The question:
So, my dear Harbaugh doubters and Maryland player drafters, how have your expectations changed for this year?
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The responses:
David: Starting last New Year's Day, I think I backed the idea that M was going to go 8-4 with a probable ceiling of 10-2. As M landed RuDock and Brian UFRed most of his 2014 games -and, admittedly, the Drake Harris hype train hit full steam ahead- I was getting confident in 9-3. Harris hasn't hit it big, yet, and RuDock is still coming along. But that defense looks, no, IS...really frickin' good, man. I thought they would be better than the past few years, but they could be the best M has had in quite a while. I wasn't too discouraged after Utah, but said to my buddy, as we walked away from the game, that I thought BYU would be the big measuring stick to tell us how we'd developed over the next month. I'm going to say that Michigan passed.
The rest of the league? Maybe not so much. Teams with good coaches grow and get better. And that could happen in a couple of places but not that many. Let's see some consistency out of the Penn State OL and Minnesota's offense. Brian mentioned that the Michigan State game looks a lot more tractable and I have to agree. It seems like it might finally be a more even game that its been over the last couple of years, obviously. With Michigan State's line of injuries over the past few weeks and some of their performances looking a tad spotty, despite playing lower level opponents, I am actually starting to like this matchup for Michigan. The Ohio State game? I feel better about it than I did a month ago, but if Ohio State executes to their highest ability, I'm not sure any other team in the country beats them. Obviously, that is a throw-out-the-records Game and just about anything can happen, but those are the types of things that are impossible to predict. If both teams play their best, I think Michigan still gets edged out. Ok, it's official. I have talked myself up to being confident in 9-3 and maybe even a little disappointed in not going 10-2*.
*obligatory mention barring major injuries to very key players: RuDock, G. Glasgow, Butt, Lewis, Peppers.
[after the jump: we jump but maybe not as high as Amara the American]
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Adam: My expectations for the season have changed for the better. At the very least, I'm confident Michigan will beat the teams they're supposed to. That's such a major change from last season that that alone is enough to feel good about, but then when you dig into the stats from some of our rivals the past few weeks, and you look at the win projections from Football Study Hall...
I read that and my brain has a hard time processing it; the output is just HYPE HYPE HYPE. I don't really know what to do with that feeling, but I do know that it's really hard to think logically when that's what your brain's screaming that at you. I didn't tweet much on Saturday because I wasn't sure what to say with gallows humor out of the question; it felt a little like riding a bike with the training wheels removed for the first time. It was incredibly fun to- HYPE HYPE HYPE. Sorry, there it goes again. Anyway, it was really fun to watch a game and be disappointed when the opposition fumbled a snap because it meant Peppers didn't get a sack after coming clean off the edge. I was disappointed in a fumbled snap, and I'm watching Michigan. Incomprehensible.
It's more efficient to list position groups where my expectations haven't gone up than where they have: quarterback and linebackers. Rudock is starting to look about how I expected him to, and the linebackers have been a little disappointing as they've been edged and botched scrape exchanges and taken poor angles more times than I'd like. That's not a condemnation of the linebackers but more a byproduct of having really high expectations heading into the season. That my expectations have been exceeded everywhere else is enough to create a whole lotta HYPE.
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[Eric Upchurch]
Ace: It's hard not to feel confident in this team after last weekend. There was the thrashing of BYU, of course, but there was also the Utah-Oregon game, which simultaneously recalibrated expectations for Michigan and Michigan State.
There are two reasons to think Michigan will do better than the 8-4 record most of us, myself included, predicted before the season. The first is the obvious improvement of the team itself. The blocking is getting better on a weekly basis. The depth and talent at the skill positions—and, in Harbaugh's offense, I'm including blocky/catchy types in that category—suddenly looks quite good. Jake Rudock is slowly but surely finding his footing. The defense will rip your face off. The coaches are adding new wrinkles on a weekly basis that actually make sense and build off previous gameplans in a way that confuses opponents, which is a wild new way to approach the whole endeavor.
