Matt Weiss hit the ground running after being hired to coach the Michigan football quarterbacks in late February, just one day before the Wolverines' spring practices began.
Weiss loved working under John Harbaugh with the Baltimore Ravens, where he spent the last 12 years (most recently as running backs coach), but joining head coach Jim Harbaugh, who he worked for at Stanford, in Ann Arbor was too good of an opportunity to pass up.
"It was hard to leave a great organization, great team, great head coach, a team that, in my heart, I believe has the chance to win a Super Bowl next year," Weiss explained while appearing on the 'In The Trenches' podcast with host Jon Jansen. But at the same time, it’s the University of Michigan, it’s Jim Harbaugh. Michigan wins, Jim wins — both things are proven to be true.
"I just felt like I had the chance to do something special here. I think any time in life or professionally, it’s always good to get outside your comfort zone, challenge yourself, do something different. I’d been in Baltimore a long time, 12 years. It was kind of just an on and off conversation with Jim. And then John, he’s definitely understanding of it, he wants Michigan to be great too. He didn’t want me to go, but at the same time felt like he could see the opportunity that could be there for me and felt like helping Jim was a good thing too. It all worked out for everybody involved."
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Another thing that drew Weiss to Ann Arbor is the talent that resides in the quarterback room. Redshirt freshman Cade McNamara showed flashes last season when he won the starting job at the end of the year. Meanwhile, freshman early enrollee J.J. McCarthy was a highly-touted recruit who is just beginning his college career.
"I’ve been really impressed with the talent in the room," Weiss said. "That certainly was a draw to come here."
McNamara, who completed 43-of-71 pass attempts for 425 yards with five touchdowns and zero interceptions last season, came out of the spring ahead on the depth chart, while McCarthy continues to learn and is the current backup. Third-stringer and freshman Dan Villari has also received valuable reps, and the Wolverines will add Texas Tech transfer Alan Bowman this summer.
While McNamara had only had a small sample size — 132 snaps — to prove himself last season, leaving some fans hesitant about what he can do, Weiss is confident in his abilities and stressed as much.
"Cade is a guy who — I think for everything that people are going to say to criticize him — is going to end up playing 10 years in the NFL," Weiss said.
"You can say he’s not enough of this or enough of that, but at the end of the day, he’s very smart, he makes great decisions, he processes things very fast and his accuracy and arm strength are more than enough to win with. He’s a guy that’s been awesome to work with. He’s extremely valuable to our team. He’s our starter — [I] love the fact that we have him."
While it appears that it's McNamara's job to lose heading into the 2021 season, McCarthy has a bright future, Weiss says. Despite being young, he's much wiser than a typical freshman.
"J.J. is a highly talented guy. Arm strength, mobility, great athlete — all of that stuff is obvious as soon as you step on the field with him," Weiss said. "But I’ve been even more impressed with his approach to things. His maturity is far beyond his years.
"Early in the spring, I was asking him about his routine, how he gets ready for practice, how he gets ready for games. With an 18-year-old, you’re kind of expecting not much to be there, and he went through his whole routine of how he clears his mind, he does his shoulder exercises. I’m sitting there thinking like, ‘Man, can I get a copy of that?’
"He’s impressive in a lot of ways. I think for him, it’s really just a question of when, not if."
Weiss started slow with his group in the spring, wanting to build a baseline of fundamentals before getting into some of the more complicated aspects of playing the position. Still, once the basics are mastered, he wants his signal-callers to take ownership of the position and use all of their talents.
"We want to be brilliant at the basics. We spent a lot of time in camp just calling out the play in the huddle. The cadence, taking a snap from under center, which a lot of colleges don’t even coach anymore. We’ve spent a lot of time going over the basics," Weiss explained.
"But yeah, as much as they can do to be successful, we’ll let them do. And I know that [offensive coordinator] Coach [Josh] Gattis feels the same way. He has a lot of flexibility in his system for us to be able to do those things. And as much as they can handle and be successful and we’re not overloading them, we’re going to let them do it. They’re all smart guys, hard-working guys, conscientious, and that’s part of the point of the position. It’s exciting."
A former NFL quarterback and the QBs coach with the Oakland Raiders in the early 2000s, Harbaugh was originally planning on coaching the position himself, before an opening on the staff allowed him to bring Weiss on. Harbaugh is still involved in the room and provides valuable insight.
"There are very few people that have played at his level, there are very few people that have coached at his level and there are even fewer people that have done both and have done it as successfully as he has," Weiss said of Harbaugh. "I think we complement each other very well, because I wasn’t a first-round draft pick, I didn’t play in the NFL for 14 years at quarterback, have my number retired by the Colts. So where I might not be able to speak for a player’s perspective, he can easily come in and speak from his own experience.
"In that way, we complement each other really well. He’s a valuable, valuable resource. His depth of football knowledge is rare — the guy has done nothing his whole life but play and coach football, so it’s pretty special."
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