Purdue: Where Michigan looked awful

Let's be clear about one thing: Purdue is a terrible football team. Despite my assertion that their hodgepodge quaterbacking troupe would outperform their season averages against one of the worst defenses in college football, they looked lost, hopeless, and overmatched in almost every regard. Were it not for a 39-yard screen pass that resulted from a missed Michigan tackle, Purdue's quarterbacks were 16/32 for 93 yards (2.9 YPA!!!). Their running game was just was bad averaging 3.4 YPC. Purdue is bad; possibly the worst team in the Big Ten.

With that said, Michigan's 27-16 victory was... uninspiring. Purdue's defensive line thoroughly destroyed what has been one of the best offensive lines in the country this year. Part of that was due to Manimal Ryan Kerrigan, who made any Michigan lineman who tried to guard him look like a high schooler. His stat line was ridiculous: 4 sacks, 2 forced fumbles, and 10 tackles. Kerrigan is a legit top-10 NFL pick this year, but his end-to-end destruction of the offensive line is disturbing, both on a coaching standpoint (no H-back to chip block him?) and performance outlook. On Michigan's last drive, they went exclusively to their heavy set with both tight ends in the game and only two receivers, which had mixed, but generally positive results.

It stands to reason that both Michigan and Illinois were worn out from last week's marathon. Both teams faced wildly overmatched opponents (Purdue and Minnesota), and both struggled significantly. At least Michigan came out on top. The other mitigating factor was Michigan's inability to get anything going during the game due to turnovers, some of which could be attributed to the foul weather. Denard was constantly sailing deep passes--worse than he has all year, likely because of the rain--and holding onto the ball was a problem for both teams. It was an ugly win, but it was still a win. Michigan should regroup this week and get ready for the two-week gauntlet against Wisconsin and Ohio State.

Bullets

• Though Denard looked bad all game, he didn't get much help from the offensive line that was getting constantly beaten at the line of scrimmage. Vincent Smith had a good day because Purdue was over compensating for Denard, and when Denard did pull the ball, the offensive line looked sluggish. His passing wasn't great either. Anything that he threw downfield sailed well over receivers' heads and his short passes were often inaccurate. This was probably Denard's worst game of the year, at least some of which would be attributed to the rain.
• Forcier looked just as bad as Denard did when he came into the game. Again, I think this falls on the weather and offensive line.
• Michigan's defense looked functional. They played in almost exclusively three-man fronts, and showed a lot of 3-3-5 with the occasional 3-4 look. It was encouraging that the defense performed the way it did without Mike Martin and Jonas Mouton, caveats about level of competition noted.
• I'll have to watch more closely on the tape, but I think Courtney Avery had a really good game aside from the 39-yard screen pass on which he was the primary culprit. Ray Vinopal also seemed to have another good day. And Mark Moundros appeared to play really well at both outside and inside lineback positions.
• I don't really have much else to say other than let's be thankful Michigan came out on top. I'm sure there will be plenty of stuff to break down this week to try and make sense of Michigan's awful day.

2010 Depth Chart thoughts

You're all probably well aware that an unofficial depth chart for Michigan has been released for the UConn game. You can read the whole thing above at MGoBlog, but I'll break down a few of the more interesting personnell notes:

- As we guessed, all three quarterbacks come in as first string QB with the now-familiar "OR" between them. Denard is listed first and will almost certainly take the first snap against UConn, Tate is second, and Gardner is third. There won't be a redshirt for Gardner.
- Stephen Hopkins is listed fifth on the depth chart for running backs. Pegged as one of the big time freshman contributors, I expected Hopkins to be second string at worst. Interestingly, Mike Cox comes in for second-team duty, a pounding back to will probably eat up a lot of the short yardage carries I thought would go to Hopkins.
- Jeremy Gallon is buried on the slot receiver depth chart. Whether or not he ever contributes becomes a question.
- Mark Huyge over Taylor Lewan at starting left tackle. I expect Lewan to come close to overtaking Huyge by year's end.
- The wildly hyped Brandon Graham clone Jibreel Black comes in at second-team DE. This is a good sign. The D-line is almost certainly going to be Michigan's best and deepest unit (team-wide) this year.
- Will Campbell is buried on the NT depth chart, which is really surprising. I thought he looked great in the spring game and was going to be a big impact player this year. He may still be a little out of shape, but expect to see him on goal line stands.
- Mark Moundros is listed as "OR" in the MLB first-team depth chart alongside Obi Ezeh. I bet Moundros takes the first snap against UConn.
- Carvin Johnson shows up as the starter at Spur and Marvin Robinson is behind Kovacs at Bandit. I expect both of these freshmen to make a big impact and in the latter's case, for Robinson to be the starter ahead of Kovacs.
- James Rogers is your CB alongside J.T. Floyd. Ugh.

