Let's talk about Ohio State
I believe they go 9-3 at best this year. I'm going to provide some rationale and some clips and many will say it's wrong, everything works out for them. Based on the last 15 years, that's entirely rational. But there was once a man named Cooper. The need for salt mine levels of caution here is obvious, of course, I'm a guy on the internet, what the hell do I know.
Head coach: Everyone know this – Ryan Day is an internal hire who independent of that is not nearly qualified for the head job at OSU. “Lincoln Riley,” they say. “Luke Fickell,” I say. Look at this Wikipedia page, it’s not impressive. Brilliant game plan vs. Michigan last year, guided Haskins to all-world numbers, led them to 3-0. 1) Conceded, 2) Was that Haskins becoming Haskins or Day helping Haskins become Haskins?, 3) who cares, Meyer was still in charge of the team. Make your own judgments, but the ultimate test: if Harbaugh had left for the NFL and Michigan hired Day, would you have been happy?
Defensive coordinator: Mattison is an odd hire. Rumor is that Day wanted Brown and was rebuffed, so Meyer engineered this move. Great recruiter, good DL coach. Well he’s only co-DC, they say, Day brought in a guy named Jeff Hafley to be co-DC with him. That guy must be a comer, young genius DC who will be the real brains behind the operation. Here’s that guy’s resume:
- Worcester Polytechnic (2001)
(Running Backs Coach)[4] - Albany (2002–2003)
(Defensive Assistant) - Albany (2004–2005)
(Secondary Coach & Recruiting Coordinator) - Pittsburgh (2006−2007)
(Defensive Assistant) - Pittsburgh (2008−2010)
(Secondary Coach) - Rutgers (2011)
(Secondary Coach) - Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2012)
(Assistant Secondary Coach) - Tampa Bay Buccaneers (2013)
(Secondary Coach) - Cleveland Browns (2014–2015)
(Secondary Coach) - San Francisco 49ers (2016–2018)
(Secondary Coach) - Ohio State (2019–present)
(Co–Defensive Coordinator & Secondary Coach)
Meh. “He’s an NFL guy”, they say. I mean, so were a lot of guys. Hoke was, after the Michigan debacle. So was Greg Robinson, before it. And it doesn’t look like he’s really the co-DC at all, he’s just running the secondary. Maybe Hafley is just taking a true year of being babysat by Mattison and observing before he takes over more control in 2020, but right now he’s just sitting on the couch watching a movie. This is Mattison’s scheme, full stop. Is that great? He’s installing a Viper, which they’ve unimaginatively re-named the “Bullet”. Mattison didn’t run a Viper when he was last DC, which means he’s picking it up from Don Brown. So this is not Mattison running his 4-3 Under/Over that he ran at Michigan, but him running another guy’s defense. Did he pick the whole thing up in two years? I’m sure he did, he’s smart, and experienced. He’s 70. Still, it seems rational to wonder if Mattison will go back to what he knows, a 4-3. And what do you know, look here. As the article states, it seems like they might be using a 4-3 more than the 4-2-5. Who knows, it’s Fall camp, take everything with a grain of salt. But you’ve already moved your 2nd best safety to Viper, you can’t put him back at safety 3 weeks into camp.
In this year’s HTTV, an Eleven Warriors writer gives a glowing review of the entire team, including the defense. He draws a direct comparison of this Mattison/Hafley co-DC marriage to that of the co-OC arrangement between Kevin Wilson and Ryan Day: an old guy / young guy combination of best of both worlds. That seems a logical comparison. But a much better one is OSU’s co-DC arrangement last year: Greg Schiano and Alex Grinch, the very same old guy / young guy combo. By all accounts it was a disaster.
Once again make your own judgments, but the ultimate test remains: if Brown had left for Maryland and Michigan hired Mattison and Hafley, would you have been happy?
Defense: You know it wasn’t great last year. Big plays everywhere. One of the worst in recent OSU memory. Well, all those players are back. Except for Bosa and the excellent Dremont Jones, who together accounted for 14 points against TCU and the win. Bosa was out after that game, yes, Jones was excellent all year (13 TFL's and an insane 9 sacks from the DT position). Was the problem scheme or players? The answer is both.
