Plz stop with the: "we lost to top 15 teams"
I cant even count how many posts iv seen that are some derivative of: "smile...both of the teams we lost to are ranked in the top 12."
Thank you...we know.
We all came into these season with the expectation of losing a few. An 8-4 finish, which is still very much a possibility, would exceed most preseason expectations.
But the issue isnt that we lost, its how we lost:
- Three turnovers
- one missed FG
- needless penalties (the face masks need to stop)
- two kickoffs out of bounds
- missed tackles
- failure to cover on the blocked kick
- missed interception opportunities.
- questionable personnel decisions
We didnt lose to two top opponents...we lost to ourselves, and two top 15 opponents just happened to be on the field with us.
So stop trying to convince everyone that they are stupid for being frustrated. Yes, im frustrated, and i think it is justified
October 17th, 2010 at 1:47 PM ^
you're cool
October 17th, 2010 at 1:51 PM ^
you're not
October 17th, 2010 at 2:28 PM ^
"UMASS is better than half the BCS--Sagarin has then rated 55!"
"Indiana has probably the best passing attack in the B10!"
"Without our mistakes we would have beaten MSU"
Meanwhile, with a supposedly better team this year, we've lost worse to MSU--at home--than we lost on the road last year. We lost worse to Iowa at home than we lost to them in Iowa last year. And we have made zero progress on the following: stupid mental errors, tackling, abject confusion on the field, missed assignments, gap responsibility, dumb penalties, and, against good teams-turnovers.
No problem everyone-we all thought we'd lose a few games. Nothing to see here!
October 17th, 2010 at 2:51 PM ^
MSU dominated us last year. We had 260 yards and like half of that was the long Stonum pass where Sparty did a Sparty thing and then against prevent on the last drive. Same with the Iowa game.
October 17th, 2010 at 3:07 PM ^
this year, and that it would have been worse but Dantonio shut it down late? Are you arguing that our performance this year was better because we got more yards? Uh, ok, all the best with that rationale.
October 17th, 2010 at 4:04 PM ^
Are you saying that MSU is the exact same team they were last year? I know everyone here doesn't like to admit it, but MSU is pretty good this year. They are 7-0 with a win over Wisconsin. I think Wisconsin did pretty well yesterday. Didn't MSU only win 6 games last year?
Are you saying that "Dantonio shut it down late" because most other coaches would still be throwing the ball and not trying to run the clock up by 17 in the 4th quarter? Really?
October 17th, 2010 at 5:00 PM ^
to be as well. I have no problem admitting MSU is good--I predicted they'd win 9 or 10 games this year. The question is, why have they improved more since last year than we have? Regarding the game, Dantonio went into Carr shut down run the clock mode--yes, other coaches would in fact have continued to pass.
October 18th, 2010 at 1:47 AM ^
Three key factors:
1. Cousins is in his second year as a starter, and has improved his decision-making. I love Denard, but he is a first-year starter, and is making typical first-year mistakes.
2. Their secondary was as bad as ours last year, but they returned everybody. They've turned the corner this year. We're basically starting over back there.
3. They returned their top two tailbacks and found an impact freshman in Bell (who, believe it or not, was a two-star recruit). We're weaker there than we were last season. We lost our top two rushers from last year and our leading returner tore his ACL.
October 17th, 2010 at 2:54 PM ^
This is where people need to listen up...
"And we have made zero progress on the following: stupid mental errors, tackling, abject confusion on the field, missed assignments, gap responsibility, dumb penalties, and, against good teams-turnovers."
RR will be fine in AA, but the above mentioned garbage needs to come under control.
October 17th, 2010 at 3:04 PM ^
Is as tired as the "unacceptable" list. Both repeated memes of what someone else said.
October 17th, 2010 at 1:47 PM ^
I really think this is some fresh insight.... I never thought about it this way before. You sir, are a trailblazer in analysis.
October 17th, 2010 at 1:49 PM ^
I'm sure it will stop
October 17th, 2010 at 1:59 PM ^
Apparently Ann Arbor will burn.
Speaking of which, I wonder how things are in Columbus today?
