Sunday Bye Week Snowflakes
I'm not married, so it isn't wife day for me. My thoughts from this week.
Apparently to be an All-Big Ten/All-American Cornerback you need to hold the reciever on every play. Dennard and Roby are masters at defensive holding and refs ignoring it.
It was very frustrating watching Wisconsin shoot themselves in the foot over and over. Missed FG. Meaningless penalty negating a turnover. Dropped interception leading to a Hail Mary touchdown. They outgained the Buckeyes and we have to go another week hearing how great they are despite them being lucky every week.
I am less concerned about Al Borges, Offensive Coordinator. I think he is an above average OC, he isn't in the Chip Kelly/Gus Malzahn category, but I think he is a good OC. Where I am concerned is Al Borges, QB Coach. For 2 years we watched Denard regress in his mechanics. Now we are watching Devin have poor mechanics. Based on Space Coyote's post over at Maize n Brew, a lot of his problems are coming from poor mechanics. I would really like to see a full-time QB coach come in and teach some good mechanics.
September 29th, 2013 at 11:59 AM ^
September 29th, 2013 at 12:00 PM ^
September 29th, 2013 at 12:10 PM ^
September 29th, 2013 at 1:17 PM ^
September 29th, 2013 at 6:14 PM ^
It means the Big Ten is awful
September 29th, 2013 at 12:12 PM ^
Further, that occured while the average ranking given to us by the AP voters went up from 18.11 to 17.88 (although that makes our reading on the proposed "Hater Index" all of -1.12 this week), so there is that as well.
September 29th, 2013 at 12:23 PM ^
I can't read Hater's Index without thinking of this:
September 29th, 2013 at 11:59 AM ^
Our coaching staff is still intact!
September 29th, 2013 at 12:02 PM ^
So Uconn got destroyed by Buffalo 41-12. Not exactly confidence inspiring.
September 29th, 2013 at 12:05 PM ^
and Notre Dame lost, and Central and Akron got convincingly squashed.
Akron, CMU, and UConn are now 2-12 for the year, with the two wins being squeakers over bad FCS teams. yikes.
September 29th, 2013 at 12:09 PM ^
September 29th, 2013 at 6:25 PM ^
September 29th, 2013 at 1:40 PM ^
September 29th, 2013 at 12:40 PM ^
turned the ball over 5 times! I'm no rocket scientist, but I am beginning to sense that turning the ball over is bad.
September 29th, 2013 at 1:13 PM ^
...mmkay?
September 29th, 2013 at 2:00 PM ^
+1, Insightful
September 29th, 2013 at 12:05 PM ^
Devin is being Devin. I watched him a few times in high school and he made the same bonehead mistakes then as he is doing now. The only difference is, he got away with it in high school because he was so much better than everyone else on the field. He will always have a lot of turnovers, it's just the way he plays.
September 29th, 2013 at 12:11 PM ^
Why didn't you tell us that a few weeks ago before we got our hopes up?!?!
September 29th, 2013 at 12:14 PM ^
Silver lining: we grow up.
September 29th, 2013 at 12:19 PM ^
September 29th, 2013 at 12:22 PM ^
and there is some real likelihood that we are only a middle-rank team within it. The D will continue to come on, keep us in some games. A great deal now depends on whether Devin remains grounded in upcoming games, on whether the O line comes together.
We're very lucky to be playing Minny at home, in a very winnable game, next Saturday. Win comfortably and the kids will not need to have to look over their shoulders at everyone else's scores. Squeak another one out and everyone's dissapointment and diminished expectations will start to tell on play, too.
Let's see how it goes.
September 29th, 2013 at 6:26 PM ^
September 29th, 2013 at 8:03 PM ^
September 29th, 2013 at 12:45 PM ^
Minnesota looked pretty bad. Nelson showed some flashes, but overall the offense looked inept. Our DL should have a good game.
On defense, they're middle linebacker was impressive. Hagerman was good when he was on the field, which was surprisingly not the often. Iowa did well by doubling him and/or running away from him. We would be wise to do the same. There a couple plays where he flat out threw the center out of the way on his way to a TFL. Miller will not be able to handle him one on one.
