The Michigan Wolverines have found their answer at quarterback for the rest of the season. Jack Tuttle came in midway through their loss to the Washington Huskies, providing an immediate spark for the offense. After falling behind 14-0, Michigan pulled Alex Orji out and put in Tuttle. 

His 98 yards passing (yes, really, 98 yards was a spark) were the most passing yards Michigan has had since benching Davis Warren in Week 3. Tuttle took over in the second quarter and just the threat of a viable quarterback opened things up for Michigan's offense in ways they hadn't done this season. 

Washington head coach Jedd Fisch admitted they were startled defensively when Tuttle came in and realized they had to play "normal" defense. They settled in enough, but the damage had been done when Tuttle led three scoring drives to take the lead 17-14 in the third quarter. 

The question is: Why didn't Tuttle start then? What could they have possibly expected Orji to do that he hadn't done in his previous two starts? 

The best guess is that maybe they didn't want to risk throwing Tuttle out before they had to, as he was working back from injury. That feels flimsy, as he was certainly healthy enough to play and handle the total workload. 

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Perhaps the most frustrating part of this was that the offense didn't look any different with Tuttle in. Their results certainly did, but the scheme was largely the same as it was during the first five games of the season. 

That tells me that they built their whole offense around Tuttle, which backs up the fact that he was the clear-cut starter in the spring. Setting aside the fact that they built their offense around a 25-year-old who has never started, that plan points to a different issue for this staff. 

Why were they forcing Davis Warren and Alex Orji to run the Jack Tuttle offense? 

I pointed out last week that it never felt like they were embracing the QB run game with Orji. They were nonchalant about using Orji's legs at all, with a lot of his runs being scrambles. Michigan OC Kirk Campbell called it a "Catch-22". 

How can Michigan involve Alex Orji more in QB run game? Wolverines’ OC Kirk Campbell weighs in on Orji’s role

Not much needs to be said about the struggles of Michigan's offense this season. The offense has been disjointed (at best) in every game this season, they are on their second quarterback, and only one player has had more than 50 receiving yards in any game this year (Colston Loveland).  Now the staff is behind […]

I certainly get not wanting to completely shift the offense to a service academy, but they barely tried to build an offense for Orji. 

This case was lesser for Davis Warren, but even he was more of a one-read quarterback in this system. He struggled to execute the offense, but the staff barely helped him out as well. 

They essentially tabbed a super senior with very little starting experience as their quarterback months ago and proceeded to not change a single thing from there, even despite him suffering an injury in the summer. 

Despite them building the entire offense for him, they didn't start him against Washington and it ended up costing them the game. 

If Tuttle started that game against Washington, it feels likely that they would have won the game. That isn't a certainty, given how Washington's defense adjusted, but Michigan likely wouldn't have had to spend most of the game clawing back from behind. 

Their plan for the season and frequent failures to adjust from a stubbornly set plan have raised some pretty big red flags in Sherrone Moore's first season. They have a bye week to sort out some of their issues, but they don't play many winnable games post-bye. If this trend continues, it feels like it'll be a long year for the Wolverines, no matter who the quarterback is.