Michigan Football: 3 position battles to watch this spring for Wolverines

Defensive end is loaded with depth and talent

Another position battle to watch for Michigan football fans is at defensive end after the Wolverines lost two of their best players at the position in Gary and Winovich.

Both of those guys could wind up getting picked in the first round of the 2019 NFL draft, so that’s a lot of talent and production to replace.

Thankfully, Michigan has some nice candidates and leading the way are Kwity Paye and Josh Uche, who combined for nine sacks last season. Both have shown nice skills as edge rushers but with Uche especially, there is concern that he can’t hold up against the run down in and down out.

Uche may be just an edge rusher and so that could open the door for Aidan Hutchinson, the Wolverines top recruit in 2018, who proved as a freshman he can hold up against Big Ten offensive tackles versus the run. The bigger issue for him is generating pressure on the quarterback.

Those three guys all played significant snaps last season an should this year as well, however, two other names to watch are Mike Danna, a graduate transfer and First-Team All-Mac performer for Central Michigan and Luiji Vilain, a redshirt sophomore that hasn’t played much due to injury.

Danna won’t be able to join the Wolverines until fall camp, yet the other four guys will battle it out this spring and Vilain especially is a guy to keep an eye on. If he can stay healthy, all bets are off.