Over the course of the season, the evil capitalist media has made much of Comrade Rodriguez "refusing to adapt" his offense to the Michigan personnel. Media nay-sayer turned blogger-nay-sayer Jim Carty has complained about play-calling not favoring the players, specifically on the offensive line. Columnists Michael Rosenberg and Lynn Henning (whom we've linked too much in the past) have joined Carty in pining for Lloyd Carr, while peddling the "square-peg/round-hole" meme. Many comment threads from the wild-west of MLive to the saner ground of MGoBlog have blown up with similar complaints. Comrades, we are here to tell you not to believe the bourgeois media that would fill your head with lies in the hopes of dampening Comrade Rodriguez's revolution.
First, let us investigate the claim laid by invetigativve journalist par-excellence, Jim Carty. First, Carty claims that this season would have never occurred under dear departed Comrade Carr:
"Well, when's the last time Carr lost to a MAC team? When's the last time he lost to a 1-4 team?"
The answer, clearly, is never. However, Mr. Carty, when was the last time Coach Carr coached the 2008 Michigan Wolverines? Rodriguez did not coach Chad Henne, Tom Brady, Drew Henson, Michael Hart, Jake Long, or Charles Woodson. Jon Jansen, Steve Hutchinson, and Jeff Backus were not starting on this offensive line. Larry Foote and David Harris were not covering the running game and passing game simultaneously. No, this team returned a single offensive starter, something unmatched in Carr's experience (when Henne and Hart started as freshmen, the other 9 offensive positions were occupied by returning starters). Would Carr have won more than 3 games with this team? Possibly. Would he have won enough to avoid making this the worst team in recent memory? No.
"Why keep calling plays - screens, passes to the flat, and certain inside runs - when the offensive line has looked incapable of blocking them for half a season now?
Leveling criticism is easy, especially when you offer no constructive alternative. Screens and passes to the flat are two of the "quickest" pass plays to call - what part of the mediocre offensive line play suggests that if they proved incapable of blocking for passes to the flat, they'd be able to block for a seven-step drop? If they can't block inside runs, what suggests that they'd be able to hold their blocks longer in order to let the back get outside? To be fair to Mr. Carty, this column was written before the line's bout of competency in the second half of the year - showing much greater success on the ground running the plays about with Carty complains.
The second meme - that Rodriguez has not "adapted" his offense, peddled by ignorant Detroit newspapers, is easier to disprove. In his final three years at West Virgina, Rich Rodriguez called the following run/pass splits:
2005: 74% run/26% pass.
2006: 70% run/30% pass.
2007: 69% run/31% pass.
3-year average: 71% run, 29% pass.
In the same time frame Michigan's splits under Carr were as follows:
2005: 52% run, 48% pass.
2006: 59% run, 41% pass.
2007: 54% run, 46% pass.
3-year average: 55% run, 45% pass.
In his first year as coach of Michigan, Rodriguez called 55% run plays and 45% pass plays - identical to the 3-year average under Lloyd Carr. Clearly, the fact that the team trailed a disproportionate amount of the time skews these numbers towards the pass, so let's examine what 1st half play-calling was, as the team was largely competitive in the first half of nearly every game:
56% run, 44% pass.
A very slight deviation from Michigan's 3-year norm. This was, plainly, not Rodriguez's WVU offense, and any claim to the contrary ignores all statistical evidence.
Comrades, as Brian at MGoBlog points out, this offense, despite a woefully inexperienced offensive line and the utter lack of a convincing down-field passing attack, was just as effective running the ball, as measured by yards-per-carry, as Michigan has traditionally been for the past eight seasons.
The offense, comrades, will work. Be patient, and give it time.
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