Big Ten media day: Rodriguez has high expectations for 2009

“I kind of know at Michigan, the lights are pretty bright,” Rodriguez said.

A year after leading the Wolverines to the worst season in program history, a 3-9 campaign that still gnaws at Michigan’s collective stomach, Rodriguez is back under the spotlight of scrutiny.

He said the program is headed in the right direction after a strong spring and better summer, but acknowledged, “until it shows with wins, I guess there’s still going to be questions.

“If we’re not in a bowl game, we’re all going to be ticked,” Rodriguez said. “If we’re not competing better in every game, we’re all going to be upset. Not talking about the fans, but us. We think that we should be a whole lot better in a whole lot of areas even though we lost a lot of guys on defense.”

Specifically, the Wolverines are counting on better play from the quarterback position to spark a turnaround.

True freshmen Tate Forcier and Denard Robinson are expected to compete for the starting job once practice opens Aug. 10. Forcier is a more polished passer with a better grasp of the playbook, but Robinson is a superior athlete who’s wowed strength and conditioning coach Mike Barwis in summer workouts with his speed.

VIDEO: DENARD ROBINSON

“By no means is anybody locked in as a starting quarterback,” Rodriguez said. “You’ve got Denard Robinson. Nick Sheridan is going to fight for the job. But Tate did a lot of things this spring I think to improve himself. He had a great summer. Talking to him, he feels strong. We’re excited about him.”

And excited about the direction of the program in general.

Rodriguez admitted he made some mistakes in rushing to put his first recruiting class together. The fallout, recently, has been the departure of three 2008 recruits, Justin Feagin, Dan O’Neill and Kurt Wermers.

Still, amid the turmoil, Rodriguez said players have grown closer and gained a better understanding of what he’s trying to accomplish at Michigan.

“The only thing I ever talk to them about is we expect to compete for championships,” Rodriguez said. “Are we good enough to win a Big Ten championship? There’s a whole lot of things that got to happen for that.

“That’s our first goal every year is compete for that, and there’s lot of things got to happen for us and a lot of bad things happen to someone else. But if we’re at least not competing for it and being more competitive in certain situations than I don’t think we’ve made the progress we wanted to.”

Dave Birkett covers the University of Michigan football team for AnnArbor.com. He can be reached at davidbirkett@annarbor.com