Stalking Reviewing the Ohio State recruiting class of 2009: Runningbacks, receivers, tight end

Duron "the Deathless" Carter: all he may or may not do is catch touchdowns

The most surprising part of this particular recruiting class, for me and for others perturbed by the struggles of the offense, is the amount of skill position players signing up to play for an offense that has totaled 75 points in its last five games of national consequence. Were I a high school recruit (who isn't necessarily a lifelong Ohio State fan), I would see absolutely nothing inviting about the Ohio State offense if I were not a bruising power back like Chris Wells (or, more appropriately for this class, the wonderfully-monikered Carlos Hyde). But clearly I am not, nor was I ever a sought-after high school recruit, because no one recruits 5'9" tight ends. James Jackson, Duron Carter, Jaamal Berry, and a host of other guys who probably should have picked an offensive juggernaut that better suits their talents, chose the Buckeyes, probably hoping for something a little more impressive than, say three points in yet another game of the century. Alright, awesome. I'll be amped when we show we can actually get them the ball in anything other than a five-yard out or an off-tackle left.

Running back gets a major boost in this class, arguably the biggest out of any offensive position. Daniel Faraday Herron has next year's starting job essentially locked up; his 2nd-half performance against Texas was nothing short of remarkable given the strength of Texas' run D and sudden way in which it happened. Behind "Boom", however, it's Brandon Saine and the freshmen. If those freshmen were not phenomenally talented, I'd say this might represent a problem area for the Buckeyes.

However, Jaamal Berry, Carlos Hyde, and Jordan Hall all bring different skill sets into a backfield that's already the envy of quite a few teams. Given how Jim Tressel has managed his talent lately - rotationally - I would not find it particularly surprising to see a steady rotation behind Herron, with Saine getting most of the early looks to see if he has progressed at all. If he has, he'll probably earn a spot as the spell back. If he has not, then I expect to see a lot more Carlos Hyde than Jaamal Berry in his stead. Hyde is another Florida product who looks and runs like Beanie Wells, at 240 pounds with (reported) 4.5 speed. He is the prototypical feature back of the Ohio State offense, and it's all but certain he'll make an instant impact in short yardage situation, not unlike McTankly himself in his freshman year.

The predicted lack of playing time is not a knock on Jaamal Berry; he's exorbitantly talented, but he isn't a Jim Tressel running back. Jim Tressel running backs have to be able to consistently execute the disgustingly cro-mag dive, draw, and occasional tricksy off-tackle grunt work, or they won't see the field much at all. Berry, like Maurice Wells, is simply not that type of back. He'll get some reps in the latter stages of blowouts his first year, but unless he bulks up considerably and shows an ability to break an awful lot of tackles - something he'll probably have to do a lot behind another mediocre Jim Bollman offensive line - he'll probably be relegated to a Maurice Wells-like role for his entire career. This is largely due to an archaic offensive philosophy that does not recognize the values and completely different skill set offered by supposed "scatbacks" like Wells and Berry. Jordan Hall, depending on the development of the other RBs, is a probable redshirt, unless of course he burns it on worthless late-game reps like Keith Wells did last year. I for one hope he only burns the redshirt in case of another catastrophic injury at the tailback position.

The 2009 class also boasted three talented wideouts, icing on the cake of an already deep set of WRs. I hesitate to believe any of these guys will make an early impact, partly because Ohio State is already deep at wide receivers, but mostly because Ohio State still lacks a truly consistent passing game. Outside of Troy Smith's senior year, this has consistently been the case, even with three first-round wideouts lining up in the Scarlet and Gray in 2005. Anyway, I digress. Duron Carter seems to be the focus of the hype for two reasons: he's rather large (anywhere from 6-3 to 6-5 according to various scouting sites), and he's the son of former Buckeye great Cris Carter, who only caught touchdowns in four years (technically three *tugging at collar Dave Letterman-style*) at Ohio State. The main knock on Carter is his perceived lack of ESS EEE SEEEE speed (despite an Auburn offer), something the Ohio State receiving corps certainly does not lack with Lamaar Thomas , Ray Small, Taurian Washington, and a host of other young burners waiting in the wings. Carter, along with Jake Stoneburner, brings size to a receiving corps that has everything but that particular attribute going for them. While I don't expect an immediate impact from him, it will be exciting to watch him progress.

