Big Ten 2010 // Keeping the Enemy Close - Buckeye Thoughts on Wolverine Football
by Graham Filler on Mar 26, 2010 12:39 AM CDT
in Michigan
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What would Michigan Week be without some old fashioned ball-busting courtesy of the Greatest Rivalry in College Sports? Our resident scarlet and grey apologist Law Buckeye was all too pleased to offer a contrarian view on the maize and blue.
What impact does Michigan football have on Ohio State football?
I'll let our readership in on a secret: Michigan is good for Ohio State. Read that again if you have to. Now look: it's not like the scarlet and grey would crumble if the Wolverines went by the wayside. But Ohio State owes a considerable bit of its national identity to That State Up North -- and vice versa. Sure, Michigan made its own luck early on with Fielding Yost and the "Point a Minute" dynasty. But after winning 10 national championships through 1948, the Wolverines sunk into a period of relative irrelevance. Bo Schembechler and the 10 Year War with Woody Hayes brought them back into the limelight. At the same time, the exchange of hostilities fueled an Ohio State program that won six national championships from 1942-1970.
Michigan and Ohio State are inextribably linked, not just as part of the Greatest Rivalry in College Sports, but as two of the five most successful programs in the history of college football. The better a team Michigan fields, the better the rivalry is, and the better the Big Ten is as a whole.
No wonder we love to hate the maize and blue.
It's no secret: the Wolverines have fallen on hard times. Can Rich Rodriguez bring them back?
Ask me this question last year and I'd give you a completely different answer. The truth is I'm finally ready to say that Rich Rodriguez doesn't have what it takes to get Michigan football back to prominence. Don't get me wrong: he may well make it past 2010. But the run-spread offense will ultimately prove to have a short shelf life in the Big Ten.
Try as I might, I just can't see a system that depends on sending glorified track stars into the heart of Big Ten front sevens working week in and week out. The undersized Tate Forcier (194 lbs) put his body on the line to get to a 4-0 start in 2009 -- and the bangs and bruises caught up in the form of a shoulder injury that stunted him down the stretch. Running back Brandon Minor (218 lbs) sat out three games his senior season, and left another early because of injuries. Will Devin Gardner (195 lbs) suffer a similar fate?
I'm not saying that there isn't a place for zone-reads, misdirection, and speed in the Big Ten, but to win in a league stuffed with giant defensive ends and monster linebackers you've got to stay healthy at the skill positions. It remains to be seen whether Rodriguez's system athletes can withstand the rigors of conference play.
What scares you about Michigan's present squad?
The underdog factor. If things go like they're supposed to, Ohio State will enter The Rivalry as a strong favorite for the third year in a row. I don't like playing a Michigan team with everything to gain and nothing to lose.
What annoys you the most about the maize and blue?
The stuffy brute that handles the PA announcements at Michigan Stadium (i.e. "Take the field, band." "Michigan fans are recycling fans.")
What do you secretly admire about Michigan?
The ban on commercial advertising in Michigan Stadium. The Gothic architecture on campus. Smokey's in Ann Arbor...
MONDAY: Spring Field Guide
TUESDAY: Michigan QB Controversy
WEDNESDAY: Mike Barwis
THURSDAY: MVP Profile - David Molk
FRIDAY: Keeping the Enemy Close - A Buckeye's Thoughts
Next week: Illinois...
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Honestly
Even with all the jabs at UM that I take, I respect them a lot. I do like to get the pot stirring when it comes to this rivalry, but that should be understood. I love to see us win over and over, but we NEED UM, a loss every now and then wouldn’t hurt. Just keep that in mind when I have my fun with Silly Goose. Except on this year’s michigan game. If we lose that, and were undefeated, I will never forgive myself for saying these things :P
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by Ian_InsideTheShoe on Mar 26, 2010 6:37 AM CDT reply actions
I’ll never forgive you either. Ever.
Columbus til I die, Columbus til I die. I know I am, I swear I am, Columbus til I die!
