We’re just a couple days away from the fighting Bryce Underwood’s taking the field! I’m mostly kidding, but what a weird place the college sports landscape has become. Bryce was committed to LSU for forever and was definitely not coming to Michigan…until Michigan had a dreadful QB room and a Billionaires young second wife (third wife? fourth wife?) decided she could not watch another season with her alma mater having this go on again. What a world. How will the team look? After losing so many defensive studs to the draft it is hard to say that the defense is going to be much better, but it seems that instead of having a couple studs drive the bus up front, it’ll be a committee approach. How well that approach works, remains to be seen, but I’m cautiously optimistic about this squad…especially with the schedule.
OFFENSE
The story here begins and ends with Bryce Underwood. How good will he be? Will he be better than JJ McCarthy? I’m not so sure that he will be, but what I do know, is that he is 100% better than every QB Michigan trotted out last year…and that is not up for debate. Bryce has all the makings of a supreme QB prospect and looks to be the next big thing. He’s mobile and has a live arm, can he put it all together on the big stage? We’re going to find out and we’re going to find out soon. I’m still hesitant to join the camp that says he is better than JJ McCarthy and will be better than he was as a freshman. JJ was pretty special and if Bryce exceeds that, then he will be poised to be the greatest Michigan quarterback ever. So maybe we’ll let him play a game or two or maybe a season first before deciding. After Underwood, it’s apparently Jadyn Davis ahead of Mikey Keene…I’m guessing Keene’s injury is still lingering. Hopefully the season isn’t over if Bryce were to go down, but all signs point to that being the end of the line. Davis still has a throwing motion that goes on too long and Keene hasn’t been healthy in months. Not great!
The running back room losing Kalel Mullings hurts big time. Donovan Edwards could make plays…but only if the hole was open for him…he never created on his own. Jordan Marshall and Justice Haynes will be able to create on their own and should make for a very dynamic duo. Marshall’s coming out party was against Alabama in the bowl game and he was the only reason they were able to move the ball on offense. I look at Marshall as more of a north-south runner and Haynes will be a playmaker that they get the ball in space too and try to get him on the perimeter. I expect nearly a 50-50 split in carries and I expect Michigan to continue to lean on the run game to carry the offense. As for the RB3 and depth? It sounds like freshman RB Jasper Parker has emerged, which would explain why CJ Hester transferred/left the program during fall camp. What does Parker bring? We’ll have to see. Everything from high school indicates he’s good at everything so we’ll just have to see if he can be GREAT at anything. If he has a good baseline of talent, I have no doubt that the coaches will mold and develop him. I would be remiss if I did not mention Max Bredeson and the fullback position. He will be a key piece leading the way blocking for this team and will be a heart and soul guy in the room. It says a lot about him that he requested to room with Bryce Underwood during camp.
The wide receiver position is where the questions start to emerge for me. Donaven McCulley earned the #1 jersey apparently but he hardly played for Indiana last year and left the program early. It seems like Semaj Morgan is going to be the starting slot and then redshirt freshman Channing Goodwin passed up Frederick Moore for the other starting outside spot, which was a bit of a surprise. It seems like a bit of a MASH unit but there is potential. Semaj will always be the gadget guy and Donaven has sizes and tools to separate. If he can be a big and reliable target for Underwood, they have a chance to take a step in the passing game. Goodwin played a little on special teams as a freshman and has some decent size so I’m looking forward to seeing what he can do in game action. I would expect Andrew Marsh to get some run as well. The true freshman is the kick returner so they’ll be looking to get the ball into his hands and let him make plays on offense. They have some pieces that are young with Jamar Browder, Jacob Washington and I’Marion Stewart and a couple guys with experience (Anthony Simpson, CJ Charleston and Kendrick Bell) but no one with any real production at the power 4 level (Sorry 644 yards from 2 years ago for McCulley does not really do it for me). It has all the makings of a committee approach and I would be stunned if anyone emerged to go over 1,000 yards…except mayyyyybe McCulley.
The tight end room is probably the deepest position group on offense. Maybe that is hyperbolic on my part, but hey, I’m never one to exaggerate. Marlin Klein has great tools and I would expect him to be the lead dog and a key target on short yardage passing situations for Underwood. Who will be the TE2? I would have guessed Hogan Hansen but he’s been working through some injury stuff in camp. He started to emerge part way through the year last year and the Illinois game was his coming out party. Zack Marshall, Deakon Tonelli and Brady Prieskorn round out the top 5 TEs on the supposed depth chart and I could see any and all of them contributing during the season. They will most certainly all play in a rotation of sorts and in different blocking situations and sets, but I think Klein and Hansen are the two guys. Jalen Hoffman is more of an H-Back but he made some plays in the spring game and I am curious to see if he gets any run. Between these five, Hoffman and Bredeson, they have plenty of beef to block and make some catches, but who can emerge as a tight end to make plays? No one will fill Colston Loveland’s shoes, but I think Hansen has the best chance to be a reliable playmaker in the tight end spot if he gets healthy.
