Everything Michigan DC Wink Martindale said on Inside Michigan Football pre-Oklahoma

On his thoughts on Jaishawn Barham’s hit

Well, you know, you know which direction I’m going to go on it. I don’t know the exact definition of targeting, I guess. I’m not sure anybody really does. Right. So, it’s your guy, you know, who’s been working all training camp on trying to avoid that situation, and it’s their rule. I’m not in those meetings. You know, it’s their rule. It’s subjective, if you will. Some people saw it a different way, but, you know, the question I have is this is all player safety related, and if it was a targeting hit, then that quarterback should have went to the boot tent.

[Sign up for Maize & Blue Review for $1 and get PLUS access for 7 days!]

On his thoughts on Barham’s play leading up to the ejection

Well, I mean, he was a dominant player in the game, and he jumped off the tape, you know, looking that way, and that’s who he is. That’s the kind of training camp he had. It was better than last year’s training camp and it’s one of those things that when you feel worse for the kid than the call, if that makes sense.

On the penalty call

Right, right. And then, you know, when I’m retired, I’ll be a really good guest one day for you, because I’ll tell you really what I think.

On making up for the loss of Barham against Oklahoma

Well, I think that it’s the coach speak of it as next man up, but the difference is we’ve been talking about the depth of our linebacker room, and you saw it in the game. Jimmy Rolder made some really good plays. Ernie played outstanding. Got a game ball from Sherrone after the game, well-deserved, and he’s been a great leader for us, and it’s the communication of that room with BJ, who’s done a great job of building up the talent in that room. We got some young guys on the come-up. You saw Troy end the game, which is another thing we could talk about, but we’ll do that after I retire. It was one of those games that showed our depth and what you and I have talked about all training camp, and I was really happy for the players.

On his thoughts on Cole Sullivan’s fututre

Right. Well, with him and, like I said, I view Jimmy as a starter, and Cole’s getting there real fast. You know, his confidence, the second year, coming into his second year, has jumped out at him, at us as coaches. He’s just elevated his game. He’s had a great offseason in the weight room, and you’re just seeing the player that you knew, that you envisioned back when he was at his first spring ball. Back then, I was telling you, I don’t know what spot he’s going to play, but he’s going to play because of his size.

On where he’s seen Jimmy Rolder grow

Well, I see it in physicality, because he’s confident, because he got through training camp. I shouldn’t say got through it, had a good training camp, and, you know, he came out healthy of it. He mentioned, I think it was BJ, that this is his first training camp period, like in the past six years, so he’s talking about high school too, where he didn’t get banged up, you know, with some kind of freak injury. When you fall on the ground and dislocate your elbow, that’s a freak injury. Yeah, so.

On what he’s seen from Rayshaun Benny

I think that he’s more explosive this year in the short area spaces. I think he’s still working on it, you know, himself, he knows to do what we need him to do, that he needs to continue to work on it. And, to me, compared to the other D-linemen, his athleticism really stands out. He’s the most athletic guy we have that’s that big.

On Damon Payne’s game

Well, I think that having the inside view of it, and I said something to Lou after the game, I didn’t say a whole lot after the game. I said, I might be wrong, but I think Damon Payne played pretty good. And then, even yesterday, I’m like, I didn’t see that coming. You know what I mean? You know what he is. He’s a veteran, he’s an older kid, he’s mature. And he’s worked on his technique. I love his attitude. I loved his attitude all training camp, all spring. And come game time, the lights came on and you saw some grown man plays out there by him. That’s what I love to see.

On determining reps for the defensive line

I think you can over-manage it. That’s what I told Lou. Let’s don’t over-manage it. Let’s just, when you see a guy tiring or just a normal rotation, put in who’s been practicing the best. And I think that’s what you saw. The tape doesn’t lie when you put on the game tape and you saw that’s what Lou did. And there’s some guys really jumped out. Were we perfect? No. The biggest jump is from game one to game two. So we’ll see, you know, it’s, it’s going to be fun to watch as the, as the season progresses.

