Past Seasons

I’m going to start off this season outlook for Ohio State by looking back to 2015 and trying to remember how I felt about those seasons going into them, and how 2024 compares.

2015

Immediately after Ohio State won the National Championship, one of my first thought was, “Oh, they’re going to repeat. Everybody is coming back. It’s not even fair.” 2015 was supposed to be the year. They were a year early in 2014 with all those sophomores.

But it just never felt quite right throughout the season until it all finally blew up in that miserable home game against Michigan State, when the repeat hopes went down in flames. Ultimately the offense just was too dysfunctional for long stretches under Ed Warriner who was replacing Tom Herman.

2016

I don’t remember what I thought going into this season, but as things progressed I did allow myself to think it was a team of destiny. The big win at Oklahoma really got me believing, although Oklahoma turned out to be a good-not-great team that year. The 2OT win at Wisconsin was heavily reminiscent of the 2OT win at Penn State from 2014, so I was really drinking the kool aid by that point. But the offense was, again, like in 2015, too dysfunctional for long stretches under Ed Warriner. The Penn State game was a real gut punch because Ohio State was up 21-7 in the 4th quarter but somehow blew it. But then you had that incredible Michigan win which got me believing again. Because Michigan was actually really good that year. And no, JT wasn’t short. Ohio State got into the playoff despite not winning the Big Ten, and I actually think there was a point where I convinced myself it was going to happen. But then those dreams just collided with a brick wall against Clemson. 31-0, the worst loss of Urban Meyer’s entire career. The offense was completely broken, and that’s when Urban finally had enough of Ed Warriner and made a change.

2017

Not entirely sure how I felt going into the season, but any hopes I did have were quickly dashed with a frankly embarrassing 31-16 home loss to Oklahoma. Baker’s bitch ass planted the flag. At that point I felt like we could still play our way back into the playoff picture because it was an early loss, and Oklahoma was really good that year.

After the incredible comeback win at home over Penn State, I started to believe. The team had turned a corner, they’d figured things out on offense, it was all starting to come together, they’d rally from that win going forward.

Then the next week Iowa just dropped a nuclear bomb on the season, winning 55-24 in Iowa City. Even then, though, I convinced myself the CFP Committee could come to forgive that as a one-off loss after a big emotional win. In reality I just didn’t want to admit to myself that the season was over. The big win in Ann Arbor where Dwayne Haskins stepped in for the injured JT Barrett and led us to a win–truly one of the all time great Buckeye moments in the history of the rivalry.

They went on to beat an undefeated Wisconsin team in the Big Ten Championship, and I remember going into selection day, I still thought they’d get into the playoff over Alabama even though Alabama only had one loss. We had won the Big Ten, Alabama hadn’t made it to the SEC Championship game. I really thought there was a chance until the final team was announced on screen and it was Alabama. Once it was confirmed that we were out, I understood that you just couldn’t have two losses on your resume and get in over a one-loss Alabama. But the way ESPN was talking leading up to the selection show was that Bama and Ohio State were neck and neck for the final spot, it really could go either way. So I had a lot of hope, even if I probably knew deep down that there was no chance.

2018

It was kind of difficult to focus on football as the whole Zach Smith thing blew up in the summer, Urban was suspended for the first three games, Ryan Day was the interim head coach. I think deep down I knew it was Urban’s final year at Ohio State but I didn’t want to believe it. The first three games were a little shaky under Day, but they did have that win in Dallas against TCU. When we lost Nick Bosa for the year, that was a really tough one. The defense was horrible from then on.

But I still did cling to some hope for the playoff until the Purdue nuke. From then on, it felt like a zombie season, even as Haskins rewrote all the QB records in the Big Ten books. And I was convinced beyond all doubt that it was finally the year Michigan beat us. They were the team that actually had real playoff hopes while we were an afterthought despite being 10-1 going into the game. Losing 49-20 to Purdue was just insurmountable, but I still thought we could make up for it if we won convincingly.

The Michigan game was pure joy–just an absolute dismantling of all their hopes and dreams. After the game it just felt like that was it for Urban, even though I didn’t want to believe it. Then it was just about running up the score against Northwestern in the Big Ten Championship, which we didn’t really do. The score was 45-24 but we were only up 31-24 with about 10 minutes to play. We added some late TDs to make it look more impressive, but it was too little, too late. I don’t think we were seriously considered for the playoff despite being 12-1 Big Ten Champs.

2019

The first year of Ryan Day, I was of mixed emotions. I knew the team we had was stacked beyond belief, but it was also led by a rookie head coach. That may have been our best team ever on paper, and even in terms of actual results in the regular season as well. Statistically Ohio State was the best team in the country that year. But LSU felt like the team of destiny throughout the season. I thought we were going to get to the National Championship game against LSU and lose to Burrow, but the Clemson game in the semifinals was just an absolute soul-crusher. I don’t really feel like rehashing it here, but we were the better team and lost. I’m not sure if we would’ve had a chance against LSU in the Championship game, but I think we would’ve fared better than Clemson did. We should’ve been up 28-0 on Clemson in the first half but instead we kicked field goals instead of touchdowns.

2020

Most of the offseason I was concerned with whether or not the team would actually have a season, what with Covid and Kevin Warren being a dumbass. I did kind of start to believe we had a chance after we obliterated Clemson in the playoff, though. I knew Bama was a juggernaut going into the National Championship game, but I convinced myself that because Justin Fields was a better quarterback than Mac Jones, we had a chance if it was a shootout.

But the injuries (including Fields’ ribs) and the Covid cases, plus the fact that the defense under Kerry Coombs had regressed badly from 2019, it was a very slim path to victory. Sark put on a masterclass of play calling and we simply could not keep up with Alabama. I wasn’t too broken up after the game, because there was really nothing else we could’ve done.

2021

Kind of unsure going into the season. With Fields moving on to the NFL and the defense still a question mark under Coombs, I wasn’t super optimistic. I liked Kerry Coombs as a position coach, recruiter and energy guy, but I didn’t think he had the chops to actually be a defensive coordinator. I think Ryan Day was still kind of trying to preserve Urban Meyer’s infrastructure within the program and was hesitant to really take over the program and shape it in his own image, and that’s why he promoted Kerry to DC.

Before the season, I liked CJ Stroud’s talent but was still unsure about him. It was evident early on that the defense was a major issue. Minnesota ran all over us in the opener, and then we lost at home to Oregon early with the run defense being the main reason why. However, as the season went on, Coombs got replaced and Stroud was gaining more confidence. Going into the Michigan game, I fully believed. We had just annihilated Michigan State 56-7–the same Michigan State team that had beaten Michigan earlier in the year.

I thought we’d go up to Ann Arbor and embarass those pussies who ducked smoke in 2020 with Covid as their excuse, and then I thought we’d be on a collision course with Georgia in the National Championship game. Even though Georgia was a wagon, I thought with our unbelievable passing attack–Stroud, Garrett Wilson, Chris Olave, JSN–we could score on them. But then it turned out we could not stop the run against Michigan–no interest in rehashing that.

2022

This was the year. More than any other season since 2014, I was fully and completely convinced going into the season that we were going to win the National Championship. It wasn’t just hope–it was full-blown belief. I knew it in my bones. It was going to happen. The defense would be much improved under Jim Knowles, the offense would be elite again with Stroud and JSN coming back and Marvin Harrison and Emeka Egbuka being the next guys up in the wide receiver room following the departures of Wilson and Olave. Nobody was beating us. I was convinced of it. We were so fucking good.

We would run through Notre Dame (closer than expected but the defense looked excellent), then the Big Ten, then we’d get our revenge on Michigan, get to the playoff and nobody would be able to stop us. The Michigan game, I still can’t believe it. This past year’s game in Ann Arbor, I think that was a legit game. They just beat us. We just weren’t quite good enough at quarterback. But 2022? That was all cheating. 100%. They were not better than us that year. That was the most head-scratching football game I’ve ever witnessed and it only makes sense in light of the cheating scandal. I will stand on that.

