September 27, 2005

On Immobile Quarterbacks And Damaged Aircraft

Blog output is way down lately because we've got the customer in house this week, negotiating over requirements and cost estimates, but I wanted to take a second to talk about Saturday's El Foldo against the Badgers (actually, just bloviate some. If you're looking for real analysis, try Brian or Vijay or Joey). It was a total team effort on offense and special teams: the line didn't open big holes, the RBs left the ball on the ground, Henne continued to regress, and Breaston produced more evidence that he isn't a deep threat. Hell, even Avant dropped a ball!

The defense played fairly well, except when they really really had to. The 'Dewey Defeats Truman' award of the day goes to me, for this gem about ten minutes before kickoff:

If we can keep Calhoun from running wild, we'll be fine, because there's no way on this planet that John Stocco can beat us.

Counterpointed by ESPN2 announcer Sean McDonough, about 8:40 Central Time:

Quarterback draw... Stocco... touchdown!

We got beat by fucking John Stocco, who is slightly less mobile than John Navarre. Hell, he's only slightly more mobile than John Goodman!

Michigan may have two engines out and a third on fire, but all is not lost. The talent is there, and Michigan has recovered from awful early seasons before - notably an 0-2 start in 1998 to finish 10-3, 1-2 in 1980 to finish 10-2 and get Bo's first Rose Bowl win, and 0-2 in 1988 to finish 9-2-1 and get Bo's other Rose Bowl win. But they need to get it together doublequick, because Drew Stanton is just dying to see how bad he can carve up M's defense (if he can stay healthy for the whole game), and after that is Iowa at Iowa, where Michigan has had trouble recently.

Win both those games, and the fire's out and they're still in the running for a BCS bid. Lose one of them, and it's an emergency landing New Years Morning in Florida. Lose both, and this Ron White line comes to mind:

"How far can we get on one engine?"
"All the way to the scene of the crash."
The crash site being Ford Field, well before Christmas.

Posted by Chris at September 27, 2005 08:52 PM

Category: Michigan Football
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