"Turner, at midcourt...inside it, at the buzzer, GOT IT!!!!"
by Andrew Tolliver on Mar 26, 2010 8:35 AM CDT up reply actions
HA!
It won’t happen. Ever.
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by Ian_InsideTheShoe on Mar 26, 2010 5:45 PM CDT up reply actions
You want Rich Rodriguez to stay at Michigan?
Tressel’s guys in grey pants will have to lose to them first. And that’s not a scenario I want to imagine either.
by OBrienSchofieldismyHero on Mar 26, 2010 6:19 PM CDT up reply actions
Michigan beating tOSU
Are you old enough to remember the 1995 season? Michigan wasn’t that good. Ohio State was undefeated. What happened there? Michigan actually has a talented team this time. With a little bit of experience, a huge chip on their shoulders, and a winnable game last year (sans tate’s numersous mistakes). I am not going to predict anything this year until I see how they play against MSU and Iowa, but Michigan CAN beat tOSU. Congratulations on your win streak Ohio State. It wasn’t that long ago that Michigan went 12-3-1 against the Buckeys. 1985-2000.
Greater love hath no man than this, that a man lay down his life for his friends. John 15:13
by Kevin Benedict on Mar 27, 2010 11:32 AM CDT up reply actions
That’s absolutely true, but 95 also featured Cooper at the helm of the Buckeyes. That doesn’t mean it’s not a good example of the uncertainty that should exist in rivalry games (though in my humble opinion, an even better one would be Bo’s first game against OSU as head coach back in 69 when the Buckeyes were on track to win a national title and Michigan was a middle of the road team).
That said, it is worth noting that Cooper never seemed to grasp the levity of the rivalry and his record against that team up north certainly speaks to that, however Tressel doesn’t share that particular flaw.
Let the discussion begin
Ah, wonderful, Jon. Where to begin…
I think that the notion that Big Ten’s way of winning, via dominance due to its sheer size and power, is become more and more archaic with the evolution of both the game and the athlete playing it.
Aside from the Big Ten, the gameplay on a national level has shifted towards coveting the qualities of quick, strong athletes as gameplay has shifted toward finesse and speed rather than the pounding running games of yore. I think that much was clear in Ohio State’s runs for the national title, where those powerful teams found themselves outmatched against teams with superior speed and athletes. Before this past bowl season, it was fairly commonplace for Big Ten teams to get convincingly clobbered by a southern or west coast team.
That’s what made this bowl season so exciting. OSU handily beat one of the top spread teams in the nation (with a spread QB, but nevermind that…), MSU beat a spread team, Iowa beat an option team. Is the Big Ten relevant again on a national level? It’s hard not to consider this past bowl season an outlier, as it certainly deviates from the recently established trend. Is the Big Ten relevant again? Jury’s still out.
Now as far as Michigan’s concerned, you bring up a very interesting point. Regardless if speed is at a premium on a national level, Michigan still plays in the Big Ten. The majority of their games will be against punishing Big Ten opponents. Can smaller, quicker athletes compete regularly against bigger, tougher opponents? Can finesse best power on a regular basis without attrition taking its toll? So far, the answer is no. But in the future, the answer is maybe.
Here’s why: Michigan has not yet shown anybody its best shot at full force. We have yet to see what the spread is capable of when it looks like it’s supposed to look. Michigan is young and inexperienced, with non-ideal personnel at many positions and many injuries to key players. Regardless of that, we still almost beat Iowa (with our starting QB out on the last drive), one of the top teams in the Big Ten. Sure, we got clobbered by OSU and PSU (and Illinois… yeesh), but it’s clear that the spread is capable of winning games.
RR has learned a hard lesson that this is not the Big East. In the offseason, more focus has been put on adding muscle, and almost everybody on the team has gained a considerable amount of weight to withstand the punishment of a Big Ten schedule. Can RR adapt his game to the Big Ten? Another interesting question.