This is the Maryland game, and OSU was awful against them. It’s the 2nd play from scrimmage. Look at the bottom of the screen, #3 Damon Arnette the CB. He very obviously has contain on this play. He blows it spectacularly. This is the 11th game of the season. Then he completely gives up in a DGAF trot almost immediately. Also see #25 Brendon White, the safety behind him (he has since been moved to Viper), taking a really terrible angle as the last line of defense (ignore his lack of speed in pursuit, because Macfarland is a burner). Arnette is terrible here, unforgivably bad. He’s back as the starter.
"WTF Damon?"
Same game, just a few plays later, Arnette #3 at the bottom and White #25 as the safety. Understandably, Maryland says hey, why not try that shit again? Arnette says fuuuuuuck no I’m not losing contain and gets laughably wide. White has to fill the alley. There’s no one behind him and he knows it. Macfarland is good but come on.
Maryland. Watch another returning player, LB Malik Harrison #39, bottom of the screen between the DE and DT. Maryland will mess with you, but this guy is following a motion man who’s running into 4 of his fellow defenders, and he’s completely abandoning his gap to do so. The Maryland lineman they brought over to block him doesn’t even have anything to do. People get got, it happens, but it happened way too much for OSU last year. This isn’t Schiano’s fault.
Maryland. This is most definitely Schiano’s fault. Watch the DE and LB (#39, Harrison) at the top of the screen. They’re switching roles. For some ungodly reason. The DE drifts in to play middle gap, the LB has to run to the edge to contain. I’m sure there are reasons to do this. All of them are lost on these players. What this created was a DE playing LB and a LB playing DE, and neither knows how to, you know, do that. Watch Harrison in particular: he gets to the outside and contains, but he needs to fight off that block. Contain itself is not the goal if the defense is in that bad of shape on the play – you need to get off and make a play on the man.
OSU spring game. This is probably unfair but I'm making an assumption based on what I see: this LB doesn't fully understand what holding the edge means. Watch Harrison #39 here, same guy from the clip above, top LB on the screen. He comes over and takes on the block in exactly the same way: he gets contain, but doesn’t squeeze the hole or get his hands on the ballcarrier or even slow him down. It’s actually hard to tell who’s the blocker and who’s the defender there. You have to squeeze or spill there, because the offense would love you to eat this block.
Maryland. Let's talk about #3 Damon Arnette again, at the bottom of the screen. He’s going against a freshman wide receiver who had 9 catches for 148 yards last year. Here are 60 of them. Mr. Gattis, throw deep all day all downs please.
PSU. #3 CB at the top of the screen, absolutely pancaked by the TE.
TCU. Arnette #3 at the bottom of the screen, obviously holding and interfering with the WR, gets flagged. This is a constant issue with Arnette, and the multitudes of OSU fans that hate him will tell you all about it. No one has been able to supplant him this Fall. He has talent, he could certainly turn it around. Not likely. I bet someone else is starting over him by mid-year. This is a Hafley project, so watch this closely for clues on his coaching ability.
TCU. A twofor on the other two OSU LB’s besides Harrison: Borland and Werner. They are fine and just that. Borland #32 is a slow Desmond Morgan who plays ILB, Werner #20 is a fast but blockable one who plays OLB (on the hash). We loved Morgan because he quality player and a thumper on a Michigan defense emerging from the desert. But you wouldn’t expect him to show up on a defense that recruits the way OSU does. Much less two of him. On this play ILB Borland is simply not athletic enough to make a difference, OLB Werner gets de-cleated by a 5’9” 180 lb. freshman slot WR. Sure it’s blindside hit, but that’s the job today at OLB – you have to know that’s coming because you get cracked all day. Both are fine, they tackle people and hold their gaps and they’re fine. They’re the 3rd/4th best LB’s for Iowa, but they’re playing for Ohio State.
