Upon Further Review 2013: Offense vs Akron

FORMATION NOTES: Discontent with trying to file plays on which a tight end motions inside of the tackle box but does not line up as a pure fullback as either "ace" or "I-Form," I've created new lingo. This is "Ace H":

Welcome it. It will be your good friend for a long time.

As the coaches mentioned, Akron spent much of the day in bear fronts. That means they folded linebackers inside of their ends at the LOS like so:

I noted this as 6-2 bear. When only one Akron player was folded inside it was 5-3 bear. (On almost all plausible run snaps Akron showed an eight-man front.)

PERSONNEL NOTES: OL was the usual, with Magnuson making his regular goal-line cameo. AJ Williams didn't play and Funchess went out late, paving the way for a lot of Jake Butt and the debut of Jordan Paskorz, runnin' routes with a broken hand.

Green got two snaps, I think, and Justice Hayes was briefly featured as a second back in a shotgun 2-back formation; all he did was pass block. Wideouts were as usual. If you squint maybe you can perceive Chesson getting more time than he has in the past.

Oh: again there was a small Norfleet package. Hopefully as the season goes along "Norfleet is on the field" starts being less than 90% "Norfleet is getting the ball."

[After THE JUMP: wha happen]

ACK

You know, change some parameters here and Michigan is fine.

FALSE. ACK

The biggest parameter is admittedly "starting QB doesn't make the large mistakes that now seem baked into his game."

ACK ACK ACK TTHPPPTH ACK

Oh and some stuff about the line and Toussaint. But we should look at the main man first. Here is a—

ACK TTPPHTHTHTH BLARF

—chart.

Devin Gardner 2012

Devin Gardner 2013

Shane Morris

Dammit. One week after a superlative performance with rushers all up in his face, Gardner gets all wobbly.

Gardner made three mistakes that had a huge impact on the game: not pitching on the speed option and the two interceptions that weren't rifled off of Funchess's head. The first INT was just a terrible read. It's the same play Michigan scored on at the end of the Outback bowl, a route that sees Gallon head inside to a seam area and then break in or out to a corner or post. This is the post, but it doesn't matter which Gallon is breaking to, when that corner sinks with Gallon he should immediately come off and hit Funchess on the crossing route:

I'm torn on the pick six, which is at least half Akron getting a good playcall in and the linebacker making an awesome play. I don't know if you can expect Gardner to see that guy when he's got defensive linemen in his face. He may have had his vision blocked.

The frustrating and crazy thing about the option play is that Gardner saw Akron didn't have a force player to the boundary, checked into the speed option, and then didn't make the obvious pitch he'd seen presnap. Akron's end played it well, backing off and waiting, but there's a moment he commits and Gardner don't curr.

I filed that as a BRX, a BR, and a –4 on the ground for Gardner (mistake plus fumble), FWIW.

Gardner got rattled after the first couple mistakes, pump-faking on a throw to Chesson and then shooting it way over his head, then throwing way late and thus behind an open Gallon to force a Michigan punt.

On the other hand, hey, Devin Gardner can do this:

That was one of three separate 35-yard runs he had. Even with a 12-yard loss for the fumble in there, Gardner ripped off 111 yards on nine carries. (He was sacked once for a ten yard loss). That was the difference between victory and death when everything else was going wrong. Also, Gardner's YPA of 8.2 remained in the excellent range.

But let's move on to the hot line takes.

OH NO. NO NO NO NO—

--wait. What?

Toussaint's day looks a lot better statistically if a phantom holding call on Jake Butt doesn't bring back a 15-yarder and he doesn't nerf a long run himself by running outside of Jeremy Gallon. Oh, and occasionally follows good blocks by his teammates. After the initial issues with zone, Michigan blocked well enough to see their tailback crack 100 yards at an excellent YPC; the tailback just didn't cooperate. Why in just a bit.

The other thing that jumps out is the noobs on the interior…

FIRE MILLER! FIRE GLASGOW! FIRE LEYLAND!

People have been mad about guys on the line in the aftermath of Saturday's game and have been demanding change. Since the tackles are obviously sacrosanct and Kyle Kalis is guru-approved, most of the vitriol has fallen on Miller and Glasgow. The fact that both have been dumped into the backfield periodically doesn't help.

