MLive on UM football players who transferred out
Of the 17 Michigan players who left, here are 10 who seem—from the MLive writer Ryan Zuke's profiles—to be doing best:
Zach Carpenter, OL, Indiana, starter
Zach Charbonnet, RB, UCLA, star
Chuck Filiaga, OL, Minnesota, starter
Giles Jackson, WR, Washington, contributor
Aaron Lewis, DE, Rutgers, starter
Oliver Martin, WR, Nebraska, 9 catches this season, we'll see him this week
Dylan McCaffrey, QB, Northern Colorado, starter for 2-7 team
Andre Seldon, DB, New Mexico State, 26 tackles
Myles Sims, DB, Georgia Tech, "the best season of his career"
Ben VanSumeren, LB, Michigan State, starter
Zuke's more extensive descriptions are worth the read:
https://www.mlive.com/wolverines/2022/11/how-michigan-football-transfers-are-faring-at-other-schools-in-2022.html
November 9th, 2022 at 9:54 AM ^
Outside of Carpenter, there's no real player that M needed (can always use more B1G starter minimum talent on O Line).
Glad Charbonnet found a place where he could feature and get snaps and I'm wondering what the hell happened with McCaffery. Maybe that injury against Wisconsin derailed his career? He seemed really different after that hit
November 9th, 2022 at 10:03 AM ^
Maybe Olu doesn’t come if Carpenter stayed and adding Charbonnet to our rotation would be fun but I don’t see a starter in the group.
November 9th, 2022 at 10:08 AM ^
Hmm good point. Overall everything worked out for UM and at least a chunk of those that transferred out. I do think Carpenter would have been helpful last year in the rotation or let Vastardis bump out to guard? I don't know how flexible O Line positions are lol
November 9th, 2022 at 11:27 AM ^
Carpenter's presence last year is an interesting hypothetical, but I think Vastardis could've performed well only at Center.
November 9th, 2022 at 1:28 PM ^
Considering charbonnet is averaging almost 9 ypc I'd say he could have started here
November 9th, 2022 at 2:01 PM ^
Started?
Over Blake Corum?!?!
Uh, nahhh....
He'd certainly be getting a larger share of carries than Stokes, and that would importantly lessen the load on Blake.
But I wouldn't give Charbonnet a single important carry over Blake except inside the 5. Let him smash into a wall a few of those times!
November 9th, 2022 at 2:43 PM ^
Charbonnet ended up being better than Haskins, and Haskins was obviously excellent.
November 9th, 2022 at 3:00 PM ^
Haskins set a school record for rushing TDs (20) last season. I doubt Charbonnet would have topped that.
November 9th, 2022 at 3:12 PM ^
Charbonnet is averaging 7.5 yards a carry behind an OL that isn’t as good as Michigan’s and he’s caught 20 passes. As you probably remember, he also holds Michigan’s freshman rushing touchdowns record. He’s outstanding.
November 9th, 2022 at 7:48 PM ^
No one said he wasn't outstanding, just that he wasn't better than Haskins.
November 9th, 2022 at 4:44 PM ^
Haskins was what we needed. We lose a few games last year if not for Haskins consistently moving piles for extra yards. Charbonnet turned out to be way better than I thought he would be, I didn't care when he left but now I get sad when I see him play lol..he is really good.
November 9th, 2022 at 9:31 PM ^
Welp - time for a new user name "oracle"!
November 9th, 2022 at 3:37 PM ^
I dont think the coaches would feel that way. If Charbonnet was still at UM, I dont think there would be a RB with a majority of total carries.
November 9th, 2022 at 8:14 PM ^
He’s not better than 2022 Corum.
November 10th, 2022 at 12:01 PM ^
Reading back what I wrote its almost like i never made the claim you are trying to refute.
I said that if ZC was on the team, no single RB would have the majority of the total carries. I stand by that.
November 9th, 2022 at 4:15 PM ^
I don't know if Charbonnet would be starting over Corum, but he would certainly cut into those carries. Edwards would be a clear #3, possibly being moved to WR. If Edwards stayed as a RB, Stokes would see as much time as Dunlap has this year. ZC would be a pretty clear 1A to Blake. Dude is that good...
