M-Borg vs. THE Flavortown U Thread, Orig. by Buckeye Paul, absconded w/by talent.

[iam416]

Sooner or later you people will believe me about Ohio State. The absolute inability of either to team to throw deep certainly favored nFw. But, OSU just isn’t that good on offense.

[THE_WIZARD_]

sandbaggus asshattus

[lineygoblue]

I'm not buying it either, Wiz.

I'll go on record now, and state that I believe this is the most cunning and well-conceived rope-a-dope in the history of college football.

CRD and his staff are laying a trap for the unsuspecting and gullible Wolverines and their fans, and on Thanksgiving Saturday, it will snap shut with a disgusting SNAP!, and dash the hopes and dreams of Wolverines everywhere. Just like any smelly rat that gets too close to the cheese.

If Muhammad Ali were still alive, he'd rise and salute CRD and his staff for the mastery in which they are carrying out this plan.

CRD is deiberately holding his guys back. He's holding back in the play book, and he's sending in plays that are DESIGNED to look ordinary, and yes, vulnerable. All in hopes that Michigan coaching staff and fans will be watching and have the audacity to think that they have a CHANCE on Thanksgiving Saturday.

The plan is proceeding nicely. With today's ordinary proceeding at the legendary Ryan Field, CRD has Michigan right where he wants them. THINKING that with today's performance that they actually have a chance in Columbus.

HAH!

Like I said, I'm not buying it. OSU is the best team in CFB. 21-7 today at Ryan Field is a mirage. The real team shows up on November 26th. And no amount of Ohio sandbaggery is going to make me think otherwise.

[iam416]

Well, we agree Ohio State looks not great. I think it’s who they are. We’ll see.

They should plaster IU next week. Plaster. Them.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Liney, did you see the game?

Wind mostly shut down stroud - didn't matter if he was throwing with the wind at his back or in his face. Tough sledding in that part of the game so, I'll give the passing game on Stroud's end a mulligan. Not on crd's end. If that passing game play calling was holding something back - a stretch IMO - it put stroud and the team in a very bad position. I thought he failed to call a workable short dink and dunk passing game consistently - a game that had a better chance of moving the chains in the wind conditions. crd was seemingly glued to making a run game work while the OL was getting exposed. No push, constantly missing blocks both at the LOS and outside.

I doubt this is "rope a dope" trickery to set M up for a fall. The Game is traditionally won in the trenches. The team that has the physicality and a matching run game from it's backs to take advantage of good OL play usually prevails. Right now, osu has demonstrated that they have neither good running backs or OL play. They rely heavily on stroud being unmolested and hitting their receivers in space. That's something they are good at ..... usually. Not today in Evanston. The top teams in the BT with good run games and OL play would have won that game today in those weather conditions. End of story.

Fitz had a good game plan and for the most part dictated the flow of play outcoaching crd for most of the game. osu's defense didn't look great. I'm not sure what the problem was there but seemed to me osu's DTs were getting beaten by nFW's OL. Whatever ...... that entire game wasn't a good look for osu weather or not. JMO.

[lineygoblue]

Jeff .. turn on your sarcasm detector. Either that or change the batteries.

[iam416]

It's nice that Liney has implicitly acknowledged exactly how right I've been about Ohio State...all year.

[Cody_Russell]

I think the weather will determine the outcome in M vs OSU. Poor weather conditions that makes it a battle of the trenches? M should win. Normal weather conditions where Stroud and his WRs aren’t affected? Ohio State wins.

M has weaknesses too that could be troubling. The M CBs still struggle 1 on 1 too often. Ohio State with the best WRs in college football… that worries me. The M WRs and passing game in general remains hit and miss. Mixed in with awkward play calling at times due to the co-offensive coordinator situation.

I’m one of the rare M fans that picked M to beat OSU last year. Trust in the weather news on 11/26!

[iam416]

Well, yeah, no shit. If neither team can't throw downfield that only helps one team.

The only conceivable shred of hope for Ohio State fans is that M really hasn't faced a team that can actually throw ball well. I mean, Penn State is the best passing team they've played (no, NOT Maryland). Ohio State has played some teams that just run. Obviously, none are as good as M, but I at least have a real sense of their run defense.

Anyway, it's not going to matter. CRD is proving on a quarter-by-quarter basis that his ceiling is an occasional B10 title (kudos to Froot for calling this years ago), and Ohio State is just soft.

It's going to be very decisive at the end of the month.

[Dr. Strangelove]

Gentlemen, Ohio State is in trouble.

[THE_WIZARD_]

sandbaggus copycattus

[lineygoblue]

OSU is not in trouble.

They had their one "bad" game of the year yesterday, and still won. Stroud had his worst day passing, and still led his team to a win.

I'm not buying any used car these OSU fans are selling. CRD has their team right on schedule to finish the regular season at 12-0, and pound whatever empty uniform the B1G requires them to play in Indy. After that, its on to the playoffs.

I hope we get to see OSU v Georgia. I think most CFB fans want to see that game.

I'm fine with seeing M at 11-1 vs PAC 12 Champion in Pasadena. The only thing that sucks about that would be the "L" to OSU, and would give talking heads more ammo to use against Harbaugh. Especially in here.

[iam416]

I don't think you've watched the last 12 quarters of Ohio State football. Buchanan has. He won't bullshit. Ohio State is, as I've been saying for awhile, nowhere near as good on offense as people seem to think.

[Jeff Buchanan]

For M fans, predicting how The Game will go down relies too much on past performance to predict future results. It really doesn't apply now and should not have applied in the 2021 meeting either.

I mean, assuming both get to The Game undefeated, these are two teams with identifiable MOs that will face each other with a clean slate. If I look at the game that way, it gets down to matchups between coaching staffs and players. You have two different approaches to football between crd and Harbaugh which makes this game all the more interesting to me.

Both teams have exploitable weaknesses - all of them discussed here, no need to repeat if you've been keeping up. They also have obvious strengths. The outcome likely gets down to which coaching staff puts the best game plan together to take advantage of each of those and which team executes the game plan the best. After that, it's about adjustments in game and at the half.

It's definitely not about osu's previous series dominance. It not about "feelings ball" predictions. Fundamentally, beyond game plans and in game strategies, it's all about the objectively measured player performances and how well each player performs at least at their established levels of on-field performance better yet above it for this game in particular.

I'd be remiss in not mentioning two factors in play. One of them, the weather, has already been mentioned. Bad weather favors M - it in fact favors any visiting team as an equalizer to home field advantage. The other is the impact of high emotions that surround this game's players. These can either be just the right amount of juice or too much of it resulting in high variance errors, e.g., fumbled punts, INTs.

Anyway, clean slate when this game is played. Two more games for both teams to get through. IMO, osu has the more difficult remaining schedule with an away game at an at least as annoying nFw team when they travel to an annoying Allen coached IU team in Bloomington. M has two home games against a QB-less Nebraska team and Burt's, now not so threatening looking, Illinois team coming to the Big House. Pretty sure both osu and M will win out but, heh, you never know. Regardless, unless some really weird shit happens,The Game will decide who goes to Indy to face ????.

[iam416]

IU is home. Maryland is away. And IU is horrible.