Pryor calls it quits at Ohio State

A few minutes ago, the Cleveland Plain Dealer reported that Terrelle Pryor will forgo his senior season, to which I say

Ohio State: Where, well...

So it's over: The season that started 4-0 ended with a resounding thump as it fell to the turf lifeless and defeated. But this game against OSU, sad as it is to say, might have been the best game Michigan played as a team since Notre Dame. Sure, they held in it against Iowa and Michigan State, but MSU dominated Michigan throughout and Iowa would've been another miracle victory. No, Michigan finally held serve with someone and, were it not for Forcier's four interceptions and fumbledeath, Michigan walks away with a victory here.

But Tate Forcier is was a true freshmen, and they're bound to have games like this one. Forcier interspersed magnificence with crippling mistakes and the muscle memory learned from his touchdown pass was responsible for the "Well, now it's over" endzone interception in the fourth quarter. Just like after the Iowa game: You live by Forcier, you die by Forcier. And in the future, this will be a wildly more positive experience than it was for the second half of this season.

As I said after the Wisconsin game: Vincent Smith has solidified himself as the 2010 starter. I hinted at it then, but now I'm officially there: Michael Shaw needs to prove himself against competition better than Delaware State if he wants to see significant playing time. He looks too frantic when he runs and has a habit of running into the back of his linemen instead of hitting holes and running patiently. He showed some flashes receiving this year when he came out of the backfield, but otherwise, he looks firmly like a backup right now.

Michigan's defense looked... competent too. There were a few personnel shifts for this game of note: Woolfolk moved back to safety, Kovacs played as a linebacker (more or less), Floyd took over the corner position opposite Warren, and Williams and Brandon Smith rarely, if ever, saw the field. Michigan played a cover-1 for most of the day and dared Pryor to throw the ball which he did poorly. But mostly, Tressell ran Carr ball: We're going to out-execute you. Michigan didn't have the athleticism, schemes, smarts, or strength to stop Ohio State's rushing attack, so they kept running the ball. Much of this falls on the linebackers, and you can, as MGoBlog has been presuming, assume Jay Hopson is out as linebacker coach next year.

The most depressing thing about watching this game was watching Pryor run the zone read. He was born for that and clearly is in the wrong system. Ohio State has resounding success when they ran the play and Pryor has the size and speed to annihilate teams running it. I kept thinking to myself: If only you weren't such a stubborn prick, you'd be running those plays here and we'd be winning. That was depressing, but going forward, I think we're probably better for it.

(How worried should Ohio State be? Barring a drastic uptick in Pryor's passing ability, that team probably won't get any better year-to-year, and needed four interceptions and a fumble for a touchdown to beat the worst Michigan defense, um, ever? I came into work today and was accosted by my boss' boss: "Your team sucks. But you do have a good quarterback." And well, sure we sucked this year, but OSU's running game won't be any more successful than it was against Michigan this year, their defense was as stout as OSU defenses get, the rest of the team played mostly as they did all year, and Forcier projects to get better from Year One to Year Two. And yet they still almost lost that game. But I digress.)

Now we have eight months to hear people talk about how Rodriguez is going to be fired (Wilbon--who, sometime last week on PTI, ripped Michigan fans for not giving Rodriguez enough support and called for people to give him more time; I'm getting more than a little tired of his noted hatred for Michigan) or should have been fired or will fail again because his system doesn't work or he isn't connected to Bo or he's planning to bomb the White House and should be fired. I will avoid these things and think about what it might be like in 2010. Sunnier days are ahead. Those who stay will be champions.

To beat OSU: Break tendency; play the underdog

Michigan's deep in it going into their final game of the season against Ohio State on Saturday. Rich Rodriguez has long said that he doesn't care about time of possession, and that's pretty obvious from the stats this season (Michigan is 119th in the country in time of possession at 26:22 a game). If Michigan wants to have any chance going up against Ohio State on Saturday, it's going to have to break this tendency and try and grind out the game, slowing it down to a crawl.

A great post a few months ago from Brian at MGoBlog went a ways to explaining it. I suggest you read the entire thing to get the whole scope of it, but the gist is this:

And it's the same for the favorite and reducing their variance: sometimes it's worth reducing expectation to get it, but only in certain situations and when you're a considerable favorite. In Bo's time, Michigan was a considerable favorite much more often and the game lent itself to low-variance moves: a 40-yard punt is much more valuable in an era when ten points is a potentially game-winning number. Anyway, to the assertion above: modern offenses have more variance to them because they score more. Don't lose sight of expectation here: Missouri had a lot of variance in their scores but that was because they averaged 42 points a game. Michigan had far less but they were averaging 20. Offenses that do this quickly are actually more predictable because they get in more trials. Moving fast without sacrificing expectation is advantageous to the better team, which is why Oklahoma was in zero even halfway close games against the Big 12 rabble. (Texas is not rabble, obviously.) Defenses reduce variance by, you know, having safeties that can tackle. The very best defenses are low variance because all of the outcomes have the same result for the opposition: shame and humiliation. In that situation, punting your ass off makes sense, because you're a big favorite, you're not giving the opponent much of an opportunity and you're reducing variance in a way that helps your overall chances of winning. The main problem with Michigan's defense over the last few years has been their suckiness, which by the way increases variance as your defense falls to a point where opponents can drive the field on them regularly.

So what does that mean for Michigan on Saturday? It means they need to chew up as much time off the clock when they have the ball and pray for Terrelle Pryor to arm punt his way to a loss. The other problem here is that it presumes Michigan will be able to stop the OSU offense, um, once or twice or three times, which at this point, seems unlikely.

Having Brandon Minor this week is going to go a long way to make this happen. Without Minor, Michigan's run game (and subsequently, it's most consistent way to run time off the clock) takes a serious hit and depends a lot on Carlos Brown--a player who has made his mark this year on the big play. Vincent Smith, last week, looked like he might have the ability to cut through holes and pick up 4 or 5 yards at a time. If Michigan can get this kind of consistent play from Smith and Minor is out (for the record, it being Minor's last game, I assume he'll play, injured or not), it will go a long way to this end.

When the ball is in Forcier's hand, Michigan is going to need to limit sacks, penalties, and dropped passes. I'd be surprised to see Michigan take more than one shot downfield if they realistically want to win this game--it seems counter intuitive, but the faster Michigan scores, the more chances it gives Pryor and his offense to score. If Ohio State is blowing up Michigan's bubble screens and breaking into the backfield on rushes, Michigan will lose. There's no doubt about it. Also, Michigan is going to need to slow the pace of their offense down. Not that they should huddle up after every play, but taking most of the time off the play clock before snapping the ball would be advantageous.

On the other side of the ball, the key for Michigan is limiting the big play. Ohio State has lived off of the big play this year and has struggled when they haven't gotten it. Misdirection plays are going to be key, like they usually are for OSU, and the safeties' ability to stay home on these will be critical. If Michigan can force Pryor to march down the field, they further take time off the clock and increase the chances that Pryor will throw a pick. It's an uphill battle and Michigan needs to treat it as such if they want to have any chance in this game.