November 9th, 2022 at 2:14 PM ^
He's very good, but if he had the starting job locked down, he wouldn't have transferred. He was behind Haskins at the time. I'm not sure he could have beaten out Corum this year. We really have been loaded at that position lately.
November 9th, 2022 at 3:33 PM ^
Didn't he move for family reasons?
November 9th, 2022 at 2:56 PM ^
LOL. He's averaging that YPC against Pac-10 defenses. And he left because he knew he wouldn't/couldn't start at Michigan
November 9th, 2022 at 3:16 PM ^
Michigan has played Iowa and PSU, which have good defenses. They’ve also played Colorado St., Hawaii, UConn, Maryland, Indiana, MSU and Rutgers. I’m not sure there’s a significant difference there.
November 9th, 2022 at 10:16 AM ^
On McCaffrey, there are several reasons why this could happen.
A) That team is so bad that it drags him down.
B) He was not as good as many people here thought and was beat out by Milton.
C) Your Wisconsin theory, but I do not buy that.
November 9th, 2022 at 4:15 PM ^
That Wisconsin hit is the Sliding Doors moment of the last four years though. Given what happened against Rutgers the next week, you'd have to at least give him a 50/50 shot of keeping the job the rest of the season.
November 9th, 2022 at 10:28 AM ^
Carpenter felt like a big loss when he left, but I'm not sure he'd be in the two deep at this point. Would he be ahead of El-Hadi? I tend to think not. Charbonnet is the only championship level player. It'd be amazing to have all three RBs (all 4 last year), but that was a win-win transfer all around. Would Sims be in the 2-deep here?
November 9th, 2022 at 6:24 PM ^
I don't know if Sims starts the season on the 2-deep, but I'd guess there's a good chance he would be ahead of Q-Johnson and so would have gotten playing time the last couple of weeks due to injuries/illness.
It's also possible Solomon or Wheeler, though not playing much at their new schools, would have ended up ahead of Mullings if they had stayed here. Just for depth purposes if nothing else, I'd have liked one of them to have stuck around.
November 9th, 2022 at 5:55 PM ^
I would think Filiaga would go in at guard this year when both Keegan and Zinter have gone out with injuries.
November 9th, 2022 at 9:54 AM ^
I prefer to focus on those who stayed, because they will be champions.
November 9th, 2022 at 10:22 AM ^
Those who stayed became champions - and will be again!
November 9th, 2022 at 10:53 AM ^
Love this..... 100%
November 9th, 2022 at 9:54 AM ^
Dylan’s stats are horrendous.
November 9th, 2022 at 10:06 AM ^
I haven't followed McCaffrey's career since he left—to play for his dad?—but he likely doesn't have the benefit of Michigan's OL, RBs, receivers, or defense.
November 9th, 2022 at 11:39 AM ^
And, on the other hand--to state the obvious--he has the distinct advantage of throwing against the defenses of FCS Big Sky programs... and still has lost multiple games by almost 50 pts. apiece. Football's a team sport, but elite talent should be able to carve out a place for itself.
November 9th, 2022 at 3:20 PM ^
He’s playing for a terrible team in a very tough conference. His Dad is a terrible coach. He’s doing the best anyone could expect considering the circumstances
November 9th, 2022 at 3:40 PM ^
Its odd to me that no one talks about the dad blowing elite QB talent with his ineptitude. That seems to be the most likely scenario.
November 9th, 2022 at 6:12 PM ^
The circumstance is that his dad ruined the career of his two younger sons. They could have went to Stanford and became gods there or just trust the process at Michigan.
November 9th, 2022 at 9:57 AM ^
Having not seen Dylan McCaffrey play, I'm curious to see how good he actually is. Stats and records can be misleading because there are 10 other guys on the field with him and that affects both of those (I wonder how good Devin Gardner would have been on the team this year). We got to see so little of him while he was here. Joe Milton beating him for the starting QB position obviously looks bad considering what we saw from Milton that season.
November 9th, 2022 at 10:02 AM ^
It seems like Dylan ended his "I want to go to the NFL" aspirations and he'd rather finish out his career playing for his dad when he transferred there.
