Honest and mostly Objective assessment of this Team

If UM backs the truck up to get a top notch OC to change the offense, then why have JH?  You would have two coaches on the offensive side of the ball with opposite intentions.  How does that end well?

I have never understood that take. It is JHs offense.  If it cant win then UM needs to move on from JH.  I don't know if I am at that point yet.  Trying not to be emotional. 

The bottom line is you build a team that can beat OSU...that alone will win you at least 10 games in a season with occasional hiccups.

Safety play was not the problem today. I would agree on a more multiple approach to defensive scheming. Thought to a large extent, this game was won inside the LOS not downfield. Michigan was outplayed on both sides of the ball at the LOS. They won first down on defense, put our offense into uncomfortable long situations and we never challenged Haskins in the pocket. That was the game in a nutshell. The rest was just better execution of plays that were called and made.

I don't know that 39 points in this game means your offense is ineffective or your play-calling isn't good enough. Michigan has now twice scored that many points against Ohio State in mammoth win years with so much more on the line, and lost both times. And it was because we couldn't stop their quarterback from making plays. Momentum in these games just takes over after awhile.

Gentry didn't catch balls that were catchable. And Patterson didn't make great throws other than to Nico Collins who along with DPJ were outstanding.

The defense got torched because it couldn't put any pressure on the quarterback and they did. That was the game. The final score was just a result of emotion, adrenaline, and putting it to your rival because you had no answer on defense.

Emotion beat logic.

I’m sure this isn’t a popular opinion, but I think every single player who has the eligibility to come back should. This includes Patterson, who although talented, is in no way ready to play in the pros. He is fun to watch and a college talent, but his accuracy today was awful and this isn’t something that has been a strong suit consistently this season. 

Harbaugh frustrates me. I’m not advocating firing him, but he can’t seem to get a rhythm offensively. I believe he was calling many of the plays today and there was some real head scratchers early on. 

Im not sure any defense could stop Ohio State today. They don’t play this well against Maryland or Purdue because they are largely unmotivated for those games. Michigan they pay attention to. We are their little brother and we did a lot of talking this season. Sometimes you eat crow. Today we did. Don Brown is a mastermind, but he was way off today. My guess is this game haunts him for a year and he develops something more coherent for next season. 

My rambles, neg away. We are all in bad moods and should be. 

The yards after catch is not on our receivers.  In stark contrast to Haskins, Shea simply did not place the ball well today.  I realize he was on the run much of the time, but his ball placement crippled YAC, even when the ball was actually catchable.

Cool. Nothing will save us. We're cursed and doomed forever. This whole school is a pile of shit. It sucks and always will. 

This is a really good post

Harbaughfense as it exists now is dead.  Michigan is an 8-10 win team yearly and won't beat Ohio State unless they fall off a cliff.  Break-but-don't-bend aggressive Don Brown blitzing was dealt a serious blow.  Any opponent that's good won't simply be worn down by our defense.  Not enough push from the interior D-line as teams learn to double up our great DEs.  Linebackers in this defense can't really handle a team that runs meshes and crossing routes at a very high level.

Harbaugh won't win the B1G without modernizing the offense and his seat will start to get warm after next season when the same problems reoccur.

We have 2 pro-level cornerbacks.

But we don't have 3.

OSU was aware of that.

Also, our pass rush vanished the last 2 weeks.

If we can't get pressure, we're going to lose to elite teams.

The end.

Since Kliff Kingsbury is fired, he would be an awesome hire for Michigan. Air Raid offense that pretty much will air it out and is creative to get playmakers in space. However, that goes against Harbaugh's power running scheme philosophy which would conflict with the Air Raid offense.

We need an offensive coordinator, and Jim needs to go out a find the best available OC this offseason.  I think its time to part ways with Pep Hamilton. 

I think they did some good things this year in adjusting to Shea.  Warriner did a great job and needs to stick around.  I think some minor tweaks are really all that's needed instead of a gross overhaul of concept.

I LOVE Don Brown but he needs to adjust to what the team does before the game starts not after giving up 21 points. 

Brown is the man.  I agree he gave up a lot in the first half in games compared to the second and Haskins said something about liking to play against our scheme, which I'm not knowledgable enough about to know what he means.  But, I don't think Brown is the problem.  The numbers speak for themselves.  He came back great against PSU this year, hopefully he will do the same next year with OSU.

We also need more explosiveness in our receivers after the catch.  The receivers are rarely are wide open or breaking tackles after the catch.  

