Spring practice is over, having officially ended with a final practice on Tuesday (yes, after the Spring Game). The players will continue working with Barwis as long as they’re in town, but organized practices have come to an end.

Shall we recap what we know from spring, then?

• Ryan Van Bergen, who was taken off the field on the Med Cart Saturday, should be fine.
• Maize n Blue Nation provides a handy chart of the individual stats from the spring game. Tate Forcier, for the record, graded out with a passer efficiency rating (not a perfect metric, but them’s the ropes) of 270.80. Michigan’s total last year was 95.13, and Steven Threet led with a 105.26 rating. Standard caveats apply about our own defense maybe just being terrible, no contact on QBs, and simulating situations rather than a scrimmage.
• VB Spring Game Recap.
• VB Spring Game Photo Gallery.
• MSC and MGoBlog recaps.

BTN Highlights:

Football news, other than that of the recruiting variety, should slow down in short order around here, unless something significant happens. Focus will shift slightly to baseball, general athletics, and other pursuits.

Posted under Football, Spring Coverage

I swear, I’m really trying to avoid doing these posts with any regularity.

• Ricky Barnum has sprained his ankle, and will miss a few spring practices to get wrist surgery. His wrist was (apparently) pretty damaged, and he was working through it before. While it sucks that he’s sustained another injury, at least it gave him the opportunity to get the wrist taken care of.
• Denard Robinson has claimed the 2nd-fastest 100m dash time in the country so far this year for high-schoolers. The incoming QB ran a 10.44 time, and expects to run in the 10.3s when track season gets underway in earnest. (Photo by Tom Ervin for the Miami Herald).
• Devin Gardner plans to publicly commit to Michigan either Thursday or Friday. He apparently did so silently at junior day, but wanted to finish out his basketball season before worrying about dealing with the press.
• Darryl Stonum has debunked the rumors that he’s intending to transfer from Michigan at the end of spring practice.
• SPRING GAME WOO GET AMPED.
• VB (Paul and Tim, at least) plans to be at todays 3:05 PM baseball game at the Fish. Feel free to say hello to us.

And, in site news: If you take a look at the top of the right sidebar, the subscription options have changed slightly. You can still subscribe via RSS, but there are now other possibilities. There is now an official VB Twitter account to which you can subscribe @VarsityBlue. You can subscribe via e-mail, which will inform you whenever there is a new front page post on Varsity Blue. And, perhaps what we’re most excited about, we’re going to start rolling out a VB Newsletter, which we’ll send out once a week (you can help us determine which day when you sign up), and will include a recap of the week’s action on Varsity Blue, along with a bit of information that may not have made it to the front page, and even a preview of what is coming in the next week. It might start out a little spartan in design (no pun intended), but we’ll be beefing it up in short order.

In other site news, we plan to debut a couple new features on VB in the coming weeks, though they’re not quite ready for public consumption yet. I’ll keep you posted when everything is ready to go live.

Posted under Baseball, Blog News, Football, Personnel, Recruiting, Spring Coverage

Paul is attending the Rich Rodriguez press conference currently underway, and sending me updates to relay. Check back as I update this post with new information.

1. Nick Sheridan has suffered a non-displaced fracture of his leg that will not require surgery. He will be out 4-6 weeks, and will be back with the team in time for summer workouts.
2. To help deal with the dwindling numbers at the QB position, Justin Feagin (QB last year, slot this spring) will continue taking snaps at the quarterback position in Spring Practice.

End relevant information. Paul will update with video shortly.

 

 Rodriguez Talking about Sheridan: Play Now | Play in Popup | Download

Posted under Football, Personnel

An intrepid Bleacher Report author has gotten his hands on “leaked information” (read: has probably posted something he read on a premium message board) that Nick Sheridan and David Cone both sustained injuries during practice yesterday, though it’s unclear how long they’re out (if each does indeed have a broken bone, it’ll probably be until the end of spring).

This is obviously bad for several reasons, most notably because it leaves Tate Forcier as the only QB on the roster who was deemed worthy of a scholarship offer out of high school. The only other QB who took snaps in practice Saturday was #18, deemed not even important enough to have his name on the spring roster.

I foresee Justin Feagin, Carlos Brown, Terrence Robinson, et al probably getting a few more reps at QB than they were planning on this spring, if only because there are practically no breathing bodies left.

EDIT: I should probably note (though it’s obvious from no link) that there is no confirmation of this from a free source.

UPDATE: Someone from the football program (presumably Coach Rodriguez) is going to be holding a press conference tomorrow presumably to address the injury rumors. Team coverage and whatnot forthcoming.

Posted under Football, Personnel, Spring Coverage