Michigan Football, Team 139, 2018 Season

[Rocky Bleier]

I heard HARBAUGH!!! has invented a new way to lift weights...no worries Blue Nation...

Does it include those special milkshakes that Tom Osborne's boys used to drink?

[hack]

Gassed maybe but they just flat out quit against OSU.

Agreed. I don't know if they flat-out quit, but they as a unit failed to pull one out of their ass on behalf of the offense, like any truly great defense does a few times a year. The defense always did its part, but never just took the fuck over and insisted on it.

[Jeff Buchanan]

If you like fancystats, this is pretty good. M is projected as 4th in the BTE based on projected 2018 S&P+. This stat includes SOS and that M has the toughest schedule compared to other BTE contenders is reflected in that projection. A couple of breaks on the road v. MSU and osu and that entire calculus changes.

I found M's complete defensive efficiency v. explosiveness chart for 2017 interesting (I didn't look at anything footballish after the osu loss for a long time). M had one of the top three spots nationally, I think, in defensive 3rd down efficiency.. That shows up on the Y efficiency axis on the chart. But they also didn't have a lot of explosive plays (e.g., TFLs, sack rate) and, if I've got this stat right, the ISOppp on defense includes big plays of greater than some number as a negative factor in the calculation. Anyway, you increase TFLs and sack rate then cut down on big plays, M is going to be very tough on D in 2018.

In the not so objective area, where Connelly is going with his own ranking methodology (lowest score is best) eg. for QBs, I'd ask is Shea Patterson or Brandon Peters to rank lower than all 4 of the QBs ahead of them (in order of the BTE contenders, PSU, osu and MSU? I think not. I also think McSorely is being given too much credit. We'll see. I think the rest of the unit rankings are pretty decent but the QB ranking really skews the point total agaisnt M. If the QB ranking went like this: (1) MSU 1pt, osu 4 pt, M 6 pts, PSU 8 pts, Wisky 10 pts, you'd have a subjective team ranking, by Connelly's method of osu (21), M (25), Wisky (26), MSU (30), PSU (33). I'm more comfortable with that outcome in the BTE (osu, M, MSU, PSU - and MSU and PSU are interchangeable) than I am with Connelly's projection.

Again, guess we'll see. At least I feel better about M actually being in the discussion as a contender than I did in 2018 after i saw a couple of games.

https://www.sbnation.com/college-football/2018/7/10/17531442/big-ten-football-2018-power-rankings

[Rocky Bleier]

I don't know how anyone can make an informed prediction when we haven't seen the O-line under Warriner, the wide receivers under McElwain, or Shea Patterson under center. The schedule will definitely be a factor, but who knows how the offense will perform? And it will probably take them several games to gel together. I am hopeful that they will be pretty good by the end of the season.

[Jeff Buchanan]

This is a good read. The Memphis offense under HC Mike Norvell would be a perfect fit for JH's love of the TE, including two TE-sets, and what we know about Shea Patterson's skill set. I've got my doubts that M's offense will look like the Memphis offense with Patterson at QB. I will say that you can run power with Memphis' approach and that might be appealing to Harbaugh in his efforts to rejuvenate his previously moribund offenses since he's been M's HC.

https://www.footballstudyhall.com/2018/7/13/17568406/mike-norvells-te-inclusive-spread-offense-memphis-tigers-rpo

[Jeff Buchanan]

No surprises here from osu country in terms of the rankings and player picks. I think it's going to be tough going for prognosticators of all stripes to separate MSU, PSU and M until we actually see each of the teams play 2-3 games. Question marks for me are:

How good is Dwayne Haskins going to be as osu's starting QB?

How good is Trace McSorely going to be without Barkely and two of his top receivers from 2017, Gesicki and Hamilton?

State returns 19 starters from a 10-3 2017 team. They are going to be good with Lewerke but how good? I'm not sold on Lewerke just like I think McSorely is over rated.

How good is M's OL going to be in giving patterson, or less likely Peters, time to do thier thing and what thing is the offense going to do?

2018 Cleveland.com Big Ten Preseason Poll

BIG TEN EAST
1. Ohio State, 191.5 points (23.5 first-place votes)
2. Michigan State, 142 points (2)
3. Penn State, 141.5 points (1)
4. Michigan, 140.5 points (1.5)
5. Maryland, 75.5 points
6. Indiana, 60 points
7. Rutgers, 33 points

BIG TEN WEST
1. Wisconsin, 196 points (28 first-place votes)
2. Iowa, 155 points
3. Northwestern, 138 points
4. Nebraska, 104 points
5. Purdue, 98.5 points
6. Minnesota, 64.5 points
7. Illinois, 28 points

BIG TEN CHAMPIONSHIP GAME
Ohio State over Wisconsin (14)
Wisconsin over Ohio State (9)
Wisconsin over Michigan (2)
Wisconsin over Penn State (1)
Wisconsin over Michigan State (1)
Michigan State over Wisconsin (1)

