*** Official Michigan Football 2007 Thread ***

[Gregatron]

mt2r: who do you think will coach less bad in the Illinois-Michigan game: Carr or Zook?

[DVaut1]

[ QUOTE ]
Ok, Mike Hart gets injured for two quarters, two blocked field goals, two failed two-point converstions, etc., etc. I'm not saying Michigan kills them over and over and over again but do you really think Appy State wins anywhere close to the majority of the time? Come on, it took the game of their lives plus a ridiculous number of blunders by Michigan and the game was won by 2. It was such a pathetic showing precisely because the difference in the teams is so great.

[/ QUOTE ]

Here's the thing: I'm not saying App. State wins that game a majority of the time. But despite the fact Michigan had a bunch of blunders, so did App State.

Let's not forget that App State turned the ball over more than Michigan; let's not forget that App State's coach COMPLETELY mismanaged the clock at the end of the game (30 seconds left, Appalachian State has the ball on the 5 yard line, and it's first down. Michigan understandably calls timeout, and instead of doing the obvious thing -- taking a knee in the middle of the field, spiking the ball with less than 10 seconds left, THEN attemping the FG -- App. State's coach decides to give us another chance to win by kicking the FG with 30 seconds left). Let's not forget that a wide open App St WR, Brian Quick, dropped a perfectly thrown ball that hit him in the hands in stride in the end-zone that would have put App St. up 35-20 late in the 3rd quarter. Let's not forget Michigan had almost 250 rushing yards. Let's not forget that penalties were nearly indistinguishable (App St. 7 penalties for 45 yards, UM 7 penalties for 56 yards). Let's not forget that the referees, after review, overturned a VERY questionable Johnny Sears fumble call which both commentators working the game (Brennaman and Charles Davis) speculated the refs might have actually gotten wrong, even after the review.

The "Michigan made a bunch of terrible blunders, and App State played perfect" is an appealing narrative, but completely contradicted by the fact that Applachian State made almost as many, if not more, mistakes as we did, and really didn't have any bounces go their way. In fact, if anything, Michigan had a bunch of lucky breaks (refs overturning questionable call, almost benefited from App State awful clock management).

I'm not saying App State wins this game a majority of the time or close to it, but let's not pretend Michigan was the victim of awful variance, or App State played flawlessly. There weren't any tipped ball INTs, it wasn't a soaked field that slowed everyone down and caused Michigan to fumble away 3 snaps, the refs didn't make 15 terrible calls, and frankly, App State probably made 5 or 10 very avoidable mistakes.

Michigan did its Michigan thing: they ran their 3 offensive plays, never figured out how to cover more than 3 WRs at a time, and more or less ignored preparing themselves on special teams. And App State exploited us by doing obvious things like spreading 5 wide, double covering the TE on transparent bootlegs, and trying to block FGs.

It didn't require any special act of God, nor some divinely inspired play on behalf of our opponents. Pretty much App State's coach had access to a TV, a VHS player, and tapes of last year's games against Ohio St and USC. That's about all anyone needs to beat us. That's about all anyone's ever needed to beat us. We're just fortunate the rest of the Big Ten is as stubborn and backwards as we are, or else we'd surely have experienced many more games like last Saturday.

[JackWhite]

As all Michigan fans know, we are extremely predictable. Brian at mgoblog, broke down the game. Among his findings:

"Whenever Michigan shuffled the fullback they ran to that side. Without exception. And whenever Junior Hemingway was in the game, they ran. Without exception. If every Michigan fan can tell you certain things obviously tip Michigan's plays, what are the chances opposing coaches don't know this? Zero. Everyone knows what Michigan is going to do. This is something we've heard every time a bowl opponent is asked about us for the past half-decade and probably longer. It's an arrogant waste of expectation because you expect that you won't need to fool the other team. It's like playing poker without ever bluffing.

Given Appalachian State's blitz directly into Henne both times we tried a waggle and irresponsible seven-man blitzes that worked, it's safe to say that Michigan's predictability goes beyond the really blindingly obvious crap we've been observing for years and into the realm of deep exploitability."

[NozeCandy]

The thing is, I fully expect Appy State to make errors like those (minus the coaching mismanaging the clock thing, awful) against teams like Michigan. The players simply aren't objectively as good. For every open drop they had that game, they had huge plays that wouldn't likely happen again. I still think they hit the extreme upside of variance in their performance and would be lucky to replicate anything close to it.

[DVaut1]

[ QUOTE ]
Given Appalachian State's blitz directly into Henne both times we tried a waggle and irresponsible seven-man blitzes that worked, it's safe to say that Michigan's predictability goes beyond the really blindingly obvious crap we've been observing for years and into the realm of deep exploitability."

[/ QUOTE ]

Henne threw just about the worst pass in the history of the forward pass on that waggle --> INT in the 4th quarter, but lost in all the justified Henne bashing is the fact that the waggle hadn't worked all day because App State obviously knew it was coming, and YET we still tried running it about 3 more times after it was obvious that App State knew it was coming and could successfully defend it. It's sickening how predictable we are; and yet the coaching staff is oblivious/ambivalent to how exploitable we are.

[jgunnip]

My favorite was the delay of game penalty late in the 4th quarter with two timeouts remaining.

/season

[DVaut1]

[ QUOTE ]
For every open drop they had that game, they had huge plays that wouldn't likely happen again.

