Quarterback battle
Michigan will have a new starting quarterback in 2020, with Patterson’s departure.
While most have called it a two-man race, Gattis demurs from that, noting there’s three who will partake in the competition this spring and into fall camp.
It’s not just Dylan McCaffrey and Joe Milton — it’s Cade McNamara. too. With that in mind, Gattis says he has to find a way to make the competition equitable as far as reps and personnel are concerned, so that he can truly evaluate who the best option is.
“The biggest thing we gotta do is we’ve gotta maintain a system that’s gonna be fair, that’s gonna give all the quarterbacks on the roster equal opportunity to push themselves and apply themselves to be able to compete for the job,” Gattis said. “It’s often a challenge during the season because when you have a starter in the past, your backups don’t always get a fair amount of reps – they’re getting them with the twos, with the threes. But they’re not given the same opportunity as the starter, whereas compared to in spring ball, we’ve gotta develop a system of reps and opportunities to allow the quarterbacks on our roster to compete with a fair amount of opportunity of reps. Whether that’s splitting time with the ones, splitting time with the twos by rotation.
“It’s something we’ve gotta be able to manage, and it’s a challenge when you have multiple quarterbacks. If the job was just coming down to just two guys, then obviously it’s just a two-way system. We feel Cade has developed. We feel Joe has developed. We’re really excited to see Joe, excited to see Dylan. We gotta figure out a way to get those guys an equal amount of opportunities to show what they can do and lead this team in the direction we need them.”