2024 Spring Football Preview: Offensive Line

Tag: Jeffrey Persi


17Mar 2024
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2024 Spring Football Preview: Offensive Line

Myles Hinton (image via MLive)

2023 Starters: LT La’Darius Henderson, LG Trevor Keegan, C Drake Nugent, RG Zak Zinter, RT Karsen Barnhart
Losses: Barnhart (NFL), Henderson (NFL), Trente Jones (NFL), Keegan (NFL), Nugent (NFL), Zinter (NFL)
Returning players: Myles Hinton (RS Sr.), Jeffrey Persi (RS Sr.), Raheem Anderson (RS Jr.), Tristan Bounds (RS Jr.), Greg Crippen (RS Jr.), Giovanni El-Hadi (RS Jr.), Dominic Giudice (RS Jr.), Andrew Gentry (RS So.), Connor Jones (RS So.), Nathan Efobi (RS Fr.), Amir Herring (RS Fr.), Evan Link (RS Fr.)
Newcomers: Josh Priebe (RS Sr.), Blake Frazier (Fr.), Jake Guarnera (Fr.)
Projected starters: LT Hinton, LG El-Hadi, C Crippen, RG Priebe, RT Persi

Michigan went from having a terrible offensive line under Brady Hoke to a decent offensive line at the beginning of the Harbaugh era to one of the best in the country at the end of Harbaugh’s tenure. In two of Harbaugh’s final three seasons, Michigan won the Joe Moore Award for the best offensive line in the country; in the third season, they lost the award but won a national championship. And now most of the key pieces to those awards and accomplishments are either in the NFL or heading there soon.

Much like the quarterback position, nobody really has a great idea of how the position group will shake out. Will it be as good as it was in 2021-2023? That’s unlikely. Could it still be a solid conglomeration? Sure. Four of the starters above (Hinton, El-Hadi, Crippen, and Persi) were 4-star prospects or better, and the only 3-star (Priebe) is a multi-year starter coming from Northwestern. Furthermore, they are all veteran players in at least their fourth year of college.

At offensive tackle, Hinton started one-third of the season before ceding his spot to Barnhart in 2023, so he seems like the most likely to start. On the right side, it could be a battle between Persi and Gentry. Both have looked somewhat rough in limited time, but Persi has two years of experience on Gentry, whose footwork still looked pretty sloppy in 2023.

At the guard positions, El-Hadi is another player who has some starting experience a couple seasons ago as an injury fill-in, so he seems likely to slide right in this season. Priebe is a veteran starting presence who should be able to fend off most contenders, if not all of them.

Word coming out of Ann Arbor about Crippen has been that he’s a potential All-American, but he’s just been blocked by two really good players in Olu Oluwatimi and Nugent over the past couple years. I have some doubts because I’m not sure why the coaching staff would recruit over him if he was that good, but he’s also two years older now than he was when Oluwatimi swooped in, so perhaps his improvement in that time has been significant.

Despite losing six offensive linemen to the draft, Michigan goes into spring with 15 other scholarship linemen on the roster. That’s somewhat mind-boggling to consider, since a team might have carried just 13 linemen a few years ago. In that bygone era of like 2019, we would be looking at 7 returning players and 6 true freshmen arriving sporadically in January and then June. Instead, there are 12 returning players, a transfer, and 2 early enrollee freshmen available for the spring, not to mention further reinforcements arriving this summer.

Some projected backups to keep an eye on are Raheem Anderson, who was reportedly ahead of Crippen early in their careers but has since appeared to be more of a factor at guard; Gentry, who could potentially start at tackle over Persi; and Herring, who’s a powerful offensive guard option that looked good in the spring game in 2023. Aside from Gentry possibly starting, Anderson and Herring are almost certainly backups for this season. Another players I’ll also be watching closely is Tristan Bounds, a behemoth of a player whose balance has been questionable in limited field time.

5Aug 2023
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2023 Season Countdown: #44 Jeffrey Persi

Jeffrey Persi (image via MGoBlue)

Name: Jeffrey Persi
Height: 
6’8″
Weight: 
320 lbs.
High school: 
Mission Viejo (CA) Junipero Serra
Position: 
Offensive tackle
Class: 
Redshirt junior
Jersey number: 
#79
Last year: 
I ranked Persi #43 and said he would be a backup offensive tackle (LINK). He started one game at left tackle and played in all fourteen games.
TTB Rating:
 82

Persi is a mammoth backup offensive tackle who would have already been starting on many past Michigan teams. The fact that he has only started one game through three seasons on campus is a testament to the depth that Michigan has built on the offensive line, not to mention the steady contributions of Ryan Hayes over the past few seasons. Persi was a backup and played on special teams, and he got a chance to start his first career game against Rutgers last season when Hayes was hurt.