Agreed, I'm not sure why this happens or doesn't.  Is it scheme, experience, etc.?  It would be nice to be able to do more crossing routes with our smaller quicker guys like Bell, Martin, Perry, etc. and stick with the deeper routes to Black, Collins, and DPJ.  Collins got too many short balls where he needs to get upfield quickly.  That is not his skill set.

 

We need better play at the Safety position. 

Agreed, Dax Hill is the #1 safety coming in next year.

Don't forget that Solomon has been out almost all year.  Gary has played injured most of the year.  And, who knows how healthy Winovich was this game.  Hypothetically if only Gary, Bush, & Long leave for the NFL that means we have Paye, Hutchinson, and possibly Villain if he gets healthy at DE.  Kemp, Solomon, and Dwumfor are back at DT.  Hudson, Ross, and Gill/Uche are back at LB.  Thomas replaces Long and Dax Hill or Hawkins replaces Kinnel.  I think the defense will be pretty good.  But, we do need to develop a playmaker to replace Winovich & Bush.

Strange.  I swear we had numerous snowflake threads for these hot takes.  Love how some people think their opinion is worthy of a new post.

Honestly, Shea is a good college QB, however he is not a great one.  He is accurate, but lacks big time arm strength.  He is also slim of build and goes down easily once in the grasp of a DL.  He bails from the pocket too quickly sometimes.  While a magician with the ball, the offense is not built on zone reads.

Its time to give Milton, Peters and McCaffrey, once he returns, a good look at the position.  If Shea comes back, there needs to be a competition.

If they are going to play this style of O (hopefully they will modify it), they will need better pass protection, quicker slot guys who can run crossing routes and more diverse passing trees.  Similar to what we saw today, and what the NE Patriots run.

A Passing Spread.

JH has built Michigan back to being the 2nd best program in the Big Ten. 

But OSU is still ahead.

Today looked bad, but...OSU got smoked by Purdue this year, Iowa last year, and suffered a shut out total domination by Clemson the year before. 

So today's result does NOT mean JH cannot get Harbaugh over the hump. 

But to rise above 2nd best in the Big Ten, JH has to look at his program, figure out why both the offense and defense substantially under performed, and make changes.  

And the absolutely must include hiring an OC that brings some fresh concepts.  And Brown is going to have to develop the ability to play zone competently against OSU and similar offenses.

No.

No. Again.

If I had to pay for your two cents I would want some change. 

I think Shea is probably gone.  He'll have a bounce back bowl game that we will be competitive in and probably win and then he'll head to the draft.  And I am OK with that.  I think we'll be better with recruited guys like DCaff and Milton going forward.  The defense is recruiting some studs (Hinton, Dax, et al) and we'll have an influx of young talent.  Don Brown needs to adapt to combat high functioning air raid offenses.  And we need an OC that can modernize the offense.  Seems like Pep is not that guy.

The offense should have abandoned the run sooner when it became clear this was a shootout, but the offense has been fine for most of the year.  They are a bit conservative yes, but if you told me before the game Michigan would have scored 32 points during the "competitive" parts of this game I'd have been happy.  

But in a game where the defense still couldn't figure out how to slow down the best version of the OSU offense we've seen this year, you need to try new things offensively and they just couldn't.  They also didn't get helped but a couple of untimely drops.

But I can't help but feel like this was OSU's absolute best shot against a defense that just couldn't catch a break.  UM's defense has some weaknesses but OSU has really not looked this efficient all year.  This was the same team that struggled to score against PSU and MSU, two teams with demonstrably worse defenses. 

Maybe it was playing at home, or because of last week's close game, or just the vagaries of fate, but this game felt like PSU from last year, where Michigan didn't play terribly in the first half but you could tell OSU just had their number, and there wasn't really a chance for Michigan to keep pace without a dramatic shift in playcalling and luck.  I do think there needs to be a change at OC, but I don't think importing a Kliff Kingsbury type fixes the offense to a degree that really matters.

Is Jim Harbaugh our John Cooper?

Today's results make me feel like what it was like to be living in Red Sox Nation from 1919 through 2003, as someone who suffered in frustration for more than half of those years, waiting for a national championship.  Just hoping that it won't take until 2086 for Michigan football to enjoy another decade of dominance over Ohio State.

The Revenge Tour seemed nice before this afternoon, but now might be a good time for Jim Harbaugh to take some lessons from John Beilein and (a) hire a new offensive coordinator to bring Michigan's offensive schemes and play calling into the 21st century and (b) immediately adopt a new slogan that'll start with whatever bowl game Michigan plays in: Quemar los Barcos!