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

[iam416]

Yeah, I mean IU will be a decent offensive test. But, shit, man, they're not better than OU on offense. It'll just be another chance to compete against athletes that at least belong on the same field.

They haven't been tested with a the "phone booth fight" approach, yet. Urbs has lost 4 games at OSU. 2 of them were because they couldn't run between the tackles and a 3rd was when their offense eventually couldn't score enough to cover their bad defense (2013 B10 CG). Oh, and the 4th was Tajh Boyd and Sammie Watkins. The defense is way better now, so 2013 isn't the way, and Boyd and Watkins ain't ever played in the B10, so that's out. The way to get Urbs is still cutting off his inside power game. Wisconsin can maybe do that.

That said, the Wisky defense they torched in 2014 was really highly ranked, too. I mean like #2 in the country or something. But that's sort of my irrational life preserver of hope. It's going to be a fucking miserable slog in two weeks.

[Jeff Buchanan]

IMO, Ohio State's OL is significantly more talented than M's. I think there are 2 first round picks playing on the line (Efflein and Prince--in 2018 ) and maybe a third (though, I'm not going to crown M. Jordan just yet)........

I think this is accurate the more I think about it. I just don't follow post game grades and such for osu players. For sure, I can't know much watching one game v. Rutgers. But, I think you'd agree, it's easier to zone block well in the spread than it is to gap block in I-Form. So, there is that.

Cole is good at C. He's a high 2nd round, maybe a late first assuming he plays another year and goes out in 2018. Magnusen plods at RT. He does OK. Nothing great but you don't have to be great at RT. Kalis at RG just makes too many dumb mistakes but does go up an down. He's inconsistent. He was graded high in both PFF and UFR v. PSU but, yeah, PSU. I'll bet he takes a hit v. Wisky. Doubt he goes early in the 2017 draft. Braden at RG is serviceable with not much of track record yet.

No question, in a pro-style offense, you'd better be able to run it between the tackles. Evans has shown some flash but he too is hindered by the Kalis factor afflicting the entirety of the OL.

The OL overall and in my uninformed opinion, is average. JBB, who went in for Newsome at LT is just too green. Lots of potential I guess.

So, can't argue otherwise and that's a big deal in high stakes games. I do like Brown and his D front to back. It's solid. I can see it as a mitigator v. osu's OL and maybe barrett too. The havoc thing he seems to like can be effective ..... it can also get M burned on those chunk plays with a guy like jtb. Zone, man, zone, man???? Got to have that shit dialed in.

[UMStan White]

A little too early in the season to be worrying about OSU. Some tough games coming up. Hope the player are more focused than some on this board.

[Jeff Buchanan]

A little too early in the season to be worrying about OSU. Some tough games coming up. Hope the player are more focused than some on this board.

Not according to Massey. Heh.

[iam416]

Buchanan:

Yeah, I'm mostly judging M's OL play on how well they run the ball, and my judgment is informed by watching this same basic unit for well over 20 games. The OL is only part of the problem, but, regardless, I don't think M can dependably run the ball between the tackles against good defenses.

Ohio State's OL has still yet to play a strong front 7, so we'll see. But, they were viewed as an area of concern by most -- not me -- but most. I think Michael Jordan starting as a true frosh only highlighted those concerns. It's now looking more like he took the job instead of it falling to him. But, anyway, as it relates to OSU-M, one huge pro-M assumption was that M's DL would dominate OSU's OL. I think that assumption has to be somewhat modified.

My concerns going into the season were DT; OLBs; Secondary. I now love the secondary and love the way Worley and Baker and Booker are playing at Sam/Will LBs. And the DTs have done well enough. My concerns are now DT depth and losing McMillan. They have no MLB other than him, and he's really, really good. I think there's a more catastrophic drop off from McMillan to Plan B than there is from JTB to Joey Burrow.

As for M's defense, I think it's very good. They can take away a lot. OSU has the players to force EVERY player on that defense to defend, though. They can get Samuel on Peppers in coverage or, even more disastrously for M, any of M's LBs. IMO, to stop OSU you have to win 1v1 against the OL. Have to. I don't think many teams can out-athlete OSU across the board in skill position matchups. If you have to commit an extra player to stop the power run then, IMO, it's over. Or you just hope UFM has his worst all-time coaching day!

We'll see how OSU progresses. Still a very young team. Hopefully they keep progressing against IU and then survive Madison.

[Jeff Buchanan]

talent, thanks for that.

No question, if you have to commit a 5th man to consistently stop the run, that's death against good spread to run teams like osu.

I'm thinking, however, that's a problem if a team is playing your vanilla 3/4 or 4/3 because that's all one can run given talent (speed) and player smarts. I've seen Brown do some pretty exotic stuff. A three man front with two edge rushers up on the LOS, tight man coverage at the corners and 1- hi Ss.

For M this brings either Hill or Long into the short zone with the speed to cover/tackle. McCray and Gideon may or may not run blitz into specific gaps. Peppers is that hybrid guy as a third LB that may or may not blitz. M does a good job of making the QB guess at who is or is not coming and where they are coming from.

