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Potential Early Departures: Defense

With the onslaught of transfer portal entries in college football, it’s inevitable that Michigan will face some more departures this off-season. Four players have already announced their intentions to transfer, and two (Cade McNamara and Erick All to Iowa) have already found a landing spot. Quarterback Alan Bowman and tight end Louis Hansen are both headed for, ahem, greener pastures.

McNamara and All are both somewhat unique cases of players who played a lot but felt slighted in some way, but Bowman and Hansen are more typical cases of players buried on the depth chart who want to see some light at the end of the tunnel. This post explores several players in similar situations who may find better situations elsewhere.

You can find the version for the offensive side of the ball here (LINK).

DISCLAIMER: This post is speculative in nature and not intended to encourage/discourage any player from leaving Michigan’s program. The reality is that college football is now a lot like unrestricted free agency from year to year.

LB JOEY VELAZQUEZ
Why he should stay: Velazquez is a solid two-sport athlete who’s having a decent impact on the baseball field with Michigan’s baseball team. His playing time on the field has increased yearly from one game in 2020 to seven games in 2021 to eleven games so far in the 2022 season. He is a steady contributor on special teams and has made a career-high 6 tackles.
Why he might leave: Playing time has been difficult to find on defense, and he has never risen above third string on defense. He was immediately passed by freshman Jimmy Rolder this fall, and the commitment of Ernest Hausmann probably does not bode well for the staff’s faith in Velazquez contributing on defense in 2023. Velazquez only has one season of eligibility remaining, and he may want to go somewhere he can compete for a starting job, which is extremely unlikely in Ann Arbor.

Hit the jump for more.

Alan Bowman, Ex-Wolverine

Quarterback Alan Bowman has entered the transfer portal. Bowman came to Michigan from Texas Tech in 2020 after losing his starting job for the Red Raiders, and he has spent the last two seasons competing for the starting position, albeit losing out to Cade McNamara and J.J. McCarthy, not to mention walk-on Davis Warren, who also passed up Bowman. While it made sense to bring him in at the time, it always seemed a bit dubious since the expectation seemed to be clear that McCarthy would be the starter as soon as possible.

Bowman completed 6/7 passes for 60 yards and 1 touchdown this season as essentially the fourth-stringer behind McCarthy, McNamara, and Warren (though the third-string guy after McNamara got injured). Last season he was 2/4 for 9 yards and 1 interception.

The most interesting thing about Bowman is that he’s going into his seventh – and presumably final – season in 2023. He redshirted in 2017, lost a season to injury, and had the COVID year not count against him, so the odd rules of the NCAA are giving him seven years to play college football when it only takes many guys three years to get a degree.

I would expect the Texas native to end up somewhere closer to home outside the Power 5 conferences, perhaps somewhere like Rice or Tulsa or North Texas. He has thrown for 34 career touchdowns between Texas Tech and Michigan, so that’s a great deal of experience and overall success if you’re looking for a veteran quarterback.

Roderick Pierce, Wolverine

Oak Lawn (IL) Brother Rice defensive tackle Roderick “Trey” Pierce committed to Michigan on Wednesday evening. The former Wisconsin commit picked the Wolverines over offers from Auburn, Illinois, Minnesota, Missouri, and Texas, among others.

Pierce is listed at 6’3″ and 290 lbs.

RANKINGS
ESPN: 3-star, 77 grade, #49 DT
On3: 3-star, 86 grade, #116 DL
Rivals: 4-star, 5.8 grade, #16 DT
247 Sports: 3-star, 89 grade, #51 DL

Hit the jump for more.

Ernest Hausmann, Wolverine

Former Nebraska linebacker Ernest Hausmann has committed to Michigan as a transfer. Transfer offers are a little bit iffy to track, but he was offered by Iowa, Michigan, Michigan State, Northwestern, and Virginia out of high school.

Hausmann is a 6’2″, 220 lb. player who made 54 tackles, 2 tackles for loss, and 1 sack while starting seven games as a true freshman for the Cornhuskers in 2022. Despite being offered by the Wolverines out of school, chose his “home state” team for a year instead; Hausmann was actually born in Uganda but was adopted and moved to be with his adoptive family when he was five years old.

High school rankings from 2022:

ESPN: 3-star, 78 grade, #24 ILB
On3: 4-star, 91 grade, #27 LB, #294 overall
Rivals: 3-star, 5.6 grade, #45 OLB
247 Sports: 3-star, 88 grade, #65 LB

Hit the jump for more.

Visitors: December 16-18, 2022

TRANSFERS

A.J. Barner – TE – Indiana: Barner is a 6’6″, 250 lb. starting tight end and captain from the Hoosiers. After spending three seasons in Bloomington, he has two seasons of eligibility left. This season he caught 28 passes for 199 yards and 3 touchdowns. Barner was a 3-star, the #51 tight end, and #1147 overall in the class of 2020. With Michigan losing Erick All (Iowa), Luke Schoonmaker (NFL), Louis Hansen (transfer), Carter Selzer (graduation), and Joel Honigford (graduation), they need some reinforcements at the tight end position.

Josaiah Stewart – OLB – Coastal Carolina: Stewart is a 6’2″, 230 lb. outside linebacker whom Michigan offered when he came out of high school in 2021. He went to Coastal Carolina and had an outstanding freshman season followed up by a pretty solid sophomore year. Now that he’s in the transfer portal, he has two years of eligibility remaining and appears to be choosing between Michigan and USC.

Hit the jump for more.