I spent a little time with Denard Sunday and most the questions and answers were pretty dry. My impression watching him—he feels like he’s the guy and exudes confidence. A few of the solid quotes including my favorite from the day*: How has he gotten better? "I think I’m more calm. I’m getting used to the offense, and that’s really helping me out." On his thoughts last year: "There was just a whole bunch going through my head and everything was coming by so fast. Everything has slowed down." On whether he thinks more than one quarterback will be starting this season. "Oh yeah, oh yeah. Because all of us are playing real good football right now. I wouldn’t be surprised to see Devin on the field and Tate on the field in one of these games. They could start the first game, we really don’t know." On Devin’s progress. "He calmed down. Everything was fast to him at first when he came in. He took it all in and he’s using it now." *On where he was with the read option last season: "Man. <laughs>. Last year I was like, ‘All right, I’m not reading, I’m just running’ – that’s what I was thinking. Now I can read it." Related: The Standard Fare Will Hagerup – Media Day Devin…
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Devin Gardner – Media Day
I spent a few moments with Devin Gardner. From the little I’ve seen, he’s clearly much improved and in the mix the fall and I’m very surprised after seeing Gardner a bit in the fall. A few quotes: Are you still living with Charlie? [for context, click here and scroll down]: Charlie? Oh no, I’m not living with Charlie anymore I’m living with Denard. How’s that going [living with Denard]? "It’s going great. You know, he’s like a garbage disposal, he eats everything, I don’t know why. He’s hungry all the time." He looks like he’s bigger. "Yeah, because he’s eating all that food <laughs>." It looks like you’ve improved [from spring to now], do you think so? "I’ve definitely improved from the spring, but I don’t think I’m where I need to be. I want to be the best at everything I do." What command of the playbook do you have at this point? "Everything they’ve taught us I know it to a ‘T’. I don’t know if they’ve told us everything, but they said it’s a big chunk that we’re going to use against UConn." Related: Will Hagerup – Media Day Tate Forcier – Media Day Media Day (Photo Gallery) Follow MVictors on Twitter
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Rich Rodriguez joins Larry Lage (WTKA audio)
Props to AP beat writer Larry Larry and Ira Weintraub for landing Rich Rodriguez for a segment this morning on WTKA 1050AM. (Sam Webb is out on vacation). In the aftermath of Media Day, the guys discussed a few items with coach, from the fan day turnout, the quarterback position of course, they got into a little bit on Denard Robinson’s habit of not tying his shoelaces. Rich Rod marveled how they don’t come off. I’ll join him on that: They also went in on the comparisons to Pat White (with Denard), on the general philosophy of competition at each position, on Rodriguez’s “campaign” to scrimmage or at least practice against other schools in the preseason, on the general state of U-M recruiting and finally on the schedule for this week (they start preparation for Western tomorrow). Here’s the audio: [display_podcast] Related: Media Day: Chicken Scratch Media Day: Rodriguez on the Quarterback position Media Day: Greg Robinson on the Field Level Advantage Media/Fan Day: Photo Gallery Media Day: The Stadium Renovation (Photos) Follow MVictors on Twitter