So, 5th guy? Who is it, where does he come from and what if he stays put and plays zone? Hornibeck sure couldn't figure that out eating the football on a sack a lot. Now Hornibeck is no jtb for sure but this kind of defense is hard. I can't disagree that you have to win the 1v1 match-ups on the OL and I'd add at LB (you're probably talking about Gideon and he does get beat on occasion when he gets iso'ed).

I thought Liafau with the Buffs was seeing this pretty well, getting some big gains until he went out. But M has two more games under there belt. Anyway, it's going to be fun to see how this goes.

[iam416]

Hornibeck isn't great, and even more importantly, Wisky has limited skill at WR. I thought some of his deep balls were pretty solid, but the WRs just couldn't get an inch of separation.

As for Don Brown -- I mean, eh. He's a good DC; he's not Moses. He's not going to do things UFM hasn't seen before. If M is counting on some sort of decided schematic advantage to beat OSU then I think they're in trouble. It's possible UFM could totally shit the bed -- it's happened, after all. But I don't think it will happen again. At the end of the day, M's DL is going to have to beat OSU's OL. I don't think there's any two ways about it. You can scheme all you want, but if OSU's OL controls the LoS then you're going to have lots of problems.

We'll see how OSU does in the next couple of weeks.

[iam416]

Twitter tells me UFM is now a stunning 39-9 against the number with more than one week to prepare. Day late and dollar short, twitter!!!!

Honestly, I have to confirm that on my own because it's a ridiculous number.

[WingsFan]

Nov. 26

Michigan at Ohio State -10

[WM Wolverine]

Whatever M's decided schematic advantage defensively (lol Charlie Wis) is trumped by your amazing athletes at the skill positions. After Colorado, you're the only offense M faces that has a chance to really spread our defense out and attack it.

[Jeff Buchanan]

......As for Don Brown -- I mean, eh. He's a good DC; he's not Moses. He's not going to do things UFM hasn't seen before. If M is counting on some sort of decided schematic advantage to beat OSU then I think they're in trouble. It's possible UFM could totally shit the bed -- it's happened, after all. But I don't think it will happen again. At the end of the day, M's DL is going to have to beat OSU's OL. I don't think there's any two ways about it. You can scheme all you want, but if OSU's OL controls the LoS then you're going to have lots of problems.

We'll see how OSU does in the next couple of weeks.

Don't get me wrong. What Brown is doing schematically has been around for a decade in the NFL and probably about 5y in CFB. I'd be the last guy to compare him to VanGorder and his schematic advantage BS and his rightful firing for mouthing that crap and then not delivering.

The point is that what Brown brought to M's defense both in style and scheme is different and if somebody asked me I'd tell them that JH brought him on to allow M to cope with the spread in the BT and nationally and especially osu's brand of it.

What I pointed out in my post was that M's D in its current style of play and deployment can be a mitigating factor v. what ufm does with his offense and particularly with jtb. It was mentioned that osu forces all 11 guys on defense to defend well. Failing that, making a mistake can result in a big play.

There's no doubt urbz will find weak, mistake prone players, he'll find weak points in a scheme and he'll damn sure exploit those mistakes and weaknesses. Look at last years embarrassing loss. Durkin got schooled. Individual players got schooled.

While I can't argue with you that M's DL has to beat osu's OL 1 v 1, Brown has shown that there are ways to make that easier to accomplish and I gave an example of how he does that.

I don't think you're missing the subtleties of what I'm talking about at the armchair level. A well placed/unexpected A or B gap run blitz; a LB who didn't do what the QB thought he would pre snap only to find out the play call isn't going to work out because of that. An unexpected Peppers arriving at the Mesh delivering a tackle for a loss before the play even gets started. That sort of stuff goes beyond 1v1 and tends to be additive to the whole.

[iam416]

It sort of boils down to this - either you think Don Brown will outcoach UFM or you don't. If you think it's an even coaching matchup then it's the jimmy and joes. If you think it's advantage Don Brown then small talent gaps may be mitigated.

I think DB is very good. He won't pour gas on the fire. His players are well-coached and he'll put them in a position to succeed. But I think UFM will do the same.

Frankly, so will Greg Schiano. We haven't really talked about that side of the ball, but I consider that way more positive for OSU than OSU's offense v. M defense. We talk about the latter because it seems like M has to hold OSU to 20 to win.

[iam416]

OSU is currently -13 @ Wisky; -14 @ Sparty; and -10 vs M.

I'd be shocked if they cover any of those numbers.

[WM Wolverine]

Your skill players are going to score points regardless of whose trying to defend you...

M's offense needs long drives that are tough to come by against a very good, likely excellent Buckeye defense. Buckeye;s opponents will need to win the 'big play', turnover battle to come within 10-14 points of the Buckeyes.

[iam416]

Folks need to pump the brakes a bit on OSU.