Chengalis Article Answers all the Qs on D
She must be reading the boards b/c she asked all the right Qs
or maybe the coaches are reeading it and asked her to let everyone know
rich rod on will campbell
"I think he's a better player than he was a year ago," Rodriguez said. "He'll continue to get better because I think the game is important to him.
From The Detroit News: http://detnews.com/article/20101014/OPINION03/10140335#ixzz12KyFWV51
Rodriguez said he expects to see Kenny Demens, J.B. Fitzgerald and Mark Moundros in the mix a bit more against the Hawkeyes.
From The Detroit News: http://detnews.com/article/20101014/OPINION03/10140335#ixzz12KyNKN2M
October 14th, 2010 at 8:56 AM ^
kind of buried the lede in my post
the Kenny Demens thing should be first, but I am a Big WIlie Style fan
October 14th, 2010 at 9:22 AM ^
I would like to see Big Will get in the mix more against Iowa too, along with Demens and J.B.
October 14th, 2010 at 9:28 AM ^
I hope so since Iowa seems to be more of a running type of team than passing. It would be nice to see Big Will get in there and give Hulk a break or two throughout the game and come in on some more packages.
October 14th, 2010 at 9:37 AM ^
As long as he doesn't look like he did against Iowa last year.
October 14th, 2010 at 9:44 AM ^
I would definitely like to see what Demens can do at MLB. I think he and JB have better instincts than Ezeh at LB.
October 14th, 2010 at 10:30 AM ^
I'm not trying to be argumentative when asking the following. I truly want your answer.....
What evidence do you have that Demens has better instincts?
.....and for the rest of the board who is clamoring for Big Will.....why? My guess is he's not playing for a reason. The knock against him out of high school was that he may lack in the motivation department. Perhaps that's still a valid concern. Will's a big dude. Maybe he's not playing quick enough and his pad level it too high.
I'm of the opinion that if you haven't found a spot/playing time on THIS defense, then you got some holes in your game.
October 14th, 2010 at 10:43 AM ^
I would say that Demens' TFLs in goaline situations show superior instincts to Ezeh. There was one play in particular during the UMASS game where Demens took the ballcarrier down in the backfield a second or two before Ezeh hit the gap.
October 14th, 2010 at 9:28 AM ^
He looks great when he has a specific assignment, like "charge straight ahead and knock guys down", but I'd like to see him react better and find the ball carrier on occasion. I'm praying that this guy's immense talent gets harnessed at some point in time.
October 14th, 2010 at 9:40 AM ^
He's still only a sophomore. I'm sure next year and the year after everyone will talk about how awesome he is.
October 14th, 2010 at 9:50 AM ^
I disagree a bit with the idea of asking Big Will to do anything other than charge straight ahead and knock people down... penetration by our NT is absolutely critiical, and there is almost no play the offense runs (except maybe a counter delay) that allows for penetration by a NT/ A-Gap DT. The whole idea of a NT is to penetrate to absorb a double team, so that DL take up the 5 OL.. leaves a good chance for LB on RB or LB on FB with SLB on RB..
I'm more worried about Big Will getting pushed backward 1v1 circa 2009
October 14th, 2010 at 10:11 AM ^
There's a gem quote at the end of the article on Denard.
When asked if he was doing anything to simulate Denard in practice this week, Ferentz cracked,
"No, not really. I mean, we're fooling around, but if we had somebody like that, we'd probably be running that same offense I guess."
What a great affirmation of Denard and his skill set!
October 14th, 2010 at 10:26 AM ^
Maybe we can go to a 4 man front to stop the run, because whatever D they played against state didn't work out so well with a few of those huge run plays.
October 14th, 2010 at 10:45 AM ^
Obi missed his gaps. As we all know, the issues on D are personnel -- not scheme
October 14th, 2010 at 10:46 AM ^
the D against MSU's running game was fairly good. Taking away the big runs, 2 of them I believe, State would have only gained a little over 150yds on the ground and a little over 3 yds a rush. The long runs were due more to missed assignments than the scheme in general.
I guarantee you that those runs are looked at hard to see where the breakdown was, and our players should learn from them and hopefully not make the same mistakes again.
October 14th, 2010 at 11:44 PM ^
I move that we take away both of those runs and the touchdown's associated with them. Second?
October 14th, 2010 at 11:00 AM ^
I can't wait for the UFR for Defense. I seem to recall us being in mostly 4-man fronts for 1st and 2nd downs. If you saw the picture pages on the front page the other day, you would have seen that UM was in a 4-man front for the 60 yard touchdown. At this point, scheme isn't making much of a difference. We are not executing at a high enough level in whatever scheme we're running to stop any offfense with any consistency at this point. I don't think it makes that much difference one way or another.
October 14th, 2010 at 10:44 AM ^
when it comes to the day to day covering of Michigan athletics. I like Wojo's columns but she seems to play it straight, with no bias and knows what she's talking about.
October 14th, 2010 at 3:30 PM ^
There's nothing about Will Campbell playing at all, just that he is getting better. If there was talk about him playing this weekend I would be worried Mike Martin's injury was more serious.
Starting nose tackle Mike Martin (ankle sprain) practiced Tuesday and moved around well, Rodriguez said, and should be fine.
October 14th, 2010 at 10:42 PM ^
We need to leave it to the coaches. They see these guys 100 times as much as we do, and break them down on film for hours upon hours.
Fans just want results.
Next.