[ed: bump so hard Jake Ryan wanna fine me]

[ed-S: I had to completely repost due to some bad html that was making it unreadable, so all the old comments are gone. Apologies to those of you who commented earlier--if you didn't, all you missed is Blue Seoul doesn't live in Seoul anymore]

Working Too Hard

So this is what it's like having a real job.  I have enough time to watch the games, but not enough to obsessively analyze them.  But there's been a lingering question about Fitz's lack of productivity compared to last season that I wanted to take a stab at answering.  So even though it's a couple weeks late, here's my analysis of what's been going wrong for Fitz. 

I see three main differences that are causing the lack of production:

• Fitz is being overworked
• The blocking is not as good
• Fitz is lacking some burst

There are some other problems in the defensive schemes and matchups, the playcalling, and our lack of run audibles, but these are minor issues and don't really explain everything. 

For Fitz' sake!

First Drive

1st10 zoneread fake

2nd5 blocked for jetsweep

3rd1 iso dive* 12:28 into a pile

 

 

This play is going nowhere right from the start.  We come out in a doubletight I left.  Purdue counters by bringing the SS down into the box on the field side.  At this point, Denard should really have audibled to attack the open bubble over the right side, but I doubt he has the freedom to do that, and we're running behind Lewan, our best lineman. 

 

 

We pull a guard, and things are looking okay at the point of attack.  Their safety is keying our FB and crashing hard on this short yardarge play. 

 

 

The problem really starts when the interior linemen scrape off their chip blocks to get to the LB's.  They haven't helped out enough to get leverage and the DTs squeeze the hole.  You might chalk this up to the "Purdue's Talent"  But then, say that phrase to yourself a few times and think about how weird it sounds. 

 

 

The pulling guard is looking for someone to hit instead of just driving into the pile to get the 1 yard. And with the safety in the box, he's got two unblocked guys to choose from.

 

 

Lewan whiffs on the 2nd level, and behind him, the DE has beaten the TE.  The backside DT is squeezing the hole and we've got two blockers trying to clear out 2 and half defenders. 

 

 

By the time Fitz gets to the l.o.s. there's a huge clusterfuck and nowhere to go. 

 

 

He tries to plow forward and push the pile, but the safety pushes him back. 

 

[AFTER THE JUMP: ADDITIONAL ITEMS]

 

1st10 split wide as decoy

2nd6 sweep to the strong side*

 

 

This play is an example of  Borges butting together a symphony of strong beats instead of playing a harmony of chords.  It's just a simple sweep, but Gallon is going to fake a reverse.  This helps keep the edge defenders at home, but it is to the detriment of the current play.  But when you look at the game as a whole, this kind of thing opens up other plays for Denard and the reverse and screens.  It starts as a spread look with double flankers to the right.  The Sam is splitting the difference between Gallon and the TE.

 

 

Once we snap the ball and show sweep motion both ILB's flow with the pulling linemen.  The Sam has to be mindful of Gallon, so that slows him down a fraction of a second. 

 

 

But once he reads run, he's sitting right there to make the play.  The hope is that he's locked into man coverage on Gallon and he'll take himself out of the play.  If we get lucky, he might run into his own teammates.  But this is a very suboptimal use of Gallon, if you're only concerned about this single play, and not about setting up future plays.  If Gallon had cracked down on the Sam or the Mike, it's possible that the Will gets caught up in the trash and this play breaks for a huge gain. Instead, it's almost like Borges is asking Fitz to "take one for the team" on this play.  Even with the reverse fake, we still could have gotten decen yardage if the frontside DE had been blocked better and our pulling linemen didn't have to go around him. 

 

 

But with that DE crashing so hard and our TE holding on for dear life, Fitz has to jump out of the way, and this blows up all the timing for the blocks. 

 

 

A couple more missed blocks and Purdue has three guys in position to make the stop.

 

 

So the line isn't helping Fitz.  But Fitz also missed the hole.  Last year he would have dived between his two lead blockers and gotten 4 or 5 yards instead of getting stuffed by the pursuit. That last part is on Fitz. 

 

3rd7 flare

1st10 frontside blocker on the reverse

2nd3 sweep, bad block bounces it outside.

