How Jimmy Rolder's baseball background helping transition to 'Big Ten linebacker'
True freshman linebacker Jimmy Rolder has seen his playing time increase steadily throughout Michigan football’s 2022 season. The late-blooming high school recruit did not show up until this past summer, but quickly has become a key depth piece in the linebacker rotation.
Head coach Jim Harbaugh has been impressed by what Rolder – a four-star enrollee and No. 175 player nationally in 2022, per the On3 Consensus – has brought to the table, referring to him recently as a “Big Ten linebacker.”
What does it mean? Nobody seems to know, but it is provocative.
“Honestly, I’m not 100% sure what he means by that,” Rolder said on Tuesday night in Ann Arbor. “But honestly just someone who can compete at a high level, just come in and work every day, just get better and compete when I’m out there.”
Physically, the 6-foot-2, 228-pound linebacker has fit right in and has looked the part. But that is not where the most difficult adjustment has come.
“It’s been a lot tougher mentally compared to physically,” Rolder said. “Just coming in fall camp, cause I wasn’t an early enrollee, so just having to retain everything kinda fast. It was definitely tough in the beginning, but it’s getting easier as I go — which is kinda expected, but it was definitely tougher mentally than I had originally thought.
Rolder was late to the party on focusing on football, originally committing to Illinois to play baseball. The process had many twists and turns, but Michigan was the right fit for him.
“Just the culture, pretty much,” Rolder said. “Everything about it. Great football, great academics, the coaching staff is very welcoming. The players were very welcoming. All around, it just felt like home. After being on visits — I came on three visits. Compared to all the other places, I didn’t take as many because it just felt like this was the place to be. “
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Baseball background helping adjustment to Michigan
Rolder had previous contact with Michigan as a baseball prospect, but once football came into the picture he decided to focus solely on that sport. Fellow linebacker Joey Velasquez pulls double duty for both teams, but he is in no danger of roster competition on the diamond from Rolder.
“In my recruiting process before, I talked to Michigan [baseball] in my sophomore year,” Rolder said. “But since I came here, I just wanted to focus on football. A big school like Michigan, I didn’t want to do all that. I just kind of want to be great at one. I joke around with Joey all the time about coming back, but I wouldn’t do that.”
Harbaugh has said in the past he likes when players are crossed trained in other sports. Rolder, a former infielder, does see some things that he can apply from his baseball days to the gridiron.
“Instinct and reaction is just I think the biggest part,” he said. “Baseball is also a game of short memory. You get three out of 10 times, success, that’s good. So if I have a bad play, just moving on and being able to forget it I think is the biggest thing that came from that.”