TCU. Another for the LBs. It’s only a 6 yard gain, but you see what they are: jet sweep and #20 Werner blocked to the ground, and #32 Borland just doesn’t have the speed to make a difference on the play.
Maryland. Don’t watch this, because it’s a B1G title going up in smoke. #20 OLB Werner has the inside slot, #4 S Fuller has the outside slot. Not sure if they were supposed to switch or stay, but they both follow the inside man. This is a wide open WR, not even covered. This is scheme because these guys don’t know what to do. Both return this year. This missed throw is also the difference between LOL Ohio State and Harbaugh being the no-doubt leader in the B1G coming into 2019. This is Meyer you deserve it fuck off into the sunset karma vs. another year of pain for Michigan fans. When people say “It doesn’t matter, you HAVE TO MAEK PLAYZZZ AND WIN THE GAMEEZZZ” remember this play. Did OSU make a play here? Is this MAEK PLAYZZ? They lucked into a win against a 5-7 football team. They did nothing here. In fact they did everything wrong and deserved to lose. This is a blind universe. There is no such thing as love.
Wide Receivers: The best ones are gone to the NFL. You know they had crazy speed, but they were also absolutely fantastic blockers. Talent remains, but not to last year’s levels.
Offensive Line: OL: Who knows? They lose 4 starters. Munford is back at LT and he’s OK. He could take a leap in his second year starting but otherwise he’s just fine. They get all-B1G Jonah Jackson from Rutgers, which in Draftgeddon they mention grad transfer interior OL don’t usually work out. I don’t know the reason for this, but I’ll take that as a point of risk. They have a new Center nobody’s seen, highly rated, first year. No idea. The other guard is Wyatt Davis, highly rated, did play two games last year and looked pretty good. Then then the right tackle is a kid named Bowen, who’s been off the depth chart for two years due to injury. Will he be good? Who knows? He was playing guard in the spring. That’s not a lot of reliability on the offensive line. The back-up tackles are Josh Alabi (from Cass Tech, the kid who brought Weber with him to OSU) and Nicholas Petit-Friere (a guy Michigan recruited hard): the former is a 5th year senior who neither the coaches nor the fans ever want to see the field, and the latter is a redshirt freshman who’s not ready based on his performance in the spring game.
Fields/QB: I don’t know, neither does anyone else. What we might know, based on what seems to be consensus insider info:
- Super recruit, but only started one year of high school football
- Didn’t do much at UGA, rumored to not have studied the playbook much
- Did not have a great spring at OSU, struggled picking up the offense (understandable, it’s known as a difficult offense to pick up)
- Did not have a great first two weeks of camp (in the team’s first scrimmage, two pick 6’s were thrown, and since no insiders would say he threw them, you know exactly who threw them)
- Had a great 3rd week of Fall camp and is named the starter
So if you’re keeping count, that’s multiple weeks of spring ball bad, two weeks of Fall camp bad, and 1 week of Fall camp good. That’s not great math for the Buckeyes. I’m going to guess they simplified everything, had him run more, and turned the offense into screen city in the 3rd week. That allowed Fields to win the job, but it won’t win OSU 10 games. Watch for the coming of screen city during the season – they had to break out in the PSU game last year in order to win, even with Haskins and those WR's. Do they have to resort to it against Cincinnati? If yes they’re in trouble this year. And of course you know the back-ups are QBs unplayable. And while Dobbins is a very good back, a back-up at RB hasn't really emerged.
Summary. Their DL is excellent, and their #1 corner very good. Fuller their #1 safety is probably very good. The negative things I've clipped above are selective to support my view, and may be biased in terms of what I want to see. All those players of course made good plays during the season. But I believe it captures some of the why on Defense. I've droned on long enough. I don't see 10 wins here. I see a loss to Michigan, MSU (Fields will have real trouble against that defense) and at least one of @Nebraska/@NW/Wiscy/Cinci/PSU. If they have to run Fields to have a functional offense and he's injured early in the year for an extended period, 7-5 is on the table.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:34 PM ^
I don't know that there's enough evidence to say Day is a good coach. He's replacing the coach with the third best winning percentage of all time in all of college football. His career is two good years as a co-coordinator at OSU and not much else. He had a few years as a bad/mediocre OC and a few more as a position coach. Nothing as a head coach.
