Kris Jenkins reveals updated weight, talks 'KPIs,' pursuit of perfection in 2023
Michigan football defensive lineman Kris Jenkins has been hard at work all offseason adding weight to his frame to round out his skill-set. The senior defensive tackle, who has earned the nickname “The Mutant” in Ann Arbor, came into last year’s fall camp at 285 pounds.
Jenkins has been attacking a plan set forth by himself, strength coach Ben Herbert and nutritionist Abigail O’Connor. He stated a goal of being somewhere between 305 and 310 pounds when fall camp started in 2023.
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Mission accomplished. Fall camp starts on Aug. 2, and Jenkins is right where he needs to be.
“I’m sitting at 307 [pounds] right now,” Jenkins said. “Unfortunately lost a couple of pounds. I probably could’ve eaten another PB and J on the way here. But I’m feeling comfortable, feeling good and ready to put that weight on the field.”
Jenkins hopes that added power to his frame and make him more explosive on the interior of the defensive line. Michigan has a 48-point checklist, called “Key Performance Indicators” or KPIs, that grade strength and power, speed and agility, flexibility, mobility and more.
From a KPI perspective, Jenkins is sitting in a great spot.
“There’s always more work to be done, but right now sitting pretty good strength-wise, still got more to do with agility and flexibility,” Jenkins said. “Always working to improve those. I’ve been honing in on all of them and that’s why we love KPIs so much because you could really look at the individual areas that you need to work on and improve. That’s been a really big help in taking our game to the next level.”
Pursuit of perfection fuels Jenkins, Michigan teammates
Jenkins is considered a potential top-100 prospect in the 2024 NFL Draft, which would likely mean more production as a run stuffer and in the sack column. Some believe that he has the potential to be Michigan’s most explosive interior lineman since Maurice Hurst, but he hopes the steps forward in the weight room help him perfect his craft, whatever the production looks like.
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“Just being the best football player I could be and best defensive lineman I could be in being a complete defensive tackle [is the goal],” Jenkins said. “Really just playing up to my true potential and hopefully, knowing that what I could do off the field and in the weight room will help inspire me to get more confidence and be more of a dominant football player on the field.”
Despite a 13-1 season, Big Ten title and trip to the College Football Playoff last year, Jenkins and the Wolverines feel like they left potential on the field. Making sure there is no meat left on the bone is the goal for the 2023 season.
“We left a lot on the field last year,” he said. “There was a lot going on where we wish we could’ve played a better game of football. The biggest thing coming up this year is that we want to do more of that. We want to perfect what we couldn’t perfect last year. Obviously, it’s not gonna be the same team playing this year, and we can’t be complacent and act like our success last year is gonna carry over to this year.
“The biggest thing is we need to do more to become a better football team every single day, every day. Every 24 hours.”
