Purdue: Where extra points are a commodity

A few years ago, there was a viral video called Super Mario: Impossible Levels. In it, you watch and listen to someone swear and stumble through completely insane levels that defy all of the physics of the Super Mario world. What you soon come to realize is that this guy is actually one hell of a Mario player who's slowly unraveling as he dies repeatedly trying to complete the most mundane jumps. Small successes are resounding victories.

The picture above comes from level 1-2. After having successfully solved the labyrinth of moving platforms and revolving fire staffs, he jumped a little too recklessly and was killed by an unassuming Goomba who would have otherwise sheepishly walked off a cliff. Needless to say, he lost his mind. "Goomba, a Goomba killed me?" He then went on a suicide spree and spends the next 5 minutes never making it back to the fated evil mushrooms. "That's an interesting way to die. I did not know you could die like that".

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I assume that Michigan coaches feel the same way about Saturday's game against Purdue where, ultimately, a missed extra point put Michigan a point behind what was otherwise a stalemate. There were a lot of other things that went wrong, but trying to win a football game with the talent and defense that Michigan currently has, and you're missing extra points, well, it's an uphill battle.

This is another game that is going to be put on the shoulders of Rodriguez who was grilled in the post-game. But what more could he have done? I disagreed with his 4th down play calling but little else. Going for it on 4th and 10 from the 20 was a poor decision. And trying a field goal on 4th and 5 from the 30 is a coin flip. I didn't like his choice. But aside from that, he called a good game, scored 36 points (with a missed extra point), racked up 427 yards, and looked prepared against a Purdue team that clearly couldn't stop them offensively. But when you're starting a freshman walk on at safety, a true freshmen at DE, and have 1.5 legitimate D-1 CBs, it's difficult to beat anyone.

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It does feel like the season is over though, doesn't it? Wisconsin and Ohio State are both games that are only borderline winnable. And with the current performance of the defense, there's little-to-no way Michigan heads to a bowl this season. This will ultimately be heaped on Rodriguez, and that's a shame. When you're playing with a talent deficiency to the likes of Purdue, a bowl game is probably a pipe dream. But that's not to say that this season isn't starting to look like a massive disappointment.

Wisconsin is the only win from the 2008 season that Michigan faces again, and maybe Rodriguez has their number. Then again, it was a confluence of luck that Michigan pulled out the win last year and Camp Randall is not a welcoming place to play. And then Michigan heads up against an Ohio State team that just trounced Penn State and is looking to take home another Big Ten Title if they can beat a Stanzi-less Iowa team next week--this is a certainty. Michigan will have the fortune of playing the Buckeyes after they've come off stretches against Penn State and Iowa who they likely have to dedicate their entire preparation time to.

Michigan can win, but it looks groom. We should've known

Bullets:
- How many times does Jordan Kovacs have to cost this team a horrible, back-breaking 70-yard touchdown before he's pulled? I haven't seen the replay, but from what I saw, the touchdown that Purdue scored after their fake kickoff was wholly on Kovacs who got beat on a straight fly route down the sideline. How bad is Vlad Emilien? Having already blown his redshirt, why hasn't he seen the field? I don't know if this is Robinson's doing or Rodriguez's insistence on a walk on program, but either way, Kovacs needs to be benched--Cissoko needed all of three games to see the pine; why does Kovacs get more leeway? In the same way that I never want to see Nick Sheridan under center for the Maize and Blue again, I never want to see Kovacs on the field again.
- Forcier looked good again but our offensive line is completely decimated. That is a bad offensive line without Molk. And Moosman's snaps were uniformly bad the entire day. Not that he snapped many over Forcier's head or into his feet, but they were all over the place.
- Turnovers: Two interceptions vs. a fumble to give a short field and the fake kickoff (that I'm considering a turnover). My estimation was mostly correct: The teams were even in the turnover column and played the game to a tie save for a missed extra point. Disappointing.
- Now we know why we haven't seen the speed option much this year.

