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Ross Fulton Analysis: How Will Wink Martindale Change Michigan's Defense? · Buckeyes TomOrrow Morning

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  Welcome to Buckeyes tomorrow morning for Wednesday, February twenty First, I'm your host,
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  Tom Or. The Akron game is in one hundred and ninety two days.
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  The game against Michigan in two hundred and eighty three days. When they
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  play the game against Michigan in two hundred and eighty three days, ohiose,
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  Date's going to have a new offensive coordinator. His name is Jim Kelly.
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  Michigan's going to have a new defensive coordinator. His name is Wink Martindale.
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  We're gonna be talking about Martindale on today's show with our buddy Ross Fulton,
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  the X's and No's guru at bucke Huddle dot com. When we have Ross
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  on the show, You're proudly sponsored by Jeff Ruby Steakhouse, proudly offering nationally
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  check out the mouthwatering menu at Jeff Ruby dot com, Flash Columbus. All
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  right, so Ross, let's talk a little bit about Wink Martindale. The
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  takes were flying as soon as his name got sort of floated, and then
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  when his name got when he ended up getting hired. He was just let
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  go from the Giants, But before he was with the Giants, he was
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  with the Ravens. So obviously the Ravens defensive staff has been place where Michigan
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  has pulled some pretty successful defensive coordinators over the last couple of years. But
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  it sounds like Martindale is not necessarily, you know, a carbon copy of
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  Mike McDonald who replaced him with the Ravens, or Jesse Minter who came from
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  the Ravens and preceded Martindale at Michigan. Yeah, I know, I think
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  that, like the first assumption people have is like, oh, this is
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  just the raven Tree, Michigan's going to continue doing what they're doing. But
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  in actuality, it's a pretty significant change, or I guess you'd say at
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  least somewhat of a change. Yes, McDonald and mentor worked under Wink Martindale,
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  but they shifted the scheme pretty significantly from Michigan and now you can see
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  it with the Ravens as well. What Mike McDonald's done there. Andrew patten
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  On X had a good post comparing like the use of coverages between martin Dale's
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  years with the Ravens and what McDonald's done since then. And like the big
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  difference is that when Martindale uses a lot less too high coverage schemes than McDonald
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  and Minter have used at Michigan. So, you know, like as particularly
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  like when it comes to like fire zones you know five man uh pressures or
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  you know creepers or sim pressures, fortman pressures where you're dropping a defensivelignment.
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  You know, Michigan did a lot of that with two high looks like we
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  talked about against Ohio State. You know, they use a lot of concepts
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  like to steel or they're dropping a defensive end in the flat is like the
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  cover two defender and rotating the covers the field. Like you just didn't see
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  Martindale doing nearly as much of that. It's much more man, much more
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  single high cover three you know when they use fire zones or creepers, and
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  so it's more akin to what Don Brown did at Michigan, or you know
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  what like Jeff Affley did Ohio State with a lot of single high emphasis.
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  Now obviously like he could pick up what you know Michigan had been doing,
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  and you see if it it was working, and you know they broke,
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  don't fix it. But that at least is not what his background has been.
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  Well. And I'm going to put that chart on the screen if I
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  remember to do it while I'm editing this together later, but the plan is
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  to put that chart on the screen here because it is a really interesting chart.
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  And you know what what jumped out to me was, you know,
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  he's playing more cover zero in you know, certain situations than McDonald did later
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  when he took over for Martindale at the Ravens. But you know he plays
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  more cover one too, so as you said, just more man coverage in
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  general and bringing pressure cover one, cover zero, man cover like that all
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  has sort of invited the Don Brown comparisons, and you know, you sort
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  of mentioned there's some similarities there. I think Ohio State fans look at Don
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  Brown as that's the guy that gave up sixty two points in twenty eighteen.
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  I don't know that's necessarily going to be Ryan Day already has unlocked the key
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  to defeating this guy's defensive playbook. I don't think it's necessarily that simple.
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  Yeah, no, I agree, you know, yeah, like this is
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  why, as I said, like the first reaction that a lot of people
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  had is like, oh, you know, continue to the Ravens tree,
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  and you know then you got like this, you know smart you know Michigan
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  Football x's and knows guys like Space Cody and Manualac are like, yeah,
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  I don't know about this because we're stepping away from what had worked so well.
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  You know, as I said on Access Week, you know, Martindale
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  is much more as you said, in the Don Brown lineage, whereas like
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  McDonald and mintor what they actually been doing is much more like big Fangio esque
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  for those who like follow NFL x's and no's, like a lot of that
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  split ski you know, split safety like quarter quarter half mixing in as I
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  said, like skit sim pressures with two high safeties. But as you said,
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  like it is different also than what Don Brown like that again is like
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  a shorthand. But you know he'll Don Brown like to use like a lot
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  of straight cover one and then mix in cover two. And you know there
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  were games where Don Brown gave ohigh state like a lot of fits as well,
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  like you know when Dayne Haskins had to come in for J. T.
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  Bar and so it wasn't all easy easy street, you know, as
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  it maybe people remember in hindsight, but you know, Mardale will use a
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  lot more sort of like the term people like to throw I was like the
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  Amiba defense where you know you have seven guys up on the line and you
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  don't know who's coming and who's dropping. Like, yes, there'll be a
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  lot of man and cover three behind that. So whereas like Don Brown did
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  not at all like to use cover three as a change up, like Markdale
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  uses a lot of that as well, and you'll get like you know,
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  as I said, pressure looks for that. So there's some some overlap.
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  Definitely would be moving back Michigan back towards much more of a single high based
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  scheme and a lot much more man. And you know, I think from
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  a Michigan perspective, it's a question of like opposite Will Johnson, like can
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  they do they have the corner play to run that much man? But there
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  are also differences in terms of the of their coverage mix compared to Don Brown.