3rd1 Leadblock for Denard (didn't touch anyone)

1st10 Zonelead to the weakside where the safety was walked up, safety made the tackle, drags him for 5 extra yards.*

 

 

I like Devin Funchess, I think he's going to be one of the all time great receiving TE's in Wolverine History.  But right now, he's a liability as a run blocker. Note the size difference between him and the guy next to him.  But more on that later.  It's 1st down and the SS is walked up with a directive to crash the l.o.s. 

 

 

The blocking design is okay, we've got a hat on a hat, except for the safety.  The problem is that we seem to be losing each of those individual battles.  This is another play where we kind of outsmarted ourselves and Purdue was overplaying our tendencies.  If Hopkins is in there, we have the opportunity to audible away from the safety.  Instead, he's right on the l.o.s. to make the tackle.  Fitz does a good job of dragging him for 5 yards. 

 

2nd3 Zoneread kept, so he's blocking the crashing end

3rd4 Naked flare, pass is too tall

4th4 passblock (no contact)

1st10 Leadblock for Vincent

2nd9 fake sweep

3rd5 blocking

1stG Hands on hips, he's already tired.Review TO

1stG Dive, no blocking, nowhere to go.* Purdue offsides

 

This play didn't count, but it's indicative of the kind of problems the O-line was having in short yardage. Notice how all the defenders are keeping their blockers at arms length, they've got their heads up to watch the ball, and their lateral movement is keeping them on the l.o.s. instead of getting pushed back into the endzone.  After watching a year of Greg Mattison, this is some pretty good fundamentals from the Boiler DL.  Fitz takes the ball a little wider than he should have, but part of that is the fullback, #36 just got destroyed.  He's too small, and his pad level is too high.  It would have been a tough cut, but there was a little bit of space behind Schofield.  That's the kind of cut Fitz was making at the end of last year. But he either didn't see it, or was too tired on this play. 

And Schofield has to do a better job of driving his block even when the defender is slanting hard. 

 

1stG Exact same play, FB blocks the outside man instead of the inside man. Fitz barely scores. FB too high, too small.

 

(Roh at DT NOT GOOD, head down, missed the draw.)

 

Second Drive

1st10 zoneread kept

1st10 leadblock for Denard

2nd7 inside zoneread give, terrible blocking* jukes the free man and stumbles forward for 5 extra

 

 

When two linemen whif at the point of attack, it's amazing to get any yards at all. Also note the unblocked optioned man is so far from the mesh that it doesn't affect him either way. 

 

3rd2 Leadblock on the power option*

 

I've noted it before, but here's another example of why we don't run more veer and speed option.  Denard just doesn't have much experience or feel for the pitch.  On this play we had a nice wall and he should have stuck his nose in there for the first down.  I don't particularly like that, because I don't want him to take unnecessary hits. But he pitches this ball way too early. 

The guy that you suck in and pitch off of should never be able to make a tackle on the pitchman, but that's exactly what happened on this play. 

 

1st10 Zoneread give, denard should have kept, Funchess can't runblock, liability

2nd10 Decoy run fake 

Start 2nd Quarter

3rd10 bench

1stG Basically same play as previous goal line dive, no push from the line, sneaks in for TD anyway.*

 

 

The o-line is getting pushed back nearly two yards on the playside. 

 

 

But Fitz somehow twists keeps his legs driving and manages to get in for the TD anway. 

 

Back to back turnovers, game over.*

 

 

I'm not saying the sun was in his eyes.  But the sun WAS in his eyes. 

 

Third Drive

1st10, leadblocker

2nd10, after falsestart. Hit in the backfield by runblitz.

3rd10 passblock

 

Fourth Drive

1st10 Bench 5WR

2nd2 Leadblocker*

 

 

That probably could have been called a holding, but I like the effort.  

 

1st10 Leadblocker on endaround

2nd8 Playaction

1st10 Playaction

2nd7 Zoneread keep, shoulda given. Fitz tried to take, slapped his hands in frustration.

 

 

So, there's a bunch of defenders right up the middle, and not a lot on the outside.  Fitz really wanted this ball and nearly took it from Denard. 

 

3rd7 Blitz pickup

 

Fifth Drive 2 minute drill

1st10 Bench (ball fumbled on runblitz)

 

Halftime

 

Sixth Drive

1st10 leadblock

2nd1 leadblock

1st10 zoneread give, missed the hole strongside unblocked safety crashing support, walked up.*

 

 

From alignment, the safety doesn't look like he's in the box, but at the snap of the ball, he's essentially blitzing. 