I’m not going to blame the 2021 game on cheating, because we simply could not stop the run at all, but then again–when we were on offense? I’m sure cheating had a big part to play in that game. But still, I will not blame 2021 on cheating.

2022? 100% cheating. 100%. No one will ever convince me otherwise. That was the strangest game I’ve ever seen in my life. Michigan gained over 2/3rd of their yards in that game on 5 plays. The rest of their plays they didn’t do shit.

But whatever, we still made it to the playoff. So despite going from being as confident as I’d ever been about an Ohio State team to being as despondent and angry as I’d ever been following the Michigan game, by the time it got to the playoff game, I had kind of come back off the ledge. Even though I was beyond pissed about the Michigan game and didn’t think the team even deserved a chance in the playoff, by the time the game started, I actually liked where we were. Nobody took us seriously, the Michigan game was the craziest fluke in the history of football, and Georgia felt more beatable than they were in 2021. Georgia was more balanced overall but less dominant on defense.

I loved our chances, and through three quarters of the game, it was pretty obvious we were the better team. We just were. And I was like “I FUCKING TOLD YOU! I FUCKING KNEW IT! I WAS FUCKING RIGHT ALL ALONG! THE MICHIGAN GAME WAS FAKE AND I FUCKING KNEW IT!” And it was true. The way our team looked against Georgia for the first three quarters, that was the reason I was so thoroughly convinced we were winning the whole thing that year. We were down to like a 4th string running back, we were already missing JSN for the whole season–the team actually had a ton of injuries, but Stroud and the passing attack were just so fucking elite that it didn’t matter. As long as Stroud, Marv and Emeka were out there, nobody was beating us.

Then Marvin Harrison Jr. got knocked out of the game, and it all started to unravel. I still maintain that we could’ve won the game even without him, if the refs had just called it a fucking targeting penalty. Because then we would’ve gotten the ball at the one yard line, punched it in for a TD, and gone up 42-24. That would’ve been enough to win. And we still almost won even without that TD we should’ve had. I don’t really blame the kicker, because a 50-yarder in college is extremely difficult to hit. I really place more of the blame on Ryan Day’s play calling at the end after Stroud’s long run got us down into field goal range. Ryan Day called the game from there like he was just satisfied with trying a 50-yarder, when he should’ve been trying to get closer. I hated the way he managed those next three plays, and then we missed the field goal.

That’s the worst loss I’ve ever witnessed as an Ohio State fan. The 2019 Clemson game is up there, but what makes the Georgia game so much worse is that the Georgia game was the real National Championship. They went on to beat TCU 65-7. We would’ve done something similar. The Peach Bowl was the real Natty. We were a field goal away from winning the Natty. That was it. The Clemson game, even if we had won, we still would’ve had to play LSU. But the Georgia game, that was it. That was the Natty.

What really makes it so excruciating is that we got a second chance. God saw Michigan cheat to beat us and said, “Okay, I know what they were up to. They robbed you. I’m going to give you another chance at this thing.” And he smited Michigan right before, too! Texas CHRISTIAN University embarrassed them.

But even though God gave us a second chance, we couldn’t capitalize.

Just. Couldn’t. Capitalize.

We were the better team. We were the best team in the country that year. I believed it at the start of the season, I believed it up until the Michigan game, and then I was having major cognitive dissonance because we lost the game but it so fucking fluky and I knew Michigan was not that good. But then in the Georgia game, it was like, “So I WAS right after all!”

2022 hurts more than any other season because CJ Stroud should’ve won the Heisman, we should’ve had our revenge on Michigan, and we should’ve won the National Championship. But those cheating fucks in Ann Arbor ruined it all, and I’ll never forgive them. That season was the biggest sports travesty of my lifetime. It didn’t have the correct outcome. That’s not the way it was supposed to go. It was inorganic, unnatural. It was a fucking mistrial, a miscarriage of justice. It felt like a rigged election or something.

Like, what the fuck, man? That’s not right. This is all wrong.

I don’t really hold anything against Georgia, but they were not the best team in the country that year. The wrong champion was crowned. It’s the one college football season that really sticks out to me where the wrong team won the Championship. I can’t think of any other season outside of 2015 and 2022 where I know deep in my bones that the wrong team was crowned Champion. And with 2015, we didn’t even get to the playoff, there’s no guarantee Ed Warriner’s offense would’ve been able to beat Bama–I can’t say for certain that we were the best team in the country in 2015, although I do believe we probably were.

With 2022, I know beyond a doubt we were better than Georgia, and the Michigan game results should’ve been thrown out due to cheating. We got cheated, robbed, screwed-over, bamboozled, hosed–whatever you want to say. That shit still eats me up. I’ll never get over it.

The more I think about it the more pissed off I get. So I’m just going to move on here. But the bottom line is that the season was a miscarriage of justice. It was the incorrect result. It was like a movie with a botched ending. It was like the ending of Game of Thrones. It shouldn’t have ended that way. We were Nikola Tesla and Georgia was Thomas Edison–we got screwed, it got buried, and history is written by the victors. We were Richard Nixon in the 1960 election. What a fucking travesty.

2023

Going into the season I was more optimistic about McCord because I thought anybody in Ryan Day’s system was going to put up incredible numbers, and Ryan Day could turn any quarterback into a Heisman finalist.

Not the case, it turned out. As CJ Stroud’s NFL career blossomed throughout the fall, and Kyle McCord continued to struggle, it became pretty clear that CJ Stroud was a special, special talent and we could not just simply expect every Ohio State quarterback to put up numbers like he did. But the Notre Dame game, even as close as it was, convinced me we were a team of destiny.

With the Michigan cheating scandal breaking midway through the season, and how much worse they looked after it, I was convinced we would go up there and beat them. But McCord just wasn’t quite good enough. And so it was that, led by the worst Ohio State quarterback of the modern era, we came up about 35 yards short of beating the best Michigan team ever in Ann Arbor.

We weren’t quite good enough on offense to get it done, and frankly, our defense, despite being very good statistically, was lacking one key area: we didn’t generate enough negative plays; we didn’t put enough pressure on the quarterback. That was a big thing all season, but we just didn’t create enough havoc in the pocket on defense that year.

Still, though, I thought we’d be able to do it. It was a weak field last year–Alabama was markedly worse than they’d normally been under Saban, and it ultimately turned out to be his final season. Georgia, after two National Titles, was a bit thin having lost so many guys to the NFL the past two seasons. Georgia felt like they were a notch below their 2021 and 2022 teams. And then I just looked at Washington and Oregon and felt like they didn’t have the dudes to really match up with us. Penix and that passing attack was scary, but we just had so much more talent than they did. Texas scared me the most, honestly. I thought they were the most well-rounded team, and their main weakness (secondary), I didn’t think Kyle McCord would be able to exploit.

But we just came up a bit short against MIchigan, and that’s definitely a loss that will haunt me, but not overly so because if you give me some truth serum, I’ll have to admit Michigan was slightly better than us. They had a bajillion seniors and old guys, and yes, they got busted for cheating, but Stalions was no longer on that sideline, and by the time they got busted–I don’t know, I guess they’d already reaped all the benefits of it? Or maybe our game against them would’ve been more lopsided in their favor if they still had Connor Stalions? I don’t know. All I know is that if the cheating didn’t benefit them they wouldn’t have done it, and their program made a quantum leap after the cheating began. I don’t know how else to make sense of it.

All I know is that if we were a bit better at quarterback in 2023, we would’ve beaten them, and then probably won the National Championship, I guess. Right? They did, so why couldn’t we? So it’s a second straight season in which Ohio State loses narrowly to the eventual National Champion. 2023 doesn’t hurt nearly as badly as 2022, though. The only thing that really bugs me about 2023 is that we couldn’t stop Michigan and the field was so weak that the unthinkable happen: those fuckfaces in Ann Arbor won a National Championship. Nobody deserves it less. They’re arrogant and delusional and now they’ve been validated. Why do good things happen to bad people?

