Three days of practice — just one in pads — haven’t made much of a difference in the quarterback battle, but at least Michigan football coach Rich Rodriguez has seen a bit more of early-enrollee Devin Gardner.

“He’s a big, strong guy,” Rodriguez told the media Tuesday afternoon. “He’s very, very — I’ve used this word several times — conscientious about wanting to learn and knowing not just how, but the whys, what you’re doing. And he’s a talented guy.”

Rodriguez mentioned seeing Gardner play a few years ago at a camp, specifically remembering his thought that Gardner needed to improve his throwing motion.

“He did a lot of work, and the (Inkster High School) coaching staff did a great job with him getting him to improve his fundamentals and his throwing motion,” Rodriguez said. “He still obviously has to learn all the offense and the techniques that we do in our system, but he’s gotten better in three days.”

Rodriguez said that he and his staff haven’t really had an opportunity to evaluate the three quarterbacks against one another because they haven’t been in live scrimmage situations yet. With the coaches standing mere feet away from Gardner and sophomores Tate Forcier and Denard Robinson, it’s difficult to assess areas like knowledge of the playbook and decision-making ability. He said after the team starts truly scrimmaging (with the first scrimmage potentially this Saturday), he will have a better idea of the Wolverines' quarterback situation.

Still, Rodriguez expects growth in all three quarterbacks this spring, and he hopes to have them in positions where they can help the team at different points of games.

“I’ll be shocked, if all three of those (guys), in particular Denard and Tate, don’t get tremendously better in their fundamentals this spring,” he said.

Spring “game”: Due to current injuries and rehabilitation processes, the spring game on April 17 might look more like last year's offense vs. defense scrimmage than two full teams squaring off at Michigan Stadium, as Rodriguez would prefer.

“What I would like to do, and I’m sure the players and fans would like to do, is have a full two teams that go after each other and keep score and all that,” Rodriguez said. “I don’t think we were going to be able to do that anyway, simply because of a lack of numbers at certain positions.

“I do think we’ll be able to do that in the future. We only have 12 seniors on this year’s team, so we’ll have a lot more bodies next season.”

Rodriguez also announced Tuesday that the football program would partner with C.S. Mott’s Children’s Hospital for a fundraiser during the spring game on April 17. Admission to the game is free, but fans will have an opportunity to donate to the hospital upon entering the gates of Michigan Stadium, with a chance to win different prizes.

“It’s a win-win situation for us to have an atmosphere similar to what we did last year, which was tremendous, especially for our young players, and a chance to be able to help the hospital, which is very dear to many of us in the community,” Rodriguez said.

Injury updates: Rodriguez said two safeties, Vladimir Emilien and Jared Van Slyke, suffered knee sprains this past week. He said neither injury would require surgery, but Emilien might not return until the last week of the spring.

Since safety is a position of concern this spring, Rodriguez was disappointed that these injuries would keep the safeties off the practice field.

Rodriguez added wide receiver Je’Ron Stokes injured his ankle and defensive end Anthony LaLota injured his elbow. Both Stokes and LaLota could return within a week.

Rodriguez said that the other players — center David Molk, defensive tackle Mike Martin, wide receiver Junior Hemingway and running back Vincent Smith — that are out for the spring are “on schedule and probably ahead of schedule as far as their rehabs.”

Molk, who tore his ACL during last season, was able to jog and take snaps during no-contact drills in practice.