10/24/2020 – Michigan 49, Minnesota 24 – 1-0

That wasn't how it was supposed to go at all.

Even the most optimistic Michigan fan in the world would concede that Joe Milton was at times likely to resemble a certain character in a book I have read one million times. Harbaugh is the elephant.

Watch Me Throw The Ball, Mo Willems

This didn't happen, even a little. The worst thing Joe Milton did in his first start at Michigan was attempt to hit a very covered seam route near the end of the first half. That was high; if anyone was getting to it, it would be Erick All. Twin Cities-area cows are unscathed today, as are the chestplates of Minnesota linebackers. The weirdos trying to peer in from outside the stadium did not get plunked.

It is possible that the next-worst thing was Milton rolling out after maybe-probably missing an open Giles Jackson on a post and then casually flipping a 50-yard improv throw while rolling opposite his throwing arm:

He was only foiled by Jackson's diminutive stature.

These were minor blips around an ocean of calm. By halftime a mainstay of charts and graphs twitter was losing all perspective:

I don’t want to jinx it but Joe Milton could end up being the coolest Michigan football player of all time

— Manuel Excel (@colintj) October 25, 2020

This man has already been told to rein it in by the twitter police. But, like Kirk Herbstreit suggesting that Ben Mason taking a drive-killing penalty was good because it was rad, there is something correct in there. Ben Mason blocking a guy into the hockey arena is rad, and Joe Milton did exude a calmness that radiates through the stadium and into your television and then into you.

Consider this: season openers are dumb, and coronavirus college football is even dumber, and new quarterbacks only compound these issues. Michigan's offense was impervious to this. They took only one what-are-we-doing timeout, that because of a late substitution. They perfectly executed a one-minute drill. They punted once.

[After THE JUMP: give me all of that JT Barrett ground game]

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Hard to remember now, but the game started with a comedy of errors. A personal foul, a sack, an inaccurate ball, a blocked punt, a blown coverage. Michigan was seven points down in a flash and there were already dark proclamations about how this was Michigan football, now and forever. (A sign of personal growth: I only thought and believed these things. I did not tweet them.)

Then something that Milton had almost nothing to do with: a handoff to Zach Charbonnet on which he ran a 70-yard wind sprint without changing direction.

Milton got to be calm because various other folks did their jobs well. The early pressure where Ryan Hayes got bull-rushed back into Milton was one of just a few on the day; blitzes were picked up like last year's interior line never left. Michigan made good on their promise to get the ball to little guys in space, from the first flare screen to Corum on. Josh Gattis crafted a gameplan that took advantage of Milton's strengths while not putting too much on his plate.

So no, that was not Michigan football now and forever in the first five minutes. The program spent its offseason with its head down, working in random fields and issuing stern, but not unhinged, proclamations about how they would like to play football. They haven't had to pause practices for COVID. They got to this game without losing a single player. That can all change in a second even if you're being careful; so far, so good.

Joe Milton was at the heart of that, sleeping on top of a pile of playbooks and dreaming about proper footwork on a fifteen-yard out.

Milton: "I felt great. I didn't panic. I wasn't scared. My touch tonight was pretty outstanding. I was impressed with myself. I've been working on it for a long time." Says he was nervous for the first snap but, "I'm fine. I'm ready to go."

— Orion Sang (@orion_sang) October 25, 2020

That's the only way to get from the guy we saw last year to Saturday's performance. Is it going to be enough against Ohio State? Probably not, but at least nobody's going to be talking about offseason leisure activities afterwards.

A NOTE ON PICTURES

We did not get a a spot on this year's very restricted COVID sidelines. We're going to have to work around that this year.

AWARDS

Known Friends and Trusted Agents Of The Week

you're the man now, dog

#1 Joe Milton. The stats are relatively unspectacular on a raw yardage basis—225 yards passing, 52 on the ground—but the offense scored 42 points and the ball got spread around so much that no skill position player did more than ~1 thing. Also: 10.2 YPA and 6.5 YPC with nothing approaching a turnover.

