Ohio State football: 5 most underrated Ohio State Buckeyes in program history

Gary Williams is an all-time great Buckeye receiver.

Coming in at as the No. 2 most underrated player in Ohio State football history, Gary Williams is one of the greatest wide receivers that Ohio State has ever seen. Yet, most Buckeye fans have no idea who he is.

Williams played at the exact same period as the prior player on this list, from 1979-1982. Williams never had a season that popped out, which is probably why he has flown under the radar, but his career is right up there with the greats.

He is No. 3 all-time in Buckeye history in receiving yards with 2,792,  No. 5 all-time in receptions with 154, No. 2 for receptions in a single game with 13, and No. 3 for receiving yards in a game with 220.

As I said before though, Williams never had that one season that just blew you away, he never got over 1,000 receiving yards in a season, with his best season coming in 1981 as he caught 50 passes for 941 yards.

The consistency though is what puts him at the top, as even in his freshman season in 1979, Williams caught 25 passes for 479 yards, and never dropped below 600 yards in a season after that.

He was a staple of the teams that went 38-10 in the years that he was with the Buckeyes, and despite not being the flashiest player you’ve ever seen, his consistency was unrivaled. Despite this, he never made an All-American squad, and could only ever crack second-team All-Big Ten

Williams will never be remembered as an all-time Buckeye great and that is quite sad considering that he has the stats to back up being included in a long line of Buckeye greats.

Marcus Marek was a tackling machine for Ohio State football.

At this point, the period 1979-1982 should just be known as the era of the underrated for Ohio State football. As now with linebacker Marcus Marek coming in at No. 1 on this list, each of the top three players played in the exact same four years.

What puts Marek ahead of everyone else in that period and in Ohio State football history though is his unbelievable stats, to go with his lack of awards and recognition in his time in Columbus.

Right now Marek leads all of the other great Ohio State defenders all-time in tackles for a career. He also holds two of the top ten spots for tackles in a season with No. 3 and No. 8. For his career, Marek racked up a whopping 572 tackles with his best season coming in 1982 where he had 171 tackles.

Unfortunately for him, he came right before Chris Spielman, who is widely considered to be the best linebacker in Buckeye history. Why is this though? Spielman did have the better overall season in 1986 where he made 201 tackles. But as far as careers go Marek has him beat.

But if you talk about all-time great linebackers for Ohio State, Marek’s name almost never comes up. He was an All-American only once, despite starting all four years at Ohio State, and he never won the award for being the best linebacker in college football.

I think that one could argue for either Spielman or Marek as the best linebacker in Ohio State history, yet only one of them is in the College Football Hall of Fame. But as time goes on, it seems as if Marek has been wrongly overshadowed by Spielman and for that he comes in as the most underrated Buckeye of all-time.

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