Blue By Ninety - BEAT RUTGERS

Episode Date: September 22, 2023

Justin & Tanner bring you a Friday morning podcast to get you ready for the Rutgers game. Harbaugh is back, Big Ten play is back, and we're back in the Big House again.

All right, welcome back to Blue by 90. I'm Justin, joined by Tanner. It is Friday morning. We're coming at you with a little pregame pod. Hopefully you're listening to this, getting ready for Saturday against Rutgers. First and foremost, though, Thursday night football dominated by Michigan football. Ronnie Bell scores his touchdown. Jake Moody, what is he, nine for nine for field goals at this point?

Yeah, after kind of a shaky preseason, he really picked it up. I also asked my wife. I was like, hey, Ronnie Bell scored his first touchdown in the NFL. And she's like, oh, that's cool. And I was like, do you know who kicked the extra point? And she guessed Jake Moody. She's like, it's the only guy I know. And I like well you were right that's why I asked so uh yeah it was a Michigan heavy game and uh George Kittle actually got me 12 points in fantasy he had been

struggling so I'll take it yeah um it was uh I think I can't remember I think it was Alejandro put it out on Twitter it was like Ronnie Bell with a touchdown and Jake Moody with the extra point. That's really cool to see as a Michigan fan. I mean, first of all, you just, I don't know. You just never think of those guys as, you know, that they're going to be stars at the next level. Obviously, we knew Moody, you know, was at the end of his career, you know, but never going into it, right, as a freshman sophomore or whatever.

And then Ronnie has been slept on his whole career. So really cool to see those fellas take off. Yeah, I mean, it's funny to think back. I was at the game where Ronnie Bell scored his first touchdown for Michigan, now that I think about it, against Nebraska. Yeah, 2018 was there. And it was like, you know, you'd heard some buzz. Like, yeah, this two-star whatever, but, like, kid can play,

and he turns out to be a really good receiver and a great leader and ambassador for Michigan football, and now he's with the 49ers who look like the best team in the NFL at the moment. Like, well, they'll be a Niners fan. They're just dominant, great defense. Like, wish we could have that defense in Detroit. I'll tell you that. You're right about that.

And it was very timely that we just talked about it on our last pod with Jack and Kalen. I was like, how cool is it that we can pick up our friends in fantasy, a.k.a. Jake Moody, and then all of a sudden he goes out and he's dominating on Thursday Night Football. So thank you, Jake. He must have been listening. He probably listened and he said this was Harbaugh's line. It was – it's a two-for-one once you get into Big Ten play because you can win and they can lose.

And so, you know, I like that. I like that a lot from Coach. Yeah, I'm excited about tomorrow, man. You know, a lot of, I don't know complaining uh on twitter about the performance i know you guys probably touched on it on the pod earlier in the week but um i just feel like jj is gonna come out ready to go harbaugh's back and like you know he's he was there for six out of seven days but i do think that there's something to last saturday jim harbaugh pulls jj aside says hey it, hey, it's okay.

Like, it's okay. You threw a pick. It's fine. You don't need to get it back all in one play, which it felt like he was trying to, you know, press. I don't know if you guys touched on that, but I thought he was pressing pretty big time, which is weird because we'd never really seen that.

So I think Jim being back is going to be great just for the psyche of the team, especially JJ. And, yeah, he's right, man right man Michigan be 1-0 Rutgers be 0-1 in the Big Ten East so ready to watch you know actually competent football team I think Rutgers looks pretty decent I know you know they beat up on some teams that you look at and you go okay but you know Northwestern's brutal Virginia Tech is terrible, unfortunately. I have some connections to Virginia Tech and, oh my gosh, they are just terrible. Really bad. It's unfortunate to see what's happened since Beamer retired. I'm excited

for Saturday. A little early wake up and get after it and go watch the boys play, man. We'll have breakfast on the blackstone at the uh going at the tailgate uh i already sent a text at 7 30 this morning uh that we're playing thunderstruck uh and um and doing a beer crack at 7 a.m tomorrow so i think that might be an issue like that that's indicative of a problem um that i have but i think some people call it a problem some people you know it's just i'm just a fun guy i mean i was in bed watching tiktok around 7 15 7 30 when that text came through i thought you meant the song which is

partially true um yeah the song is a part of it yeah Yeah, but we get stuck on those guitar solos. You're just screwed, man. That's happened a time or two to me in my life. So, yeah, you don't want to get stuck on the solos. It does. All right. So, I mean, yeah, listen, it is what it is. I'm just excited.

