Buckeye Outpost

I must admit that I was surprised at how well Braxton Miller ran last weekend and I was equally surprised at how little passing was actually displayed.   I realize that they were trying to ease him into the QB role, but it would have been nice to develop a rhythm for both him and the dropsie wide receivers we have.  While this strategy will work against Colorado, it won't do much for any team in the Big12.  We got to get a passing game established or it will be a very long year.  Of the guys suspended, Posey is really the only guy we desperately need back.  We need his presence to open things up for the other receivers and Stoneburner.  If we can somehow beat MSU, we should be in much better shape.

The Oline was opening wide holes for the entire running game and there really wasn't a reason to throw.  The last time we saw holes this big was against Akron and we know how good a team they are.  I think this was more a function of how bad Colorado is and not how good our Oline played.

I am especially concerned about the defense now.  We have had way to many missed tackles over the first few games and this is quite uncharacteristic of a OSU defense.  We haven't really been dominating the line as much as in years past and you begin to wonder if Williams and Simon are as good as advertised. 

Overall,  the MSU game is critical for this team.  A victory will demonstrate that we can overcome adversity.  A loss will most likely cost Fickel his job.  Because more losses are sure to follow.

Technorati Tags: Adversity, Big12, Games, Holes, Last Time, Losses, New Era, Oline, Osu Defense, Passing Game, Posey, Presence, Reason, Rhythm, Running Game, Shape, Stoneburner, Tackles, Victory, Wide Receivers

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In the spirit of this weeks bye, it's a good time to focus on why it's time to say bye to the Bucks.   in the last two weeks, the Bucks have looked dominant in all aspects of the game.  You really couldn't see any weaknesses in the game and we were up big by the half in each game.  past deficiencies in the running game and secondary on the defense were not apparent the last few weeks.  We looked like a team with something to prove.  Of course, it's too late for this season.  The pollsters are showing their Buckeye bias and we have been passed up by just about every 1 loss team in the country and sit solidly at #11 in the BCS.

Any hopes we may have had of playing in the Natty are bye.  The way things are stacked against us, we'd need BSU or TCU to lose before we stand a chance of returning.  The only way we can hope to pass Wisconsin is for them to stumble or struggle against any of their three remaining inferior foes and for us to soundly destroy Iowa at home followed by a whipping of Michigan.  For the same reason, hopes of returning to the Rose Bowl are bye as well.  We most likely can look forward to a trip to the Capital One Bowl.

If you were looking for a reloading next year and had Natty aspirations, those are most likely bye for next year as well.  List of starters which are bye bye next year are:

Sanzenbacher

Boren

Torrence

Chekwa

Saine

Hines

Barclay

Rolle

Homan

Miller

Browning

Larrimore

Heyward

Most likely, Pryor and Posey are both bye bye as well.  This leaves us pretty much decimated across the board.  Sure, we'll have people step in and have a great incoming class, but with the inclusion of Nebraska into the Big11 and a Conference Championship Game, things do not look great for us next year.  If you look at things, Illinois and MSU are on the rise as well as UM (can't get any worse for them). 

In a nutshell, OSU football has a long winding road ahead of them before we can even think of getting back into the national picture again.  For now, it's bye bye buckeye.

Technorati Tags: Aspirations, Barclay, Bcs, Bias, Boren, Bsu, Buckeye, Bye Bye, Capital One, Capital One Bowl, Conference Championship Game, Deficiencies, Foes, Good Time, Homan, Incoming Class, Larrimore, Long Winding Road, Nutshell, Pollsters, Posey, Rose Bowl, Running Game, Spirit, Tcu, Torrence, Whipping

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Well folks it's do or die time for the 2010 Buckeyes!  We are #1 heading into Camp Randall for a night game against a pretty good Wisconsin team.  This has all the makings for a dissapointment.  I don't mind being #1, but we just aren't playing like a #1 team and that can mean a lot of trouble.

Face it, we are a passing team.  I think the UI game was Pryor's best performance.  Granted he could have read a book with all the time to throw, but he made some nice decisions, didn't have to scramble and was very efficient.  Most importantly, he didn't need to use his legs to win the game.  Look for him to have to do that to beat UW this weekend. 

