The remarkable story of Michigan Football commit Ifeanyi Emedobi

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Maize n Brew caught up with Kalen Desrosiers, a defensive line and linebacker training specialist at TractionAP, based out of Fort Wayne, Indiana, to discuss 2027 four-star Michigan edge rusher commit Ifeanyi Emedobi.

Desrosiers works closely with Emedobi, who pledged to the Wolverines last month following an official visit, helping the junior ascend developmentally which has to continuous soaring in the recruiting rankings. Michigan is high on Emedobi’s potential at the next level, and so is Desrosiers. He explains why in our Q&A:

On Emedobi as a student-athlete

“Obviously, he’s a great athlete, but a lot of people don’t know is that he does a lot of stuff off the field with community service and just giving back to his community. He’s the oldest of, I think, 11 or 12, so he’s got that big brother mentality. Ifey kind of treats everybody like they’re his younger siblings (laughs). Some people take it well, some people don’t, but he’s definitely a leader. Definitely a leader on our team and just everywhere he’s at.”

On discovering Emedobi last year before he took up football

“There were a couple of guys texting the coaches group chat saying that there’s some new kid that’s dunking the basketball in the gym class. I was like, ‘After school, I’ll be there to talk to him.’ ‘Hey, you play football?’ He was like, ‘No.’ I said, ‘You do now.’ Come to find out his dad played at Eastern Michigan and was an all-state guy at the same school back in the day. So it was in his blood, he just didn’t know. Before that, he was video games, anime, all that kind of stuff. He was like, ‘I never really play sports.’ I’m like, ‘Well, I think you have a future in it if you can apply yourself.’ As you can see it, it took off from there.”

On Emedobi arriving onto the scene in a matter of months

“The funny part is he didn’t just play sports, he didn’t watch it. So, the schools that were talking to him, he was like, ‘Hey, who is this?’ I’m like, ‘That’s Michigan. That’s Penn State.’ It was really just square one. Like, literally getting him to start watching football and then applying what he saw to his own on-field presence. Getting him to learn the position. Everything that everything saw in film last year, that was after two, three months of him playing the sport, So I’m just excited to see what he does this year. With another 20 pounds on him and another year of experience, I think people are gonna be even more surprised about what they see on the field this year.”

On how college coaches reacted to Emedobi’s potential during the recruitment process

“They don’t believe it’s his first year. Like, he’s trying to learn everything from different positions and formations. This is all brand new. It’s like anybody else picking up a new hobby. We all grew up watching football. It wasn’t gonna be his interest, but now he loves it. So I think a lot of coaches are surprised by how much room he has to grow. I think that’s what they’re really excited about. They’re like, ‘If you’re doing this at square one, then what does two years down the road look like? What does your body look like? What is your knowledge of the game?’ So they’re excited, They keep using the word clay — they feel like that’s where he’s at with it right now.”

On the opportunities available to Emedobi at Michigan

“He keeps saying over and over again, ‘I want to study psychology.
I want to open up a children’s center.’ So just the exposure that he can get and the hands that he can begin to shake while walking through those doors. I mean, Michigan is definitely a spot where connections can be made. Since it’s pretty decently close to home, he’ll be able to do whatever he’s trying to do in Fort Wayne.”

On what to expect from Emedobi down the road

“Sky’s the limit. We hear that term a lot, but you use it for guys that play football their whole lives. Well, what does it look like when it’s a kid that’s one year in who’s still learning the game, still learning how to use the God-giving abilities? (A player) who just jumped to 37-inch vertical, ran another 4.5 (40-yard dash), close to a 4.4 again in the cold. I’m like, ‘Dude, you don’t even know.’ He doesn’t even know what he can do with his body. The number one thing is just his tenacity and his motor — if I had any question about that, I would say there’s a limit, but since I don’t have any questions about that, I would say the sky is the limit.”

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