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ANN ARBOR, Mich. — If you’re a true freshman entering a running backs room with four potential starters at the position, you’re almost assured a redshirt, right?
For Michigan early-enrollee and true freshman Blake Corum, don’t count on that being the case.
Despite not having played a down of football and behind several players who have various levels of high-end experience, the first-year tailback is certainly going to be in the mix come September — even while having missed all of spring practice, as it was canceled due to the novel coronavirus pandemic.
A former four-star from powerhouse program Baltimore (MD) St. Frances Academy, Corum was noted to be ‘as fast as advertised’ two weeks ago by his offensive coordinator in Josh Gattis. All he’s done since arriving in December is draw rave reviews from the coaching staff, and he continued to do so with his position coach, Jay Harbaugh, praising his work ethic as a reason why he could see the field early and often.
“The guy who hasn’t played in Blake Corum, the good thing about him is he was an early-enrollee, so he did practice with us,” Harbaugh said. “So he has done a little bit of it at least. And even though he missed spring, he’s a guy who will walk through things on his own and he played against great competition in high school. I would expect him to translate and transition well in terms of the speed of the game and everything.”
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The challenge is that Michigan had two starters at the position a year ago in Zach Charbonnet and Hassan Haskins — both of whom proved their potential as they got to be more dynamic as the season progressed. Chris Evans also returns, after having spent three years on the team as the veritable second-string guy, just waiting in the wings. Christian Turner has been oft-injured, but now that he’s healthy, the staff is eager to see what he can do.
Still, Corum is showcasing his level of seriousness, contending both on and off the field, bringing a strong curiosity and enthusiasm to the position. Traits which serve him well, according to Harbaugh.
“Blake is awesome,” Harbaugh said. “The main thing about him is he just goes all out in everything that he does. If there’s one thing that’s generally true in life as well as our football program is that the guys that just go all in, they don’t dip their toe in, they don’t think about, ‘Hey, did I do this or not?’ – he just goes hard with everything that he’s presented with. I think he got a 4.0 or close to it in his first semester. He’s on time for everything virtually. He turns everything in, he takes notes, he asks questions. He’s just a junkie for football, but also for everything. He’s very binary. He’s all in or he’s not into it.”
Still, not having an opportunity to hit the practice field — save for three practices in December — should be a setback, right?
Not always. It wasn’t for Charbonnet or Haskins, who missed all of spring last year due to injuries. Like those two aforementioned, despite it being his first semester and the calamity of the pandemic setting in, Corum has been locked in, which Harbaugh says is serving him well with the season fast approaching.
“I think that will serve him really good in terms of getting through this without being a setback for him,” Harbaugh said. “Like what I mentioned for a lot of the other guys, too, is we just have a lot of guys like that. You could put them a thousand miles away and give them a laptop and a field and a pair of cleats – they’re gonna find a way to make the best of it. Our team doesn’t make excuses and I think that when it’s all said and done, we’re gonna be really glad with the type of team we’ve assembled and recruited because they’ve handled it so, so well and Blake’s just another example of that.”
Corum will still have his work cut out for him, given the depth chart. But one thing you can count on: if he continues to do what he’s done thus far, should things remain on course, you can expect to see him toting the football in live games starting in September.
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