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2024 Outlook

This season I don’t really have any expectations. Maybe that’s because it’s April, but I think the big part of it is that after being burned so many times in the past, and having my dreams crushed, I don’t want to set my expectations up too high. I’m just going to let the chips fall where they may.

Now, that said, I have never really felt this way about Ohio State before. Other than maybe 2015, but even this feels different. We have the best roster in America, I think. Even in 2015, I felt that was the case, but I also felt that Bama might be on par with us.

This year, the only team out there I see on par with us is Georgia. It’s us and them. And I just love our veteran experience. I mean this year’s Ohio State squad is a legitimate superteam. It already feels iconic with Jeremiah Smith, the LeBron James of football, in the fold. It feels like the LeBron Miami Heat, honestly. We’re a rockstar team. It’s a fucking dream team.

If I hadn’t been burned so many times in the past, I would probably be more confident than ever that this Ohio State team will win the National Championship. We’re going to have the best defense in America, and it might even be generational. When you have a generational defense, you are a prohibitive favorite to win the National Championship. Period.

Having a generational defense is just different than a generational offense. We’ve had generational offenses in Columbus multiple times since 2018.

But a generational defense is different–it means, simply, that you just don’t really need much out of your offense and you can still win. If you have a generational offense but a suspect defense, you are still going to need to outscore teams in order to win games. You might be able to score 45 on anybody, but it takes a lot to go right for that to happen in the big games.

I just think stout defenses travel better, and are more replicable. In other words, I think it’s much more likely for an offense that scored 45-50 points a game to have a massive letdown and score 20 than it is for a defense that allows 9 points a game to suddenly have a game where it allows 35. You get what I mean?

It has to be a truly generational offense–like 2019 LSU or 2022 Ohio State–to be immune to letdowns. Most of the time, though, when you have an elite offense, you’re prone to letdowns.

I just think the truly great defenses are what wins in college football. And it’s because a great defense just makes life so much easier for the offense, whereas a great offense doesn’t really make life easier for the defense. If that makes sense.

Like, for instance, if my defense is holding opponents to 10 points a game, then on offense, I know I just have to score 17 points and we win. My job is a lot easier. I don’t have to have this amazing, perfect and synchronized offensive performance to win. All I have to do is cobble together 3 scoring drives and we win the game, and if I’m able to get 4-5 scoring drives, we’ll win comfortably.

If we’re up 17-7 in the fourth quarter and we can’t get much going offensively, that’s still okay because I know the other team isn’t going to score on our defense. We can win even if I’m not perfect on offense.

But if I know our offense will score 40, that still doesn’t make my job easier if I’m on defense. Because if I take my foot off the gas, I might let up 35-40 points. I still have to be on my Ps and Qs here. If we’re up 41-20 going into the fourth, and I as the defense take my foot off the gas, two scoring drives and it’s a ballgame.

You just have a lot more room for error in all facets of the game if you have an elite defense. And that’s why I’d take an elite defense over an elite offense any day of the week. Just think about it.

You throw a pick on your own side of the field on offense? That’s okay, the defense will force a field goal.

You can’t get much going on offense for the first half? That’s okay, because the defense will keep the game close and allow you to easily come back in the second half–or you might even be ahead at halftime even in spite of a bad half of offense.

Special teams muffs a punt? That’s fine, the defense will mitigate the damage.

Special teams lets up a return touchdown? We’re fine, because the other team still can’t score on our defense. It’s not a critical error.

An elite defense just gives you so much more room for error. It makes life so much easier for both the offense and the special teams units.

Bottom line: if nobody can score more than 20 on you, you are incredibly difficult to beat. It’s that simple.

In my view, no matter how you slice it, you still need a defense that can hold the opponent under 20. Because even if your offense scores 45 points, if you let up 27 points or 34 points, you still haven’t really put the other team away.

And that’s what great defenses do: they put games away. They shut the door. You cannot truly shut the door on an opponent with your offense, right? Because no matter how many points you score, if the other team keeps scoring as well, it’s still a ballgame.

Football is about scoring more points than the other team, and you can approach that task in one of two ways: score as many points as you can on offense, or hold them to as little points as possible on defense. Ideally, you’d be able to do both, but only the truly greatest of the great teams are elite on both offense and defense.

I’m looking at the 2019 LSU schedule, and as amazing a team as they were, they still had a lot of shootouts they were in that season. I’m seeing scores like 45-38 vs. Texas, 66-38 vs. Vanderbilt, 46-41 vs. Bama, 58-37 vs. Ole Miss, 42-28 vs. Florida.

But I look at 2001 Miami, they only let up double-digit points four times that year. They only had one high scoring game that year, and it was a 49-27 win at FSU. They were up 49-20 before FSU added a late TD.

Miami in 2001 only allowed 9.8 points a game to opponents, and when you can stifle teams like that, you can win even if your offense doesn’t have it that day. They had an 18-7 win at Boston College, for instance, that they almost lost. They were up 12-7 and Boston College was driving inside the Miami 10 yard line with 34 seconds to play–until a pick six by the Miami defense sealed it. The point is, though, with an elite defense, you can win those types of games where you’re on the road and your offense just has nothing going at all.

It just makes such a massive difference going into a road game where your offense knows it only has to score 20-24 points and you can win, vs. going into a road game knowing you need 40.

All this is to say, I think Ohio State’s defense this season is going to be elite. Possibly generational. And that gives me a ton of confidence in their chances to win a National Title.

It means their offense is not going to need to score 40 a game.

Now, it will have to be better than last year’s offense, because while I still think Ohio State could’ve won the National Title last year even in spite of its less-than-stellar offense, I also think the field this year is going to be much deeper and tougher than it was last year.

I just think in 2024 there will be more great teams than there were last year. In fact, I don’t think there were any great teams last year. I thought there were a handful of really good teams, but nobody was great.

This year, I look at Georgia, Texas and Oregon as teams that could potentially be great alongside Ohio State. Ole Miss very well could be great also. It’s just a much deeper field this season.

However, while I do have my concerns about Ohio State at the quarterback position as well as on the right side of the offensive line, I’m confident they’ll be better than last year’s offense because of one guy: Chip Kelly.

Chip Kelly has never had this much talent at his disposal offensively. He’s got the best running back group in the country and the best receiver room in the country. He’s done more with lesser quarterbacks than Will Howard. He always manufactures a great running game, and that’s something Ohio State hasn’t had in a while. He’s just such a great Xs and Os guy that he’ll be able to take this offense to a higher level than it was in 2023 even if there are question marks at the quarterback position.

Plus, I do like the fact that they’re bringing back most of their offensive line, and the offensive line is a development position where continuity is such a big deal. Last year, they were replacing three starters on the offensive line, and that’s really hard to do even for a program like Ohio State. They had a redshirt freshman at center, and again, the offensive line is an upperclassmen-driven unit. You can get away with having young guys at a lot of positions, but not so much on the offensive line. It takes time for high schoolers to turn into grown men from a physical standpoint, and that’s why the offensive line is really about juniors and seniors.

So just by virtue of the fact that you have Josh Simmons and Donovan Jackson coming back, plus Seth McLaughlin who was a multi-year starter at Alabama–that’s huge. Josh Fryar is a bit limited as a right tackle, but I also thought some of the sacks he let up last year were McCord’s fault–McCord was terrible with his feet and moving in the pocket, and often walked right into a lot of sacks. Like if Fryar forced a guy outside and behind the quarterback, the quarterback has to step up to avoid that pressure and help out his tackle. McCord had a tendency to drift backwards and right into a sack.

Even if Ohio State does have to go with Josh Fryar at right tackle, I think as long as the quarterback is more mobile and has better pocket awareness than McCord (not very high bars to clear), Fryar will be fine.

Ohio State will plug somebody in at right guard, and it may even be Fryar.