James Jackson is the burner of the group; both he and Jaamal Berry boasted 4.3 (reported, I cannot stress that enough) 40 times, and he sported offers from Michigan, Bama, Iowa and a host of other smaller schools. The Ohio State receiving corps, contrary to popular opinion, is quick, speedy, athletic, however you want to put it. Jackson adds to this. Whatever the criticism on the field is next year, chances are good none of the Scout and Rivals retards will be complaining about "not enough speed on the field", whatever the fuck that means, if Jackson, Thomas et al. see significant playing time in the wake of Robiskie and Hartline's departures.

Chris Fields is the lesser known prospect of the three; but the general theme of his recruitment was his "big-play ability", which I assume means his ability to catch the ball well downfield. How important this ability is will be seen, because it is entirely dependent on Ohio State developing that downfield passing game we've been hearing about so much. Good chance of a redshirt.

And not that I expect him to ever do anything other than block, but Ohio State did pick up a tight end, the could-you-be-any-more-whitely-named Reid Fragel, who'll get to the whole football thing after he wraps up the LAX tournament and downs a few Natties with his boys, brah. Okay, I have no idea if Reid is a bromosexual, but his name practically demands it, doesn';t it? Scout lauds his blocking ability among other things, which will, of course, be key in a Jim Tressel offense. Reid follows in a long line of big, awkward white dudes playing the TE position at OSU, and is probably going to be Ballard's successor as another glorified tackle. Interesting note: they actually say he has "deceptive speed" on his Scout profile, which is easily the most common keyword for "boy, this guy is white". And he is. Oh yes, he is. I don't expect him to redshirt, but it all really depends on what the Ohio State coaching staff wants out of Jake Stoneburner. Stoneburner was quoted as saying he expects to play wide receiver during his recruitment, but rumbling out of preseason camp last year had him playing TE and redshirting to gain muscle mass and possibly, gosh, add a nice weapon at the TE position that Ohio State might actually use (!). If Stoneburner and Ballard are your starting TEs, the chances Fragel takes a redshirt go up exponentially, but knowing Jim Tressel's love of three TE-sets, I'm sure Andrew Miller and Fragel will rotate as the third guy for most of next season.

Next up: the linebackers, the secondary, and the curious case of Kenny Guiton.

Stalking Reviewing the Ohio State recruiting class of 2009: the lines

Melvin Fellows has interspecies friends, why don't you?

So the recruiting season is in the books and Ohio State has either the 3rd or 1st best recruiting class in the country according to Rivals and Scout respectively. Recruiting has been said to be hit-or-miss and in a way it has been under Jim Tressel; he struck gold with previous 3-stars Malcolm Jenkins and James Laurinaitis, but he struck out (largely through no fault of his own) with Jamario O' Neal, Alex Boone, and others who fell prey to laziness, greed, wacky tobacky or some fun-filled combination of the three. I've always been iffy about blaming coaches for recruiting failures, and there are many good reasons why, most of them stereotypical: kids are young, dumb, arrogant, so on and so forth. If there is any group of human beings that lends itself well to stereotyping, it's teenagers of both genders and all colors. We just suck at disproving stereotypes, don't ask me for a deeper reasoning behind it.

Anyway, the way in which Ohio State has littered recent drafts with prospects has clearly had an effect on its recruiting lately, and also should continue to limit claims of the Buckeyes having "no athletes" or whatever Mark May is bloviating about these days. As a Rob Oller column recently pointed out, the class is heavy on linebackers, defensive backs, and skill position guys, but relatively thin on both lines; the defensive line will benefit from the addition of Simon and Fellows almost immediately, but the offensive line nabbed only Mewhort, Hall and Linsley. Linsley is seen as a tweener who can play and contribute on both lines, so technically it's a tie if you only count him as half-one, half-the other.

