I went back and analyzed the second half offensive plays, and here is my take away on each possession. I’ll list them in order of each possession and then go into each play. Take what you will from this review, but I hope it helps the fort see the offense in the 2nd half for what it was. If you like this, I can try to do this more often after games. I'm off of work today, and had a sick kid laying around, so I had some time to re-watch film and take some notes.
1st series post halftime. Score is 20-3, 13:51 on the clock.
1st play: 1st and 10
Handoff to Haskins for about 3-4 yards. Not a terrible push by the O-Line. Nothing spectacular but a decent play. Nothing terribly concerning with this.
2nd play: 2nd and 7
False start. Makes it 2nd and 12
Blitz comes off the corner, Cade makes the right read. Lofts one in the air, behind Henning. This is on Henning. He missed the blitz read. If he cuts his route off and reacts to the blitz, who knows what happens. It was actually a good read and decent throw to an area by Cade.
3rd play: Third and 12:
Handoff to Corum. First lets start with the run. Blake attacks the middle. Rutgers is ready. If he bounces it out to the right side he may have something.
But to me, this to me was a conservative call and situational football. Also, this is a little bit of where I question the staff's trust in Cade. Why are we not trusting our offense to do more. I do have to acknowledge that this approach is "old school football" and we were up 20-3, so Harbaugh may have been saying, Rutgers has done nothing, don’t get too cute yet. I get that approach, but I'm not a huge fan of it, given modern football and the " always attacking" nature of the great offenses. (Do you think Ole Miss and Bama do that?)
Now we punt.
Next series. Third quarter. Score is 20-10, 6:24 on the clock in the third.
1st play: 1st and 10:
Cade makes a nice throw to Baldwin on the left side for 7. Good execution. Nice toss and catch. No issues with this call. Sets up a good down and distance on 2nd down.
2nd play: 2nd and 3
Corum up the gut for 2 (almost 3). So close to a 1st down. Great play by the Rutgers player. Blake is almost at the marker and he yanks him backwards. One note from my view: If Blake take his run to the right, he has a definite first down. But with the down and distance, I get why he goes right up the gut. O-Line created a hole, but it did close quick.
3rd play: 3rd and 1
Heavy formation. Mis-read by Haskins. He goes left, there is nothing there. If he reads it and goes to the right and follows Eric All, he likely gets the 1st down. Now, it’s hard to tell what the call was and where it was intended to go. But again, from my view, if Haskin goes right, he gets the 1st.
4th play: Harbaugh calls punt after some attempts to bring Rutgers offside. Score 20-10. Again with the conservative play call
Third series. Score 20-13. 14:04 in the 4th
1st play: 1st and 10.
Pass to Sanristil. This was a low throw but that’s smart placement with the safety coming over. This HAS to be caught. It hit sanristil in the hands/chest as he was going down. That is not on Cade. (Second play I attribute to a receiver not helping the QB out). Also, good protection by the O-line. One HUGE issue I have with this play is the route tree. Sanristil is coming across on one side and Johnson runs a crossing route that literally takes him and his defender within a few yards of sanristil. I do not understand that concept. Catch still should have been made. But this was a bad designed play (considering all routes) or a missed route by CJ.
2nd play: 2nd and 10
Cade passes to Eric All. Just out of his reach. I will say this is on Cade. Good protection by the O-line again. Not a bad play design. He did have a TE underneath but he would have gotten only around 5 because there was a man coming up behind him. Eric All would have been over a first down. Mark this down as Cades first “passing” miss in my eyes
3rd play: 3rd and 10
Pressure up the middle from Rutgers. This is a mistake by Cade. He rolls right and does a nice job of evading pressure. What he misses is Corum shadows him to the right. As he goes right all he needs to do is make a short 3-4 yard pass to Corum and they have the first down. Again I put this on Cade. As he goes to the line and the backer comes up, he has to have better awareness and get that ball to one of the best playmakers in the country. Great players see that and make that play. If he does that, it is a big play for Michigan.
Now UM punts at 13:17 left in the fourth.
Fourth series. 5:24 on the clock in the 4th
1st play. 1st and 10.
Corum to the right outside. Nice run. Gets 9 yards. If he stays inbounds, it is 15. Nice block on the perimeter by Eric All.
2nd play: 2nd and 1
Corum up the gut for 5-6. Singleton makes a heck of a back side play. If he doesn’t, Corum is gone. First down. Nice blocking. Well executed.
3rd play: 1st and 10:
RPO to the left. Hands it to Corum. This is my issue with Cade in the RPO. If he keeps the ball he has the entire left side to himself. Instead Corum gets 2 yards.