#2(t) Aidan Hutchinson and Kwity Paye. Hutchinson spent the day tossing Minnesota OL into a heap and tackling guys. He was probably Michigan's best defensive tackle. He is a defensive end. Paye was very quiet until the instant Chris Fowler said he was quiet, and then he picked up a TFL and two thunderous +3 sacks. Chris Fowler : Kwity Paye :: Brian Cook : Trevor Siemian.

#3 Michael Barrett. Thunderous sack created a Fat Guy Touchdown™. Spike a couple of guys who tried to get the edge. Picked up a squib kick and returned it inside the ten.

Honorable mention: Ben Mason killed a drive but also scored a touchdown and was the key block on the two long runs. Hassan Haskins had one of those runs and also crunched Minnesota on an attempted fake punt. Gemon Green was always in the right spot and picked up two PBUs. Jaylen Mayfield had multiple pancakes and didn't allow a pressure (probably). Ronnie Bell got tripped by the turf monster but led Michigan with 74 receiving yards; that plus another thunderous block on a bubble get him on the list.

KFaTAotW Standings. (Scoring: 8 points for first, 5 for second, 3 for third, 1 for HM. Points from ties adjudicated by an ankylosaur named Sharon.)

8: Joe Milton (#1 Minnesota)
3: Aidan Hutchinson(T2 Minnesota), Kwity Paye(T2 Minnesota), Michael Barrett(#3 Minnesota)
1: Ben Mason (HM Minnesota), Hassan Haskins(HM Minnesota), Gemon Green (HM Minnesota), Jaylen Mayfield (HM Minnesota), Ronnie Bell(HM Minnesota)

Who's Got It Better Than Us(?) Of The Week

Minnesota continues their rich tradition of assuming Michigan's viper doesn't exist, leading to 1) a thunderous sack, and 2) a Donovan Jeter touchdown.

Honorable mention: Zach Charbonnet scores a touchdown so easy it's on Ty Isaac's high school highlights. Hassan Haskins pops out of a pile and stiffarms a guy for 50+ yard run #2. Ben Mason skies for a touchdown, no you did not hallucinate that. Kwity Paye goes back-to-back sacks.

​MARCUS HALL EPIC DOUBLE BIRD OF THE WEEK.

The Ben Mason PF –> Milton sack –> blocked punt –> waggle TD sequence briefly sent Michigan twitter into a torrent of self-flagellation.

Honorable mention: 0/3 on field goals is our concern, dude. Various Ibrahim runs that either battered Michigan's DTs or jumped outside. The no OPI –> PI sequence on Minnesota's second touchdown.

OFFENSE

Hell yes give me that JT Barrett ground game. There was a third and three where Michigan lined up with three wide and then motioned the back out of the backfield. I thought "yes!" presnap; Michigan ran QB pin and pull against a six-man box and converted. This was immediately after a scramble to set it up. These two plays are a paradigm shift:

This second and eleven run was also encouraging:

Milton takes contact at four yards there and gets nine.

As someone who watched many, many JT Barrett games and was despondent about every third and four or less I welcome this development. Having a jumbo quarterback who can move decently gives you so many more options to be +1 in the box.

After Michigan had established Milton as a problem on the ground they pulled one lineman and set Erick All up for a walk-in touchdown he dropped. Long term the setup and the dagger are way more important than All getting too eager for a touchdown.

Bench Mason, literally. As in "Ben Mason put a guy on the sideline." I saw this on the edge of the screen live and immediately went "no no no no," and sure enough the flag came out:

sometime you have to set the tone by committing a drive-killing personal foul pic.twitter.com/aYQ3RdQYLR

— the joe milton discourse (@AceAnbender) October 26, 2020

You can call that soft but also the play ended ten seconds before the flag. You can probably send 90% of that message without getting a flag.

