Fall Roster Overanalysis 2015!

They handed out the new phonebooks at yesterday's presser, and the internet managed to captured a shot of them before Steve Martin made off with the lot:

You'll have to click for big. But I've already updated the master spreadsheet with all of it. Remember the rules: all weight gain is burley muscle that won't slow them down AT ALL, and all weight loss is a guy in the best shape of his life who's going to do crazy fast things as his new svelte self.

TO THE SPREADSHEETS!

[jump for items of interest and interest]

ITEMS OF INTEREST

AIEEEEEEE BUNTING! He gained another 9 lbs since spring, bringing him up to an absolutely plausible 6'7/252 skillet-handed nightmare. But I wonder if the tight ends were weighed after a super soaker fight; if so they nailed Ty Wheatley Jr. with the CPS 2000 because omigod dude is an offensive lineman-sized 291. That is 31 pounds more than he weighed as a recruit. Add the injury to 849.0 mL/s of high-pressure insult and a redshirt beckons. Khalid Hill was up to 270 in spring and shed 7 since then.

Speaking of the freshmen, they're big. Runyan is 304 (up 29 from his recruited weight), Newsome is 300 already (+20), and Gentry is 244 (+14). Kinnel, Higdon, Perry, Ulizio, Reuben Jones and Washington were relatively close to what the sites had them.

But Shelton Johnson, whom we're hoping they would turn into an SDE, is 13 pounds smaller than the already thin 225 they had him as a recruit. I saw Johnson outside the stadium when he visited last year, when he looked closer to his current listed weight or smaller. Unless they're playing him at safety this year I imagine he's redshirting. Reuben Jones is 222, likewise hopefully heading for a year of growing. John O'Korn is 11 pounds smaller than he was at Houston. Keith Washington is 6'2/170; I imagine he'll turn sideways and disappear for a year.

Annoying Cheese Commercial Difference: Noah Furbush is suddenly linebacker sized! He was 217 in spring and is now listed at 242, i.e. plausible playing weight for WLB or MLB. He was 240 in his recruiting profile, and checked in at 210 a few years ago, at which point our brains put him on a shelf till at least 2016. Since there's been no practice hype to go with it, the weight doesn't mean much except incremental hope for something on the current roster that's playable by 2017. That hope is important given the sketchy linebacker depth after Gedeon…

Okay so at least I made it past breakfast today without a long, Brady Hoke-induced sigh.

Line Gain 2000. Mason Cole is up 18 pounds, passing that 300 threshold with 5 to spare, which ought to help him be more of a factor in the run game. The 2012 and 2013 classes made that sophomore to junior gain: Kalis is also 305, up from 292 in spring. JBB is now the biggest guy on the team, at 325.

The DL depth also beefed up. The Lawrence Marshall is 250 thing is now on paper. Taco Charlton is up another 12 lbs to 6'6/285. That's three pounds more than Tom Strobel, who's now a DT-ish 282. Hurst and Godin had modest gains.

The starters however seem to have topped out. Willie Henry shed 4, down to 307. Wormley and Glasgow gained 3 lbs apiece. Ojemudia stood pat at 253.

Best shape of their lives: This is all probably good news. Derrick Green is down to 225, and Ty Isaac dropped 12 since spring. Braden is down 9, which for him has to be a good thing since he was at 331 in spring.

Position changes? Very few of note. Winovich and Poggi remained tight ends while Strobel is back to "DE" (not DT) and Pallante is back to "DL", the only one of that group not specified as a tackle or end. RJS is still a linebacker and at 245 it seems he's only as much of a defensive end as Jake Ryan was. They specified safety or cornerback and the stuff we heard from the student-only practice etc. didn't come out in the roster: Jeremy Clark is listed as a safety and Wayne Lyons is a cornerback. Canteen is still listed as a receiver. It's possible they haven't updated it but they did go through this since spring, when all the safeties and corners were listed at "DB".

Among walk-ons Joe Hewlett went from QB to RB and Jordan Glasgow is now a safety not an RB—please adjust your expectations from walk-on Anthony Thomas to walk-on Jordan Kovacs.* This was subtle but may be meaningful: Kenny Allen went from "P/K" to "K/P."

The Number Games: Here are the relevant ones:

B-Will with my nephew's birthday gift.

• Allen Gant 12 –> 14
• Henry Poggi 7 –> 19
• Desmond Morgan 48 –> 3
• Brian Cole 81 –> 41
• Chase Winovich 58 –> 44
• Tom Strobel 50 –> 49
• Ian Bunting 94 –> 89

Some of those are just defenders going to TE. I don't know what's up with Brian Cole. I liked having Bunting be a weird number; bah. The big news of course is, okay Morgan not being a Legends number anymore, but the BIG BIG news is Allen Gant had to move to 14 to make room for Aussie punter Blake O'Neill. That says Gant is playing on special teams, which isn't news. But it also means the streak of nobody since Brandon Williams playing an entire Michigan career as #12 continues. Gutierrez, Coner, JT Floyd, Karl Tech, Roundtree, and Gardner join Gant on the list of lost 12s.

Also Da'Mario Jones remains #10 despite that going to Gentry, which seems to suggest Gentry is at least redshirting. Sorry to all the Gentry at TE conspiracy theorists this disappoints.

Dan Liesman, who looked decent at linebacker in the spring game, is now wearing #54 (was #66). Kicker Kyle Seychel switched from 43 to 31, which was adopted by longsnapper Scott Sypniewski, who switched from 43; if all that means anything it could be Wormley is playing special teams.