Monday evening, the Michigan football team’s defense received confirmation that a key piece will be back in 2024. This time, 6-foot-4, 208-pound safety Makari Paige officially announced that he would to Ann Arbor for a fifth season.
With his return, Michigan’s secondary figures to be loaded, as the Wolverines also return Will Johnson, Rod Moore and the bulk of its backup players. Up front, Michigan will also return Mason Graham, Kenneth Grant, Rayshaun Benny, Derrick Moore, Josaiah Stewart and Ernest Hausmann.
After two seasons on the bench in which he played in six games and recorded just eight tackles, Paige has been a solid, underrated piece of Michigan’s defense the last two seasons. In 26 games the last two years, he has recorded 82 tackles, one tackle for loss, one interception and four pass breakups.
With good length and quickness for the safety position, Paige has been great at coverage over the last two seasons. This year, in 260 coverage snaps, he allowed eight receptions for 86 yards on 14 targets, with not one completion going former than 20 yards all season. Last year he had a similar stat line, allowing 54 yards and six receptions on 11 targets in coverage. That means that, in 556 coverage snaps over the last two years, Paige has been targeted in coverage 25 times, allowed 14 completions and just 140 receiving yards.
This year, Paige also grew as a tackler, finishing with three missed tackles compared to 41 tackles overall. According to Pro Football Focus’s grading system, Paige ranked 24th out of 224 Power-Five safeties in run defense grade, 14th among the group in tackling grade and 10th in missed tackle rate.
The West Bloomfield native turned 22 last week, and is a former four-star recruit.