It's no secret, however, that many of Ohio State's problems the last few years or so are related in some way to the play of both lines. An influx of young talent on the offensive line is going to make or break Jim Bollman's career; that much is certain. While he's probably headed for retirement anyway, Ohio State got top line prospects from Ohio, Texas and Florida that will all now be sophomores, and who all stand a good chance of starting if they play their cards right. If they, like Steve Rehring and Alex Boone, do not pan out, it has to be hung at least in part on Jim Bollman's antiquated coaching and blocking schemes. I personally had hoped the guy would be let go at the end of last season but it did not end up being so. Jim Tressel is awfully forgiving having just watched easily the worst Ohio State offensive line in the last twenty years, outside (maybe) of the leaner years under Cooper. It's quite rare for freshman to start at Ohio State on the offensive line without massive attrition this team probably couldn't handle, so I wouldn't look for Mewhort, Linsley or Hall to see the field much aside from mop-up duty. However, if the line is as subpar as I think it will be, it's very possible they could work themselves into one of those useless rotations Tressel likes doing.

On the other side of the ball, Jim Heacock, former defensive line coach, achieved marginally better results with his specialty, but again, Ohio State could not find a consistent defensive tackle out of a rotation of Cameron Heyward (who took on more of a starting role near the end of the season) Nader Abdallah, Todd Denlinger, Dex "the Lawman" Larimore, and Dough Worthington, an end playing wildly out of position on passing downs who actually holds up rather well. Technically, it's possible Johnny Simon could be phenomenally talented, and that he could come in and provide some consistency on the interior, but I would not count on it. He may even redshirt; the line is deep, just not particularly good. Simon could also probably use a year to get up to linemen size; he only checks in at a depressingly light 273 pounds according to his Rivals profile, making Doug Worthington look like a lardass in comparison. Here I would expect continued rotation, but these guys are eventually gonna get better right? Two years running we've rotated the tackles heavily and they've improved slightly, but not enough to stop determined running games - that are good, you do not count, Michigan State- nor can they rush the passer with consistency. I tend to think Ohio State's defensive ends are very, very good - Thaddeus Gibson, for instance, showed flashes of being the next Gun Show against Penn State - but they are limited by having average defensive tackles working alongside them. Lawrence Wilson has been plagued with injury, but if he can stay healthy, he and Gibson will be a very dangerous set of bookends. It's hard seeing Melvin Fellows crack the starting line-up, which is no knock on him; Ohio State has defensive ends out the ass. Safari Planet joins Keith Wells, Nathan Williams (who may miss games for robbing a Kwik-E Mart or something), Thad Gibson, Solomon Thomas, and Willie Mobley, and Rob Rose too, who also works as a tackle-end tweener.

As it stands, this recruiting class will probably not have a huge impact on the lines immediately. The Buckeyes are already quite deep on the lines; however, if both lines continue to underperform, I could easily see Simon or Hall replacing a benched senior or two. I do not believe Ohio State suffers from a lack of talent as Oller hints above, mostly because it doesn't jive with the recruiting stars on various sites. I honestly think it has more to do with development, and most of that falls on coaching. Unfortunately, we will not be getting the changes on the staff we had hoped for until at least next season (sigh), so the prognosis for these young players is not good. For now. I'm still holding out hope that Bollman and Heacock will get axed next season regardless of record and we hire, I don't know, Oklahoma's offensive line coach to replace Bollman or something. I know it won't happen, but a guy can dream, can't he?

Joe Ohio State Message Board Denizen's Dissertation on the Ohio State Offense

Hello fellow BUCKEYE FANS, I'm Joe Ohio State Message Board Denizen and I've got somethin' I been wantin' to say for a really long TAHME.