I’m not super worried about the offensive line, and I’m really not worried about the quarterback spot, either, because quarterbacks in Chip Kelly’s system will produce. In 2010, he led Oregon to the BCS Championship game with a quarterback named Darron Thomas. Thomas never even played in the NFL after college.

I know Kelly doesn’t run the Oregon “blur” offense anymore, at least he didn’t at UCLA, and I don’t think he will at Ohio State given that it’s still Ryan Day’s offense ultimately. But the point is the offense is in great hands. Chip Kelly is one of the great offensive minds in football history. In 2013 with the Eagles, he had Nick Foles as one of the best quarterbacks in the league. 

Chip Kelly does not need an elite talent at quarterback to produce. He’s a guy who can do more with less.

Overall, I think a lot of people are focused on the Ohio State offense because of the quarterback competition, and of course the alien himself Jeremiah Smith. The offense is more interesting right now.

But while I think the offense will be good, with the potential to be great hinging on the QB play, the real story for Ohio State is the defense. They bring almost everyone back from a defense that was top-3 in the nation last season, and they’ve added Caleb Downs. They’re going to be unbelievable on defense in Jim Knowles’ third season in Columbus, and that’s why I am putting my expectations for the 2024 season in the rare air of “should win a National Championship.”

Only two other previous seasons fall into that category: 2015 and 2022.

That means I view them as the best team in the country, and the team most likely to win the National Championship this year.

But it’s a bit different from 2022. That year, I viewed them as a team of destiny–it was their destiny to win the whole thing. I wasn’t actually certain they were the best team in the country going into 2022–Georgia was coming off a Natty and brought a lot of guys back, Bama was still Bama (we thought), Michigan brought a lot of guys back. I wasn’t convinced Ohio State had the best roster in the country in 2022, it was more that I thought CJ Stroud was so great, and their offense as a whole would be so great, that when you add in Jim Knowles to fix the defense, they’re going to be unstoppable. I didn’t think Knowles would get them up to that top-5 level because that’s just unrealistic to do in your first year, but I also didn’t think they needed to be top-5 level on defense with how good they were on offense. They didn’t need to hold teams to 10 points a game, just 20. But even beyond the tangible, on-paper stuff, I just had a feeling about 2022. A premonition or something.

This year, and perhaps as a result of 2022, I won’t go that far. I won’t allow myself because I’ve been burned in the past. There is no such thing as destiny or fate in college football–you have to play the games, and there are too many different ways that something can go awry. Injuries, flukes, bad calls, cheating, etc.

Plus, with an expanded postseason, there are now more opportunities for something to go wrong. Best case scenario, Ohio State gets a bye in the first round of the playoff, but even then, they will have to win three playoff games to become Champions instead of two. And if the regular season goes awry, it’s four.

Now, with the expanded postseason also comes a greater margin of error in the regular season. They can legitimately lose two games in the regular season and still make the playoffs, but then they would have to win four playoff games, and you don’t want that.

But overall, with the expanded playoff, the path to a National Title isn’t as clear. Again, there’s just more that can go wrong, and football is a high parity sport by nature (fewer possessions compared to a sport like, say, basketball, and the do-or-die nature of the postseason also factors into that as well). College football is much lower parity than the NFL because of the imbalances in talent, so I do think it’s overwhelmingly likely that Ohio State not only makes the playoff but earns a bye as one of the top four teams.

It’s really just about being able to beat Georgia and Texas, in my eyes. I know I have Oregon in that top-4, but they play Oregon in the regular season, and it’s very likely they’ll also play Oregon again in the Big Ten Championship game. So we’ll know how Ohio State and Oregon stack up before the playoff. 

Georgia is turning over more than half of its roster from last season–43 players either graduated, declared for the draft, or hit the portal. They’re losing a ton of guys that have played key roles for them over the past couple of seasons, including Brock Bowers, Ladd McConkey, cornerback Kamari Lassiter, DB Tykee Smith, S Javon Bullard, C Sedrick Van Pran, OT Amarius Mims, both their running backs Kendall Milton and Daijun Edwards.

Georgia does bring back some guys on the offensive line, at receiver, in their front seven, and of course QB Carson Beck, who I thought really came on in a major way later in the season in 2023 and may well be the best returning quarterback in college football.

They’re going to have a strong front seven as usual and an elite quarterback, so while they do have some big losses, they’re still going to be great.

Texas is interesting because they also, like Georgia, bring their QB back, and if Carson Beck is the best returning QB in college football, Quinn Ewers might be the second-best. Some people may even prefer Ewers over Beck, it’s pretty damn close.

But Texas has a lot of key losses as well. While they do retain most of their offensive line, which is a huge deal, they lose a ton of skill players. Receivers AD Mitchell and Xavier Worthy are NFL-bound, as are running back Jonathan Brooks and TE Jatavion Sanders. Defensively, they lose those two monster tackles Byron Murphy and T’Vondre Sweat but retain just about everyone else on that side.

Overall, 32 players turned over on the Texas roster from last year to this year. The offense will have a lot of new faces at the skill positions, including transfer WR Isaiah Bond from Alabama, but that turnover will be mitigated a good deal by the return of Ewers as well as the return of most of their offensive line. Christian Jones is the only offensive lineman they lost to the draft, and they were pretty damn good up front last year to begin with. So this might be the best offensive line in the country. Plus, running back CJ Baxter got a lot of experience last year filling in for Jonathan Brooks after he blew out his knee, so Baxter is not some wet behind the ears newbie.

Really, though, I just don’t think people are talking enough about this Ohio State defense. It’s got a great chance to be the best in the country, and it’s like none of you even care.

People are so worried about the quarterback position that they’re missing the fact that Ohio State no longer needs a CJ Stroud-level quarterback to be great.

The defense is going to be even better than it was last year–potentially a lot better–and the defense last year was still good enough to get within 35 yards of beating the eventual National Champions on their own field. And that was with Kyle McCord at quarterback.

I thought McCord was pretty terrible. His numbers were decent, but a lot of that was Ryan Day’s system and Marvin Harrison Jr., I thought.

And yet the Ohio State defense was almost good enough to beat the eventual National Champions. Now, I do think the defense kind of dropped the ball a bit in the Michigan game, allowing 30 points. They simply weren’t able to generate enough negative plays to keep Michigan behind the chains, and so even though they held Michigan to a low yards per rush number, it didn’t matter because Michigan was still able to gain 3-4 yards consistently, and when you get a third and short or even a fourth and short, you just go for it because you know you can get 3 yards. It’s really, really hard to stop a team on third or fourth and short.

So that’s one area where Ohio State will have to improve–generating pressure.

The good news is, I think they will because they have the best secondary in America. The secondary is the strongest part of their defense, without question. They are absolutely loaded back there. They’ve got three cornerbacks who I could see being first round picks, plus Caleb Downs and Lathan Ransom at safety. And then behind their cornerbacks they have studs in the second unit: Jermaine Matthews and Calvin Simpson-Hunt are the most notable. It’s an embarrassment of riches in the secondary, truly. Tim Walton is the best in the business at coaching and recruiting DBs.

So what does this mean? It means they can blitz away up front. Or, they might not even have to because their secondary will generate a bunch of coverage sacks. But if they want to generate pressure on the quarterback, they are free to blitz to their heart’s content knowing they have an elite secondary.

In 2022, what killed them on defense was the big plays. There were some big plays against Michigan that they let up (cheating certainly helped), but they also let up some big plays via coverage busts against Georgia. Those big plays they allowed were the main reason they didn’t win the National Title. Jim Knowles was known as a blitz-a-holic back then, and he straight up said that year that he was fine with allowing some big plays because that’s all part of the deal when you are blitzing a ton and putting pressure on the quarterback. And they felt like this philosophy bit them in the ass.

