Rutgers Snowflakes: The Offense

BTW, JJ and Donovan Edwards are amazing leaders.  Immediately coming out of the half you could see they were walking the sideline with tons of energy, hugging and pumping up their teammates.  Edwards was energizing the crowd from the sideline (and with his play!).  Leaders and Best.

My biggest concern with losing Gattis was not losing him as our OC but rather that he was a great WR coach, both from a recruiting and development perspective. I think we’re pretty clearly seeing the impact of losing him. 

Is Cade McNamara still with the team?  I thought his injury was a 3 weeker, but that was like 8 weeks ago.  He obviously didn’t go in last night.

The thing I don't like - watching this game and previous games - is how rarely we get pass plays to open receivers. This is highly unusual for a team that boasts a fearful and oft-used rushing attack because quite frankly an opponent would be silly to not focus on stopping the run first. This should generate opportunities for easy big plays through the air - because it's not like we have a useless QB who can't throw or an O-Line that can't protect. And yet it seems the vast majority of passes McCarthy throws are contested or at least to a receiver with a DB right on his ass.

That either means the receivers suck at route-running, the timing of these plays is completely off, McCarthy throws to the wrong guys or the offense is so predictable opponents can reliably anticipate Michigan's passing plays. It's certainly one of those things that make you wonder.

It’s becoming clearer that the receivers are a problem.  We’ve been quietly playing true freshmen for a few snaps a game at WR, which seemed weird given how difficult the position is for freshmen and how supposedly loaded the receiver room was.  Well, now we can see why: that room is not loaded at all.  Sure some dudes have flashes here and there but at some point you are what you produce, and they produced very little.  Hopefully Walker a will be a step up.