Michigan football: CJ Stokes fires back against his recruiting ranking, speaks on trust with Mike Hart
Michigan football typically has a way of bringing in young players and letting them grow behind program stalwarts. Freshman running back CJ Stokes is very much on that path learning behind junior Blake Corum and sophomore Donovan Edwards.
Stokes’ emergence as a key part of the Michigan backfield is a bit different, though. He was not seen as a player that might be ready to go out of the box, nor was he a highly-touted recruit. The On3 Consensus had him as a three-star recruit and the No. 793 player in the 2022 recruiting class.
“I’m not a three-star. I want to get that out of the way first,” Stokes said on Tuesday night.
Stokes has 42 rushes for 232 yards and a touchdown during his true freshman campaign as the team’s 3rd back behind Corum and Edwards. At times, he has played a burst and vision that some either overlooked or did not see in his high school film.
But Michigan did.
“In the recruiting process, [Jim Harbaugh] treated me like I was a five-star,” Stokes said. “He didn’t really treat me like I was a three-star, and I loved that from him. They showed me love and brought me down here and on my visit. I don’t know if people know this, but I committed halfway through my official. I didn’t want to go anywhere else and they didn’t want me to go anywhere else. It’s kind of a perfect fit.”
CJ Stokes moves on from early Michigan mistake
Stokes got some early run in Michigan’s non-conference games, but his first touch in Big Ten play was a lost fumble against Maryland on Sept. 24. After that, we went almost a month without seeing him in game action.
Stokes said that moment helped to refocus him after a nice start to his freshman year.
“I wouldn’t even say I was necessarily in the dog house; it was more them making sure that I was mentally ready to go back,” Stokes said. “I was harder on myself than anybody really could have been on me about the fumble. It was my first Big Ten carry and I fumbled it, so it was demoralizing to me, but I got past it. The fumble is definitely the best thing that happened to me this season as far as locking me in.”
Focus and attention to detail are defining traits of the young Michigan runner. He famously showed up to class in cleats and was taped up and ready to go for practice. This allowed him to multi-task and get to the football building to keep soaking up the knowledge being made available to him.
“I wanted to make sure I got every install and everything, so I was mentally ready,” Stokes explained this week.
Stokes is at Michigan in large part because of the trust put into his skill set by position coach Mike Hart. Hart has taken some heat from Michigan fans and other critics for his lack of sizzle on the recruiting trail. Given the way Stokes was ranked, he wants to prove that the faith placed in him was justified.
“Everybody has their moments. I’m not perfect, so I slack sometimes,” Stokes said. “But the first thing I think about is the amount of trust that [Mike Hart] put in me to bring me here when a lot of people didn’t think I could play here. I’ve got to play hard for him to prove people right and defend him. … I gotta go out there and put out a return on what he brought in.”