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  Well, and going back to that chart real quickly, the one thing
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  that really jumped out to me and immediately was you know, the whole chart
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  is cover zero. So that's where you don't have a safety back and it's
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  just kind of, you know, hope your hope your pressure gets home,
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  hope your coverage guys can cover because there's there's no one back there playing deep
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  safety. So it's seven percent, eight percent, ten percent every year.
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  The only year that it's higher than ten point seven percent is twenty nineteen for
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  Martindale and Baltimore when it was fifteen point eight percent and the company tweet f
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  form and new Patten says, remember that twenty nineteen, Raven's defensive back room
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  was nuts. The Michigan defensive back round this year, I mean they got
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  Will Johnson, They've got you know, they've got some solid safety coming back
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  as well. You got to figure out what you're doing on the other side
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  of the field. They it feels like he might be able to be aggressive
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  this year, especially if you've got Will Johnson on one side of the field,
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  if they can find someone of the out of the field, but that
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  may you know, if you're willing to be super aggressive in the year when
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  you can do it, and then you're not the other year, you're not
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  you're not super wedded to the idea that, well, we have to just
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  do this because this is what we do, so that that kind of suggests
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  good coaching to me. So, but you know, are they going to
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  be able to do that potentially this year and then maybe you're going to have
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  to adjust next year once they don't have Will Joneson on the roster presumably anymore.
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  Yeah, it'll be interesting. I mean, you know, I thought
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  this year they got away with having Josh Wallace as their other quarter, and
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  they were able to do it somewhat by protecting him with the you know,
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  the mirror coverage schemes that Jesse Mencher was using. And now obviously that's an
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  open question. They do have really experienced safeties. Now again you're like asking
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  you know, cover zero, you're asking those safeties to play man coverage.
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  So you know, safeties can have different skill sets. You know, even
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  when like McDonald or mintor use cover zero, they are usually dropping guys into
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  sort of underneath the zones like the like one coverage is called train or you
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  drop both deep and events a sort of hooked players. And so again it's
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  it was i would say less overtly aggressive and yeah, I think that that
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  corner position begs the question. But yeah, as you said, I mean,
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  I will give you know, Wink Martin Vicdale the benefit of the doubt
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  that he can adapt somewhat. And then again, I think it it'll be
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  interesting to see, you know, how much he picks up what Michigan has
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  been doing and tries to continue that versus you know, going with his natural
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  inclinations, which is to play single high. But yeah, I mean I
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  think Michigan, you know, they they still have a lot of guys back
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  on defense. I think it's certainly, you know, so they do have
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  the experienced pieces there to put in some of the more complex blitz packages.
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  All right, and now to wrap up, I have to ask the question
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  that's way overly simplistic but leads to the splashy headline, Ross chip Kelly versus
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  Wink Bartondale. Who you got who has who has improved their chances? Who
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  has improved themselves schematically? How did these guys match up? I mean,
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  obviously this is a little tongue in cheek. It's a little bit, you
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  know, there's a lot of stuff that goes in there, not running the
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  chip Kelly offense, for example. But you know, what do you when
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  you just look at these two guys, is there anything that jumps out to
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  as, oh, this might be good for Michigan, or hey, the
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  way Ohio State is going to maybe try to run the ball might give the
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  Michigan problems. Any any thoughts on that front. Yeah, I mean I
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  think that you know, obviously a lot of experience being propped up between the
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  two guys. I think that again, like what we talked about last week,
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  Chip Kelly fills something that Ohio State has been lacking or you know,
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  needs improvement upon in the run game. Whereas I tend to agree with you
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  know, Space Couty and others that I referenced earlier that you know, if
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  I was Michigan, I would want to keep going what I had going on
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  defense, and so like I think stepping away from that mix would would I
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  would consider that a step back as well. You know, in particular,
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  I thought Michigan's had a lot of success against Ohio State the last few years
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  and Ryan Day using those sort of cover two schemes where you're bringing guys from
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  different angles and then you know, rotating your cover to the field, so
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  you're you're stat against the run to the short field. You know, we
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  talked about boundary stretch, but you're playing the multiple receivers of the field.
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  So I do think that, you know, again, like having a more
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  a combination of a more diverse run game for Ohigo State. Plus, Like
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  you know, I think Ryan Day, if you give him a lot of
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  single high coverages, has had a lot of success over the years, you
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  know, So I think that's probably a plus for Ohio State. Needs to
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  be Michigan, but you know, again, I think both teams have a
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  lot. Highly has a lot coming back on offense, Michigan has a lot
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  coming back on defense. And just like when you're looking at personnel, you
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  know it should be another top first, top matchup. Definitely, definitely one
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  to look forward to. Only two hundred and eighty three days away. Go
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  ahead and start packing the trunk. You're gonna tailgating will start soon, we'll
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  be we'll be out there at the at Ohio Stadium sooner than you think for
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  what is definitely gonna be one of the most anticipated games of the year in
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  all of the college football schedule. We were looking forward to that one.
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  We're looking forward to the spring game. There's a lot to look forward to
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  and a great place to look forward to. All of it is at Buckeyehuddle
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  dot com. That's for Ross is one of our exes and those guys making
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  you a smarter football fan. Along with Mickey and Justin and Devin Mark cover
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  and the team, Tony Kevin or Mark covering recruiting, Tony Kevin and I
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  covering the team. It's all at buckehuddle dot com. And of course,
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  make a reservation today. That will do it for today. Thank you guys
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  all for joining us. Have a great day. We'll talk to you tomorrow.