So in 2023, I think in terms of philosophy, they shifted too conservative. They were “fighting the last war,” so to speak. Their priorities on defense shifted from generating tons of pressure to not allowing big plays. They were deathly afraid of not letting up big plays, and in a vacuum, as far as that goal was concerned, they achieved it with flying colors. They let up the fewest 40+ yard plays in the country, the third fewest 20+ yard plays, and the 2nd fewest 10+ yard plays.

They were bound and determined to not allow big plays, because that was their undoing in 2022, but unfortunately in 2023 it came at a cost. They dialed back the blitzing dramatically and relied on their front four to generate pressure, and they wound up 60th in the country in sacks with just 28 all season. They were 66th in sacks per game at just 2.15. They were also 65th in tackles for loss with just 72, which came out to just 5.54 per game, good for 73rd nationally.

So this year they’ve got to find a middle ground between generating enough pressure and not letting up big plays. I think they over-emphasized pressure in 2022, and then over-emphasized preventing big plays in 2023. This year, they need a Goldilocks defense–it has to be just right.

Fortunately, I think that’s possible with how good their secondary is. They don’t need to drop a bunch of guys into coverage this year–the secondary is good enough to cover without additional help from the linebackers. So now they’re going to be more freed up to send the linebackers on blitzes.

And it also helps that they’ve got two new guys playing linebacker, Sonny Styles and CJ Hicks, who are basically built to rush the passer.

Their defensive line brings back three of the four main starters, and they replace defensive tackle Mike Hall with Ty Hamilton, who is a real monster in the middle. The best part is that they’ve got tons of depth on the defensive line and will be able to rotate guys in and out all game long, and all season long, to stay fresh for as long as possible. Last year, they left their starters in so much and I think they were on dead legs by the end of the regular season.

So while the Ohio State defense was really good in 2023, it definitely had some fatal flaws, namely that they didn’t generate enough pressure, and they didn’t do a good enough job rotating guys along the defensive line.

This year, I think both categories will improve. They really are loaded on defense, the only real question is the linebacker play, but they’ve got a veteran in Cody Simon plus two absolute freakshows in Styles and Hicks, both of whom were 5-star guys. Styles, however, is converting to linebacker from safety, and Hicks hasn’t really played much until this year. Both guys are freakishly talented, but don’t have a ton of experience at linebacker. So that would be my only real question about this defense. There’s got to be a “weakness” somewhere, even if it’s just relatively speaking, and if there is one, it would be at linebacker.

But still, overall, this is going to be a heck of a defense.

And nobody really seems to care. It’s all about the quarterback–which I understand, since quarterback is the most important position on the field, but as long as the quarterback is just better than Kyle McCord, Ohio State can absolutely win a National Title. No question about it.

College football isn’t the NFL. You don’t need Patrick Mahomes or Tom Brady to win it all. In the NFL, you’re basically fucked if you don’t have a top-5 quarterback. For the most part. It is insanely difficult to win a Super Bowl without an elite quarterback.

Not in college football.

2017 College Football playoff, Georgia vs. Oklahoma: Oklahoma had the Heisman-winning quarterback who would go on to be the #1 overall pick in the draft, Baker Mayfield. Georgia had Jake Fromm at QB. Georgia won the game. And it was a shootout, too. 

This year’s National Championship game: Michael Penix, a Heisman finalist and one of the three best quarterbacks in the country, lost to JJ McCarthy–and this is not about how good or bad you think he’ll be in the NFL, but more about the fact that he won the game while completing only 10 passes.

Alabama beat Georgia in the SEC Championship with Jalen Milroe at QB, while Georgia had Carson Beck. Jalen Milroe is terrible at throwing the ball. He’s a running back playing QB, while Carson Beck was a top-10 QB in the nation last year, at minimum.

I’m just going to list off some of the quarterbacks that have won National Championships since 2000: JJ McCarthy, Stetson Bennett (twice, although the second time he was a Heisman finalist), Mac Jones (he had an All Star team around him and the best playcaller in the game in Sark), Trevor Lawrence BUT AS A TRUE FRESHMAN, Jalen Hurts/Tua (back when Hurts couldn’t throw at all, and Tua as a true freshman came in and saved the day in the Natty), Jake Coker (I’m not making that name up, either), Cardale Jones (Ohio State’s third-string QB that year), AJ McCarron (twice), Greg McIlroy, Matt Flynn, Chris Leak, Matt Mauck and Craig Krenzel.

Some of the guys on that list people have never even heard of. Like, who the fuck? Matt Mauck?

Do people even remember that Alabama won a National Championship with a quarterback named Jake Coker? Has there ever been a more anonymous National Championship-winning quarterback?

The two best Bama QBs of the Saban era–Tua and Bryce Young–didn’t win National Championships as full-time starters. Yes, technically Tua did come in for the second half and led Bama to victory in 2017, but he was a true freshman and was not the full-time starter all season. When Tua was the full-time starter, they were unable to win a Natty.

We all agree that the Heisman is mostly a QB award now, right? 

Since 2000, there have been 24 Heisman winners. 20 of those 24 have been quarterbacks.

Of those 20 quarterbacks to win the Heisman Trophy–which essentially means the best quarterback in college football–only 4 of them have won the National Championship that same season: Joe Burrow in 2019, Jameis in 2013, Cam in 2010, Matt Leinart in 2004.

Now, in fairness, a further 9 of those 20 have gotten to either the National Championship game or at the very least the college football playoff, so that actually makes 13 of the 20 that have gotten at least to the CFP (11 of the 20 have gotten to the National Championship game while the other two, Baker Mayfield and Kyler Murray, only got to the CFP Semifinal).

But still: that means 9 of the 20 Heisman winning QBs since 2000 were defeated in either the National Championship game or the CFP Semis.

I watched Stetson Bennett beat CJ Stroud in the playoff.

I watched Cade McNamara beat CJ Stroud in 2021 and end Ohio State’s decade-long win streak.

Sure, there are your instances of Joe Burrows and Cam Newtons and Vince Youngs. Florida State in 2013 does not win that Natty without Jameis Winston.

But you even think about Matt Leinart in 2004–sure, he was great, but he also had Reggie Bush and an outstanding defense.

In college football, it’s the best roster that wins the National Championship, not the best quarterback. Sometimes there will be a quarterback who is so transcendently great that he can carry the team himself, like Cam Newton in 2010. But other times, it’ll also happen that the best QB plays on the best team. That was the case with Leinart in ‘04.

And I know this might be sacrilege, but fuck it: Tebow was fortunate he played on the best roster. Those Florida defenses in that era were insanely good, yet Tebow got all the credit. For one thing, when people talk about Tebow winning two rings, he was only the starter for one of them: 2008. Chris Leak was the QB in 2006, but he’s basically been erased from history Because Tebow. In 2008, though, Florida won the National Championship 24-14 over an Oklahoma team that rewrote all the college football offensive record books. Florida’s defense held that historic 2008 Oklahoma offense to 14 points.

In other words, Tebow only had to lead the offense to more than 14 points in that game. Wow–great, man. They also had Percy Harvin, one of the greatest offensive weapons in the history of college football.

I’m not saying Tebow wasn’t great, because he was, but he’s not on the same level as a Cam Newton or a Joe Burrow or a Vince Young, man. He just isn’t. Texas won that 2005 Rose Bowl over USC (a USC team that had won consecutive National Titles) by a score of 41-38. Vince Young had to score, and answer, and answer, and answer again–Tebow ain’t like that.

The one year Tebow did win the Heisman, 2007, Florida went 9-4. Why were they 9-4? Because the defense wasn’t nearly as good as it was in 2006 or 2008. In 2007, in games where the Florida defense let up 28 or more points, they were 3-3. They even lost 20-17 at home to Auburn that year–Heisman winner Tebow could only put up 17 points at home against a 9-4 Auburn team.

In both the 2006 and 2008 National Championship games that Florida won, they held their opponents to just 14 points each game. And both their opponents had Heisman-winning QBs. They held 2006 Ohio State, who had Troy Smith, to 14 points–and really it was just 7 points, because the other 7 points for Ohio State were on a Ted Ginn kick return on the opening play of the game. 2008 Florida held Heisman-winner Sam Bradford to 14 points in the National Championship game.