But! Herbstreit wasn't entirely wrong, just mostly. Mason was obliterating dudes. He carved out paths on Michigan's big chunk runs but this was the most satisfying clocking of the night:

The entire MGoBlog braintrust is delighted that we've gone from "Josh Gattis has no use for Ben Mason" to KILL ALL THE LINEBACKERS.

Hit 'em where they ain't. The stat of the game from PFF:

Minnesota’s defense was awful against Michigan, but two players don’t deserve the blame: Outside corners Coney Durr and Benjamin St-Juste. Joe Milton and the Wolverines avoided the two at all costs and instead attacked their areas of weakness. Those two combined allowed just 11 yards in coverage all game.

Josh Gattis came up against a team with one unambiguous positive on defense and didn't bother testing it. This is approaching a trend. Last year MSU entered the Michigan game with the #1 rush defense in the country, per fancystats, and Michigan spent 80% of their time doing anything but testing Raequan Williams:

The other thing Michigan didn't do is beat its head against a brick wall. Michigan went out of its way to avoid the center of the Michigan State defense. If we set aside short yardage, by the time it was 37-10 Michigan had run 20 times to 37 dropbacks. Those runs were:

• 3 edge attacks: two end-arounds for Jackson and a speed option
• 4 arc zone reads; Patterson kept two, really should have kept a third, and 50/50 on the fourth
• a QB draw
• 12 fairly conventional interior runs (split zone, iso, inside zone, etc.)

So not only did Michigan pass a lot, nearly half of their runs were either pure edge plays, hybrids (the arc), or a QB draw that doesn't go up against MSU's conventional run approach.

This is not the kind of offense that tells you what it's going to do and dares you to stop it. 

Ed Warinner for… uh… offensive line coach. The OL error rate was not zero; it was well under any reasonable expectations. There were no false starts. [ED: correction, there was one] I think there were no missed blitz pickups aside from an early snap that got timed up and ate a double A gap twist. The early Hayes incident mentioned above may have been the only instance where Milton got quick pressure, and that wasn't even a –2 in my grading.

Minnesota's defense is probably going to be very bad and there are questions about what happens when Michigan gets in one-on-one battles with higher-end DL. Mentally this was very encouraging.

Corum has it. Michigan's first snap was a flare screen to Corum where the playside LB was unblocked, because it was Corum's job to dust him. He got dusted. Didn't even get a finger on Corum. The rest of Corum's day he was deployed as an interior runner, finding gaps and cutting back in tight spaces to add three yards to his carry.

A running back who can credibly operate inside and out is going to be a dude.

Evolving the arc. Michigan did not run the arc read play that's been their running game staple the past two years. Instead they had Eric All dodge that DE like Nick Eubanks did all last year and then head into the flat for a quick screen. These were RPS+ plays whenever run.

DEFENSE

The foley artist. Michael Barrett did a ton of impressive things in his first start but if you're looking for the one-second summary it's the sound that he made when he caved in Tanner Morgan's chest*:

Barrett popped off the field a couple years ago in the spring game because when he hit guys they stopped. Now he's translating it to the field.

*[Herbstreit's best moment of the broadcast was after this play, when he pointed out that there's always something going on when there's a defensive back lined up directly behind a guy tight over the slot. YES. WHY DID A FULL DECADE OF MICHIGAN OFFENSIVE LINES NOT KNOW THIS?!]

Did Zordich pull another one? Remember a couple years ago when we were all panicked that Zordich kept dumping on his cornerbacks and then it turned out he was just being mad at Lavert Hill motivationally? I feel there may be a similar dynamic going on with Gemon Green.

Green did the most important thing with 100% consistency: he was in position to make a play. This was the situation on the big completion he gave up:

You cannot be more in a guy's chest than that, and his head is getting around. Autman-Bell is about to put his left hand on Green's back and shove him past the play on an underthrown ball—one of those obvious, critical OPIs that get called maybe 20% of the time. I'd be happy with that coverage from any of the killers Michigan has put out at CB over the past half-decade.

