I got a late jump on this post because...life. So it's not going to be excessive long or particularly funny (if mine ever are). But hey, I promise it'll be less stressful than watching the game. So that's a thing.

Best: The Not-So-Wayback

You always hear that the internet is a permanent record of our digital lives, an indelible tome chronicling our transgressions and triumphs. And there's a growing concern that it's starting to dull our ability to remember the past and replace it with search terms we'll use to find the answer. But the stark reality about the internet is that it doesn't have a particularly good memory; lots of information gets lost every day as servers go down, people delete old accounts, algorithms are tweaked, and services that seemed omnipresent (seemingly everyone had an Angelfire or GeoCities page) fade away into the oblivion. The internet is a mile wide and an inch deep, and more times than not it's going to be hard to recover what was lost.

That's a big reason why I think sites like the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine deserve a ton more attention than they get. It's a really simple service (it basically stores cached versions of websites at various times, leading to over 380 billion unique pages currently saved for future reference), but it's pretty amazing and is well worth your time if you want to find a seemingly long-lost site or simply want to chuckle at what we considered good web design a mere decade or two ago. And it's particularly great because it gives you a chance to see a snapshot of what people were thinking at the time, unfiltered by revisionist history or selective editing.

The first recorded version of mgoblog.com featured a discussion about Les Miles definitely not taking over for Lloyd Carr, a brief recruiting discussion about Darryl Stonum, and a reference to Tony Toni Tone that was short one Tonee? But you could see the DNA of the site's identity even then (which makes sense, as it had existed in various incarnations before), and other than a couple of cosmetic face-lifts it has mostly stayed the same. Michigan was grappling with problems that have plagued them really for decades, a crisis of sorts between figuring out what the program could be and what it is. Every decision felt somewhat fraught because college football, at its very nature, feels like a couple of key moments interspersed with rote action. Winning a title versus playing in a secondary bowl can come down to a handful of plays and a couple of inches. And so as fans you find yourself analyzing every possible decision because they feel like they should all be interconnected, and one misstep will cause the tsunami that sinks your season.

The reason I bring this up is that I've seen a lot of people complaining that this year is just a rehash of 2013, where the wheels really started to come off Brady Hoke's regime and Michigan was the least impressive 5-1 team after narrowly beating a mediocre Akron and a terrible UConn. Then the infamous 27-for-27 against PSU happened and the season spiraled out of control. It was a team plagued by an inconsistent offense and a defense that wasn't up to carrying the load. Tell me if you've heard this story already.

But that team isn't all that similar to this one despite the (false) presumption that Michigan has played down to their competition. Devin Gardner remains one of the most "what if?" players in Michigan's history, an athletic marvel who was saddled with the worst part of the RR era and the Hoke morass. Jeremy Gallon was an anomaly, a sprite who could jump out of the gym and was nicknamed "Rocket boots" by the end of the year. The team couldn't run to save their lives despite somehow recording 27 rushing TDs, and they averaged 8.4 ypa because Indiana (and to a lesser extent OSU) lost their damn minds. But it was a deeply flawed team, one that couldn't really get to the QB (only 25 sacks on the year), get people behind the line (only 5 TFLs a game), or stop guys in the air (66th in passing yardage allowed). Heck, the survived as much on turnovers as anything else.

That season felt like a slog as soon as they scraped by Akron, but you could see the signs coming as early as that ND game. Gardner threw an awful pick-6 and, for all his magic, was running for his life more than you'd have hoped. Tommy Rees (yes, that Tommy Rees) threw for over 300 yards, and it was probably not a good sign that Michigan's top 3 tacklers were all in the secondary.

