Michigan Football, Team 139, 2018 Season

[Jeff Buchanan]

M remains at #4 in AP poll while WVU slips ahead of osu. AP is basically unchanged except for osu getting jumped by WVU and Dana Holgerson's hair ..... heh.

https://sports.yahoo.com/college-football/rankings/

[edindetroit]

'The Simpsons' picks a side in Michigan-Ohio State rivalry (kinda)

https://www.freep.com/story/sports/college/university-michigan/wolverines/2018/11/12/simpsons-michigan-ohio-state-rivalry/1975918002/

[hack]

We need experts to tell us not to look ahead past OSU? FFS.

[Detroit Dan]

We need experts to tell us not to look ahead past OSU? FFS.

Agreed. Hard to imagine Michigan looking ahead to the Northwestern matchup, when there's a road game against a team that beats us every year and has only one defeat for the whole year ahead. Beat OSU and the season is an unqualified success. Should be another classic.

[drok]

Jeff - where is the new game thread???

Let's fucking GO! Can't believe we have to wait a whole week for this still.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Trying to honor the don't post the score (or unstick the thread/post the next one) until later today.

I think I'll reconsider after I make my From the Stands post.

[Detroit Dan]

Looking back to the predictions from August (September in one instance) in this thread:

• Jeff Buchanan: 11-1. M gets to the CCG and advances to the CFP play-offs.
• Hannibal: 7-5
• WM Wolverine: 9-3 or 10-2
• Talent: 9-3, 10-2, or 11-1
• Detroit Dan: 9-3 or 10-2 (made after loss to Notre Dame)

One outlier here...

[WM Wolverine]

Wisconsin, Sparty, Ohio state not as good as expected, Notre dame better and Penn state about what I expected.

[WM Wolverine]

Notre dame has benefited from a weaker schedule than projected too, would like to see them play a B1G east schedule instead of ACC trash.

[iam416]

Yeah. I'd say both M's and ND's schedules turned to shit. I'm not sure that ND playing B10 East teams would matter much. They already beat the clear best team and did so by controlling the entire game. Sparty wouldn't score more than 6. Penn State and Ohio State have massive issues. It's a trash year for the B10.

I suspect we're going to see this all play out with Clemson-ND and Alabama-M. I don't expect those games to be close.

[Jeff Buchanan]

Yeah. I'd say both M's and ND's schedules turned to shit. I'm not sure that ND playing B10 East teams would matter much. They already beat the clear best team and did so by controlling the entire game. Sparty wouldn't score more than 6. Penn State and Ohio State have massive issues. It's a trash year for the B10.

I suspect we're going to see this all play out with Clemson-ND and Alabama-M. I don't expect those games to be close.

Not prepared to endorse that suspicion yet.

Too many anomalous things can happen between now and December 29th. FiveThrityEight has some interesting odds. Even with a 53% chance of beating osu, M has only a 44% chance of winning the BIG and a 35% of making the playoffs. Those odds round out with M having only a 6% chance of winning the NC.

Clemson, ND, UAT, and UGA, in that order, are ahead of M. Clemson has the best chance of winning the NC (36%). UAT has the best chance of winning the SEC.

These odds are after week 12 but before the CFP selection committee rankings. FiveThirtyEight will update odds sometime tonight.

You can see that the risk, in these particular odds, of the BIG getting edged out of the CFP and instead two SEC teams get in (UGA and UAT) is real.

https://projects.fivethirtyeight.com/2018-college-football-predictions/

[iam416]

IMO, there's a slightly better chance that Georgia beats Alabama than M loses either of its two final games. And, IMO, both would knock M out of the CFP. So, I think it's right to be more concerned about Georgia than anyone M is playing.

Clemson's high percentage is, obviously, due the ease of its remaining games.

[Jeff Buchanan]

IMO, there's a slightly better chance that Georgia beats Alabama than M loses either of its two final games. And, IMO, both would knock M out of the CFP. So, I think it's right to be more concerned about Georgia than anyone M is playing.

Agree with that ....... I wish I could spend the time to look real close at both Alabama and UGA and get an eyeball sense of these two teams. Obviously, I spend a lot of time reading about and watching film of M. After M's last two games, I don't think they are the juggernaut they looked like after they swept Wisconsin, MSU and PSU - all three of these teams with dinged up QBs and not really very good it turns out.

In the case of Rutgers, I think M purposefully limited Shes's carries off the RO and that affected what the O looked like and objectively delivered. IU is at another level altogether. A previously stout pass D got had too many times in that game to call the passing D v. IU an anomaly. I think it's a scheme issue, has cropped up before and had more to do with what Brown was doing with his edge rushers and LBs. They didn't get enough pressure on Ramsey as a reward for all the risks Brown took doing what he did. Obviously Allen put a lot of emphasis on figuring out how to mitigate the edge rush. Whatever he was having his OL do, they did well at it. I was impressed with how well IU's OL and TEs got the outside rushers out of their intended more direct lanes to the QB. Gary and Winovich lost their match-ups more often than they won them. Two surprises therefore materialized: (1) Ramsey unexpectedly hit some deep shots putting the ball into a phone booth. (2) Gads of space in the middle zone caused by missing LBs made Ramsey's connection on multiple slants easy.

Not to rehash the IU game ....... what this post is about is that fans need to put the brakes on expectations for M to land in the CFB play-off let alone beat osu, NfW and any of the play-off contenders if they get there.

[AlabamAlum]

.. I wish I could spend the time to look real close at...Alabama

I am here for all of your Alabama questions.

[Jeff Buchanan]

OK ..... if M and Alabama meet in the CFP, assume you are the OC and then DC. What strengths present in UAT's offense produce advantages against M's defensive weaknesses. Do the same as if you were DC. If there are Bama weaknesses that M can exploit on either side of the ball, feel free to discuss.