 

 

This is one of the few times when we got a nice walled off hole, but the safety is already at the l.o.s. by the time Fitz gets the ball. Last year, Fitz woulda given him a stiff arm, taken the outside path, and stumbled forward for an extra 4 or 5 yards.  On this play he cuts back and the unblocked pursuit gets him with no possibility of a broken tackle. 

 

2nd7 passblock

3rd7 passblock

 

Seventh Drive

1st10 zoneread give, CB blitz and the DL slanted away, nowhere to go.

2nd8 playaction fake

3rd2 leadblock

1st10 zoneread keep

1st10 outsidezone nowhere to go, OL can't sustain blocks. *

 

 

The blocking on this play is horrid.  We've got plenty of guys out in front, they just can't stick to their defenders. 

 

2nd10 Doubletight dive. OL can't get to the reach blocks. Funchess again a liability as a runblocker.*

 

 

I don't know what this is.  But it's ugly. Really f***ing ugly.  Look at Funchess 4 yards deep in his own backfield on a running play. 

 

3rd10 bench

 

Eighth Drive

1st15 splitbacks, weakside dive. The safety is coming down so hard he's sitting in the hole and Fitz takes it up the middle instead of bouncing outside.*

 

 

Again the safety is coming up in run support, so there's going to be an unblocked defender in the hole.  Gallon is giving a hitch fake so Borges can see whether or not the safety is reacting to him.  He doesn't.  So Fitz 'takes another one for the team'. 

 

 

Lewan actually gets a pretty decent block and Fitz might have had some yards if he'd bounced it outside the tackle.  But that unblocked safety is making him rush his decision and he cuts it inside where the DL and LB are squeezing down away from the blitzing safety. 

 

2nd15 leadblocker

3rd12 outlet hook

1st10 playaction fake

2nd10 bench

3rd8 flat route

 

4th Quarter

 

Ninth Drive

1st10 zoneread keep. Denard pops open for like 60 yards

1st10 zoneread give, unblocked end eats him up. no push on the frontside

2nd11 offtackle with a reverse fake.  Pulling lineman has to choose which of the 5 (FIVE!) unblocked defenders to pick up.*

 

 

At least the reverse is going to be wide open.  Sorry Fitz, no soup for you on this play.

 

2nd26 leadblock for QB draw, looks tired, runs into Denard

3rd18 passblock

 

Tenth Drive

1st10 zoneread give, there was a hole, but it was squeezed down pretty quickly, fitz didn't look like he had any burst left to get there. 

2nd8 leadblocker

1st10 zoneread give, decent blocking this time the hole is again squeezed shut, but there is good push up the middle, but fitz doesn't slam the hole when he has a chance, instead he bounces outside for no gain instead of the 4 or 5 yards he could have had. *

 

 

The line has gotten a good two yard push, so Fitz could have just ridden them for a nice pickup on first down.  In the podcast for this game, Brian was complaining of Fitz bounce, bounce, bouncing too much, but this was the only egregious example I could find. 

 

2nd10 Leadblocker, very tired, is jogging halfway through the play.

3rd6 playaction pass block

 

11th Drive

1st10 Bench

2nd5 Bench

3rd3 Bench

1stG Bench

 

So out of about 70 offensive plays, Fitz was in on 60, and he was blocking on 25 plays in addition to carrying the rock 17 times. The rest of the plays were zonereads he didn't get the ball on, playaction fakes, or passing routes. Fitz was being used a lot on short yardarge downs, so that's part of what pulled down his ypc. Five of his 17 carries were short yardage plays and another 6 or 7 were terribly blocked. So he had about 5 carries for about 20 yards and a couple of goalline TD's.  That's not great, but it's about what you'd expect from a FB who is blocking all day. 

 

In the end, I think there's nothing wrong with Fitz that a lighter workload and better blocking won't cure.  The return of Hopkins, the development of Rawls in short yardarge, and the return of Vincent on 3rd downs with his billygoat blocking would be very helpful for Fitz's ypc. 

 

Last year, many of Fitz's big runs came late in games when the defense was tired and he was fresh.  With all the blocking, that's not happening this year. 

ETC:

Jake MotherF****** Ryan! The long lost brother of Jack MotherF******** Johnson.  I like how having an expletive as your middle name has become a term of endearment. 

