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5Sep 2017

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Michigan vs. Florida Awards

Chase Winovich and Noah Furbush (image via GBMWolverine)

Let’s see more of this guy on offense . . . Ty Isaac. Isaac averaged 10.4 yards per carry on 11 carries, giving him 114 yards on the day. He had 50% as many carries as starter Chris Evans, who averaged just 3.5 yards/carry, and Karan Higdon averaged 4.0 yards/carry on 7 chances. Isaac had the hot hand on Saturday, and some observers have said he’s in better shape now than he ever has been. I’m done expecting Isaac to be a breakout star, but I sure wouldn’t mind a few more performances like this.

Let’s see less of this guy on offense . . . Grant Perry. This has less to do with his performance on the field than his behavior on and off the field. The guy faced felony charges in the off-season, and on his first time touching the ball during the year, he spun the ball and earned his team a 15-yard unsportsmanlike conduct penalty. Did he learn his lesson? Nope. He spun the ball again later in the game. I’m not saying the off-the-field and on-the-field things are related, but maybe he needs some more tough love to help the messages sink in.

Let’s see more of this guy on defense . . . David Long. It’s too early to call Long injury-prone, but he was injured and redshirted in 2016. Then he missed some time this spring with a nagging injury. And he exited this game early with a leg injury. He seems like a guy who’s in need of a steady diet of steak and whole milk.

Let’s see less of this guy on defense . . . Brandon Watson. Directly related to the Long situation, I don’t think Watson is a starting-caliber cornerback and he could be taken advantage of by teams who game plan for him and have the right athletes. He’s a stop-gap guy, and I think it’s concerning if he’s a long-term starter. It helps greatly that Michigan has a very good pass rush, which mitigates some issues on the back end.

Play of the game . . . Chase Winovich’s strip sack for a Noah Furbush touchdown. There are a few options for this honor, such as a couple Ty Isaac runs, a Brandon Watson pass breakup, a Josh Metellus tackle in the open field, a Wilton Speight deep ball to Nick Eubanks, etc. But the Winovich sack of Florida QB Malik Zaire sealed the game for the Wolverines, and Furbush did a great job of corralling the ball before it could trickle out of the back of the end zone.

MVP of the game . . . Ty Isaac and Devin Bush, Jr. I can’t really choose between the two. The offense struggled to move the ball through the air, and Isaac averaged a first down every time he touched the ball. He also made a couple clutch plays to keep drives alive. On the other side of the ball, Bush made 7 tackles, 3 tackles for loss, and 2 sacks. He was all over the field and did a great job in his first game as a starting middle linebacker. He almost got booted from the game on the first defensive play when he was investigated for targeting, but luckily he stayed in the game to help Michigan win.

3Sep 2017

Blog, homepage 150 comments Thunder

Michigan 33, Florida 17

(image via MGoBlue)

The elephant in the room. Wilton Speight doesn’t look any better than he did in the spring. He was 11/25 for 181 yards, 1 touchdown, and 2 interceptions. He threw more touchdowns to Florida (2) than he did to his own guys. I don’t believe this is a Jim Harbaugh thing. Harbaugh has shown elsewhere that he’s capable of coaching the quarterback position. Speight is the lone guy in Harbaugh’s history who has regressed. I hope Florida was just really good defensively – despite having 10 players suspended and a starting safety out with a torn Achilles – but I have no faith in that being the case. Speight consistently overthrows balls, a frustrating thing when guys are wide open, and a dangerous thing when guys are in traffic. I’ve seen people insisting that the first pick-six was on Kekoa Crawford, whose hands it bounced off of, but that throw was high and a tough catch. The second pick-six in the general vicinity of Grant Perry was wildly overthrown.

The hippo in the room. John O’Korn looked about the same as he did last year, too. I don’t understand yanking Speight in order to have O’Korn hand off the ball three times before punting, either. You don’t need a backup QB to hand off the ball. Speight is better with the ball handling, anyway, so that first O’Korn series was a waste, and the draw play on third down was awkward.

The armadillo in the room. I sure hope Brandon Peters gets some playing time this year.

Hit the jump for more on the game.

Preview: Michigan vs. Florida

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RUSH OFFENSE vs. FLORIDA RUSH DEFENSE

Michigan finished #33 overall with 213 rushing yards/game in 2016, but leading rusher De’Veon Smith graduated. The depth chart is probably a little thinner this season, with Chris Evans, Karan Higdon, and Ty Isaac likely to share crunch-time carries. They all put up excellent yards per carry last season, with Evans leading the way. Michigan’s offensive line was #64 in Adjusted Line Yards, and they’ll be starting four guys at positions they weren’t starting at last season. Ben Bredeson returns at left guard, Mason Cole moves from center to left tackle, and there are brand new starters at center, right guard, and right tackle. It’s a concerning unit. Florida was #37 in rushing defense, giving up a little over 144 yards/game, and that’s consistent with their #36 Adjusted Line Yards ranking. Florida’s top tackler, safety Marcell Harris, is out due to injury, and the #2 guy (Jarrad Davis) was a 1st round draft pick. The top available, returning tackler is sophomore middle linebacker David Reese II (49 tackles), a one-time Michigan commit. The Gators have some talent on the starting defensive line in tackle Taven Bryan and end CeCe Jefferson, but the #2 guys at both DT spots are freshmen, and the #2 DE is suspended.
Advantage: Michigan

Hit the jump for the rest of the preview.

2017 Season Predictions

Tarik Black (image via MLive)

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LEADING RUSHER
There has been talk over the past few months that there’s a race for the #1 running back spot, but so far I have yet to see evidence of that. Chris Evans and Karan Higdon are thought to be the top two by most, and some have said that Ty Isaac looks to be in the mix for #2, as well. Until I see otherwise, I’m going with the front-runner.
Prediction: Chris Evans, 900 yards

LEADING RECEIVER
This one is really a crapshoot with no returning yardage producers to speak of and a bunch of freshmen in the running to play. The top returning receiver is Grant Perry, who had some off-the-field troubles and lost jersey #9 to freshman Donovan Peoples-Jones. Peoples-Jones, Kekoa Crawford, and Tarik Black also seem likely to play a bunch. I’m going with the guy who looked best in the spring, and that was Black.
Prediction: Tarik Black, 830 yards

Hit the jump for the rest of the season predictions.

2017 Season Countdown List

Nolan Ulizio is my nomination for “most underrated” in the 2017 Countdown

First of all, thanks for reading. I can’t tell you how monumental of a task it was to write approximately 100 posts about the upcoming football season. This year was more of a Herculean task than others, and I thought about cutting it off numerous times. There were several times where I was up at 4:00 a.m. or staying up until midnight to get posts ready. It brings a literal sigh of relief to have this thing finished.

Below is the countdown from beginning to end. Due to a couple stupid omissions and counting errors, I have rearranged the following list to hold true to a numerical countdown, rather than keeping the 3A, 3B, 5A, 5B, etc. This should give you a truer sense of the ranking, even if the actual posts themselves might have slightly different numbers.