The Michigan Wolverines aren't as bad as they look on offense. Sort of.
Through 8 weeks of the 2024 season, Michigan ranks:
— Zach Shaw (@_ZachShaw) October 20, 2024
112th in points per game
113th in yards per play
117th in turnover margin
119th in yards per game
120th in first downs per game
122nd in turnovers lost
130th in scrimmage plays of 10+ yards
131st in scrimmage plays of 20+ yards
"Sort of!"
Look, I might be writing this at 3 am, intermittently checking out my window to see if my night terrors have become manifest and are after me (specifically me, always me), but I am not a crackpot. Just hang with me here.
Specifically to the passing game, the Wolverines are:
— Zach Shaw (@_ZachShaw) October 20, 2024
113th in interceptions
118th in passing TDs
127th in passer rating
128th in passing first downs
129th in passing yards per game
129th in passes of 10+ yards
130th in passes of 20+ yards
132nd in yards per pass attempt
I said hang with me!
Yes, Michigan lost to Illinois in embarrassing fashion, 21-7, the first time in like a decade they've been held to just a touchdown, and yes, the combined total yardage for Michigan wide receivers is just over half of what true freshman Jeremiah Smith has done by himself, and no, there's no way to sugar coat the fact that Michigan's offensive line is beyond awful, and yes, offensive coordinator Kirk Campbell's playcalling is an alphabet soup that sometimes spells "run Mullings" but usually just says "XQMPSDJLR" and sure, there's a decent chance that the Wolverines score like 50 points total in their final five games of the season but... uh...
Michigan's lowest point total in 10 years?
— Nick Baumgardner (@nickbaumgardner) October 19, 2024
Sounds about right. This looks like Michigan's 2014 offense. Almost exactly.
Dammit, I'm trying to make a point here. In brief: Michigan can do two things occasionally well on offense. They did those two things for two and a half drives on Saturday, and it sort of worked out for Michigan, until they said screw it and promptly looked like the worst offense on the planet.
If they figure out a way to actually do those two things with any kind of regularity, they'll beat Michigan State and/or Northwestern, maybe. Fail to do so, and they might end the 2024 season on a seven game losing streak.
THE TWO THINGS
Michigan had ten drives against Illinois. Three ended in a punt, two ended because of Michigan fumbles, one ended thanks to an interception, there was one missed field goal after a poor snap, and one drive ended with Michigan turning the ball over on downs after quarterback Jack Tuttle (20/32, 208 yards, one INT) had three straight incomplete passes to kill it.
All of that is very bad, and importantly, very funny.
Tuttle's interception was especially cool and good because Michigan was driving and about to score their second touchdown of the game, when the 3rd Wolverine quarterback of the season lost track of safety Matthew Bailey and threw the ball directly at his face:
But before that, when not getting sacked five times, Tuttle was converting a 4th-and-18 by hitting the one functional part of the Michigan passing game, tight end Colston Loveland, for a nice 29 yard back shoulder completion that was basically undefendable. My favorite (actual favorite, not dripping with sarcasm favorite) play design that Campbell dialed up was a pass out of a two tight end set, where Loveland was used as a decoy/blocker to get the ball to freshman tight end Hogan Hansen. Hansen had four catches for 50 yards, his only action since getting one pass against Arkansas State, and like... it kind of works?
Add that to a generally efficient Mullings/Edwards performance on the ground (Edwards has quietly been given some opportunities to run in space in the last two games and done fairly well), and hell, maybe you've got something resembling a college offense. Not a good one, per se, but not an abject disaster at least.
I'm not blind, I see the score and I watched the game. Every time Michigan throws the ball to a Not Tight End or tries anything more complicated than pulling a guard is throwing a down directly into the garbage disposal. If they keep doing crap that takes forever to develop Jack Tuttle is going to be eaten alive in addition to turning the ball over five times a game. I get that. But I also think that there's a slight chance that Michigan is finally starting to do some of the work in creating a functional offense that they should've done over the summer.
A BRIEF POINT ABOUT TURNOVERS
The Wolverines had three of them against Illinois, and now are up to 15 on the year, worse than all but four other teams in the country.
I'm torn on whether turnovers in general are incidental or systemic (that is to say, mostly random events versus a virus everyone is infected with), and personally I tend to lean towards incidental mostly because I ascribe to the Base Rate fallacy in weirdly specific ways. But then sometimes Tuttle just says "I hate the feel of pigskin, ew yuck!" and throws the ball away to the other team in disgust. It's possible the Wolverines have something inside of them that really, really likes turning the ball over and they aren't going to stop.
So I don't know. Michigan would be a much better team without so committing so many turnovers. Whether or not they can stop themselves from doing that is up in the air.
THREAT LEVEL
Readers of Threat Level might get occasionally confused because I'm not spending 800 words reveling in Michigan's crapulence, and this might be interpreted as some kind of sympathy or Stockholm syndrome due to watching so much Wolverine football over the years.
The actual explanation for this is that after three straight losses to them, I am paranoid.
I can still see a very dimly lit path for the Michigan Wolverines to make Ohio State uncomfortable in late November, and I hate it. I understand, in whatever parts of my brain not infested by cobwebs and field mice, that Michigan is a bad football team. I know that if the Buckeyes and the Wolverines played tomorrow Ohio State would be favored by 25 points.
But that's not enough, not yet. I remain GUARDED because even the slightest chance of Kalel Mullings pulling a Tim Biakabutuka gives me hives. That isn't going to happen unless the Sherrone Moore and company get considerably less bad at coaching in the next month, but stranger things have happened.
On the other hand, if Michigan loses to Sparty next week, then forget everything I just wrote. Bucks by a million.
Header photo: Ron Johnson-Imagn Images