Another still from an attempted fade to Bateman late:

There is no window there. On the next play Michigan put Green on Bateman when he lined up in the slot. Bateman seemed to stumble out of his break without Green influencing that much. Still, Green getting that assignment when everyone in the stadium on the planet knows the plan is "throw it to Bateman" says something about something.

The Faustin switch does indicate that there's something suboptimal about the corner spot. Maybe it's just depth? It's either that or Green playing better than he has in practice. Hopefully the former.

The other side. Vincent Gray was not as good. He was in a good spot on Bateman's long catch but got tangled up and fell, allowing Bateman to make the catch and getting hit with a flag for good measure. Then he got caught in man coverage on mesh and got lost on it. He went well out of the way of the Minnesota WR coming the other way and was never going to tackle on the catch.

With Dax and without. Michigan faced a team that had one of the best receivers in the country, and they lined him up in the slot a ton. When Dax Hill was over the slot Bateman had ~25 yards on six catches, and when he tried a stop-and-go this was the result:

Hill got flagged for that, but when the color guy says it's a "questionable call" what he means is HOLY GOD THE SEVEN SINS DESCEND UPON THE DEMON WHO THREW THAT FLAG.

Then Hill went out for the game and Makari Paige came in. Paige had a rough go. Bateman took a slant from eight yards to a chunk play by cutting back outside Paige, who could not tackle on the catch. Ibrahim was able to hop outside him for a 20-yard chunk of his own. Paige looked like a true freshman thrown in before he's ready, which he was.

FWIW, it doesn't seem like Hill's injury is going to keep him out long-term. Sam Webb thinks he'll play against MSU. I wonder if Sammy Faustin might get a look in the slot

Point Don Brown. He pointed out that Michigan gave up fewer RPO completions than almost anyone last year, and Minnesota's formidable passing game petered out into not much:

Minnesota had one of the top passing offenses in the country in 2019. It looked like it would field another formidable offense in 2020 with quarterback Tanner Morgan and wide receiver Rashad Bateman returning. But they looked far from formidable against Michigan on Saturday night. In fact, it was their least efficient passing offense since their 5-7 season in 2017.

Morgan had easily the worst game of his collegiate career — he finished the night recording a sub-30.0 passing grade and had nearly as many turnover-worthy plays (four) than completions over 10 yards downfield (five). There was no doubt some big fluky plays in there helped Michigan, but this loss is solely on Morgan and the offense.

If Hill hadn't gone out those numbers would have been worse.

Defensive tackles: still meh. Carlo Kemp had a couple moments, and Julius Welschof showed up on a couple of pressures. The DT problems seemed unresolved nonetheless. Nobody was able to hold up against Minnesota's interior doubles, let alone penetrate against them.

Still not working. Michigan's 3-3-5 package attempts to dial up the wacky but consistently gets gashed on the ground. Wasn't much different here. This jumped out:

That's a 3-3-5 with Paye as a nose tackle, more or less, and Ben VanSumeren and Josh Ross the only guys to the right of the center. Morgan has just audibled Ibrahim from his right to his left; Minnesota runs IZ off to the right and converts despite Ross just about coming off the RT. Great play, no support.

Walking wounded. Cam McGrone was playing with a club on his hand. Michigan's backup ILBs were both walk-ons. Things could go south at LB in a hurry.

I object to "Juice" as a nickname because he's German and this has nothing to do with his country of origin. Julius Welschof, Ol' Efficient Subway Design* himself, featured as a rotation DT frequently deployed on passing downs. He picked up half a sack when McGrone flushed Morgan to him.

Quality penetration. He's got some juice to him.

*[Welschof's prospecting name is a work in progress]

SPECIAL TEAMS

Hoo boy. I said this was going to be a dumb season, and this game had a season's worth of dumb just in special teams. Let us count the ways.

Michigan misses all three of their field goals. The last one had a difficult snap to get down and may be more on the lack of Cameron Cheesman than Moody. (There was also a questionable snap on an extra point.) The others were fine until they drifted outside the uprights.