On the run defense and areas of improvement

I think what we did well was the physicality overall as a front seven. I think that they were flying around with the football and they were hitting whatever moved. And I think that jumped out during the game and on the tape when you watched it, you know, improvement wise is, they’re — life’s all about decisions and some of the younger guys are making some of the wrong decisions off the leverage of a block, for example, where to go, where to fit or a call, things like that. So we’ve got to continually clean that up and Lou does a great job with those guys up front, Phee on the edges. A lot of the discussion we have in the run game, cause it’s different than the pro game, you know, with all the different quarterback runs and everything else. But that was one of our goals going into the game was we want to see how many times we can make a quarterback get up off the ground. I think we had 20 hits on him. I think, 20, 21 hits on him and they were hitting him. That’s what the other people like the whole big talk is going to be Jaishawn being suspended. What about the other 15 times we hit them and, you know, I don’t know. I don’t know what’s next. I really don’t know what’s next. When I say that it’s not concern as a defensive coordinator, it’s concern for the game. After a while that it’s going to be so slanted that you’re going to get a kid hurt because he’s trying to do something that’s not natural when you’re going full speed.

On his evaluation of the EDGE defenders

I thought that they played well same thing as the inside guys. There’s things to clean up as far as the physicality part of the game. You know that, but they got the best coach in the business with Pee, you know, to correct those things. And there’s a lot the people don’t understand is in this system, the edge players play a significant role, especially in the run game. So there’s a lot of teaching, a lot of technique, but I thought the physicality was great. I mean, D-Mo set the tempo early, TJ did a nice job as well. We had some young guys that went out there and you already brought it up with Jason. It’s a lot of fun to have with those guys.

On the fun he’s having dialing up different looks

Well, you know, it’s, it is fun that way. I think that the differences in college, you keep it very basic, but in teaching the concepts of the pressures, you got guys on their own now during practice, during training camp that are switching around and moving. And it’s, they know the system, you know what I mean? And it’s fun to watch that way. It is fun to, with the moving pieces and, you know, as athletic as TJ is, he can move around and do different things. And the great thing of it is, is you just flip two guys and it looks completely different to an offensive lineman.

On Cam Brandt’s game

Yeah. I thought Cam was dominant in the game and we knew going into the season that he’s that type of player. You know, I said, he always does the dirty work, which he does. It doesn’t matter to him where you line him up. Some guys have preferences, I like the left side, the right side. Cam just wants to go play football. And he’s as blue collar as it gets and playing with the physicality of football, it’s fun to watch.

On what he saw from the younger players

Well, like we’ve already talked about Cole, you know, the interception, the sack. The other thing is too, is he, he kicked butt on special teams, with Cole. Nate Marshall is going to be a name everybody’s going to be talking about because you could see it from day one. Now he’s young, he’s been the guy in high school. So it was a little bit different for him in training camp because you’re not the guy anymore. You’re just one of the guys. And he’s adjusting to that, but yet he showed everybody, every Michigan fan that the way he rushed the quarterback, he’s just getting started. He’s still green, but he’s fun to watch.

On his evaluation of the defensive back play

I was really pleased with Zeke’s play because and I’m not saying anything that surprised him. In training camp, he was banged up. I was concerned with where he was at physically going into that game. I mean, he was played every play until we finally took him out and he played really well. Same thing with Mason Curtis. He was all over the place. Took much better angles and tackling. He had a miss, but for the most part, he took much better angles and he was very physical. Obviously, B-Hill was physical.

On DBs playing physical and going up to get interceptions

And Lamar does a great job with that, you know, with our pillars and he has ball disruption and, like for example, Damon Payne got the ball disruption for TJ’s pick. Cause he drove that guard right back into the quarterback’s lap. And that’s where the ball, it hit off the guard’s head, you know, that’s ball disruption, so we’re, we’re continually talking about that. You get a lot more ball production too, when you’re physical, like that was a, uh, a weird game to coach in if you will, because the 75 new players they had, so you really didn’t know what the personnel’s were. And I think there was some substitution by deception. They did a nice job with that 12 in the huddle. I don’t know if that’s a rule or not anymore, but, it was different that way, just with the different things. It became a backyard football game, especially there at the end.

On preparing for a dual-threat quarterback

Well, I think that we’ve had some experience in the past going against, when I was in New York, going against Lamar and you can name different mobile quarterbacks in the league. It’s definitely a challenge and, I think at any level, you just can’t let a quarterback just sit back there and, you know what I mean? And not have any movement, not giving him different looks, give him different windows, different things. You have to keep changing the picture for him. And that, like I said, that’s any quarterback, but you know, especially this guy, he’s a talent.