Michigan State Football: 3 position battles to watch ahead of 2022

Michigan State football has most of its depth chart set in stone, but what position battles will be the most worthy of monitoring?

Mel Tucker opened Michigan State football’s fall camp on Thursday and spoke to the media afterward about his excitement and expectations for the season.

One thing that hasn’t quite come up yet is the notion of position battles in key areas. When the pads go on, that will be more vocalized and hopefully there are more answers than questions in a few weeks.

Michigan State has some positions up for grabs heading into fall camp.

Keep an eye on these position battles as fall camp has officially begun.

3. Tight End

Mel Tucker went into the transfer portal looking for a tight end and plucked a good one from Illinois in the form of Daniel Barker. He had 64 catches for over 800 yards and 11 touchdowns in four years with the Illini, but joining an offense like Michigan State’s may only help him. Jay Johnson wants to utilize the tight end more and Barker may be the perfect guy to do it.

Barker is the favorite to start, but Tyler Hunt returns along with Maliq Carr. Hunt is a blocking specialist while Carr is more of a receiving threat. The two have opposite strengths, but I believe if Carr can work on his blocking, he can be the team’s starter.

And then you throw in a guy like Luke Nickel and even Michael Masunas and you have some talented young depth. I think Nickel is going to be really good, but he’ll have to wait his turn.

The battle between Barker, Carr, and Hunt will be a good one.