Great Detroit Free Press article
This article is very eye opening. It highlights some serious issues with this team's coaching. Definitely worth the read.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:08 PM ^
The article gets it exactly correct.
Players are making too many mistakes.
But the bigger problem is the JH, Drevno, Pep offensive game plans and play selection.
I hope they are not too stubborn to figure look in the mirror and change things starting today.
If the game plan next Saturday isthe same, that would be a very bad sign.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:19 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:39 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:29 PM ^
Here's a hint:
If the organization of the offensive staff is too complicated and ambiguous for anybody to understand, then maybe the game plan is too.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:39 PM ^
We are going to lose to IU next week. Something that neither RRod nor Hoke managed to do.
IU's defense is going shut us down, the recipe to defeating Okorn is to pressure him. And our D while good is still probably going to give up 13ish points.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:45 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 3:05 PM ^
Yes we are, IU's only losses are to top 5 teams in PSU and OSU. IU will score enough to win and our offense will probably turn the ball over 3 or more times. I think a 13-7 score is likely.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:09 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:17 PM ^
The signs have been there the entire season but we ignored them during our winning streak.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:37 PM ^
when the Gators were beaten or any of the other wins?
October 8th, 2017 at 3:36 PM ^
Florida just lost to LSU. They aren't very good.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:48 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 5:11 PM ^
October 9th, 2017 at 12:18 PM ^
MSU has about 12 seniors. We have 30+. I am f**king tired of the "young" excuse. We put 11 players into the NFL last year. There was nothing young about that team.
It's is easy to put your finger on it. We haven't had a good quarterback in years. When was the last drafted QB that actually had/has a decent NFL carrer? Chad Henne? Half credit for Rudock.
October 9th, 2017 at 4:01 PM ^
MSU:
4 offense - LJ Scott, Beedle, Allen, Higby
3 defense - Frey, Dowell, Williams
Michigan:
4 offense - Perry, Cole, Bredeson, Hill
1 defense- McCray
October 8th, 2017 at 2:17 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:30 PM ^
We are starting to suffer from Charlie Weis disease.
That did not end well.
October 8th, 2017 at 5:07 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 4:09 PM ^
Asking the Harbaugh "Brain Trust" to simplify? That is blasphemy, we have the greatest offensives minds in the game on our team. Every one of our offensive coaches would be a coordinator in the NFL if they didn't want the privilege, nay the honor, of working for coach Harbaugh.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:25 PM ^
said MSU Coach Dantonio. "The ran 40 plays in the first half."
This isn't necessarily praise. These are words from a guy who figures out just how much new information his players need to win pretty darned consistently, and limits them to that.
Two things going on here IMO:
1) A kind of hubris, where our former NFL coach has his team trying to run before it can walk--and lamentably--sometimes, despite this, stumbling into very predictable and (worse) erratic playcalling, and
2) Too many cooks on offense, not all of them Michelin four stars. Head coaches have a delicate balancing act to fulfill where they can delegate a lot or a little.
ND's Kelly stopped calling plays this season because strategy left him too little time, he felt, with his players, especially the D.
What's the right balance for Harbaugh? I don't know, but I'll bet it doesn't involve THREE play-callers.
And as much as that hubris may be hubris, now might not be the time to abandon the sophistication. Because by next year this team COULD be running 40 plays well and kicking butt.
If you're sticking to your guns on the diverse offense, however, then you may just want to play Peters. I would by no means blame O'Korn for all of yesterday's problems, but he did not look world class to me.
Michigan is not playing for any championships this year, but there are some very interesting decisions ahead.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:28 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:39 PM ^
We hit the lottery with Don Brown. It is now clear that elite defense is here to stay at Michigan.
This is a game changer.
The truth is that we can now get away with keeping it simple on offense. We no longer even need to try to miraculously engineer the college version of the New England Patriots.
Just a basic college-level offense coupled with Don Brown's defense will have us playing for championships.
