The Best Things Chuck Filiaga, Daxton Hill Joel Honigford & Roman Wilson Said: Sept. 7, 2021
Four players with varying roles met with the media on Tuesday night and gave some good answers ahead of the big showdown with Washington.
Fifth-year senior offensive lineman Chuck Filiaga praised senior center and captain Andrew Vastardis for a variety of reasons, while junior defensive back Daxton Hill went into detail about his new role. Converted tight end Joel Honigford told a very entertaining story about how he's living out the dream of most offensive linemen and finally, wide receiver Roman Wilson spoke about the wide receiver room that now contains an injured Ronnie Bell.
"He's one of the hardest working guys I've ever been around. I look up to him as one of the guys I want to be like."
It was just really cool to see Filiaga light up about Vastardis. As a former walk-on, Vastardis isn't a household name for most Michigan fans even though he's now the starting center and a captain. When Filiaga was talking about Vastardis being the hardest worker he's ever seen, and then you think back to left tackle Ryan Hayes revealing that Vastardis' nickname is "Gramps", you start to get an idea for what kind of guy he is and why he was voted a captain.
"It's kind of 50/50. Sometimes I play with it and sometimes if we want to disguise a certain coverage and they want me to line up in it or never line up in it."
Honestly, Hill's entire dialogue was interesting. He spoke about his new role, how he was "giddy" about the new responsibilities that come with it, how confusing quarterbacks is an art and how he feels like he's learning more and more with every passing day. He's so talented, fast and instinctive that it just feels like a matter of time before the new job clicks all the way for him. He didn't necessarily have any splash plays against Western Michigan but he was co-defensive player of the week along with Aidan Hutchinson and graded out very well (78.6) according to Pro Football Focus behind only Hutchinson (93.0) on defense.
"In camp we'd have our days where tensions were pretty high because they're slamming into each other all the time and I'm out there just running routes and catching balls."
Honigford isn't exactly a known commodity but he's been putting work at Michigan in for several years. He took that work to a new level this past offseason and dropped nearly 50 pounds in order to move from offensive lineman to tight end permanently. Now, he's more cut up, running better and, according to him, living the dream. Hearing him talk about how much easier his practice days are now while laughing all the way through it was definitely entertaining and gives you a glimpse of why wide receivers, who get after it even less than tight ends, tend to be divas from time to time.
"The message is we've got to do it for Ronnie."
Not much more needs to be said. Wilson was asked about Bell right out of the gate and you could see how much it was affecting him immediately. His face dropped, he shook his head a lot and then finished his answer with the quote above. He also said that the situation sucks about three or four times, which is really all you can say. It just does.
Wilson figures to be one of the guys who will step up the most in Bell's absence but it will likely be a collective effort. His playing time immediately increased against Western Michigan, which figures to be a trend moving forward. Cornelius Johnson led all receivers by playing 41 of 64 snaps on Saturday, while Wilson, Mike Sainristil and AJ Henning played 32, 24 and 11 respectively. Johnson was already in a leading role, while the others will battle it out for snaps or split them up to fill the Ronnie Bell-shaped void.
