MGoPodcast 9.8: The Emperor’s New Mattress Column
1 hour and 16 minutes
Scheduling note: A day late because Ace had to get home from Pennsylvania, where they don’t let you buy food with credit cards.
[Patrick Barron]
We Couldn’t Have One Without the Other
We can do this because people support us. You should support them too so they’ll want to do it again next year! The show is presented by UGP & The Bo Store, and if it wasn’t for Rishi and Ryan we’d be talking to ourselves.
Our other sponsors are also key to all of this: HomeSure Lending, Peak Wealth Management, Ann Arbor Elder Law, the Residence Inn Ann Arbor Downtown, the University of Michigan Alumni Association, Michigan Law Grad,Human Element, Lantana Hummus and new this week introducing Ecotelligent Homes
---------------------------------
1. Offense
starts at 15:00 (uh…yup, unless you want takes on dead bugs and McDonalds)
Improvement to less than mediocre. Sacks 50/50 between OL and O’Korn not getting rid of the ball. PSU took away the run by playing it tight, and passing O went how it is. Coaching this team has to be a special kind of hell for Pep Hamilton. We’ll see Peters eventually. Yelling “accountability” on the internet totally works guys. Big reason we want Michigan to win is to stop the stupid takes.
2. The Defense
starts at 28:00
Good news: Joe Moorhead is going to be a head coach elsewhere next year. McSorley played out of his mind. You’d think after watching Dalvin Cook vs. McCray they wouldn’t let that matchup happen with Barkley, but they did—Hudson blitzes were too aggressive. Barkley as the QB was a really good idea, good example of how to use a guy worth overreacting to.
3. Hockey
starts at 44:53
Michigan peppered Vermont on Friday for not much to show for it, then got some lucky goals on Saturday. Team looks like what we hoped they’d be: not very talented but defense is solid and they get after it. Lockwood is super-fast. Hughes trying to do too much but does cool stuff.
4. Around the Big Ten with Jamie Mac
starts at 58:41
Would Maryland take John O’Korn? Would Illinois? Would Rutgers? Minnesota? Northwestern? Would…omigod…most of the conference? Akrum Wadley has mad talent and can’t get out of the backfield. Illinois is all true freshmen and Jeff George Jr. Rutgers had 212 yards and 8 first downs…and won? Purdue couldn’t convert a 3rd or 4th down for their lives. Mike DeBord runs three straight inside zones and punts on 4th and 2. Also two QB draws then threw a fade to not Cobbs. Also a ref jobbing for MSU. LJ Scott had a 7-play suspension: one for each arrest. Wisconsin had just 9 drives, averaged 8 plays per drive.
---------------------------------
MUSIC:
- “Mattress”—Atmosphere
- “Ultralight Beam”—Kanye West
- “Lights Follow”—Matthew Heath and Grady Griggs
- “Across 110th Street”
THE USUAL LINKS
October 24th, 2017 at 8:28 AM ^
Ennui sets in . . .
October 24th, 2017 at 8:29 AM ^
"Yelling 'accountability' on the internet totally works guys. Big reason we want Michigan to win is to stop the stupid takes."
October 24th, 2017 at 9:03 AM ^
What driving me crazy is the way in which that word is being abused. That word has just not been attached to anything sounding remotely like a reasonable argument. I've heard outrage that Brown was content to let McCray cover Barkley from Brian, and. . . that's it? That's an argument that makes some sense. A sad, distant second would be the calls to insert a redshirt freshman QB into a blowout against an elite pass defense as if that would totally turn the game around.
There are certain things the coaches need to be held accountable for, but I don't see them mentioned nearly as much as YEAR 3! or Hoke's record! or this school! or excuses! If that's accountability that's Dilbert-style accountability, complete with Powerpoints and meaningless statistics and sipping bad coffee.