September 29th, 2013 at 1:45 PM ^
September 29th, 2013 at 1:54 PM ^
September 29th, 2013 at 2:36 PM ^
BOOM ROASTED.
Also, the rest of his grammar seemd fine. It's not as if he doesn't know the difference. Sometimes you just have a brain fart.
September 29th, 2013 at 3:27 PM ^
I blame the hangover
September 29th, 2013 at 1:15 PM ^
Some snowflakes:
- Cooked up a brisket on Saturday as I watched other games; it was delicious
- The Georgia - LSU game was terrific
- Notre Dame lost ... and not by some stroke of luck by OU ... yea!
- Tucson weather has cooled off and the dog days of summer are behind us
- Looking forward to watching Michigan play a solid, mistake-free game against Minnesota and win by a nice boring score of 35-6.
September 29th, 2013 at 2:15 PM ^
If these are snowflakes to you then I'll have a snowball of what you're serving.
September 29th, 2013 at 4:33 PM ^
I'm not sure why Notre Dame losing is so good or celebrated here, it undermines our (team and conference) good win and, combined with losses by CMU, Akron, and UConn further calls into question the ability of our team, which has been under constant scrutiny and question since 4:00pm on September 14th.
September 29th, 2013 at 5:05 PM ^
You're thinking with your rational brain. I would agree with you 100% if I allowed my rational brain to interfere with my intense hatred of all things Notre Dame. But I don't.
When I put my rational brain into a box and let me irrational brain run free, I feel nothing but intense dislike of all things Notre Dame. By far the most obnoxious fan base in all of college football. I don't like their stadium, which is a rip-off of Michigan's; I don't like their mascot; I couldn't stand the movie "Rudy,"; and worst of all I loathe Lou Holtz.
I'll grant Ara Parseghian was a decent fellow. Old school classy.
But everything else associated with Notre Dame is awful. Everything.
Harumph.
/rant
:-)
September 29th, 2013 at 5:34 PM ^
Makes sense. I actually grew up a Notre Dame fan (though probably not an obnoxious one) before I ended up choosing to go to Michigan in 2008. I'm happy to say it took all of approximately 3 hours on campus for me to completely renounce my Notre Dame fandom.
September 29th, 2013 at 7:52 PM ^
you could have renounced it in 1.
September 29th, 2013 at 9:24 PM ^
We get a lot of mileage out of "Winningest Team in College Football". It's even painted on our equipment trucks that drive to away games.
Notre Dame is right on our heals for best winning percentage of all time (the best measure of performance). We are only a win or two ahead of them.
They used to lead us for best all time winning percentage until we passed them a few years ago. When we used to brag about most number of wins, they would say "Big deal, you've been playing longer. What really counts is best winning percentage, which we own." They had a point.
Every single loss by them helps us. This record is for all time. It goes well beyond the ups and downs of any particular season.
September 29th, 2013 at 10:08 PM ^
| Rank | Team | Winning Pct. | Games Won | Games Lost | Games Tied | Games Played |
| 1 | Michigan | 0.735294118 | 907 | 315 | 36 | 1258 |
| 2 | Notre Dame | 0.732893652 | 868 | 303 | 42 | 1213 |
September 29th, 2013 at 1:40 PM ^
Dennard did not get away with it against ND. There were at least 5 flags for holding/PI against Dennard and others in the MSU secondary in that game. So much so that Dantonio had a closed-door complaint session with the B1G. As for Roby, I haven't seen enough of him to judge, other than the fact that he is a Buckeye and is probably cheating.
September 29th, 2013 at 1:58 PM ^
The first half was awful, but after watching the second half, I feel better about Devin. I felt like he needed to spend the bye week getting his confidence back. I was surprised to watch the second half and watch a poised Gardner play pretty well. He threw 1 bad pass and other than that looked pretty good.
I also noticed on the long Touissant TD run, Gardner saw the LBs gearing up to blitz up the middle and audibled to the speed option that went for a TD. Borges also had a couple other calls geared to deal with LBs blitzing up the middle that went well. The LB blitzes confusing our interior OL has been a big worry for me, so I was glad to see we had adapted in the second half.