Look at how far away he is from this play.  But his instant recognition and his quick first step™ allow him make the play.

 He completely takes the running back by surprise with his Superman impression.  

And trips him up for a nice TFL.  That's called 'selling out' on a play.  (Giving it your all)

The most nonchalant hook n' ladder pitch of all time.

"I ain't got the ball."

Devin Gardner's Development

I believe that's what the kids are calling, "Highpointing the ball". 

How does scoring a touchdown make DG feel?

Pretty damn good. 

How do two TD's make Fitz feel?  

Well, alllllrighty then...I'm not real good at reading expressions, but I'm pretty sure that one is saying "Hey twitter, STFU."

Hate Week: Never Forget.

[Ed-H: Bump. There, I did it. No more Urban Meyer.]

So, yeah.   

I got a little busy at work during the winter, and then recruiting magic was happening, and then I figured it was too late for this post.  But finally I got a day off, and it's raining, and I've had these screencaps online for 6 months, and I've got literally nothing better to do for a few hours on this sunday.  So here is the Nebraska game wrap (with pics!)

Domination!

That was kind of unexpected. AND AWESOME!  It was without a doubt our best game of the year.  Heck it was our best game IN YEARS.  It was maybe the best team performance since the 1997 PSU game, although I'm probably forgetting some good ones in between. 

During the game, I remember thinking the score was pretty close and anything could happen until the turnovers made it a laugher. But after watching it a few times since then, we really did dominate in all phases of the game.  

By the end of the 3rd, the stat sheet was pretty one-sided.  They really only had 2 great plays all game. (Two plays that I highlighted in the preview post.... so maybe I'm not completely stupid. Still, I did rag on MSU's O-line which gelled pretty strongly by mid-season. ooops.)

Defending the option

Like most of the Michigan fan base, I have huge man crush on Mattison. The things he and his staff are doing, and the performances they're getting from our players are out of this world. I would love to just sit at his feet, follow him around, and absorb as much football knowledge as possible.  

If you've accomplished as much as this man, people won't make a big deal out of you using your moobs to signal the playcall. (This GA knowns that peripheral vision is sometimes a weird thing.)

Defending the option is so simple, yet so hard.  You need your players to know their assignments and play with decisiveness.Here is Jake Ryan demonstrating the textbook definition of "forcing the pitch".

Nebraska has this play blocked pretty much as you would draw it up. Ryan is the 'optioned' man who is unblocked. Martinez doesn't see the whole open up on the backside, but he's running to where the play is called. He's supposed to read Ryan and "make him wrong".

Jake's first step is lateral as if he's going to squeeze the zone on the slot receiver.  But when he sees the option motion coming towards him, he cuts upfield with authority. Martinez reads him correctly, and it looks like this should be a decent gain for the Huskers. 

Meanwhile, Mike Martin has beaten his block and is pursuing to stop cutbacks, and the secondary is coming up in run support.

Ryan's change of direction is so fast that Martinez can't get a good pitch off with his left hand. Burkhead managed to fall on the loose ball, but if he hadn't we had two guys coming up quickly and there would have been no way for Martinez to get it with his face planted in the ground. The moral of the story is that one way to defend the option is to make those options keep the ball and get killed, or pitch the ball and get killed.

Another way to stop the option is to get an unexpected defender free. Nebraska comes out in a 4-wide set to try to get a good personnel matchup. But we just stay in our base 4-3 so it doesn't matter when the TE comes down to the line of scrimmage.

Mike Martin explodes through the line and forces the pitch FROM THE BACK SIDE. That's impressive.

Meanwhile, Kovacs is up in run support and all over his assignment as you would expect from a player of his intelligence. He reacts so quickly that the blocker whiffs on him. And the pursuit isn't giving Burkhead anywhere to go.

Getting a 5 yard TFL on first down against your opponent's bread and butter play ... that's a good a thing.

Getting off blocks

One of the stark differences between last year's defense and .... uh ... others... was how well they were getting off blocks and getting to the ball. I don't want to disparage former defensive coaches...BUT the improvement was remarkable. 

We're in our zone blitz package with Martin dropping and Demens rushing. Demens gets doubled. That's a pretty big weight disadvantage for him.

So he squares up and gets some arm's length separation from the defenders, one of whom starts looking for someone else to block. 

Martinez decides the coverage is too good and thinks he can squirt through that passing lane. But both Demens and Ryan see it, react to it, and clamp down on that hole.

