blake corum: denard but thick

Formation Notes: Northwestern kept their safeties down all day so the “Hi” metric is doing more work than normal. I started giving safeties +0.5 in the box if they got within 8 yards within a second after the snap, and +1 in the box if they got closer than that.

Michigan had a formation where the slot receiver and tight end switched spots. When they did this I denoted it with “Flip” then the position headers, so this is Gun YH Flip.

Substitution Notes: Filiaga (RG) and Barnhart (LG) went all day for injured Keegan and Zinter. Just one snap for McCarthy until Michigan had a comfortable lead in the second half. Roman Wilson returned but his snaps were mostly soaked up by the debut of Andrel Anthony as a rotation guy, so by snap count the current order is Johnson, Baldwin, Sainristil, Henning, Anthony, Wilson. Hibner came in before Seltzer when they decided they were up enough to save the mileage on All, and Edwards got a drive until he fumbled it.

[After THE JUMP: This was a long one, and I charted them all since they had relevant starters and JJ in late]

Formation Notes: Double Eagle.

This was called 245 Split and if I added a letter that’s the gap with a down LB. 245 Split A.

And they also ran a 404 Tite front with a pinched DE, which I called 4-3 Tite.

Continuing with my convention of naming their 11 personnel formations by the position of the H (slot) receiver—”Gun Wk” for in the slot weakside, etc.—when he lines up inside I’ll call out the gap. So this is Gun Str B (H receiver is in the B gap of the TE’s side).

Substitution Notes: A lot of movement at guard. Filiaga got the start at LG and rotated with Keegan until Zinter left at the end of the 1st Q. Zinter came back at the end of the 2nd Q when Filiaga went out (after stepping on McNamara), and it was Barnhart & Zinter until halftime, then Keegan and Barnhart until Keegan went out, then Barnhart and Filiaga, then Filiaga got re-hurt late and it was Barnhart and Atteberry.

[After THE JUMP: The UFR that never ends]

Formation/Terminology Notes: Going to clean up my terminology for power running because Michigan runs so many variants. A guide:

• Buck: Pin & Pull is now “Buck” because they’re really the same thing. That is when the frontside guard is one of the pullers.
• Power: If the backside guard pulls to the frontside it’s “Power.”
• Counter: If they pull to the backside it’s “Counter” regardless of backfield action (because Michigan often substitutes a false read for its counter step).
• Down _ is when they pull a frontside blocker as the kickout, e.g. Down G.
• Fold is a two-man combo where the player named folded around the guy inside him. If it’s not a G going around a T I’ll note the downblock then the pull-around.
• Trap is when the puller kicks an unblocked interior defender instead of the edge. 

When two guys pull I’ll list the kickout blocker first.

Also there was some question about “Cover 0” and “0” in my “Hi” column. I will start using “NA” for goal line and save 0 high for the times when it looks like they’re running Cover Zero (pure m2m, no safety help), like so:

NIU did this a lot. They also used a lot of these wide splits to deal with Michigan’s powerful off-tackle running game. In course there were a lot of runs that cut back inside, where Michigan’s interior OL were blowing up the DTs and ILBs on the regular.

Also I added Expected Points Added (EPA) to the offensive chart now as well.

Substitution Notes: Filiaga replaced Keegan after the first drive until halftime when Keegs returned. Baldwin returned to the lineup and was the #2 WR. Schoonmaker got all the 2nd TE snaps until backup hour so he’s passed Honigford, and after this game probably for good. Second team OL was (left to right) Barnhart-Filiaga-Crippen-Atteberry-Jones.

[After THE JUMP: Competency >>>> Ol’ That’s Six.]