This is the time of the year when Tress usually starts to adapt his teams to their yearly strengths.  It's obvious that he has become pass oriented.  He's found a way to utilize Saine as a receiver and it just creates nightmares for opposing defenses.  He's also looking to get Boren and the tightend more into the game.   When Stoneburner returns, it should pay dividends.  Our Oline is far better at moving back for pass blocking then for pushing off the line of scrimmage.  I still think you can't win a Natty without a running game (or win the Big10) and it's going to bite us sooner or later. 

Our defense shut down a really good UI offense.  The corner were especially impressive as they UI aerial attack is one of the best in the country (to date).  You just get the feeling that it's going to be hard to score on them.  They are still weak in the middle of the field, so we can't get too confident.

I'm looking at this Saturday as defing the rest of the season for us.  I don't know if we have enough on Offense to win this game, as UW will look to dominate the time of possession with their running game.   I expect this to be a low scoring affair.  Special team play may kill us this weekend, so pray for no let downs.

Technorati Tags: Aerial Attack, Best Performance, Big10, Boren, Buckeyes, Camp Randall, Decisions, Dissapointment, Dividends, Heading, Legs, Line Of Scrimmage, Night Game, Nightmares, Oline, Possession, Running Game, Team Play, Tightend, Wisconsin Team

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It really seems like last Fall when expectations were so high for the Buckeyes and everyone was convinced that Terrelle Pryor had progressed over the offseason to become that special player everyone thinks he is.  We thought that Tressel could work his magic like he did with Troy Smith and we'd all be toasting another Natty.  We quickly learned that Pryor had regressed and appeared robotic and clouded with too much thought in both the USC and Purdue games.  The national media all cites the "special" performance Pryor had in the Rose Bowl and how that can only bring him to greener pastures this year.  Unfortunately, it may have all gone to his head (as it did last year).  Read my last posting, if you want my impressions on the Rose Bowl.  It looks like there's too much hype again this year behind Pryor.

That said, this year's team my actually be slightly worse then last year's.  We've lost defensive linemen as well as our safeties.  Our receiving corp is depleted with the surprising losses of Carter and Thomas and our running game has depth, but no special backs.  The strength of the team will remain the defense and all of our hopes on offense lie with Pryor.

The problem and solution is that all of our hopes lie in the mind and ability of Pryor.   I'm guessing that we lose one game this year because of lack of discipline on offense.  He'll have another Purdue game and, since our backs are average, we'll have no one to bail him out on offense.  Therein lies the problem when all of our offense really keys on Pryor.  

There does appear to be some encouraging (or discouraging) news in the announced two deeps for Thursday night's game.  Many freshman are showing up.  This bodes well for our future, but doesn't say much for some of our middle classmen. 

In any event, my gues is we go 11-1 (with a silly loss to someone like Purdue) and are on the outside looking in again on the Natty.  I also think Pryor will have another disappointing season making him one of the biggest busts in OSU history.  Here's hoping I'll be eating some crow in 4 months....

Technorati Tags: Bigg, Buckeyes, Deeps, Defensive Linemen, Discipline, Freshman, Greener Pastures, Gues, Hype, Impressions, Offseason, Purdue Game, Purdue Games, Rose Bowl, Running Game, Safeties, Terrelle Pryor, Thursday Night, Troy Smith, Usc

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Yet again, the Buckeyes are Big Ten champs.  I really didn't think we would pull it off this year, but we managed to do it!  Now we have the bitter sweet task of dealing with Michigan this week.  While we wait all year for this game, we don't want it to be here because it signals the end of the regular season for us.  As always, this game will be tough (regardless of the records) and shouldn't be taking lightly.  In fact, this whole hub bub about the throw back uniforms is too much a distraction for my likes.  This is the Michigan game after all!

