Eight key position battles as Michigan State fall camp heats up

EAST LANSING, Mich. - There are indications that the middle portion of the roster - The Bottom 40, as Nick Saban used to call it - is getting stronger at Michigan State. Spartan head coach Jonathan Smith alluded to this trend during the first day of fall camp when I asked him if the number of position battles for starting jobs is different this year than it was 12 months ago. “A year ago there were probably more battles to start,” Smith said. “This year we’ve got more battles for how much you’re going to play.” Last year, due to injuries and other circumstances, Michigan State put a few players on the field at times who weren’t quite capable of playing winning football. At some positions, there wasn’t as much competition to get on the field as should be the case for a team trying to survive in what turned out last year to be the toughest conference in college football.  This year, there are a few positions where starting jobs will be contested during fall camp. There are other positions where competition will be hot to determine which players are the second- and third-stringers, and will get a healthy share of snaps in the playing group.  “We might have the guys who will run out there first but we want to be a place where we’re rotating,” Smith said. “I think about on the defensive side, I think we can play a lot of guys. “We might know, okay Jordan Hall is going to start (at Mike linebacker), type of thing, but we’re going to play a lot of guys at that position. In the secondary, with what we brought in here in January and the summer, that’s going to work itself out. That’s probably a position group that is truly competing to start.” Smith likes the competition that is shaping up on the offensive line. SpartanMag projects a healthy competition for the starting jobs at offensive guard. Meanwhile, there are three or more offensive linemen in the staging area who could provide better back-up capabilities than the Spartans had in 2024. “I was asked last week what did you learn last year,” Smith said. “Going through the nine conference games, the Big Ten, depth is critically important, especially at that position. Yeah, we got snake-bitten a little bit early in the season last year, and a couple of guys go down for the season. “But we want to be able to play more than five guys at the o-line. It’s a physical brand of football. So you need depth. We’re trying to create more and more.” My list of eight key competitions for starting jobs for fall camp:  1. RUNNING BACK Transfer Elijah Tau-Tolliver (6-1, 204, Sr., Sparks, Nev.) rushed for 950 yards and had 38 receptions at Sacramento State last year. He participated in spring practice, where he needed to work on his pass protection, and add some mass. This month, Michigan State needs him to show improvement over the spring, and that’s the plan. (MUCH MORE inside SpartanMag).