Unfortunately, the issues here are more complicated than sending one or two guys to the unemployment line. As noted in the picture pages, some of the things they're doing don't make sense, and it's hard to tell why. The one about Michigan leaving first-level defenders un-doubled spawned a triple-digit comment thread featuring a lot of infighting about whether this was terrible on the part of Miller and Glasgow or terrible on the part of the coaches/Gardner for not checking away from the doomed play. I don't know.

I do know that if M does double those guys at the line, they are far less exposed to the kinds of TFLs they experienced in the first half of that game until Akron starts shooting gaps, and that not doubling guys on inside zone—which was Michigan's first play of the game—is very bizarre.

But why is Glasgow in the game? Because he executes his assignments more consistently than his competitors. Miller, too. Yes, even if he's badly negative in this one. Maybe Chris Bryant will be a revelation at some point, but every snap those guys take and every one in practice Bryant misses because of nagging injury du jour distances the current starters from their backups. Their issues are serious, but not fixable by anything but time.

In this edition of "here is a subtle thing I think an experienced offensive line might pull off," Miller releases on the Chesson end around and blocks the linebacker nearest to the play:

That turns out to be the wrong guy to block, because Akron's in man coverage and the guy further outside is the one shooting to the backside of the play while the guy Miller blocks is checking Toussaint. Miller looks at both of these dudes and picks the superficially logical one; a deeper understanding of what he's looking at when the playside LB is stepping away from him means might get him to block the guy booking for where the play's actually going. (Coaching types, feel free to tell me this is crazy to expect.)

That kind of stuff is the thing holding back the running game against Akron and CMU. It's turning around in space, or not getting the right double. It's no coincidence that when Michigan's running game turned into see-man-smash-man power plays it (largely) took off. It may turn out that Miller can't hold up against Big Ten linemen and gets replaced, but so much of offensive line play is quick decisions aided by reps and chemistry. A midseason shift brings its own problems.

If you want a little hope in this department, watch Glasgow on one of Gardner's two big inverted veer gains:

Schofield gets pushed back, cutting off Glasgow's route to where the play design is, so Glasgow decides to end that guy and go get him a linebacker. That is one huge crease up the middle all of a sudden and Gardner's off to the races. That's the kind of thing I'm talking about. That kind of instinct under fire is a long-developing thing.

I actually think Michigan has a problem elsewhere…

Fire Toussaint? Surely you can't be serious.

Not exactly Fire Toussaint, but he's really starting to frustrate me. He all but refuses to follow his fullback (again, as noted in the recent Picture Pages) and has turned into Michael Shaw when it comes to any and all options. Here he's already cut to the back side of the line on an iso. Unlike many times he's done this, it works out for him because the guys on the backside have blown their guys back and he evades a tackle attempt—#5 on the ground there.

He takes this ball outside of Gallon. Yup. Instead of cutting right upfield on the M and maybe juking a safety for six points he goes east/west, bringing the sideline into play and turning an irrelevant block by Gallon into a holding call as he blows up that blocking angle. Gallon's blocking an iso to the other side of the field—he can't expect the running back to go behind him.

Meanwhile, this was another iso on that drive:

That is a huge freaking hole. Every one of his offensive lineman has executed his assignment and Kerridge is about to cut the MLB to the ground. Toussaint cuts this to the backside like he did on the frame above; this time he gets tackled by that linebacker hanging out back there, turning a potential big gain into four yards.

We've been trying to figure out why the run game sucks so much basically since the season started, and every time I try to explain this I talk about the offensive line mostly and then go "oh by the way, Toussaint probably should have done something different." Those add up. He's turning 2 yards into –2 yards and 10 yards into 4 yards too often and not making up for it much. He's got a nice 14-yarder against ND and then yet another cutback into trouble when he had a gaping hole that he managed to turn into 22 yards by breaking a tackle and juking. That's it.

Meanwhile on play after play he's killing blocking angles to everyone's detriment. For every play on which the opponent actually overplays the playside enough for the cutback to be the best choice there are three on which he's setting yards on fire. This was the capper, a power play on Michigan's penultimate drive that he cuts back into blood and doom for no earthly reason:

That is a healthy gain if he follows his lead blocker turned into a loss. Michigan would complete a tough eight yard pass on the ensuing third and nine. I know he had a nice day against Notre Dame in the run charting, but if he doesn't break that Day arm tackle he's right around zero for that game with negatives in the two MAC games—you know, the ones in which there were actually holes for him to hit because the line wasn't getting spanked by NFLers.

