Btown Wolverine

October 5th, 2015 at 10:55 AM ^

Sucks for Ojemudia. I hope he's able to recover quickly.

Good news on the rest. And I'm really happy with the way Harbaugh and co. are handling injuries. I think it's super smart to sit these guys out for Maryland, a game in which weather looked iffy and which we would be able to win even when we're not at 100%. No sense risking making a small injury much worse by playing too early.

Joined: 08/23/2013

MGoPoints: 1536

go16blue

October 5th, 2015 at 11:11 AM ^

Agreed on your second point. Harbaugh made some point in his press conference about how De'Veon had some injury that he would need to "play through" or something like that - it's nice to see that a lot of that is talk, and that he's willing to sit players when it helps the team. Not that most coaches wouldn't, I suppose.

Joined: 04/28/2010

MGoPoints: 6755

M Gulo Gulo

October 5th, 2015 at 10:56 AM ^

Great to hear Stribling, Kerridge and Smith should be back this week. We will need them to help defeat NW! It really sucks to hear Ojemudia is probably done. He has been playing so well the last few games. I wish him the best and a speedy recovery!

Joined: 02/23/2015

MGoPoints: 3382

evenyoubrutus

October 5th, 2015 at 10:59 AM ^

We have now lost two guys off the defensive line for the remainder of the season.  I don't want to hear any bullshit from Staee about their injuries. Especially since they have been lucky as hell for years leading up to now.

Joined: 11/04/2008

MGoPoints: 178243

Goose1724

October 5th, 2015 at 11:05 AM ^

Injuries are part of the game. That is why depth is so important. Very smart to get a few guys some rest before NW and MSU. Followed by an open weekend, shapes up pretty well so we will be rested to close out our season enroute to a B1G Championship game. Hail Harbaugh!!

Joined: 10/28/2014

MGoPoints: 1647

getsome

October 5th, 2015 at 4:37 PM ^

its not personal.  i didnt say it here but ive commented elsewhere.  jenkins-stone is in his final year of eligibility and hes just not very good compared to other LBs and DEs, either on his team or around the country.  

hes failed to make significant strides and has never made much of an impact on the field - sure, he received poor coaching for 3 years, but does not change facts (not to mention all other LBs and DEs on roster received the same coaching).

he was an undersized (in terms of power 5 prospect) and decently athletic kid in hs who played tough and liked to run and hit and did pretty well at cass tech -  he just never took the next step.  he has not developed into a gap-filling tackling machine nor has he been effective as an edge rusher.  and hell not only struggle at DE to beat decent OL to the QB but hell prob be a liability vs good teams in the run game.  unless hes been laying in the weeds and sitting on a ton of untapped potential for 3.5 years, past results are pretty solid indicator here.

im sure jenkins-stone is a great person and teammate, a hard worker, and a dude wholl likely succeed post-grad.  but hes just not very instinctual or impactful as a football player at this level (and few are).  the odds are greater a kid does not make big impact or make all conference or enter the nfl, its tough

Joined: 09/07/2013

MGoPoints: 7386

getsome

October 5th, 2015 at 4:48 PM ^

i think its gotta be gedeon.  pretty sure theyve already tried stroebel and similar dudes to no avail.  and i guess winovich or furbush may surprise but unlikely.  i think they have to rep gedeon at that spot and then go extra big if they want with charlton or even shuffle henry and others for some snaps (which obviously weakens depth and rotations at other spots) if they dont want to really split up the snaps.  stone cant do it other than some throwaway snaps here and there and marshall hasnt proven anything yet (though i havent really seen him).  gedeon just appears to be the only guy with a chance of pulling it off without limiting their playbook or getting gashed.  

but maybe im just bigger fan of gedeon than most.  ive always seen him as a guy that needs to be situational player at the very least - hes more explosive and athletic than the alternatives and has pretty decent history of making impactful plays (while never getting totally exposed) in limited snaps.

itll be very very interesting

Joined: 09/07/2013

MGoPoints: 7386

gopoohgo

October 5th, 2015 at 11:06 AM ^

Sounds like Ojemudia tore his Achilles (see Terrell Suggs)...hopefully he caught enough eyes for a team to take a flyer on him (doubt he will be ready for pre-draft workouts).

Joined: 09/12/2011

MGoPoints: 10661

StephenRKass

October 5th, 2015 at 11:06 AM ^

This is pretty much what we've heard so far. Just a few observations.

  1. I like that Harbaugh doesn't feel the need to report what he is doing. I don't think anyone expected Smith and Stribling to stay home. So called Fort Schembechler makes sense to me.
  2. Strategically, this was a great opportunity to see Isaac, Green, and Johnson at RB. I think this helps sort things out a bit. Right now, Smith and Johnson seem to be the main backs carrying the ball. I don't know, but Isaac has some serious work to do to get out of the doghouse. And I don't know what is up with Green . . . some guys don't pan out.
  3. I also love the strategy of not playing guys you don't absolutely need. As said elsewhere, Harbaugh had to feel pretty confident Michigan would win, so why not give Smith and Stribling extra rest? This is playing for the long haul.
  4. There isn't really logic or reason to the injury bug. But Michigan has gotten off pretty light. It really is terrible news for Ojemudia. But other than Ojemudia and Mone, Michigan is good a third of the way through. Contrast that to MSU, where they have some really bad injuries impacting the season.
  5. I'm thrilled that Rudock hasn't been roughed up. And that Peppers is healthy. And that the OL and DL have mostly been unscathed. If Rudock, Peppers, Lewis, and the starting OL stay healthy, we'll be pretty well set. I feel more confident of depth in other areas of the team.