Ryan slaps the ball out. Check out how far away from the ball Van Bergen is. But he's got his head up, he's disengaged from his blocker, and he's pursuing the ball.

One funny bounce later and it's in RVB's hands. Brian keeps saying that fumble recoveries are just luck and 50-50 propositions. I would disagree and say the fumble recovery percentage is more of a function of the number of each team's players near the ball when the fumble happens. In this case, we were a little lucky because Nebraska had more guys near the ball. But if RVB isn't hustling and getting off his blocker, our chances of getting that ball go from slim to none. So yes, luck plays a part, but I don't believe it's JUST luck or that it will always regress to the mean..

And lets not forget the good hustle and technique which caused the fumble in the first place. Strip that ball!

(The other 85% after the jump)

*programming note, got busy during the holidays, sorry if anyone was looking for scouting reports.  Things have slowed down now, so expect a Nebraska game wrap next week, or the week after, depending on if I feel like writing anything about the SEC non-championship exhibition game.

Winners find a way to win.

It started as a joke, but now no one can deny the awesome power that is Brady Hoke's magical golden poop.  Everything he touches turns into roses.  When he walks through a forest, flowers bloom in his wake.  Youtube is sadly lacking in good golden poop videos, so a unicorn farting rainbows of destruction was the best I could find.  I hope it's not too disturbing.

Our ND friends gave us the wonderfully self-fulfilling cliche' "Winners find a way to win, losers find a way to lose."  But we'll just focus on the first half of that, and they can focus on the 2nd half, thank you very much. 

Was Brady Hoke lucky that Tressel was caught lying?  Maybe. Maybe he pulled a Peter Wiggin and dropped a few well placed emails.  Was it luck when we fumbled on the 1 yard line against ND and Denard scooped and scored a walk in?  Maybe.  Maybe Hoke used his secret telekinesis.

I don't know, I don't care. At this point I'm just happy to be along for the ride.  

But how else can you explain what happened? 

How does a sure INT on a fake FG where no receivers went into pass patterns end up in the arms of the long snapper for a first down? How does what looks like a TD to 80% of the twitterverse get reversed in OT?  How have all the great things that have happened this year happen to one team, in one year?  It boggles the mind. 

They say you make your own luck.  They say that "Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity."  But whether it's luck, or karmic retribution, or a secret plot by an undercover invisible agency from the future, it can't be sustained at this high of a level.  So let's just enjoy it while we can.  

On to the pics.

Al. Al? ALLLLLLLLL!!!!!!!

This week's love-hate relationship status with Al Borges is .... .... Love? That's odd, because during the game there were times when the needle was strongly tilted towards hate.  But after a second look at the game film, the final analysis, just like the outcome of the game, is slightly positive.  

Much like the Iowa game, the lack of production on offense wasn't really his fault so much as it was a combination of a lack of execution, personnel limitations, and a darn good defense.  

Oh sure, there's plenty of things he could have done better and a few stinkers that make you want to pull out your hair... hmmm....nevermind.  And I'll get to those in a moment, but overall, we did what we've done all year. And many of the plays should have worked. 

I mean, Molk getting injured and having this

happen on two consecutive plays to kill the first drive can't really be blamed on Al.  Maybe it would have been better to go under center with the backup playing, but after we've been crying all year for more shotgun, you can understand why he didn't.  Luckily Molk came back in, but wasn't at 100% which probably put a dent in our selection of play calls. 

And give VT credit.  They played a lot of Man-Free forcing Denard to make tough passes to the outside, which frankly, we all know is not his comfort zone. 

Yes, the manball mentality is frustrating especially when VT is putting 9 men in the box. 

 (It's 8 because Denard going backwards is not a threat to run.) But it's there to setup big plays.  

With both safeties up like this, the thing you have to do is make them pay for it. 

But with two defenders beating their blockers, Denard has pressure right up in his face resulting in this jump pass. 

It's not Al's fault that Denard threw to the wrong guy.  Roundtree had a step on his man and Jr. was getting interfered with.  Despite the interception, you can't argue that it wasn't the right play call. 

[ED: More after the jump.]

Finally! No,... FINALLY!!!!!

So that game was closer than it should have been.  Raise your hand if you think the replay official had taken Ohio against the spread.  A touchdown would have made it a 10 point game with Michigan covering the 9 point spread. But let's bitch about that later.

