Upon Further Review 2015: Offense vs Oregon State

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Let me further emphasize the fact that pants are entirely optional when you go with HomeSure Lending. I mean, it's not like Matt has anything against pants. You want to go with pants, you go ahead. If you want to go with a mumu or board shorts or whatever, also fine. He can't see you. Also, excellent rates. He may have wanted me to emphasize that instead of the pants.

But seriously, excellent rates. He's got a ticket offer going for a Michigan football or basketball game. If you're buying a home or refinancing, he's the right guy to call. Also no pants.

FORMATION NOTES: Michigan went heavier in this game. I did not this week but in the future I am going to start specifying H-backs like Butt in this shot:

While TEs lined up next to other TEs are often H-backs in the offense I'm going to reserve the H designation for either the above or instances where there is a tight end near the LOS but tucked inside the edges of the line.

Michigan also had an under-center version of the diamond formations that Oklahoma State and other spread teams started implementing a year or two ago:

Generally the diamond had a tailback with a tight end and the fullback in front of him. In fall camp there was the occasional rumble of these formations featuring all tailbacks. Not yet; that would be something they hold for a tenser outing, I think.

I had no idea what to call this goal line formation with the FB and RB next to each other.

And if I call something "tight bunch" this is generally what I mean:

That's a TE, FB, and WR in the bunch. Harbaugh loves throwing out buckets of formations with 2 RB, 1 TE personnel. In the Utah game this was very frequently a pitch sweep; Michigan broke that tendency in this game by running off-tackle- ish at the bunch.

FWIW, I am designating Houma and Kerridge as FBs and listing all other blocky catchy types as TEs.

SUBSTITUTION NOTES: OL was the same as it was against Utah: Cole/Braden/Glasgow/Kalis/Magnuson. Braden got dinged and left for a play or two; David Dawson entered in his place. That's not a huge surprise but there were a couple rumbles that Blake Bars might be the first guy in the game. That may be the case if a tackle goes out; it's apparently not the case at guard.

QB Rudock; RB was Smith almost the whole way until the fourth quarter, when Isaac and Green got the stress-free time. Isaac did spot Smith at various times in the first three quarters.

WR was the same rotation between Darboh, Chesson, and Harris on the outside. Perry got less time but I think that was more an effect of playing a lot of tight ends than anything else. Moe Ways got scattered snaps as well.

At tight end, every available one played except Khalid Hill. No idea what's going on with him. Fullback was mostly Kerridge until late when Houma came in to impress us all with his running and hair; Kerridge reportedly had a stinger.

[After THE JUMP: we can has manballs?]

OH WELL NOTES: The tape is missing four plays in the third Q. They are a five yard Rudock run that must have been a scramble, a 6 yard Smith run, a 14 yard completion to Chesson, and a one yard Smith run.

I mean I guess by the end they were okay.

It was a bit of a rocky start. They got a lot better, and they got a lot better from week one.

But Oregon State. How much should we take from this?

This isn't the Miami (NTM) and Appalachian State walkovers from last year. Oregon State isn't going to be very good, but we're about to see a huge difference in strength of opponent when UNLV wobbles in here. There's not good and there's NOT GOOD; the Beavers are the former. UNLV is the latter; so were Michigan's two true tomato cans a year ago.

Neither is it time to sing from the rooftops. I mean:

The thought process that linebacker went through is a mystery to all.

I think there's something to what went down, though. By about midway through this game most runs featured at least one Beaver going for the proverbial "ride":

That didn't happen last year, at least not with such consistency, and Michigan played some very bad rush defenses.

But for real I mean Rudock is just…

I mean he's fine. Remember last year's Minnesota game?

No.

Probably for the best. Trust me, then, that if this

CHART

chart is bad, I will take that.

Jake Rudock 2014

Jake Rudock 2015

Rudock was rough to start. By the time he airmailed a third and medium conversion there was a palpable air of discontent in the stadium; just about the instant that happened he settled in and had a solid day. It's worth noting that he had two important potential completions stolen from him by uncalled and quite blatant pass interference. You and everyone else know about the endzone throw to Darboh; the first snap of the game was less obvious but still must-call PI:

the white on top of Darboh's shoulder pads is from two hands draped on him

That is the DB preventing Darboh from leaping for a perfectly-thrown ball.