All of Minnesota's specialists are out. So of course they hit the only field goal of the game. At least the punter was memorably bad. I enjoy thinking about that one time Pat Fitzgerald's soul left his body because his punter kicked a three-yarder…

…and every Minnesota punt recalled this happy memory. Relatedly…

Minnesota fakes a punt. It didn't go well. Looks like they tipped it and Michigan read it:

One of these things is not like the other pic.twitter.com/xFJfh3IDFC

— RichardJohnson (@RJ_Writes) October 25, 2020

Haskins stuck this like he's the primary backup at MLB, which uh is he? Even if he's not we need to have a Football Decathlon between Haskins and Barrett.

Michigan's punt gets blocked. Minnesota runs a twist that gets a guy directly up the middle that doesn't get picked up. Plonk.

Minnesota gets goofy with their kickoffs. Pop ups to the 30 were working fine. Squibbing it directly at Michigan players was inadvisable, and then Barrett grabbed one and zipped through a gap carved out by Charbonnet and Sainristil.

What it all means? Nothing! #covidkickers

MISCELLANEOUS

NO JAUNTY FAKES AT PORTENTIOUSNESS PLEASE. I about died when the broadcast teased Momentous News about Michigan's season deep into garbage time, because Hill had missed a couple quarters. Then we found out that Harbaugh was wearing slightly different pants.

Just the kind of guy who vomits a lot. We've all known several!

Josh Ross on Michael Barrett's on-field vomit: "Mike B, he's one of those guys who might just throw up a couple times. ... That's actually funny. He's done that before, so I'm not surprised."

— Daniel Dash (@DanielDash_) October 25, 2020

So it's not nerves since this has apparently happened in practice enough that Barrett is well-known for vomiting. Ol' Scratchy Teeth is going to fertilize the turf. It's a thing.

HERE

Best and Worst:

King crabs, one of the 5 instances where nature said "screw it, let's grow some claws and walk sideways", live anywhere between 100 and 400 fathoms below the surface; the best un-assisted dive (no scuba tank or atmoshperic suit) in recorded human history is a bit over 100 fathoms, and that guy had multiple strokes and apparently still has coordination issues years later. So it makes sense, on a practical level, for evolutionary trends that worked in one set of conditions to work in similar ones, to repeat the cycle that led to an outcome that not only survived but thrived in the world around it. The fact it led to an armored, 6-legged, two-clawed nightmare creature that one state liked so much they made it their State Crustacean is, I guess, more a feature than a bug.

So why bring crabs and evolution up in a game recap after Michigan blew the doors off a ranked Minnesota team to kick off this disjointed 2020 season? Because for so long Michigan has tried to fight against the natural evolution of college football. Every elite program has amazing amenities, top-notch trainers, and recruit nationally. Sure, there's a level of bagmen that Michigan won't quite step down to, but the era of Michigan just out-Michigan'ing teams to the most wins in college football history went out the window decades ago, and so Michigan's insistence on fighting the current of football philosophy out of some weird attachment to a bygone era stymied their ability to keep pace with the other elites.

Stephen King (not that one) on some schematic things:

2. Using the H-back for short passes

We saw a number of these: Short passes to the H-back cutting across the formation, the easiest things in the world to complete, putting reasonably beefy guys into space.

I clipped the Mason TD because it uses split zone action. Split zone was a basic run play of ours last year, and it also is the base play that sets up the zone read arc action that Michigan has used well in the past, most notable two years ago against Wisconsin.

Here's Mason running left across the back of the OL as they run their outside zone blocks to the right. This is looks like a standard split-zone run play; in the past, Michigan has also been known to option the contain defender that knifes in, while arcing the H-back around him to lay a block downfield as the QB pulls and runs for dozens of yards.

Joby on Michigan going right back to guys:

Tonight's game featured at least four mini-stories where the coaches gave players opportunities to redeem themselves. Perhaps the most poignant, to me, was seeing Chris Evans punch it in (and in Chris Evans fashion, no less) after coming back from the academic malfeasance, admitting his mistake, earning his way back onto the team, into the lineup and onto the field. He was given another chance.

