DETROIT – The Michigan Wolverines will wage a quarterback competition in fall camp as it looks to find out who will fill the void at the most important posiiton on the field. But moreso than that, there is a major leadership gap to fill for the 2024 squad after departures from the 2023 College Football Playoff title team.
Junior quarterback Alex Orji heads into the summer as the odds-on favorite for Michigan at the position, and his success could come down to more than how he throws the ball or reads a defense. The Wolverines are going to need a signal-caller they follow into battle and trust he will do his job.
Orji feels confident he can be that in whatever shape that takes for the team. Regardless of how the battle plays out, he wants to be one of the leaders on the 2024 team.
“That’s the biggest thing,” Orji told reporters at Will Johnson’s camp in Detroit on Thursday. “Talent is talent and preparation is preparation. But at the end of the day, nothing really changed as far as a preparation and an expectation standpoint for me. I just want to be the best that I can be. Same as in years past where there was the second thing. Third, fourth, first, eighth string, whatever it is, try to be the best quarterback that I can be to add value to the team. From there, I think that the only thing that really changes is the type of leadership that you take on with whatever role you sort of enter on the team.
“I think that there are different aspects to who you are in the facility. You can be different in the weight room from who you are on the field and who you are on the field can be a different type of leader then, or who you are in the cafeteria when you talk about nutrition. I think that it’s just, figuring out how everything shakes out, and finding a way to be the type of leader that, gets respect from the guys. It’s different for everybody. For a guy like Colston [Loveland], he became a leader in his room earlier than a guy like me.
“We had a leader in our room [in J.J. McCarthy] who was the best leader of the nation, in my opinion. Whenever it happens, it happens and everyone can kind of feel it. But at the end of the day, it’s time to step up and time is now.”
Still, Orji has to go out and win the job, and he will compete with graduate Jack Tuttle and senior Davis Warren for the job. Whether he is Michigan’s starter or not, the program’s culture and pedigree of team above all else is what matters most to him.
“I think that’s just what it means to wear the Maize and Blue,” Orji said. “The different sayings we have… It’s like at some point it feels like those are just words on a wall or on a plaque, but once you sit through it, you live through it, you kind of play through it. You realize that they hold truth and it goes from words on a wall to words engraved in a ring. And that’s when you really feel it. You’re like, ‘Oh wow, like this really means something.’ You kind of see different things like dudes like Amorion [Walker] and he sees how it is somewhere else and comes back just because he knows it’s a little different here.
“It’s going to be the things that we’re going to do. We’re going to try to find success every day. That’ll lead to success, every week, every month, throughout the season. But that’s how Michigan is. That’s what the culture is. We’re all a family. It’s the same as if I go home and me and my brothers are working out, and it’s like, I want to see them do the best that they can do. I want to see us do the best.
“I committed to the University of Michigan. I didn’t commit to being a starter. I committed here to support the University of Michigan. Try to give us the best chance to win and whatever I can do and try to add value to the team. It’s not a personal or selfish ideology when you come here at all.”
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