The second is that the Big Ten is bad. Ohio State will be great by the time they roll into Ann Arbor, but Michigan State looks beatable, and every other game on the schedule seems like it should be a win. Northwestern's defense is good; their offense can barely move the ball. Minnesota might have to replace Mitch Leidner to spark their offense. Maryland and Rutgers are terrible. Indiana is Indiana. And does anybody believe Penn State can block this defensive line?
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| Mo Hurst vs. Penn State. Think about that. [Upchurch] |
From both Michigan's perspective and a wider, Big Ten perspective, the season is shaping up for the Wolverines to get to nine wins even while absorbing an upset of sorts, and ten wins no longer seems like a huge stretch. I'd still guess Michigan finishes 9-3—there will be a game that reminds us this is a team with some holes in their first year under a new coach—but even that is an improvement over the expectations entering the season, and those rivalry games look a whole lot more interesting than they did this summer, too.
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Seth: My operational wisdom for Michigan football since the very bad thing is expect the worst so you can appreciate the best. That setting has served me well; because of it, today I can wax poetic about a broken Henne and Hart beating Dantonio's first team, and Gardner almost beating Urban's second one. When you spend years giving money to Dave Brandon and the fourth most fun thing that could possibly happen is 67-65 over a Ron Zook outfit you have to go in with a certain mindset.
I've met plenty of Michigan fans who never changed their setting from Bo, more now that I sit next to an actual sports talk radio call-in phone for two hours every week. These people are better equipped for existence in a world where Durkin can recreate Florida's slasher flick defense without a buck, where Drevno can bash people with Ben Braden at guard, and where Michigan can woo one of the NFL's best football coaches back home for love, then be whipping ranked teams by game four.
At the beginning of the season I guessed 8-4, but when a gambling site asked me to choose between 7-5 and 9-3 I took the under "because the universe has to prove it doesn't hate me first." Also because going 5-1 against @Utah, BYU, @Maryland, @Minnesota, Northwestern and @Penn State seemed unlikely. Now Maryland's a disaster and other than a pick-six how exactly are the latter three going to score against Peppers and ten salty friends? Maybe Michigan won't break Indiana's 3rd quarter shutout streak; after 30 minutes I doubt we'll have to.
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| Yes, Mr. Dantonio sir, of course you're the #2 team in the country. Why, who said you're not? Sir? [Rapai] |
I wouldn't say Michigan can beat Michigan State—like a good comrade I burned all my DISRESPEKT fields during the retreat so the Spartans can't use 'em—but, completely hypothetically, if you asked me to make a case for how Michigan could beat one or the other State…
Still 8-4. Too many football things can happen, especially with all these road trips.
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Brian: We're doomed. Northwestern has cut a swath of destruction from the West Coast to Muncie, Indiana, where there is no beer because Brady Hoke has resumed drinking it all. The Hoosiers are undefeated and nearly secured College Gameday for the first time ever. Penn State has only given up ten sacks in one game. Minnesota's tactical delay of game skills are unmatched. Maryland has the best punt returner in the country. Michigan State is almost outgaining directional MAC schools. Ohio State is doing things that are usually reserved for the East Carolinas of the world. Rutgers... we can probably beat Rutgers.
I'll be here all week! Which is more than you can say for any particular Rutgers player, coach, or administrator!
Obviously many things are on the table now for Michigan. The defense appears to be the kind of unit that can paper over big problems elsewhere. In retrospect they almost did against Utah, rampant Utah. Their main issue so far this season was containing Travis Wilson, a pretty mobile spread QB guy. There isn't a team on the schedule that looks like it will even be able to try to replicate his modest success until the Ohio State game. Can Michigan score 20 points against any particular team? Then they will win that game.
The only thing holding me back from big crazy projections is the fact that football is weird and combinatorial math always drags you down. I would be surprised if Michigan lost to any Big Ten team on the schedule other than MSU and OSU, and right now Michigan State looks like a coinflip. I guess to be reasonable I should account for that one game Michigan will play when they punch themselves in the face for 60 minutes. Still looks like 9-3 to me and I'd be more surprised with 8-4 than 10-2.