October 17th, 2010 at 1:50 PM ^
We didn't lost to your grammar either. Everyone is frustrated, if you had told me before the season we would've put up 500+ yards on Iowa's defense I would've looked at you funny. You can't win em all, but once we get some defensive depth and experience we just might.
October 17th, 2010 at 1:55 PM ^
I think that's his point. Issues of depth and experience aren't necessarily what's causing Michigan to lose. It's making very stupid and very preventable mistakes. Which, obviously, should decrease with more experience, but is also a function of discipline and potentially practice issues.
October 17th, 2010 at 2:02 PM ^
I think Lewan showed us that he has a lot to learn yesterday, he killed several drives. He came out in the second half a lot more composed. I'm inclined to believe that some of the facemasks were more desperation tackles trying to save homerun plays, but I honestly haven't gotten a chance to watch a recording of the game yet.
October 17th, 2010 at 2:07 PM ^
its hard to make judgments on lewan's person fouls, because they usually were not shown on screen. but im sure the coaches will be on him about that.
As for the facemasks, that just seemed unncessary. A couple were while the ball carrier was already on his way out of bounds
October 17th, 2010 at 8:35 PM ^
How are stupid and preventable mistakes not related to [lack of] depth and experience? They are, that's how.
When these guys are upperclassmen they won't be making as many of these mistakes (fumbles, interceptions, special teams gaffes, penalties). If they are, then it's time to complain about coaching.
October 17th, 2010 at 3:06 PM ^
Are you making fun of bad grammar with bad grammar?
October 17th, 2010 at 1:53 PM ^
Absolutely we're frustrated. That's to be expected. It doesn't matter how we lost, it'll always be frustrating. We could lose by going 3 and out on every possession because an opposing team's dline was just 100x better than our oline and it we still wouldn't just sit back calmly and say, "Well, we just lost to a better team."
What people are stupid for is predicting 7 or 8 wins before the season and saying that if that happens Rodriguez should stick around, and then when we lose to two top 15 teams they all of a sudden decide that this is completely unexpected and unacceptable.
More discussion of what the issues are and how they can be fixed throughout the rest of the season is acceptable and more than welcome.
October 17th, 2010 at 3:27 PM ^
What people are stupid for is predicting 7 or 8 wins before the season and saying that if that happens Rodriguez should stick around, and then when we lose to two top 15 teams they all of a sudden decide that this is completely unexpected and unacceptable.
This, the above, is wise. Wish people would think before they talk (aka, scream, "Unacceptable!!!1!!)
October 18th, 2010 at 1:48 PM ^
What people are stupid for is predicting 7 or 8 wins before the season and saying that if that happens Rodriguez should stick around, and then when we lose to two top 15 teams they all of a sudden decide that this is completely unexpected and unacceptable.
The problem with this logic is that the 7 or 8 wins predictions all came before the season when there was a whole lot of unknown about the team; before any of us knew how good this team could have been and what their ceiling of potential was. It was all based on the potential we saw last year.
The extremely frustrating part, as pointed out by the OP is HOW they continue to keep losing. They don't seem to be making any progress in the stupid mental mistakes and the stupid, pointless, immature penalties aspect of the game.
It seems to be a widely held belief that these are relatively easy things to fix and "at least they didn't get outplayed," but I pose this question to the forum... If the stupid mistakes and the stupid, pointless, immature penalies aspect of the game is so easy to fix, why haven't we fixed it by now? It's been three years of the same ol' crap.
The outrage, contrary to the predictions, is coming midway through the year, now that we have a lot more information about our team THIS YEAR and we all see how good they COULD be and the potential they have THIS year if they could just continue to progress and grow from the start they had.
Perhaps "unacceptable" is a bit strong, but certainly frustrating, disappointing, and underachieving.
October 17th, 2010 at 1:52 PM ^
The fact that this is why we lost is more comforting than knowing that we just got outplayed isn't it? This means the talent and scheming is there, but our young kids are making mistakes (weird).