Countdown to Kickoff: Where's Tate?

If the various camp reports and Troy Woolfolk's incendiary comments about Tate Forcier weren't enough to convince you that Denard Robinson will be Michigan's starting QB on September 4th, maybe Tate's complete absence from recent Countdown to Kickoff videos will be the straw that breaks the camels back. There were lingering comments the past week or two that Forcier has been dinged up and missing a lot of practice (when the Big Ten Network was around, they mentioned a few times through Tweets that Tate was sitting out parts of practice due to injury). And in today's video, not only do you not see Tate once--not in the background, taking snaps, or anywhere else--but Devin Gardener is running with the twos (though this could also be because Tate is injured and they're trying to get Gardener more experience).

Regardless of the reasoning, I still don't see any way that Robinson doesn't take the first snap on September 4th. Other personnel bits I've gleaned from the Countdown to Kickoff videos:

• Mark Moundros has been running with the ones a lot in practice. His presence on the starting defense is really beginning to worry me. Then again Obi Ezeh has always worried me.
• Vincent Smith appears to be running with the twos and Fitzgerald Toussaint appears to be taking a lot of snaps with the starting offense.

Other than that, I don't want to venture any guesses. These are observations from random practice videos and that can offer a bare minimum of actual information.

Fall camp roster

So today is the first day of fall camp which means the following weeks will be filled with specious camp reports about So and So playing well above their projection. But a piece of objective information that we got today is a complete roster with the incoming freshman class added. Bullets:

• Justin Turner is listed as a cornerback. There's been a lot of speculation about a late growth spurt that may harm his chances as a cornerback, necessitating a move to safety. Right now, though, he's listed at corner. I suspect this is due to a number of factors, but primarily because of depth issues at corner.
• Martavious Odoms and Roy Roundtree are listed as slot receivers despite both having spent a little time as wide receivers (because of injuries) in the spring.
• Mike Shaw is on the roster. There has been some hemming and hawing about his eligibility, and while this doesn't clear up much, it's tentatively a good sign that he's on the roster. I suspect we'll hear more about him in the coming weeks.
• As suspected, Troy Woolfolk is still at cornerback. This is a permanent move.
• Mark Moundros is listed as a FB/LB. I don't expect him to see the field much on either side of the ball, but he might pop up here and there.
• Richard Ash is a defensive tackle. He's listed at 6'3", 320 lbs. Hopefully Barwis can turn him into a world-eating nose tackle with that weight. Those measurables scream Out of Shape and Redshirt to me. For comparison, fellow true freshman Terry Talbott is also a defensive tackle and is currently 6'3", 248 lbs; redshirt as well, but for other reasons.
• Mike Martin shows up as a defensive tackle. MGoBlog has been posturing that we'll see Martin move outside to a defensive end spot, leaving Will Campbell as a true nose tackle. I still think we see Martin bounced out to defensive end a lot, but this means that we're still likely to see a lot of four-man fronts with Martin shifted over to the tackle position.
• Craig Roh is listed as a linebacker.

That's about it as far as information that can be gleaned. Let the camp hype train begin.

Everything I love might not be a smoldering crater

So I downloaded MGoVideo's torrent of the Spring Game to rewatch and re-evaluate and my thoughts are slightly more positive than my initial reaction. Only slightly though.

Quarterbacks
Not too much changed in my evaluation here. Robinson is your far and away starter. Forcier looked kind of lost (though I presume much of this had to do with a second-team offense that he was out of rhythm with). And Gardner, while impressive for his youth, is clearly not ready to be on the field. Next year there will be a great QB battle.

Defense
So... the second team defense is basically a horror show. Vlad Emilien still doesn't look ready for the prime time. Mark Moundros as linebacker is a nice idea but he will absolutely not contribute in any meaningful way this year. The defensive line backups are fine but unremarkable. The point being, depth is going to be an issue. The incoming freshmen should help mitigate some of this, but not entirely. Also, they're true freshmen.