Purdue Preview

There's a chance you remember the play above. It was one of the more painful moments of Michigan 2008 and all but ended a game that Michigan mostly deserved to win. Purdue decided that they'd pull out all of the stops against struggling Michigan, and waited until their last drive of the game to bust out the back breaking hook and ladder for the go ahead score with only seconds remaining. Ugh. Numbers pleez:

Purdue Defense Offense Passing 34th nationally 194.67 YPG 42nd nationally 235.33 YPG Rushing 88th nationally 168.44 YPG 73rd nationally 136.78 YPG Scoring 84th nationally 28.00 PPG 80th nationally 24.56 PPG

Michigan Defense Offense Passing 63rd nationally 220.33 YPG 91st nationally 193.89 YPG Rushing 85th nationally 161.78 YPG 14th nationally 207.65 YPG Scoring 70th nationally 25.11 PPG 27th nationally 31.56 PPG

Michigan appears to have an advantage rushing the ball (like they do against everyone in the Big Ten) and can put the ball in the endzone one more time than the Boilermakers. That is when they're not vomiting the ball to the other team the entire game. Purdue is a team who's had similar turnover woes. Joey Elliott has thrown 11 INTs this season already. Elliott is mostly a pocket passer and tends to hurl the ball a lot, so his comfort in the pocket will be a focus. He's not afraid to scamper out when he has the chance, though, notching 63 carries on the season. Elliott is a senior now who is finally getting quality playing time and making the most of it: 179/310 for 2,081 yards, 14 TDs, and 11 INTs. He isn't setting the world on fire, but probably will against Michigan's secondary.

The only advantage here is that Juice Williams won't be making Michigan's linebackers look silly. The bad news is MOEAKI!! Expect to see a lot of max protect sets with tight ends slipping into the secondary. This is the formula for success against Michigan. If the defensive line can get to Elliott quickly and often, Michigan will win this game. Also, the linebackers staying in rushing lanes will be supremely important, as will be their ability not to completely bite on play fakes. The chances of these things happening are slim.

Purdue's defense is approximately as bad as Michigan's, which bodes well for Michigan's running game, going up against the 88th ranked rushing defense. Expect them to load the box though and force Michigan to put the ball into the air. Michigan's rushing attack has been able to move the ball against much stouter defenses in the past, though, and I expect that Brown and Minor (if healthy; please, please be healthy) should be able to go to work.

Ralph Bolden is Purdue's main rushing attack and will get most of the carries. He's a sophomore who's been largely unremarkable this year, save for games against Toledo and Northern Illinois. He had a nice game against Oregon (4.3 YPC on 29 attempts, and finding the endzone twice), but against most other FBS opponents, he's been in th 2.5-3.5 YPC range. I can't tell whether or not a good performance by Bolden is a good or bad thing for Michigan. On the one hand, the more he runs, the more Purdue isn't throwing the ball. On the other hand, linebackers and secondary and non-Warren corners. Again, the key for success in this game is getting to Elliott. Bolden should be a non-factor.

Prediction: Purdue is a difficult team to get a handle on. They lost to Notre Dame by three and to Oregon by two, beat Ohio State, were shut out 37-0 by Wisconsin, and lost to Northern Illinois, Northwestern, and Minnesota. But I've read this script before and it doesn't end well for you and I. This game is as must win as must wins get for Michigan who, if they go down here, will have to beat Wisconsin on the road or Ohio State at home, neither of which look particularly promising. (I have had this sneaking feeling though, that, like MSU preparing for Michigan all season, Michigan has been spending time preparing for Ohio State and will come away with a victory there. Michigan probably just isn't a good football team.)

Once again, winning the turnover battle will be supremely important, and if Michigan is behind in this category, you can expect them to lose this game in spectacular fashion. My heart is telling me that Michigan is going to win this game, but given Purdue's recent ability to beat real football teams and apparent peak late in the season, my mind is telling me that Michigan is going to get beaten in this one. Does desperation count for anything? Not when you're team isn't any good. If Michigan had caught Purdue earlier in the season, I'd have put this game firmly in M's column (even if Michigan had been performing the way they had lately). As it's 9 games in, and who knows how many times Michigan will turn the ball over, I have to put a conditional on it:

Michigan 35-20 if they win the turnover battle
Purdue 28-20 if Michigan loses the turnover battle

