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Jim Harbaugh ‘falling in love’ with budding superstar Jabrill Peppers

By Patrick Schmidt

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The Jabrill Peppers hype train is back on track after an injury-shortened freshman season and the Michigan sophomore is poised for superstardom as the leader of the Wolverines defense.

Jabrill Peppers was supposed to be the savior of the Michigan football program last year after coming to Ann Arbor as the nation’s No. 1 athlete and No. 3 overall recruit, according to the 247Sports Composite Rankings.

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He was compared to Heisman Trophy winner and former Wolverine, Charles Woodson before ever practicing for the Wolverines but there were no Woodson comparisons and he wasn’t the savior many hoped he would be when he arrived in Ann Arbor.

However, the hype that preceded his arrival is back on track after his freshman season was cut short as a result of a pair of leg injuries and took a medical redshirt.

With the spring a time for optimism and renewed hope, Peppers thrived in spring practice after he was moved to his natural position at safety and now that he’s healthy, he is wowing new head coach Jim Harbaugh whose praise has been effusive.

“He wants to keep getting better and better. You start to fall in love with guys like that.”

After Michigan’s spring game on Saturday, Harbaugh said Peppers has been A+ this spring and defensive backs coach Greg Jackson said Peppers has “it” and reminds him of former All-Pro safety Rodney Harrison.

“He reminds me of Rodney: enthusiastic, intense during practice, full speed to the ball all the time,” Jackson told the Detroit Free Press. “He’s a kid that’s hungry, ready to prove himself and a guy like Peppers, you can’t teach hustle, he’s just got it, just got that knack of being a football player. If we just keep him going in the right direction coaching him, I think he’s going to be a really good player.”

That’s the opinion shared by many who watched Peppers in high school when he was a two-way standout and garnered offers from schools across the nation. College football fans were deprived of seeing his talent on Saturday’s last year, but I think Peppers will make up for lost time this year for Michigan in the middle of their defense.

After playing nickel back as a freshman, Peppers should have a bigger impact roaming the center of the field to defend against the pass and come down in the box for run support and do what he loves, hit people.

“I just like hitting more and I feel at the safety position, I’m around the ball a lot more,” Peppers said. “I can have a bigger impact on the game than just being on one side, where they can go away from me.”

He’s bigger, stronger and smarter after a year in college, but most important, he’s hungry to get back on the field after having it taken away from him last fall. He’s only missed one practice this spring when he had to have a tooth removed and he hated being away from the field because he missed a chance to get better.

“He wants to keep getting better and better,” Harbaugh told MLive.com. “You start to fall in love with guys like that.”

When a player as talented and as smart as Peppers is that hungry then you have the makings of an All-Big Ten performer who can make the most effusive of praise look modest by comparison when you see him making plays all over the field on Saturday.

Harbaugh already loves him and when you see him play this fall, you will too.

Next: Big Ten Power Rankings Entering Spring Pracitce

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