Anyway, I don't know if Michigan's 2019 season is going to ultimately turn out record-wise like that 2013's squad. They definitely have a tougher road to travel this year than in 2013, where they got a couple of great teams (MSU and OSU) and a whole lotta floatsam beyond them.  This year Michigan will likely play at least 4 top-10 teams before the end of the year, and even teams like MSU and Indiana look dangerous.  But what stuck out in 2013, as it did in 2007, was this foreboding sense of doom, that bad decisions had been made and Michigan was going to have to scramble to compensate for them. In 2007 it was the notion that Carr left a year too late; in 2013 it was coming to grips with the fact that the guy with a career .500 record as a HC really had just caught a bunch of breaks in 2011 and was profoundly mediocre beyond that. I know people will argue against this characterization because of his struggles in "big games" (read: against OSU), but Jim Harbaugh has put Michigan in a far better and more stable position than they've been basically since the middle of the Carr era. He's recruiting well, the team is generally winning, and he's seemed willing to change and shake up parts of the team that don't seem to be working. Bringing in Josh Gattis and handing large swaths of the offense over to him wasn't a given, as we've seen lots of coaches fail to relinquish some control when the walls close in. To his credit, Harbaugh is trying to fix this team's offensive woes, and as I've said numerous times what's killed Michigan for years is a lack of continuity and consistency in approach.

So maybe Michigan finishes 8-4 this year; it wouldn't be a shocker. Hell, 7-5 is on the table if things go sideways. But this program doesn't feel like it did in years past, and while where it is maybe not be where it should be to some fans, that doesn't change that calculus.

Best: Don Brown Did a Thing

After Wisconsin eviscerated Michigan's front 7, you couldn't throw a stone without hitting someone who wanted to can Don Brown. And that isn't to say the comments about the defense overall were all wrong; there remains issues with defensive line depth that they've had to paper over with the little Glasgow that probably shouldn't and a former fullback-turned DT-turned back to FB (?). Some of that is due to recruiting misses (both Hudson and Paea either aren't on the team or at tackle), others to player attrition (I don't blame players for leaving, but I'm wonder if Solomon is second-guessing his decision a bit as he struggles to break through on a bad UT line), and some is bad luck (Dwumfour just now getting healthy has a made a world of difference). But it also felt a bit like a perfect storm against Wisconsin, as the offense scuttled and the Badgers got a couple of breaks, and then it was just a steady diet of big linemen and a Heisman Trophy-worthy player running behind it.

But since then, Michigan has totaled two ground Rutger and pulled off two turnover Rutger to boot. Caveats aside about last week's opponent, that's still incredibly impressive to go from seemingly not having answers defensively to rather emphatically smashing two teams. And Iowa, warts and all, was a top-30 offense per SP+ (30th) coming into the game, and was coming off a game where they ran for an average of 7 yards per carry on 51 rushes. Yes, SP+ (like any metric) can have some weird outliers (witness Oregon having the #1 defense and #56 offense in the country six weeks into the season), but this was still an offense in Iowa featuring at least 1 first-round tackle (Jackson played but was limited), a couple fine WRs, and a QB who can absolutely make tough throws when he isn't turfing balls under duress. Iowa got the same number of first downs (2) rushing as they did via penalty, and even one of those felt like a bit of a gift. Michigan also picked up 8 sacks as part of their 13 TFLs, and truth be told they'd probably have gotten at least one or two more had Nate Stanley not done his best Ben Rothlies-whatever (sans off-the-field activities) and thrown the ball with multiple defenders draped over him. Stanley's undoubtedly overrated (he was at one point a preseason first round draft choice before reality set in), but Michigan's defense still dominated him in a way that is somewhat opponent agnostic, picking him off 3 times and hitting him constantly (6 QB hits). They even forced Iowa to commit 3 holding penalties, which I believe equalled their total for the season up to that point.

And the hits came from all across the defense. After collecting 2.5 sacks in about a half of football, Kwity Paye went out with what looked like a hamstring injury...and Michigan seemingly didn't miss a beat. Michael Danna slid right in picked up another sack. Cam McGrone shook off a rough first half (Stanley had some early success picking on him with guys out of the backfield or running short crossing routes), but once he downloaded the Iowa gameplan he repeatedly pressured Stanley while keeping Iowa gains to a minimum. Jordan Glasgow consistently got free runs at Stanley and made them count, picking up 2 thunderous sacks and finishing second on the team in tackles. Hell, Carlo Kemp maybe had the best performance by a DT in the past couple of seasons (he was absolutely eating up Iowa's interior linemen for long stretches of the game) and my guess is a lot of people barely noticed. I mean, even if you throw out the lost sack yardage Iowa averaged exactly 3 ypc on 22 runs and Stanley got his 260 yards throwing the ball 42 times (for 6.2 ypa). Will this wipe the taste of Wisconsin out of anyone's mouth? Unlikely. But I'm certainly more optimistic about how they'll fare against teams like Notre Dame (24th in offense per SP+) and MSU (62nd) than I was a week ago.