August 25th, 2019 at 11:15 PM ^
Until we beat the fuck out of them in November, I am going to assume that Ryan Day is Urban Meyer 2.0.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:07 PM ^
That is a lot I am just going to make this simple. Their non conference schedule is weak as hell. This gives fields plenty of time to get ready and acclimated for big ten play. The only trip up I possibly see is back to back Nebraska Michigan state but still don’t see it happening since the team with better players which they have 9.9 out of ten times wins. I hate them with a passion but do not see a loss on their schedule. Then they come to the big house and we will be 9-2 10-1, and I believe history will repeat itself, but sure do hope I am wrong.
August 25th, 2019 at 11:23 PM ^
I'm not saying OSU's OOC schedule is a world-beater, but it looks deceptively "trappy."
FAU is only 2 years removed from winning 11-games and the CUSA title under Lane Kiffin.
Similarly, UC also went 11-2 under Fickell last year and is returning all their major pieces as far as I know.
August 26th, 2019 at 7:42 AM ^
I forgot Fickell went to UC. It would be a glorious day if he goes into Columbus and beats his old team!
August 25th, 2019 at 11:44 PM ^
I don't know why for some reason I feel like Frost is going to pull this one off. Martinez seems like a baller as a true freshman and now having a full season under his belt might do some things.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:08 PM ^
Beating OSU would be fantastic... They've had it great for so damn long. They don't truly remember what it's like to fear us.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:16 PM ^
Their entire season hinges on Fields being good or even staying healthy. I think they'll look a lot like the traditional running QB OSU offenses even though it is said Day wants a throw first offense.
They still have a bunch of good WR's. Their defense is deep, more overall talent than UM's.
UM's OL and QB group is probably better and is maybe the only position groups UM has on OSU. LB's are close. Their CB's and D line are better.
They could sleepwalk to 10 wins. It'll be just as hard as ever to beat them. If the offense doesn't click this season it will probably be another L.
August 25th, 2019 at 11:10 PM ^
Michigan has a better receiver group.
August 25th, 2019 at 11:45 PM ^
Don Brown is better than their DCs combined.
August 26th, 2019 at 10:04 AM ^
And that has amounted to how many wins against OSU?
August 26th, 2019 at 10:29 AM ^
Zero. Wins have nothing to do with the statement I made.
August 26th, 2019 at 11:32 AM ^
62 points say otherwise.
August 26th, 2019 at 1:11 PM ^
That was 1 year. What about the other 2 when the D was good enough? Reality is every defense is going to have games where they get got and this is especially true when playing against an air raid esque offense like osu last year. I think what brown did the previous years against osu are more indicative of what will happen this season.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:22 PM ^
Let’s stick a fireplace poker up our own asses.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:24 PM ^
9-3 sounds right. Ryan Day has been overrated. They should have moved up Kevin Wilson instead. But they still will have opportunity to do that if Day doesn't work out.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:27 PM ^
You had me at 9-3
August 25th, 2019 at 10:27 PM ^
Them and their fans can go fuck themselves. All I have to say
August 25th, 2019 at 11:38 PM ^
They*
August 26th, 2019 at 5:57 PM ^
The Michigan difference!
August 25th, 2019 at 10:28 PM ^
Awesome write up.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:29 PM ^
Nice write up, but they won’t drop off much for the exact reason you mentioned in the very beginning of your post. Everything always works out for OSU.
Lose a dominant coach in Jim Tressel to scandal? Fine, Urban Meyer falls right into your lap. He inherits a stacked roster that knows nothing but winning and immediately has a QB that couldn’t have been a more perfect fit for his type of offense.