October 17th, 2010 at 2:02 PM ^
Yeah, no doubt. I'm actually not all that upset about the Iowa loss today. Don't get me wrong, I was plenty upset during the game yesterday, but it was because of the mistakes that we were making. It was a totally different type of being upset than it was last year or the year before, where it was blatantly obvious that we were just flat outplayed and/or didn't have the talent to compete. Everything that I saw yesterday will get better from more experience.
October 17th, 2010 at 1:52 PM ^
I don't understand why so many MGoBloggers are such hard asses about posting opinions that are similar to what someone else felt and posted. What does that take away from the board, exactly? It's like you're all frothing at the mouth for the opportunity to feel superior to someone every time we lose. It's really ugly.
October 17th, 2010 at 2:15 PM ^
"What does that take away from the board, exactly?"
It displaces some thoughtful, original content. For example, "OT: Attn Lloyd Brady-Please read."
OK, I'm partly kidding about that post (even if I bothered to click on it), but, really, how many threads do we need that amount to an unhappy person accentuating the negatives from yesterday's games? Five? Ten? More?
RichRod is clearly a mixed bag at this point. But, I don't think it's reasonable to blame him for @#$%ing everything. That's what goes on in many of the "Me unhappy!" posts. He gets blamed for not recruiting any cornerbacks in '06 and losing to Appalachian State in '07.
October 17th, 2010 at 1:52 PM ^
Three picks and a fumble. But who's counting?
October 17th, 2010 at 1:56 PM ^
because they don't do the dumb things we do to beat ourselves. Young, inexperienced teams do those things, which is what we are.
The only things standing between us and the top 10 are better decision-making and better execution. Those things come with experience, which is what we're currently acquiring.
I feel very optimistic about the future, myself.
October 17th, 2010 at 2:08 PM ^
I would feel much worse if we played mistake-free football and lost.
October 17th, 2010 at 1:56 PM ^
People shouldn't be frustrated for losing. I think what people are underestimating is the pressure having such a bad defense puts on every other play. It is hard going into a game knowing you need 40 to win. That puts a lot of additional pressure on every offensive snap that leads to penalties and turnovers because in all honesty an interception feels similar to a punt so might as well throw it up and give your guy a chance to make a play instead of throwing it away and punting.
I don't advocate giving free passes but until the defense becomes average every single play is going to feel like life or death and lead to mistakes you wouldn't otherwise see.
October 17th, 2010 at 2:03 PM ^
then get your shit right. There were 4 turnovers yesterday.
EDIT: Didn't notice Crime Reporter pointed this out already.
Besides, your post is worthless... thanks for nothing... There are these conversations happening in every post so why can't you just be a decent MGoBlogger and put this in any comment box under any other post like THE ONE WITH THE POLL'S since that is obviously what you are talking about. This team is very close to contending for the Big Ten. Maybe the experience is there now after these two tough losses, which hurt worse since we beat ourselves, but this team is on the right track. No doubt in my mind.
Go Blue
October 17th, 2010 at 2:03 PM ^
"stop trying to convince everyone that they are stupid for being frustrated." Some wack logic there.
As if it isn't possible to hold both ideas in our perfervid little minds: we f'd up. We lost to two very good teams we coulda beat.
I think it's the OP who should have thought twice before wasting our time with such weak sauce.
October 17th, 2010 at 2:04 PM ^
OP your analysis is bizarre.
If we, as you say, "lost to ourselves" rather than a top 15 Iowa team then wouldn't this bode well for the future given that we have a defense made up of very young talent and an offense of mostly young talent as well. If, as you state, we lost to ourselves then one would naturally expect that the sort of progress made in the last year by Denard (and Tate it seems), by the offensive line (looking at you Omameh) and by the offensive weapons (Roundtree etc.) should persist. How is that not positive going forward?
As an aside, please don't shout back with irascible comments about how RichRod can't coach em up or scheme or whatever given the development of the players listed.
October 17th, 2010 at 2:15 PM ^
i agree with your sentiment completely. i dont feel that these losses reflect negatively on our potential or our future. I think there are plenty of positives to take away from this game: the fact that we were able to stay in it despite all of the mistakes.
My point is that a talent deficit is not the reason for the losses these past two weeks, rather its repeatedly shooting ourselves in the foot with these avoidable mental errors.
