Hoke: Nebraska players "wrong" about offense predictability
November 11th, 2013 at 2:04 PM ^
November 11th, 2013 at 2:05 PM ^
Yeah, I'm pretty sure they backed up their claims on the field coach.
November 11th, 2013 at 2:05 PM ^
That Fitz is going to run the ball, you probably are predictable.
November 11th, 2013 at 3:23 PM ^
Runs by Fitz, Green, DG (including scrambles): 13
Pass: 9
While still favoring the run, it's less than 60% run on first down. It's pretty balanced actually and was 50-50 going into the 4th (not sure what happened in the 4th).
November 11th, 2013 at 3:33 PM ^
It's not about run/pass predictability, Michigan tips their plays by not diverting from what they do from each formation. They scream scissors and the defense responds with a rock. The one drive in which Borges dared to do different resulted in a touchdown, and with it went all smart adjustments.
November 11th, 2013 at 3:54 PM ^
I don't mind people saying logical complaints. Plenty to complain about after that performance. Don't need people to make things up on top of it.
November 11th, 2013 at 2:09 PM ^
My eleven year old was frequently calling the play before the ball was snapped. But he was the QB for his Pee Wee team and likely smarter than most of Nebraska.
November 11th, 2013 at 2:10 PM ^
November 11th, 2013 at 2:22 PM ^
tread lightly
November 11th, 2013 at 6:36 PM ^
Seriously? Grow up.
November 11th, 2013 at 9:23 PM ^
November 11th, 2013 at 3:17 PM ^
Listening to the WHOLE game in your office? I recommend more fiber in your diet...
Or less.
November 11th, 2013 at 3:11 PM ^
Now if you're calling out off tackle right, inverted veer, PA pass corner-post combo to gallon then Michigan really is predicable. And you should probably be coaching football...
November 11th, 2013 at 4:53 PM ^
For more than half the runs I wasn't just calling out the run, I was able to call the the intended direction and holes. As an example, that set where they come out with a FB/TE tight stack on one side, shift them to the other, and then run away from the FB/TE. Consequently, NB seems to know that play as well as I did and oversold the weak side every time resulting in stuffing the play.
Every once in a blue moon the actual play was a misdirection, but it was rare and as a defense, once you saw the misdirection play, you could pretty much bank on the next 5-6 plays being completely straight forward. And that's part of the problem. The flow of the plays that Borges calls are completely predictable. When the announcers are on TV running down Borges tendancies and they are playing out on the field completely the same way, you have a problem.
November 11th, 2013 at 5:40 PM ^
Frankly, the only drive that wasn't considerably predictable was the first one of the second half. You know, where they scored convincingly.
I'll hand it to their secondary - they actually did a decent job of locking up our receivers. It really seems like Gardner has okay pass protection against teams not called State. But the line collapses in designed power runs, and it's embarrassing to see that much fail on one line.
November 11th, 2013 at 2:08 PM ^
Not that anyone cares about my emotions regarding Hoke's quotes.
November 11th, 2013 at 2:15 PM ^
on being "made"
November 11th, 2013 at 2:54 PM ^
I am still made about it though.
November 11th, 2013 at 2:08 PM ^
i don't understand : nebraska said they knew what was coming, they did in fact know what was coming, they then stated the obvios and somehow they were wrong? i think brady need to learn what "wrong" means.
November 11th, 2013 at 2:24 PM ^
Well, to be fair, it's easy for the Nebraska players to say that after the fact.
November 11th, 2013 at 6:58 PM ^
November 11th, 2013 at 9:28 PM ^
November 11th, 2013 at 9:30 PM ^
Yes it is very easy for them to say it after the fact, because they were very effective in shutting us down. Based on their previous poor performances on defense throughout the season they must have known something.
November 11th, 2013 at 9:31 PM ^
double post
November 11th, 2013 at 3:26 PM ^
The statement was never made as a "look how predictable Michigan was and that's why we knew it". This statement is made after opposing defenses stop offenses quite often. They say it basically to say how prepared they were by their defensive staff.
During the game I could guess and equal amount of plays (which was never even close to 100%) from Nebraska as I could Michigan. Both were equally "predictable", meaning, I had a decent idea of what the team was going to run. That goes with both offense and defense for both teams.
November 11th, 2013 at 3:37 PM ^
Just stop. You know way more about football terminology and teaching technique than I ever will, but if you don't think Michigan's play calling was predictable than you can have fun on your small island. Nebraska may be predictable but they did different things post snap. And they aren't the gold standard offensively anyway, but they still came through with almost half their offense injured. I'd love to have your seeming optimism bottled up since anyone who legitimately questions the play calling doesn't know what they're talking about.