I'm a little antsy. I was on the car, car ride into work, singing Pitbull, you know, who shot on Mr. 305, Mr. Worldwide, still we go. You know, but, yeah, you know, I'm a little over excited for tomorrow, which is not a bad thing, my book. I'm excited because I don't have to – I like manning the grill, but, man, you get that hot grease popping off there and hitting you on the arms.

It doesn't feel great. You know, I've been manning the grill, what, the last two games? A little hot dog, a little hamburger action. You've been killing it. Yeah, I appreciate it. Those burgers turn out pretty good. We didn't have any cheese, man. Like, they're just burgers.

I know. And they are so good. Blackstone, whoever invented the griddle, shout out to that guy or gal because it's a game changer. But, yeah, like, you know, you told me last night we're going to be having some breakfast food, some pancakes, I'm sure maybe some bacon, sausage, whatever, like, and the ladies are taking over.

I'm down with that. That's going to be incredible. Shout out to the women of Blue by 90 because they really are the only thing that keeps us going. That's true. Real quick question for you, going back to JJ and Coach Harbaugh. Do you love what Coach said in his press conference this week, which was, like, he still wants him to be the gunslinger. Like he's

not coming in here in week four after, you know, a less than, than great performance in week three and saying, you know, Hey, let's tone it down. He's like, no, he's our playmaker. We're going to let him go make points. Yeah. And I talked about this on the, uh, the voice college football, the Michigan show. And I, yeah, you can't, you can't overcoach him on this stuff because if you want him to be a game manager,

Michigan can probably win the big 10 again, like he did last year. But if you want to win a national championship, you have to let the kid play ball, but you have to let him make mistakes and be, you know, run outside the pocket and, and play outside of, you know, the typical uh you know pocket passer that that uh michigan has had under jim harbaugh like you

have to let him be a playmaker get outside make throws on the run um and just be a difference maker because when you think about teams like i they're so the blue chip ratio i don't i'm sure you've seen that like so i have a point with this because somebody brought it up um so michigan is still above that 50 blue chip ratio line where you want to be to win a national championship but the teams with like the lowest was 2010 auburn 2016 clemson and i want to say 2018 Clemson. What do all three of those teams have in common? Generational college quarterbacks. Cam Newton, Deshaun Watson, Trevor Lawrence. I'm not saying JJ is going to be any of those guys, but for Michigan to win a national title when they don't have the same level

of talent as Georgia. Michigan is very deep and talented, but Georgia is a different level. You need JJ to be able to win that game and be the difference maker. That's where I think about it from the perspective of trying to win a national championship. He's 100% right. You can't overcoach him. You can't tell him not to be a gunslinger. You can't try to put the cuffs on him. You have to let him run free and be that guy. I always go back to the Johnny Manziel thing, right? And I don't think J.J. and Johnny Manziel is like the perfect comparison because I think J.J. is a much more complete quarterback than Johnny.

Johnny was like the ultimate just fun guy to watch and just everything was absolute chaos. Yeah, it was incredible. But there's a little bit of that to JJ where, you know, if you want him to be able to make the unbelievable play, you can't say, like, oh, well, you can't try. You know, there are going to be times where he does make a mistake trying to fit one in that tight zone or, you know,

throw that last second thing after he scrambles for 10 seconds. There's going to be a little bad with the good when you have that style of play. You can't say, oh, he's going to make those unbelievable plays without some of those things

not working out. I love that Coach Harbaugh came out and said that in support of his quarterback. You know, it would have been a little concerning if he actually came out and was like, yeah, we're going to temper, you know, what he's going to do out there now. Let's reel him back in.