4th play: 2nd and 8
Hand off to the right side. Rutgers gets great push. Looks like a designed run the whole play. Rutgers Blows the play up. O-line and TEs get beat bad on the right side. We get bailed out with a face mask penalty. Not good execution on our behalf.
5th play: 1st and 10 after a facemask penalty
Handoff up the middle to Corum. I take this as bad execution on Cade. It looks like an RPO read. If he keeps it he has the entire outside to himself. Defense is not even viewing him as a threat. Corum gets a few yards after the hand off.
6th play: 2nd and 7:
Same play as before, but to the left. Cade hands off but if he were to pull it and actually read the edge defender (the safety) crashing down, he would get a huge gain. To me, this is lack of awareness on Cade’s part or him not wanting any part of the “Run” in the RPO. Instead, he hands off for no gain. This was a bad miss on Cade (from my perspective), being that it was the 2nd consecutive play he did this.
7th play: 3rd and 7 (timeout)
Here’s my take. I think Gattis told Cade that the edges were Open during the timeout. (Which they were). So cade goes out, keeps the handoff, when he shouldn’t and gets stopped in the backfield for a loss of 2-3. I don’t think the play would have been a big gain if he gave it to Corum but it would have been Corum vs a backer, one on one. I like that more than Cade verses a defender…. But I do think he got told to watch that, because of how open it was the two plays prior.
After that, we have the missed FG then the defensive stop/TO to seal the game. (Not going into the kneeling plays at the end of the game)
So to sum it all up, here are my big take aways:
1. We need to decide if we are, in fact, an RPO team. If we are, Cade needs to read it better and have some willingness to pull the ball and take the 5-15 yard gains the defense is giving him.
2. Our WR's missed some plays. Plain and simple. QBs can't do it all. Sanristill HAD to make that catch. And Henning had to make a better read on that unguarded blitz, to at least have a shot at the ball that Cade threw. He made a good read and threw the ball to an area, which is likely his read on a blitz like that.
3. Cade missed some throws & reads. The toss to All was a miss on his part. Not seeing Corum is him getting caught up in the moment and not keeping his situational awareness going. I've gone into the RPO misses he showed, but that has to improve.
4. Our O-line was not terrible in the 2nd half, contrary to popular belief, but it was not outstanding either. Need to keep working and tightening up there.
From my experience, nothing I saw in the 2nd half was "doomsday". There is a lot that can be coached and cleaned up. My biggest worry is the designed nature of our offense, if we have a QB who won't do the "Run" part of RPO. That may be where the staff has to give JJ a look, if Cade doesn't have that willingness in him. I think overall, Cade made good reads and throws a really nice ball.
1st series post halftime. Score is 20-3, 13:51 on the clock.
1st play: 1st and 10
Handoff to Haskins for about 3-4 yards. Not a terrible push by the O-Line. Nothing spectacular but a decent play. Nothing terribly concerning with this.
2nd play: 2nd and 7
False start. Makes it 2nd and 12
Blitz comes off the corner, Cade makes the right read. Lofts one in the air, behind Henning. This is on Henning. He missed the blitz read. If he cuts his route off and reacts to the blitz, who knows what happens. It was actually a good read and decent throw to an area by Cade.
3rd play: Third and 12:
Handoff to Corum. First lets start with the run. Blake attacks the middle. Rutgers is ready. If he bounces it out to the right side he may have something.
But to me, this to me was a conservative call and situational football. Also, this is a little bit of where I question the staff's trust in Cade. Why are we not trusting our offense to do more. I do have to acknowledge that this approach is "old school football" and we were up 20-3, so Harbaugh may have been saying, Rutgers has done nothing, don’t get too cute yet. I get that approach, but I'm not a huge fan of it, given modern football and the " always attacking" nature of the great offenses. (Do you think Ole Miss and Bama do that?)
Now we punt.
Next series. Third quarter. Score is 20-10, 6:24 on the clock in the third.
1st play: 1st and 10:
Cade makes a nice throw to Baldwin on the left side for 7. Good execution. Nice toss and catch. No issues with this call. Sets up a good down and distance on 2nd down.
2nd play: 2nd and 3
Corum up the gut for 2 (almost 3). So close to a 1st down. Great play by the Rutgers player. Blake is almost at the marker and he yanks him backwards. One note from my view: If Blake take his run to the right, he has a definite first down. But with the down and distance, I get why he goes right up the gut. O-Line created a hole, but it did close quick.
3rd play: 3rd and 1
Heavy formation. Mis-read by Haskins. He goes left, there is nothing there. If he reads it and goes to the right and follows Eric All, he likely gets the 1st down. Now, it’s hard to tell what the call was and where it was intended to go. But again, from my view, if Haskin goes right, he gets the 1st.
