It's been a little hard to focus on Michigan football recruiting, with all the national championship attention focused on Dusty May and the Wolverines, but Kyle Whittingham's staff was busy hosting recruits over the weekend.
One of those is three-star 2027 quarterback Thaddeus Thatcher. The 6-foot-3, 215-pound quarterback out of Las Vegas, de-committed from Utah following Kyle Whittingham's departure. Jason Beck leaving surely had something to do with it, too.
Since then, Thatcher has been offered by Nevada. Things have been a little slow, until a weekend visit to Ann Arbor for the No. 756th overall prospect in the 2027 class.
The visit went well, and Michigan football extended an offer. The coaching staff knows Thatcher well and has also been making gains with Damani Warren, a 6-foot-4, 210-pound wideout ranked No. 275 overall, according to the Rivals Industry rankings, who happens to be Thatcher's teammate.
USC is the leader there, according to the Rivals Recruiting Prediction Machine, but the Wolverines feel like they have made a move. With Thatcher, they most certainly did, as Ethan McDowell of The Wolverine has now put in a projection for the Rivals RPM for the three-star QB to become a Michigan football commitment, giving the Wolverines a 99.7 percent chance to win out.
Could Michigan take two quarterbacks in 2027?
What's most interesting about this projection is that Michigan has been trending to flip four-star quarterback Kamden Lopati away from Illinois. Even Steve Wiltfong of Rivals is predicting it.
Lopati is 6-foot-2, 225 pounds. He's also ranked No. 122 overall via the Rivals Industry rankings out of West Valley City, Utah, in the 2027 class. The blue-chip target should be the top priority. And the development with Thatcher could have nothing to do with Lopati, or it could be a sign that things are trending in another direction.
It might just be that the new staff wants to bring in more arms to develop for the future. Tommy Carr is looking like a future starter, but you can never have enough quarterback depth, and that's my read on this, at least for now.