Because that's honestly what I thought that they, you know, he did to Shea Patterson, which I thought really held Shea back. You know, when Shea, I was talking about this with somebody the other day. Like when Shea came in, we were watching Ole Miss highlights where he is doing the Johnny Manziel dance all the time, and that was what we were excited for. Then he gets here, and it's like handoff play action, you know, just really tamed it down.

And some of that was because of injuries. But I think to your point like jj is at his best when you're letting him do jj things um and i gotta read uh let me pull this stat up that uh shout out my man dave so faro from uh from pff he sent this to me uh with it's a stat on jj in the or uh off play action and this is really good podcasting because I'm struggling to pull it up right now. Well, I can tell you JJ off PA is unbelievable. Because especially when you consider Michigan's run game, like it makes sense. Yeah, so JJ off-play action this season.

95.1 PFF grade, which is first in all of college football he's 16 for 16 for 326 yards three tds and a perfect 158.3 passer rating that's pretty ridiculous so every pass should be play action like honestly like why not why not like honestly why not just have every pass be some sort of fake run i i think that they're like holding – like, you know, doing it a little bit, little bit now, and then once we actually get into big-time play and, you know, continue on, that they're just going to go pretty much to that in the passing game?

Yeah, I mean, they're holding so much back. Like, it's so vanilla at the moment. You've seen a lot of the same concepts in kind of some of the route trees and route combinations so far this season. And, you know, again, this goes back to Michigan's goal. And, like, you know, we talked about in the offseason about the beat Georgia drill, right? Like, their sights are not just set on the Big Ten. Like, they are set much higher.

And so that's what cracks me up when people complain like oh Michigan only 135.7 but you know what I'm talking about oh I know exactly what you're talking about and it drives me nuts because of one thing do you really think like even though Jim Harbaugh was not there on the sideline those first three games do you really think that he doesn't have like a plan for the full season do you think he's just winging it and they're like really like come on man i he's i agree with you they're holding back they know you know listen the reality is that you and i could have lined up at the right and left guard which you know you sometimes are mistaken for the the guard uh trevor keegan back

that that has happened but it's only in our friend group i don't know if it's ever happened outside of that but uh we could have lined up at right and left guard and they still beat those first three teams you know and so they all know that you don't have to pull out all the stops and i know it's not a 65 to nothing you know sexy win but guess what they're're going to be okay. And I think that we're going to see that here in this Rutgers game too. Yeah, I agree. I think, you know, I'll just give my prediction.

I have Michigan winning 38-10. I think JJ is going to come back with a big game. I think he's going to go for three touchdowns, no picks. And I think he's going to get a touchdown each from Dono and Blake. Like I just – I have a feeling that last week you know wake up call and you you win by 25 points i guess i mean you know turn it over four times unfortunately three of those were from jj and you know a couple of those were unfortunate um you know maybe mistakes maybe just miscommunication whatever it is and then you know obviously the the fumble

max buddy just fair catch it my guy please i was having i was having a heart attack in the stadium watching him i was like dude just go down like this isn't gonna end well uh i love ready he's like literally one of my favorite people good too like he greeted out really highly and just the fumble it's just one of those things that where it's just like you just don't be the hero don't be the hero just just fair catch. I've been on kick return plenty of times in my life. And like as much as you're like, I have so much green grass to work with. You've got to know that you're the fullback slash tight end and you just fair catch it and go, you know, give JJ the ball to take it down.