October 18th, 2010 at 12:51 AM ^
Maybe you should try looking at the other side. The one that says "despite" the talent deficit and -4 TO, we still had a chance. Not to mention all the yards and first downs we had on offense.
October 17th, 2010 at 2:18 PM ^
If we still had Lloyd coaching, Obi Ezeh and Greg Banks would be future 1st-round NFL picks and fighting off agents.
/sarcasm
October 17th, 2010 at 2:17 PM ^
It sucks to shoot yourself in the foot, but it sucks worse to not even be competitive. Saying that the mistakes cost us the game implies that when we were not making mistakes we were still in the game. Even playing like we did yesterday (i.e. sloppy), we should be able to beat PSU, Purdue and/or ILL. This team is improving in fits and starts, and we all knew it would be another year before we could consistently compete with the best teams in the conference.
While we are complaining, please stop with the "our coaches stink because our freshmen and sophomores don't play as well as other teams' seniors." Who killed us against Iowa? Seniors Stanzi, Johnson-Koulianos, Clayborn, Klug, etc. Who made the big mistakes for us? Sophomores Denard, Tate, Smith, Floyd, etc. Throw in injuries to our most consistent O-lineman and D-lineman, and it is not the end of the world. If we get healthy in the bye week, 8-2 is not hard to imagine going into WI and OSU.
October 17th, 2010 at 2:21 PM ^
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October 17th, 2010 at 2:39 PM ^
sdnah ruoy no emit hcum oot yaw evah uoY
October 18th, 2010 at 2:04 PM ^
Genius! How do you do that?
October 17th, 2010 at 2:40 PM ^
We shot ourselves in the foot. That's what young teams do. OSU got manhandled and punched in the face. That's not what you want from an experienced team, let alone the number 1 ranked team.
I'd rather take a loss knowing we can control our errors with time as opposed to a "what the hell just happened to us" loss.
OSU looked like a high school most of the time last night.
October 17th, 2010 at 2:42 PM ^
Knowing that we could have and should have won had we made less preventable mistakes than to lose because we just plain suck.
I've said it before, and I'll say it again. Our offense is crazy good. Its depressing to know that if we control the turnovers that we could very likely have won the last two games, but turnovers do happen, even to experienced teams, but we just can't afford to do that because our defense is so bad.
I look forward to having a defense again. You want to know what our future is once we do? Think Oregon, only better, because we're Michigan and thanks to everything we've done in the last 130 years, all a recruit needs to know is that he can be a part of keeping that tradition going.
October 17th, 2010 at 2:52 PM ^
Iowa did not turn the ball over, but Stanzi came close to throwing 2 picks. One pick may have been a pick 6. If Stanzi throws the 2 interceptions, Michigan could have won this one.
Would the haters still be hating on the coaching staff?
It's funny, the opposing the team doesn't turn the ball over (Iowa and MSU) and our coaches get heat.
October 17th, 2010 at 3:09 PM ^
What's your point?
October 17th, 2010 at 4:36 PM ^
My point is why isn't Randy Edsall on the hot seat for losing to Michigan and turning the ball over more than Michigan did? Why isn't every coach on the hot seat for losing to Michigan on the turnover battle?
They obviously must be poor coaches right?
Yes, it's all sarcasm.
October 17th, 2010 at 3:16 PM ^
Weird. Sounds like a young team. But we are all aware of what a seasoned veteran group we have here at UM
October 18th, 2010 at 12:25 AM ^
Of the guys who started yesterday, I believe only Omameh and Lewan didn't see time last year. Omameh, Lewan, Denard and Smith are believe are the only underclassmen that start. Molk, Schilling, Dorrenstein, Roundtree, Stonum, Webb/Koger and Hemmingway are all upperclassmen (or have at least been with the program - for some of those guys this is their 3rd year of seeing meaningful action.
October 17th, 2010 at 3:20 PM ^
I'm tired of hearing this crap on here too. All it is is well if this and this and this had happened and this didn't happen we woulda won!
It's about execution, being disciplined, and eliminating mistakes, not about what COULDA happened. Get used to it.
