Why as a program do we refuse to embrace the passing game?

Here we are again... People who should know more but for some reason don't. 

1. You can't have a strong passing game if you have poor lineman play.

Coach brought in Warinner, Mclwein, and Shea. We have improved with the lineman play but yesterday didn't have JBB playing. A rushed QB can't pass how he would like to.

It's as simple as that.

Harbaugh is a Bo disciple and I have to believe that a power run game is the way things were done back in the day.  It would seem like a relatively easy thing to complete short passes but with this team every pass seems like work in spite of a very good QB.

There is a reason why many college offenses have switched to a pass-heavy offense and why the NFL is going in the same direction.

Peters has a good arm & looked damn good on his single pass yesterday. 

I have been saying it for years, the best model for an offense is the NFL style Passing Spread which New England operates.  They manage to get a run game out of it as well.  Lots of crossing routes, TE and slot WR use, and they go deep shots as well.

Yesterday was very frustrating.  Nearly all pass plays seemed to be 2 or 3 man routes...all verticals!

Watching OSU carve us up with crossing routes and then seeing Pep unable to have any in his game was indefensible.

Harbaugh had better WAKE THE FUCK UP.  This is 2018.

The more times I log back on, the more I wish HUEL would have picked today to shut the site down and do some more fixing of the bugs.  

Dude, we did embrace it.  Did you not see the McMurray package yesterday?  No reason to target Black, DPJ and Collins when you have JM against OSU.

We were quarterback U back in the 1990's and early 2000's.  I remember it well.  Grbac, Navarre, Henson, Brady.  All those guys could sling it.  We had 300+ yard passing games pretty much on the regular.  We had 1000+ yard receivers.  Moeller and Carr were not afraid to throw the ball but we've always been a team that preferred running the ball first, especially when it's working.  And when it wasn't working those coaches would throw more.  But the thing that we had were GREAT offensive lines, some of the best Michigan has ever had.  JH seems more intent on running the ball with lesser OL's than Moeller and Carr had.  It's a little stubborn and frustrating.

I’m a decent high school OC in the state, I’m only saying this because I don’t want to come off as a “know it all” “or a guy with all the answers” IMHO Michigan runs way too many basic “90s” football 9 route tree routes. Even man ball Bama has implemented new routes into their system which started with Kiffin. OSU blitzed Michigan leaving their DBs on an island, the difference is they knew every route that was coming. Harbaugh or Pep i don’t know who’s giving the okay but Michigan needs to add some more rub routes, 1 and ups, 3 and ups, whips, double moves, even some spread combo routes like cross, pivots, raider, smash like fuck use some damn imagination. 

Lloyd Carr and DeBoard did the same thing back in 98-2000.  They had Brady and then Henson for 9 games in the year that he started.  The running game was crappy back then, even with A-Train and 5 OL who went to the NFL, one who will be a Hall of Famer.  They did not get push and their run schemes on the 98-00 teams were garbage.

However Michigan had excellent WRs and TEs and they would get down in games, and then be forced to open it up and go 4Ws to pass the ball.  Brady would inevitably march the team down the field.

We knew back then, 20 years ago almost...that you needed to open up the offense and pass it.

For some reason, the program and coaches are stuck in this Bo Mindset.  Well that worked in 1973 because Michigan could overwhelm other B1G teams with strength and talent.  Run, run run, etc. worked back then.  It doesn't work today.

I think Harbaugh just wants to control the clock and shorten the games. Even though we have a strong D, he still wants to limit their snaps , give them less chances to blow an assignment and give up a long TD. I don't necessarily agree with that, but you can see yesterday, even our great D can get Fd up. 

My theory is that, when Harbaugh arrived, we passed (and did so creatively) out of necessity despite that not being the long term plan, and eventually the coaches picked to favor the long term plan. 

Of course, we all prefer the old plan. Because it seemed more well suited to punching above one's weight class. And that (not in the Heavyweight class) is our program's current status. 

Cause Bo! Duh. It worked in the 70's with no scholarship limits against teams who would lose to mac schools in today's game, so why wouldn't it work now? We just need time! We're on the right path! Just a few 400 pound 6* lineman with 4.4 speed and a 260 pound RB with 4.0 speed and it'll work. Just be patient you entitled brats. In Harbaugh we trust.

I like to believe also that Harbaugh tries to adapt the O to the strengths of that years team. Going into the season he looks at at strengths and weaknesses.

This year we had a senior workhorse RB, we had a 5 guard OL who were much better at run blocking than pass pro. We had a new QB. Thatbnew QB is a pretty good runner too. We didn't have any proven WRs and not much WR depth after all the transfers.

So you look at all that and you think, ok we need to be a run first team this year.

Looking at next year and it should be the opposite. Lose the senior workhorse RB, have 3 established junior WRs, a better pass pro line, either a 2nd year Shea or 3rd year McCaffrey at QB. If Harbaugh doesn't become a pass first team with that? We are hopeless for any change or adaptation going forward .