Wrist injury behind him, Madden Faraimo is ready to unleash his full potential, aiming to become a dominant force for Notre Dame's defense.
Rising sophomore linebacker Madden Faraimo is one of the players that has limited availability during spring training due to a wrist injury that he had cleaned up from last season. With Drayk Bowen and Kyngstonn Viliamu-Asa also out this spring to varying degrees, Faraimo had the opportunity to take a massive step forward, but they made the decision to clean up his wrist injury so he was ready to go for fall camp. This injury has plagued him for a couple of years, and the California native is ready to put it behind him.
"It’s been an issue since my senior year of high school," Faraimo explained. "I got surgery the first time; that didn’t work. I'm hopeful that this one will. It’s been a lingering problem for a while now so I’m excited for it to be over. I had surgery at the end of my high school career and I was in a cast forever. All last spring I was in a cast and throughout the season it was bothering me. It never really went away. I had a brace on it last year. It was real painful, but got through the season well."
Despite the injury, Faraimo was still able to turned some heads last season and has made a strong impression this spring even though he's not able to participate in team periods. New linebacker's coach Brian Jean-Mary has been impressed with what he's seen from Faraimo so far from the film room to the field.
"The experience he had last year is invaluable," Jean-Mary shared. "Just the little bit I’ve seen from his games and then seeing the little bit that we’ve been able to get with him, you can see the growth. One, he’s more comfortable and two, he knows where he needs to fit. Now it just comes back to the production part.
"He’s very talented obviously, athletic, a big guy that can do a lot of things," Jean-Mary continued. "We want to see him take it to the next level as far as making more plays on the ball and then seeing some of the athleticism show up with some of the blitzes and tackles for loss, sacks and those things."
Linebacker is a tough position to battle through a wrist injury. It's very physical and you have to be violent at the point of attack. Now that things are getting cleaned up for the 6-2, 235-pound linebacker, he's ready to make a big jump for the Irish defense in 2026.
"At linebacker you have to use your hands a whole lot," Faraimo explained. "It showed up a lot on my film. I was strong outside with my right arm and my left arm was a little bit out. I was overcompensating for the pain. It’ll be a big difference to have a fresh start this year."
Notre Dame is one of the few schools in the country, and might be the only team in the country, that returns all five linebackers that were in the rotation last year. In addition to Faraimo, Bowen and Viliamu-Asa, the Irish also return Jaylen Sneed and Jaiden Ausberry who are healthy this spring. This is a big year for Notre Dame and the defense, like they were last season, will be a major driver of success. They'll need this linebacking corps to play to their potential.
-------
Be sure to stay locked into Irish Breakdown all the time!