As for the first team defense, they're just OK. The biggest thing that stood out to me watching the film was problems with the linebackers (surprise). With Michigan sending out 4- and 5-wide sets for much of the spring game, this meant Roh and Mouton were being pulled back into the secondary to cover zippy slot men. The hope is that with the depth of the incoming freshmen, as well as doing package subs, Michigan will have a nickel look to mitigate these problems. Early down passing is going to hurt Michigan a lot this year.

The first team defensive line is good. They're clearly the strength, anchored by Will Campbell. He was plugging up the middle and the team actually did a good job on runs throughout the scrimmage, stuffing most of them for minimal gains (at least there was only one or two long runs that broke out). If we can get the linebackers and Kovacs to hit their gaps properly, this could be a kinda not terrible run defense. Speaking of Kovacs, my opinion of him has not changed. Watching the tape, he's just so clearly in over his head. He is going to be absolutely demolished this season by tight ends and big running backs. He doesn't have the speed to drop into coverage either. Expect him to be attacked often and successfully for the entire season. We need Marvin Robinson to be able to play Kovacs' position.

Other offense stuff
The running backs were all unremarkable. No way do you see a feature back this year though don't be surprised if Michigan starts using more I-formation with Hopkins who is clearly the most physical back on the team.

Taylor Lewan, the oft-hyped left tackle this spring was good in protection but definitely got a little lost a few times. The moving pocket seemed to be a bit of a problem for him and he had trouble getting to the second level on runs. In any case, he looked competent enough to be the starting left tackle and we can feel confident that he'll be valuable throughout his career.

The wide receivers and slots were also kind of Meh during the scrimmage. We hear a lot about Player X has the potential to be a big threat on every play, but Michigan never sends receivers downfield in this offense. Maybe having more years in the system/more experienced QBs will change that, but we certainly didn't see it in this scrimmage. Otherwise, they mostly caught the balls they were supposed to catch and then got tackled.

That's about it though. You're OMGWE'RETERRIBLE ceiling has been raised to 8-4, but I think that's grasping at straws.

Spring roster

So MGoBlue has the spring roster up and there are a few notable things:

• No Nick Sheridan. I haven't heard any word of where Sheridan is or that he had plans to go elsewhere, but last year was a pretty clear signal that he wasn't going to play. Lo and behold, though, Sheridan doesn't even appear on the roster. Currently listed are: Forcier, Robinson, Devin Gardner, walk-on redshirt freshman Nader Furrha, and redshirt sophomore Jack Kennedy (who looked impressive in last year's spring game and got in for one or two snaps at the end of the Delaware State game). Nick Sheridan, wherever you are, good luck.
• Redshirt freshman Cameron Gordon is officially listed as a safety. A wide receiver in high school out of Inkster, Gordon, who had been rumored as someone who might flip to either linebacker or safety, is now officially a safety, or so says the roster. I wouldn't be surprised if he got a few looks on the offensive side of the ball as well, but it looks like he's moving primarily to the defensive side of the ball.
• Another interesting move is that Teric Jones is also listed as a safety. Jones is undersized (5'9", 194 lbs) for safety and stuck in a position of, probably, the most depth on the Michigan roster (slot receiver). This sounds and feels a little bit like a Kovacs replacement/backup, but we'll have to wait and see. This is really surprising.
• More safeties? Why not. Brandin Hawthorn is also a safety on this roster. I don't really know what this means for the linebacker positions, as I assumed Hawthorn would be competing for the Stevie Brown position, but this also feels like a goodbye Kovacs move. Mike Jones is your odds on favorite for the new Stevie Brown.
• Troy Woolfolk is listed as a cornerback. Probably the move of Jones, Gordon, and Hawthorn to safety, as well as the incoming freshmen made this move a bit less harrowing for the back end of the defense. Woolfolk proved to be a very good corner last year and I'm pretty happy with this.
• As was rumored, Ryan Van Bergen is listed as a defensive end. He'll be playing the Boy I Wish We Still Had Brandon Graham role.
• Mark Moundros, who had asked for a look at linebacker, is listed as a fullback. For the time being, it looks like he'll see mostly special teams action and limited time on the offense. That is unless RichRod decides to go back to some fullback looks now that he has a more experienced QB.