Stalled

Actually Smith is a classic third-down back - an excellent pass blocker and receiver.  

For Al Borges. He had the most electrifying player in college football for two years. DRob's performance against Ohio last year should have told him all he needed to know. Instead, we got pathetic play calling. Obviously, the turnovers aren't his fault, but turning it over on downs absolutely is on him.

So, one more season. He'll have what amounts to his prototypical QB under center, and (hopefully) a bit more oomph from the OL. If he can't get it done next year - B1G Championship Game or bust - time to give him the boot.

"...but the fact that he isn't working with his own talent remains....We can't put Borges of the cross for this season."

That is irrelevant.  Borges has these players.  Plainly put, today he did not use this talent effectively.  It was obvious.

The fact that he could not recognize that running up the gut didn't work and Devin/Denard fusion did work is inherently the source of our criticism.  This isn't 20/20 hindsight, Sunday morning quarterback type-deal.  This is a real time analysis that a good majority of us were complaining about in the 3rd and 4th quarter while it was going on.

I don't want to fire Borges.  But how can today's second half be defended?

Guess who else will have his recruits once Borges does...Urban Meyer, Brian Kelly, Bill O'Brien, and Wisconsin's coaching staff will be more cohesive. Life doesn't get any easier.

Better quit looking at me like that. I'm'a punch him in the face.

Hoke will never fire anyone. He's too loyal.

Really? I'm pretty sure he fired several of his coaches after his difficult start at Ball State.

that was Rodriguez's undoing. I believe in the end Rich was fired because he stayed loyal to his defensive staff.

I'll allow Borges one more year with Devin at QB and Shane at back up. If the big game play calling continues to be head into brick wall with QBs who can play his system, then it is time for Borges and the O-line coach (maybe) to go.

You are describing Tressel-ball.  Disclosure - I am an Ohio State fan.

It can work - your first line is the right question.  What is the strategy?  If you are going to go somewhere between Tressel and Wisconsin - 21 personnel, TE/FB Pro-style, West Coast, then keep doing what you are doing.

It truly hurt and was terrible, just horrible what happened to your RB Fitz Touissant.  Tactically - yeah - lining up and pounding out of the I is my favorite play; however, you didn't have the backs to run that on that D.  PA and a pass would have made sense.  I was pretty surprised that UM tried that several times.

To the bigger question - you need to decide if you are going to play like USC, Stanford, Wisconsin, Alabama - Michigan of the 90's - or if you stop right now and play like A&M, Oklahoma State, OU, Oregon, OSU, Clemson, or even WVU.

I personally love the I based TE/FB run game and even though Ohio state is winning and scoring, I still don't like this Urban Meyer spread offense as much as I liked Tressel-ball.  Maybe it's because I'm old-school or just old.

That said, it does feel like Michigan is still in transition - Dick Rod had some offensive athletes, and staying with some sort of spread/ power run based offense would not be that much of a course correction for UM.

You have a good class and that QB Shane Morris is excellent and can do a lot of things.

Ohio State seemed lost at times offensively - or more accurately - Braxton Miller was still relying on his skills mostly vs. his progressions.  Game really could have gone either way.  OSU choked after a couple of gift turn overs.

I spent a lot of time thinking of how Denard was going to smoke OSU on jailbreak screens, quick trips/ quads screens, then Roundtree on the backside.  Didn't really see any of that and Ohio State was getting smoked by UCF, Purdue, and Cal and those teams are not in the same league as UM.

I do think UM has to seriously consider their offensive strategy going forward.  You are a national program and will recruit nationally.  Coach Hoke has done a good job in Ohio, and Meyer is ticking off a base of Ohio HS coaches by passing on some good Ohio talent.

That said, Michigan has historically done well in TX and there are tons of QB's, RB's receivers, OL types out here.  There are QBs from California out there, as are some great RB's.  Take a national view and - as much as I hate the spread and love the Power Run game, UM probably needs to go that way because this spread game is here to stay.  Either compete and go Big and Play an Alabama/ Stanford style game which UM did in the 90's or go spread and get an OC like Kliff Kingsbury or other proven innovators because Michigan still has a buzz and this was going to be a transition year and you have a good class coming in and Hoke recruits his ass off.

I wish OSU and UM both ran Power I but that is not going to happen until the game cycles back in a decade or more.  Other than Nebraska, OSU and UM are going to lead this conference for quite a while. O'Brien can coach at PSU - look at what they did without 10+ players.  They will be not half bad despite the scholarship reductions.  If UM had a Bill O'Brien type, that would work, too.  Just seems like UM is not yet set on who they want to be offensively.

Hoke can recruit.  He is loyal - I actually like that - got a kick out of him in his short sleeves today.  He's got stones and I called him names last year and I actually like him.  He seems like a great guy and the real deal - BBQ's for the recruits, loves the Michigan tradition and won't ever let the program or the players or his staff down.

There have been two tight games two years in a row.  These two teams will settle in to who they are going to be next year and they will be playing in Indianaoplis both next year.  I just hope they don't ever move The Game from the end of November to October or something idiotic like that just for this stupid conference game which will be boring no matter what is at stake.

This Rutgers, Maryland B1G 14 to 16 bothers me.  I liked the old days, or at least adding Nebraska and PSU whcih are good fits.  Otherwise, I like it that UM and OSU tee it up the last game of the year.  Every year.

Go Blue! Go Bucks!

You can't just remove the big plays from the game. They happened.

Great job guys. Thank you for the work that goes into this blog. We do seem to enjoy it! LETS GO BLUE

Brian has said it ALL YEAR, and it's true, the interior O line is weak. We haven't run up the middle successfully all year. What made Al think this was all of a sudden going to happen in key short yardage situations in the most important game of the year in the most hostile environment we play in? Especially after having success in the first half doing exactly the opposite. Don't care how you slice it, it didn't make sense.

Not gonna happen. The board has skipped hyper-speed and gone straight to ludicrous. I expect this from the masses, but it's sort of sad to see Ace give in to it. Thankfully, Dave Brandon doesn't give two shits what people on this board think, and neither does Brady Hoke, and that's what's going to prevent us from turning into ND.

You want to blame someone, blame Tate Forcier for being a really big idiot and getting kicked off the team and out of school.  Had he stayed around and eligible, we would have had that QB tandem we needed this year and last. 

Smith carried the ball on 3rd and 1.  Denard carried it on 4th and 3.

If we're getting abused in the trenches then why in hell would you try to run up the middle? And sorry, but we had a QB who *could* throw but never had the chance to get comfortable because every frickn time he completed a throw he was pulled from the game.

But yeah, our personnel *did* telegraph our play calling because every frickn time Denard went in it was obvious we would run.

We may have gotten out-played, but we definitely got out-coached.