The point is, those 2000s Florida teams won with defense first.

Look, obviously there’s more than one way to skin a cat here: you can win with a transcendent quarterback like Joe Burrow, or Cam Newton, or Vince Young. Sure, it can be done. 

But it’s not the Most Ideal Path to a National Championship. It’s just not. College football history shows us that there’s a lot more AJ McCarrons and JJ McCarthys and Jake Cokers and Craig Krenzels and Greg McIlroys and Matt Flynns and Chris Leaks and Mac Joneses than there are Joe Burrows or Cam Newtons or Vince Youngs.

Plus, Ohio State has tried the Amazing Quarterback route with Justin Fields and CJ Stroud–it didn’t work.

Maybe you’ll say I’m crazy, but I think I’d take a stifling, ferocious defense over a Joe Burrow. That sentence felt really weird to type out, and after typing it out I’m not even sure I believe it, but I think the real takeaway is that it’s more realistic to try and build up an elite defense than it is to hope for a Joe Burrow or a Cam Newton.

Those guys just don’t grow on trees, man. You’ve got a much better chance of putting together an elite defense than you do of finding the next Vince Young. And I have numbers to back it up.

15 of the past 25 National Champions ranked inside the top-5 defensively in terms of points per game allowed.

(The reason it’s 25 is because in 2003, there was a split National Title, so there have been 25 National Champions over the past 24 years.)

Comparatively, 10 of the past 25 National Champions ranked inside the top-5 offensively in terms of points per game scored.

Now, that does not mean there wasn’t any overlap in there–there are five teams going back to 2000 that were top-5 in both offensive and defensive points per game, and they are as follows: 2001 Miami, 2008 Florida, 2013 Florida State, 2018 Clemson and 2022 Georgia.

But that still means there were 10 teams to win a National Championship ranking inside the top-5 in defensive points allowed while not ranking in the top-5 in offensive points scored, whereas there were only 5 teams that ranked in the top-5 offensively but not defensively. Double the number in favor of the defenses.

Put differently: only 5 of the past 25 National Champions have been able to do it with a top-5 scoring offense while not having a top-5 scoring defense.

Additionally, the #1 ranked scoring defense has won the National Championship in 9 out of the past 24 years, while the #1 ranked scoring offense has won the National Championship twice in 24 years.

Defense wins championships. It’s as simple as that.

And if you think that’s just a relic of the 2000s when the game was heavily skewed towards defenses, and it’s not so much the case now, think again: 4 of the past 7 National Champions have been ranked #1 nationally in points per game allowed. Michigan, Georgia in 2021, Clemson in 2018 and Alabama in 2017.

For all the talk about offense nowadays, defense still wins championships. It even does in the NFL, too, but that’s beyond the scope of this post.

And you know what? I’ll even go a step further here: you can win a National Championship with straight up turmoil at the quarterback position. Four of the last 10 National Champions have had unclear situations at quarterback. In 2021, remember how during the regular season Georgia was going back and forth between JT Daniels and Stetson Bennett before finally settling on Stetson? In 2018, Clemson started the season with Kelly Bryant at QB but then benched him midseason for true freshman Trevor Lawrence. In 2017, Nick Saban benched his starting QB at halftime of the National Championship game and had a true freshman, Tua, come in to save the day in the second half. And in 2014, Ohio State won a National Championship with a third string quarterback, with the top two guys having gone down with season-ending injuries.

Ohio State should be a lot more excited about the fact that they are going to have an incredible defense. Straight up. That’s what really moves the needle when it comes to winning a National Championship.

I know offense is sexy and more fun, and it’s more interesting to speculate about, but really, it’s about defense. An elite defense provides you with a much clearer, more tried-and-true path to a National Championship than a great offense does.

Obviously, you want to be elite on both sides of the ball, but if you can only be elite on one side, it’s probably smarter to choose defense, quite honestly.

The quarterback at Ohio State is probably going to be Will Howard, and he’ll be fine. He won’t be Joe Burrow, he won’t be CJ Stroud, but that’s okay. He doesn’t have to be with this defense.

I still think Ohio State will be able to be a top-10 offense, though. I really do think that.

And it’s because they’re about to have a stacked run game as well. Remember, they’ve got the best running back duo in the country, and we haven’t even really talked about that.

I think Ohio State over the past few years fans have gotten tricked into believing there’s only one way to play football, because that’s what they’ve grown accustomed to. They’re using to being a pass-first team where the run game doesn’t play a huge role, and where the defense is nothing more than a liability.

They don’t know how to view the defense as an asset–they don’t remember what it’s like to have a team where the defense carries the offense. They’re used to the offense leading the way, and the only thing the defense can really do is fuck it all up.

But you can win with defense and a run-first offense. It’s a tried and true formula. Michigan just did it. Nick Saban won tons of National Championships putting defense and running the ball first.

In fact, all but 3 of the past 25 National Champions had a run:pass ratio over 50%. The only three teams that threw the ball more than they ran it: 2019 LSU, 2016 Clemson and 2000 Oklahoma. That’s it.

The average National Champion since 2000 has run the ball 57.7% of the time. Nine of the 25 Champions ran it 60% of the time or more.

Both of Ohio State’s National Championship teams, by the way, have clocked in at over 62% runs. In fact, the 2002 team has the highest run percentage of any National Champion since 2000: 69.2% run plays.

From 2012-2020, so the whole Urban Meyer tenure through the first two years of Ryan Day, Ohio State ran the ball on average 60.6% of the time. That’s a nine-season span.

However, from 2021-2023, Ohio State has run the ball on average 50.3% of the time, with a low of just 46% in the 2021 season. 2021 is the most pass-happy Ohio State has ever been, by far.

And the run game really hit a low point in 2023: Ohio State only averaged 138.8 rush yards per game, by far the lowest figure since 2012. The next lowest? 177 a game and that was in 2018. Even in 2021, when we only ran the ball 46% of the time, we still were able to average 181 rush yards per game.

Ohio State ranked 88th in the nation in rush yards per game last year, and that’s just not acceptable. Previously, dating back to 2012, the lowest Ohio State had ever ranked in rush yards per game was 55th, and that was in 2018.

Similar story with rush yards per carry: just 4.2 yards a pop for Ohio State on the ground in 2023, the worst figure for the program since 2012, and good for just 73rd nationally. In 2018, they averaged 4.3 yards a carry which was 71st in the nation.

So I’m on solid ground when I say: 2023 was Ohio State’s worst year running the ball in over a decade. In the Urban Meyer/Ryan Day eras, they’ve never been as bad running the ball as they were last year.

Something has got to change for this year, and I think it will with the addition of Chip Kelly. Now, it’s not true to say that Ryan Day brought in Chip Kelly because he wanted to re-emphasize the run game, because Bill O’Brien was his first choice, and Chip Kelly wasn’t even available when Ryan was originally looking for someone to run the offense. Plus, Bill O’Brien is more of a pass-first kind of guy anyway, and that’s, again, who Ryan originally went for.

But whether by accident or by design, Chip Kelly is a big run game guy–he understands its importance, he understands how to run the ball. He is going to get the Ohio State run game turned around, if nothing else.

And again, I don’t know if Ryan Day made this a point of emphasis or if it just happened to him, but either way, it had to happen. I’m just reading the tea leaves here, I’m not basing this off anything Ryan Day has said, either. I’m just going off of two things: he brought in Quinshon Judkins, and he brought in Chip Kelly to run the offense. Bringing in Judkins was the first sign that Ohio State wanted to get back to running the football, and that perhaps Ryan Day realized his program had strayed from the light. But bringing in Chip Kelly–again, whether by design or by accident–confirms it. 