A few comments about last week's victory are needed.  Iowa's strength all year has been their Line play, so a close game was completely expected.  Every team rises to play us and, yes the Iowa freshman QB played lights out for most of the game.  In the end, he is a freshman and they paid for it.  I am not sure why so many people are disgruntled about going to the Rose Bowl and winning the Big 10.  Yes Tressel played conservatively and he had some good reasons.  The running game was strong again which is very surprising.  Pryor didn't have to make any big decisions and that is the key point.  Did you really want to see Pryor chucking the ball all over the field against the Iowas defense?  Did you really want to have Pryor run the 2 minute drill at the end of the game (have you forgotten the USC and Purdue debacles at the end of the games or the practice 2 minute drill against Indiana where he threw a pick in the endzone)?  I think Tress knew what he was doing when he opted to go into OT and then opted to kick the field goal.  The game shouldn't have made it to OT and probably wouldn't have if not for the Iowa kick off return and tipped ball which Iowa caught. 

We really need to celebrate what we have which is a winning coach and, yes, we will start winning these big games again.  It really comes down to player execution.  Tress does play the odds and he does win 0.800 of his games.

UM has a lot to prove this weekend and still has the best offense in the league.  If our offense doesn't show up to play then we could be in for a lot of trouble thiw weekend.  We shoudl never sleep on UM.

Go Bucks!

Technorati Tags: Big Games, Buckeyes, Champs, Distraction, Endzone, Execution, Field Goal, Freshman Qb, Hub Bub, Key Point, Michigan Game, Odds, Ot, Purdue, Rose Bowl, Running Game, Some Good Reasons, Throw Back, Uniforms, Usc

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I had to wait to watch the game on Saturday because of various personal conflicts.  I have a DVR, so it was no big deal to sit down and watch it later.  I made sure to tell everyone I saw to not tell me the score as the first thing I said to them.  The looks I received were quite comical.

In any event I sat down to watch the game and yada yada yada it was halftime and we were up 7-0.  My point is that the first half of the game was basically more of the same.  No real offensive explosion.  Pryor make a mix of good and bad plays and nothing to write home about, except for the one nice 18 play drive we had which failed with our missed field goal.  The lack of emotion from the offense was apparent and I thought Oh boy here we go again....

The short kickoff got Minnesota off guard and actually provided the spark we needed in the second half to dominate and win.  Both the running game (even with our 3rd and 4th RB's) and Pryor's overall play worked for us (granted we were playing the 9th best defense in the Big 11).  Two things really stood out in the game for me:  Posey has emerged as a big play maker and Martin was bowling people over up the middle).   I was shocked to see that an Ohio State offensive player was in the top 10 for any good category.  Posey finished with 161 yards which would have been more if he hadn't had a sure touchdown catch knocked away from him as he was turning.  Again Minnesota's defense ain't that good, but it was nice to see a RB running up the middle and taking people with him.  My feeling is this type of change of pace is necessary for us since the other 3 RB's we have are much better at moving on the edges.  Hopefully, Martin will continue to produce as we need some running help.  Kudos do go out to the O-line for not being the ole line from the prior two weeks. 

I am still more than a bit concerned about Terrelle Pryor.  Late last week he mentioned that the Purdue loss humbled him and that he was a new man.  What about the PSU loss last year or the USC loss earlier this year?  Why would it take last week's loss to change him?  In addition, after Jordan Hall scored a touchdown, Pryor looked to the sideline and Tressel pointed toward the endzone.  Pryor then sprinted down the field to congratulate Hall (who, by the way, was a highschool teammate of his).  The fact that Tressel had to prompt him to go down field shows you Pryor's attitude, me first.  I really hope that Tress can bring him around to being team first because that is what the team sorely lacks, an offensive leader who can hold players accountable. 

I do think that Pryor will ive up to his potential at OSU, but it may take 2 years to get there.  I don't see him as anything other then a QB and Tressel can be the best thing to happen to his career in the long run.  It's obvious that being a prima dona isn't going to get him where he needs to be at the college level and humility and hard work are the only routes to salvage his career.

Looking forward, things were incrementally better on offense this game and we need to make many more strides forward.  PSU remains the biggest challenge on our schedule.  Playing in Happy Valley will not be good for our offense and we will need some special plays to pull out a victory there.  I actually think Iowa will be a winnable game as they are not explosive on offense.  We have to be careful or yada yada yada the season will be over and we are at the Outback Bowl.