We don't have to wait five more years for the ultimate complex pro-style offense to (maybe) materialize.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:29 PM ^
was the Dantonian version of what we call a joke. There's an underlying element of bitterness and snideness in it. Maybe because Harbaugh is the dude with the mega contract and the national celebrity, while he's the Midwestern football coach who does a good job, at a school where it's easy to fail but tough to reliably succeed, and yet gets little wider recognition.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:32 PM ^
He's not wrong.
Forty formations. Three points.
That's some fancy shootin' there Tex.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:44 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 7:05 PM ^
The three points?
October 8th, 2017 at 2:40 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:25 PM ^
Its incredible how people buy into narratives. Like stupid Herbstreit talking about Dantonio coming out swinging. The game I watched, Michigan had a 16 play drive, forced a 3 and out where I don't think MSU gained an inch, and then was marching again till Isaac fumbled. I guess thats "swinging"?
The momentum shift in the game was palpable. Momentum in college football is huge and MSU caught the 2 biggest moments (the other being the 60 yard run).
Yes, what the article says is true. And maybe some of the ints are on the coaching staff. But few teams win games when they are on the wrong side of a 5-0 TO discrepancy. Sort of a black swan game.
If Isaac doesn't fumble we might be talking about how Sparty may never win again. Which would be about as true as everything being written about Michigan now.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:36 PM ^
even if Isaac doesn't fumble..this game would have been very close because those offensive deficiencies on Michigan go beyond turnovers and bad weather. We saw it in good weather and without turnovers in previous games.
We may have won if any one of 5 or 6 little dominoes had fallen differently but it would have never been the sort of emphatic win that would have led to that sort of positive talk on here.
I agree that the 'bad moment's of the Harbaugh tenure have for the most part been down to small things, things that could have gone differently if fate smiled upon us a little more..but in these things there's always been an element of home truth, too.
In this game the home truth of an offense that's well below average in the conference and nation has resulted in the first L. There'll be other games we lose without 5 turnovers and in slightly more passable weather because of that offense. It's not helpful to reduce it all to 'bounces'.
October 8th, 2017 at 5:55 PM ^
"If" is the biggest word in the loser's dictionary, regardless of the sport.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:54 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 3:09 PM ^
Nothing. But we have an awesome defense. Good enough to win every game including last night. The Isaac TO resulted directly in MSU's first TD. We were marching, no fumble probably leads to 6 - 0 or 10-0 rather than 3-7. You never know how the game changes from that. Oh well.
I wonder how many people firing the coaching staff were debating whether 12.5 pts was a better spread or 17.5. For the record, I said 5.5 would have been a better spread in a thread. And you can bet if I wasnt so depressed from last night I'd be having a ball with the "i told you so"'s.
October 8th, 2017 at 8:46 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 8:57 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:28 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:48 PM ^
I was there in '87 and I disagree.
That was all on a young Demetrius Brown still learning his way. The rest of the system was still sound.
Just look at the five years before that season, and the five years after that season and you can see how sound it was.
Last night was not like that at all.
Last night was a system-wide issue. it was not just a young O'Korn learning the ropes on his way to Rose Bowl wins over USC.
October 8th, 2017 at 3:37 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 7:07 PM ^
But like most Bo QBs, that was his first on-field year.
He did not play any significant downs in '86 or '85.
October 8th, 2017 at 5:17 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 5:45 PM ^
is a Black Swan event in a game. And both last night and 30 years ago, despite a horrific amount of turnovers, we still had a chance to win the game at the end. That tells me as a fan that there's plenty of justification in being disappointed, but zero reason for panic and despair.
I've seen more games than the vast majority of posters. I've seen more games than the vast majority of posters' fathers. I'm not commenting on the grandfathers, but I'm betting that I surpass more than a few.
This, too, shall pass.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:30 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:35 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:52 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:40 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:33 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:40 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:42 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 9:09 PM ^
The answer is what the trophy at the end says?
I think it has NCAA written somewhere on it.
October 8th, 2017 at 2:43 PM ^
October 8th, 2017 at 2:55 PM ^