Chip Kelly is not going to just let Ryan Day get all pass happy–those guys know each other too well for anything like that to happen. Chip Kelly is not afraid to say “No” to Ryan Day, and that’s a good thing. He’s known him since he was a kid–Chip Kelly might know Ryan Day better than he knows himself. So I fully expect Chip Kelly to have those conversations with Ryan Day like, “Look, you’ve gotten away from running the ball. You used to run the ball a ton back in 2019 and 2020, now you don’t run the ball well at all.”

And look, in fairness to Ryan Day, a lot of this has to do with simply not having a running QB. He told CJ Stroud not to run because he was terrified of Stroud getting hurt. McCord didn’t run because he couldn’t run. But prior to him, Fields was a willing runner. Haskins wasn’t, which is why that was the only year under Urban where the run game was poor. But prior to Haskins, you had JT Barrett who was a runner, Cardale ran it, and then Braxton was an amazing runner. Urban always had a running QB until Haskins, and then for Ryan Day, back when he ran it a lot, he had Fields.

So it’s not just the traditional running back run game that’ll make a comeback in Ohio State–it’ll be the QB run game as well. Will Howard is a capable runner, maybe not a burner but he’s definitely way more of a runner than Kyle McCord was. And I think Ryan will let him run more than he let CJ run. There’s going to be a return to running the ball at Ohio State this year, I’m pretty confident of that.

You’ve got the two best running backs in America, you’ve got an offensive coordinator whose speciality is scheming up the run game (and he’s done it at an amazingly high level for a long time), you’ve got a QB who is both willing and able to run.

The run game is making a comeback in Columbus.

There’s going to be games where they lean heavily on the run, it’s going to be because they have the horses to do it, and because Chip Kelly’s run game is firing on all cylinders. The run game is going to take a quantum leap this year with Chip Kelly in charge, I’m telling you.

Now, that might concern people because we have all these amazing receivers like Emeka and Jeremiah Smith and Carnell Tate and Brandon Inniss, and OMG if we stop throwing the ball they’re all going to transfer because they want to be first round picks, and they came to Ohio State because of how much we threw the ball, what are we going to do!

First of all, if Ohio State is winning and it’s translating into big wins and the team is #1 in the country, and they’re on track for a National Championship, and they beat Michigan, and they win the Big Ten–ain’t nobody going to complain at all.

Second, this recommitment to the run game is a good thing: outside of Emeka, we have a bunch of young and inexperienced guys at receiver. I know Jeremiah Smith is the LeBron James of football, but he’s also a true freshman. Carnell Tate and Inniss are true sophomores. Other than Emeka, these are young and inexperienced guys, so the best thing for them is to have a run game that the opposing team has to key on, which will make life easier for the receivers.

And it’ll make life easier for the quarterback, too. I thought McCord was pretty bad, but in his defense, the one thing I will say, the guy got almost no run support, which only compounded the problems. I mean if you have a quarterback like Kyle McCord, you have got to give him a run game. That’s what Nick Saban did with AJ McCarron and Jake Coker and Greg McIlroy and those guys: you cannot just expect an average quarterback to be able to throw you to victory and take you all the way.

If you have an average quarterback, you’d better be great at running the ball. That’s the only way you can make it work–if the quarterback isn’t asked to punch above his weight class and shoulder too much of the load. If he’s not Joe Burrow or Stroud or DeShaun Watson, then he should be handing the ball off more often than not and serving as a compliment to the run game. He should not be the main entree.

Ryan Day basically asked Kyle McCord to be CJ Stroud, and obviously he couldn’t do it. Honestly, in light of this, McCord did a lot better than I thought he would’ve, but he still failed, and it’s because he was kind of set up to fail, to a large extent.

So Ohio State is going to have to be a run-first team. Doesn’t mean they won’t throw it at all to their talented receivers and they’re all going to transfer out–it just means they are now going to run to set up the pass, instead of the other way around.

Again, it’s a good thing. It will make it easier for the receivers to get open, it’ll make it easier on the quarterback–and it’ll make it easier on the defense because the offense will possess the ball for longer and shorten games. Running the ball runs out the clock, whereas throwing the ball can easily result in three incompletions in under 20 seconds of game clock, then a punt. That wears on a defense.

There are lots of benefits to being a run-first offense and a defense-oriented team.

It all seems like a foreign concept to Ohio State fans because they’ve gotten used to being pass-first, defense optional over the past few years.

But being run-first on offense and defensively-driven overall is a proven formula for success.

It’s okay, Ohio State fans. Being pass-first hasn’t won you anything. Just let it go.

“But how are we going to beat Georgia if we don’t have our quarterback throwing for 350 yards and 4 TDs!”

The same way Georgia beats everyone else: with defense and a power run game.

The same way Nick Saban won his National Championships (except for 2020).

The same way Michigan won theirs last year (although our offense will be a lot more dynamic).

Ohio State’s running game is going to be a lot better. I don’t think people understand quite how much.

This is Chip Kelly’s specialty. It’s what he does. People may think he fell off because his teams at UCLA were never anything special, but he’s been very public about how that all went down. It became about politicking and glad-handing and not so much about football. The school really can’t support the program financially.

And yet, after his first two seasons of a total rebuild job at UCLA, Chip Kelly’s teams, for all their faults, always ran the ball very well.

From 2020 to 2023, four seasons, they averaged over 221 rush yards a game, an average rank of 11.5 nationally. So fringe top-10 in rush yards per game.

In terms of yards per carry, over those same four years, UCLA averaged 5.3 yards per carry, good for about 17.5 nationally over that span.

And that’s at UCLA.

When he was at Oregon, his teams had the best rushing attack in the nation. At the top of the rankings over those four years he was there, in terms of rush yards per game, it was basically the service academies and then Oregon. His final two years there–2011 and 2012–they led the country in yards per carry. They averaged 283 yards a game rushing and never finished lower than 6th in rush YPG. They averaged 6.0 yards per carry over those four seasons, and never finished lower than fourth: first twice, fourth twice.

Oregon under Chip Kelly was the best run team in college football.

He even got UCLA up to #1 in the nation in yards per carry in 2022.

This guy is going to have a great rushing attack no matter what. He had the best run game in the country at UCLA in 2022, and that’s with UCLA players. Other than his days in the NFL, he’s never had talent like this. Not even when he was at Oregon.

It’s not like he’s going to have to turn this thing around at Ohio State over a period of three years, like he had to do at UCLA–he’s already got the horses to be successful.

And we went over how bad Ohio State was running the ball last year: 88th in rush yards per game, 73rd in rush yards per carry (4.2). Chip Kelly last year, with UCLA talent, was 17th in the nation in rush yards per game and 25th in rush yards per carry (4.9). If he is just able to replicate that at Ohio State, it’s a massive, massive improvement in the run game.

And that’s a low bar to clear. Again, he did it at UCLA with UCLA talent, with the whole program falling apart, with his relationship with the administration in shambles. He had a true freshman quarterback! I’m sure he could do better at Ohio State with Ohio State talent, all else being equal.

If Ohio State had UCLA’s run game numbers last year, they might have won the National Championship.

But I think Chip Kelly is going to do even better than just replicate his 2023 UCLA numbers. He’s got two amazing running backs that are better than anybody he had at UCLA.

You may think Ohio State has average offensive linemen, well the first thing is, they don’t, they actually have some really talented guys. And the second thing is, they’re still better than the guys he had at UCLA, they just weren’t being coached and deployed properly. Chip Kelly will fix that. (Although in fairness I think a lot of Ohio State’s run game woes were when Treyveon Henderson was out and they had the backups filling in for him–I saw these guys miss a lot of holes, Chip Trayanum in particular. So I don’t think it was the offensive line’s fault entirely. Part of it was certainly the running backs’ fault, and there’s a new RB coach at Ohio State now, too.)

Chip Kelly is going to get this Ohio State run game turned around quickly. Again, it’s his speciality.

Running the ball is Ryan Day’s kind of weak spot, or at least in comparison to his passing game acumen. He’s a passing game savant, but lacking in the run game. Well, Chip is the opposite: he’s a run game savant, but not as brilliant when it comes to the throw game.

