freddy canteen

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We don't have a good Pallante shot, unfortunately [Eric Upchurch]

The phonebooks are here!

We'll have our usual phonebook overreaction soon. This post is about a couple of absences:

Canteen's status was known to be in question after offseason surgery; this would appear to resolve that. No word yet on whether that's a transfer or a retirement. He kept bouncing between WR and corner throughout his career, never getting established at either spot. He wasn't expected to contribute this year, although the surgery probably had something to do with that.

Pallante is a bit of a a surprise since he saw scattered snaps towards the end of the year and Michigan is already two under their scholarship limit. While he didn't look like a guy who was going to play much going forward you'd think the program would keep him around for this year at least; looks like Pallante could read the enormous four- and five-star ratings on the wall.

Both Canteen and Pallante were slated to take up slots on the 2017 roster and will no longer. Michigan now has 21 slots in the 2017 class and is recruiting for around 30; it's not too hard to look at the roster and find another four spots from would-be fifth year seniors and early NFL Draft entry.

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[Fuller/MGoBlog]

News bullets and other items:

  • Reon Dawson and Jaron Dukes are medically retiring.
  • Freddy Canteen and Moe Ways recently had shoulder and foot surgery, respectively. Canteen’s status with the program is in the air; Ways should be back in 3-4 months.
  • Speight, O’Korn, and Morris are getting more snaps than the other QBs, but they’re all still making at least one “big mistake” every practice.
  • Devin Bush Jr. had his best practice of the spring on Saturday.
  • Harbaugh responded to Gene Smith’s comments because he felt a shot was fired across Michigan’s bow and, after waiting many hours, thought he needed to do the same. Just never, ever tell him that he likes to get in twitter wars because it’s a form of competition.
  • Harbaugh said it doesn’t matter to him what time of day games are played; a night game or lack thereof doesn’t faze him.

What did you see out there from your group today, and what were you looking for specifically here today?

“Uh, you know, good, competitive football fight. Getting better: in a lot of areas we are and in a lot of other areas not bad and other and all areas we need to keep improving, so…the guys are grindin’.”

Did your quarterback rotation go about how you wanted, and what did you see out of those guys?

“Uh…you know, there’s—like I told them, there’s, you know…we’re looking for a quarterback to move the team and not make the big mistake. They’re all in the mode of a big mistake a day, so we’re not—we’re just gonna keep plugging away and keep getting better, keep giving them things they can improve on, things they can take and use. Looking forward to the game setting. Maybe that’ll be another good test, but they’re getting a lot of tests right now. Strides are being made, but we’ve still got a long row to hoe.”

What does it do for your fans and for your team to come out here in this setting at Ford Field and open it up?

“I think it’s great in the way of sometimes spring practice can get monotonous. Some would even say boring. There’s no game that comes at the end of the week. It’s something different. Something to make it livelier, special—that’s what we get out of it. To have people in the stands, always felt that makes it better. Even the cameras, even the TV cameras—even if they didn’t have film in them, you know?”

They don’t anymore.

/long pause

“Touché. So even if you had a camera that wasn’t actually recording anything guys would work hard. Guys would enjoy it more. People are watching, so that’s a good thing for us.”

With the quarterbacks, are you still repping them evenly or are you changing that up some?

“I’d say there’s Wilton [Speight], John [O’Korn], Shane [Morris] getting more. It’s not dead even anymore, no.”

Would it be Wilton, John, Shane in that order?

“I can’t even make an order right now. It’s to be determined still. It means a lot to all of them. You can tell in the way they play and just continuing to be able to play loose and play smart and continue to get repetitions. Continue to get looks and learn—that’s what they need to see right now. Looking forward to some game-like action. We’re going to make it game-like in the spring game. Everything’s going to be real tackle football live; the quarterbacks, everybody. There’ll be live bullets for them, so that’ll be a nice, good-size task for us. Looking forward to seeing how that plays out.”

[Hit THE JUMP for more]

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Dukes caught the only TD of last year's spring game against Dennis Norfleet

Per Harbaugh:

The departures of Dukes and Dawson bring Michigan to or under 85 depending on the status of the as-yet-unsigned Dytarious Johnson; if Canteen does not make it back they'd be at 84 and able to issue a scholarship to Ryan Glasgow.