November 11th, 2013 at 3:47 PM ^
Nebraska had their third string freshman QB running the point for them and a host of important players on the injured list. They were predicatable as well, and as you would expect they would be. Anyone who didn't see Nebraska running option to the weak side where they had numbers to take the lead wasn't paying attention to Nebraska's play calling previous to that play.
November 11th, 2013 at 4:15 PM ^
These are all 1st and 10 plays when the game was within 1 score either way. Name what the playcall was:
1. Butt is in a wing position, Williams at Y-TE. Gallon stacked behind Gallon
2. Gallon on top, Butt at Y-TE, Dileo in the slot and I believe Funchess down off the screen.
3. Funchess at bottom, Williams at Y-TE, Gallon on top.
4. Houma at wing, Paskorz at Y-TE. Funchess on top, Gallon on bottom.
5. Paskortz at one TE, Butt at the other. Funchess down on the bottom, Gallon in motion to the top.
Without going back through the game, tell me which play was run in each of these situations. Then tell me how you know. This is even giving you an advantage as you've already watched the game.
November 11th, 2013 at 5:19 PM ^
Cool i'll play.
1. Pass to either Gallon or Funchess
2. read option probably a Devin keeper.
3. Power up the gut probably a loss
4.it's hard to tell but i'm going to say play action.
5. Play action
Do i win a cookie?
I'm not really 100% sure. I'm betting if i knew how the DB's where playing on run vs. Pass I'd be able to get 80%. I'm not football wizard by any means but i know that most of the running plays i saw ran into blitzing linebackers. I also remember one of nebraskas defensive fronts looked like they had 10 men in the box and i was screaming please dont run into that and then michigan ran into it.
November 11th, 2013 at 5:23 PM ^
Honestly it doesn't matter what the play call is because the defense could go Madden and run the same defense every play and get great results 80% of the time. A double a gap blitz kills just about every Michigan play be it pass or run.
November 11th, 2013 at 5:39 PM ^
And, FWIW, you were 3/5 run vs pass (interesting that on 1st down, Michigan ran the ball ~60% of the time). Of those 3 you got right, you were only half right on all of them (even without being very descriptive).
November 11th, 2013 at 5:44 PM ^
interested in facts, SC. They just aren't. You can do this until you're blue in the face.
November 11th, 2013 at 8:03 PM ^
Was going to say the same thing. Have to admire SC for swimming upstream against this torrent of BS and self-appointed gurus with their genius wives and children.
November 11th, 2013 at 9:41 PM ^
November 11th, 2013 at 9:49 PM ^
It really doesn't go that far beyond the OL issues. I think the other position groups are getting better and improving. I think that improvement is heavily masked by the ineptitude of the OL is pass pro. I talk about it quite a bit in the link in my signiture (including some Borges criticism of my own).
November 11th, 2013 at 10:36 PM ^
November 11th, 2013 at 11:24 PM ^
But it doesn't look to me like they're simply slow getting to the spot, it looks like they are mentally confused which probably gets more back to the individual drills and how they are drilling those than what they are doing in the O vs D portions of practice. But it could be part of it to an extent maybe.
November 11th, 2013 at 6:46 PM ^
So some guy on a message board gets 60% right, imagine how many the Nebraska coaches and players get right. Congrats, you've proved yourself wrong.
November 11th, 2013 at 6:48 PM ^
Yeah, a guy was 60% right if a play was a run or a pass and never said exactly what the play call was. What do you think the plays are that were run (I bet you'll go watch the game and look for these). What are they give aways for each? You don't even know your own argument anymore. You've just looked at my profile and responded to things I've written today. Congrats. You're a troll.
November 11th, 2013 at 6:50 PM ^
What does that make you? A troll with a platform?
For what its worth, I've thought you wrote an absurd defense of the end of the Penn State game and from then I've kept tabs on what you've wrote. For the most part, you sound like Al Borges is putting money in your pocket.
November 12th, 2013 at 9:34 AM ^
Same here. To me, SC comes across as someone you enjoys the process of the argument, and who eventually beomes a little blind to the big picture.
What your pictures DO NOT SHOW is what the game situation was. There were stretches of the game where UM was compeltely predictable. And UM was much more predictable by down and distance.
While your general point is somewhat true - that Borges' offense is likely less prredictable than many of us are saying, you are too far in the other direction of calling it normally-predictable.
November 12th, 2013 at 10:20 AM ^
And the game was within a single score and they were end of the half situations. These are all standard downs and distances and were explained in my post.
I've also said they may lean slightly more on tendencies than other teams, but it is hardly much more. If they do that, it's only because their TEs are not prepared to be diverse enough yet to handle all the assignments correctly.