October 24th, 2017 at 10:59 AM ^
I don't think the idea is that Peters would turn the game around. The idea is to start playing for next year because this season we are not reaching our goals. Part of that is getting Peters some experience against terrifying defenses. See what we've got, give him some real game reps to learn from, that kind of thing.
October 24th, 2017 at 11:15 AM ^
But Harbaugh's right that hindsight coaching is super easy. I can see the merit to playing Peters, but people really aren't upset about that; they're upset about the blowout. If Peters did play in the second half and got his ribs caved in (and mind you the OL was a sieve all night) the boards would be up in flames about how Harbaugh pissed away his backup backup QB in a meaningless blowout, the fool. I see the upside, but any decision Harbaugh makes requires considering the downside. People are upset about a particular decision that didn't have a whole lot of consequence and not grounded in anything Harbaugh's doing wrong.
Mind you, that's just one thing, and hardly the worst, which is why I said it was the second best complaint I'd read. If Harbaugh played Peters it wouldn't have been the worst thing; I just wonder why people are burning forum servers over this. The most aggravating complaints by far are the ones yelling YEAR 3!! like that automatically eliminates all context. It's Year 3 and I'm tired of waiting for my NC; why hasn't Harbaugh hit the big red button and fixed the offense already!!?!?!?!
October 24th, 2017 at 11:44 AM ^
October 24th, 2017 at 8:41 AM ^
Something that might be marginally more fun than UFR this week would be to chart McSorley and see just how hot he was. Not because that would be fun by itself, but the resulting DSR might put the defensive performance in some semblance of perspective.
October 24th, 2017 at 8:55 AM ^
just kept waiting for one of those moon-balls to sail anywhere but right in the middle of two Penn State reciever hands, like one inch over the fingertips of a Michigan defender. People can say he is just "mediocre" all they want but holy hell was he accurate on Saturday. Those were pin point throws.
October 24th, 2017 at 9:04 AM ^
He's the strangest thrower I've ever seen. He's the only QB I've ever watched that has a hang time. His passes take forever to get where they are going, and they reach a North Korean ICBM level of altitude.
But the dude keeps making it work . . .for now at least.
October 24th, 2017 at 9:18 AM ^
When you want to stress the safeties you need to throw it deep. Preferable you stand in the pocket and rifle it out to give the coverage little time to react. But if your O-line sucks you need to get the ball out quickly. The only way to execute that is to throw a moonball, and from there it's throwing to a spot with the right timing. It needs to drop with a predetermined hang time or (as we saw with early Rudock-Chesson struggles and subsequent epiphany) the receiver runs out of field or gets overthrown.
So I'm guessing it's deliberate, but that means the OC had tremendous confidence in the QB's accuracy. Must be nice, man. . .
October 24th, 2017 at 9:07 AM ^
On a majority of the arm punts, the receivers just went up and took the balls. He put them where they could be caught and the receivers took over from there. Being "catchable" isn't really accuracy, but in the end they look the same.
October 24th, 2017 at 9:11 AM ^
being "catchable" exactly what accuracy is?
October 24th, 2017 at 10:49 AM ^
I don't remember many of those. I remember balls dropping right into the receivers hand in full stride. Perfect coverage and no chance to make a play on it. I was expecting the arm punts that worked for him last year, but this wasn't that.
October 24th, 2017 at 9:16 AM ^
He'd good but if anyone's taking this particular game as evidence that he's great, I refer them to Mitch Leidner, Trevor Siemian. . . if I kept going I could go back decades.
It's one thing when we field a defense so horrible we make Gary Nova look good, but we also get more than our fair share of college QBs playing the best game of their lives.
October 24th, 2017 at 10:21 AM ^
Here's Reddit trying to figure out why McSorley's "rainbows" work so well:
October 24th, 2017 at 10:50 AM ^
McSorley's accuracy on these moonballs and his WRs ability to high-point the ball made for a tough day for the Michigan secondary. I know Jourdan Lewis recently tweeted about height not being a factor on fade routes but it sure felt like it on Saturday night. Most of the time, the coverage was right there but we couldn't break anything up.