ALRIGHT, we all know of this team's FAILURES on the BIGGEST STAGE the last few years. We know that due to Jim Tressel's CONSERVATIVE OFFENSIVE PHILOSIFY, WE HAVEN'T BEEN WINNIN' THE BIG GAMES AGAINST THE BIG BOYS. He has failed the PROGRAM, the BUCKEYE NATION, and most importantly of all, he has failed ME. He has SHAMED me in the presence of my NON-BUCKEYE FAN (AKA FAGS OLOLOLOLOL) COWORKERS. Now I'm gonna git to the defensive philosophy in my NEXT post, here I'm gonna tell Jim how he MUST RUN THE OFFENSE in the upcoming BOWL GAME AGAINST UT (LOL ONLY STEERS AND QUEERS OLOLOLOLOLOL)

1. Play with SPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED. GET ALL OUR SPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED ON THE FIELD.

2. PLAY AGGRESSIVE. 3rd and 1? Call a deep post pattern! Patton woulda done it! Ya gotta do the unexpected to win the unexpected, Jimbo!

(Ed. note: I shit you not, that last line was something I read on Scout shortly after the Penn State game. I can't find the link, though. I fear the thread - full of treasures similar to that one - was locked, and is lost forever. I don't know about you, but the minute I read it, it became the guiding philosophy of my life)

3. BE AGGRESSIVE! B-E AGGRESSIVE! This might seem simlar to my first point, but it's something we aren't enough of anymore. I wanna spread 'em out. I want to get 'em in space. I want us to UTILIZE our ATHLETES. I want catchphrases and overused football clichés!

4. RUN OPEN COMPETITION PRACTICES. It werks for USC, so it'll work for us! There's no way an entire offseason of practicing, drills, and meticulous analysis of players' abilities will let you create a bonafahde DEPTH CHART. YA GOTTA BENCH 'EM THE MOMENT THEY MAKE EVEN THE SMALLEST MISTAKE. WOODY WOULD APPROVE.

5. BE UNCONVENTIONAL. Everyone always be tellin' me that you got something you're hahdin' from us all Jim, and that ya been done doin' that since before we played the UNIVERSITY OF SPOILED CHILDREN OLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOLOL!!!!!1111 Well I'm not sure ah buy it anymoar. For the bowl game, I got some ideas for plays that I'm sure will work against the SHORTHORNS OLOLOLOLOLOL!!!!11one GET IT SHORTHORN = SMALL COCK OLOLOLOLOL!!!111one

a. Double reverse triple option flea flicker screen to Todd Boeckman. KEEP THE EYES OF TEXAS ON THE BACKFIELD, LOL! Then BOOM, Rehring and Co. are HUSTLIN' DOWNFIELD like DOUGGY DATS IN THE '06 FIESTA BOWL!

b. TACKLE ELIGIBLE PLAY - If Alex Boone getting consistently beat by speed rushers tells me anything, it is that he can tote the ball downfield with the best of him. Get our 300-pounders in space, Jim!!!!!!11one

c. ONCE TEXAS BITES ON PLAY A, ya gotta run the DOUBLE REVERSE TRIPE OPTION DUBBLE BUBBLE SCREEN TO LAMAAR THOMAS, cuz we all knows SPEED KILLS, and LaMaaaaarrr's got that SPEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEEED. I SEE HIS SPEED ALL THE TIME ON CAMPUS WHEN I PARK MY CAR ILLEGALLY BY THE CENTRAL CLASSROOM BUILDING, MASSAGE MY MUSTACHE AND SLOWLY SLIDE MY HANDS DOWN MY LEVI'S AS I WATCH HIM HURRY TO CLASS

*ahem*

Lastly, and MOST IMPORTANTLY, YOU CAN NOT FAIL BUCKEYE NATION AGAIN, JIM. WE DESERVE A BOWL WIN, AND NOTHING LESS. Anything short of it, and you can go shake John Cooper's hand at the unemployment office NEXT SEASON, because you're a massive FAILURE of a coach and my entire OPINION of you hinges on this ONE GAME.

GO BUCKS, scUM sucks ROFLMAOPWNED!