Michigan football's 8 most interesting quotes from first week of spring camp

The Michigan Wolverines are a little over a week into spring football practices, where the program is hoping to set a foundation for a fruitful 2025 season. U-M is about a third of the way through its slate, which concludes on April 19 with the spring game at the Big House.

Head coach Sherrone Moore, his coordinators on each side of the ball and a handful of players have spoken with the media throughout the last week or so. Here are some of the most intriguing quotes out of the Michigan camp.

Head coach Sherrone Moore

On Bryce Underwood‘s work ethic: “I think just early enrollees in general, it’s a great thing for the game and for those players to be able to come in and… not only just for football, for school, be able to handle school, be able to maneuver in school and know where your classes are, but for him and all the quarterbacks, it’s been good. Adjusting to things and doing things a little bit differently, but he’s done well. He works his tail off. He’s in here late, in here early, and, you know, those guys have really worked hard to compete at that position.”

Offensive coordinator/quarterbacks coach Chip Lindsey

Underwood’s physical and mental development: “I’d say he’s pretty advanced. He’s highly decorated and all that in high school, which a lot of them are. But his sheer physical side of who he is — he’s 6-4, whatever he is, 220-plus pounds. Some of those guys come in and they’re really light and they’re not developed yet. Depending on their age. Some of them, nowadays they reclass up and down. And that used to never happen.

“When I was growing up in the 90s, nobody became the starting quarterback until they were like redshirt juniors and they were like 20 or 21 years old. It’s just different now. I think kids are more advanced in general throughout the country. A lot of trainers now start with these kids really young. And you go to different parts of the country when you’re recruiting and you can tell they’ve been working a long time. They all have these trainers and so forth. He’s very advanced physically. And I think for him the speed of the game is always something you worry about coming into college compared to high school. And then how much can he handle.”

Defensive coordinator Wink Martindale

On Jaishawn Barham expanding his game as a pass rusher: “I think there’s definitely gonna be an expansion of his role. But I think it goes game to game of how we want to use him. Do we want to use him as a rusher off the ball, for example? Because that is a trait the NFL looks for. Can he rush off the edge? Sure he can. We rushed him off the edge last year. I think we need to give him more work of rushing off the edge to fully prepare him for the next step that he’s taking. And how that fits into our game plans, we’ll wait and see how that does. We played him on the edge quite a bit last year, as well, but when you have the guys we had as edge players for us last year, it’s hard to always get those reps, too. It’s an exciting time.”

Senior EDGE Derrick Moore

Teaming up with TJ Guy to lead the pass rush: “I got a crazy feeling about [the EDGE group]. I feel like me and TJ are about to have one crazy year. Crazy duo. This whole offseason, we’ve been grinding, just working. We’re just telling each other, ‘man, this is our last one, so we gotta go out with a bang.’ Also on top of that, just stepping up and being leaders for the team, stuff like that. We’re both not guys who talk as much, so we’re really challenging each other to be that guy on the field but also, how can we help the team get better all as one?”

Junior RB Justice Haynes

What led Haynes to transfer to Michigan from Alabama: “I’m a big faith person. I felt like God was calling me in a different direction in my life, and so I’m just relying on His plan that He had for me. I’m thankful for my time at Alabama. It was an amazing two-and-a-half years I had there, being coached by Coach Saban, being coached by Coach DeBoer. Great people, great men. But Michigan, I fell in love with the place. I knew [running backs coach Tony Alford] from when I was getting recruited from Ohio State. I came up here, and this is the place I knew I wanted to be as soon as I got here.”

Sophomore RB Jordan Marshall

On leading Michigan’s backfield if he has to: “I’d love to do that every game. It’s not ideal, but if that’s what it comes to, yes. But that’s why you bring another great back in, and we have guys that can play capable minutes, and that’s a testament to [the coaching staff], getting guys ready to all be able to play. There’s no drop off in that room. I would say we’re just ready to compete. I’m excited for the challenge of having so many good backs in that room. We go in there, and we want to compete every day, but we’re also gonna learn from each other because everybody brings something different to our team. It’s a really good mindset to see all that.”

EDGE TJ Guy

On Michigan’s freshman class: “[Wide receiver] Jamar Browder made a catch [on the first day of practice]. I was like damn, that’s gonna look good. So him, for sure. A whole bunch of guys. This class is uber-talented, I think, for real. You guys are gonna see. [It was only] day one, but we’ll see more for sure.”

Senior linebacker Ernest Hausmann

On the win over Alabama in the ReliaQuest Bowl: “It was huge. The game was huge (for everyone). For all three phases of the game. Just really build that momentum going into the off-season. But at the same time, keep that hungry mindset. We were 8-5. That’s nowhere where we want to be. That’s not the standard at Michigan here. We’re nowhere satisfied with the result.”