Real Kato Blog: More Michigan Self-Flagellation

I'm a masochist... just like mgoblog. So I have to keep thinking about that dang game.

After going through mgoblog's "under further review" piece, where they break down every play of the game, I can pinpoint the problems in Michigan's effort more concretely. Why would I want to do this? Because, obviously, I hate myself.

Let's look at the defense first. I think the most crucial play of the game came early, when Appalachian State scored a 68-yard touchdown to tie the game 7-7. Michigan had just marched down the field, and if ASU had been forced to punt, it might have lowered their spirits and made them doubt themselves. But instead, scoring a tying touchdown probably inspired them to believe that they could really win the game.

On that fateful play, ASU line up five wide receivers. Michigan had five defenders in man coverage, along with four down linemen, one middle linebacker spy, and one deep safety. So far, so good; I'd say this is a pretty good base defense against a five-wide spread. On the left side of the play, Johnny Sears was lined up against the wideout, ASU's Dexter Jackson. Linebacker Chris Graham was lined up against the slot receiver.

Umm, but here's something peculiar. Johnny Sears creeps up to the line to play press coverage. Was that a designed shift, or did he make the decision on his own? Who knows. But if you go up to play press coverage, you must jam the receiver at the line. If you do not, you are done. And Johnny Sears did not make his jam.

Once Sears fails to make the jam, the receiver makes the catch in front of him. Obi Ezeh is too far away to make a play. Chris Graham has been taken deep by the slot receiver. It is up to free safety Stevie Brown to make the saving play. He's in good position at first...

but oh noes, all fall down. Or in technical terms: Stevie Brown takes a bad tackling angle, and doesn't break down properly. He loses his balance, and it's all over after that. By the way, ASU's Jackson runs a 10.5 100-meter dash, making him one of the fastest receivers in the country. Including Division 1-A, including the SEC.

So on that play, I think the play calling and the scheme were sound; it was poor execution by the secondary that doomed us. And the really bad thing is, that play probably made Ron English assume that he couldn't rely on a single deep safety to stop big plays. That would kill us in other ways on subsequent drives... like, on ASU's fourth touchdown drive, in the second quarter.

Here, English has put out two safeties, four down linemen, and five guys in man coverage... leaving no one in the short middle of the field for run support or middle zone coverage.

Two defensive linemen stunt to the weak side. Seven defenders drop back in coverage, with four on three on the strong side and three on two on the weak size. So as long as the defensive linemen can contain the quarterback, we are golden. But oh noes... Jamison falls after being roll-blocked by the right guard, and linebacker John Thompson falls trying to cut back towards the middle.

And now quarterback has broken the line of containment, and there's no run support behind the line. What's worse, now the guard (who took Jamison out of the play) is back up to make a lead block on the secondary.

So we were victimized by this "umbrella" defense that left us with no run support... and maybe, just maybe, we ran a two-deep-safety set because Stevie Brown proved he couldn't be relied on by to provide deep support by himself. As Brian on mgoblog put it: "...Our safeties remain way downfield holding their penises, or, in Stevie Brown's case, trying very hard to grab his penis but falling down and watching it score a touchdown."

And that was the story of the first half. Missed tackles. Defenders falling down. Poor play calling. It was a general disaster. The second half was better, but by then, we'd dug ourselves a hole that was too deep.

So what about the offense, then? I won't break down the individual plays, but take a look at these statistics:

RUN
19% - 0 or negative yards
28% - 1-4 yards
42% - 5-8 yards
11% - 9+ yards

PASS
46% - 0 or negative yards
10% - 1-4 yards
12% - 5-8 yards
32% - 9+ yards

For those who believe we should call more passing plays, take the fact that nearly 46% of our called passing plays went for zero or negative yardage. But 53% of our running plays went for five or more yards, even though ASU was stacked against the run. We are a great running team. Our passing game wasn't at its best on Saturday, but point here is that passing is a gamble... yeah, we had one 24 yard pass to Mathews, and the end-of-the-game bomb to Manningham. But a lot of the time, when we tried to pass the ball, we just ended up putting ourselves in long yardage situations, or we failed to convert on third down. Maybe we should have tried to pass in less obvious passing situations, but I definitely wouldn't say that we needed to pass more than we did.

So look. I'm not a football coach, and neither are most of the pundits out there in the blogosphere. Most bloggers haven't got the faintest idea how complicated it is to craft offensive and defensive schemes. I especially hate the commenters who say "I play Madden 2008 and I could easily call a better game than Mike DeBord". Those are the folks who only know about three kinds of plays: runs, short passes, and long passes. But can they identify the quarterback keys that tell him who the primary receiver should be, and what play he might have to check down to? Can they make the proper offensive line blocking assignment calls based on the defensive line and linebacker sets? Can they identify what read each eligible receiver should make to determine which route to run? Hundreds of thousands of pages of theory have been written about football offenses and defenses. Can any bloggers (besides me, natch) claim to have read more than ten of those pages?

But with that said, you have to look at how passionately and carefully the Michigan blogosphere is dissecting the ASU loss. We have nothing to gain from doing this; there are no lucrative television contracts or professional careers awaiting us. We just love our school and our team, and we just want Michigan to do well. I just hope that our coaches and players are studying the ASU loss as carefully as we bloggers are.

Permalink 2 Comment

Posted by Ken in: sports

Comments

Comment #1 from Amy (Guest)
2007 Sep 10 - 1:35 am : #

Nice post! Ignoring the reason for the post and the content, I enjoyed the frame by frame breakdown with labels on the players - much easier to see what's going on than in real time.

Comment #2 from EaglePecker (Guest)
2007 Sep 12 - 3:07 am : #

If you need a place to vent your hexes and curses.....? As a Georgia Southern University alumni, we hate App St. with a white hot passion. We'll take whatever mojo Carr hasn't sucked out of Big Blue, and you can send it our way. We line up against App St. in October...at their place. If App runs the table and remains undefeated this year...people MIGHT think that a better team beat you and God forbid...Carr stays. A victory for GSU might, in some small way, help you out.

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