Several of the most talented Michigan receivers over the years broke out in their sophomore seasons after being relatively quiet in year one. The Wolverines could use it this year, a season in which there\u2019s no obvious home run threat.\u00a0<\/p>\n
RELATED:<\/strong> ITF EXTRA \u2013 Notes from Michigan \u2018MPower\u2019 meeting in Ann Arbor \u2013 some major momentum<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n There\u2019s experience, of course, and guys who have made big plays in the biggest games. Michigan grad student Cornelius Johnson<\/a><\/strong> came up huge at Ohio State last year, for example, his two long touchdown receptions huge turning points in the game.\u00a0<\/p>\n But that guy whose number you can call, and you know he\u2019s going to come down with the ball when it\u2019s thrown to him? <\/p>\n It\u2019s been a while.\u00a0<\/p>\n Michigan sophomore Darrius Clemons<\/a><\/strong> has the ability to be that player this year, both his teammates and coaches insist. Throughout the winter and into the spring, Clemons has been putting extra time in the weight room and after practices to get stronger and faster and perfect his routes before the season.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI\u2019m always in the building, so I see him working out by himself. When we got to the winter cycle, and for him to be as strong as he was in the weight room, it was pretty shocking,\u201d Michigan senior Roman Wilson said. \u201cHe\u2019s a pretty strong guy.<\/p>\n \u201cI think he\u2019s going to shock a lot of people when he gets his opportunities this year.\u201d<\/p>\n That\u2019s the goal, Clemons said in the offseason Though he caught only one pass for 7 yards at Michigan last year, the praise for him started when he first arrived. Many predicted he\u2019d have a significant impact as a freshman, and he admitted it was a bit disheartening when it didn\u2019t happen.<\/p>\n \u201cObviously, it\u2019s frustrating not playing football,\u201d Clemons said. \u201cI\u2019m competitive. It\u2019s what I came here [to Michigan] to do. But at the same time it\u2019s keeping my mind on trying to control what you can control \u2014 to try to get better every day. Learn from the older guys.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cWe had Ronnie Bell<\/a><\/strong>, Cornelius Johnson, Roman Wilson. Those guys are all going to play in the NFL one day. I\u2019d be a fool not to try to take something from that.\u201d<\/p>\n So, he keeps his head down and continues to work and take coaching from Michigan receivers coach Ron Bellamy. Bellamy said in early June he saw significant progress in his sophomore, and he\u2019s excited to see what he can do this fall.\u00a0<\/p>\n There\u2019s nobody else he\u2019s rather learn from, Clemons said.<\/p>\n \u201cI love coach Bellamy as a coach. I think the best part about having him as a coach is he\u2019s done it before,\u201d Clemons said. \u201cHe\u2019s done a lot of things I hope to do in my career at Michigan, so it\u2019s like having someone who has seen it, he\u2019s done it \u2026 just having someone with a first-person view into it. I\u2019d be wrong not to listen to him.\u201d<\/p>\n Bellamy never promised him anything at Michigan, Clemons said, and he always professed faith in him should his number be called. Though it wasn\u2019t \u2014\u00a0he was essentially a healthy scratch the last four games of the year \u2014\u00a0Clemons never stopped preparing.<\/p>\n \u201cHe\u2019s more of a \u2018stay ready\u2019 kind of guy. I think the way he looks at it, there are a lot of guys who could play right now,\u201d Clemons said. \u201cBut we\u2019re the young guys in a sense. I think he just says stay ready, keep trying to get better.\u201d<\/p>\n And that\u2019s exactly what he\u2019s tried to do. He appears to be in incredible shape, ready to make his second year special.\u00a0<\/p>\n \u201cI want to improve everywhere,\u201d the Michigan sophomore said. \u201cIn no way am I content where I\u2019m at right now as far as my skillset. I want to get better at everything, be a better version of myself.\u201d<\/p>\n He appears to be on his way.\u00a0<\/p>\n The post Is the second year the breakout season for Michigan receiver Darrius Clemons?<\/a> appeared first on On3<\/a>.<\/p>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Several of the most talented Michigan receivers over the years broke out in their sophomore…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":0,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"ngg_post_thumbnail":0,"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-8843","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8843","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=8843"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8843\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=8843"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=8843"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/demo.wztzfm.com\/wp\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=8843"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}