Wha Happened addition

My brother who is good with numbers, pointed out that I'm not that good with numbers and flubbed something in Wha Happened?. Per him in an e-mail titled "you did that thing I hate":

You adjusted Forcier's numbers for dropped interceptions then compared them to unadjusted Threetidan numbers. Surely they had a couple of balls that were dropped, or at least they had 8,000 balls that, had they been thrown correctly, would've been intercepted. The trend in online statisticating is to do some self correcting but sometimes the raw numbers are important, or at least they paint an important picture, and the picture being painted by the raw numbers-- that Forcier is way more accurate/safe than Threetidan-- seems to gel with, like, reality (what we've actually watched), an oft-forgotten aspect of statistics (that is, if someone developed an uber-metric for the NBA that said Kwame Brown was the best NBA player...well, their math might not be wrong but our eyes tell us that their model is).

This is a good point. It has been made and should be noted.

Wha Happened?

The one thing that I feel like I keep writing about in all of my game previews is turnovers. It hasn't gone well. You can blame "fluck" if you so choose, or freshmen quarterbacks or the defense's inability to jump on the football when it's rolling around on the ground. But it doesn't matter who you blame, really, because Michigan has been turning the ball over with regularity in the last few games--some of which (Iowa and MSU) the team likely would've won had it not been for said turnovers.

Last year, the team had the same problem, though more specifically they had Threetidan under center and non-Matthews players trying to return punts. It did not go well. A diary post at MGoBlog outlines it, concluding:

Turnovers are NOT a result of the RR "system". Turnovers were very high in RR's first year at WVU but came down after that. So far TO Lost has been unusually high for M in the RR era and TO Gained has been unusually low.

That's basically what we all came to assume. It's interesting, however, just to take a look at all of the turnover margins for Michigan, this year and last, and see how the team fared in the games:

2008		2009
Utah	0	WMU	+2
Miami (OH)	+1	ND	0
ND	-4	EMU	0
Wisc	-1	IU	-1
Ill	-2	MSU	+1
Toledo	-3	Iowa	-4
PSU	0	DSU	-1 (!!!)
MSU	-1	PSU	-4
Purdue	0	Ill	-3
Minn	0
NU	0
OSU	-1
Totals	-11		-10

There are a few that really stick out here. 2008: Notre Dame, Wisconsin, Minnesota, Purdue, and OSU. 2009: Iowa, Notre Dame, and MSU. Many of 2008's debacles came on punt returns. I can't remember exactly how many Michigan coughed up on special teams last year, but it was quite a few (I think three, at least, in the Notre Dame game alone). They've been mostly good on returns this year, save Hemingway against Illinois and Matthews' one flub. With respect to the defense's turnover recovery numbers, Michigan's ineptitude in this region is actually outpacing 2008's. And I would venture to say that Defense 2008 is similarly awful to Defense 2009. This is not going well.

The real concern are the interceptions. Sure, Denard has thrown 4 INTs on only 22 passes, but the team (with one by Sheridan for good measure) has thrown 10 INTs this year against 12 INTs last year. So unless Forcier/Robinson throw less than two INTs in the next three games, we're looking at, again, some ugly numbers. True freshmen and whatnot, taken into account.

Threetidan had a .0355 INT/attempt ratio (I don't have national numbers anywhere, but I assume that's bad). RobinForce has a .0416 INT/attempt ratio. Those numbers are a little skewed by Robinson (.1818 INT/attempt vs. Forcier's .0259 INT/attempt) but nonetheless, the quarterbacking has been subpar in terms of taking care of the ball. FWIW, Threet was .035 INT/attempt and Sheridan was .036 INT/attempt last year. Worse still are the interceptions that didn't happen. Forcier has thrown two intercecptions this season (one against Penn State and one against Iowa) that were inexplicably dropped. They were so bad, in fact, that I had even planned a post about the one he "threw" against Penn State but ended up scrapping the idea. If both of these had been caught, Forcier would be staring down worse numbers than Threet and Sheridan, even if only marginally: .0362 INT/attempt.