The offensive line was supposed to be good last year, but unfortunately it was kind of what you expect when you lose 6 guys to the draft. It ended up being just okay and they still ended up losing 3 starters in Hinton, Priebe and LaDarius Henderson. Two of which were cut this week in the NFL and Hinton went on IR but hey, they went to camp. At any rate, it’s a young crew and they worked to add talent in the portal as well. The biggest hit so far was losing true freshman stud five star Andrew Babalola to a knee injury and he’s out for the whole year. He was pushing Evan Link to start at left tackle and now, not only will he not contribute but he loses a year of development. So what is the starting offensive line?
LT: Evan Link LG: Gio El-Hadi C: Greg Crippen RG: Brady Norton RT: Andrew Sprague
Sprague and Link started in these spots in the bowl game so you’re essentially looking at the bowl game offensive line with El-Hadi at his natural LG spot and Brady Norton at RG. Norton transferred from Cal Poly and played tackle there. It looks like he beat out Nathan Efobi for the RG spot for now, but Sherrone says that both will play. So either Efobi is the 6th offensive lineman or they have not decided who the true starter at RG is…which is a scary possibility. I’m hoping that the experience of last year will help Crippen and that El-Hadi sliding back to LG will make him more comfortable. It’s good to have youth at the tackle spots and they were decent in the bowl games, but Link had his fair share of struggles last year. I’ll be curious to see if he keeps a hold on that spot all year or if someone behind him like Blake Frazier or Ty Haywood pushes him at all. Lawrence Hattar, Avery Gach, Luke Hamilton and Kaden Strayhorn will provide depth at the guard spots with Jake Guarnera as the backup C. This unit needs to stay healthy this year. Especially now that Babalola is down for the season. They need to protect Bryce and they need to open up holes in the run game. Anything they can do to keep Bryce healthy and provide him with an effective run game to make passing easier. Teams are going to want to blitz the hell out of the young QB even though he has some mobility. So these guys MUST help him stay comfortable.
DEFENSE
The defense is where things get exciting. Losing Mason Graham and Kenneth Grant were major losses up front and losing Will Johnson obviously hurts the secondary (though with his injuries last year they got an early taste of what life without him will be like). It’s damn near impossible to replace marquee players like that but Michigan dipped into the portal and added Damon Payne and Tre Williams to help alleviate the pain. Rayshaun Benny will be the leader of this group and I expect Damon Payne to start next to him. Tre Williams will be the starting nose tackle so he will get plenty of playing time but is not a three down player. The cool part is we got a peak at Trey Pierce and Enow Etta in the bowl game against Alabama with the opt outs so we know that this defensive tackle unit has depth and we’re not even talking about the freshmen. This will be a true committee approach and I expect big things from them as a group. And if you don’t believe me, Sherrone says they are planning to play 5 or 6 defensive tackles this year.
Looking at the EDGE spots and I think that getting Derrick Moore back was a huge boost to the unit. Moore and TJ Guy should be the two starters, but I would expect a healthy dose of Cameron Brandt, Dominic Nichols, Lugard Edokpayi and then Jaishawn Barham. They said they’re going to move Barham around this year and get him some snaps on the EDGE and I believe it. They seemingly like their depth at the linebacker spot and want to get guys in positions to make plays. Moore has been an effective pass rusher every year he’s been in school and TJ Guy burst onto the scene last year, but if Barham can bring some more juice, then you have to use him. I’m expecting Nate Marshall to redshirt but I would also expect him to play the maximum of 4 games to get as many reps as he possibly can. This is another group where I expect it to be anchored by Moore but I expect a pretty heavy dose of rotation and a group effort getting after the quarterback.
Linebacker is where things on defense start to get interesting. They’ve already said they’re going to move Barham around, especially because Jimmy Rolder has had a great camp, but I’m not so sure. Rolder has been exposed in game action so I’m not buying what they’re selling with him until we see it on the field. You can only watch a guy get pulled for being destroyed in coverage so many times before it takes hold. On the other hand, Ernest Hausmann is one of the best MIKE linebackers in the Big Ten. There is not much else to say about him other than he is a key cog and leader of the defense and they need him to play at the high level he is capable of. The guy that I’m most intrigued to see is Cole Sullivan. He seems poised to be the 3rd guy in the middle and he is another guy that drew major praise from the coaches in camp. Troy Bowles transferred in from Georgia and should be the 4th guy in the middle and then you’ve got a pair of freshmen in Nathaniel Owusu-Boateng and Chase Taylor. Taylor should be an easy redshirt candidate but Owusu-Boateng could be talented enough to play more than his four games. Especially if there is an injury and they continue to move Barham around…This group is intriguing and unproven but have two absolute studs in Barham and Hausmann.