Yeah. I mean, if you're going to catch it and you're going to run, just fall down before the kickoff team gets to you. You know, if you start to see them closing in, in, just curl up and just fall down. It'll be fine. But, yeah, I see Michigan rebounding in a big way. I mean, you look at – if you subscribe to any of the advanced statistics out there, there's one where it's expected points per play. And Michigan was the second most dominant team in the country

in that statistic. Like they should have won that game by 60, but the turnovers obviously. They could have. Turnovers for sure, obviously. Yeah, I mean that's four drives off the board, right? So you think you score on those four drives, it's 59-6, and all their points came off turnovers from Bowling Green's perspective so maybe it's 59 nothing I don't know but it just I just don't understand

where this Michigan has to beat everybody by 70 points because it doesn't matter right now like none of that matters how many times in the past two years to the first few games and we're like oh this offense is so vanilla we'll never you know this was it forever it was like we'll never beat ohio state by doing this and then you go out and you play really good defense and be methodical and you go beat ohio state by multiple scores i think i've i think i've shared this i was at the michigan nebraska game last year and michigan wins 34 to 3 you know not bad And I think they were maybe up 17, three early in the second half. And the dude in my section is like,

this is why Michigan is going to get smoked by Ohio state. And I'm like, I think about that dude at least once a week. I'm like, I wonder what his like just being a jackass in the section 19 at the big house about Michigan, not beating Nebraska badly enough. And it's like, Michigan can beat Nebraska last year by just running the ball, which they did. Like, I don't, I don't know. I just don't understand where this, like, I guess people just want to be able to look good for the polls,

but like Michigan's going to be there. Exactly. Michigan's going to be there. They don't need to beat everybody by a hundred. Exactly. Unless they, you know, lose or win by three points in this game, they're still going to be number two. I think that's just reality. Let's talk about Rutgers for a second. Yeah.

I don't know how to say his name. Kyle Monangai? Yeah, that's exactly it. Yep, Monangai. That's pretty good. That's great. 357 yards through three games is is very good their running game's really solid it is yeah um you know they're a great shiano team this is his fourth year uh in his second stint at rutgers so you know he started in 2020 during

during covid so you know take that with a grain of salt, but you know, I think they've gotten, you know, better each year. You know, they came into the big house three years ago or two years ago with a three and a record. And we all, we, we know that that game was a little sloppy. Michigan ends up pulling it out 20 to 13, but yeah, I think that they're a solid football team and, you know, they have Aaron Lewis, who's a really good defensive end, who was a former, he was enrolled at michigan for a time yeah before transferring back home to be close to his mother

um there when i think about gavin whimsat i think about a kid with a lot of potential but i think the most recent stat line i saw last week was 7 of 16 for 50 or 46 years maybe i mean he's through through through these three games where they have played well and definitely like even though they're power five teams that they're playing they're all like pretty inferior power five teams and when i'm saying pretty inferior power five teams to ruggers like that says something right and he still is only thrown for 51% completion percentage. And that's where I think if Michigan can get to him with the way our secondary has been playing all year, and then if you tee off on him a couple times with Chris Jenkins gets to him,

Braden McGregor, Jalen Harrell, Derek Moore, those guys get to him a couple times, I think Rutgers offense is really going to struggle because then if we get to him and, you know, we're containing the QB and then we can stack the box and contain that run game as well, which is obviously what they're going to try to go to to help him out, help that QB out. I expect not a lot going on for Rutgers offense in this game. I agree, you know, especially with the way those defensive tackles have been playing.

You know, really excited to see these guys against a pretty competent, I mean, pretty good run game with Menangai, you know, and Wimstead's a scrambler, a runner too. I think he had 80 yards last week against Virginia Tech. But, again, I just – this defense, the way that they're playing, they've just been so dominant. I just don't – I don't foresee a way that Rutgers is really able to move the ball consistently enough.

And also, Wimsatt threw three picks against Michigan last year, so I'm sure that they're going to be looking for some turnovers. Absolutely. Hopefully they get some of the guys in the secondary back as well. I think it sounds like Will might play. I don't know about Rod, but I think he's getting closer from what I've read on the message boards and stuff. Yeah, I'm not sure either.

I do think Macari's going to play as well, which is big. Yeah, he played a little bit last week, so get him back into the swing of things. I mean, this defense has been incredible, and they've been without three of their best guys in the back seven. That's a real – I know, obviously, we've played inferior opponents as well, and I saw people ripping on – let's talk about Urban Meyer in a quick second. By the way, you should look at...

