After year as starter, Michigan QB Wilton Speight embraces new reality

Entering his fourth season at Michigan and now on his third quarterbacks coach, Wilton Speight is well-schooled in the college football reality.

Even if he arrived as an idealistic freshman, eager to bond with his coaches, he’s more grizzled now.

“You get to this point in college and my goal is to get to the next level,” Speight said last weekend at Michigan’s A4 QB camp. “I know a lot of my teammates, that’s their same goal. When it comes down to it, at the end of the day, it’s a business relationship. There’s no, ‘Does he like me, does he not like me? Will he have me over and grill some cheeseburgers?’ It’s not about that anymore.

"Obviously, it works better and obviously, Pep (Hamilton) and I have a good relationship. Hopefully he does invite me over for a cheeseburger. But, at the end of the day, I’m trying to get to the next level and use him and be a sponge around him and he’s trying to make me the best quarterback I can be to build his resume and continue to climb up the ladder as well.”

Speight explained the symbiosis as he will to the talented freshmen arriving this summer at Michigan. They were wooed by the U-M coaches with everything only about the relationship. Now that it becomes about the work and production – Jim Harbaugh’s famous meritocracy – they’ll learn the previous bonds with the coaches won’t get them on the field.

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Speight understands that as much as anyone on the team.

The Wolverines are severely lacking in returning starters and he was the quarterback for every game he was remotely healthy (12 of 13) last season. At last year's team banquet, Harbaugh told the crowd Speight could be one of the nation’s best QBs next season. So it’s reasonable to assume he would retain his job, even if primarily for stability.

But after spring ball, Harbaugh was toning it down, saying Speight was the leader but the job will be open the first 10 days to two weeks of camp.

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“That’s what I tried to do, even when I was the fifth string, to attack every day like I was the starter,” Speight said. “Hopefully, that’s what the other guys are doing. Everyone needs to approach it like they’re the ones who are going to be playing on Saturday. That’s going all the way back to Coach (Doug) Nussmeier, then Coach (Jedd) Fisch and now with Coach Pep, it’s always preached you should attack every day like you’re the starter. So it’s not any different than what I did previously.”

It’s the mature Speight that is understanding nothing will be handed to him.

“You hear that multiple times, from Tom Brady, from any returning starter, everyday is a competition,” Speight said.

After filling himself culturally after the Rome trip by visiting Belgium, Paris and Armenia, he expanded his football world with another trip to guru Steve Clarkson’s weekend retreat in Coronado, Calif., earlier this month.

The weekend A4 camp was good for him, participating as he does every year but this time with more of a presence as a major-program starter. Plus understanding, by association, there’s more interest in his day-to-day life than other QBs in other programs.

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“There’s a lot of competition and being around a bunch of other starters, everyone has kind of the same schedule and the same daily process,” Speight said. “Just kind of vibing off those guys, seeing what they do, what kind of workouts they do and stuff. They all have great coaches and stuff, but they’re all wondering about Coach Harbaugh ... because he’s kind of like the mega-figure in developing quarterbacks, I guess. That was a great weekend.”

Some of those conversations were with UCLA quarterback Josh Rosen, who now has Speight’s mentor the past two years, Fisch, as his offensive coordinator.

Which brings everything back around to this year’s many adjustments, from the new, young receivers to Hamilton, his new position coach.

That’s why they’re building a bond with “baby steps” as Hamilton recently said.

“Just getting to know each other,” Speight said Saturday. “Getting to know (Hamilton’s) son a little bit on that Rome trip. The rest of his family on that Rome trip. They were living in Cleveland, so Pep was always going back and forth obviously to be with his family and then he’s out recruiting. So in the off-season, you don’t see your coach really unless it’s spring ball on the field. But days like today (at the A4 camp), we talk and get to know each other more. Obviously, I think that relationship’s going the right direction.”

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On the field, Speight insists Hamilton may change some of the verbiage from what Fisch used, but the basic premise of the offense isn’t changing, because the head coach isn’t changing.

“It’s still the Harbaugh effect,” Speight said. “It’s still the Harbaugh gig. He wasn’t going to bring in a spread guy, he wasn’t going to change anything too much. It’s still the pro-style offense and a lot of the same terms.”

Now that the upperclassmen on offense have graduated, Speight understands his role is changing.

The off-season tasks previously taken care of by captains Jake Butt and Chris Wormley now fall to him, Khalid Hill, Mike McCray and Mason Cole.

They’re the leaders and Michigan needs their intensity in the off-season, when coaches aren’t around to run the 7-on-7s and player-led workouts.

“We’re all in it together, trying to make sure everyone’s included and it fits everyone’s schedules,” Speight said.

There are new realities in Speight’s world from a year ago.

But as his eyes open wider, he’s understanding the world around him, inside and outside Schembechler Hall.

Contact Mark Snyder: msnyder@freepress.com. Follow him on Twitter @mark__snyder. Download our Wolverines Xtra app for free on Apple and Android devices!