[/ QUOTE ]

Which plays were those? The "spread 5 wide and throw to a speedy WR on an inside slant" (the first App St TD -- the 68 yard pass to Dexter Jackson, along with App Sts second TD, to Batichon -- both two step cut inside slants), which has always worked against Michigan because we don't bother covering the middle of the field when teams spread 5 wide against us, or "Spread 5 wide and have our speedy QB run a draw play" (see Armanti Edwards all day), which has always worked against Michigan because we don't bother covering the middle of the field when teams spread 5 wide against us?

Sorry, I don't mean to be a sarcastic douche, but look at the post-game quotes. Pretty much every [censored] App St. player said the same thing: "boy, I'm sure glad Michigan didn't change anything with their defense; we watched some tape and noticed Michigan has a bunch of gaps when teams spread 5 wide against them, so we know when we spread a bunch of WR, Michigan can't stop it."

You're right: In some kind of rational world where our coaches make these magical things called "adjustments", those huge plays wouldn't happen again. But, of course, they happen all the time against us, because at Michigan, our coaches don't know what "changes" are. Bo laid out the path in 1969, and apparently the Michigan coaching staff believes football really hasn't changed much since.

Like I said, we're just lucky the Big 10 still generally disfavors speed, mobile QBs, and creativity, or else last Saturday would be a much more frequent occurrence.

[MacGuyV]

[ QUOTE ]
[ QUOTE ]
Ok, Mike Hart gets injured for two quarters, two blocked field goals, two failed two-point converstions, etc., etc. I'm not saying Michigan kills them over and over and over again but do you really think Appy State wins anywhere close to the majority of the time? Come on, it took the game of their lives plus a ridiculous number of blunders by Michigan and the game was won by 2. It was such a pathetic showing precisely because the difference in the teams is so great.

[/ QUOTE ]

Here's the thing: I'm not saying App. State wins that game a majority of the time. But despite the fact Michigan had a bunch of blunders, so did App State.

Let's not forget that App State turned the ball over more than Michigan; let's not forget that App State's coach COMPLETELY mismanaged the clock at the end of the game (30 seconds left, Appalachian State has the ball on the 5 yard line, and it's first down. Michigan understandably calls timeout, and instead of doing the obvious thing -- taking a knee in the middle of the field, spiking the ball with less than 10 seconds left, THEN attemping the FG -- App. State's coach decides to give us another chance to win by kicking the FG with 30 seconds left). Let's not forget that a wide open App St WR, Brian Quick, dropped a perfectly thrown ball that hit him in the hands in stride in the end-zone that would have put App St. up 35-20 late in the 3rd quarter. Let's not forget Michigan had almost 250 rushing yards. Let's not forget that penalties were nearly indistinguishable (App St. 7 penalties for 45 yards, UM 7 penalties for 56 yards). Let's not forget that the referees, after review, overturned a VERY questionable Johnny Sears fumble call which both commentators working the game (Brennaman and Charles Davis) speculated the refs might have actually gotten wrong, even after the review.

The "Michigan made a bunch of terrible blunders, and App State played perfect" is an appealing narrative, but completely contradicted by the fact that Applachian State made almost as many, if not more, mistakes as we did, and really didn't have any bounces go their way. In fact, if anything, Michigan had a bunch of lucky breaks (refs overturning questionable call, almost benefited from App State awful clock management).

I'm not saying App State wins this game a majority of the time or close to it, but let's not pretend Michigan was the victim of awful variance, or App State played flawlessly. There weren't any tipped ball INTs, it wasn't a soaked field that slowed everyone down and caused Michigan to fumble away 3 snaps, the refs didn't make 15 terrible calls, and frankly, App State probably made 5 or 10 very avoidable mistakes.

Michigan did its Michigan thing: they ran their 3 offensive plays, never figured out how to cover more than 3 WRs at a time, and more or less ignored preparing themselves on special teams. And App State exploited us by doing obvious things like spreading 5 wide, double covering the TE on transparent bootlegs, and trying to block FGs.


[/ QUOTE ]

Yah I was gonna say all this; thanx for saving me the time. Just b/c Mich. "would win the majority of the time" doesn't mean the game was full of ridiculous fluke "Murphy's Law" type stuff. The fact that App St. made as many mistakes as they did is part of what makes the outcome so astounding. It wasn't like Villanova shooting 85% against Georgetown.

[NozeCandy]

Yeah, I think with a team like Appy State that it would be reasonable to say that breaking slants like that for enormous touchdowns wouldn't happen again, for the most part. I know Michigan is vulnerable to them, but I just don't think App is good enough to consistently break those plays wide open if this game was played over and over again. If we're talking OSU of last year or USC, then I think this is a different story. Then again, the rest of this year could prove me wrong and Michigan could be that bad. Let's hope not.

[JackWhite]

[ QUOTE ]
My favorite was the delay of game penalty late in the 4th quarter with two timeouts remaining.

/season


[/ QUOTE ]

That was brutal. If memory serves, that was on a 3rd and 5 play when we were in likely 4 down territory, in a situation where a first down wins the game. I like and defend Henne more than a lot of UM fans, but that was inexcusable. DVaut mentioned that horribly INT he threw, made even worse because it occured on a first down if memory serves. I am willing to blame the coaches for almost everything, including the weather, but Henne made mistakes that a senior just cannot make.

The game on Saturday will be so interesting. Will we finally make some adjustments against a mobile QB and quick WR's? I saw that Dixon ran for over 140 yards against Houston. He must be counting the minutes to get a chance against our D.

A few interesting stats. The last time we lost 3 consecutive games was in 1979. In our current 3 games losing streak we have given up 108 point. The most in any 3 game stretch since 1959.