The Bartelstein Blog: Entry 3, J-Mo
10/22/2010 12:00:00 AM | Men's Basketball
Oct. 22, 2010
Sophomore guard Josh Bartelstein will give an inside look all season at the 2010-11 version of the Wolverines.
Five days, seven practices and a lot of running, we have finished our so-called "training camp" as our trainer John DoRosario called it. (I need to devote an entire week of blog entries to John Do at some point).
We have tomorrow off which is much needed for a lot of the team. Guys are banged up and tired from a great first week. I really mean that too, we got so much done since Friday it is amazing. I really feel like our team is so far ahead of where we were last year, partly because of going to Europe but also because our freshmen are picking things up so fast. Evan, Tim, Jon and Colton are all showing why they can get meaningful minutes this year.
One big guy who has really stood out is Jordan Morgan.
J-Mo is a great guy who I've really become close with over the last year. Things have not been easy for Jordan since he arrived on campus but I think he is a lot better off now than anyone could have imagined.
As Jordan will tell you, he will tell you a lot by the way, he gave an arm and a leg to get to this point, literally. He had major surgery on his knee and just when he was getting back from that he injured his shoulder in practice. J-Mo actually plans on writing a book called "I gave an arm and a leg for Michigan Basketball," look for it in stores around 2018. His shoulder injury one of those injuries you don't forget; I was standing near the play and saw his shoulder completely pop out -- disgusting. Everyone in the gym will remember that day.
After we all took a summer break, August rolled around and J-Mo was finally back and might I mention better than ever. He was in great shape, had a much-improved jump shot and, most importantly, was just excited to compete again.
By the way, Jordan might have set a record for must one-armed jump shots ever taken. He literally shot one-armed so much I thought he might just switch to it permanently. It was probably better than the jump shot he came in with last June!
The more I thought about it, the more it made sense why J-Mo had invested so much time. When you have something you love taken away for a year you realize how much it means to you. Jordan realized that very quickly. That is why Jordan, along with Darius, was always in the gym shooting before early morning lifts.
Jordan wanted to prove to everyone, and himself, that he was back and he put the work in to have a great season. No one on our team had seen Jordan really healthy. We did not realize what we were missing. Jordan is knocking down jump shots with ease now, running the court like a madman and rebounding like a man possessed.
As a teammate, and more importantly a friend, who saw how hard last year was for him it is really nice to see him healthy and smiling running up and down the court. J-Mo is going to have a really good year and a great career at Michigan.
On another note I want to give a shout out to Manny Harris who is doing a great job with Cleveland this preseason and has made their opening day roster. We are all proud of you and none of us are surprised how well you have done.
DON'T FORGET ... I will respond to the questions we have received in the next entry, please keep sending in questions, comments or whatever you want to say to askjbart20@gmail.com.
