Michigan’s season-opening win is actually reason to sound the alarms

A win is a win when it comes to the win column, but not all are created equally when it comes to assessing college football teams. Last week saw the No. 9 Michigan Wolverines struggle at times offensively vs. the Fresno State Bulldogs out of the Mountain West. While the victors proved victorious to the tune of 30-10, these are the reigning national champions going up against Fresno.

No, this is not meant to be a slight on Fresno State. The Bulldogs have been one of the better programs in the Mountain West for years. However, they play at a lower level than Michigan, are at a massive talent disadvantage and saw their iconic former head coach in Jeff Tedford very late into the offseason due to health reasons. Yet, Fresno State at least kept it interesting into the fourth quarter.

While I fully understand that this is Sherrone Moore's team now and not Jim Harbaugh's, nothing I saw last week gave me any indication that the Wolverines will be able to move the ball effortlessly vs. the new SEC contender in Texas on Saturday. It may be Big Noon Saturday in Ann Arbor with ESPN's College GameDay being there as well. It just might be game over for Michigan before 1:00 p.m. ET.

I have massive concerns about the Michigan offense, and you should, too. This game could get ugly...

Michigan's Week 1 offensive futility will be bad news vs. Texas in Week 2

While these were two of the last four teams standing in last year's College Football Playoff, that was also last year. Although Texas is on the shortlist of teams who can realistically make the expanded playoff this season, Michigan will be lucky to be the fourth Big Ten team getting in. After seeing what USC and Penn State did last weekend, I am not entirely sure that this team is even better than Iowa.

And that right there is precisely the biggest problem plaguing the Wolverines. Their quarterback play might stink. Losing J.J. McCarthy to the NFL after only three seasons felt inevitable. His talent was too much to keep on the bench for long. An unintended consequence of anointing him the starter was seeing Cade McNamara transfer to, you guessed it, Iowa! He looked great for the Hawkeyes.

Now you look at who is playing quarterback for the Wolverines this year. Everybody and their brother thought Alex Orji was going to be the starter, even though none of us could honestly say we saw him throw a football. Well, he did throw the football a little bit vs. Fresno State, and it was not great. When I saw Davis Warren was the Week 1 starting quarterback for Michigan, that completely blew my mind!

Look. There are a lot to like about this year's Michigan team. The defense has dudes everywhere, most notably Mason Graham in the trenches and Will Johnson in the back-end of it. On offense, we know what Donovan Edwards can do in the ground game. We also know what type of playmaker Colston Loveland can be at tight end. My biggest concerns are coaching attrition and quarterback.

No, it should not shock you to see Michigan getting 7.5 points at home from Texas ahead of their Week 2 matchup. Texas beat the brakes of poor Colorado State in their Week 1 matchup. Colorado State is widely seen to be the better Mountain West team over Fresno State entering this season. Neither are on Boise State or UNLV's level, but we are talking about two top-half teams in the league.

Overall, the only way I see Michigan getting to 2-0 is if Graham wrecks Steve Sarkisian's game plan and then proceeds to wreck Quinn Ewers. While I do not trust the Texas quarterback's durability in the slightest, I would actually take an unproven Arch Manning over whoever Moore wants to take snaps from the Michigan center. Michigan could win this game, but the Wolverines will not blow out Texas.

We love a big helmet game like this in the non-conference, but I'm afraid this one is going to be a dud.