Having now some exposure to the life of a regular journalist you learn a few things. One thing I’ve appreciated for a while, having done a few now, is the effort that goes into prepping, executing, transcribing and finally republishing an interview. I grabbed a bunch of audio on Sunday but 90% of it won’t see the fiber-optic light of internet beyond the audio Rodriguez telling us that he’s planning to use three quarterbacks against Western Michigan.
I ran over to catch Tate Forcier on the practice field after RR presser and found some sound worth talking about. First notes:
- On whether he’s going to keep the “T.” of Forcier on his jersey now that there’ll be no “J. Forcier” rejoining the Wolverines. We already know he will keep the T., but interesting that Tate was actually curious about that as well.
- On why he ended up at Michigan and his brother role in encouraging him to give Ann Arbor a look.
- On living with his brother, who Tate says is staying in town to start his own business. They have an apartment and Jason sleeps on an air mattress next to him. [Sorry, no confirmation whether they are going to build a bunk bed a la Step Brothers].
- Regarding Denard and competition in general, the freshman did admit some moments of complacency during the spring after Nick Sheridan went down with the leg fracture:
“During the spring… when Nick got hurt, I caught myself just walking through it. Now that the competition is here, there’s no more taking the easy way. You really got to work. You’ve got a competition in front of you and you’ve really got to work for it.”
Because that might get some reaction I’ll add my take: He’s a freshman and he was trying to make the point that Denard and Nick make him better. It’s natural that he might have got a little comfortable with the 1’s as unless it was a rap-off, David Cone wasn’t applying too much pressure. Some may spin this as Forcier got “lazy” or whatever. If you think that any of these guys are taking anything for granted you haven’t seen a practice. Every drill they run is intense. Even moving from station to station during practice these guys move quickly and it’s all business.
- Continuing the audio:
- He was asked, in essence, whether seeing Denard Robinson made him question his decision to go to Michigan. As you might guess this just rolled off Forcier and he said that Denard can do some incredible things, but he’s “making a lot of the same mistakes I made in the spring.”
- On the reps, Forcier towed the company line and said the snaps in practice were “even” between the three guys.
- More on Denard, “Honestly I didn’t think Denard was going to do so well coming in, coming out of the offense he played…he shocked me, he’s actually a really good quarterback and he’s making me a lot better because he competes every day.”
- Mentally, Forcier admits he’s trying “to get where Nick’s at.”
Here’s the audio:
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