WOOOOOO!!!!!!

10-2 with wins against ND and OSU! It's beyond all expectations. If we hadn't laid an egg at Iowa and gotten screwed by the refs that game, we'd be sitting with just one loss, 3 close wins, and 8 curb stompings.  You could say that I'm sold on this coaching staff.  I had no idea the coordinators and position coaches would be this good.  We still have a lot of issues with our WLB and our secondary, but we're light years ahead of where we were last season. 

On to the pics!

Fickell

I have to give him credit for coming out with an aggressive gameplan that put a lot of pressure on Braxton Miller's arm and Posey's ability to get separation.  It almost worked.  But the punt from the 36 yard line was a pure Zookian moment.

It's 4th and 4, the game is a high scoring affair, you've been moving the ball pretty well with your mobile QB and there's a strong possibility that you'd only be gaining 16 yards with a punt anyway.  There's no debate.  This was a HORRIBLE, HORRIBLE decision.  Their punter did a good job executing the coffin corner kick, but that still doesn't justify the thought process.  

Add that to Fickell's continued clock mismanagement, and I doubt you'll find a single bucknut fan who is sad to see him go (or demoted, or whatever).  Not forcing a punt at the end of the first half was not that bad with a one point lead, but wasting 16 seconds for a 3rd down spike on the last drive was just awful.  You could even hear Spielman rolling his eyes at that. 

F* That guy

Miller is going to be a problem going forward.  He fits "Urban Meyer's offense" as Spielman called it during the game (so much for the two weeks of pretense) almost perfectly.  He doesn't throw a very accurate ball but *cough*tebow*cough* that doesn't mean he can't be successful in that offense. 

It is interesting to note that Miller had 9 TD's and only 3 picks.  Yeah, he didn't have many yards or attempts and was under 50% passing, but that's still pretty remarkable for a true freshman.  He's been missing his receivers in safe ways and pulling it to run if the coverage doesn't look right.  That's pretty good ball security for someone you'd expect to misread coverages due to inexperience. 

He started out the game doing what we expected, we just weren't ready for his speed on the first couple of plays.  On this 2nd and long, Ryan is blitzing from a walked off OLB spot.  

But his path is a little too much to the outside.  I know he's thinking about contain, but he's got to aim more directly at Boren and then use his arms to stay off the block. 

Instead, he gets pushed outside and the tackle is free to release onto Demens. 

Morgan has to do a better job of reading that lineman crossing the LOS and react quicker to Miller.  Ryan would adjust later, but this gave them an important early 1st down. 

Mattison really sold out on stopping the run and stopping Miller's scrambling.  On Kovacs' delayed blitz, you can see we did a much better job of filling the running lanes on the rush.  Morgan is playing spy (which was kind of useless...) and the D-line is free to shoot the gaps away from the blitzer. 

But Miller is very elusive and showed great leg strength in getting away not only from Kovacs, but also RVB.  Fortunately Demens and Martin have followed the play allowing Kovacs a second shot at the sack. Meanwhile, Morgan is .... well I think Ohio watched a lot of film on Morgan and decided to go after him all game. 

Martin and RVB were great all day (of course), and they were twisting on most passing downs.  This is a pretty good idea when the O-line you're facing is known to have communication problems. On this play RVB is supposed to go around Martin, but Brewster gives Martin a pretty good pop. 

That's no problem for the two seniors, RVB just decides to go first and Martin swings around.  

The center and guard are so concerned with Mike, they let VanBergen go free for the easy TFL.

Miller picked up 1st downs with his legs all day.  The early bombs really messed with our gameplan and gave him more room to run.  On this 3rd and long, we've got Kovacs in the box in our crazy lineup with all the guys on the line and different people dropping out. Because of the earlier passing success, three people are dropping into coverage, even though Ohio LOVES to call the QB draw in this situation.  

The result is that Morgan got caught with his weight going the wrong direction and Miller galloped over Kovacs for a big gainer. 

But I think Mattison just decided he wasn't going to let Boom Herron beat us.  I think Herron ended up with less than 40 yards because of plays like this.  Here we've got Kovacs coming off the receiver to run blitz. 

And again you can see the linemen shooting gaps away from him.

Kovacs gets in there so fast that both Boren and Posey are blocking air.  Jordan gets the TFL and the Ohio is stuck in another 3rd and long. 

