Michigan Football, Team 137, 2016 Season.

[hack]

Surely Peppers is gone. I know he said last year that he might stay, I think just after Lewis announced that he was staying, but I really doubt it. He is of course welcome to stay and I would be overjoyed but it is not the right decision.

[jaadam4]

There's no reason for Peppers to stay.

[Wellington_beefhouser]

I've seen Peppers going as high as #3 in this draft.

[Pasadena Blue]

As we enter the second half of the season realizing we have a pretty decent football team, I am worried that JH had made a mistake in going with Speight.
We have a defense capable of covering up a lot of mistakes by the offense. But no way we can beat O-state without having an offense to outscore them. I think we would have a much better shot in C-bus with O'Korn over Speight.

[Jeff Buchanan]

No.

[WM Wolverine]

The best player plays under JH, not sure why people believe in a conspiracy about the QB position. Speight gives the team a better chance to win.

[jaadam4]

I've seen Peppers going as high as #3 in this draft.

I don't see Peppers going that high. What position is he going to play at the NFL level? Safety? Once Peppers starts getting wrapped up in the crazy knit pick over every measurable he'll end up in the 6-10 range

[*JD*]

The spartie game was just announced as a nooner.

[jaadam4]

The Sparty name doesn't carry any weight to make it a prime time game.

[iam416]

Clemson-FSU was always going to be the prime-time game for that Saturday. UNL-Wisconsin is best B10 game, and it's only an ESPN game at 7.

[Pasadena Blue]

The best player plays under JH, not sure why people believe in a conspiracy about the QB position. Speight gives the team a better chance to win.

because Speight's throwing motion looks like crap, and his short to medium passes have been incredibly inconsistent. I have no doubt he has looked better than O'Korn in practice.
He is a game manager perfect for the first 11 games of our schedule. His slow release is not going to get it done against the Bucks.

[Hannibal]

I wonder what could have possibly gone wrong in practice for O'Korn to not have won the job handily. I really hope that Peters can win the job next year. Next year is a good one for a new starter at QB to take his lumps.

[Jeff Buchanan]

because Speight's throwing motion looks like crap, and his short to medium passes have been incredibly inconsistent. I have no doubt he has looked better than O'Korn in practice.
He is a game manager perfect for the first 11 games of our schedule. His slow release is not going to get it done against the Bucks.

Not disagreeing on the overall comments about Speight here but ......

I really don't think he can be characterized as a game manager any more than other QBs who run similar offenses to that of Harbaugh.

He does have a quick release when the play calls for it and he's ok when he gets the protection that produce passing lanes and the receiver runs the route correctly. So, IMO, it's not just one guy (Speight) that makes it look like those quick shots aren't working well.

My view of the difference between Speight and O'Korn, albeit just a speculative one, is that Speight gets and can execute (makes the reads) the play calls better than O'Korn. I think in terms of pure QB skills, O'Korn is probably better than Speight - he looks the part - but I'll bet he muffs the play calls more often than he gets them right. You can see that he appears to bail quickly if he doesn't get exactly what he thinks he should be getting.

It's tough for a QB coach and HC to flesh this kind of thing out and put the right guy out there to win ball games. But JH has got a terrific defense and an offense that without a lot of fan fare or mistakes is running up 50 points per game on average.

Moreover, Speight, in 6 games, has had just three turnovers. One on a huge sack that should have never happened (free rusher) and one of them on a tipped throw. The other, his first, well, there is that. But overall, he doesn't make mistakes. This is a different looking season if he were a turnover machine and giving opponents short fields. I think that is probably why he's in there - he's a safe bet and the O is doing just fine with him as QB.

One other thing and to your comment about Speight not being the kind of QB to deliver a win v osu. Well, he did v Wisky throwing a perfect long ball for a game winning TD when he correctly read man coverage on Darboh. He does offer that and in close games, like I expect osu v M will be, it only takes one or two of those big plays like that to be the difference when your D is dominating and there's no reason to thing it won't.

I think you're right though Speight is no jtb or Jalen Hurts of Alabama either, both spectacular dual threat guys. We can throw in Clemson's Deshaun Watson and Louisville's Lamar Jackson too. Different guys, different offenses. And, yeah, that dual threat posed by those other QBs is really hard to defend against. The downside for those offenses and we've seen it in everyone save maybe Alabama's is that you take away the run threat, put those guys into positions where they have to make throws, you increase the likelihood of bad things happening in close games. For now, I'll take Harbaughffense run by Wilton Speight ....... and I reserve the right to change my opinion on that!

[froot loops]

Maybe the same thing went wrong with O'Korn that went wrong at Houston.

[jaadam4]

The thing that I don't like is that during these blowouts we've seen Okorn for a series or 2 then Morris comes in. Either put Okorn in earlier or let him stick around a little more. He's not getting enough game time for a backup when we've had the opportunity.

Speight is John Navarre. He's not as much of a statue as Navarre but there's not much more of a ceiling. I certainly hope Peters is ready next year.