ANN ARBOR, Mich. — There seems to be a lot of hyperbole coming out of Schembechler Hall in regards to the new-look defense. Now, the defense isn’t new-look due to there being a new defensive coordinator in Jesse Minter, but instead, it’ll be different by virtue of that side of the ball having lost seven starters from last year.
Pundits will tell you that this year’s Michigan defense is doomed as a result — especially considering three of those seven starters ended up going in the first two rounds of the 2022 NFL draft — Aidan Hutchinson at No. 2 overall. What they won’t tell you is that, in a way, the Wolverines return nine players who either were full-time starters last year or that have started games at one point or another. What’s more, every expected contributor that isn’t a freshman has played significant minutes at some point in the past two seasons.
One such player who has started games for the maize and blue but wasn’t one of last year’s ‘starters’ is safety RJ Moten, who’s entering his third season. He sees a group on defense that really could improve upon last year’s 20th-ranked squad.
“We all are confident,” Moten said. “Most of us played in a couple games last year. We got a couple new guys getting ready to play this year. But with the leadership, with the guys that have been in the fire before, I think we’ll be able to all come back as a defense and be better and see bigger than last year.”
He may be waxing poetic, but Michigan has consistently fielded a top-tier defense. 2021 actually was the second-lowest output via total defensive yards per game given up in the Jim Harbaugh era, with 2020 being the actual outlier. Every other defense since 2015 has been, at worst, ranked 11th overall.
This offseason, Harbaugh has been espousing the notion that this defense will improve upon last year’s output, despite having ‘no-stars.’ Asked about the concept, Moten actually sees it quite the other way…
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