I am actually cautiously optimistic about the starting secondary this year if they stay healthy, even after losing Will Johnson, Josh Wallace and Makari Paige. Jyaire Hill and Zeke Berry are another year older and both got valuable experience last year. Frankly, they both played well last year, it was not just experience for experience sake. Who ends up playing in the nickel spot is the real question. I would not be surprised if they rotated a couple guys just to see if anyone will take the job and run with it. I’m going to go out on a limb and say that TJ Metcalf gets the first crack at nickel. After this trio though, the corner group gets young in a hurry. Shamari Earls is a true freshman and Jo’Ziah Edmond is a sophomore that played a bit last year. After those two you’re looking at a grad transfer in Caleb Anderson, a true freshman in Elijah Dotson (who they just moved to corner from safety), a redshirt freshman in Jeremiah Lowe, and Tevis Metcalf. If Berry or Hill get hurt, you’re looking at a young kid getting a ton of playing time in a hurry. It’s a slippery slope and keeping those two healthy may be the most important thing after keeping Bryce Underwood healthy. I like Earls and Edmond’s potential but they’re quite obviously still kids.
Shifting to the safety spot, I was hoping Rod Moore would be back and ready to play but it seems he is still working through his knee injury from last spring. Which means it was way more catastrophic than they let on since he’s nearly 16 months removed from April 2024. For the starters without Moore, I’m expecting Brandyn Hillman to start at strong safety. He should be a fan favorite in a hurry, if not already. He is an absolute hit stick and flashed a bunch last year…truly fun to watch and I am a big fan.
Yes please.
For the free safety spot, they could go a number of directions. It could be Jaden Mangham, the former MSU transfer, or Mason Curtis, the sophomore athlete. Mangham missed most of last year with an injury and Curtis is a someone that has emerged over the last few months. So much so, that TJ Metcalf shifted his practice time to nickel. After that, it is two true freshmen in Jordan Young and Kainoa Wilson. Neither one will be ready to start, but with Moore working back from injury, I would expect at least Wilson to get some game action early in the year to keep him ready just in case. I’m going to guess that both Mangham and Curtis play and they see who seizes the job. Obviously if Rod Moore is healthy, he is the starter here, but it does not sound like he’s ready. Ideally the younger player gets all of the game reps in the meantime and they look to the future, but I’m not sure how Sherrone Moore will separate ties. Will ties go to the younger player to look ahead or will ties go to the upperclassmen? Lot of questions will be answered on Saturday, but one thing is for sure, this defense will have a lot of players and contributors week in and week out. They will attack problems with and teams with their depth and rotating and staying fresh.
SPECIAL TEAMS
Who is the punter? I guess it’s Hudson Hollenbeck because the Missouri transfer left the team…but I’m not super concerned with that. Dominic Zvada is BACK as kicker and he is a weapon. He was robbed of winning the Lou Groza Award last year and he should win it this year. Without him, the Michigan offense would have been toast and the team would have lost at least 3 more games. He has supposedly kicked a 70-yard field goal in camp this year which is absolutely absurd. They will need him this year and the fact it is easy to get into his kicking range is such an asset over every other team. The trio of returners will be Andrew Marsh, Semaj Morgan and Micah Ka’apana with Marsh getting the nod. Like I said earlier, he’s a playmaker and they want to get the ball into his hands early and often. Also word on the street is that the kickoff man is a former MLS goalie so I’m curious to see if they think he can be a kicker for the future or if he just has a cannon with zero accuracy.
DEPTH CHART
SEASON PREDICTION
Man, with this schedule the sky feels like the limit and I think I expect a 9-3 season at minimum with a 10-2 season being most likely. You have a stud quarterback, but he’s young. A new offensive coordinator, one that knows what he is doing, but it is a new-ish system with new verbiage. It’s year two of Wink Martindale calling plays on defense and he hit his stride the second half of the season last year, so I expect the defense to come out of the gate firing but they don’t have Grant or Graham anymore. So the confidence in the coaches is much higher this year for me than last year but the roster has less star power in some key spots. Which, to be fair to Sherrone, he had to throw together a staff last year last minute so I’m not totally surprised some of it did not work at all. This year the staff has been much more prepared and they know what to expect and you have players that are more familiar and more comfortable with the system. You lose a ton of star power and production on defense, but hopefully they can replace it in the aggregate. I could be wrong but I think Oklahoma on the road that early in the season will be too much for Michigan and I think the Ohio State game will cause a problem. 10-2 is a good enough record to get in to the playoff but will the resume be good enough without any marquee wins?
Photo via: USA Today
Photo via: Michigan Athletics
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