/Warinner put a Bachie-free LB corps in the wrong gap? What's gone awry for MSU this year that's made them much less of a death machine? I dunno.

I don't expect this to be a paving but I do think Michigan's going to be able to crack some things open, especially if Patterson is making some good decisions on the ground. Arc is a bad bet, but surely Michigan can anticipate that and cook up some ways to punish scrape exchanges.

KEY MATCHUP: MIKE ONWENU and BEN BREDESON vs NFL AUDITIONS. And also my relentless promotion of both but especially Onwenu as high-end guards.

Pass Offense vs Michigan State

[Fuller]

There's also been a seeming regression here. MSU is giving up a half-yard more per attempt and has been hit for 8+ yards an attempt in three of their last four games. (On the other hand, they have yet to enjoy outings against Maryland and Rutgers.) Meanwhile a 286 yard, 6.8 YPA, 3 TD performance from Indiana's Michael Penix was about three feet away from being a hamblasting; Penix repeatedly found WRs wide open downfield and barely missed them.

That game combined with Illinois giving MSU a case of the Imhatorbhebhes suggests an approach: bomb it deep. MSU's cornerbacks are not to the standard they have been in the past, and with the safeties doing their usual thing on any run action, someone's getting put on an island with Collins, Peoples-Jones, or Black. Seth was relatively high on MSU's CBs…

Both safeties got big coverage dings for abandoning their posts when poor third CB and jam specialist Shakur Brown (+2/-1, +10/-6), just returned from an injury hiatus, got singled up with Josh Imatorbhebhe, the Illini's 5-star USC transfer, on such plays you remember as The Hail Mary That Didn't Have to Hail TD at the end of the half and 4th & 16. Brown splits time with both Boundary CB Josh Butler (+2/-3 cov), the dude who interfered on the 4th down, and Field CB Josiah Scott (+1/-1, +4/-1 cov), a rootin'-tootin' hard-hitting 2nd team all-B1G candidate. DB Tre Person (+0/-2, +3/-3 cov), whom you might remember from such plays as the long DPJ touchdown or the mansome Nico Collins catch last year, is now their nickel, still about 160, and still slow.

…but I'm a little dubious. Josiah Scott does not fare well in our favorite rough CB metric, which is unassisted tackles per PBU. Lavert Hill, for example, has 7 tackles and 6 PBUs. Scott has 33 tackles and 4 PBUs. Josh Butler, Tre Person, and Shakur Brown combined: 32 tackles, 7 PBUs. Nobody in this secondary is making a lot of plays on the ball, and when presented with multiple punts to Imhatorbhebhe there weren't even contests.

4th and 16 no problem pic.twitter.com/XmGpEOydUp

— ??arcusD ?? (@_MarcusD3_) November 10, 2019

Nico Collins should feast against this.

"Nico Collins should feast against this" and "Nico Collins got four targets" are the before and after story of the season, of course. Michigan's probably going to get one big chunk and two DPIs out of Collins and then I'll rend my e-garments about it afterwards. This is the way.

The good news is that Donovan Peoples-Jones did work on a fly route against Person last year and is still around; the bad news is that Shea Patterson is coming off another poor game, one in which he did not get touched by Maryland and still scuffled to a mediocre day thanks largely to balls that were uncatchable or close to it.

FWIW, Michigan State's pass rush has been a B- unit this year. The Kenny Willikes matchup does remain a potential sore spot—he continues to get work done. Michigan's tackles did an excellent job against PSU's rush ends and the line as a whole has been impeccable at pickups, so double-A blitzes are likely to backfire on MSU; straight up getting whooped on the edge is a problem without good solutions and that might happen a couple times.

KEY MATCHUP: NICO COLLINS vs FOR GOD'S SAKE THROW IT TO NICO COLLINS. [gestures despairingly]

Run Defense vs Michigan State

this guy probably transferred [Fuller]

MSU sprung to life against Illinois, but that's not likely to translate. Illinois is the #58 SP+ defense and had two of its starting linebackers ejected from the game early. Michigan is the #4 SP+ defense. MSU's rushing output against teams in the general vicinity of Michigan, sacks excised:

• OSU (#1 D): 3.6 YPC
• PSU (#8 D): 3.3 YPC
• Wisconsin (#6 D): 2.2 YPC
• Northwestern (#20 D): 3.1 YPC

MSU did scrape up to 4 yards and change against Indiana and blasted Illinois, but the Indiana game was before the injury plague really took hold and deleting two Illinois linebackers puts random number generators on the field.

