Tom Strobel Answers Your Questions

Mentor (OH) Mentor defensive end Tom Strobel (#36)

Defensive lineman Tom Strobel was indoctrinated into Ohio State culture from childhood, received an Ohio State scholarship offer, and even admitted to favoring the Buckeyes in the early stages of his recruitment.  Aside from being raised in Ohio and identified as one of the top prospects in the nation, Tom graduated with a 3.8 GPA, maintains a focus on academics, and talks about a strong commitment to his team and "doing things the right way."

In short, he's just the kind of recruit that Brady Hoke and the coaches love to reel in.

Tom was recently nice enough to volunteer a few minutes of his time to update Michigan fans on several topics and answer a couple reader questions.

Playing 5-tech, playing early:  "As far as right now, the plan is that I'm going to play the 5-technique - not necessarily starting but just getting in the rotation.  That's really what I'm looking to do. . . . The plan is to not redshirt me.  If they chose to, then I'd be more than willing to take it, but I'm ready to play whenever they need me."

Height and weight, greasy food:  "I'm 6'6'' and 255/260 [lbs.], but I'll definitely be putting on weight.  In the off-season I dropped weight because I started to get a little bit fat, so I'm putting on weight the right way now. . . As long as I can still move, I'll get as big as I can.  I've got so much room to put on weight - I'll get bigger right off the bat.  I'm nowhere near my full potential. . . . I try not to eat any greasy or fast food because that just destroys me.  I can tell the difference when I don't eat something right; I feel it in my workouts.  I know my body that well now."

Studying with Matt Godin:  "I'm looking to go into business and finance.  My ultimate goal would be to get into the business school.  That's difficult to do, but I'll buckle down and see if I can get in there because that will be better for my future and help me get a job, hopefully after I go to the NFL.  But I've been working so hard.  My parents have pushed me my whole life to do well in academics. . . . My roommate Matt Godin - who will also be doing business with me - we'll be working hard together."

Respect your enemy:  "There are just a lot of Ohio State fans [in Mentor, Ohio].  They're just everywhere.  You get the closet Michigan fan every once in a while who'll say, 'I'm so excited for you to go [to Michigan],' and then they walk away. . . . So I've adjusted, and my family's adjusted because we grew up Ohio State fans. . . . I think Ohio State is a great place, a great program, and they've done some awesome things, so all respect to them.  But aside from that, when they were recruiting me, the coaches would be around, but it didn't seem like they were truly 100% focused on you.  And that's what I look for, so it was like, 'Do you really want me that bad?  Obviously you don't.'  They stopped by and talked to me and gave me their little tour, but I didn't get that feeling from them or from the coaches that I actually had a future with the team, and they wanted me to do things with them.  They didn't really give me that push, so I didn't really like that about them.  And also, their academics are decent, but when it came to Michigan - I mean, hell, look at their reputation as being the Ivy League school of the Big Ten.  And the coaches at Michigan were so welcoming and helped me.  At first, I was like, 'Is this too good to be true?  Can these guys really be this nice?' And they really are.  And then at Ohio State, who knows where I'd be playing  there.  They wanted to move me down to defensive tackle or something. . . . It just wasn't very clear.  It was an uncertain future.  And that was before Tressel got booted.  I had no idea about that situation before I committed [to Michigan], whatsoever."

A singer and thespian:  "I love to sing.  I sing whenever I can. . . . I was in choir in ninth grade, and I was in a musical this year.  They were begging me for years to do some sort of play or musical with the school.  So I did the musical the Titanic this year, and I won the lead role.