Looking Back at Preseason Predictions
The Monday before the opener against Youngstown State, I put out five predictions regarding how I thought the 2008 season would play out. At the halfway mark, I thought it would be fun to go back and see how those calls are holding up.
Guessing fail
1. Pryor will see the field in the first half against Youngstown State and his workload will increase from there.
Though you didn’t exactly have to be Tressnac to see that Pryor would get snaps his rookie year, he did get in during the first half of the YSU game and considering he’s taken over the starting job from Boeckman, it’s safe to say that his workload has in fact, increased. At 3-0 as a starter, he’s the future of Ohio State football and a large reason why fans were so quick to put the drubbing in LA in the rearview.
2. DeVier Posey will post at least 400 yards receiving on the year.
Posey started nicely with 4 receptions for 47 yards including a 25-yard touchdown in the opener, but he would go on to go catch-less in his next three games. He’s back on the board with a catch in each of the last two games, against Minnesota and Wisconsin and though he’s receiving more and more snaps as the season progresses, it will be tough to get to 400 on the year when he’s sitting at just 63 at the halfway point. Given the fact that the offense is trending more option than five-wides, I don’t see this happening.
3. Beanie Wells will not win the Heisman Trophy.
I think I’ll nail this one, but not exactly for the reasons I originally stated. I thought the combination of blowouts and the number of playmakers on the offense would limit his touches, but it was the toe injury suffered in the opener that essentially killed his campaign. Since his return, he’s played like the best player in the country, but those missed games, including the marquee matchup with USC will kill any hope he has to win it this season (all bets are off if he puts up 800 yards against the Wolverines, which I think is a possibility).
4. The defense will be truly sick.
You’re forgiven if you decide you never want to read this blog again based on this prediction alone. Worst. Prediction. Ever.
5. The Buckeyes will beat USC and go on to play in a third-straight MNC game.
Another failure at prognostication — the USC game, as if you need me to tell you, wasn’t even close. What’s really nuts is that I thought the offensive line would be a big factor in a victory at the Coliseum. Silly me. Regarding a third-straight MNC run, if the last two seasons had never happened, there’s perhaps a slim chance pending some upsets the last half of the season. This year, there’s no chance.
So, it looks like it’s shaping up as 2-2 with an outside shot on that Posey call. What about you — what are your predictions for the stretch?
That MotSaG post is hilarious.
It’s extremely difficult to make predictions about college football these days. Few people had Bama and Vandy headlining the SEC (along with the current national champs). All the upsets from 07 were widely regarded as flukes, but it’s clear that parity is indeed here and it’s anyone’s ball game on any given Saturday. Few of the Buckeye faithful firmly believed that we’d be playing worse than last year. And that fateful day Beanie went down shocked Buckeye nation. Everyone pretty much knew Michigan would have a down year but who knew it would get this ugly?
I didn’t make many predictions. I actually thought Pryor would get redshirted.
Hey, not bad overall. Nothing crazy there to be ashamed of. Congrats on commenting on these …
It was a common belief that the D was going to be really good and many thought this team was going to be in the MNC because of how bad the rest of the conference is. Therefore, the two you misfired on were common misconceptions held by many. I mean, who woulda thunk that a Defense gets worse the more experienced they get?
I think it is still possible to hit the Posey prediction, however small the chance is. let me rephrase that, I hope to hell your prediction comes true as we need that if we get into a BCS bowl game against a good team
Here is an easy one, but Freshman of the Year in the B10 goes to LiC…..I’d like to predict the nation but Julio Jones is quite the impact player, we’ll see how that turns out.
I’m also gonna throw my hat in that JL has at least one HUGE game where he records like 15 tackles with an INT and repeats as Butkus winner. Even tho he hasn’t played like last year, by moving heyward inside, he may see less lineman in his face before he sheds and makes the tackle. Hard to deliver those bone-crunching hits when you have to go around a big ugly every play.
Lastly, I think that we get the bowl monkey off our backs this year too. But thats all I will say so as not to jinx it.
“It was a common belief that the D was going to be really good….”
Not if you saw them in bowl practice last year. Not good.
They’re still not completely out of the MNC this year, from a mathematical standpoint, but I just can’t see the BCS putting us in a title game when we lose as badly as we did out at USC. And that puts aside the obvious pitfalls remaining on the Big T(elev)en schedule. After the Bucky game, and what John Clay did to us, Sparty’s Ringer is making me nervous.
I’ll stick with my original guesstimate of 9-3, or 10-2 at best. They’ve got a shot to win out, but the receiving corps needs to help Pryor develop, and make some plays for him. And we absolutely have to get better between the tackles, on both sides of the ball - then pray that no one goes deep on us, because our safety play is really sub-par.
