They’ve developed it enough to beat OSU. Win in the playoff? TBD. Truth be told, I saw nothing in The Game that has me thinking McCarthy is suddenly Patrick Mahomes. I saw busted coverage after busted coverage, resulting in huge chunks of yardage and points for Michigan before their run game finally got going and OSU quit.
There's a difference between someone being Patrick Mahomes and being capable. OSU treated McCarthy as if he wasn't even the latter. He was a 5-star recruit who started at IMG. You would have thought he was a walk on that couldn't throw it more than 15 yards down field, relative to the game plan defensively.
He hasn't thrown an interception
since the second week of October. During that stretch, he has taken just 4 sacks, scored 11 TD's and made countless big plays with his legs. That stretch also included digging them out of the dirt against Illinois late and then hitting nearly every single big play that was presented to him against OSU.
He's making his 12th career start and has only attempted 300 college passes in his career. For him to make the plays he did, with so little experience, is nothing but encouraging. Do I think he will ever be Pat Mahomes? No. Do I think he's the perfect style of QB for Michigan's system? I do.
Literally the only bad thing I’d say about Michigan is again, not sold on the QB at all. I wouldn’t rely on UGA having nobody within 10 yards of receivers.
I would suspect with 4-5 weeks to heal, Corum will be, at worst, 90-95%? Assuming his knee is structurally sound and he needs a bone bruise / mild sprain to heal. Depends on the severity though. From what Michigan has said post game, Edwards hand should be 100% by the CFP. Both those dynamics change their offense pretty considerably and give similar 1 on 1 opportunities in the pass game. Will they be streaking down field? No. Are Bell, Wilson and Johnson good enough to win at a decent clip 1 on 1? Sure.
Michigan will probably be an 8-10 point dog against Georgia.......but there's more of a punchers chance. Georgia hasn't been as good in both phases (which admittedly was truly, truly elite). Bennett is even more of a game manager and has been pretty mistake prone recently. I'm not saying Michigan walks in and beats them but it is a more realistic endeavor this season, assuming Michigan can get Corum, Edwards, Morris, etc. healthy. If they can't, it is a pretty tall task, even if Georgia makes some mistakes.
The thing they (Michigan) certainly have working for themselves this season is a path to avoid Georgia in the semis, which helps. Not having to play them with weeks of concentrated prep levels the field a bit......as does it introduce elements like injuries or fluke losses prior to even playing them. If Michigan wins Saturday, they know they will not play Georgia in the semis......and I think that is big, as TCU strikes me as a pretty flawed team.