Technorati Tags: Change Of Pace, Dvr, Field Goal, Hadn, Kickoff, Kudos, Lack Of Emotion, New Man, Offensive Explosion, Offensive Player, Ohio State, Personal Conflicts, Posey, Psu, Purdue, Rb, Running Game, Second Half, Terrelle Pryor, Touchdown

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Well, the season is officially over for most Buckeye fans.  We still have the Big11 to play for and it somehow seems hollow.  Most people thought we would reload like USC or Florida does and the way the Defense was playing early on, it appeared to be so.  After last weekends complete and utter collapse, its now a Rebuilding cause for next year.  If Gibson (big if) stays, we'll have 18 returning starters next year and may be back in the hunt.

We'll start with the biggest surprise, the defense didn't come to play.  Hand it to Purdue, they had a quarterback who could throw on the run and they spread the offense out.  Our defense just looke tired and couldn't close on the Purdue play makers.   Make no mistake, every remaining foe will try to do the same thing to us and some might suceed.

The offensive line might have well not even taking the field, they were letting everything get by them.  Our running game never really got off the ground (Purdue was daring us to pass) and Pryor made some bad decisions.  Until Pryor can learn to throw and make good choices, we will face this against every team we play.  Every ome thought we were getting an improved version of Troy Smith and so far all we got is another Steve Bellisari. 

Tressel's refusal to bench Pryor for even a series and unwillingness to say anything negative about Pryor suggests that kid gloves need to be used when addressing him.  He's more a prima dona than a player and that is apparent.  We can't light a fire under him to motivate and have to wait for him to develop.  The biggest question is do we have the patience and the answer is we have to.  Tressel has thrown his lot with this kid and we have to take it for the next 2 years.   He does have the potential to be something special and we have to wait for it.

The offensive line is as much to blame as Pryor is for our 92/119 offensive ranking.  Adams and Shugarts don't appear to have a grasp on the basics of blocking.  I'm tired of ranting about how Bollman needs to go, but whatever he is teaching them isn't working and something has to change.  We are getting 4 star recruits every year on the Oline and have little to show for it. 

Finally, there is no chemistry or emotion on the offense.  I don't see Pryor as a leader (to much into himself) .  Theres no decision to suceed at any cost and we are not imrpoving (regressing actually) on offense,

There's too much to fix in order for us to have an offense which even resembles Northwestern's.

Technorati Tags: Bad Decisions, Bench, Buckeye Fans, Foe, Gibson, Grasp, Kid Gloves, Offensive Line, Ome, Patience, Prima Dona, Purdue, Running Game, Shugarts, Starters, Steve Bellisari, Tressel, Troy Smith, Usc, Utter Collapse

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The game against Illinois was impressive because of two items:  the shutout on the defensive side and the apparent emergence of a running game with excellent blocking by the offensive line.  Prior to the start of the season, pundits were citing the explosiveness of the Illinois offense and how they could be the sleeper team in the Big 10.  They were a sleeper team, the played like they were asleep.  I think the overall performance was more indicative of the play of an obviously lost team.  They played mistake proned uninspired ball on both sides. 

If the defense continues to play as it has,  we have a chance of going far for the rest of the season and actually making a BCS bowl as Big Ten Champions.  If the offensive line continues to block as it did last weekend, we could make a lot of noise nationally.   There were a lot of good things that happened especially considering everyone in the stadium knew we were going to run the ball in that inclimate weather and Illinois couldn't stop us from doing it.  The execution was there even if it probably had more to do with Illinois not showing up to play.  Pryor did what he had to in those conditions and didn't make too many mistakes.  It was a good building opportunity for his confidence.

In mainstream TV, a colloquialism has been coined, "jump the shark",  when a TV series has some event which occurs where the show loses its novelty or intrigue and takes a turn for the worse never to be the same.  It was originally coined in reference to the Happy Days episode where Fonze jumped a shark while on water skis (www.jumptheshark.com).  Happy Days was never the same again.