Michigan's receivers were also spotty in this game. I kind of want to yell WHAT ARE THOOOOOSE at a few routes. Chesson did not adjust to an (possibly intentional) underthrown deep ball until it was way too late, and this one from Harris is just…

…well, they're not on the same page. Harris should probably be running perpendicular to the LOS so he can catch and turn upfield; with the zone guy outside of him chasing the flat route he's not running into danger.

OTOH, I thought this was Rudock's mistake on a good decision by Grant Perry to sit down:

Rudock's leading him into the flat defender and a monster hit; Perry has a shot to turn it up if he gets a YAC-friendly ball there.

But Rudock generally moved Michigan down the field, and now that Butt is drawing extra attention he's proving himself adept at looking for him, then tossing it to the open dude. Rudock's ability to move around in the pocket and find a useful completion was highlighted a few times in this game; this was the most impressive:

That is more along the lines of the guy I saw at Iowa.

And then the pick. Credit to Oregon State: they had this snag triangle dead to rights. Live I thought it was late and inside; on replay it is just a great play from the D. Rudock shouldn't have thrown it; he should have looked at Drake Harris on a post, as the Perry motion caused the safety over there to walk down.

That is the kind of stuff a young QB will fail to notice and is a cost of a new system with a new QB, even if he's old.

But that's not what this game was about.

Hit me. As Michigan was wont to do.

All right then.

So. No, I did not think Braden was racking up a near-perfect day on which he finished with Molk numbers. I mean, I didn't see him biff anything, but as I was counting it up I was like… oh. To be honest, I might have preferred it if these numbers were more, you know, sane.

We'll see how it holds up. Probably not as well as we hope.

It wasn't tested much, but with limited exceptions that were all messed up blitz pickups pass protection was great:

Note the perfect pass protection score from the line; "Team" protection minuses are handed out when the protection itself is broken; most of those came on the fumble. Spielman immediately pointed out that the protection slid the wrong way and that it was likely on Rudock. All other protection minuses were Isaac blocking the wrong guy on a blitz.

I don't have that much to say about individual line members below except Ben Braden, but I thought both tackles had very solid games. Cole was much better in space this week:

That bang-bang double block where you get both guys is A+ and usually a big gainer.  That has something to do with the opponent, no doubt. I bet there's significant, real improvement in there as well.

Could Braden start for OSU?

Dang it, Spielman, you gotta go and kill your cred with Michigan fans with that stuff? You're not helping me convince everyone you're the best, which you are.

No, he could not, at least not until we see him do these kind of things against big and mean guys. I do think I understand why Spielman thought that in this game, where Braden's size and ability to pull surprisingly fast made him look real good. Without Utah's DL stealing his lunch money you got a Tarzan-lookin' guy playing like Tarzan.

The missed Smith cut I cited above is an excellent example of Braden thinking on the fly; this game also featured a few pulls on which Braden had a decision to make because the edge wasn't set well. I thought he got it right every time. When things opened up to the interior he got to the POA really fast:

IIRC that was a lot quicker than anything we saw last year from anybody.

And nobody beat him up or put him in the backfield. This, too, is real progress. I can't tell you how many clips I had from early last year against real tomato cans in which Braden was getting blown past. It is entirely possible he has made a step forward that was obscured by the fact that he can't hang with Lotulelei types yet. That would be bad against OSU and MSU, but good against the rest of the schedule.

Next week hopefully won't tell us anything. BYU will be the test, especially if their NFL NT is still out. Otherwise it might be a bad time again.

DE'VEON SMITH IS ALL OUT OF BUBBLEGUM WOO

This game is an example of why De'Veon Smith is the most Harbaugh-friendly back on the roster. He had a punishing, grinding day.

