Two Michigan breakout tight ends have 'turned heads' in fall camp

Michigan Wolverines football has three tight ends that are expected to play a significant amount of snaps in junior Colston Loveland, junior Marlin Klein and senior Max Bredeson, who also serves as the team’s H-back and fullback. Meeting with the media this week, though, position coach Steve Casula identified two other players at the position who are having exceptional fall camps.

“Fall camp is always a great opportunity here for guys to really develop, grow, make a name for themselves,” Casula said. “We have an old saying here, ‘It’s a meritocracy. You shall be known upon your talent and effort.’ So there’s ample opportunity for that.

“Two guys that have really had outstanding fall camps and have grown and developed — and it’s not just fall camp, it’s the offseason cycle, as well — [sophomores] Zack Marshall and Jalen Hoffman have really done well.

“They’ve turned heads. And when called upon, they’ve made the most of their opportunities, and they’ve really had good camps.”

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Marshall saw time in only two games last season (wins over Minnesota and Indiana), redshirting in his first season in college. He was a three-star recruit and the nation’s No. 530 overall player in the 2023 class. Hoffman, meanwhile, walked on to Michigan last season. The 6-foot-3, 235-pounder saw time in one game (Indiana) but was twice named Scout Team Special Teams Player of the Week in 2023.

Hoffman is viewed as the backup to Bredeson at fullback and H-back, though the rest of the tight end room takes snaps in the backfield as well.

“Jalen Hoffman is kind of that guy getting developed,” Bredeson said on The Wolverine Podcast. “Similar skill set, similar body type. It is kind of a body type position. Same kind of story, a walk-on guy, same as I was. I’ve been really trying to show him the things that you find with age while he’s younger. I’ve been really trying to develop him at a younger age and really give him the tricks of the trade as fast as I can.”

Klein, meanwhile, has played only 45 offensive snaps in his two-year career, but he’s set to break out and inherit the role left behind by AJ Barner, a fourth-round NFL Draft pick to the Seattle Seahawks. While he’s been behind talented players like Loveland and Barner in the past, he’s always had physical traits that have stood out.

Casula was on staff as an analyst when Klein committed to Michigan in September 2020, and he remembers watching the German’s highlight tape from his time at Rabun Gap (Ga.) Nacoochee School.

“[Michigan head] Coach [Sherrone] Moore was actually the tight ends coach that Mar committed to,” Casula pointed out. “I remember the first time I watched him, I was just A) taken aback by the mountains in the background at where he went to school and B) I had never seen somebody at that age, at that size run the way he did. 

“He displayed early in his high school career real-deal, high-end physical traits. I remember there was a clip on either his junior or senior high school highlight film where he’s running down someone that made an interception. And you’re like, ‘Whoa.’ He didn’t have the ball, he ran someone down, chased him and caught him on a pursuit play. It was a ‘wow’ moment watching the guy run. You could tell — high-end physical traits, for sure.”

Between Loveland, Klein, Bredeson and potentially some of the emerging young players such as Marshall and Hoffman, Michigan is poised to use its tight ends quite a bit this fall. The Wolverines had multiple tight ends on the field on 58.3 percent of offensive snaps last year.

“We’re always going to play with tight ends here,” Casula said. “There are going to be some weeks when it’s a lot of 12 and 13, getting into the flow of the game, and you gotta do what you gotta do to win the game. But we play with a lot of 11 personnel, too, and if we need to be in 10 personnel to win a game and it gives us the best chance to A) effectively move the ball and score points and B) run the football, C) throw the football, we’re going to deploy our personnel as necessary.

“And a lot of it is dictated by how the defense handles different personnels, as well. That’s kind of a big, living, breathing, week-to-week organism. But we’ve got really good players at both positions, we’ve got really good players in the tailback room, as well. So we feel like we can be super multiple and do what we need to do.”