I really have begun to wonder  whether OSU football is past it prime and we have "jumped the shark" and taken a turn for the worse?  Prior to the 2OT victory over Miami for the National Championship in 2002,  I never dreamed of going to the Natty.  My main concern was winning the Big 10 and beating Michigan.  I was content with the latter more then the former.  I guess all those years of being really really good under Cooper only to have it viciously taken away from me at the hands of UM jaded me into this.  Even going into the National Championship Game, I was convinced we didn't stand a chance and was content with the victory over hated UM.  When we won the Natty in the fashion that we did, it awoke something more monstrous in me, a will to win it every year.  That became the expectation especially considering Tress' great success over UM.  We need to keep it in perspective on how hard it is to actually make it to the National Championship and how special it is that we are winning as many games/year as we are.   The novelty of getting there and enjoying has rubbed off for most fans (including myself) and we need to realize what we have at this moment since we may not have it any longer.

As far as the point where we "jumped the shark", it has to be immediately after that touchdown run of Ted Ginn's in the National Championship game against Florida in 2007 where he was jumped on by a teammate and twisted his ankle while celebrating his score, we basically "twisted the Ginn".  Up to that point, OSU football was respected, expected and did win.  Tressel was the "best big game" coach in the country.   OSU fans were in seventh heaven and expected this year in and year out.  Six more big game losses to top 5 opponents and we are not the same by any means.  Nationally the Big 10 is the laughing stock of all college football and Tress is under fire because of his ultraconservative ways.   The program appears to be on the decline and is at greater risk of being canceled.  For now, suffice it say we've twisted the Ginn.

Technorati Tags: Array, Bcs Bowl, Colloquialism, Confidence, Emergence, Execution, Football Game, Ginn, Happy Days, Inclimate Weather, Intrigue, Jump The Shark, Jumped The Shark, Mainstream Tv, National Championship, Offensive Line, Pundits, Running Game, Shark, Shutout, Tv Series, Victory, Water Skis

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Well we survived a potential let down after last week's heart breaking loss.  This game provided just about everything we needed to help us feel better about the Buckeyes for this year.  Terrelle Pryor had some shaky decision making but in the end had the type of game we were hoping to see every week.  The Defense was spectacular and actually made some stops when it mattered.  Unfortunately, the running game isn't there again this year.

I'll start with the Defense, since that is the easiest to cover.   They were flying all over the place and really dominated a very good Toledo offense.  The Toledo QB couldn't get any rhythm and their running game was nonexistent.   Overall, I've been really impressed with the play of our corners over the last few games.  They performed much better then I expected.  The D line is ferocious this year and I retract any earlier comments about them being a weakness.

It's broken record time.  Our offensive line is yet again offensive.  We have let inferior teams D line push us around.  We have no game up the middle and we lack a decent running back to compensate for this atrocity.  This seems to be a staple for any Tressel team I can think of in years past.  The only logical solution is to lose Bollman.   This guy is worthless and Tress has to get rid of him.  We have recruited some of the best O linemen in the country the last few years and have nothing to show for it.    There is no reason why we shoiuld be performing so poorly on offense other then we do not have a good ground attack and it starts at the the point of attack.  Even supposedly revamped this year and leaner and meaner we seem to be same old same old.

Pryor seemed shaky in his decision making until he finally tucked it and ran it for 44 yards in the 3rd quarter.  I think that really enabled him to take control of the offense and make better decisions.  This game had to be a confidence builder for him and hopefully he can blossom from it.   I still think he is thinking too much and needs to just relax.

Bottom line is we will not win any championships until we have a balanced offense.  Pryor has shown he can not shoulder the responsibility for winning games for us.  We are basically a one dimensional team with some "X" dimension sprinkled in.  We can pass the ball and have that Pryor "X" dimension for when things breakdown.  Until we can establish a running attack which starts with the O line, we will be beatable by teams with disciplined defenses because they just need to shut Pryor down and get in his head.    Unfortunately, I will probably be cutting and pasting this last paragraph for each of my posts for the rest of the year.  In fact I've probably already been doing this as this is a broken record.

