UM Least Lucky to be Undefeated - ESPN Expected Win %
Narrative I keep seeing around the interwebs is that Michigan has struggled and doesn’t deserve to be a top 4 team. Seems to have been echoed by the AP voters this week as well, dropping Michigan below Clemson.
According to ESPN Analytics of expected win probability throughout the games, Michigan is the only top 10 team that hasn’t been expected to lose a game at some point during the season. FPI ranking (#) for reference
1) Georgia: 18.9% against Missouri (58)
2) OSU: 48.6% against Notre Dame (15)
3) Alabama: 20.4% against Texas (4)
4) Clemson: 18.5% against Wake Forest (24)
5) Michigan: 61.7% against Maryland (20)
6) Tennessee: 20.5% against Pitt (42)
7) USC: 24.1% against Oregon State (48)
8) Ok St: 29.4% against Texas Tech (44)
9) Ole Miss: 34.5% against Kentucky (36)
10) PSU: 10.6 % against Purdue (22)
*Manually pulled data, so I may have missed a data point that is worse for non-Michigan teams
So maybe for an offense that is designed to wear down a defense and dominate in the second half, we should wait until the second half before screaming that the sky is falling? Just a thought.
October 10th, 2022 at 9:49 AM ^
i dont think that is because we are amazingly elite. I think its because we've played mostly trash. Only Maryland has a pulse in our 6 games. You can only play who is on your schedule, but we haven't beaten anyone worthwhile yet.
This week? Lets see it happen and I think we're in the mix!
October 10th, 2022 at 9:53 AM ^
Penn St? The same team that struggled against Purdue, CMU, and Northwestern?
They're clearly trash too. And so is anyone else who Michigan manages to beat. The first rule of Michigan football is that nothing is ever good enough and if we win a game it's because the opponent sucks. Get it through your thick skulls, people
October 10th, 2022 at 10:20 AM ^
Do you think PSU sucks? Who is actually good this year? Definitively good. I realize PSU struggled early, but the fact is, theyre 5-0 (or whatever and 0). Most teams cant say that. They should have lost to Purdue... but they didnt.
Are you seriously saying those first awful 3 games weren't a complete joke?
Also, Iowa just lost to Illinois 9-6. They lost to iowa state.. 5-3? i mean... is that a football team? They suck.
Indiana has lost a lot too.
I'm giving us Maryland because theyre actually pretty good, and they were in it with us until late.
There's seemingly only 1 elite team this year.. and that is OSU.
Everyone else appears to be in the mix. Nobody we've played YET is even close to either category.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:56 AM ^
I think what he's saying is that the narrative since forever has been that a team is determined to be not good once Michigan beats them. It's pretty consistent.
October 10th, 2022 at 11:25 AM ^
Okay, but minus the.. "everyone is against us" mentality. do you really think anyone on our schedule so far this year, other than maryland is even a decent team?
October 10th, 2022 at 10:57 AM ^
You're missing the point of my post completely. I'm just jabbing at the people who always seem to find ways to doubt our team amid a stretch of considerable success.
Yes, beating PSU will add some legitimacy to our resume. Yes, they are probably a better team than anyone we've played before.
Will it make the doubters think Michigan is legit? Probably not. The only thing that will is a win over OSU.
As a serious answer, I don't think PSU is all that great. They are definitely better than last year, but Michigan should handle them fairly easily at home if they are playing well. Never underestimate James Franklin's ability to shit the bed on the road vs a top team.
October 10th, 2022 at 11:14 AM ^
Please stop with the OSU is the only elite team crap. I hear this every year but I don't see any championships since 2014 for OSU.
Under Day they have an offensive philosophy that creates early big leads against lower skilled defenses- so they look elite. This "eliteness" does not seem to translate against top teams.
October 10th, 2022 at 12:47 PM ^
Isnt the claim “the only elite team on our schedule” not “the only elite team?” If you think OSU is not gonna be a tough game i dont know what to tell you
October 10th, 2022 at 11:19 AM ^
There's seemingly only 1 elite team this year.. and that is OSU.
even AN ohio state looks like they are beatable IMO ... this may be one of those years where no one is head and shoulders above anyone else. Bama and UGA look beatable. Tennessee won in OT against Pitt. Clemson barely got through Wake.
October 10th, 2022 at 12:46 PM ^
Yeah. That PSU schedule is a real gauntlet of death. NW, CMU and Purdue. I mean wow!
October 10th, 2022 at 2:02 PM ^
In fairness, Purdue is better than anyone we've played. And Auburn, while not good this year, is still way better than anyone we played in the non-conference, especially at Auburn.
October 10th, 2022 at 12:53 PM ^
PSU and UM have significantly lower ranked SOS than the other teams and UM's is worse than PSU's. None of this is surprising. It doesn't mean everything. It's just a data point. But neither does this "least lucky" data point.
There's a question one might ask for both data points -- "So what?"
