The Game: M 42 - "The" Ohio State 27 - Not Anymore. Post Game Thread.

[Mike]

He’s part of the 90 percenters.

[iam416]

Heh.

The thing is, as I've said, if you look at HARBAUGH!!!!!'s recruiting, this is pretty much what his roster will look like. He may beat Ohio State this year -- and I happen to think it's an annoying and irritating likelihood. But, for the foreseeable future he's always going to go into this game with a meaningful talent gap. And, as I mentioned, wait until he plays in the CFP against an elite southern school.

[Hannibal]

He has a huge talent gap this year. Larger than '15 through '19.

[Obi-Jon]

For me, it's more important to beat osu than it is to make the CFP. I'd make that trade every year, every time. For UM, that seems to be equally difficult.

[iam416]

He has a huge talent gap this year. Larger than '15 through '19.

Nah. He has enough elite players to get by and he actually has a credible QB.

I will say that I think people forget that the 2019 team was pretty good. The difference between 2021 and 2019 is that Wisconsin and Penn State were actually pretty good in 2019. And, well, Don Brown. But, mostly that the road trips to Madison and HV were tough. But even in 2019, after getting blasted by Wisconsin, M was really good -- only lost to PSU in a game they could have easily got to OT and blasted the rest of their schedule.

Last year was going to be a terrible year. COVID spared you the bulk of that misery.

But, as to 2019, that was, IMO, Ohio State's best team of the past decade both in terms of overall performance and talent. I think the gap in 2019 was pretty big AND M was actually a very good team.

[Hannibal]

Our only elite players are All, Hutch, and maybe Hill. Corum possibly, but he has been hurt lately. Haskins is extremely reliable but doesn't even average 5 ypc. The '18 team had gads of talent on both sides of the ball, especially defense. It's mind blowing that they were as bad as they were the last two games.

[iam416]

And the 2016 team is still HARBAUGH!!!!'s best and most talented (IMO). That team was good everywhere except, heh, QB -- where they were mediocre at best. Neither one of the teams in 2016 game had the offense to win in the CFP, but they both were elite on defense and good enough on offense to beat almost anyone.

[iam416]

Our only elite players are All, Hutch, and maybe Hill. Corum possibly, but he has been hurt lately. Haskins is extremely reliable but doesn't even average 5 ypc. The '18 team had gads of talent on both sides of the ball, especially defense. It's mind blowing that they were as bad as they were the last two games.

Yeah, you know -- I actually don't know, for sure, what M is. I've said it before, but I'm still not entirely sure what M is on defense because they really haven't played an offense that can throw the ball consistently. Again, Sparty and UNL. Meh.

They played Wisconsin at exactly the right time -- they were absolutely dreadful on offense. I mean dreadful. They've sort of figured things out so M will have a harder time with them in Indy than in Madison, but they'll still win.

Penn State is really bad on offense, too. I don't know how you end up with an OL that is that awful, but there it is. They have zero running game and god-awful pass protection.

So, I think, e.g., that Dax Hill is probably elite, but I'd like to see him on the field against elite. I think Ojabo is probably elite, but I dunno -- I'm not getting there based on Penn State.

I think the thing this year's team has is that Cade is really, really good in the ball-control passing game. I mean, he's really good. If you go back and watch, e.g., some of the throws he made against Sparty, they're really impressive -- especially a couple huge 3rd down conversions. That wasn't Sparty being Sparty -- that was M beating good coverage. The obvious issue is they don't try to stretch the field vertically. But, as it relates to this game -- that's not going to matter. OSU is miserable against ball control passing. Miserable.

Anyway, I feel like I'm shooting a little blind. I feel like it's certainly possible Ohio State could go into AA, give Stroud time and tear apart a secondary loaded with guys who will never play in the NFL (Dax Hill excepted) and end up winning a game that looks like 2019. I also think that M's defense is sound enough to, as Buchanan has said, force slightly longer reads from Stroud and allow the pass rush to get home enough to force enough stall points to keep the score around 30. I'm leaning toward the latter.

Finally, I really don't know what OSU's power running game is going to look like against M. Against Penn State, M was rightfully focused solely on the pass and Penn State actually had somewhat of a running game -- modest, but modest is way more than they usually get. And Henderson is easily the 2nd best back M will face and, IMO, the most talented (his upside is higher, IMO, than KWIII).

[Hannibal]

McNamara is OK in short passing but he's a major liability in the running game, which has lots of option plays called and no keepers.