Two of his touchdowns featured him running through DBs' tackles as if he barely noticed them, as did multiple non-touchdowns. This was in fact the run I asked Ace for when I wanted a slice of Smith hyperviolence:

I wanted it because it was eerily similar to the GIF that symbolized what we were hyped up about when Smith was a recruit:

He started delivering on his Hart-but-angry promise in this game, by far the best of his career. I'm beginning to love the thing where someone grabs onto his back and Smith goes into high-stepping, this-is-why-I-run-with-a-parachute-on mode.

Smith's vision was good. There were a couple of big missed lanes against Utah* but other than that it was hard to tell much about his adaptation under Harbaugh and Wheatley because his options were limited. When you get guys dumped in your lap you generally have one direction to go: down.

This went in the opposite direction. On some plays he could have done just about anything and gotten a chunk. Where is the right way to go here?

Yes. Yes is the right way to go.

Still, I thought there were a number of plays on which he did encouraging things, starting from his first carry:

That's a bit awkward as Braden and Cole end up swapping spots to deal with a stunt; Smith doesn't take the bait outside and finds the crease inside the tackle, where he gets a nice gain that would be more if Butt—who didn't have a good day—gets much of anything on the closest linebacker.

Smith started popping outside the tackles some; when he did it was usually just outside and a good idea. Hey, man, if they give you the edge you gotta take it. What I'd like to see more of is Smith setting up his blocks when that's necessary. Great backs will make their own blocking by feinting one direction with a single step and then cutting hard just behind the block they've set up. Smith did a good job of that on the first snap of the spring game.

Smith was not perfect, and this showed up a bit more on zone stuff. Here Michigan catches a slant away that disrupts Braden's ability to even release, let alone get to a linebacker. Here it is in SloMo SatanVision:

This could probably be its own Picture Pages, but in brief: if this DL was in this gap pre-snap you would want the OL to "scoop" him. Basically, Cole would hit him inside and Braden would step around and then you could hit that LB with Cole. Since this is a slant and M isn't running a stretch that's not realistic.

Braden does a good job here to not run aimlessly at a guy he cannot get to; instead he helps laterally displace the slanting DE. There's a crease for Smith on the interior that is a big chunk run; he misses it. It's not the worst result—three yards on second and four—but it is a missed opportunity. It's possible he grows into that as we go along here with Wheatley; it's possible he never gets particularly good at that, in part because Michigan isn't going to be giving him a ton of zone reps.

Anyway.

There wasn't much of note from running backs other than Smith. Isaac blew a pass protection or two and had that one nice run on which an arm tackle slowed him up enough to notice the gaping hole to his left. Green mostly got what his blocking provided him. Drake Johnson just had the one carry, and while you don't want to overstate its impact it was a contrast with Smith:

There is a 1% chance that brings Smith down. If you can deliver him three yards downfield… you're gonna have a good time.

*[I pointed a couple of these out in last week's offensive UFR and got some pushback in the comments. If you don't believe me, believe De'Veon Smith:

"I know one of those plays I missed a hole that a bus could drive through," he said Tuesday. "That was one of the bigger ones that kind of stuck with me — got under my skin."

But if the last few years have proven anything it's that literally any criticism will have black knights quixotically defending against it. C'est la vie.]

You were a little overhyped about AJ Williams on Monday.

I was, but he still had a good outing. Many of the blocky/catchy guys matched it. I think the sentimental thumbs up is metaphysically warranted.

This was perhaps the area of biggest improvement. Poggi looked pretty good a week after standing out as a guy who struggled; Williams was consistently moving guys. This third and one conversion is salvaged by Williams banging a guy back and staying attached:

You can say that's "just Oregon State" all you want and I won't listen. Against anyone, that is progress. Williams even caught a pass well downfield. It is probably too early to be thinking about what could have been if he'd been with Harbaugh for four years, but… I mean…

As mentioned above, Butt was the most inconsistent guy on the day by some distance. His second level blocks were poor against guys that Cole and Magnuson were engulfing; you expect some issues since he is not an OL, sure. He should at least annoy dudes. This in particular was disappointing:

Two point stance, guy moving inside him, difficult to do that much there. But rule #2 in the MGoBlog Layman's Rules Of Blocking is "stay attached at all costs."* Smith is cutting backside; if Butt is even annoying this DE there's a good chance Smith can cut again and then get loose. Butt's expecting a kick and does not get it; the difference between the Picture-Paged iso that goes for six yards and Smith getting obliterated in the backfield is staying attached. Run at him, cut him in the midsection: do something, anything.