Illinois always gives us fits and as long as Ben  and Juice are healthy we could be in for a long day on Saturday.  Illinois had a bye week, so they'll be ready to give us something special.  Hopefully the Troy Smith version of Pryor shows up and not the Steve Bellisari version.

Technorati Tags: 3rd Quarter, Array, Atrocity, Buckeyes, Confidence Builder, Control, D Line, Decisions, Games, Ground Attack, Heart, Linemen, Logical Solution, Offensive Line, Qb, Record Time, Rhythm, Running Game, Staple

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I honestly thought total annihilation was in store for us last week and was very surprised by how close the game was.  That said, we had ample opportunity to snatch victory from the jaws of defeat and were unable to capitalize on them!  Originally, I wanted to cite both Pryor and Tressel as the main culprits in this loss, and now believe it was a team loss.

No matter how much you hate Tress' conservative ball control and field position chess match, it's the pill we will have to swallow as long as he is our coach.  We can second guess him all we want, but the bottom line is that the offense didn't execute as he intended.  Ohio State football has been about 3 yards and a cloud of dust for as long as I can remember.  When we failed to even get a 4th and 2 against Navy a few weeks ago that should have been a sign that we have major issues again with the running game.  All the juggling of O'line is an indication that we really don't have strong O'linemen  and we have to make do with what we have.  In all honesty, the O'line (revamped or not) isn't any better than what we've been forced to swallow the last 3 years.  In neither of these games did we create holes for our RB's or move opposing D'lines.  Bollman has to take a lot of the blame for this and really needs to go, but again our players are not executing either.  Something desperately needs to change here or we will never get back to our winning ways.  The only Tressel call I don't get, is why we don't use Pryor on a 4th and short situation, he's 6'6" and weighs 260 lbs, he should be able to get us a short yardage situation easily.

Pryor looked to me like he was thinking way too much.  His hesitation to act really cost us the game.  Last year I was complaining about him looking to run first before checking down and this year it's just the opposite.  If he has improved in the passing game, it hasn't shown because his decision making is horrible at this stage.  This is the second week in a row that Pryor has been outplayed by the opposing teams supposedly inferior QB.  Oh and don't be fooled by UM's Forcier, he didn't play a real defense yet and I expect him to look worse in the near future. I also feel Pryor doesn't forget his mistakes, he dwells on them during the game and it effects the rest of his play.  He is unfortunately a work in progress.

The defense was the biggest surprise of the night.  The line held up for most of the game and really gave it to the vaunted USC O'line.  The corner coverage was outstanding and LB play was decent.  Yet again, though, we found someway to give up 2 big drives at the end of each half.   This is a disturbing trend which has continued in every big game.  In the Tressel ball control system, the defense has to be able to make stops when it counts.  That is critical to the success of the system.  Somehow, the defense can't put an end to the game when we really need to do it.  The defense is as much to blame for the loss as the offense. 

Tressel ain't going anywhere and his system will work against a lot of teams.  He plays not to lose.  He plays the percentages and tries not to take risks.  This only works when the team executes his plays that he calls and minimizes mistakes.  When we play a team like USC with offensive firepower and the "play to win" attitude it will give his system some fits.  Pryor's poor decision making, the lack of any offensive line push and a "let us down" when it counts defense has created this problem for us.  The problem really is that we've been talking about the same issues for the most part the last 5 years and it hasn't changed.

Toledo will give us fits on offense this week, but their defense is horrid.   Now is a good time to change our losing ways.  Pryor gets some exciting plays on offense, the line actually creates a big hole that a mack truck could drive through and the defense makes a stop when it counts against a potent offense.  That would be the makings of the perfect storm for the buckeyes.  Hopefully, we'll see it for a change.

Technorati Tags: Ample Opportunity, Bollman, Bottom Line, Chess, Cloud Of Dust, Culprits, Decision Making, Field Position, Hesitation, Honesty, Jaws, Linemen, Ohio State Football, Passing Game, Rb, Running Game, Total Annihilation, Tressel, Unexpected Occurrences, Winning Ways

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