PRESEASON BIG TEN DEFENSIVE PLAYER OF THE YEAR
1. Nick Bosa, Ohio State DE, 74 points, (20 first-place votes)
2. Rashan Gary, Michigan DE, 38 points, (6)
3. T.J. Edwards, Wisconsin LB, 24 points
4. Devin Bush, Michigan LB, 14 points (1)
5. Paddy Fisher, Northwestern LB, 8 points (1)
6. Joe Bachie, Michigan State LB, 5 points
7. Chase Winovich, Michigan DE, 2 points
8. D'Cota Dixon, Wisconsin S, 1 point
8. Olive Sagapolu, Wisconsin DT, 1 points
8. Khaleke Hudson, Michigan LB, 1 point

[Hannibal]

I just saw this stat for the first time that I was not aware of....

Michigan has 11 straight games without a WR catching a touchdown pass. Wow.

[iam416]

How good is Dwayne Haskins going to be as osu's starting QB?

How good is Trace McSorely going to be without Barkely and two of his top receivers from 2017, Gesicki and Hamilton?

State returns 19 starters from a 10-3 2017 team. They are going to be good with Lewerke but how good? I'm not sold on Lewerke just like I think McSorely is over rated.

Funny how there's a lot of QB questions there but one of them isn't "How good will Shea Patterson be?"

I would take McSorely over everyone else in the B10, at least at this stage. There's a remarkable seemingly interminable "MGO Bias" against Franklin and "Arm-Punt" that runs deep amongst M fans.

Michigan has 11 straight games without a WR catching a touchdown pass. Wow.

That's staggering. Welp, what do you expect after Hoke's OL recruiting/development debacle?

[WM Wolverine]

McSorely relies on his receivers to make plays with his deep balls. Not sure if he has the receivers this season, plus he's missing his running back. I might put Sparty above them.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Funny how there's a lot of QB questions there but one of them isn't "How good will Shea Patterson be?"

I would take McSorely over everyone else in the B10, at least at this stage. There's a remarkable seemingly interminable "MGO Bias" against Franklin and "Arm-Punt" that runs deep amongst M fans.........

I've got plenty of questions about Patterson. I already know Haskins looked damn good against a very good Michigan D off the bench. Impressive and from what I read about him (with the usual grain of salt about such things in the pre-season) he continues to look good.

The hype about Patterson is mitigated in my mind by tape showing how bad he looked against good defenses. Ol'Miss's Ol was probably as bad if not worse than M's but still, the Ol'Miss O was designed to overcome that deficiency and Patterson made plenty of bad decisions/throws when defenses figured out how to neutralize any tactical advantage Ol'Miss's coaches thought that they could put out there on the field. Lots of mistakes on tape.

I could be way wrong on McSorely. I get the "arm punt" stuff coming from Mgo Board. That's not who I'm getting my doubts about McSorely from. My doubts come purely from the facts that PSU OC for 2017, Joe Moorhead, has replaced Dan Mullen as HC at Mississippi State so, he's gone. Gesicki and Hamilton are gone. Barkley is gone. I have no idea what the PSU depth chart looks like but, those are huge losses so, maybe it's less about McSorely and more about his surrounding cast that made him appear to be really good last season. We'll see.

[Hannibal]

James Franklin is about one more really good season from me no longer having any doubts about him. He already has more B1G championships than Harbaugh.

[Hannibal]

Funny how there's a lot of QB questions there but one of them isn't "How good will Shea Patterson be?"

I would take McSorely over everyone else in the B10, at least at this stage. There's a remarkable seemingly interminable "MGO Bias" against Franklin and "Arm-Punt" that runs deep amongst M fans.



That's staggering. Welp, what do you expect after Hoke's OL recruiting/development debacle?

It's also what happens maybe when you don't have a fucking dedicated position coach. The Michigan single game record for TD passes caught (4) exceeds the total for all of the WRs last year (3). Lost in the abyss of shitty QB and OL play last year was disappearance of Michigan's wide receivers.

[drok]

Funny how there's a lot of QB questions there but one of them isn't "How good will Shea Patterson be?"

I think there are two things at work here: 1) hard to imagine Shea not being an improvement over last year's QB mess. 2) OLine is still biggest offense question for us.

I'll add a third: 3) we're merely hoping he's going to be good and don't really want to ask that question

[Whitley]

I just saw this stat for the first time that I was not aware of....

Michigan has 11 straight games without a WR catching a touchdown pass. Wow.

Not surprising considering how young the WR core was last year, the injury to Black AND the O-Line mess.

[Hannibal]

I would take McSorely over everyone else in the B10, at least at this stage. There's a remarkable seemingly interminable "MGO Bias" against Franklin and "Arm-Punt" that runs deep amongst M fans.

mgoblog is big on game theory and in-game decision making and they place a huge importance on those. In all fairness to them, Franklin is a bona fide retard in those areas.