You should pull up Ohio State's 2024 schedule because it's just as bad as Michigan's 2024 schedule. And go look up the non-conference games that Urban Meyer had. Which was like, he played shit teams all the time.

And here's the reality, too, is that Michigan would have been playing Notre Dame every year throughout this if Notre Dame didn't back out of this schedule. So it's like we see these games, which is still so ridiculous to me, that it's like, oh, Michigan will play this team in 2045 or whatever when they schedule well when Notre Dame backs out you know it's tough to schedule these power five games within you know at kind of last minute if you want to call it that but only a year or two out it's really difficult

so like and you know what I still stand by it until the college football playoff, until they make it a benefit to play big games early on. Why do it? It's smart. I don't care if you get style points or you get points to say, Oh, we, you know, we're a big boy team and we play big boy teams in our non-conference.

I don't care. It is a benefit to try and go 12-0. It doesn't help you to play a good team at the beginning and possibly have an L on your schedule. Yeah, and I mean, I don't know. It's just like are people going to be talking about Michigan's schedule this much next year when they play Texas or the two years after they play Oklahoma or 2027 when they play Texas again? It's like, dude, we know it's bad. It was a one thing caused this to be bad,

and it was that Michigan was not going to have seven home games, and the university likes that revenue, so that's why they canceled with UCLA. But if you look at 2024, Ohio State Buckeyes, do you want to know who they play? And they're ripping on this guy. Do you want to know who they play? Southern Miss, Western Michigan, Marshall. It's the same exact schedule as us.

There's a MAAC team in there. There's a team from the American. It's just unbelievable. So we can expect Urban to trash Ohio State next year, right? No. Yeah, I don't think we're going to get that. They also don't get USC next year. Convenient.

Very convenient. Well, it's fine because we're going to go kick their ass again, and Ryan Day is going to be fired, and then they're going to be – maybe Urban comes back. He'll have a chance. He might go to MSU. I've been seeing people on Twitter. They've been wanting Urban.

Oh, man. Spiro, I can't do it. Did you see some of it, like the bigger MSU accounts are clowning on Spiro at this point, which I love that. I think there I don't remember his name, but there

must have been a former MSU football player. Yeah, it was their long snapper. Was it their long snapper was it their long so he the basically the gist of it was spiro said something then the the alum said like you have to be joking i hope you're joking on this and then spiro was like what you know what do you know about michigan state football and he was like uh 54 games worth. Because he had played 54 games in an MSU uniform, which the ratio on that was incredible. It was tough.

It was tough. But yeah, I mean, it's just frustrating to continually have this conversation because it's been the last two years. But if you look, the rest of their schedules sans covid because they didn't play any out of conference there's always a power five team there and this is just a one-off and when we move forward in 2024 texas comes to ann arbor michigan then has a home-and-home back-to-back years with oklahoma and then they go to austin in 2027 and it's just like it's just such low-hanging fruit and it gets engagement because michigan fans

look i'm emotional we're all emotional we're sick of the disrespect uh shout out to mark d'antonio like we are just over having these conversations and so urban knows that like you know he can get some engagement speaking of d'antonio as well, there was – somebody posted the screenshot of him on the sideline at the game, and it's 41-0 Washington. And it's just like him on the sideline, you know, arms crossed. That got a little smirk out of me, I'm not going to lie. I mean, at this point, like, if I'm him,

I'm worth millions and millions of dollars. You know, I've made a lot of money coaching i've invested in that program i'm hanging out with my wife kids grandkids whatever his family situation is man i'm doing i'm doing some honey to-do lists at home you know i'm i'm relaxing and i'll watch that game i don't know if he has peacock i don't know but i if i'm him i'm watching that game on on uh the streaming app and uh you know i'm turning off at halftime and i'm moving on with my life i just can't imagine look i know he loves msu all that good stuff i get it when you love you know uh an institution and you want to help and i respect that but if i'm him man i'm out of there brother i'm i'm good