Him and Ryan Day are like the perfect yin-yang offensive duo–they cover up each other’s weaknesses. Ryan Day can have more input in the throw game, while Chip handles the run game. It’s perfect. It’s almost unfair–like, back when Chip Kelly’s teams were blowing the doors off everybody at Oregon, it was like, “Could you imagine if they were great at throwing the ball, too? They’d be unbeatable.” With Ryan Day it’s kind of been like, “Well, he’s so great with the passing game, but the run game is a bit lacking.”

It’s pretty extraordinary the more I think about it–pairing up these two offensive minds. It’s like adding another infinity stone to the gauntlet. In 2022, Jim Knowles was the first infinity stone–he was going to fix the defense and get things right there, while Ryan handled the offense. I thought that was going to be an OP combo, and they almost won the National Championship in year one. They were a field goal away.

Now, you’ve got Jim Knowles handling the defense, Chip Kelly handling the offense and specifically the run game, Ryan Day having input in the passing game. Plus Tim Walton and Brian Hartline, and Larry Johnson.

Ryan Day has got all the infinity stones, basically.

So this is why I’m not too worried about the quarterback position.

I just don’t think Ohio State needs a Heisman-caliber quarterback this year. I don’t think you need one to win a National Championship in general if you’re good enough on defense and running the ball.

We need “Good” at quarterback, not great. Not elite.

Would it be nice to have a great, or even an elite quarterback, in addition to all we have now?

Oh, absolutely. If Quinn Ewers or Carson Beck hit the portal and wanted to come to Ohio State, yeah, make some room. Everybody in the QB room, hit the damn portal now, except Sayin and Noland.

But I’m not worried at all if we go into the season with Will Howard. He’s a known commodity. He led Kansas State to a Big 12 Championship. He’ll be throwing to the best receivers he’s ever seen in his life by miles.

We shouldn’t be looking at it as, “Is Will Howard good enough to carry us to a Natty?”

It’s more like, “Is Will Howard good enough to be AJ McCarron, or Mac Jones, or Stetson Bennett?”

And I think he most certainly is.

Ohio State has the kind of roster this year where they don’t need a Cam Newton or a CJ Stroud.

They just need a guy who won’t screw it up, who won’t dribble down his leg in the big games.

And I think Will Howard is more than capable of being that guy.

The funny thing about Will Howard at Ohio State is people act like he’s a complete unknown. “We have no idea if this guy is any good or not!”

It’s like people forget he’s got four years of playing experience under his belt. He’s played 34 collegiate games. You can go on YouTube right now and look up highlights of his. He’s pretty good.

He’s not elite or anything, but he’s pretty good. People are out here like, “Is he even better than McCord?” Yes, he clearly and obviously is.

He’s a dual threat quarterback: he’s athletic, he’s got a surprising burst for his size, and he’s pretty crafty as well. The arm isn’t amazing but he’s definitely not afraid to fire away. 

People are saying he has a weak arm despite being 6’5”, and I’m kind of in agreement with that, although I wouldn’t say he has a “weak” arm. It’s just not as powerful as you’d expect for a guy his size, and I think it’s due to his throwing motion. I don’t really see him getting a lot of legs into his throws, honestly. He looks to me like an arm thrower; he doesn’t really set his feet before throwing. So they’re going to have to work with him on getting his whole body into his throws. But still, it’s not like he’s got a bad arm or anything like that. I still like him more than McCord as a passer. McCord I thought was timid when throwing to anyone other than Marvin Harrison Jr. I don’t see that in Howard.

To be honest, this might be out of pocket: I see a lot of Tim Tebow in Will Howard. Just a big, rumblin’ white boy; not the greatest arm in the world but a willing thrower; fearless, crafty; kinda stiff but not overly so.

He’s like a middle-class man’s Tim Tebow.

And before you say, “That’s insanity!” Remember that Will Howard played at Kansas State, while Tim Tebow played at Florida with the best talent in America, in an Urban Meyer spread offense. Tim Tebow had Percy Harvin and Aaron Hernandez and weapons galore (no pun intended), while Will Howard’s best weapon at K-State was a white H-back named Ben Sinnott. Seriously, Sinnott was his top receiver last year.

I am not saying Will Howard is going to magically turn into the next Tim Tebow now that he’s at Ohio State, but could he be in that neighborhood? I think he could, really. He’s going to have Ryan Day and Chip Kelly running his offense. Ohio State has like five receivers right now that are better than anybody he ever had at K-State.

As far as I can tell, the only NFL offensive player he played with at Kansas State was Deuce Vaughn.

And Will Howard won games at Kansas State, too! It’s not like they were going 4-8 every year. I mean they won the fucking Big 12 in 2022–they beat TCU in the Big 12 Championship.

He’ll have the best backfield in the country, and offensive line that may not be the best in the country but it’ll be improved and better than what he had at K-State. And his receivers will be leaps and bounds better than the guys he was throwing to at K-State.

Again, I’m not saying Will Howard is about to level up massively and become this Heisman-caliber playmaker quarterback like Tim Tebow, I’m just saying his play style reminds me a bit of Tebow, and I think that with the massive upgrade in talent and coaching around him at Ohio State, it’s very much on the table that we see him play and think, “Oh, wow. I didn’t realize he was this good. He never looked this good at K-State.”

He averages about the same number of rush yards per carry as Tebow did at Florida, although Tebow ran the ball way more (Howard had 81 rush attempts last year, Tebow over his three years as a starter at Florida averaged 201 rush attempts a season). Tebow was a much more efficient thrower than Howard, but we’ll see how much Howard’s efficiency goes up at Ohio State.

In Tebow’s last season at Florida, 2009, he had 35 total touchdowns (passing and rushing), and 3,805 combined rushing and receiving yards. He did that on 314 pass attempts and 217 rush attempts, 531 combined total.

In 2023, Will Howard had 33 total touchdowns and 2,994 total combined yards, on 438 total touches.

That’s not that far off from Tebow. Yes, about 800 fewer yards–but he also had almost 140 fewer rush attempts than Tebow did.

You give Will Howard a massive upgrade in supporting cast, and yes, I do think it’s possible that he comes close to putting up Tebow numbers. Maybe not the same passing efficiency, but then again, who knows? I mean, Kyle McCord completed almost 66% of his passes for 3170 yards in 12 games last year. You think that was McCord, or the Ohio State system? I guess we’ll find out when we see him take the field at Syracuse, but it wouldn’t surprise me if Will Howard’s completion rate goes up from around 61% to 65%, while McCord’s goes down to the low 60s.

I don’t think Howard will put up 2007 Tebow numbers, like when Tebow won the Heisman and he had 55 total touchdowns that season. Those are historic numbers.

But 35-40 total touchdowns? I mean, why not? He had 33 last year at K-State.

To me, it’s not crazy at all to expect 30 passing TDs and 10 rushing TDs out of Will Howard, especially in a 15 or 16 game season.

Again, I am not saying Will Howard is the next Tim Tebow. I’m just saying, I think people’s expectations of the guy are too low. There are really some Ohio State fans out there who think he’s no better than Kyle McCord and our offense will be a carbon copy of last year. To me, that’s incredibly ignorant. Go watch his K-State highlights and try to tell me he’s not better than Kyle McCord.

The Ohio State offense isn’t going to look like it did when Haskins and Fields and Stroud were playing quarterback, I think it’ll be pretty effective. I really do believe that.

Kyle McCord was not a great quarterback–he wasn’t terrible, but he wasn’t good either. He made the offensive line look worse than it really was, it was actually pretty good in pass protection. Will Howard because of his mobility will make it look better. I think the running backs and another year of development for the offensive line will be noticeable.

I’m expecting a top-15 offense out of Ohio State this year, I really am.

Having a top-3 defense with a strong chance to be #1 in the nation, along with a top-15 offense that could very well be top-10–that’s a recipe for a National Championship. Absolutely.