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ANN ARBOR, Mich. — The beginning of the 2020 season was particularly brutal for Michigan tight end Erick All.
Known as a sure-handed pass catcher according to his coaches and teammates, in his first real prominent experience at the college level, All defied those notions as he struggled to reel in passes regularly. In the first three games of the season, All was targeted 16 times, but had only 5 receptions. Of those 11 missed catches, four were straight up dropped, and he led the conference in that metric.
Since then, All steadily improved, with 6 catches on 9 targets and zero of the three misses being drops. So what changed for him? All said on Monday he learned to be confident in his ability again, an attribute that had started to wane.
“Obviously, it was irritating dropping the ball and stuff,” All said. “I don’t even know why I was dropping it. It was irritating, because I knew how good of hands I had, I just needed to trust myself. Once I found that trust in the Rutgers game, I felt confident, I felt like a new person took over me. It felt like I had a different energy. It made me a better player for the team and also for myself.”
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But how did a sure-handed pass catcher start dropping the ball with regularity? Was it technique or fundamentally related?
Perhaps, but as All sees it, it was more of a mental lapse that started with the first time he was targeted this season. When he didn’t come up with the easy catch, thinking and overthinking started to take over.
“That’s what I think what happened,” All said. “After I dropped the first ball in the Minnesota game, I think it was just in my head. Thank God it’s out, because I was down bad for a little bit.”
Regardless of his struggles, All never lost support from his coaches and his teammates.
Some little things had to be tweaked to get him right once again, and, with tight ends coach Sherrone Moore working with him, All started to regain his confidence — which led to a big turnaround.
“With coach Moore, he just tells me to look it in, because believe it or not, in the game, that was probably the first time I dropped the ball the whole season,” All said. “He just tells me to look it in, like, ‘You trust your hands too much. Just make sure you’re looking it in.’ Pretty much, that’s all he’s telling me. When it comes to jugs and stuff like that, every Thursday with coach Tress, J. Tress, I get me and Ronnie get a hundred jug catches in every Thursday after practice.”
PFF’s weekly grades for All’s drop rate started incredibly low, but have steadily improved throughout the season. He earned an abysmal 16.4 vs. Minnesota, 21.7 vs. MSU and 31.6 against Indiana — all negative grades. But against Wisconsin, despite the lopsided loss, he earned a 70.7 drop rate grade, and that improved more against Rutgers, when he reeled in 4 receptions on 5 targets — good for a grade of 74.9.
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