Michigan @ Wisconsin, Saturday, 9/21/19, Noon(EDT), Fox Sports

[Hannibal]

I don't use Twitter at all, so I don't know anything about his behavior there. I'm not surprised to hear that it is not pretty though. He doesn't strike me as a model human being.

I do watch his reports on youtube and since I began watching him, his track record on reporting info has very good. Every time that I have seen him get into some sort of pissing match with mgoblog or Sam Webb, he has been right. At least recently. This year alone he has totally clowned Webb on Oliver Martin and Andrew Steuber. I don't forget about guys being wrong. I don't put a lot of stock into the athletic department having disowned him. He has never claimed to be officially affiliated with the university. He just says that he has sources and he clearly does.

[WM Wolverine]

Webb can't report info the University wouldn't want him too, not without losing inside access. Yoder loves to take credit for info from rivals, 247 and passes it off as his sources.

[hack]

My understanding of it is same as WM. Webb preserves access by witholding when necessary and by refraining from speculation. Yoder takes other people's spec, passes it off as his own, and is right often enough to have some unearned credibility. IMO both are part of a balanced media diet, along with guys like Brian, Lorenz, etc.

[froot loops]

If Charbonnet had previous knee problems in high school, it seems like running him like Chris Perry against Army wasn't the greatest strategy.

[Hannibal]

Yoder has had a few big scoops this year where he had legit sources.

[hack]

The anatomy of the Oliver Martin transfer was a good take on how Yoder works and why you take him with a grain of salt. He's willing to educated-guess his way into things.

[hack]

If Charbonnet had previous knee problems in high school, it seems like running him like Chris Perry against Army wasn't the greatest strategy.

Yup. If you're just going to run a back into a stacked line, put Mason back on offense.

[Hannibal]

With both Oliver Martin and Andrew Steuber, he broke the story first, declared it to be 100% fact and then stood his ground hard on both stories after mgo/Sam Webb pushed back and said that they were fake news. I'm fairly sure those weren't educated guesses.

[hack]

I forget where it was but there was an anatomy of a "Yoder scoop" piece done specifically about Martin. Basically, he guessed his way into it. if you follow them long enough you see he's wrong most of the time. But, again, one part of a balanced Michigan-media diet.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Back to football .... and not a diss of the convo about Yoder v. others. Good takes there.

Anyway, this guy, https://mgoblog.com/diaries/film-ana...ffensive-reads is so good at what he does that I had to watch his analysis of the Army game becasue I think it is germane to Wisconsin.

I now understand exactly what defensive player the QB looks at for his reads and know exactly what the correct read is and why. I also see that there appears to be a difference between what goes down on an RPO and a ZR. That may seem like a duh! but it's not. That's because of how the Gattis offense - and all the ZR/RPO offenses - try to disguise whether or not an RPO option for the QB is on. You'll need to watch the full video analysis to get what I mean.

While I will let my emotions take over in the immediate aftermath of the game and post stuff that would be better held in abeyance, I more often tend to wait for Brian's UFRs - that come on Wednesday - Friday. I'm not convinced he's a great communicator. His grades are useful but I find it hard to follow the write ups he does for each play, even with the videos. You can't always see jersey numbers so it's hard to figure out which guys he's talking about when he describes the play.

I think Brian knows as much as this guy knows about play design and who should be doing what. But what this guy does with the way he winds the video and uses markers on the screen to let you see what is supposed to go down v. what actually does go down is much more effective than what Brian does within his UFRs. I like Brian's conclusions section. This guy leaves it up to you.

Here are some things I have concluded from watching both part 1 and part 2 of this guy's work:

• Immediate post game hot takes and some of them within the first 2d were wildly inaccurate after the Army game.
• Harbaugh DID NOT completely turtle and yank the play cards from Gattis. I do think he limited the RPO option by direction but Gattis was still calling the plays. In this way M stuck to ZR starting in the 3rd quarter, like 90/10. He was about 60/40 ZR/RPO in OT and in the 1st half. You can still feel a run game emphasis though that Harbaugh seems to like best.
• The ZR offense is unmistakable and a big departure from 2018 IZ/OZ power that M's offense featured.
• The chaos we assigned as a characteristic of M's offense v. Army had more to do with inconsistent execution of blocking assignments than errors in play calling/bad play design.
• There was some of that. Most notably the two times that M ran some kind of zone stretch play in the first half that made no sense. Another was a an Arc-Zone-Read play that failed on it's first 3rd and 2 attempt and that Army was completely ready for when the exact same play was called again and predictably stuffed on the second 4th and 2. If that was Gattis, it was a bad play call. If Harbaugh phoned it in, over-riding the play call that came down from Gattis, equally bad.
• The last obvious issue was failing to give Patterson the green light to hit open receivers in the flat when it was there. The video in this guy's analysis of the 2nd half diagrams some plays where it clear, despite how the Army defense played it, that a receiver was open with CBs backed off. Glaringly obvious on that 4th and 2 above. Clearly, Patterson got the play-call and it was IZR run all the way. He never checked to his right, where, if he had done so, an easy pitch and catch was available to to Black who was running an inside route to the flat to Collin's out route clearing the CB. It would have been a TD, game over.
• Because M was much bigger and more talented up front, M very well might have been better off running pure power from under center with a bit of PA out of the gun (or US) mixed in v. Army rather than ZR with minimal RPOs. That approach DOES NOT apply to Wisconsin. M is much better off going with improved execution of the ZR/RPO offense.
• OL, TE and WR blocking mistakes were a bigger player in the chaotic offense than anything Shea Patterson did incorrectly with his reads or bad throws. He got and has gotten a bad rap. He wasn't great - he may or may not be elite - but he also wasn't terrible. I believe that after watching this guy's analysis of the 2nd half, that he didn't keep because when the play went down that option wasn't on the table. He did make some mistakes on the reads but out of the plays that were analysed by this guy, Patterson made far more correct reads than bad ones. The bad ones were just obvious. Pretty sure the injury he's dealing with affected his throws; some were brilliant, some were terrible.

