The Wolverine: Covering University of Michigan Football and Sports
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40 THE WOLVERINE OCTOBER 2019 T he following excerpt is de- rived from Chapter 30, "If Football Was Taken Away," about former offensive lineman Grant Newsome, in John U. Bacon's latest book, OVERTIME: Jim Har- baugh and the Michigan Wolverines at the Crossroads of College Football, which came out Sept. 3. His book tour is on johnubacon.com. "IF FOOTBALL WAS TAKEN AWAY" Grant Newsome's mother, Kim, gradu- ated cum laude with a bachelor's de- gree from Princeton. There she met Grant's father, Leon, who played base- ball and became an All–Ivy League de- fensive end before joining the Secret Service, where he has worked for 26 years. Grant grew up in McLean, Virginia, just outside D.C. In ninth grade he enrolled at Lawrenceville, an elite boarding school about 15 minutes from Princ- eton. He felt burnt out on baseball, so he joined the junior varsity football team. Though he didn't start, he loved the game immediately— much to his father's chagrin. After a strong sopho- more season on the varsity, Rutgers' head coach Kyle Flood invited him to visit. "I really had no idea what to expect," Newsome said. Flood offered him a scholarship on the spot. The day after Penn State offered him a scholarship, Temple followed suit the next day, sight unseen. After New- some's junior year he had 34 offers, in- cluding Alabama, LSU, and most of the top 25 programs. "Grant could have gone to any of the Ivies," Kim Newsome told me. "But he wanted the best of both worlds: foot- ball and academics." Next stop: Ann Arbor. "I wasn't really thrilled about visiting Michigan," Grant confessed, but his par- ents urged him to go. When he did, "I said, 'Whoa! Where has this place been hiding?' I was kind of blown away. "I loved the football aspect of Penn State, but everything else, I preferred Michigan. There was something inde- scribable about the culture that I just felt I could be comfortable there." He was impressed by Michigan but still leaned toward Penn State. Kim viv- idly remembered them sitting in their family room, when she asked a simple question: "If football was taken away from you for some reason, what school would you want to attend?" "No question," Grant said. "Michigan." WHEN NEWSOME MOVED UP to the second team as a freshman, he faced the first string in practice: Chris Worm- ley, Taco Charlton, Matthew Godin, and Ryan Glasgow. "I'd just turned 18. I'd been playing the game for only four years, and just three at offensive line. And now I'm facing off with a first-round draft pick, a third- rounder, and two other guys who are still playing in the NFL today. If that's not trial by fire, I don't know what is. But this is Michigan football: adapt or die." Newsome thrived. Midway into his freshman year Harbaugh called his par- ents to let them know he wanted to burn Newsome's redshirt and play him. "You think about college football be- ing this heartless machine," Kim said, "but that's not what it was for us. I thought that was so thoughtful — and really, unexpected." Grant's parents knew before he did. At the hotel meeting before Michigan's eighth game, up at Minnesota, coach Tim Drevno asked, "Grant, are you ready?" "I'll never forget it," Newsome said. "I wasn't even sure what he was asking. Ready for what, exactly? But when I nodded, he said, 'Good. You're going to be getting some reps tomorrow.'" After Michigan's 29–26 victory over Minnesota, Newsome played the re- maining five games that season and started the next year, 2016. "My football career escalated very quickly," he told me. "I remember the build-up before that 2016 season. That team had a chance to be very, very spe- cial, and we all knew it, with the swag- ger you have when you know you're the baddest kid on the block." That confidence looked justified when the fourth-ranked Wolverines waxed Penn State, 49–10. "That was the most fun I ever had on a football field," he said. It would also be the last game New- some finished. WITH HIS PARENTS and two younger brothers in the stands for Michigan's game against eighth-ranked Wiscon- sin, the Wolverines were on the march when they called "99 Truck," a toss play to De'Veon Smith toward the left side of the line — Newsome's side. "But before the ball was snapped," Newsome recalled, "I got this premoni- OVERTIME: Jim Harbaugh And The Michigan Wolverines At The Crossroads Of College Football John U. Bacon's New Book Goes Inside U-M's 2018 Season