Michigan Rod Moore No. 5 returns at safety

Pro Football Focus (PFF) continued its rankings ahead of the 2023 season, and another Michigan Wolverine has emerged.

Among PFF’s top 10 safeties, Rod Moore checks in at No. 5. Here’s what they had to say about the soon-to-be junior:

“Moore is arguably the nation’s most versatile safety next season and was a PFF honorable mention All-American in 2022.

“He was one of two Power Five safeties in 2022 to earn 80-plus grades in both coverage and as a run defender. Another, Alabama’s Brian Branch, is a 2023 top 10 prospect by PFF. The NFL Draft big board. Moore’s four interceptions were tied for seventh among Power Five safeties.

Moore has come a long way in two years in Ann Arbor. When you look through his recruiting class, you’ll see familiar names like quarterback JJ McCarthy, running back Donovan Edwards and linebacker Junior Colson. But if you keep scrolling — and scrolling and scrolling — you’ll eventually find Moore, the country’s 506 prospect.

Moore was born into a Buckeye family an hour outside of Columbus. He was a supposed afterthought in the class — depth at safety who would at most make it on special teams but would inevitably get lost behind the talent in the safety room. .

A year earlier, Michigan’s 2020 recruiting class featured a trio of highly touted four-star safeties: Jordan Morant, Makari Paige and RJ Moten, all of whom appeared poised to battle for the right to start as the third safety alongside the duo. Brad Hawkins and Dax Hill in Mike Macdonald’s 4-2-5 system in 2021.

Even veteran player and special teams ace Caden Kolesar had moved up in the safety ranks prior to the season. No one thought Moore – who didn’t even enroll early – would play a role as a freshman or even crack the top five at safety.

But when he arrived in Ann Arbor that summer, he immediately got to work.

Michigan head coach Jim Harbaugh shared an anecdote about it In the trenches podcast about Moore’s freshman work ethic last fall:

“Rod wasn’t a guy who talked a lot in recruiting classes,” Harbaugh said. “When you talked about guys like Donovan Edwards, Junior Colson and JJ McCarthy and even others — but about three weeks into camp, I went to check on everybody and how much tape they were watching. You give them iPads (to watch the tape) and Rod Moore had watched twice as much as the next best guy in terms of the volume of the tape. He watched the installations, he watched the installations again.

“I go, ‘Who is this? Is this guy delusional that he thinks he’s playing with some of the safeties on this team like Brad Hawkins and RJ Moten and (Caden) Kolesar? Maybe he’s just such a big dreamer. Turns out he was.’ It’s really the first time he was on my radar as a guy to really watch.

Moore’s blue-collar work ethic and fielding helped him steadily rise up the depth chart during his true freshman season, and in Week 10 against Penn State, Moore made his first career start. Two weeks later, Moore started against the household favorite Ohio State Buckeyes.

Moore led the team with nine tackles and played a key role in shutting down the Buckeyes for the first time in a decade. After committing to Michigan in high school, he was told he would never beat Ohio State; in two seasons, Moore has never lost to them.

In Moore’s second season, he started 13 games and finished third on the team in tackles (71) and first in interceptions (4). In doing so, Moore became just the second Wolverine since 2000 to reach 70 tackles and four interceptions in a season. Additionally, against Purdue in the Big Ten Championship, he recorded 14 total tackles, the second-most in a single game by a player in the Harbaugh era.

By the numbers, Moore turned a three-star prospect into two Big Ten titles, an undefeated record against Ohio State, and became the exclusive of one pair of “Turnover Buffs.” Imagine how insignificant he will be as just the No. 5 safety in the 2023 season?

We trust Rod.