Know Your Notre Dame Football Enemy: The Michigan Wolverines

https://slapthesign.com/2019/07/30/know-your-notre-dame-football-enemy-michigan/

A Notre Dame blog is criticizing Michigan of being "everyone's sweetheart" sleeper CFP pick?

I see no irony there whatsoever...

Ah, Damefan1, how I missed ya.

That was brutal. Don't waste your time. It was written by a high schooler.

Completely ignores the hiring of a radically different offensive coordinator.

I read about 3 sentences and closed the article. The writer has no clue what he is talking about.

The author is one of these guys and while I'm not sure which one is Dan but it really doesnt matter.  I read the article and if you want to read something that is devoid of any analysis, football knowledge and dredges up every anti-Michigan cliche you've ever heard then you've come to the right place.  

This was written by a teenager who's a Notre Dame fan.  Nothing more and certainly a whole lot less.

I usually read opposing fan articles and to an extent agree with their takes and can see where they are coming from when they predict a victory over Michigan. Not that I always agree, but usually it’s well thought out and they make good points. This is not that at all. This is extremely poorly written and there is no analysis what so ever. 0/10 would never read anything from this author again. 

Fun read! 

Hope we drop 50 on em!

Wow, what’s the point of posting such an obviously biased and pointless article. Last year I went to “One Foot Down” to get NDs view of Michigan and while I thought at that time that they were being optimistic (obviously weren’t) at least they were fair. This article just want to take swipes at Harbaugh at every opportunity 

"Once again, Michigan is confident they’ve found a way to score more than 20 points a game. I’ll believe it when I see it."

Michigan averaged 35 points a game last year.  People who don't watch or study football should not write about football.

Snarky article.  Not all that insightful or even thoughtful.  How does he predict a score when they will have 5-6 games under their belt before they meet?  There's a lot that can happen before the game.

DameFan1 at his finest.

I was expecting informative analysis. But the endless hottakes nearly melted my screen so I had to quit reading. 

Maybe its bias hope, but I fully expect the passing game to be the strongest part of this team. This is college football not the NFL. Put the guys with the most talent in a position to succeed. Thats what Harbaugh did by bringing in Gattis. 

Always a good sign for the quality of your research when you fail to name last season's sack leader (and #3 in TFLs) when discussing how the defensive line will need to replace lost pass rush.  Reading articles like this from (admittedly shitty) sites like Fansided-branded blogs further illuminates just how good the quality of analysis and effort is put in here.  

That said, he isn't wrong in the sense that Michigan has some questions, especially on offense.  But it may shock ND fans to learn that on a per-play basis last year UM averaged 6.09 ypp while ND averaged only 6.0 ypp, and their S&P+ ranking (25) was higher than ND's (34).  So yes, Michigan has somewhere to go to be an elite offense, but acting like ND was some juggernaut is just selective homerism.

It'll be a good game, and I think ND is probably the 2nd or 3rd best team on the schedule, but they went 5-0 in one-score games last year and that's probably not a level of luck you can rely on.  Them coming back to earth even a little bit will hopefully bring about the return of ND fans bitching about Brian Kelly and all of the usual tropes about morality and not being able to compete with other programs that bend the rules.

flat like hotcakes..... not not takes.

I can do a better job than that kid about ND just from listening to podcasts.

Irish homers think

—they have a top 5 receiver unit -tho they are thin on experience past the top 3.  They think their new #1 has a chance to be a top 2-3 WR in the country.  (Maybe a CB problem instead?)

—the DE position is Sooo good that the 3rd string on ND would start at many programs

— still think of Book as a game-manager that needs to improve the deep ball

— Are extremely thin on experience at LB particularly ILB but feel that the OLBs have more physical ability than ND has had in years.  Most experienced LB is Asmar Bilial -who they feel similar to how M fans felt about Joe Bolden...- at 90+ career tackles has 60 MORE tackles than the rest of the LB room COMBINED.  (I forget all the names of the other ILBs but one reminded me of a more talented Mike McCray with similar injury history and another of a less athletic Desmond Morgan..)

- They are thin at DT -reminded me a bit of M -  (memory getting really fuzzy here) have 2 deep at 3-tech but not much experience and NT was of note to me that they said an injury to a non-EE frosh meant he would no longer get the significant PT they expected in 2019.

— Also thin at CB (at least in the Spring due to injuries) - Howard Griffith’s son was a starter in the Spring and a very homer podcast team noted he was “a great run stopper for a CB” and might need Safety help.

Much like the linked article above - these professional podcasts (Tied to either their Rivals or 247 sites) had the same gripes about the over-hype of M and more exposure than warranted —-pot - kettle - etc.   (way to be self aware ND!)

Exactly why I can't stand Notre Dame, they have got to be the most bias and blinded fan base. I worked with a huge ND fan once and that sounded exactly like he was writing it! "There’s no way they have explosive plays against Alohi Gilman and Jalen Elliot." I heard something similar the year Denard drove the field and scored the game winner in 2010, the quote then was "Not this year" Irish eyes were cryin that day!

About the crazy prediction on Michigan's offense in the ND game....  The mind boggles.  It's either:

1. Deliciously subtle sarcasm lost on all of us;
2. Writer is grossly misinformed & didn't bother to do a single shred of research on the entire subject of his article;
3. Is aware of Gattis but thinks by the ND game, the Gattis experiment will have failed and/or will fail early in the game, thus predicting that Harbaugh will go into lizard brain mode & try grind down ND manball style;

Based on the rest of the article, I don't think it's #1. If it were #3, he would have likely used a sentence or two to lay out all that lead-up analysis to the reader.

Going with door #2, Bob.  What do we win? 

Dumb slappies who can't write. Next.

We never should have agreed to play in South Bend 2 times in a row. After we beat them this year - To hell with Notre Name