Play like horseshit the first 11 weeks of the season with a sieve of a defense? No problem, turn it right back all on at the right time and look like downright worldbeaters against Michigan. All your weaknesses suddenly become strengths,.
Down to your third string QB? No problem. Run roughshod to a national title.
Point being, until I see things occur differently, I will just assume that everything is going to work out in OSU’s favor because that’s just been the way the world has worked the last 20 years. Things can certainly change, but I don’t believe they will until I see it happen.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:40 PM ^
This is exactly why I DON'T want to talk OSU.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:31 PM ^
More dolts with no attention span, god forbid we read something that isn't a clickbait headline and is a long read of actual substance. Great post.
August 26th, 2019 at 11:30 AM ^
Appreciate you saying this, thank you. I would assume those who thought it too lengthy would have stopped reading and moved on, rather than bother to post a reply.
August 26th, 2019 at 12:18 PM ^
Wish they'd use a tried and true message board system like Reddit has so that every thread doesn't turn into a meta circlejerk for the first page and a half. Any post with more than twenty replies turns into complete garbage.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:32 PM ^
I'm not foolish enough to believe this isn't going to be anything other than an agonizing defeat or complete ass kicking.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:37 PM ^
Pass.
August 25th, 2019 at 10:43 PM ^
Some good stuff there with plenty of reason behind it but one game at a time. Until we get to The Game!
August 25th, 2019 at 10:55 PM ^
Malik Harrison played like he was Lawrence Taylor against us.
Thats all that matters.
August 25th, 2019 at 11:02 PM ^
This is the best message board post I have ever read on MGoBlog, and I have read a lot of good ones.
August 26th, 2019 at 11:28 AM ^
Really appreciate that, thank you
August 25th, 2019 at 11:06 PM ^
I think Day will be more Mark Helfrich than Luke Fickell
August 25th, 2019 at 11:08 PM ^
Urban Meyer has left a long lasting legacy behind at Ohio State and that means that they are not going anywhere for a good while. Meyer walked into a powerhouse that was rebuilt and modernized under Jim Tressel making it quite easier for him. Meyer, however, is truly a great football coach. His recruiting has stacked the sidelines in Columbus for quite a while too. I was surprised when they handed it over to Day who has never been a head coach. I was even more surprised when they hired Mattison. There are lots of new faces in Columbus in terms of coaching so we will have to see. Even the great programs go through periods of change- like Alabama did after Stallings. Tressel is the one who created such a gap between OSU and UM by stopping Michigan's recruiting in the state of Ohio. He also changed the program as the game changed. Unfortunately, Michigan was still clinging to the past well into the 2000's and it finally came to head in 2007. We all know what happened from then until Harbaugh was hired but that is past history and there is no need to rehash Rich Road and Brady. When Harbaugh came into Michigan, he had a TREMENDOUS job to do just to get Michigan modernized. Fans like to give him shit about Ohio State but how many people managed to beat the Buckeyes under Meyer? Not many and Harbaugh came razor close in 2016. I'm waiting to see how the season plays out before the big game this year. OSU will have an entire season to break in a new QB and a new staff before arriving in AA. As for Michigan, we have a very tough schedule so let's take it one week at a time.
August 25th, 2019 at 11:18 PM ^
Please kept doing this analysis through the year. We need a ‘Michigan Monday’ level of evaluation on the opponent.
August 25th, 2019 at 11:24 PM ^
A lot of wishful thinking for such a lengthy tome.
Think about it like this:
Ryan Day and Urban Meyer crossed paths in 2001 when Day was Chip Kelly's QB running the prototype of the modern power spread and Urban was taking over Bowling Green. Meyer went to NH to study this offense and it became the basis for his offenses moving forward. Meyer and Kelly are thick as thieves and Day is a cross-pollinatzation of the two. The other coach Meyer linked up with and studied: Randy Walker and his whiz kid young assistant, Kevin Wilson, Day's current OC. If you think Urban Meyer was a guy who could amass 5* recruits, he also has an eye for 5* coaches. Day is "the guy" Meyer has in mind. He is much closer to Riley than he is to Fickel...besides, would we have been happy if, instead of Harbaugh, we got Lincoln Riley fresh off his first season as the OC of Oklahoma? Probably not.