Trust me, it'd be much easier for me to just blindly follow others, this isn't about just arguing a point. People are arguing their points incorrectly and with false logic and false information. People have claimed knowing the exact play 90% of the time. People have claimed that Michigan runs on first down the vast majority of the time (less than 60% on normal down situations actually). People have made all these claims, and they're simply lies. It's people seeing what they want to see. I bet if people went back and watched the game without a preconceived notion of Borges and watched the game with some objectivity, they would see that the things they are claiming are false.
The point above was to point that out, and I think I did because, despite listing the situation, no one has been able to take a good stab at what it is and a lot of people are very reluctant to do so because they know that they can't really back up their claim.
November 11th, 2013 at 8:04 PM ^
The give aways where personel and the look of the defense. I guessed if the DB's where playing off they expected pass and if the DB's where on the line then it was a run. Thats the reason i said... 4. i think was play action because one db was up and the other was off.
A huge percentage of our pass plays go to Gallon or Funchess and when we bunch WR's it's usually a pass. Not hard to guess that .
November 11th, 2013 at 7:58 PM ^
I got most of from your previous point where you tried to drive point home that michigan did pass on first down, so i figured you'ld put more pass plays than run plays. I'm not one of those guys who disects plays obviously. I know that MSU and Nebraska both blitzed 60-70% of their defensive plays. If i'm an offensive coordinator i'm doing everything i possibly can to avoid the blitz or use to my advantage. Borges did neither, well cept for the screen to Funches and Fitz which both got pretty nice gains.
November 11th, 2013 at 8:06 PM ^
I think 3 times. It worked once. That is a play that is directly set up to attack the void left by blitzing players. As I've said, the fact that defenses don't need to respect deep routes because they know their blitzes can get home means that they sit right in the hip pocket of all the short routes without respecting the deep stuff.
If I was a DC I'd blitz and have stunts up the interior most of the time too, because there are very few things that can be called to beat it with Michigan's poor OL play.
FWIW, I would like more screens as well.
And also, my point of the pictures wasn't to try to trick people. I actually appreciate you answering. The point was to show all the people that said things were obvious to take a nuetral down and distance and show people why plays aren't so easily tipped. Sure, there are tendencies, and there are tendencies in the plays above as well. Some of which, if you look at the tendencies, you will get the answers rigth. But that's not the point, the point is that tendencies don't make it a sure thing, far from it. And while you can guess many plays and have a decent idea of what may happen, you can't sell out of it because it's not that simple.
November 11th, 2013 at 7:00 PM ^
1. Pass. Two man cover 3 beater, dig/seam combo, a rub of some sort
2. inverted veer
3. PA pass. Gallon go, Funchess post/seam read
4. Zone stretch/outside zone
5. Power to Funchess's side.
November 11th, 2013 at 7:02 PM ^
You were correct 2/5 times as far as run to pass. Of those two times you were right with 1 and not with the other.
November 11th, 2013 at 7:28 PM ^
In your blog post, you mention something about how one needs to be able to roll to both sides.
Considering strengths/weaknesses of rolling to each side, do you find there are different routes/throws available on each roll? How about rolling to the field or boundary?
November 11th, 2013 at 7:39 PM ^
You don't want routes that force a QB to throw back across his body. You also don't want to run routes that don't allow for good footwork/mechanics. So, for instance, it's unrealistic to do a full roll and expect to throw a seam because you can't get your front hip/shoulder upfield.
Some also depends on if you're rolling from under center or from shotgun because that dictates your path to a degree (such as depth, etc).
Now, my point on that was that in gun, it is actually easier to throw to the sideline rolling to your non-throwing arm side. It is probably easier throwing something like a hitch or a snag (where you run a slant and out) that ends up being even with the QB laterally to your throwing arm side. Things that require touch, such as a fade or wheel, tend to always be easier to your throwing arm side because it's hard to throw touch with a closed shoulder (which tends to happen when you roll away from your throwing arm).
You can roll to boundary or field. A lot of that will depend on defensive tendencies. Do they like to blitz the field/boundary corner? You don't tend to like rolling into that blitz because often it doesn't give the play time to develop. But, sometimes if a team put more bodies field but is trusting their zone to the backside, you'll want to roll boundary because you have a numerical advantage. Rolling boundary will also shorten the throw for your QB and often make your QB more of a run threat because it's less likely to have a defender filling the alley, but it also means taht defenses can roll coverage quicker and make the windows much smaller. On the flip side, the field has more room to cover and more potential for different route concepts. But you are also more likely to have pressure in your face or more defenders to that side.