Meh: The Offense

I'm going to be a contrarian here and say the offense legitimately looked like it was making solid strides against what is a very good (if unspectacular) defense. Yes, Jim Harbaugh is probably trolling a bit when he says he thinks the offense is hitting its stride, as 10 points in any game is rarely a sign your team is firing on all cylinders. But I re-watched this game and there were a number of times where a play here, a play there turns what was a nail-biter into a blowout and we aren't having as many existential conversations about the state of the program. I know Iowa players said they didn't make adjustments to the pass defense, and I guess if your philosophy is "zone them hard and grab anyone who tries to get away", then in broad strokes that's probably correct. But Michigan still ground down the field at a decent clip (4.1 ypc after you excise sacks, kneel-downs, and whatever happened during that DPJ play), and perhaps most importantly stayed ahead of the sticks consistently (Iowa only picked up 4 TFLs, and two of those came on sacks and a third was the aforementioned DPJ play). Iowa's one of the worst teams in the country in generating tackles behind the line, but as we've seen past performance does not remotely portend future results. And heck, Patterson actually kept the ball on a couple of plays and picked up a couple of first downs in the process.

Yes, it was infuriating to see Michigan have success throwing to Nico Collins deep that one time (even though Iowa had it pretty well covered) and then seemingly abandoning it for most of the game, though in a couple of instances when they did try to stretch the field Iowa had it well-covered and Patterson was forced to move around a bit or check off to another receiver or a back. There are obvious counters to that defense and it took Michigan more time than you'd like to deploy counters, but after looking lost for long stretches to start this year it looked like a team with a pulse offensively.

Like most, I came into the season expecting fireworks in the passing game and a competent rushing attack behind a veteran line. That hasn't happened yet, and while there's always a hope of a second-half awakening there's a ton of defenses between now and then to muck that up. Most of my concerns were defensively, as Michigan lost a ton of talent and had to replace it with unproven players. Thus far, sans the Wisconsin game, the defense has been about as good as we've come to expect from Don Brown. But the offense still feels like it's figuring out something approximating an identity, and you saw it during those couple of drives when Patterson was moving around, receivers were getting a step on the defender, and the line was opening up lanes for guys like Wilson and Charbonnet to smash through. This is going to sound like sunshine-from-the-ass optimism, but it does really feel like an offense that is closing in on another level, and if they can get there I don't see why they can't beat teams like PSU, ND, and MSU.

Best: Where I Defend the Indefensible

As noted earlier I've had issues with Patterson as a QB generally, but I was struck by the level of vitriol directed at him following this game. Did he make some bad throws? Absolutely. That interception should have never been thrown, and as he's wont to do he likely missed a guy or two downfield (though I'll be honest, it didn't seem like any of his receivers were consistently getting separation). The playcalling also put him in some weird positions, as the aforementioned downfield plays didn't seem to be called as often as some hoped, and forcing anyone to dink-and-dunk down the field is a recipe for disappointment. But he also suffered by a couple of crucial drops on first-down throws (both Bell and Black dropped balls that hit them in the hands) and at least one blatant PI that went uncalled near the endzone. And for the first time all season, he ran for a couple of first downs within the flow of the offense, willing taking a couple of shots to get the necessary yardage.

I'll sound like a broken record, but this is Patterson's third offensive coordinator in 4 years. His offensive line has underwhelmed this year, and for all the talk about these NFL WRs I've seen way more dropped passes and (seemingly) bad routes run than you'd expect. This isn't to single out anyone; it's college football, and my general mantra is when a pointy ball meets college students I don't expect perfection. Patterson isn't going to meet the expectations of certain fans; it's a sunk cost if you based your season's prognostications on "Patterson will be a darkhorse Heisman candidate". But taken for what he is, he's making steady strives toward deploying the offense Michigan wants to run, and I'm interested to see how he grades out in UFR.