I could be entirely wrong about this but I think that if M can cut down on these execution errors - on the OL, by WRs/TEs - and by Patterson - there is nothing wrong with M's offense design or quite frankly how the Army game was called. Wisconsin could get tripped up more by M's offense than they seemingly have v. thier first two opponents. They are going to come into this game cocky behind two shut-outs. It won't be easy though. M has to play nearly mistake free football - no turnovers, no blocking dorfs that screw up the potential for demoralizing chunk run plays and crisp passing out of more RPOs. Go to the flats with the passing game, get good with screens, challenge the shuffling and/or delaying conflict player on the ZR keeper.

Win.

[lineygoblue]

I'm not sure how Michigan wins without a credible running threat like Charbonnet. If he's out, its Wisc by 14-17 points.

With Charbonnet out, Wisc can completely focus on pressuring Patterson and clamping down on the passing game. There's nothing left as a Plan B.

Michigan spreads joy in Madison on Saturday. Book it.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Per the web, here;s the latest on injuries:

Patterson say's in an interview on Tuesday, "I'm 100%." He's probably not. It takes a while for an oblique injury that affects trunk rotation to the extent it looked like it did to heal. 2 weeks ain't it. Patterson admitted, he was thinking about it v. Army. "A mental thing," (affecting him) he said. Does that go away? Watch the game.

DPJ questionable. Isn't likely to play. Seems like it's one of those lingering high ankle sprains.

Charbonett, questionable. Ask me sometime around 12:15pm tomorrow, earlier if M looses the toss. Too much speculation with nothing solid.

Dwumfor is weird. He has been off and on ready to go for both of M's 2 games, did not play v. MTSU, came in for one play v. Army. Dead silence on this one. Questionable. Suposedly a bad arm and not the foot thing he's been dealing with in the past.

Wilson. The word is he is fine but did not practice per Harbaugh on his Radio show Tuesday. Could be precautionary like Charbonett. Turner, who will play, seems to have moved Wilson from #2 to #3 - assuming Charbonett plays. If not, he'll see some snaps.

Runyan. Per Warinner, good to go at LT. Warinner also said there is nothing stopping Hayes from playing some at RT.

Jeter will play**. Without Dwumfor and his beef v. Wisconsin playing a NT role, M will probably run a three man front with this thing Brown (among other DCs) has been doing by walking a 4th guy up from a LB spot making a 4-2-5 look. Ss, sitting about 8-10 yards deep, key the FB and pick the gap he leads to. It's a solid formation against the run, especially the way Wisconsin executes run plays, even though it appears it leaves too many gaps uncovered.

This is worth looking at and I can't copy and insert the protected photo of it. If interested: https://matchquarters.com/tag/don-brown/

** That Jeter is playing is important for the DL. It lets Brown put Hutchinson and probably Uche who has looked to bounce past Mike Dana on the depth chart at the DE spot. The DTs will be Jeter and Kemp with Mazi Smith and Chris Hinton rotating in to spell either one of them.

Nothing further to report.

[lineygoblue]

When anyone is "questionable" with Harbaugh, that means they're out. No DPJ, no Charbonnet.

[Niffla]

Does anyone really believe UM is going to go into Madison and win tomorrow? Serious question. Somebody inject some confidence into me.

And what does it mean if Michigan gets blasted out tomorrow? Or does it even matter whether it's an ass kicking or a semi-close loss?

But seems to me if UM gets dominated tomorrow that the seat is going to get extremely hot for Harbaugh. And I don't mean necessarily that it's going to be hot in terms of him being in danger of losing his job...I just mean from the fan base. Am I crazy or is it gonna get ugly? Also the national media, too.

[Hannibal]

It'll get ugly.