Miller ran the speed option a lot the last few games and that continued against us.  On this touchdown, he cuts against the grain and makes Roh miss in space.  Spielman was babbling about how great a play call this was and how it was a counter speed option. 

I call bullshit.  They definitely do have a counter speed option, but this play wasn't it.  You can tell because Roh is unblocked. On the designed counter, the tackle engages the end and tries to seal him inside or kick him outside. 

This looks more like improvisation by Miller. I think they just tell Posey to block on the backside like he means it on every play. They got a TD here simply on Miller's talent, not on any blocking scheme.  You can see he takes a hard jabstep upfield that fools Roh just enough so that he can get outside.  

After that he makes an amazing jumpcut and his momentum carries him into the endzone. 

THIS is the counter speed option, except it's a playaction pass.  The tip off that it's a pass is that Miller turns away from the LOS instead of going nose towards it. 

It's a well designed play that turns into a rollout to the right.  They've got three layers with a deep corner, the intermediate cross, and Stonebrunner is going to release into the flat. If the Defense over pursues the rollout, there's even a throwback available to Herron. 

But Stonebrunner doesn't hold his block long enough or Miller doesn't get enough depth and Roh is right up in his face. 

A more experienced QB might have tried to hit #11 who is open, but like I said before, Miller has been very safe with the ball.  Morgan does a good job of knowing who he's playing against and comes up expecting the run instead of uselessly trailing the TE.  

He was wide open though.  And Denard made a similar play that turned a sack into a short gain. Maybe Miller will be making those plays in the years ahead.  Guh. 

I'm just glad we'll have Mattison.  Because when push came to shove and we needed a stop on the goal-line in the 4th quarter, Mattison basically declared that Miller wasn't going to run the ball in.  And credit Kovacs for picking up the TE on playaction so that Miller didn't have an easy throw.  

F* this guy too

With only one game of film to watch, our DB's were not prepared for Posey's talent.  

But after a couple of short passes to him, they were very concerned about his presence.  A little too concerned. 

If Gordon hadn't screwed the pooch on this, the ball was not well thrown and he could have given Brown a harder time catching it since Miller threw it to the wrong shoulder and brown had to turn around to find it. 

I'm going to give our DB's a tiny little bit of slack in saying they haven't faced anyone with Posey's skill except for Michael Floyd.  And they had a lot of safety help against Floyd that they didnt' get for this game.  Posey is as close to Mario Mannigham that I've seen on an oposing team.  He does a great job of getting on the DB's toes and making them turn their hips. But still...

Even though this is a triple move, (headfake outside, cut inside, cut outside)...

You can't let a guy get that wide open.  Lucky for us this duck was overthrown.  

If you're going to put 8 men in the box and play man up against the WR, then freaking play man up.  Troy has Posey one on one, but because he's lined up so far back, there's no chance for him to make a play on anything but a fly.  

This deep cross was not a fly.

And it didn't help that Posey turned Troy around with an outside fake.  Amazingly, Miller hit him in stride (no it wasn't a tight spiral). 

Posey did it to all three of our DB's (Kovacs was essentially a LB this game).  On the last drive he turns around Floyd.  J.T. was thinking about getting an interception, and we almost paid dearly for it. 

We were about a yard and a half from being down by a point.  There would have still been 1:30+ left on the clock, but I was pretty happy to see this ball hit the ground.  Our offense was pretty good, and Denard was pretty accurate, but no offense to Gibbons, I'm glad we didn't have to drive for a winning field goal.  

[hit the jump for the remainder]

Ed-Seth: Bump.

Talented BUT . . .

So I've watched about 7 of Ohio's games, (Brady Hoke has only watched 4, he clearly doesn't "Get It".  I mean what's the point of the countdown clock if you're not doing something every day to beat Ohio?  Doesn't that include watching ALL of their games? /sarcasm) and the team has lots of talent, as you would expect.  BUT...

Most of it is inexperienced, and the experienced parts of it are having trouble getting on the same page.  It's one thing for your QB to be young and dumb, it's another for your senior laden O-line to not be getting to their blocking assignments or your two upperclassmen running backs doing their impression of the keystone cops when you put them in the wildcat.  Those things are on the coaches, and it's been pretty clear for awhile that these coaches are on their way out.  (Regardless of what lies Urban is spinning)

The video above is pretty typical.  Shazier is stepping in for team captain Sweat.  He's got loads of talent, but if you look carefully, you'll see that a lot of the plays he's making are downfield (when they're not running right at him) because he's slow to react and diagnose.  Once he get's going, he's got a lot of speed to get there, and he likes to hit, but not very much form on the tackle because it seems like he's more interested in making a big hit. 