I recently posted about Myles Hinton (LINK) and it was a toss-up between the two regarding whom to rank higher. I think Hinton has more upside, but there are some things to clean up from his time at Stanford. Meanwhile, Persi still looked in the spring like he has some filling out to do. And when you’re 6’8″, there’s just a lot of physical maturation that needs to take place. He seems like a guy who should probably be playing close to 330 lbs., and maybe that time is coming. Anyway, if La’Darius Henderson, Trente Jones, and Karsen Barnhart all depart after 2023, it seems likely that Persi and Hinton will be starting in 2024 at left tackle and right tackle, respectively.

Prediction: Backup offensive tackle

2Apr 2023
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Thoughts on 2023 Spring Game

Benjamin Hall (image via Detroit Free Press)

Okay, it’s time to put some thoughts about the spring game on paper.

QUARTERBACK: We know what J.J. McCarthy brings to the table, and Michigan was never going to let him factor into the run game, so whatever. This comes down to thoughts on the backups. After watching Michigan have a good 1-2 punch the past two years with McCarthy and Cade McNamara, there is a big question mark at the #2 quarterback spot in 2023. I thought redshirt sophomore Davis Warren once again outplayed the competition, which comes from Alex Orji and Indiana transfer Jack Tuttle. Tuttle had a couple decent throws and showed some decent athleticism on the run, but Warren is more accurate and probably a better decision maker, despite the fact that Tuttle is a sixth-year player. Orji has decent arm strength but leaves something to be desired when it comes to his timing and accuracy; running is the best part of his game, and he’s a change-up guy. I would put him at #4 on the depth chart.

Hit the jump for more.

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9Dec 2022
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Potential Departure Candidates: Offense

Tavierre Dunlap

With the onslaught of transfer portal entries in college football, it’s inevitable that Michigan will face some more departures this off-season. Three players have already announced their intentions to transfer, and one (Cade McNamara to Iowa) has already found a landing spot. Tight ends Erick All and 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 Hansen is a more typical case of a player buried on the depth chart who wants to see some light at the end of the tunnel. This post explores several players in similar situations who may find greener pastures elsewhere:

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.

RB TAVIERRE DUNLAP
Why he should stay: Every Michigan starting running back during his tenure has turned in a 1,000+ yard season, but they had to wait three or more years to do it. Hassan Haskins and Blake Corum have both turned in star performances after waiting their turn. Dunlap has done well when given a chance, averaging 6.1 yards per carry.
Why he might leave: Opportunities are limited when you’re the third string back or lower, and there’s no reason to expect much of a change in scenery for 2023. While Corum is likely headed to the NFL, Donovan Edwards is a bona fide star in the making and freshman C.J. Stokes already has many more carries (55) in one season than Dunlap has in two (16), and walk-on Isaiah Gash (19 carries, 101 yards, 2 touchdowns) even topped Dunlap in touches. When it came to the Big Ten championship game and Ohio State, Michigan decided to use a big back at times . . . but that back was the 6’2″, 232 lb. backup linebacker Kalel Mullings instead of Dunlap (6’0″, 217).

Hit the jump for more.

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2Aug 2022
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2022 Season Countdown: #43 Jeffrey Persi

Jeffrey Persi (image via 247 Sports)

Name: Jeffrey Persi
Height: 
6’7″
Weight: 
305 lbs.
High school: 
Mission Viejo (CA) Junipero Serra
Position: 
Offensive tackle
Class: 
Redshirt sophomore
Jersey number: 
#79
Last year: 
I ranked Persi #82 and said he would be a backup offensive tackle (LINK). He played in two games.
TTB Rating:
 82

When Matt Dudek was Michigan’s recruiting coordinator up through 2020, Persi was the poster boy for staff evaluation. Maybe the recruiting sites didn’t love Persi – he was a low 4-star at #322 overall – but the staff did. But if it’s not plainly obvious that a guy is going to be good right this minute, that guy is probably not going to make an impact as a true freshman. But Persi also didn’t make much of an impact in 2021, playing in just a couple blowouts.

This post predicts quite a leap in 2022, as Persi goes from #82 to #43. Michigan likes to use a sixth lineman as a tight end, like they did in 2021 with Trente Jones. It’s not a coincidence that Jones is penciled as the starting right tackle now that Andrew Stueber is gone. So if Jones is Stueber in 2022, who is Jones in 2022? It probably comes down to Persi or Karsen Barnhart. Barnhart seems to be the #1 backup at a few positions – he started four games at left tackle in 2020 and two games at left guard in 2021 – and the staff will either make him the sixth lineman as the “tight end” or keep him ready at tackle/guard. Either way, I expect Persi to start to see an increased role as the seventh or eighth lineman, whether he enters in certain packages or is just in the two-deep as a backup.

Prediction: Backup offensive tackle