He's still a lot better than Funchess. He had multiple blocks on which he moved guys who ended up relevant to the play.

He also got an extended block on the backside of Smith's TD run that opened it up:

He's usually plausible; sometimes he is worse and sometimes he is better. With the pass threat he brings it's enough. Would still like to see him improve as we go along here.

He also opens things up for everyone else. That fourth down conversion opened up because three Oregon State guys freaked out about Jake Butt:

This was a theme.

*[#1 is, of course, "never turn upfield."]

Any hints of the coming Stanfordization?

Moreso in this game than in previous ones. We saw more pre-snap frippery, including a post-lineup tackle over flip:

I'd feel a little better about proclaiming that a win if Cole had gone forward on his block, but the OSU D ends up in a weird alignment that provides Joe Kerridge nobody to block once the play pops outside, so chalk one up for Harbaugh.

We also saw a few traps. The blocking was borked on a couple but this one was a block away from blowing up big:

It is mandatory that when football coaches talk about the trap they sigh wistfully about how it's a lost art. Harbaugh loves him some traps. They're the manball equivalent of those midline options where a DT is set free up the middle and gets read. These days DEs are very suspicious when nobody tries to kill them; DTs are more susceptible to the innocent joy of "oh boy I'm gonna sack em".

It is a lost art. I can count the number of trap plays I've seen Michigan run on one hand even after this game.

Michigan also incorporated fullback dives, one of which saw OSU bust directly in the hole:

Probably just that guy screwing up, but the meme after the game that Michigan's fatality of a final drive was just power over and over again wasn't quite right. It was a lot of power; it mixed in things to keep the opponent off balance.

And finally, we saw a sizeable amount of an under-center version of that "diamond" set a lot of Big 12 spread teams like Oklahoma State have been deploying.

The diamond gives no indication as to where your run strength is and lets you apply three new blockers (the two lead guys and a puller), two of whom can build up a nice head of steam before they impact anyone. It also lets you do spread-like hijinks where you set guys up for easy blocks. Check the rearmost highlight there. That's Poggi; Poggi sets up as if he's going to block that end and then jets by him; end lunges and Kalis is now hitting a sitting duck.

Early yet but I like that Michigan is setting out to confuse guys, and that we've seen them diversify in week two.

Receivers?

A mundane day. Nothing even close to a circus catch, only two passes even filed as moderately difficult, and no drops. A couple route minuses were significant: Chesson's OPI was salvaged but frustrating at the time, and the Harris issue mentioned in the Rudock discussion above contributed to early offensive sputters.

[0 = uncatchable, 1 = circus catch, 2 = moderate difficulty, 3 = routine]

Worth a short discussion: Jehu Chesson. He's a consistently good blocker, but the inability to adjust to the deep ball and the OPI give you an indication of why he's struggled to become a major target despite his evident speed. He's just not consistent enough.

Heroes?

All OL minus Glasgow, but especially Cole and Braden. Smith.

Maybe not so heroic?

Chesson. The refs. Rudock was iffy early, and Glasgow had an off game.

What does it mean for UNLV and the future?

UNLV gon' die. Sometimes they play a 230 pound guy at NT.

Maybe the Utah struggles were partially new system stuff. No idea which is the more realistic picture; probably we end up somewhere in the middle, steadily ticking towards competence.

Ben Braden doesn't want to go on the cart. Let's see him against BYU. Will be fascinating.

Outside WR is weak past Darboh. Consistent routes are rare. Wouldn't mind some flanker Butt.

De'Veon Smith is a HarBack. For real though. Get this man to a place where a DB is supposed to tackle him and watch the limbs fly. As he develops in the system his vision should improve. The fumble is currently not a high priority issue.

Blocky/catch could be an asset. They were good all around, and deep.

Rudock is settling down a bit. The last three quarters he was pretty good.