Fiesta!

Come all you rambling boys of pleasure
O-linemen of easy leisure
We must kick 'Horn ass and hope we'll see
Arizona once again

Some housekeeping: I may be moving into new digs in the near future. Whenever it happens, I'll drop the link here so all five of you can follow me.

It's Tejas

"Watch this, Lis. You can actually pinpoint the second his heart rips in half."

While it is far from the best of all possible match-ups, Ohio State has drawn a relatively favorable one in Texas. In the Fiesta bowl, too, where we had so much success before the Game That Shall Not Be Named, though Buckeye partisans are sure to point out that that wasn't actually the Fiesta Bowl, just a national championship game played at the Fiesta Bowl site. Whatev. What matters is Ohio State is 3-1 in Tempe, and the last four trips there have showcased partisan Buckeye crowds. Given the results of the last two bowl games and the spiraling deathstorm that the gubmint calls an economy, bowl attendance for Ohio State is likely to take a hit. Yes, the Buckeyes are typically one of the best traveling fanbases, but so is Texas, and I'd be shocked in the crowd isn't basically split down the middle.

I like this match-up for a number of reasons. First, Texas has a terrific fanbase. I went to the game in '05 and by far they were the best of any visiting group of fans. Predictably, they were treated awfully by most of Buckeye nation, but the hilljacks Ohio State fans I sat near were very cordial to the visitors. The atmosphere was suitably tense for most of the game, but the vulgar language was directed toward the field (three audible "RIP HIS FUCKING HEAD OFF"-s when Vince Young toted the ball), and not at the opposing fans, which was nice. The horror stories I've heard from that night are undoubtedly true, but it seems Texas fans in my section took it in stride if they were victimized in any way.

Second, Texas' defense leaves a lot to be desired. They're vastly improved from last year, given the acquisition of the Right Honourable Boom Motherfucker, Esq., head coach-in-waiting and card-carrying twisted psycho. Nonetheless, Texas has been a bend-but-don't-break defense for most of the year, getting aggressive when need be but giving up yards in bunches, mostly through the air.

Third, Texas has one thing it does really well on offense, and that is airing it out. RoboColt completes roughly 77 percent of his passes last I checked, but (probably) hasn't seen a secondary as good as Ohio State's all year. Secondly, Texas doesn't have many burners in the vein of Damien Williams from SC or Percy Harvin from Florida. They're there, but they're either young or not starting. I fully expect Texas to put as much speed on the field as it can against Ohio State, because while the Buckeyes don't lack speed (grr), they have had trouble stopping speedsters with their soft zone approach, which more often than not makes the Buckeyes look slow.

Fourth, there is one team Texas played all year that looks certifiably like Ohio State's offense, and it's Oklahoma State. Texas barely beat Okie State 28-24 in Austin. The same Okie State team traveled to Lubbock weeks later and found itself the victim of a 35-point beatdown at the hands of Texas Tech. Okie State is not particularly good. There is a problem: Okie State has a passing game. Texas could not stack the box against Okie State because Zac Robinson is a true dual threat with a playmaker like Dez Bryant to throw to, unlike the One at this point in his career. Ohio State absolutely must attack Texas' secondary, the weakest part of the defense, in order to win. If they cannot do this, Texas will stack the box, like Penn State and USC, and dare Ohio State to throw its way to a win. Terrelle Pryor has not shown he can do that yet. If there is any time for the Ohio State passing game's coming out party against a sub-par pass defense, it is now.

This is by far the most winnable BCS game in which Ohio State could have landed. Those of you who care about our program's "reputation" should enjoy this match-up as a chance for Ohio State to show it really can beat the Big Boys. By no means is Texas overrated, or is Ohio State underrated. These teams are where they deserve to be in the polls. The line is currently at 10 and will likely move up come game time. This game is on the coaching staff, because this team is undoubtedly talented enough to win this game, and every game it had on its schedule for that matter, but I digress. The coordinators have one last chance to impress. Regardless of how this game goes, I'd like to see them gone gone gone in the offseason. But a win against a genuinely good team earns them a little of our patience. I fully expect them, when given said patience, to flush the opportunities it presents down the toilet come September, but maybe that's just me.

In the coming weeks I'll be doing unit breakdowns and match-ups as bowl preview. I fully expect analysis of the facts to improve my outlook of the game, but I caution against any and all optimism on the grounds that I grew more optimistic while examining the stats prior to the LSU game last year, and then reality promptly took a nice giant nutty shit on my happy little world come January 7th.

Sittin' on top of the world, part 2

Part two of a three-part series of incoherent rants, jumbled musings and confused bullhockey about the last three seasons. Highlighted here is the Season of Unfulfilled Promise, 2007.

So the fluke may have been just that, a fluke. We'd never lose a game that ugly under Tressel again, for reasons I can no longer scrounge from what remains of my seventeen year old self. It simply couldn't happen again, could it? We're the elite of the elite, a top 5 program, and nothing can slow us down, right?

Well, for the first eight games, 2007 seemed to return to the storybook sensibility that 2006 often portrayed up until the brutal, final end. Bruised and battered from humiliating defeat, a young team was rising to the occasion to redeem itself and the program for one massive, recent failure that shamed them (unfairly) in the eyes of the nation. Led by yet another in a long line of big, bruising Buckeye running backs, an affable, fifth-year (!) junior at quarterback and a downright sick defense, the men of the Scarlet and Gray were carving out a warpath to New Orleans, and they were hellbent on bringing back the crystal to its rightful home. That yarn culminated in a 37-17 prison rape of Penn State in Happy Valley. Todd Boeckman put Troy Smith's performance in '05 to even greater shame, Thunderous McTankly could not be stopped by the best run defense the Buckeyes would play all year, and the passing game finally showed signs of being a genuine threat, something other teams actually have to worry about. The defense gave up some yards to Penn State, but they "always ran on us", so it was forgivable, ya know?

