In fairness to Rudock...

[Todd Manta Ray]

That was a poor performance, but it'll probably be as poor as he plays this season. He had 5 picks all of last year and had 3 in that contest alone. He was probably a bit geared up and uneasy back there.

He did miss two deep balls, but he also hit plenty like that last season. He'll come around.

The game could have easily been a .500 connection rate with the deep balls and 1 pick...

He is quite a bit better than Devin Gardner, I can assure you that.

 

[Reality Man]

I couldn't agree with you more. Rudock is an okay qb but he has to be able to make some big throws now and then and he didn't last night as key times.

I'll take him for this year but as I said last night...Harbaugh and staff have to get more production out of the running game because Rudock is not going to consistently beat teams down field. That first long throw miss hurt.

Many people focus on the pick 6 and that shouldn't be excused because as a qb you'd rather punt than give up either a pick 6 or field position. I however, as did Harbaugh, have a problem with the previous play that put UM into that position. UM should have been either 3rd and 1 or 1st down but instead mucked up the play.

Look at it this way...UM would have punted the ball in a best case scenario rather than have 3rd and 1 if they executed (Smith/OL). They didn't. Good teams don't muck up a play like that against a good team.

Utah was better and UM played better than usual but those mistakes cost you big time.

 

[illhawkdvv]

He only had that many interceptions last year because he wasn't allowed to throw the ball the way he did tonight. If he would have thrown the ball as many times and down the field like he did tonight he would have had twenty picks.

 

[Todd Manta Ray]

What? His picks were on the sort of short routes we see all the time at Iowa. Outs, hitch routes, etc... Just a bad game. The offense reminded me a lot of what Iowa does, anyway. Part of the problem, at least with a few of the picks, may be that Rudock and WRs weren't on the same page.

 

[Gobluehi]

That last drive Rudock conducted was great. If only he can pick up from there against Oregon St this week...