[klondike]

Michigan needs long sustained drives to keep OSU's offense of the field. But the way they commit penalties, I'm not sure they can do it much

[Jeff Buchanan]

McNamara is OK in short passing but he's a major liability in the running game, which has lots of option plays called and no keepers.

I agree with this assessment of McNamara but I'm not entirely sure that his shitty RO/RPO game is on him. Other observers have stated the same. Those doing the UFRs often have a hard time deciding to ding McNamara for a missed read wondering if, on that particular play, he's told you cannot keep the ball. There is some evidence that's what's happening as you can tell by looking at his head that he's focused on the correct read player, the read player shuffles outside and it's an obvious keeper inside but, nope, he hands it of. There's also evidence that he does make the reads and decides based on that what to do with the ball - most of those are RPOs not reads where he's going to hand off or keep.

The implication is that opponents know McNamara's not a threat to run so LBs and DEs are keying on the RB and as a result there are a lot of 2 and 3 yard gains that look like burned downs. Last week, and the week before, M introduced some new edge plays intended to punish teams that bring a S up and put him 3 yards deep. The consensus was that it wasn't a very good counter to power. The better counter is a well executed PA and that's where McNamara and receivers are way better at that than earlier in the season. An RPO would be better but, well .....

McCarthy is another matter. He will definitely keep it and is a threat to do that and the D has to account for. His live action reads though haven't been great ....... this just isn't a read option offense.

[klondike]

That's bothered me in that UM never runs true RO/RPO plays. Ever since Rich Rod left it was like taboo, since. Even when they had solid running threats in McCaffrey and Milton they would only have them run obvious QB runs around the end or other H.S. schemes on running the QB.

It's too bad because whatever you can say about RR as a head coach he was a genius at setting up RO plays.

It's time to get that back in the Playbook, just to keep defenses honest id nothing more..

[Cody_Russell]

And the 2016 team is still HARBAUGH!!!!'s best and most talented (IMO). That team was good everywhere except, heh, QB -- where they were mediocre at best. Neither one of the teams in 2016 game had the offense to win in the CFP, but they both were elite on defense and good enough on offense to beat almost anyone.

That 2016 M defense was clearly the best in the Harbaugh era. Exclude the bowl game because Peppers opted out of the game at the last moment and I think that messed with team moral to some extent. An elite college football defense.
2021 M defense is so spotty. We know the pass rush should be good with Hutch and Ojabo. It’s been too inconsistent everywhere else.

Think this 2021 M offense is better than 2016 … at least with the way they are playing now.
I wish Speight didn’t suffer an injury late in the 2016 season because maybe that was a key turning point.

[Tom W]

Speight's injury was probably THE key turning point. A miserable pick six and fumbling on the ohio 1 yard are far less likely to happen to a QB that isn't playing damaged. Take either one of those away and it doesn't matter how deep the refs were in Urban's pocket.

[Jeff Buchanan]

It's time to get that back in the Playbook, just to keep defenses honest id nothing more..

Generally, and as I understand offensive schemes, they aren't "plays" in the strictest sense of the term read option. You either have an option offense (that includes ROs & RPOs) or you don't.

M's offense isn't an option offense . I suppose you could call it a hybrid offense and I've seen it characterized like that. RR ran a true modern option offense. Frost runs a true modern option offense. Plays in those offenses might resemble power (e.g., belly play) but their schematically just part of the option set of plays in an option offense.

M is an NFL style pro offense that runs power and PA as their base run/pass offense. I think fans have this expectation that like some NFL teams (Eagles) that were early adopters of an option offense, M should be like that. They aren't.

Given the amount of practice time and the skill levels of CFB players, my understanding is there isn't enough time to get good at running this combo of offensive schemes. That it's my belief that Harbaugh has tried to incorporate modern football concepts (option ball) into his offensive style (pro-style power), it doesn't seem to turn out that well. Hence this appearance of disjointed play calling that lacks continuity and effective constraints to their base set of pro-style offensive plays.

It's worth noting in this discussion the term constraint is misused a lot by fans. Constraint plays are plays, usually audibled into, when an opponent's defense cheats diverging from their base offense. e.g., the S steps up with the D expected to be in Cover2, man leaving an obvious match-up advantage for a TE, slot or WR with an audible to a PA. I suspect McNamara has a green light to do this some but I also think he's limited and that Gattis will see the defense repeatedly cheating in a certain way in the booth and make a play call that is designed to punish that (a constraint). What an offense really needs to be efficient is the ability of the QB to take the defense by surprise with an audible. It's not easy to learn all that needs to be learned about reading defenses and knowing what plays will work with the players you have on the field for a QB to be good at that.