I don't know if the guy is totally borked after last year's slasher flick, but I sincerely hope Fred Jackson spends the next three weeks screaming at him to follow his lead blocker. Kerridge is wrecking people to no purpose. Fitz needs to stop playing heroball.

FWIW, Green's only carry was a power play on which Kalis made a mistake and got caught up by the playside end crashing inside. He burrowed straight upfield for a few yards instead of heading to the intended gap, which I can understand but do not prefer.

Receivers?

[Passes are rated by how tough they are to catch. 0 == impossible. 1 == wow he caught that, 2 == moderate difficulty, 3 == routine. The 0/X in all passes marked zero is implied.]

This week in Jeremy Gallon is good at football:

Lock-on syndrome does appear to be a thing, and it hurt Michigan on one of the interceptions.

I don't have a table for this, but with Akron in press coverage for big chunks of this game it was strange to see Michigan try to block guys. It turned an otherwise open Chesson end around into two yards when running the DB off* is usually the preferred option. Michigan did that on the doomed option play…

…to good effect, so not seeing it a couple other places was odd. You know they use it.

Speaking of Chesson, welcome to the party. Good to see a few targets his way, especially when he's such a nice guy that opponents actively try to get him touchdowns.

*[IE, immediately releasing outside and running a fly pattern, which will turn the DB's back to the LOS away from the play. By the time the DB realizes it's a run, he's 20 yards downfield.]

Funchess blocked some dudes?

Yeah, he was considerably better in this game. When Michigan ran power Akron was shooting the end inside (playing to "spill"), hoping to get penetration on Funchess and pick off the pulling G. Funchess got the guy inside and held his ground enough to allow the guard around, and Toussaint picked up some nice runs when that happened since Lewan and company were pounding their guys inside. Example:

Watch the H-back.

Funchess also got some nice kicks on iso plays that cut back to him and was the key block on Gardner's inverted veer touchdown. He may have gotten away with a hold, but I'll take Funchess driving a guy six yards off the LOS any way that he can do it. I don't even really blame him for the one ugly block he seemed responsible for, as he was given a tough assignment, trying to seal a DE lined up outside of him on a pitch to the boundary. That's tough for anyone.

Caveat: I do think Akron Isn't Notre Dame is a big factor in his improvement. There's Prince Shembo and then there's a 230-pound defensive end you have to catch because he turned his back to you for no reason.

Funchess also was more involved with the gameplan, catching a 17-yarder and of course turning upfield for a long catch and run on the first drive. An encouraging game that may not mean much against stiffer competition.

Do you have a preview of Khalid Hill's life at Michigan?

Yes!

Heroes?

Glasgow and Kalis consistently bashed in the Akron line. Gardner's legs were hugely important. Gallon was as good as he usually is.

Maybe not so heroic?

Gardner's huge mistakes cost Michigan ten points and depending on your POV of the pick-six maybe another seven. Toussaint gave away a ton of yards by not trusting his blocking. Miller had a rough day.

What does it mean for UConn and the future?

The offensive line wasn't as bad as it looked. They had some identification issues early that hampered things, but they also get credit for blocking the inverted veers and once they adjusted to what Akron was doing they were blowing them up, for the most part. Protection was good, as well. Glasgow had a good game after a tough outing against Nix. If there is a change it will be sliding him to center so Bryant can come in.

Glasgow is ahead of Kalis. That's right, I said it.

Toussaint has PTSD. Poor Damn Toussaint is only a thing still because he assumes the blocking will die and makes bad decisions both when it does (bouncing hopelessly) and doesn't (cutting away from big creases). Not to sound like a low-rent color commentator, but go north/south, and stop pussyfooting around like a pinko. RUN LIKE 'MERICA: INTO THE TEETH OF UNNECESSARY DANGER.

Gardner is a danger to himself and others. If he stops making the big mistakes, look out. If he continues making the big mistakes, look out. He can get wobbly and fall apart; when he's on, he's really f-ing on.

Michigan needs some counters. Passing off the veer or running that counter trey right or something. Need it.

THROW IT TO DILEO. No targets. Cumong man.