Ohio State may be a major regression candidate this year because of a former position coach.
Although Justin Frye seems to be promising as the new offensive line coach for Ohio State, the Buckeyes are beginning to pay a price for his predecessor Greg Studrawa’s regular failures on the recruiting trail.
Gene Ross of Land-Grant Holy Land held nothing back when it came to Studrawa. While I do keep close tabs on the Ohio State program from a national perspective, I will admit that I did not know this was such a massive underlying issue for the Buckeyes. But again, looking at the data Ross presented, I can understand how big of a deal this is. You cannot win big without great big uglies.
With an offensive line that will be losing book-end stars such as Paris Johnson Jr. and Dawand Jones to the 2023 NFL Draft, Ohio State fans may have to settle for a third-straight season in which they don’t go to Indianapolis…
Ohio State paying dearly for former offensive line coach’s recruitment failures
While I won’t go as far as to say this is an indictment of head coach Ryan Day, but this isn’t Urban Meyer’s Ohio State program any more. It may not go the way of Mark Helfrich Oregon in the wake of Chip Kelly’s departure for the NFL, but Day is losing fans in Columbus faster than you can say Horseshoe. Frye may be able to recruit blue-chippers in-state like Studrawa never did, but wow…
Even though Studrawa did a fine job in helping cultivate Johnson and Jones’ raw talents, the Buckeyes play in the same division as Michigan, a program who has a strong identity of being nasty in the trenches. Factor in how good Penn State may be this year, we may see a third-place finish in-division for the Buckeyes if we aren’t too careful or Kyle McCord is not the dude, man…
In time, Ohio State may be able to rectify this pervasive and persistent offensive line talent issue, but it’s not going to be an overnight fix. There is enough talent seemingly everywhere else where even in a worst-case scenario, this team should still be able to win 10 games anyway. However, this is just another ever-present reminder of how Ohio State blew it to Georgia down in Atlanta.
The Buckeyes should be fine at some point, but it is hard to keep pace when you don’t recruit well.
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