October 10th, 2022 at 9:58 AM ^
That's why I put the FPI ranking for reference. Only OSU and Alabama had their "struggle games" against better teams than Maryland.
And Bama was at about 50/50 on the last play vs A&M this weekend (23)
October 10th, 2022 at 10:08 AM ^
Indiana had quite the pulse in the first half. Iowa hung around.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:17 AM ^
Indiana's scoring drives were kept alive by a bad unsportsmanlike call and a moon ball Hail Mary (which I'm pretty sure the WR stepped out of bounds and was not called). It was never sustainable.
Michigan v Iowa expected win % plot is essentially linear from the beginning (78%) to end of the game (100%). The only reason people feel Iowa hung around is because of Kinnick voodoo and scarring from the RichRod/Hoke years.
October 10th, 2022 at 6:19 PM ^
The side judge / head linesman was hatless, so he did see the receiver step out of bounds. The inference, then, is that the official ruled that he was pushed out of bounds but reestablished position immediately (in which case, he’s allowed to catch the ball without penalty). It’d also be possible that he ruled the receiver wasn’t’ the first to touch the ball, but I didn’t see the defender touch the ball so I doubt it.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:29 AM ^
Hmmm..... Before Iowa game, there were so many worried about Iowa because young QB will make a mistake. The gameplay was to limit mistakes and everyone worried about JJ. One can never win.
October 10th, 2022 at 11:16 AM ^
yea, we haven't faced the fearsome world beaters like Mizzou, Notre Dame, Pitt, Texas Tech, and Oregon State.
Purdue is just gutted a victory over Maryland on the road and PSU won on the road so ok we'll give it to the Nits.
October 10th, 2022 at 9:52 AM ^
Why not design an offense that is good in the 1st AND 2nd half?
October 10th, 2022 at 10:06 AM ^
Our offense is ranked 8th in efficiency.
But I'd argue as a large favorite, which we've been in every game, you want to have a low-risk strategy to minimize the number of high-variance plays that could result in you actually losing the game.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:06 AM ^
Because football is hard... Only one team has looked truly elite all season. Every other team has had rough patches.
October 10th, 2022 at 11:26 AM ^
Do not speak his name
October 10th, 2022 at 1:09 PM ^
It finally hit me this weekend that the person not to be named is Dan Bilzerian
October 10th, 2022 at 1:27 PM ^
You mean Dan Hefner?
October 10th, 2022 at 2:29 PM ^
^ Both colossal a-holes.
October 10th, 2022 at 9:52 AM ^
It helps to play the teams we have played.
October 10th, 2022 at 9:54 AM ^
This is some solid detective work.
October 10th, 2022 at 9:57 AM ^
Are we “least likely” or unlucky?
October 10th, 2022 at 9:55 AM ^
Thanks for this deep dive. Looking forward to Saturday. Beat PSU.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:01 AM ^
as stated in an earlier thread..... every team we beat is, by default, a shitty team.....
Georgia gave up 22 pts to Kent State and were only leading by 2 scores for most of the contest then almost got beat by 2-2 Missouri. both unranked teams.... so i guess they've struggled too...
October 10th, 2022 at 11:55 AM ^
I don't think we're being punished because we've "struggled". We're being punished (in the polls) because we haven't played anyone.
Clemson has two wins over solidly ranked teams. We have zero. We've only beaten one team with a winning record. The two best teams we've played both lost last week: Iowa and Maryland.
So I think that's more what's hurting us than our own "struggles".
It's 100 percent reasonable to have Clemson ahead of us.
Georgia too. They have arguably the most impressive win of any team this season v Oregon.
October 10th, 2022 at 12:06 PM ^
I think we can call Maryland a "somebody." They're 4-1 in non-Michigan games and that one loss was by two points.
October 10th, 2022 at 3:04 PM ^
we can just keep winning and then the chips will fall where they fall.
Onward,
Go Blue!
October 10th, 2022 at 10:04 AM ^
"So maybe for an offense that is designed to wear down a defense and dominate in the second half, we should wait until the second half before screaming that the sky is falling?"
Tom Allen's wording was: "...our defense played hard, they got wore down in the fourth quarter." It's almost like Harbaugh planned it that way...
October 10th, 2022 at 10:23 AM ^
We can think that. Their D wore down because their offense works at a pace taht if not on the field picking up 3-4-5 first downs per possession, leaves them on the field nonstop.
Oregon, under Chip Kelly, had this issue. Even though it was effective most of the year, they tended to fail late because of how quickly he ran their Offense. That said, that was probably the best "fast" offense in college FB history. Indiana is not that. Our coaches adjusted, they had more quick punts.. we dont attack down field AT ALL... so we chunk our way down the field and they wore out.
