Revision of Upon Further Review: Defense Versus OSU from June 27th, 2008 at 3:50 AM

I will stand back and watch you explode.

I'm not that mad, actually. The two dagger plays on the final drive--the Smith spin and the Gonzalez OOB play--were fantastic individual efforts from Smith and his downfield throws were frighteningly accurate all day. At some point you have to tip your cap to his performance and give his phone number to Drew Rosenhaus.

I'm not totally un-mad, though. Michigan's defense failed at the beginning and at the end for like the sixth time this year, which goes beyond coincidence. It was blindingly frustrating to see corners lined up eight, ten, even fifteen yards off the line of scrimmage. Danielson kept remarking about how Ohio State hadn't gone deep all day, and the reason was that Michigan's presnap alignment on every play was cowering in fear of the deep ball. Pat Massey's total failure to exist--obvious to everyone from mouthbreathing Internet trolls to handsome, combative bloggers to opposing coaches--never troubled them all year. What plays they got were more the result of Michigan's talent defying design than Herrmann dialing up a clever playcall (with some exceptions). A holistic view of the season does not yield the impression that Michigan is well coached.

What is the deal with the opening drive touchdowns?

We're amazingly predictable on those opening drives. We come out, zone up, and don't blitz. We respond to multiple WR looks with safeties or linebackers over slot receivers. We rotate our backup defensive linemen in. We prevent the big play. The result is that it's easy for teams to put in a special set of plays that get us off balance, exploit our tendencies, and march down the field. In short, the Michigan defense is reactive, not proactive, and until we have something to react to we allow things ("touchdowns") to happen to us.

At least... that's my best guess.

And then what's the deal with the late game failures?

More of the same predictability. It should be noted that even on the one blitz Michigan sent they were still in a zone, and then on the weird fake blitz they were in a zone behind that, too. There was an umbrella of three players attempting to prevent the deep ball on all plays--blitzing is not aggressive when backed up by a three-deep zone, it's just an invitation to Please Exploit Your Hot Route. Michigan seems convinced that with a narrow lead that asking the opponent to do a long series of relatively easy things is better than forcing them to do a shorter series of harder things. This, as you've heard before, is dumb.

Why does Michigan treat man coverage like it's the plague?

I don't know. Are there other teams that play like this, running zone on what must be about 90% of defensive snaps? Why would you do this? It seems completely insane to give up on half of the coverages in football, especially when you have defensive backs who can run. Having the quarterback misread your defense is a sure way to turnovers, incompletions, and punts, but how many times did you see Troy Smith throw into coverage? How many times did you see Drew Tate throw into coverage? If the men who are not rushing the passer do not cover anyone, can they even be said to be "coverage"?

Look, I am not a football expert, but dammit I've played all sorts of games my entire life, and revealing your intentions to your opponents is always the worst thing you can do. Sun-Tzu:

"All warfare is based on deception. Hence, when we are able to attack, we must seem unable; when using our forces, we must appear inactive; when we are near, we must make the enemy believe we are far away; when far away, we must make him believe we are near."

To say that this train of thought does not seem to be foremost in Lloyd Carr's mind is to be charitable.

Okay, you'd like to rochambeau the coaches. What about the players?

Chart:

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That seems too kind to the defensive line since they didn't sack Smith more than once and didn't get much pressure, but recall that +7 of that comes from the two turnovers that kept Michigan in the game. The linebackers (aside from Crable, who is less a linebacker and more a randomly-placed pass rusher) did little; there were no plays made in coverage by anyone aside from Mason, who forced one incompletion by jumping a route. All in all, most players were put in a position to watch Ohio State do something and then minimize it; this they did.

Say something nice about the coaches.

Crable's deployment is an example of outside-the-box thinking that got a strange player on the field and playing effectively. Early in the season he was looking like a total bust; now he has a role on the defense and a future to be at least somewhat excited about. Ron English's work in the secondary was exemplary this year and Steve Stripling maximized the output of Alan Branch; he was prepared to play both DT and DE.

What does it mean for next year?

I don't know. Watson is the only player who we'll miss, but if Michigan doesn't take advantage of an experienced secondary with two fast corners by playing a more aggressive brand of defense it won't matter. Other than the outside linebackers, everyone on the team executed what they were supposed to do.

The caveat: their tasks were designed to minimize their shortcomings instead of take advantage of their talents. It's obvious that the Michigan coaches did not trust their team to play both aggressively and responsibly, so they went with the responsible, cut off the big plays, and superficially improved the defense by slowing the game down. The truth is somewhat murkier (and something I hope to explore in the offseason).

The good news is that Michigan does seem to swing towards more aggressive play when they have veterans at their disposal, something which will be true of both the offense and defense next year.