The game offered up three other real-time instances of redemption. First, Ben Mason got the unsportsmanlike conduct penalty that killed all of the momentum of the first drive and put the team in 3rd and very long. But on the very next drive, he was on the receiving end of the much-ballyhooed FB pass for an impressively acrobatic TD. He got another chance.

Then Blake Corum, the wunderkind freshman that got the ball rolling offensively, literally got the ball rolling on a kick return, fumbling it away and being extremely fortunate that Michael Barrett bailed him out. But on the next series, he gets his number called and busts off a chunk play. He got another chance.

Finally, Erick All dropped a slam-dunk TD on a superbly designed play by Josh Gattis, but gave him the ball on the little arc pass and he nearly scores. He got another chance.

ELSEWHERE

Sap's Decals. Touch The Banner. Maize and Brew. MGoFish. Maize and Blue Nation. Hoover Street Rag.

My dad is on a style pic.twitter.com/j2msXAG1Cq

— James (@JamesHarbaughJr) October 25, 2020

Bill Connelly on the situation:

Michigan improved from 66th to 21st in offensive SP+ over the second half of last season, discovering a diverse and exciting run game to pair with a passing game that did just enough. … Michigan gained 478 yards on just 56 offensive plays (8.5 per play). The Wolverines had never averaged better than 6.5 per play against a ranked opponent in the Harbaugh era.

Tougher tests await:

The Gophers were projected to fall from 26th to 44th in defensive SP+ after losing a majority of last year's starters. One game in, they're 67th. Michigan's seven remaining opponents, only Maryland's defense ranks lower.

That's not entirely based on one game since SP+ has a lot of roster and history baked into its projections but it's still pretty jumpy. Michigan shot up into the top 10 based on the Minnesota game.

Iowa also debuted a new quarterback in their 24-20 loss to Purdue. This is how new QBs usually feel:

could see a few times he deliberately slowed down his delivery and tried to 'float' passes in as well, didn't work well, experience should help there but it reminds of how Stanley looked early on at Iowa

— Hawkeye Gamefilm (@hawkeyegamefilm) October 25, 2020

Harbaugh on Milton:

"Joe was great,” Harbaugh said. “First time starting, on the road against a really good team, top-25 ranked team, everything. Big Saturday night stage, the whole shebang. He was as cool as a cucumber, I’ll tell you what. He handled everything with aplomb.

“His accuracy in the passing game, a real command of the offense, and he ran the football with authority and had great ball security. Just really played an outstanding game.”

Interesting fact things from the Athletic:

3. Michigan has won 17 consecutive road games at Minnesota, the longest streak against a single opponent in Big Ten history.

That’s according to ESPN Stats & Info. The Wolverines won 49-24 at Minnesota on Saturday. Minnesota’s last home win against Michigan came in 1977, when the Wolverines were ranked No. 1.

Michigan’s 49 points were its most in a road game against a ranked team since their 54-51 loss at Northwestern in 2000. The Wolverines had zero runs of at least 50 yards last season and just two of 40-plus yards, but they had runs of 66 and 70 yards on Saturday.

Michigan scored 35 points in the first half. According to Elias and ESPN, it’s the most points Michigan has ever scored against an AP ranked opponent in a first half.

Sam Webb on Barrett and other matters:

Some inside the program went further than saying there wouldn’t be a drop-off from Hudson to Barrett... some say they believe Barrett will be better before all is said and done. During the NFL combine last spring Hudson measured in at 5-11, 220 lbs., and ran a 4.56 forty. During Michigan’s conditioning tests Barrett measured in at 6-0, 227, lbs., reportedly ran a 4.52. They also say he is quicker laterally predecessor. It’ll be a while before a true comparison can be made, but it definitely looks like one that is going to be worthy of making.

Michigan opened at –23 against MSU, line is now –25.