So its probably both things. We wore them out by design, and we wore them out by bad (Indiana) design.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:31 AM ^
If you're going to take away credit from UM for not being the sole reason their D was worn down, then you need to give them some leeway in giving up 10 first half points because Indiana blew their load too early.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:51 AM ^
im good with that. i was impressed by our defense in the 2nd half. whatever the reason, we shut them down, got rid of drives, attacked their QB, and they folded.
I dont think giving up 10 was the part that frustrated most. it was our offense kinda looking like dog doo. Some say that's by design. I don't quite understand that, but... to an 80% clip under harbaugh, its worked
October 10th, 2022 at 12:50 PM ^
Sure, their defense got wore down in the second half, when we finally adjusted to their tempo-based short passing game. You know who else got wore down in the second half? Their fan base. I was at the game and I would guess the stadium was 50% empty in the 4th quarter and just about bone-dry of IU fans at the end. It was glorious.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:05 AM ^
The rankings will sort themselves out. The key thing is remaining healthy and growing. In addition to that, giving every game your all.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:08 AM ^
It tend to think the post-game win expectancy of SP+ is more a measure of luck than whether a team has been down at some point during the game. For example, Georgia's final win expectancy against Missouri was 89.5%, so really they were unlucky that the game was as close as it was. OSU was over 95% against ND. Michigan's lowest was 83.5% against Iowa (the stats in the Iowa game were closer than the Maryland game). Michigan hasn't been lucky, but most of these other teams haven't really been lucky either (Clemson was lucky to beat Wake and Ok St. was slightly lucky to beat Baylor).
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheets/d/1llrN8luL0XWuP8Y-Pb1NXKU84JhXLeUPafy1RfITEDw/edit#gid=967943920
October 10th, 2022 at 10:24 AM ^
Stats don't tell the full story either. Especially when Harbaugh is willing to let teams kill the clock (and their chance to win) at the end of the game, but they pad the stats.
Georgia really was lucky against Missouri if you watched the game. They were a shoe-string tackle by their QB on an almost scoop-n-score and a false-start penalty at the 1yrd line (leading to a FG) away from being down an additional 8 points.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:15 AM ^
Off topic but not worthy of a new thread... I was looking at Week 7 SP+ rankings and noticed the Big Ten has 6 of the top 9 defenses, with 3 of them still on the schedule:
- Iowa
- Alabama
- Georgia
- Illinois
- Minnesota
- Penn St
- Texas A&M
- Ohio St
- Michigan
Another fun fact, only two teams are top 10 in offense, defense and special teams: Georgia (who is top 5 in all three) and Michigan.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:52 AM ^
That just cannot be true. We don't throw the ball downfield, we don't end the game at the half, we keep running the ball and we have multiple coordinators. /S.
We are at a point where we over analyze all the things we think will kill us against good teams. That is just who we are as fanbase. You bringing facts into the equation does nothing to the traces of BPONE still left in us.
October 11th, 2022 at 12:08 AM ^
Are you setting up a Michigan-Georgia rematch, but this time in the national championship game? Yes, I think you are.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:21 AM ^
It's crazy to me how people can watch Harbaugh teams year in and year out and not realize that the slow-motion beatdown is a feature, not a bug. How many data points do we need? In games against overmatched-but-not-moribund opponents, Harbaugh teams are far more likely to grind them down over the course of 4 quarters than they are to, a) absolutely blow them out, or b) get pulled into "deep water" as the FOX crew intimated.
Harbaugh's Michigan teams have a pretty consistent profile at this point:
- we usually blow out bad teams
- it usually takes more than 1 half for us to grind down teams who are overmatched but not terrible
- we get drawn into a true 4-quarter scare every so often against teams who are overmatched but not terrible, and usually we prevail in such games
- it usually takes us all 4 quarters to beat good teams
- we get blown out extremely infrequently
October 10th, 2022 at 10:25 AM ^
What you say is mostly true, with the one outlier. Michigan state. If we beat them more often when we "should", a lot of the perception about our struggles against lesser teams, would probably be moot.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:39 AM ^
I think people are a little into recency bias with MSU. The two Tucker losses were (1) the worst Harbaugh team, by far, during Covid year (bad team loses to slightly worse team isn’t much of a story) and (2) a close road loss in a top 10 matchup featuring a dubiously overturned strip sack TD. Before that Michigan was 3-2 against them under Harbaugh, and one of THOSE losses was an inconceivable one in a thousand miracle. I don’t think Michigan has near the MSU problem that people think, it’s more been a lot of weird BS has negatively impacted things. Now if they lose THIS year, then I’d change my mind on this issue. But I don’t think they will - contrary to popular belief, the better team usually wins this game, despite the weird expected shenanigans that happen during the game.
October 10th, 2022 at 10:46 AM ^
Lunacy, your user name does not check out in this case!
The four losses to State were all flukes in some ways…
-punt
-typhoon with 3rd string QB
-covid
-overturned touchdown
October 10th, 2022 at 11:14 AM ^
Flukes that if the offense schemed better probably wouldn't have happened