Joined: 07/15/2008

MGoPoints: 23001

True Blue Grit

October 5th, 2015 at 11:19 AM ^

Hopefully, Smith and Johnson both stay healthy going forward because they're going to be key cogs in the offense.  I thought Green looked OK against Maryland but that's about it.  I think he may have had some minor injury since one of the announcers said something about him sitting on the bench with a heat pad on his knee. 

Joined: 01/21/2011

MGoPoints: 32373

Wolverine In Exile

October 5th, 2015 at 11:28 AM ^

See the short  yardage carry he got in the second half. Line play is basically a stalemate, need a RB to hit any hole with authority and just push through for a yard. Green sees the hole closing and instead of going full bore and trying to knock a LB back for one yard, he shuffles his feet, takes a second to decide where to go next, and by that time the LB has disengaged from Houma and grabs Green for everybody else to bring down behind the LOS. I don't know if he would've gotten the first down if he didn't stutter step, but that killed any forward momentum he had. Green's a big back with supposed speed. He needs to ge tthe ball and just drive with authority into 1 of 2 holes and either try to jump over the top to get the yard or stick his head down without losing a step.

Joined: 11/08/2008

MGoPoints: 10790

SHub'68

October 5th, 2015 at 2:35 PM ^

I could be wrong generalizing from just a couple instances, but he doesn't seem good at picking up the blitz. Saw one particularly bad example that lead to a Rudock sack. Was guessing the cause on some of his scrambles, sure enough, out went Green. I wonder if Smith got the job in the first place by being better at blocking. Maybe the UFRs show this?

Joined: 09/29/2010

MGoPoints: 6663

Franz Schubert

October 5th, 2015 at 11:26 AM ^

Michigan getting off light, I guess it could be worse.

Out for season

Pipkins

Mone

Ojemudia

 

Kerridge- missed last 2 games

Stribling- missed last week

Smith-missed last week

B. Cole-out indefinitely

Canteen-Missed some games?

Thomas-missed at least 1 game

Houma-missed at least 1 game

Joined: 07/20/2009

MGoPoints: 4453

StephenRKass

October 5th, 2015 at 5:07 PM ^

I guess I was thinking of injuries that happened this season, or in prep for this season. I mean, if you want to go the way you're going with Pipkins, you could also include OL Chris Fox on that list. The reality is that neither Fox nor Pipkins were going to play for Michigan this year, so they were non-factors imhe. Six of one, half a dozen of another.

Joined: 07/15/2008

MGoPoints: 23001

Sideline

October 5th, 2015 at 11:11 AM ^

This staff rest guys in this scenario. Northwestern will be tough, but a healthy Smith should be beneficial against them... Kerridge is a huge boost if he does play... He's just so crucial to our offense right now... I love Houma, but he's not the best receiving FB I've seen. Houma is block or run, Kerridge is block or receive... At least to my eyes. Eating Stribling back really helps our secondary. NU is really going to have run a lot... I don't expect their passing game to do much without being set up by the run

Joined: 12/09/2009

MGoPoints: 2378

zapata

October 5th, 2015 at 11:42 AM ^

and not only about eating Stribling's back (which is definitely a bad idea). I don't think that Houma has been that bad catching passes out of the backfield, but I confess I'm not gonna look up any stats on it. Anybody have something like that handy?

Joined: 03/10/2010

MGoPoints: 1094

Muttley

October 5th, 2015 at 8:27 PM ^

of the ill-advised back-across-the-middle Rudock throw that Jake would have gotten away with had Houma caught it.  (IME, it was still a bad idea back across his body into the middle of the field with one Houma and three Maryland defenders in the area.)

Joined: 07/07/2009

MGoPoints: -73245

Champeen

October 5th, 2015 at 11:13 AM ^

RJS has had a decent amount of playing time.  But i sure hope Lawrence Marshall is as good as i think he will be, sooner than later.  He will be taking up some serious snaps now, unless things are shaken around up front.  I really don't want that to happen though because the chemistry on the front line is really good right now. 

 

 

Joined: 04/07/2011

MGoPoints: 14967

Gustavo Fring

October 5th, 2015 at 12:07 PM ^

It's that the coaches want to maximize snaps for the best players even if positional fits aren't 100%.  

So the question is: would you rather give more snaps to Taco Charlton (a player who would start on a lot of other teams or certainly get more snaps if he wasn't competing with so many good players) or Lawrence Marshall (freshman).  

Ask Taco to do less in coverage and we'll be fine.  It's not like having a BUCK who can cover Jake Butt is the crux of this defense anyway.  Just need to drop him into some zones on a quick blitzes from time to time.  

Joined: 09/29/2009

MGoPoints: 5175

Muttley

October 5th, 2015 at 6:50 PM ^

http://informedathlete.com/medical-hardship-waivers/

 

NCAA Division I – An athlete must not have participated in more than three contests or 30 percent of their season schedule (whichever is greater) and not after the halfway point of the season (based on the number of contests rather than a particular date

Had Mario played just one less game, an appearance in the B1G Championship Game (plus the subsequent bowl) would have made him eligible. Two less games and he would have been eligible no matter how many games Michigan ends up playing.

As it is, Michigan will have to accept the NFL's playoff invitation after we win the CFP Championship in dominant fashion and win at least one NFL playoff game to advance to a second.

Good luck, Mario!

Joined: 07/07/2009

MGoPoints: -73245