Defense: 2018 was a low water mark for OSU. How'd that happen? Meyer hired Greg Schiano in 2016 and expected him to stay for two seasons and end up taking a head coaching job. He hired Billy Davis as the LB coach and expected similarly that he would follow Schiano to his next stop. First two years Schiano was there, things went well and OSU was predictably good on defense. The end of the 2017 season hits and all was going according to plan. Schaino was getting lots of interest so Meyer goes out and hires Alex Grinch as the new DC for Ohio State. Things appeared fine until a couple of pretty serious changes happened. Schiano was railroaded out of Tennessee and Kerry Coombs was poached by Mike Vrabel to coach corners for the Titans.
A log jam occurs. Coombs was likely co-DC with Grinch and they would find a new LB coach. Suddenly you have a misfit bunch of coaches, one coming in thinking he was going to run the defense, a veteran HC getting snubbed and forced to return to his previous job coupled with replacing a stud DB coach late in the game after a lot of the college hires were made. The results were apparent. All the talent a defense needs and they made very simple mistakes that cost them dearly all season. The coaching chemistry was terrible and there is a reason only Larry Johnson was retained.
The hires Day made on defense during the offseason were designed to bring cohesion back to the units. They have two salty old veterans, Mattison and Johnson and three younger coaches who have quite a bit of upside. If the staff gels, the talent on the roster exists in spades, OSU has recruited very well in case you've been under a rock for the last 7 years. No reason to think they won't be remarkably better this season than last season. We know what kind of coach Mattison is and Washington is definitely a rising star. I would not expect a bad defense again in Columbus.
Haskins surprised everyone. He surprised himself even. Ryan Day took a guy who didn't sniff the field as a true FR, was yanked from the Illinois game in November, 2017 for a series of miscues, had an up and down stint as a garbage time back up and refined his immense talent. Haskins has a gift for accuracy but he was not a starting-caliber QB in 2017. It is really a testament to the OSU staff for effectively retooling the offense to fit his skill set. He wasn't a zone read QB, something Meyer ran for his entire OSU tenure, and to be honest, OSU struggled with some of the limitations Haskins presented as a runner. The RPO's they used to overcome his lack of running skills impacted their running game a lot because the OL was reacting to the play rather than blocking to develop the play. Their running game actually took a step back last season and it cost them in short yardage situation when they were left with throwing the ball rather than running for 1-2 yards. At the start of 2018 most OSU fans felt Haskins was probably going to play OK and build up to his senior season where he would be a star. Clearly his rapid development was centered on his god-given talent but if you fail to see the hand in this Ryan Day had, that is the definition of "ignorance is bliss"
Fields was heavily recruited early by Meyer, they wanted him in their 2018 class but early on it seemed there was no way Fields would leave the SE. Georgia was a poor fit for Fields both schematically and depth chart wise but the pressure to stay in Georgia was pretty intense. Imagine a 5* Michigan QB talent leaving the state. It was pretty clear the offense Kirby wanted to run suited Fromm better and certainly when a returning starter is running an offense that suits him better, he will beat out the true FR. Now, as for the "Fields isn't a student" rumor, read up on the elite 11 coaching staff's accounts on how Fields prepared for what amounts to a flag football game. Then ask DeShaun Watson and Dwayne Haskins' QB guru Quincy Avery about the kid. He is pretty serious about his development. I think we're seeing Braxton Miller's legs paired with JT Barrett's brain and an arm that is a lot stronger than either one. Fields is no Haskins when it comes to arm talent, that is sure, but he is far better than anything else OSU was going to trot out this season. Tate Martell is playing back up WR for an inept offense. That, my friends, is not good news for us.
