Experienced Grad Transfer vs. Familiar Face vs. Star True Freshman

Michigan has a very interesting trio of starting quarterback candidates heading into the 2021 campaign.

The familiar face is redshirt sophomore Cade McNamara. The 6-1, 205-pounder started one game and played in several last year and did some nice things. He led Michigan to victory against Rutgers and showed great poise, touch and accuracy in doing so. He was off to a decent start the next week in his first start against Penn State before getting injured. In his four game appearances, McNamara is 43-of-71 for 425 yards and five touchdowns with no interceptions. He's never going to be a video game-number guy, but he's solid, smart and good enough to win games.

Alan Bowman is now at Michigan after spending his first three seasons at Texas Tech. The 6-3, 215-pounder actually won the starting job as a true freshman in 2018 and did some really nice things as a rookie. During his three-year career as a Red Raider he has passed for 5,260 yards and 33 touchdowns against 17 interceptions. He's battled some pretty severe injuries throughout his career and was ultimately pushed out last year, which left him looking for a new home. He's got three years of eligibility left so if he wins the job this fall, it'll really get interesting for McNamara moving forward.

Finally there's JJ McCarthy. The five-star, fresh faced youngster is already on campus and several practices deep through spring ball. The 6-3, 195-pounder is probably the best athlete of the bunch and also has the livest arm. He's a winner, he's confident and he's capable. He's also still supposed to be in high school. It's really hard for a true freshman to come in and take over right away, but that's exactly what McCarthy is trying to do.

It sounds like McNamara might have an edge over McCarthy through the first few spring practices, which is to be expected as the youngster works his way through a brand new world of football. Bowman doesn't even get to Michigan until this summer, putting him even further behind the 8-ball despite being the most experienced guy of the bunch.

Jim Mora Jr. has experience breaking in a five-star freshman from dealing with Josh Rosen while at UCLA, which he admits can be a very tricky thing to figure out. The veteran coach broke down some of the pros and cons for each guy at Michigan in the video above and thinks each one of them has a leg up over the others for some different and specific reasons.

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