In just his first year of college football, Michigan football fans got to see the truly excellent in Semaj Morgan as a returner. And in the very next game, the potentially catastrophic.
Against Iowa in the Big Ten Championship Game, Morgan nearly housed a punt, going almost the whole distance from the 10-yard line. But the very next game, on the biggest stage, the Rose Bowl against Alabama, Morgan muffed his first return, giving the ball back to the Crimson Tide.
Michigan still went on to win the game, but his new special teams coordinator, J.B. Brown, wants to see more of the former and less of the latter.
He spoke with Jon Jansen on the ‘In the Trenches’ podcast on Wednesday, and noted where Morgan has an opportunity to improve and just how good he might be in the future.
“The next step for him is just consistency, right?” Brown said. “We saw the flash that can happen, good and bad. But also the consistency of when he learns how to catch consistently. He’s going to be one of the best in the league, I think he’s gonna have a real shot. So for him, it’s just catching, seeing the ball, getting different situations and us doing a better job as coaches of putting him in those situations before we get to the game.”
Morgan won’t be the only player who will return kicks and punts, of course. So who are the others that Brown is looking at?
One we’ve seen before, quite a bit, but he mentioned two others that should be in play this season. Ultimately, he notes, he’d like seven total return men, but the ones he mentions are tantalizing options.
“Tyler Morris is the guy that’s done it for us, who can also do it for us,” Brown said. “We’re going to try to build up to try to create seven different guys. Fred Mo, he’s gonna be able to do it — Fredrick Moore. Brandyn Hillman — all those type of guys that had the skill set in the past and our high school tape, we’re going to try to work out this summer to make sure that they could do it.”