Michigan Football: 3 Wisconsin Badgers to watch this week

The Michigan football team attempts to get its season back on track Saturday. The Wisconsin Badgers await and these three players could be X-factors.

The Wisconsin Badgers have had a roller coaster start to their season much like the Michigan football team — although the respective seasons could not be more different. Both sides made statements in their openers with convincing wins, however that is where the similarities stop.

Wisconsin has not played a game since because of a team-wide COVID-19 outbreak and Michigan football has fallen off a proverbial cliff after losing to Michigan State and Indiana in consecutive weeks.

Both teams should be eager to get back on the football field and prove themselves nationally for a second time.

Let’s get into the three Badgers who will need to be accounted for each and every snap if Michigan football wants to stop the bleeding on this 2020 football season.

Graham Mertz

Season Stats: 20-21 (95.2%), 248 yards, 5 TD

The Graham Mertz hype train was going as strong as any player in the country after the Big Ten’s opening weekend. However, that train came to a screeching halt after about 24 hours and it was reported that Mertz had tested positive for COVID-19 and an outbreak was oncoming for the Badgers. After cancelling the following two games, the Badgers and Mertz are primed to reassert themselves into the national conversation.

Mertz, a former top 100 recruit according to 247 Sports, dazzled in his first career start against Illinois. He showed off supreme accuracy at all levels of the field, in fact his only incompletion was a dropped pass! Was that simply a product of playing a poor Illinois defense? Or is he the first Wisconsin signal caller since some guy named Russell Wilson to give the Badgers a true downfield passing threat?

Michigan football and its leaky pass defense should find out quickly what the answers to those questions. Here are two other Wisconsin Badgers to keep an eye on this week.