i'm i'm i'm relaxing i'm not you're not dragging me down like i'm i'm happy he started to look happier too like photos i saw like he looked much happier than when he was on the sideline in 2019 and you know what he did his part for msu like he you know he was the best coach of in probably their history right they had some they had some national championships back but like modern era yeah for sure like but if you go back to like the 50s and 60s like i know duffy doherty i think had a national championship or two so like but yeah i mean in the last 50 years yeah you know how i know you're a michigan fan you you know you go back well i just i know college football history dog i know i know uh i know all the schools i'm joking um so let's end it with this

uh what do you think is gonna happen as soon as as Jim Harbaugh steps out from that tunnel? I think the place is going to go ballistic. Oh, it's going to be incredible. Like I may skip the tailgate just to get there. I don't even have tickets yet, by the way. It's so expensive for Rutgers. It's so expensive. It's like $100.

I know. So I'm going to just play it by ear tomorrow and just wait at the tailgate. Just have like Seagate on my phone and be like, oh, sixty five dollars. Absolutely. Even though last year for UConn, I paid like 20 bucks to get in. So but yeah, I think people are going to go crazy. I'm going to be very excited. Definitely going to try to get to get to this game because I'm going to the Nebraska game next weekend, too. So I'm going to try to keep that streak going. So I'm going to just try to keep that streak going.

Unfortunately, I will not make it out to Minnesota. But, yeah, I think people are going to be very excited to see Jim. I'm going to be very excited. I think it's going to be just a great moment. And I think, you know, going back to my points earlier, I think this team is going to come out ready to go. Like last Saturday, it just didn't feel like they were juiced up. They were kind of flat.

I don't think that's going to happen on Saturday. I think they're going to be ready to go, and I think they're going to look pretty damn good, and I'm excited. I agree. I agree. Talking to most of the guys, as good as the night games are and the atmosphere and you can get up for them, a lot of them like the noons better because you're not just waiting around all day.

I think for a night game against Bowling Green, you're sitting around all day. For these noons, you can get up and go, and you're locked in and focused. So I agree with you. I think they're going to come out firing. I expect, like, touchdown, first drive, you know, stop, and then you go, especially with the juice that the crowd's going to bring for Coach. I think it's going to be, coach um i i think it's going to be for all things considered a noon game against rutgers like i think the atmosphere

is going to be pretty damn good yeah i mean the atmosphere is pretty awesome all season like the student section you know people like to take pictures last quarter like they were going crazy it was insane last week the crowd they're literally, I don't know a game in the last decade that I haven't been able to at least, like, find a few spots, you know, at the top of the student section or just, like, seats so that I can sit with my friends instead of, like, in, you know, my normal seats. There literally last week was not a single section where I could find, like, four to six seats together, which is awesome.

It was absolutely packed. This is, Tanner, this is what we've been waiting for for a long time. Yeah. To be able to just have like a packed big house that is actually affecting the game and bringing a really good atmosphere. Yeah, and I don't know if this is just a placebo effect on me, but when I watch the highlights on my – I like to watch the game on my phone when I'm at the gym on Sunday or whatever.

And I'll tell you what, man. It feels like on the TV broadcast that it's louder. And I'm assuming partially a lot of it's due to just the new scoreboards and that traps more sound in and it just bounces back off the scoreboards. But it feels louder. So I can't wait for the Ohio game to to see how loud it's gonna get i mean side note i wish they would just close everything off with like all the like just do brick all the way around and just close it off and just have like that's gotta be next right

i mean dude you want to talk about intimidating like just create more suites around the top and then just have that i mean it would be one of the loudest stadiums in the country at that point. Capacity is 120,000. I mean, you could just make them like the glass suites for the very well-off folks like they have now. I mean, just wrap those suites all the way around. You don't need to add any more seats. I love it. Yeah, I'm ready for Saturday, man.

It's going to be a fun time. Let's go. I can't wait either. We'll see you at the tailgate. Shout-out North Peak Brewing and Hale IPA. let's go. I can't wait either. Um, we'll see you at the, at the tailgate. Shout out, uh, North peak brewing, uh,

and hail IPA. Um, shout out to the blue by 90 beer as well. Come have a couple with us. Why not? Please. Um, for us,

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