4th play: Harbaugh calls punt after some attempts to bring Rutgers offside. Score 20-10. Again with the conservative play call
Third series. Score 20-13. 14:04 in the 4th
1st play: 1st and 10.
Pass to Sanristil. This was a low throw but that’s smart placement with the safety coming over. This HAS to be caught. It hit sanristil in the hands/chest as he was going down. That is not on Cade. (Second play I attribute to a receiver not helping the QB out). Also, good protection by the O-line. One HUGE issue I have with this play is the route tree. Sanristil is coming across on one side and Johnson runs a crossing route that literally takes him and his defender within a few yards of sanristil. I do not understand that concept. Catch still should have been made. But this was a bad designed play (considering all routes) or a missed route by CJ.
2nd play: 2nd and 10
Cade passes to Eric All. Just out of his reach. I will say this is on Cade. Good protection by the O-line again. Not a bad play design. He did have a TE underneath but he would have gotten only around 5 because there was a man coming up behind him. Eric All would have been over a first down. Mark this down as Cades first “passing” miss in my eyes
3rd play: 3rd and 10
Pressure up the middle from Rutgers. This is a mistake by Cade. He rolls right and does a nice job of evading pressure. What he misses is Corum shadows him to the right. As he goes right all he needs to do is make a short 3-4 yard pass to Corum and they have the first down. Again I put this on Cade. As he goes to the line and the backer comes up, he has to have better awareness and get that ball to one of the best playmakers in the country. Great players see that and make that play. If he does that, it is a big play for Michigan.
Now UM punts at 13:17 left in the fourth.
Fourth series. 5:24 on the clock in the 4th
1st play. 1st and 10.
Corum to the right outside. Nice run. Gets 9 yards. If he stays inbounds, it is 15. Nice block on the perimeter by Eric All.
2nd play: 2nd and 1
Corum up the gut for 5-6. Singleton makes a heck of a back side play. If he doesn’t, Corum is gone. First down. Nice blocking. Well executed.
3rd play: 1st and 10:
RPO to the left. Hands it to Corum. This is my issue with Cade in the RPO. If he keeps the ball he has the entire left side to himself. Instead Corum gets 2 yards.
4th play: 2nd and 8
Hand off to the right side. Rutgers gets great push. Looks like a designed run the whole play. Rutgers Blows the play up. O-line and TEs get beat bad on the right side. We get bailed out with a face mask penalty. Not good execution on our behalf.
5th play: 1st and 10 after a facemask penalty
Handoff up the middle to Corum. I take this as bad execution on Cade. It looks like an RPO read. If he keeps it he has the entire outside to himself. Defense is not even viewing him as a threat. Corum gets a few yards after the hand off.
6th play: 2nd and 7:
Same play as before, but to the left. Cade hands off but if he were to pull it and actually read the edge defender (the safety) crashing down, he would get a huge gain. To me, this is lack of awareness on Cade’s part or him not wanting any part of the “Run” in the RPO. Instead, he hands off for no gain. This was a bad miss on Cade (from my perspective), being that it was the 2nd consecutive play he did this.
7th play: 3rd and 7 (timeout)
Here’s my take. I think Gattis told Cade that the edges were Open during the timeout. (Which they were). So cade goes out, keeps the handoff, when he shouldn’t and gets stopped in the backfield for a loss of 2-3. I don’t think the play would have been a big gain if he gave it to Corum but it would have been Corum vs a backer, one on one. I like that more than Cade verses a defender…. But I do think he got told to watch that, because of how open it was the two plays prior.
After that, we have the missed FG then the defensive stop/TO to seal the game. (Not going into the kneeling plays at the end of the game)
So to sum it all up, here are my big take aways:
1. We need to decide if we are, in fact, an RPO team. If we are, Cade needs to read it better and have some willingness to pull the ball and take the 5-15 yard gains the defense is giving him.
2. Our WR's missed some plays. Plain and simple. QBs can't do it all. Sanristill HAD to make that catch. And Henning had to make a better read on that unguarded blitz, to at least have a shot at the ball that Cade threw. He made a good read and threw the ball to an area, which is likely his read on a blitz like that.
3. Cade missed some throws & reads. The toss to All was a miss on his part. Not seeing Corum is him getting caught up in the moment and not keeping his situational awareness going. I've gone into the RPO misses he showed, but that has to improve.
4. Our O-line was not terrible in the 2nd half, contrary to popular belief, but it was not outstanding either. Need to keep working and tightening up there.
From my experience, nothing I saw in the 2nd half was "doomsday". There is a lot that can be coached and cleaned up. My biggest worry is the designed nature of our offense, if we have a QB who won't do the "Run" part of RPO. That may be where the staff has to give JJ a look, if Cade doesn't have that willingness in him. I think overall, Cade made good reads and throws a really nice ball.
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