When I watch this edition of OSU, I see lots of playmakers, but I don't see a cohesive team. 

OSU on O

The Speed Option

The two plays I worry about from Braxton Miller are the QB lead draw and the speed option.  He's also dangerous when he scrambles, but I feel like our DL can be disciplined enough to keep him in the pocket.  I've already focused on his scrambling and the lead draws in the previous scouting reports, so this time I'm focusing on the speed option, which they ran much better this game, and ran more often. 

They like to run out of the pistol, and they'll run it to either the weak side or the strong side depending on what the defense does.  But they do prefer running to their right, which is behind Shugarts.  PSU shows a cover 2, so there's a numbers advantage to the left side. 

I kinda think PSU is a little bit miss aligned for this formation, but it seems like they had a CB blitz called on the weakside.  The option motion just goes away from it and those two guys are not going to be a factor in the play.

It's just zone blocking and this is one of the plays where the O-line does a good job of scraping to the 2nd level. 

Miller looked much better this game at taking the hole that is in front of him.  But from a scouting standpoint, he almost never pitches.  So it kind of seems like a waste of a player.  They had one play where they did the power lead, which I would be even more concerned with.  

So now that they've hurt PSU with the base play, it's time for the companion playaction. PSU had 8 men in the box for a lot of the 1st quarter, but backed off a bit after Miller hit a couple of passes. Here they've only got 7 in the box. 

The option motion starts to the right, but then Miller jabs his foot in the ground and gets depth to throw.  The key to reading this play is that the O-Line is clearly in pass blocking mode. The backpeddaling uncovered guard is a dead giveaway. 

PSU does a great job of rushing with discipline, no one is over-running Miller, and they get a free rusher coming up the middle. 

Miller will usually make the first man miss, but because of the spread out pocket and controlled rush by the D-line, he's got no place to go. 

[Ed-Seth: take the jump for the much more.]

[ed: bump]

Know your enemy

Not much time this week, but I wanted to put up some plays from the OSU games, Neb game wrap will come out during the down time before the bowl game.  Win or lose vs TSIO, revisiting the beatdown will be something fun to do in a week or so. 

Unbalanced I-Form

OSU used a lot of unbalanced sets against Purdue, so our CB's have to be ready for it and talk to the LB's so that we can get properly aligned. 

On this play, the boilers are in man coverage so when the TE flops, the OLB goes with him. This means the the DE no longer has contain so both he and the DT on that side shift down a gap. The OLB needs to be aware that his man is now ineligible to go downfield, so he doesn't have any coverage responsibilities, or he's got backs coming out of the backfield. 

Purdue is betting against Miller's passing game and has 8 in the box, 9 if you count that CB who is kind of playing center field on the backside. The two receivers are man'd up by the CB and FS

OSU continues to have problems identifying who to block with their zone scheme.  Both the split end and the LG completely whiff leaving the two frontside LB's unblocked. 

There is a danger of a playaction rollout on this play.  If that safety is so far off of the split end, there's a lot of room for him to do a post deep cross, so it's important for the backside DE to keep contain and respect Miller on a rollout. 

With the missed block, this is an easy TFL for purdue, but their frontside defenders have also beaten their blockers since they maintained outside leverage and the LB forced the RB to bounce. 

On this play we've got the same formation, but it's flipped.  Again, Purdue is selling out against the run.  They're showing 9 in the box as that CB is faking a blitz, but he steps back and is in man coverage with the split end.  Again, the TE is inelligible, so guy #5 up there has contain on the strong side and guy #1 has contain on the weakside. 

Again, there's a real danger for playaction on that post or crossing route.  The SAM backer has to get into a pass drop if he reads pass blocking from the linemen.  This play turns into a lead draw, so he's okay, but he's in a tough position because he has to help in coverage and watch for the cutback once he sees that the action is going weakside. Fortunately for Purude, the DE beats his block and the FB fails to pick him up. 

So this results in another TFL, but if that SAM evacuates his area too quickly, there's going to be a huge cutback lane.  

[ed: time to jump]