Two weeks later, [Name Redacted] and the fighting [Redacted]i came into Columbus with two losses: to middling Michigan and Iowa teams. In quite possibly the strangest choice of defense in his entire time at Ohio State (outside the Florida game, of course), Heacock chose to run almost exclusively soft zone against Juice Williams, one of the most mistake-prone quarterbacks this side of Chris Leak. Blitzing only on obvious passing downs (a meme that will be reinforced later on), Juice was asked to make simple reads and simply run to the side they're not blitzing on when said reads were covered. Thus, we have the easiest 4 TD passing day Juice Williams has probably ever had. Maddeningly, Jokester Jim number two chose to blitz on seemingly every down on Illinois's final possession, and, enragingly (that's a word now), all Juice had to do was run where there wasn't a LB blitz. That's it. Ohio State gave him the easiest first downs of his life, and he took them without question. But to blame this game on Jokester Jim number two and Jokester Jim number two alone is unfair, and ignorant of a number of other factors I don't feel like listing because for me the grief is still too near oh fuck it here they are: Todd Boeckman threw three picks, three defensive breakdowns and one terrible fumble call by a corrupt ref and simply a better game from the Illini gave Illinois the win. It's as simple as that. Despite their thuggish actions after the game, I hold no grudges to Illinois for exploiting the second-dumbest defensive scheme I've seen.

Sigh.

So you can tell that loss still sticks with me. Losing to Ron Tiberius* Zook at home is something that should scar anyone for life, even if you're a Northwestern fan (my condolences).

*Not really his middle name, but should be

You know the rest of the season. Ohio State rode Thunderous McTankly to a 14-3 win at Michigan, Pandora's box was opened in the intervening weeks: War, disease, death, destruction, hunger, filth, poverty, torture, crime, corruption, American Idol, and Ohio State finding its way back to the title game. Against an SEC team.

Hell, LSU looked beatable. Darren McFadden beat them By His Own Damn Self, and so did a meh Kentucky team. Surely we're better than Kentucky?

Turns out, not so much. After another fast start, the Buckeyes crumpled, and Tressel and Heacock went into their respect run-run-pass and soft-zone-obvious-blitz shells after LSU came back and left a big ol' mushroom print on Ohio State's hopes of actually winning. I don't know why they did it, I don't care to know why they did it, they did it, it sucked, life sucks, and we're never gonna fucking win a bowl game against these mulleted hicks and their fried food and their shitty T-birds and their shitty Kenny Chesney and fucking Christ next year better fucking redeem us.

I stopped thinking that way the next day. Well, at least the redemption part. I realized that as much as I love and support the players on this team, there is a chance that, like God Himself Bruce Springsteen once sang, their best will never be good enough. I knew it was a little early to declare this special group of players; Malcolm Jenkins, James Laurinaitis, Alex Boone, and the rest to be - for lack of a better term - cursed. To this day I still don't think they are, because since then I've realized the fault does not lie entirely with the players and the multiple first-day draft picks on both sides of the ball. The problem is increasingly coming from the top, and no matter how much talent is being brought in, this problem can not be covered by recruiting the daylights out of the "speed states" and grabbing three of the best offensive tackles in the latest recruiting class.

This is already too long, but as a footnote, you may have noticed a distinct lack of funny in this piece. This season was unbelievably frustrating because it showed what this team can be at its highest point (Penn State) and the very lowest (Illinois, LSU), and the timespan between those highs and lows was short and jarring. Thus, the humor, what little their was, didn't come easy.

I want to point out that I have never felt a sense of entitlement for this program. I have never believed that since I spend so much money on Ohio State merchandise and because my father donated something like 1/10th of his company's worth to the University, that the program, or the players, owe me a damn thing. Even when I was young and (less) stupid, this concept never entered my mind. I owe far more to this program for great memories of great football than it does for my meager contributions. When I call for the heads of certain coaches in the final installment of this series, it will not be because I "demand" it or I find the current (very good) state of Ohio State football "unacceptable". Think of them more as business recommendations, or how the program can improve its standing by trimming the fat, literally and figuratively. There is a particular path we don't want to go down, and that is the path of Michigan and Florida State - one of cronyism, nepotism, arrogance, misplaced trust and blind faith that because we are good we will always be good and nothing will ever change forever and ever amen lalalalalalalala I can't hear you we're the elite of the elite no matter what happens lalalalalala.

You get the point. I hope.

What the fuck, Scout?

So I made the mistake of dropping by the Ohio State Scout website today, only to see that recruiting has hit a new high (low?) in overall creepiness. The young man above is a freshman for an Ohio high school football team. A freaking freshman. I could not tell you which high school he plays for, because I am not a pederast. Look, I know the guys at Scout have jobs to do and probably get paid for well for what they do, but come on. He's a freshman, damn it. The kid is about five minutes older than my youngest cousin, someone I remember as a newborn. Soon he'll get hair in funny places and start thinking about girls.

I'm exaggerating, but before this kid has had to memorize the Preamble, he's got 40 year old dudes, Scouts and fans of teams he may or may not be interested in salivating over his "athletic ability", his "hip swivel" and his "body control". Calm down, you dirty pedos, and at least wait till the kid is within shouting distance of 18 so he can immediately recognize your sweaty, fat, poorly-mustachioed asses for what you are, answer your questions, and avoid your shit until signing day.




"Hip swivel", dude.