I think we all thought this defense would be sick in the good way, but turns out i tihnk 90% of us were wrong. I think our safeties and scheme are the biggest problems, alot of people say we don’t get enough pressure and as you watch other games outside Buckeye games you see the blitzes working and alot of DL sacks come from that. I think the rest of season hinges on beating PSU to give us a signature win which i would guess Gameday will be at, all that being said i truly think Illinois will be the team that beats us. I think Wells will end up with over a thousands yards and Robo will have a couple of big games. I hope Posey gets more of chance because we have not had much of YAC, which when you watch a team like Missouri there offense gets alot of that. I think ending the year in the top 12 is reasonable and respectable. I would also like to see a signature hit by somebody on our defense, i can think back on almost every great LB we have had has that monster hit and i can’t recall JL monster hit where it changes a game or anybody for that fact. I also think this weekend’s game will be a close call and we will be stressed out again. All this being said can’t wait to see Pryor and Beanie together again.
JBev -
It is sad when the ‘Monster Hit’ of the half year, belongs to our frosh QB.
No need to apologize, the defense IS sick. In the sense, that it makes you sick watching it.
Beanie will get to 1000. Mark my words.
“Beanie will get to 1000. Mark my words.”
If he stays healthy, I agree totally. OSU will have to lean on him down the stretch, and hope to The Almighty that he stays healthy.
Scott-
You seem to be forgetting the wood that Hines laid early in the season. That hit on the Ohio starting QB, not the one named after a ghostly sound and lookin the a headshrinker from late 80’s wrestling….he broke the dude’s collar bone. That was a ridiculous hit. Sabino has had a few good pops on kickoff’s this year too.
Beanie is the best, i repeat, the BEST player in college football. If I were an NFL GM he is the player I would build my franchise around. This isn’t me being a homer, the kid is special and a complete back regardless of whether he wins the Heisman or not.
Kyle - 100% agree with you that Beanie is the best player in college football.
I disagree with you as an NFL GM. RBs in the NFL are used up and tossed aside faster than any other position in the NFL. You build a franchise around a Quarterback, O-line, and D-line. Everyone else is an interchangable part.
When talking big hits i mean like the big cat on Corby Jones or Doss on Kittner thats laying the wood.
Fair enough JBev.
Not buckeye related, but if you havent seen this you should. Google Image Search “Marzia Prince” it is SFW and WELL WORTH YOUR TIME.
- Beanie will break 1000 yards by the Illinois game
- Pryor’s INTs will start to stack up, but so will the TDS. I think by the end of the year his numbers will be something like 18 TD - 10 Ints.
- Pryor will rush for at least 6 or 7 more touchdowns and 300+ more yards.
- We lose ugly at Illinois, but put up a few points and a lot of yards in doing so.
Oh, and the defense will finish barely in the top twenty nationally after ugly 400 (possibly 500) + yard “efforts” against Penn State and Illinois.
Kyle… I would agree with you, that when HEALTHY he is the best player in college football. HEALTHY, would be the key word and he just hasn’t been able to show that he can stay healthy throughtout the year. If I am a GM I’d want the kid on my team, but he’s still a gamble and I don’t know if I could really build a franchise around him based on the fact that I don’t know how much he’ll give me every year. See Peterson in the NFL - When he plays he is the best pure RB in the league, but with the amount of games he misses it will make it tough for the Vikings to build around him alone.
I have a question about our D… A lot of people have thrown around us running a 3-4. I would agree with most that it wouldn’t work because we don’t have 3 powerful run stoppers it would take to make that scheme work, but why don’t we run more stunts? If we can’t beat them 1-on-1, wouldn’t stunts allow us try and beat O-Lines on technique?
Just a thought…
Illinois worries me a little. Penn State, not so much.
I hope we play the Illinois that struggled vs Louisiana-Lafayette instead of the one that scores as many points as minutes played.
I’m willing to wager that ULL put a spy on Juice Williams, played man-to-man, disguised their blitzes and had their corners playing less than 5 yards off the LOS.
Heacock would rather send this program tumbling into the depths of Nebraska, Florida State, and Miami than do any of that “aggressive” stuff.
Personally, I think Posey (and Thomas and T. Washington) should be playing more than they are.
But it was good to see Posey in the game on the game-winning drive at Wisconsin. With all due respect to Robo and Hartline, I think OSU’s young WRs will offer more in the coming seasons. It won’t hurt that by that time, Pryor will probably be a more polished passer.
Bummer on the predictions. But college football is less predictable than tomorrow’s weather. So, take some solace in that.