casey thompson

It's football content season again, everybody! With less than four weeks to kick-off, it's time for the return of The Enemy, Ranked (as well as Football Bits later this week). Just like last year, we will be counting down Michigan's 12 opponents ranked by each positional group, but this year we will be counting down from worst to first. Today we'll be starting with the quarterback position. 

12. Connecticut

Get used to this. I have a feeling most of the articles will be beginning with UCONN in the cellar because *glances at UCONN football's history dating back to the 2011 Fiesta Bowl*. At QB it's no different. Amazingly, the Huskies' likeliest starter is someone B1G fans may be familiar with, Ta'Quan Roberson. He was the backup at PSU last year who was called into game action against Iowa when Sean Clifford went down with injury... it did not end well. Roberson went 7/21 for 34 yards, which, yes, comes out to 1.6 yards per attempt(!!!!!), with 0 TD to 2 INT. It was some of the worst QB play I have ever seen in the B1G, which is not a high bar to clear. Roberson is a former top 300 recruit, so there is some raw talent, but there's a reason he got on the field once in his first three years in State College, and even more reason that he was forced to go to UCONN out of the transfer portal. He's bad. 

If it's not Roberson, it could be Tyler Phommachanh (fun name), a RS FR who got into three games last season to the tune of  48.6% completion at 4.5 Y/A, 1 TD to 2 INT. He was a 2021 recruit who was outside the top 2,000 in the composite(!!), whose other offers included Army, Albany, and Central Connecticut State. As you can guess from the Army offer, he has some running upside, but has not shown much passing. Cale Millen could also be the guy, a similar profile to Roberson as a former Top 300 guy who lost his way, never getting on the field at Oregon, taking a stop-over at Northern Arizona, and now finding the path to Storrs. He attempted 15 passes at Northern Arizona, under 50% completion and under 3 yards per attempt. Yeah. 

[Associated Press]

11. Hawaii

The Rainbow Warriors have a cluttered QB room, which is the result of a coaching change after Todd Graham was fired and Timmy Chang was inserted in his place. The one guy who stuck around to see the change through is the nominal leader on the depth chart, Brayden Schager. He was a Who Dat 2021 3* recruit with mostly FCS offers that chose Hawaii despite Todd Graham being the coach and managed to get on the field as a true freshman. Schager did about as well as you'd expect a true freshman thrown into the fire by a dictatorial head coach who the whole team hated to do, 2 TD to 5 INT on 60.2% completion. There were some happy moments, including an upset of Fresno State (Schager's 11-for-27 performance suggests it was in spite of him) and a game where he ripped apart decrepit New Mexico State, but as a whole, he was well below par. There's an optimistic case that with another year of experience and perhaps better coaching, Schager can be better. But will he be significantly better by week two? Doubtful. 

If it's not Schager as the signal-caller, it might be Joey Yellen, a former Top 300 recruit who is now on his third program in four seasons, with five career appearances to his name. His performance as a true freshman in 2019 for ASU showed some glimmers that were then washed out in 2020 and he did not get on the field for Pittsburgh a year ago. Cammon Cooper also transfers in with a similar recruiting profile in his past, although he has just 23 career attempts in regular season action. It's hard to know who the starter will be and if any of these guys will be good. Right now, there's no reason to suggest they will be, and certainly not for week two, which is why they're 11th. 

10. Colorado State

One thing to know about the Rams is that they basically copy-and-paste'd the entire Nevada program to Fort Collins by hiring Jay Norvell in the offseason. Some pieces were lost in translation, but a huge chunk of the Wolfpack program packed up its bags and followed their coach two states over. One such member of the program was Clay Millen. First off, I will acknowledge that just three teams into this piece we have a "Cale Millen" and a "Clay Millen". You are correct, they are brothers. Unlike Cale, Clay is expected to start for his new school, as he exited spring practice with a firm grip on the starting job. We don't know a ton about Clay Millen; he was a 3.5* star recruit in the 2021 class for Norvell and then threw two passes as a freshman while maintaining his redshirt. That's it. Assuming he gets the start on September 3 in the Big House, that will be his first career NCAA start. Could be great! Could be terrible!

I ranked Colorado State at 10, ahead of 11, because I think there is a decent chance Millen will be better than Schager when they see Michigan. Both are 2021 recruits and though Schager has more experience, Millen is the one who has had the same head coach for both seasons, even if he transferred. Therefore, I expect him to be a bit ahead of Schager developmentally, with the same coach and system in front of him both years. Moreover, given Norvell's track record of QB development in producing Carson Strong, I'll slot CSU ahead of Hawaii if both have relative unknowns at QB, which they do.

[AFTER THE JUMP: some bad B1G QBs]