Heisman Rankings 2018: Top 20 Heisman Trophy candidates

The ride to Michigan has been a winding one for Shea Patterson, as he began his college career at Ole Miss. Patterson was expected to redshirt during his freshman season back in 2016, but when Chad Kelly went down to a torn ACL, that was thrown out the window.

Heading into the 2017 season, Patterson was named the team’s starter and got off to a blazing start for the Rebels. He threw for over 900 yards through the first two games of the season, including an Ole Miss record of 489 yards against UT Martin. However, his season would end with a torn PCL, and he wanted out after that.

With Ole Miss facing another postseason ban in 2018, Patterson asked to transfer out of the program, and he ended up landing on Michigan. Usually, a player has to sit out a year in order to transfer to another school, but Patterson is eligible to play right away, as the NCAA accepted that he was lied to during his recruitment about whether or not Ole Miss would have sanctions levied against them.

Now that Ole Miss is in the rearview mirror, Patterson can turn his attention to Big Ten football, where he is certain to be one of the best signal-callers in the conference. The Wolverines are going to run a lot of shotgun with Patterson as their quarterback, and he has the luxury of playing under a former NFL quarterback in head coach Jim Harbaugh.

Patterson completed better than 63 percent of his passes last season, and in him, the Wolverines have a major upgrade at the quarterback position. He is one of the best in the country, and with better talent around him, should be in for a monster season in his first year in Ann Arbor.