As a bit of perspective, in Chad Henne's 2006 season--the last before he was seriously injured--he had a ratio of .0243 INT/attempt (8 INTs on 328 attempts).

So, um, Wha Happened? In terms of Denard, he might not be able to throw a football. As far as Forcier--true freshmenness aside--it's interesting to look at his rushing numbers. His best game came against Notre Dame where he averaged 5.4 yards on 13 carries (though if you take out his 31-yard scamper, he averaged only 3.25 YPC), while he also had a decent game against WMU with 3.4 YPC on 11 carries. From there, he's had 5 games of 2.1 YPC or less (three games of less than 1 YPC). Part of this might be poor decision making and pulling the ball when he shouldn't or trying to do too much. But I think much of it comes from teams gameplanning for Forcier's shiftiness. MGoBlog has been harping on the lack of new packages, and I think these numbers are particularly damning on that issue. But as Forcier's running numbers drop because of opponent gameplanning, you can assume his passing numbers would falter similarly.

This all stands to reason, however, that if Michigan can simply take care of the football, they probably come away with another win or two, this season and last. And that maybe Forcier as Messiah is more far off than we had imagined.

As an addendum, it should be noted that excluding teams that couldn't prepare for Forcier (WMU, ND) and one's that had no business being on the field against Michigan (Eastern, DSU), Forcier's INT/attempt ratio is .032, which appears to be exceedingly average.

Illinois: Where it's time to sacrifice lambs

On Saturday, I was touring a hospital in Gainsville where college football is happy and people watch TVs and call Him, Timmy. Text messages are no way to watch a football game.

Sitting on the bus on my way back to our hotel in Orlando, I received this text from my brother who had been sending me frequent updates:

1st and goal from 1...we turn it over on downs

It was an unpleasant thought and one that seemed kind of impossible. Brandon Minor, Carlos Brown, Tate Forcier, Denard Robinson, Kevin Grady. No one, no one could get the ball into the endzone with four tries? I responded hurriedly and with an extreme sense of foreboding:

Need the D to come up big here. Could be a big momentum shift if they score

The score of the game was 13-7.

70 yard TD run, Illini

Fuck.

Excuse the vulgarity, but that's how I experienced Saturday's loss to Illinois. I caught the first 7 minutes of the fourth quarter before turning off my television completely and walking out of the room to meet my boss for dinner and a number of drinks. It's a good thing I had to work all weekend. I'm having difficulty thinking about this game.

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The first game of my senior year was against Appalachian State. The gravity of that game never really hit me. I remember commenting on the way home, "Well, if they're going to ruin my senior year, they might as well do it the first game of the season." And that's kind of how I felt. The last regular season game I had experienced was The The Game. That was more difficult to handle than App State. We were too close.

In retrospect, obviously, App State and all of the problems with 2007 were way more disappointing. The way that team, when healthy, was able to dismantle Florida between its two National Championships showed how much potential that squad really had. Chad Henne never beat Ohio State; that crushes me.

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I like Rich Rodriguez. More than you do. From the moment he was hired, I was ecstatic. Through all of last year, I was a huge supporter. After losing to Illinois, I'm still a huge fan. I like Tate Forcier, possibly because I knew Jason when he was at Michigan and always had high hopes for him. I like Junior Hemingway's name and Greg Matthews' studious glasses. Brandon Minor is impossible not to like and Brandon Graham is a humble super star. I like this team. I might even go so far as to say I like this team as much as I liked my 2007 Wolverines, something I never thought would happen. I had four years of Chad Henne and Mike Hart and those were the guys I looked up to and worshipped and still do. It was going to take a squad of no names and upstarts like the one assembled for me to like them as much.

Rodriguez is 8-13 at Michigan. And that makes my stomach uneasy. I like him too much.

But I was working all weekend and ardently avoiding internet sports providers and news sources. I won't rewatch the Illinois game and provide play breakdowns. It's all too masochistic. The similarities to the basketball team's season continue to expand. Juice Williams is now nothing more than a horrible spectre that will haunt Wolverine dreams and not clunky linebackers. And Michigan stands on the verge of missing a bowl game again. Saturday is Judgement Day. Time to sacrifice a lamb.