Has this season been any different then predicted?
To start: losing sucks. Period. This has been heart and gut wrenching start to my favorite time of year. But a question:
Is this start all that off from what was predicted?
Brian's offseason analysis:
- Improved Run Defense with a strong front 7 (check)
- Improved Secondary (TBD - Lewis has been a revelation, Countess has been eh. Peppers and Taylor have been rotating through injuries)
- Overall Defense: Good but not Awesome (check)
- An offensive identity (Check)
- Offensive line moving from awful to almost OK, despite losing two NFL tackles (check)
- Problems still caused by offensive linemen making mental errors (check)
- Gardner being superman under Nuss (Nope)
- Improvement from WR & RB (would be a check, but the WRs bit the big one yesterday)
-Overall Offense: Signs of moving in the right direction, but not enough to overcome youth and adapting/implementing to a new system (check)
---------Conclusion--------------
Looking Game-by-Game, this has held up, with Gardner, and a bad day of WR drops, and Taylor's injury being the only major changes. This has led to games where the defense keeps us in, the offense moves the ball, but then the mistakes happen and the offense falls apart. The team is too young and the system too new to have the full bevy of plays in the playbook to effectively counter the defenses when the defenses sell out. The Good-But-Not-Awesome nature of the defense leads to the eventual scores, and game over.
This has led to a 2-2 start.
All of this follows what we knew would be the script but didn't want to believe. Actually, this script has been predicted for ~2.5 seasons. On the other hand, the same script also said that 2015 being a very positive year positive. The offense will continue to grow this season, correct the mental mistakes, build its identify/knowledge of zone/playbook, and start to capitalize on the opportunities it is creating... especially if Morris is given the reigns or Gardner gets the wake up call and overcomes his Football PTSD (or if Gardner book ends Funchess to create a deadly WR combo.... )
It is frustrating. I do not like it but there is little that can be done to rush/fix it.
September 21st, 2014 at 8:50 PM ^
September 21st, 2014 at 8:59 PM ^
nothing about the offense has looked good
September 21st, 2014 at 9:04 PM ^
I have no idea what the OP is talking about after reading the post. How this offense looks promising is beyond me. The one checkmark reached with the offense is that the OL is more of a line rather than two points and nothingness.
Devin just seems lost.
I can't believe Nussmeier is being talked up by some people here as an interim coach. Nussmeier inherited a record-setting quarterback (single game) and managed to get lots of regression and the first shutout in 30some years. Sure, Devin isn't as good as that one game, but he isn't as bad as this.
September 21st, 2014 at 9:12 PM ^
It was actually precicted back in the spring. By a writer linked in the thread above this one.
http://www.mlive.com/wolverines/index.ssf/2014/04/analysis_why_is_michi…
You can't go through this many transitions and hope to keep winning. The defense is starting to get there because it is ladden with upperclassmen. The offense is still too young and it shows.
September 21st, 2014 at 9:28 PM ^
Multiple teams around the country would disagree with you. Just because you think Michigan is the only team that has to go through ''transitions'' when they hire a new coordinator doesn't make it true.
Also Darboh and Chesson are juniors and neither resemble anything but an occasional target. Our offense is literally Funchess and running it up the middle.
September 22nd, 2014 at 9:48 AM ^
with Brendan Quinn did a post game analysis and he put ALL of the blame on coaching, specifically Brady Hoke. This before he knew that only 10 players particiapated on the ill fated punt return for a TD. Nick Baumgardner was not predicting ineptness at the most basic levels, he was predicting just being outplayed.
September 21st, 2014 at 9:18 PM ^
... was "worst case 7-5, best case 11-1," and eventually settled on 9-3.
Link: http://mgoblog.com/content/preview-2014-heuristics-and-stupid-prediction
The individual position/unit predictions aren't far off, but most everything seems to have come out on the low end of the predicted range.
Four games into the season 9-3 isn't ruled out, but looks like an awfully big hill to climb.
September 22nd, 2014 at 8:07 AM ^
September 21st, 2014 at 9:25 PM ^
Vegas had our over/under at 7.5 games for the regular season. Most of us laughed at that (I predicted 9-3). Since Vegas is generally trying to even out the money, that means 7.5 games was the consensus across the gambling community.
September 22nd, 2014 at 3:47 AM ^
Yes, it's been worse than predicted because we're losing in blowouts. Because the offense is an exercise in futility.
And because the coaching is worse than we expected.
Someone needs to ask Hoke if the University of Michigan deserves a great head football coach, and whether he considers himself a great head football coach. I am willing to be that his answer would be, "I'm trying to be a great coach, but I'm not there yet, obviously."
"Trying to be" is not the same as "being" a great coach.
Our university deserves, and should demand, nothing less than the best head coaching, as it does the finest professors and the highest level students it can attract.
It also deserves the finest Athletic Director, capable of evaluating coaching talent and capable of serving the needs of its clients - the students and the alumni - by offering a great athletic department experience in every way and not alienating them.
Right now it has a tone-deaf marketing guy and a coach in over his head. Both need to change.
September 22nd, 2014 at 7:21 AM ^
September 22nd, 2014 at 7:28 AM ^
WE SCORED LESS POINTS THAN IDAHO STATE DID AT UTAH!!!
What part of that horrific fucking fact is ok, so-so, expected?
IDAHO FUCKING STATE!!!
Wake up man, we stink.
September 22nd, 2014 at 8:05 AM ^
September 22nd, 2014 at 8:46 AM ^
on offense against ND & Utah?
September 22nd, 2014 at 8:57 AM ^
I figured we would be somewhere between 4-0 ( with luck) and 2-2 (with bad luck) at this point, but no way, no how, did I expect the offense to be this inept.
To the OP, this is why it is often more revealing to look at the whole rather than just part by part, and even if part by part, there is no position more important than QB. It's a bit like saying someone is in overall good health because everything is functioning as it should except one organ, the heart.
September 22nd, 2014 at 10:06 AM ^
Giving up a punt return for a TD with only 10 men on the field and then still having only 10 men on the field for the subsequent extra pont? (Check)
September 22nd, 2014 at 10:39 AM ^
I congratulate you on a very level-headed post. The Michigan fan base is a little over anxious. I can't blame them, but calling for Hoke's head is not exactly the smartest move. Do people remember how terrible coaching transitions are? Michigan just went through two of them.
I can't blame our fans because the two losses were AWFUL. I hope Nuss and Hoke figure something out because the offense looks really confused and inept at times. But the bits I watched of the Utah and ND games, Michigan could actually move the ball, but they couldn't put together long drives to put it in the end zone. Hopefully something will click and the offense will go wild.
But, you are right - they've improved in areas where they needed to improve. They've just regressed in other areas that were unforeseen. But, there is time to turn it around. The Big Ten sucks and this team could end up with a decent season.
September 22nd, 2014 at 11:46 AM ^
if the play turned out a bit different than she thought?
September 22nd, 2014 at 11:49 AM ^
I had the UT game as one of our wins. If the coaching is good this team should improve through the season. However, MSU will beat us fairly convincingly. I had thought we would lose a B1G game we should have win but now that may be a couple.
I suppose I will now go 7-5 from my original prediction of 8-4. But I have a feeling this may be a 6-6 season. I had originally thought there would be know way possible Hoke would be fired after the season going 8-4 but if he finishes 6-6 or even 7-5, it is over for Hoke!