I’m withholding judgement on whether the spread can survive in the Big Ten until it’s a fair fight. Let’s just hope RR can keep his job for that long.
Fair fight?
Variants of the spread have been very successful in the big 10 (Northwestern, Illinois to an extent, Minnesota to an extent…until Brewster went back to a pro set offense last year) but they have been because they didn’t have the athletes to play smash mouth with the big boys. A notable exception was OSU during the Troy Smith years, but OSU was able to line it up with a big back and two tight ends and ram it down your throat if need be. And that is starting to be the identity of the Terrelle Pryor years, but that book has yet to be written. the others did/do it out of necessity, Michigan has chosen to do it, and a couple things have become very apparent:
1) For one game, you might be able to out-quick and out-fake an opponent, but you can’t do it, essentially, for an entire season against similar defenses. Barwis can run his 260 pound linemen until they puke every day to get them in condition, but during a game, they will tire. And when they’re tired, they’re still gonna be outweighed by 30 or 40 pounds, and then they’re going to get overpowered.
2) You can call this last bowl season an outlier for the Big 10, but defenses eventually catch up to offenses. It has taken more time for the Big 10, because they just don’t see the spread enough to worry about it on a week to week basis, but Penn State, Iowa, Wisconsin, and Ohio State all smothered spread/speed offenses. And UM is nowhere near LSU, GT, Miami, or even Oregon in terms of talent. And once you put it on film every week, and it’s studied by pretty smart Bigt 10 coaches week in and week out, your offense will get figured out even quicker. Now you can’t run your spread, and you have no smashmouth game to fall back on.
3) And if RRod doesn’t get it done in 2010, UM is really in no man’s land. Do they go forward and see if he can turn it around, or do they pull the plug and get someone else to get a more traditional offense? That’s two or three more years, and now you’re looking at a decade of mediocrity and irrelevance for one of the marquee franchises in college football. And that’s a damn shame.
"We're used to Favre-a-palooza now. We're engulfed in Favre-a-palooza. It's not even Favre-a-palooza anymore. He's family now."
--Vikings TE Visanthe Shiancoe, on Brett Favre
I love it
Yes and on all accounts yes.
One thing I forgot to mention in my spring preview is what you mentioned in point #1. The coaches saw the exact same thing you did about the linemen, and the emphasis this offseason has been on getting the lines (on both sides of the ball) bigger. With much success, I might add.
I guess this season will tell if the Big Ten has caught back up with the rest of the country in defending the spread. They should see it less, though, because Illinois and Minnesota are going back to a Pro-Style this year with their new OC’s.
Michigan's offense FOUND a QB last season,
their head coach case just decided to pull him for a variety of inconceivable and unfathomable reasons in a crucial game @ Iowa that could easily have put Michigan in the postseason. Instead, they’re 5-7, which EASILY qualifies as a disaster season.
Again, WHERE IS REPEAT WHERE IS TATE FORCIER THE WORLD WONDERS
by OBrienSchofieldismyHero on Mar 26, 2010 6:13 PM CDT reply actions
Again, OSU partisans are HAPPY that they have beaten Michigan repeatedly, aren't they?
That’s what I thought.
If you lose to Michigan, it doesn’t matter if you had a Heisman winner on your team.
It doesn’t matter if you had the best defense in the conference.
It doesn’t matter how “good” those 5 star prospects really were.
It doesn’t matter how “fast” your QB was outside the season.
Because Ohio State will still have lost to Michigan.
And that’s not where Buckeye fans want to go.
by OBrienSchofieldismyHero on Mar 26, 2010 6:18 PM CDT up reply actions
Well said.
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by Ian_InsideTheShoe on Mar 26, 2010 10:32 PM CDT up reply actions
The Sherman Protest Quote...
Better late than never.
“War is the remedy that our enemies have chosen, and I say let us give them all they want.”
Courting mediocrity since 1964.
by lakeeriemonstar on Mar 29, 2010 8:04 PM CDT reply actions
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