The journey taken by Mike Barrett to become Michigan’s most successful player

Houston — Mike Barrett Jr. is a little unusual in the world of collegiate football today.

The graduate linebacker, who was first drafted as a quarterback, is 24 years old and in his final year of eligibility. He has attended Michigan for his whole six years of college. Barrett stuck with the position and found his place, moving from quarterback to wide receiver to the hybrid viper position, and then back to linebacker. Barrett stuck in Ann Arbor even after learning that he wouldn’t be a starter in a new defensive system for his final year.

And now, with all but one final game of his journey in the rearview mirror, Barrett’s loyalty and his longevity have rewarded him with an impressive distinction. With 60 wins under his belt, Barrett is officially Michigan’s winningest player of all time.

It’s a title that has led to some jokes from his teammates, who according to senior edge rusher Braiden McGregor jokingly call him “old man.” But it’s one that Barrett wears with pride.

“It’s come up in the locker room a couple of times, I mean we all talk about it like, ‘Is that something to be proud of Mike?’ ” McGregor joked with The Michigan Daily. “But he loves it, he’s like, ‘Man I’m history bro, you can’t talk to me like that.’ ”

And that’s something Barrett’s not wrong about. With his name already in the record books and his hands all over the Wolverines’ turnaround from a dreary 2-4 season to the doorstep of a National Championship, Barrett has been a foundational piece in Michigan’s renaissance.

But if you ask him what he thinks most about his career and the history that he has made, he takes a more introspective tone. Because for Barrett, the joy of his career and the joy of this season isn’t just about where he is now, it’s about what he’s overcome to get here.

History isn’t without its ups and downs, but it always marches on. And the same goes for Mike Barrett. Through loss, tragedy and finding himself on the football field, Barrett has always marched on.

From pretty much the earliest days that Michael Barrett Sr. can remember of his son’s life, Mike Barrett Jr. was inseparable from his football.

“He’d eat, drink, sleep football,” Barrett Sr. told The Michigan Daily. “He used to sleep with his football on his arm, he fumbled one time when he was small and he couldn’t get over it, so he’d sleep with his football. He’d come to the dining room table with his football, and we actually had to take his football cause he always caused (trouble). ‘Try and knock it out now, try and knock it out now.’ ”

At points, Barrett Jr.’s infatuation with football frustrated his parents, but there was nothing they could do to stop him. If it was six a.m. and he was missing from the house, he was out front running drills. If it was 100 degrees in the humid south Georgia summer, he’d go for runs. Barrett was obsessed, and so was his cousin, Kris.

Throughout their childhoods, Kris and Barrett Jr. lived across the street from one another, and from a young age, the two were practically inseparable.

“Every knock on our door normally was Kris,” Barrett Sr. said. “They was always together, I mean always. If they wasn’t in the backyard playing football they were in the front yard playing football, running up the street with the RipSticks and the skateboards and the four-wheelers. They was always together, I mean they were really extremely close.”

Through football, the pair’s bond only grew. In middle school, Kris had been the centerpiece that started a friend group of local athletes that called themselves “The Apes,” and became Barrett’s main group. And in high school, the pair again played football together for the Lowndes Vikings with Barrett the star quarterback and Kris the holder for kicks.

But as the pair split up after high school, having spent their lives joined at the hip, Barrett Jr. underwent one of the hardest periods of his life that would be shaped by loss. In May and June, Barrett lost two of his former teammates, Joshua Gardner and Jaylen Lott, in separate drownings. And in early August, as Barrett was fighting to find himself and his position in Ann Arbor, Kris was killed by a drunk driver.

“It was back to back, he had to come home twice and speak at the funeral,” Barrett Sr. said. “We was on the phone with him all the time, praying, talking, trying to get him back in a good space, because that was probably one of the roughest times I can ever remember.”

It took late calls with his family, prayer, and time, but Barrett now plays for Kris, and he even takes him with him everywhere he goes. Tattooed on his right arm is a screaming ape with a halo above it, forevermemorializing Kris and the group that he started.

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Three and a half years later, Mike Barrett Jr. was again facing adversity.

After having bounced from quarterback, to slot receiver, to viper, to running back, back to wildcat quarterback, back to viper and finally to inside linebacker, Barrett Jr. found out that he wouldn’t be starting in his senior year. The past year he had started all six of Michigan’s contests as the hybrid safety-linebacker “viper,” but under a new defensive scheme, a viper was no longer necessary, and Barrett found himself coming off of the bench.

“I was just kind of at a low point in my life,” Barrett Jr. said. “I was in seven classes at the time, I was working a job on campus. Going through camp I was fighting injuries trying to get back into a starting spot that I had lost during that camp. Just frustrated, getting down on myself, and battling back.”

But instead of burning out, or transferring away, Barrett Jr. fought through his frustrations.

“He went to school and did workouts and all up until six, and he had to be there at about 10 or 11 and work until about 2 or 3 in the morning, and then had to be back for workouts at 6 a.m.,” Barrett Jr.’s mother Anitren Barrett told The Daily.

Barrett Jr. made it through that year with his seven classes, his job and football, and on the other side, he finally found what he had been looking for. In the two years since then, he has become Michigan’s stalwart. He routinely blows up runs at the line of scrimmage as a part of one of the best rushing defenses in the country. He has forced three fumbles, recovered one and even snagged two interceptions last year against Rutgers.

And for those around him, Barrett Jr. became the mo