About that injury plague: up to four MSU OL starters will miss this game. Cole Chewins, Kevin Jarvis, and Matt Allen are not listed on MSU's depth chart and didn't play against Illinois—subterfuge is a possibility but not a strong one given the result of the last game. Tyler Higby and Luke Campbell didn't play against Illinois but are listed as ORs on the depth chart. Also, TE Matt Dotson is done for the year.

When the bones clatter into the mausoleum the result is likely to be, uh, this:

Those are two true freshmen on the interior. There are offenses that can get after Michigan's DTs. This wasn't one of them even at the start the season before the Cosmic Mallet Of Justice doinked all those guys.

The one bright spot is Elijah Collins. Michigan State paged through various bad versions of Michigan State backs before finding Collins, a pretty good edition of the genre. MSU backs are all burly and all fall forward inevitably on contact. Unlike Connor Heyward (who transferred midseason) and La'Darius Jefferson (ditto), Collins can change direction without coming to a complete stop.

He is now getting the vast majority of MSU RB carries, and will probably pop out some eight yard runs that should have been two.

MSU does distribute a healthy chunk of carries to QB Brian Lewerke, who's coming off the best game of his career on the ground. Is that because they ran a bunch of arc read? Yessir. Have they been practicing arc read for weeks for this weekend's game? Yessir. Did they bring it out against Illinois because it's pretty good but wasn't worth debuting in inevitable losses? Yessir. Did it work? Yessir. Did they win? No.

Anyway: you're probably familiar with Lewerke's brand of mobility. It's in the Patterson/McCaffrey realm. Lewerke makes good decisions on when to keep, is reasonably fast, and isn't going to juke guys in the open field. There will be no brakes on his carry count.

This looks like it should settle into a steady diet of not much with the occasional Collins play and QB run leavening the two- and three-yard carries. The one potential monkeywrench is the trademark Michigan State Fall Camp Drive in which they unveil a clever package of stuff they saved all year for this game. I'm not sure that's still a thing. It wasn't last year and the chaos on the OL is going to force guys who will do well to execute basic things on the field. But it might still be a thing.

KEY MATCHUP: MICHIGAN SAFETIES vs FALL CAMP DRIVE STUFF. If they've got stuff to rip off 15 yards it's one thing. 40 is another.

Pass Defense vs Michigan State

this is gonna be MANHUNT: the hunt for a man [Fuller]

Lewerke has a functional throwing arm this season and the pass offense has perked up from utterly abominable (#126 in YPA in 2018, 12 TD, 14 INT) to mostly abominable (#102, 12 TD, 9 INT) despite a decided lack of Felton Davis. Don't let the relatively modest climb in YPA spots obscure a fairly big leap in actual YPA from 5.7 to 6.5. This is closer to a real offense than last year. It's still not particularly close, with 5.7, 4.0, and 4.2 YPA performances against OSU/PSU/UW and 1 TD to 5 INTs in those games.

The injury/transfer bug has also bitten here. Leading receiver Darrell Stewart is out for this game. Cam Chambers transferred. Dotson, as mentioned, is out for the season. Cody White and Tre Mosley started against Illinois and will probably go again. White is fairly big and fairly athletic but has a wiry build that makes him susceptible to jams and is more towards the Stonum/Crawford end of the jump ball spectrum than then Davis/Collins one. Mosley, a freshman, is the guy who doinked a touchdown into an interception against Illinois. Fellow freshman Julian Barnett is welcome to transfer to Michigan and play corner after the season; right now he's an MSU WR with 10 targets on the season and 76 yards.