Anyway, if you want to feel better about the team, rewatch the U-conn game, but start right after the second half fumble. I actually think it says good things about Devin that he was able to pull it together at halftime.
September 30th, 2013 at 1:03 AM ^
The gameplan was a lot more favorable for Devin in the second half. Shorter passes, more runs - things to get his confidence back. It did seem to help and I'm am quite thankful for that. Hopefully he can keep some positive momentum going for here on out. The bye week came at a very good time.
September 29th, 2013 at 2:03 PM ^
I also wonder why we don't have a dedicated QB coach. I watch Braxton Miller's passing progression, fairly good, and see Devin regress in two weeks ... well, small sample size I guess. All is not lost, but still, why don't we have a dedicated QB coach?
September 29th, 2013 at 2:13 PM ^
Which position would you take away a dedicated position coach from? You can only have a certain number of coaches on the staff. I don't know why it would make any difference if the QB coach is also the OC. During position drills the OC has nothing to do, so he coaches the QBs, during the scrimmage situations in practice, he watches the whole play, but if anyone besides the QB needs technique advice, their position coach helps them anyway. It doesn't really take any teaching time away from the QB. And the QB is supposed to be an extension of the OC on the field anyway.
September 29th, 2013 at 2:34 PM ^
Unsure, I've just been disheartened at the lack of progression of Denard and now Devin as Borges is the "QB Coach". While I fully admit that I may be putting too much weight on the last two games, I was hoping for significantly better improvement through the first 4 games of this season.
Of course, caveats apply. Borges in his 3rd year, Denard not his recruit, etc. and I agree. Just a statement.
September 29th, 2013 at 2:16 PM ^
I'm pretty sure Borges is our QB coach. He also serves as our OC. That's not an unusual situation.
September 29th, 2013 at 2:22 PM ^
Right, that's why I said dedicated QB coach, as in one that is not also the OC.
September 29th, 2013 at 2:34 PM ^
This is pretty much an issue of semantics, because at most schools, the QB coach is basically the passing game coordinator (and thus a co-OC). I think the jury is out on Borges as QB coach but I don't his success or lack thereof is affected by him being OC.
September 29th, 2013 at 2:39 PM ^
I think that, in general, I agree with you. I'm not unsold for Borges as our OC, but overall QB play this year has been erratic. Of course there is plenty of time for the offense to sort it all out.
September 29th, 2013 at 2:04 PM ^
The thing I took from the UW-OSU game was how the Buckeyes seemed to take advantage of every Wisconsin mistake. The combination of their talent and scheme makes it so important to not make mistakes and take advantage of theirs, because they will do so on yours. I know it's not exactly rocket science but their offense seemed to jump all over any second opportunity they were provided last night.
September 29th, 2013 at 2:08 PM ^
There's no way in hell you can put any bad QB mechanics on Borges. Denard just was not a naturally pretty passer, and Devin showed incredible mechanics and ability in the first two games this season, he just ad a stroke in the quarterbacking region of his brain after the ND game. That's not on Borges.
September 29th, 2013 at 2:14 PM ^
There was some surprise on the board last year when Kentucky scored some decent recruits out of the Cincinnati area. I think it's mostly assumed that for football interest OSU>>Kentucky everywhere, and at the very least everywhere in Ohio.
Last night I was driving from Springfield to Cincinnati and listening to the Wisconsin/OSU game and starting about 20 miles south of Dayton, when I lost reception for WING (Dayton station)...
...it wasn't on! In disbelief I tried every am frequency. I found three different stations carrying Kentucky, two carrying Louisville, one carrying Dayton v. Marist, no end of bigger stations carrying faraway games, but there was not a single station broadcasting Ohio State football with a signal that could carry all the way to Cincinnati.
Their local contract is with a station that goes low-power at night. 300 watts. At one point I was about three miles from their antenna and I still couldn't get a signal.
Just a data point. Thought somebody might be interested.