After two years of staying home for the holidays and no Bowl gear in Big House Bob's stocking, Michigan will be heading to a bowl game. If you want to be negative, there is still plenty to be negative about like: bowl games should not be the goal of the season - championships should be, 65 points? are you kidding me, and 3 years of probation is 3 years longer then Bo ever had. I know and understand it, but I would much rather enjoy this win, ponder who we might play, and think about how 15 more practices that will advance this young team.
Pete from AnnArbor.com beat me to this but here is where some of the experts believe Michigan will end up:
CBS Sports.com says: Insight Bowl against Oklahoma. Really Oklahoma? I doubt it.
Rivals: Texas Bowl against Texas. Would love it! Rather have the game in Florida then Texas.
ESPN Big10 Blog: says Dallas Football Classic. January 1 Bowl in the Cotton Bowl. First Annual.
College Football News.com: Says Texas Bowl vs Baylor.
I would rather have Michigan playing in Florida but being in the first Dallas Football Classic on January 1 would be pretty cool as well. Michigan will be highly regarded and selected for any Bowl since they are a Big Name that travels well.
Can a Defense Play Better and still give up 65 points? The answer is Yes. Stay with me. Michigan turned the ball over 5 times and it seemed there were improvements and some good plays by some young players. I thought Courtney Avery played much better, he had a couple of good tackles and was right with the WR on the long touchdown pass. Ray Vinopal had a huge tackle on 3rd down, Cam Gordon was always around the football, Kenny Demens made a play on pass break up and seemed to attack the running plays, it's 100% clear Roh is a better DE then LB and was a regular in the backfield, and Mouton made the last play of the game by getting by the RB trying to block him. Sure there were 100 mistakes as well, but this is a positive post today, remember!
DeAnthony Arnett: For those that don't know, Arnett is a 4 star highly rated instate WR in the 2011 class. He has been listing a number of schools including MSU, Tenn, USC, and others. Reportedly, he was somewhat down on the Wolverines becuase they don't pass enough and he wouldn't get enough looks in RR's offense. DeAnthony was a visitor for the Michigan game on Saturday. Do you think he changed his mind after the days Roundtree and Hemingway had? He could be planning an announcement this week. Could he be Blue? He might. He visited USC the weekend before.
Question from a Big House Reader: Ricky Asks: Would this defense been different had Donovan Warren not declared for the NFL draft and Troy Woolfolk didn't suffered a season ending injury. Do you think they could've at least help us get 1 or 2 more wins?
Also, am I crazy or is it the case that the Michigan offense is more prolific with Tate Forcier as QB?
Let me answer the first question first. The answer is Yes. Having two senior CB's in the secondary could have made a huge difference in Michigan's wins total this year. All of Michigan losses could have been wins, when you have two healthy seniors at each corner, Michigan could have done some other things to protect the defensive line and linebacker play to stop the run. Sure, Michigan would still have issues at safety and LB, but this team would easily be in the top 25 with those guys in the lineup. The MSU game would have been different and the Penn State experiment that went way wrong would have never happened. So let's say, Michigan takes 1 out of 2 from either MSU and/or Iowa and beats Penn State.
To your second question. The answer is yes and no. Michigan is much more dynamic and hard to plan for if Denard is the QB. His run/pass option is a defensive coordinators nightmare. The safeties, CB, and LB's don't know if they should chase Denard or cover the Michigan WR's. That type of indecision can cause long runs or open WR's. As you can tell, Michigan's opponents are trying to take away the run and have Denard beat them with his arm.
So why is Tate a better option? If Michigan gets down by more then two touchdowns, I believe Tate is the better option. Michigan's offense is built to be in the lead or near the lead. If Michigan turns the ball over and gets down by say 17 points, Tate is the better option for a comeback. His passing skills (all though his reads are sometimes too risky) are a couple levels above Denard's and he has more experience reading defenses. When Tate is in the game the defense adjusts to play more pass, which opens up running lanes for him or the RB's. As you could tell on Saturday, he made a couple of good first downs with his feet.
I would like to see Tate throw the shorter pass to the tight end or the WR. He sometimes looks for the bigger play/TD instead of getting the first down.
Great Question! Thank you.