The crazy thing here is that despite the OL injuries and the fact that the one guy who isn't injured is the consistently horrible Jordan Reid, MSU actually leads the conference with just 12 sacks allowed. Combining the cyan with that stat leads to an inescapable conclusion: this is all dinks. Seth:

They'll pull out all the modern tricks: RPOs, flexed tight ends, five-wide from 11 personnel. The routes are quite simple—especially once they're down to the freshman receivers. They run mostly pick routes, not so much mesh as that play where a slot or tight end goes upfield and bangs into a linebacker or trailing cornerback to free a route that breaks inside and under that. [Ed: this is referred to as an MSU OPI route in UFR]

[Lewerke's] reads are not complicated: either they're cutting the field in half for floods and triangle reads, or there's one guy to throw to on a sideline fade, RPO slant, or what's basically a screen where the tight end blocks the coverage and Lewerke just has to throw it to the open guy

Michigan's going to be in a lot more zone than they've been in the past so expect a lot of underneath drags that pick up minimal yardage and the occasional attempt to run a smash or something. Lewerke's not particularly accurate but he does have a wide array of throws he can make and that'll lead to a chunk or two; a confused OL going up against Michigan's jetpack package and any Josh Uche vs anyone…

On a per snap basis, Josh Uche is the most prolific pass rusher in the entire nation. 126 pass rush snaps
32 total pressures

— Jarad Evans (@Jarad_Evans) November 15, 2019

…should mean passing downs are death. And there will be a lot of those.

KEY MATCHUP: MICHIGAN vs ZONE BUSTS. Veteran QB, WRs who aren't much of a threat to break away against man but an offensive system that wants you to play zone against it—this will be some sort of test for the integrity of Michigan's cover two.

SPECIAL TEAMS

Let's take a moment to remember that after Jake Hartbarger got injured last year no fewer than five MSU players punted in a game, including backup QB Rocky Lombardi (1 punt, 20 yards). Hartbarger is back and banging them 43 yards a pop. MSU doesn't give up an inordinate number of returns and those have only gone about 5.5 yards each.

Kicker Matt Coghlin is good at 42-yarders and less good at 47-yarders; he's lost a significant amount of his efficiency this year, with just 13 makes in 20 attempts and a number of chippies gone awry.

MSU return units have been dull. It's still mostly Brandon Sowards on punt return; Cody White gets some at-bats in. Neither is particularly explosive and they collectively get about six yards a return. Stewart was the main kick returner; Julian Barnett got a few cracks at it against Illinois and got 12 yards a pop.

KEY MATCHUP:  AHHHH DEFEND THE FAKE

INTANGIBLES

CHEAP THRILLS

Worry if…

• MSU springs the fullback for 75 yards.
• Michigan's trying to win the game by running it for three yards at a time.
• Patterson's accuracy remains off.

Cackle with knowing glee if…

• It's an MSU passing down.
• Nico Collins gets 15 targets.

Fear/Paranoia Level: 4 (Baseline: 5; –1 for Sparty No Is Back Baby, –1 for An OL Ever More Hilariously Overmatched, –1 for Deckchairs Meet Titanic, –1 for 17 Total Points In OSU/UW/PSU games, +1 for The Usual, +1 for Dantonio's Last Stand, +1 for Patterson Is Making Me Nervous)

Desperate need to win level: 10 (Baseline: 5; +1 for Nail In The Coffin, +1 for Literally The Worst Athletic Department In The Country, +1 for Comeuppance Tour 2019, +1 for I Cannot Overstate The Worst AD Thing, +1 for Dantonio Postgame Presser)

Loss will cause me to… watch the disappearing Dantonio gif in reverse, weeping, until the sun explodes.

Win will cause me to… who's ready for the Mike Tressel era?

The strictures and conventions of sportswriting compel me to predict: 

MSU has not gained 300 yards or scored more than ten points in any of their games against top 20 Big Ten teams this year, and without Stewart, Dotson, and even more dudes on their OL it's not likely that trend changes even if MSU has some things up their sleeve.

On the other side of the ball Michigan should have a bit of an easier time than they did last year because MSU's D has taken a step back, but they'll need a version of Patterson closer to last year's to make that true. The inaccuracy is verging on a trend because he was not exactly on point after the rain cleared versus Notre Dame. I am concerned. Even so, Michigan has a functional OL that's excellent at pass protection and should be able to carve out a reasonable number of points to win comfortably. A cathartic blowout is probably not on the cards.

Finally, three opportunities for me to look stupid Sunday:

• Michigan hits three deep balls for most of their scoring.
• MSU is held under 200 yards.
• Michigan, 26-11