OSU has the talent to win 11-12-13 games and if they put it all together challenge for the playoffs. I would love to see them at 7-5 or 9-3 but I am not convinced that they actually dodged a bullet with Meyer leaving after 2018 and not dragging them down into oblivion the way he did Florida in 2008. Day has recruited very well for 2020, finished off the 2019 class with some big names. I think the odds are he does well at OSU, if that is the case hopefully some NFL front office can't wait to swoop him up.
August 25th, 2019 at 11:55 PM ^
You're my favorite new poster. Keep it coming.
August 26th, 2019 at 12:44 AM ^
Well...that’s a lot of wishful thinking for such a lengthy tome.
August 26th, 2019 at 7:37 AM ^
tl,dr Was there a point other than OSU is the greatest?
August 26th, 2019 at 8:21 AM ^
IMHO, one of Meyer's greatest weaknesses is loyalty to cronies. He hired Wilson because he knew him since Randy Walker. He had to take Schiano back after Schiano lost the head gig at Knoxville, thereby fucking over Alex Grinch. Meyer loves Mattison, an odd hire but definitely a Meyer arrangement. And of course Zach Smith, who was Earle Bruce's grandson.
So, Ryan Day, protege of old Meyer pal Chip Kelly, gets the co-OC gig at precisely the moment Urbz flames out. Color me skeptical.
August 26th, 2019 at 8:47 AM ^
I blame the bad performance by our DL on Mattison. Except for a player year in and year out, we never had a terrorizing DL ever since Mattison got to town. He is a good coach but not the best based on results from last four years. He is on the other side now as a DC. Let us see how performs but I am not buying it.
August 26th, 2019 at 10:56 AM ^
Perhaps, but the bad news for us is that OSU isn't letting Mattison near the D-linemen. Larry Johnson has a monopoly on coaching that group. Mattison has and will continue to focus on OSU's LB group along with Washington. I'm not even convinced Mattison is the true D cooridinator at OSU. I think it's more of a title and mentorship than actually rolling up the sleeves type of work.
August 26th, 2019 at 3:43 PM ^
I'm betting that the fact that he is no longer in UofM's Dline room, holding it back, will be more than enough for this year's line to outperform last year's.
August 26th, 2019 at 9:53 AM ^
Thanks for the response. I'm hoping to see reasons why my logic is flawed or can be explained away.
What I see in your excellent reply is a mirror of my view, but without any analysis of players. Tressel was an excellent coach with an amazing tree, and he picked Fickell (and Fickell may end up being good, but 2011 was laughably premature). Your description of the defensive coaching dysfunction is reasonable, but subjective. Haskins: this is also reasonable but entirely subjective. I don't assert that Day had no effect on Haskins, I only question whether he did, or whether it was primarily Haskins on his own. I don't think anyone really knows. And I didn't evaluate Fields in my OP because there is nearly nothing to evaluate - but your description of him is way, way over the top based on available evidence. Braxton's legs and Barrett's mind with a better arm than both is an incredible player. Maybe someday. But neither of us know. I think we'll see a player at the level of freshman Braxton Miller this year.
August 26th, 2019 at 10:48 AM ^
Great analysis, perspective and well put together. Out of curiosity, do you do some writing for a living?
August 25th, 2019 at 11:24 PM ^
I only care about them losing 1 game.
August 25th, 2019 at 11:29 PM ^
You can’t underestimate how important losing Meyer is. I understand things have worked out well for them the past 15 years, but we went through an historically poor period in the program’s history. The OSU dominance can’t and won’t last forever. Harbaugh has had 4 full years now to get things right, build depth throughout the roster, and get the best position coaches and coordinators in place. I believe he has done that and this is the year it should all turn around.
I remember consistently winning these games in the 90’s. It was great. Those days will come again and this is the year. My only question is do they fire Day immediately after they lose to us, or do they give him one more season?
August 25th, 2019 at 11:31 PM ^
I don't care what OSU's record is as long as we beat them
August 25th, 2019 at 11:34 PM ^
Let’s not talk about “the” school that trademarked “the” word “the” ... just to say “The” in “the” same sentence with Bucknuts.
August 26th, 2019 at 8:01 AM ^
"down south" works for me.