The announcers kept pinpointing the problem as having a safety in that coverage but what else are you going to do? They are running fades out of the slot and you can't put four CBs on the field and hope to contain Barkley in the running game. PSU had a great gameplan and they executed it as well as you can hope to. Hats off to them for crushing our top-5 defense.
Let's get all the positive feels back the next few weeks.
October 24th, 2017 at 9:59 AM ^
about Meat in a Box? Didn't JT on SNL already do that bit?
October 24th, 2017 at 9:59 AM ^
Said this in pregame columns, we'd take Mcsorely in a heart beat. Don't understand what people are making fun of. This is CF - moonballs or no, it works; not the pros here. Obviously that is not the offense harbaugh wants, but it just works for penn state.
We need patience to get the Harboffense rolling and once it gets to juniors and seniors on consistent basis it'll work like Wisconsin's non-stop RBs and OL's. Need consistency for couple of years though.
October 24th, 2017 at 10:49 AM ^
This doesn't crash your point but I think Harbaugh would take Penn State's offense in a heartbeat. Once they finally got it down Rudock was doing similar things with Chesson, throwing arcing passes to spots downfield (opened up by the routes) and having Chesson run under the ball.
I don't know if Moorhead's playcalls were as advanced but any moonshot that isn't just a jump ball requires highly accurate throws where not only the location but the timing of the ball's descent is precise. McSorely was doing it way too often to say they were just lucky arm-punts. Looking back to late season Rudock, Harbaugh could definitely most certainly do things with a QB that can do that consistently.
October 24th, 2017 at 10:51 AM ^
But feels like Rudock had more "zip" in his balls still. Mcsorely's really feel like forever hang and a high point. Chesson was burning people and getting to the ball, not really high pointing like Giseke/ENT they got.
Also please tell me Giseke is graduating. What a nightmare to cover. Safeties looked like kids. So tall. Yikes.
October 24th, 2017 at 11:23 AM ^
You could be right but we'd have to time it because human brains have a terrible sense of pace.
How many years does Gentry have left? Seems like he's been here forever but he's nowhere close to fully weaponized because of our QB problems.
October 24th, 2017 at 11:16 AM ^
"it'll work like Wisconsin's non-stop RBs and OL's."
Wisconsin average S&P Offense rank last 5 years: #42
October 24th, 2017 at 11:10 AM ^
just won't end...
October 24th, 2017 at 11:30 AM ^
Look for the Fullbacks to take a beating in the UFR. They have not played to a Michigan standard all year. They blew several blocking assignments and blocks in this one. People would have a completely different feel for this offense if we could have executed like 3 simple blocks in this game.
October 24th, 2017 at 11:41 AM ^
Hey, at least we can retire the "Michigan is ##-0 under Harbaugh when rushing for more than 100 yards." So that's something...
October 24th, 2017 at 11:45 AM ^
Frankly, I'm starting to suspect Brian has it in for 80's Australian social-responsibility pop.
October 24th, 2017 at 11:58 AM ^
I do think they were a bit harsh on O'Korn. Expecting a guy to sit in a pocket for 3 seconds and assume that the receivers who can never get open or hold onto the ball are going to come back after sprinting down the field and throwing the ball to that expected location while under siege is a tall ask for most college QBs. He's not a good QB, but this reflexive "the QB is always doing stuff wrong" response to everything, especially after the effusive praise he got after Purdue, is jarring. The entire offense is broken, and O'Korn is part of it. But much like Devin Gardner getting squirrelly after years of poor protection and limited receivers, is it really that crazy to see now 2 QBs struggle to get any rhythm or trust going in the air?
October 24th, 2017 at 5:27 PM ^
October 25th, 2017 at 1:07 AM ^
Ace's Hockey Podcast remains to be my favorite segment on any show ever.
Comments