November 9th, 2022 at 10:19 AM ^
Imagining Devin Gardner on this team is a fun exercise. It would have been fun to see his natural gifts and evolving abilities shine with quality coaching, a bunch of talent around him, and perhaps most importantly, no untreated QBPTSD. Now, we might have varying ideas on this board about where and how the current coaching staff and their gameplanning would utilize DG's abilities, but I don't think it's a stretch to imagine his career trajectory would likely have been different.
DG's toughness, intelligence, and will to win made for a heckuva package.
November 9th, 2022 at 10:56 AM ^
I love Devin, he is one of my all time favorites, but he wasn't as good a passer as JJ, and he would tell you that. A better runner, and a helluva gamer, but JJ is better
November 9th, 2022 at 11:20 AM ^
you might well be right. But i'm just not sure we saw DG's potential given the state of the program conditions/climate when he was here. i'm not saying he's better than JJ nor that the 2022 team would be better with DG than they are with JJ. I'm not knocking JJ one bit, just engaging in a rather useless, but mildly entertaining hypothetical regarding DG and what his career might have looked like if he'd been surrounded by a similar group of talent, and an upgraded coaching staff.
November 9th, 2022 at 1:08 PM ^
I mean, maybe?
We can't know for sure. As far as I can tell, nobody really coached Gardner, he got by on sheer ability and, tbh, some high school tactics which occasionally got him lit up
(remember how one of his favorite ways to escape pressure was to turn around, run backwards, and try to weave? Nobody coaches players to do that in college.)
Also remember that he was jerked around, playing WR for most of a season until Hoke remembered that he forgot to coach anyone else as a backup QB in case Denard went down with an injury he (Hoke) couldn't just IGNORE away.
So Gardner's only progress was what he could figure out for himself. That's Factor #1.
Factor #2 is that Hoke & co. regularly tried to get Gardner killed. Between horrific OL, even-more-horrific game plans, and a criminal lack of caring re: injuries...the fact that Gardner could sometimes take over a game is testament to his insane talent and fortitude.
Factor #3 is that his coaches didn't show any kind of leadership nor support. In 2014, they refused to name team captains. Gardner got fucking BENCHED for "motivational reasons." And then reinstated the next game after utter disaster.
If anyone, at any time, had worked with Gardner on mechanics and passing concepts, I gotta believe he'd have lit up the world. This guy is STILL all over our record books despite playing in the most moribund offenses Michigan has fielded since the 1930s.
JJ has the benefits of a coach who believes in him, an OC who calls coherent games, teammates who don't put games exclusively on his shoulders. And intact ribs.
November 9th, 2022 at 1:29 PM ^
Gardner was a far better deep ball passer, jj has completed 1 or 2 all year?
November 9th, 2022 at 3:45 PM ^
At the very least, Devin would have been draftable on this team. He never would have had to go to Japan to play football.
November 9th, 2022 at 11:19 AM ^
Devin would have been lethal with RichRod -- not that the latter wouldn't have worked out anyway -- but he was too constrained in Hoke's system. We only got a few glimpses of his potential (e.g. ND and OSU 2013).
November 9th, 2022 at 2:14 PM ^
I’m just grateful (but also feel a little bad for his sake) that he didn’t go to / transfer to OSU. Coulda won a Heisman there - better than Braxton and freshman Barrett - instead of being wasted by Hoke.
November 9th, 2022 at 3:46 PM ^
DG (with a broken foot) leading that TD drive in the waning moments of the 2013 OSU game was one of the gutsiest performances I've ever seen. Talk about a guy who deserved better.
November 9th, 2022 at 1:12 PM ^
Did you know Biden is recruiting Joe Milton to overthrow the Russian govt?
November 9th, 2022 at 2:17 PM ^
Did you know Trump was recruiting Milton to overthrow our government?
(No politics, I know. But, mom, he started it!)
November 9th, 2022 at 3:22 PM ^
we mgobloggers are as diverse as our breakfast taco pants
November 9th, 2022 at 2:19 PM ^
I know we try to keep a healthy buffer between sports and politics on this board, but that was funny.
November 9th, 2022 at 9:59 AM ^
Wishing all of them well. Stay healthy, complete your degree, and best of luck in the future.
However, should they and their current team face Michigan - don't expect my rooting interests to change.
Go Blue!