Worst: Bring Back Shark Boy

In what is apparently this diary's goal to annoy the most people possible, I'm actually going to lament the loss of Jim McElwain. Yes, the guy we all made fun of because someone took a picture of a retired cop who vaguely looked like the former coach humping a shark, and who then didn't find the humor in being asked about a meme (again, of someone humping a dead shark on a boat) during a media day, was actually a pretty good WR coach. Yes, I wouldn't want him as my HC because he was rightfully fired from Florida both for gross incompetence and lying, but as a position coach I think we dismiss just how much of an impact he had on the WRs development last year, and how his absence seems to have stunted some of their growth this season. Far too often, it seems, people assume that positions like WR and RB can be sorta coached "on the side" by someone who is doing some other job to boot. In this case, Josh Gattis is both the OC and (apparently) the primary WR coach. I'm sure there's some synergy there between the two spots, but to be good at both positions takes a lot of time and effort and, I'll be frank, it feels like the receivers have suffered a bit in that time allocation. Per last year's UFR charting, Black, Collins, DPJ, and Bell dropped approximately 6 moderate and routine passes out of 70; those four came into this game having failed to hold onto 6 of those same throws in 48 opportunities. You can certainly quibble at the edges of the scoring, but it's been an offense out of sorts in part because the receivers have failed to hold onto the ball, and in games where Michigan doesn't run a ton of plays (they only ran 58 in this one before the kneel-down), those missteps are magnified.

And yeah, I'm not saying you bring back McElwain, even though he's taken CMU from one of the worst offenses in the country last season to one hanging out near MSU, Cincy, Temple, and other not-terrible schools. But just like how Fred Jackson "coached the running backs" in a very particular interpretation of those words, it does feel like the receivers are sort of stuck in a weird coaching limbo. It was actually refreshing, I guess, to see Gattis chew out Collins a bit for failing to run past the first down marker before his break on Michigan's first FG drive; that's the type of situational awareness that needs to be reinforced at all levels of play, and these players are too talented to not be able to reach their potential. I doubt much will change in-season on that front, but hopefully there will be some re-shuffling of assignments such that a coach (maybe Moore) can give more of his time to this part of the offense.

Quick Hits

• I know some people were annoyed by Michigan's final drive of the first half, but I was legitimately excited to see them nearly steal 3 points after what looked like a drive destined to just run out the clock. After Haskins picks up 18 yards on 3rd-and-1, nobody would have been surprised if they had simply run out the clock. But instead they threw a ball to DPJ who, honestly, should have ran out of bounds instead of trying to fight for more yards and burning 10-15 seconds off the clock. They then picked up a first down and were in a position to throw a prayer to the endzone. It didn't work out but an Iowa penalty got them one final Nordin FG attempt from 58 yards that missed by only a bit. It was encouraging to see Michigan seize on an opportunity and try to move the ball downfield, and hopefully that continues because stealing possessions/points in some of these upcoming games will be key.
• Offsetting penalties where one is mostly procedural and two others are rather substantial (personal foul and holding) always drives me crazy, and apparently I'm not alone. I get that you can't "ignore" bad actions by both sides, but Iowa getting another free punt return because somebody got pushed out of bounds and then came back in to make the tackle shouldn't negate what happened during the return. I know it's part of the game and a minor annoyance, but it's like when a team gets a big third-down conversion because the ball was so underthrown the cornerback ran into the receiver. Some context should always be applied to penalties.
• Michigan picked up 3 holding penalties on Iowa and probably still got robbed a half-dozen more times. The defensive line really worked over the entire Iowa offensive line, and injuries and all that aside they dominated in a way that should be replicable against lines like PSU's and MSU's. And don't look now but Michigan is averaging 3 sacks per game, basically the same number as they had last year and this year they had to deal with playing an Army team that rarely gave them opportunities. Don Brown is absolutely generating a pass rush by different means than last year, but the results remain about the same.
• Kirk Ferentz didn't have a ton of opportunities to do Four Loco Ferentz things, but that timeout to set up an Oliver Martin "FU" fade was college football at its best.

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Next Week

It's Illinois. They're probably better than Rutgers, but are also down their starting QB (Peters) and just gave up 333 yards rushing to Minnesota. Hopefully Michigan makes quick work of the Illini and can focus on the following week against PSU; I'd like to see both Milton and McCaffrey get sustained drives if the game is settled early on.